Posts Tagged ‘ history ’

Interesting … people have always had this odd tendency to “remember” the “good old days” … and look forward to the future with pessimism: “In 1848, writer Thomas Macaulay wrote in his “The History of England” that “In spite of evidence, many will still imagine to themselves the England of the Stuarts as a...
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Today is the day. While I’m on-call for another week, and will return to the office next Friday for a cake&coffee with the team, I’m leaving the company that I’ve been with for 15 years (give or take a month). That’s 15 years through 7 different jobs: Research Assistant Staff Writer Marketing Project Manager...
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Now this is amazing … a mechanical computer from 65 BC with differential gears. Reminds me of a Difference Engine …
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Some books that I’ve just finished up: Witnesses of War, by Nicholas StarGardt About children’s lives under the Nazis before, during, and slightly after WWII. Appalling, moving, engrossing.  In Search of Stones, by M. Scott Peck Peck’s tale of a trip he and his wife took to the UK in search of dolmen and...
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Chris Forde, a documentary filmmaker, is doing a movie on Paddle to the Amazon … the longest canoe journey ever. I’m interested in this because I read and reviewed the book Paddle to the Amazon, which is the amazing story of Don Starkell and his son Dana, who paddled from their home in Winnipeg,...
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What I’ve been reading: The Last Mortal Man, by Syne Mitchell: fairly good sci-fi Where the Hell are the Guns, by George G Blackburn: very good personal history The Triangle Run, by James B. Lamb: very good (story of the Canadian navy doing convoy duty in the Atlantic Spartans, by Paul Cartledge A Soldier’s...
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Somehow I’ve missed reading Corrie ten Boom’s In My Father’s House until just this past week. Corrie ten Boom was a Dutch woman who, with her father and sister, hid Jews from the Gestapo during the German occupation of Holland in the second world war. For this crime, many members of her family died,...
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I’ve always loved reading about General George S. Patton, a passionate, brave, smart commander – who had his flaws just like the rest of us. My favorite Patton quotes: Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way. Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will...
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