Juneteenth 2023

  Juneteenth, now an annual American holiday, commemorates the 19th of June, 1865 when Texas, the last state of the Southern Confederacy, finally released their slaves.   Most Americans I’m betting don’t know that. You know what else I’m betting they don’t know which should be right up their with the Declaration of Independence, D-Day and the Gettysburg Address?   The Gag Rule.   In 1836 the…

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Quotes Worth Quoting

   Writing books is the closest men ever come to child bearing.   Norman Mailer      A critic is someone who enters the battlefield after the war is over and shoots the wounded. Murray Kempton      You’re not really famous until you’re a Pez dispenser. Carrie Fisher   Marrying the same woman twice, is like breaking back into jail.  Casey Stengel   Time wounds all heels.  Dorothy Parker   …

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Things Even I Didn't Know

Things Even I Didn’t Know

The word amateur comes from the Latin word amator meaning lover, the verb amare, to love. And here I thought being called one was a slur when in fact it’s doing something simply for love instead of money.   On June 26, 1917 during World War I when General John J. Pershing (1860-1948) marched into France with 14.000 American infantrymen, the French in shambles so grateful to see them, referred to…

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