Wannaskan Almanac

What starts off as rubber, turns into steel, and ends up as glass? Our body's resistance.  I might make a terrible drawing, but if it's on good paper, with a beautiful frame, surrounded by a big museum, well then, quick! Call Christies! It's as if at Appomattox, Lee said to his troops, "Scatter boys! Wreak havoc!" I slow down to avoid accidents. But that leads to boredom, leading to sleep, leading to accidents. We don't ask "Brother, are you saved?" anymore, but rather, "Where are you on the spectrum?" God sent the Buddha to the peoples of India and China, but the feisty Fertile Crescent required some stronger medicine. Chairman Joe McDonnell

Hello and welcome to another Saturday here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Today is November 21st. Can it really be only two weeks since I confessed to my cake coping strategy ? The good news is that I've stopped making cake. The bad news is that I've really only made a lateral move to doughnuts and cookies. Even worse news is that I haven't been sharing. At all. I atoned for this parenting sin, however, by making brownies for the kiddos on Friday. And I reinstated  Cheese & Wine Hour , so really, all is forgiven. Yes, folks, our gang over here in our corner of Wannaskan country is back to distance learning. I started out optimistically, per my usual. "We've got this!" I cheered to my crew. During the transition period, I let the kids have their computer comas with the hope that they would quickly get over the thrill of having their very own devices. (Note: I'm talking mostly about the little ones here.) I placed all of their learning-related items into a to...

  by Chairman Joe McDonnell I've had a long-running fantasy of doing standup comedy, but there's no way I'm going to set myself up for that kind of potential humiliation. I've been master of ceremonies at various events and will throw in some jokes, but it's always a dud. Maybe someone in the audience will smile, but what I need is guffaws. Even if my jokes are not all that funny. Jerry Seinfeld is the ultimate in standup comedians. He said that when he started out doing standup, he hoped he could make it to the one good joke he had reserved at the end of his monologue. As he got better, his jokes improved and now all his jokes are good. We expect Seinfeld to be funny so we'll laugh even at his far out stuff.  Comedy is weird. When I was a kid, my father, who was a firefighter, worked a rotating shift. If he was working on a Friday night, my mother would let me stay up watching TV to keep her company. There was a late night show hosted by Jack Parr, who today is...

 2020: A Palmville Deer Season

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac for Word-Wednesday, November 18, 2020, the 47th Wednesday of the year, the ninth Wednesday of fall, and the 323rd day of the year, with 43 days remaining. Wannaska Nature Update for November 18, 2020 Watch for the Leonid meteor shower in the next few days. Nordhem Lunch: Closed. Earth/Moon Almanac for November 18, 2020 Sunrise: 7:38am; Sunset: 4:40pm; 2 minutes, 33 seconds less daylight today Moonrise: 11:45am; Moonset: 7:48pm, waxing crescent, 17% illuminated Temperature Almanac for November 18, 2020                 Average            Record              Today High             32                     51     ...

 The circle closes Those who've had it Those who know someone who's had it Prince Charmin knows the score The mystery has a name Those affected now have a name And still the games are played Blame and fame And an adoring group of posers Fingers pointed Solutions sought in the dark The lock returns Shackles around the face and heart People dying alone for their own protection Life goes on Circles get smaller Until we are all touched Or dead

“ And I tried to remember any case in the course of my reading where two women are represented as friends. (...) almost without exception they are shown in their relation to men. (...)                               [women in fiction were] not only seen by the other sex but seen only in relation to the other sex.                                                    And how small a part of a woman's life is that ” ― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own If you are going to read the poem featured today, please be sure to read the background below the poem that explains how the three poems were composed. Today’s post centers on friendship between women; in this case, three women. But first – and I’m not going to ask permission – a few words on the current state of female friendships – those be...