We've All Been There, Brother

Parnell Hall sings "Signing In the Waldenbooks" . Can I get an A-MEN?

Quote of the Day

From the New Yorker profile of writer Neil Gaiman:

If he had not been a writer, he says, he would have wanted to design religions. “I’d have a little shop, and people would phone up or come into the shop and they’d say, ‘I’d like a religion,’ ” he said. “And I’d say, ‘Cool, O.K. Where do you stand on guilt, and how do you want to fund it? And would you like sort of a belief in the universe as a huge beneficent organ? Or would you like something more complex?’ And they’d say, ‘Oh, we’d like God to be really big on guilt.’ And I’d say, ‘O.K., how does Wednesday sound to you as a sacred day?’ ”

You gotta love this guy.

For The Flashman Fans

Flashman's Retreat provides a daily meditation from the pen of Brigadier General Harry Paget Flashman, VC, KCB, KCIE, (aka Flash Harry), George McDonald Fraser's beloved anti-hero. A typical selection:

I know these beauties, you see, and it don’t matter whether they’re queens or commoners, when they start to play the cool, mocking grande dame it’s a sure sign that they’re wondering what kind of mount you’ll make.

And:

I told him I had ambitions, too – to live as I please, love as I please and never grow old. He didn’t think much of that , I fancy; he told me I was frivolous, and would be disappointed. Only the strong, he said, could afford ambitions. So I told him I had a much better motto than that…“Courage – and shuffle the cards”.