Magnificent Octopus

I undertook the watching of The Wizard of Oz with my not-quite-4-year-old spontaneously, as it happened to be on television just when televi...

Yesterday being a most miserable day, a mix of uncooperative people and failing technologies (of many kinds and in multiple physical locatio...

Yes, as a matter of fact I am reading The Red and the Black , and so are a lot of other people. If you are one of those people, or want to b...

Helena by mid-August had announced she wanted to be a ghost for Halloween. How lame, I thought — what's more cliché than a ghost at Hall...

Supper finished, the table not yet cleared, Helena starts making faces. We all start making faces. She sticks out her tongue and I reach ove...

Because I won't give her any candy. Because she didn't finish her soup, as we'd agreed this condition must be satisfied. "M...

It's been months since I read The Dodecahedron, or A Frame for Frames: A Novel of Sorts , by Paul Glennon. I've started writing abou...

What horrible Edward Gorey Death will you die? You will swallow some tacks. You are a little weird, maybe not so much in a good way. Bu...

Horror at Fontenay , by Alexandre Dumas. Let me start with the double horror of the cover — the grotesquerie it depicts and then the travest...

"In any of the pages of any of my books may lie a perfect account of my own secret experience of the world." The Library at Night ...

Speaking of moustaches ... My father wore a moustache all his life, certainly I never knew him without one. Legend has it that he lost it on...

The Lord of the Flies .

Not to imply that there is any connection between them other than my experiencing them in tandem, but they both have me thinking about what ...

I try to lay down some ground rules for Helena, giving in to her insistence that she accompany me on what was supposed to be a super quick n...

Today was Thanksgiving in Canada. I like to think that most days I give appropriate thanks where thanks are due — my friends and family, my ...

Goodbye, Tolstoy ; hello, Stendhal ! The Red and the Black . Discussion to begin in November and carry into the new year. Pace will be relat...

Main Entry : frac·tious Pronunciation: 'frak-sh&s Function: adjective Etymology: fraction (discord) + -ous 1 : tending to be trouble...

It was the night of the tenth of March, 1793. The bell at Notre-Dame had just struck ten, and each stroke rang out clear and distinct, one ...