Tag: history
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The Soals of His Feet, Which Had Some Passions
The title for this one was a tossup between the line I used, and: The Unexpected Zaniness of Bacon I’m reading for research, and to flavor a story I’m planning to write soon. It will be set on Malta, and it will involve an alchemist, a cat, and possibly Roger Bacon. Not really sure. What…
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The Old Books
Not that a steady diet of only the old books is to be preferred. Simply that there is much to learn, and much to be held in memory, which can be forgotten willfully or through ignorance. Which leads me, of course, to Project Gutenberg. Where you can find the old books for free and easy…
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Paleophilia
I suppose this love affair with museums comes from somewhere. I’m not entirely sure what that wellspring is, though, as I don’t recall many museums in my childhood. We did a lot of vacations to very remote areas – which I also love! – but virtually none into cities where you could find such refinements…
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The Case of the Viking Bodysnatching
I will admit, I don’t actually read science journals and blogs to find story ideas. It just… happens sometimes. I can usually count on historical accounts of any era to spark some evocative mysterious questions that just beg to be fleshed out. Because there’s no other way to answer some of these long-cold cases than…
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The Strange Acquisition of the Sewing Desk
Adapt, improvise, and overcome. Some days, I do this more than others. I was thinking about juggling the other day, and how there are times I feel like I’m dropping balls all over. This blog, for instance, which has wandered from a daily flight up and over into the other hand, to rolling across the…
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Paleomicrobiology and Other Interests
So every now and then I run across a book I would really love to read, but cannot bring myself to justify buying – not even in the name of research. Paleomicrobiology of Humans is one such. (You can read a detailed review of it here, if you’re interested) It’s a fascinating concept, and although it’s not…
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Valley Forge
Last month while I was travelling for work, I wound up with a few hours to kill before I needed to be at the Philadelphia airport, and I realized that Valley Forge was just off my route from Point A to Point B. It was an irresistible chance to walk on ground imbued with history.…
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Why Read Cookbooks?
As a companion piece for my post today at the Mad Genius Club, where I talk about audience for writers, and give the results for a very interesting survey I conducted of readers, I decided that I’d talk here about why you should read cookbooks. Not just to use them for looking up recipes, but…
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Retrogression
What do Environmentalists, JRR Tolkein, Luddites, and Progressives all have in common? The answer is both easy and complicated all at once. The core of it is fear, but the roots lie deeply embedded in the human psyche, all the way back to a time when something out of the ordinary in the environment surrounding…
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Curmudgeon’s Corner: BFP War Party
This Blast from the Past was originally published in September 2012 at Classical Values. The War Party by Sanford Begley I’ve been listening to both sides since 9/11/01. There is a group who want to go to war with Islam, a group who want to ignore it and hope it goes away, and a group…
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The Silk Road
The silk road stories fire my imagination. It was the first time in human history that markets were no longer constrained to how far a person could walk in a day or two. The sheer doggedness of the traders who opened the various routes, the stories that are long forgotten, the hidden traces archaeologists sometimes…
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The Incredible, Edible, Rise of Civilization
Sarah Hoyt published my essay on food and its connection to the world as we know it over at According to Hoyt today. It always comes back to food. It’s not just my personal pleasure in cooking, eating, and feeding others. It is literally the foundation of the human condition: good food and plenty of…