Behind the Ironic Column

There are still a few boxes/stacks of books scattered around the apartment, left over from that clearing and sorting binge I went through last winter when I was clearing out the storage room. The reason I’m noticing them now, of course, is that I’m trying to make my living area ...

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Hi, my name is Brenda and I'm a book addict.  At least I think that's what it is.  I begin to worry if I don't have a book, or preferably books, to read.  I get anxious and my stomach tenses up at the thought of a bus ride or an ...

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  It was cold in Portland today.  The Arctic winds swept down the gorge from the east, bringing us air that had recently been in Canada.  The wonderful thing about the cold wind was that it also brought us blue sky and sun.  After ...

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There are various ways of interpreting that advice about not standing in your own way  -- or, sometimes, not standing in your own light.  Essentially it means avoiding some action that detracts or distracts from your real goal.  I think it’s fair to assume that most authors intend for their works ...

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I’ve had a headache all day today – no doubt caused by spending something over 8 hours reading yesterday and the tension brought on by the various wizard trials and events.  Or maybe brought on by the fact that this is the last of the Harry Potter series and I ...

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I don’t even like The Princess Casamassima that much – so why do I have this paperback copy of it – hanging around for years and years but never being re-read.  It’s a nice, chunky paperback – Henry James tended to write fairly long novels – so it ...

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