Month: January 2023

RIP – Russell Banks

Russell Banks, Novelist Steeped in the Working Class, Dies at 82
He brought his own sometimes painful blue-collar experiences to bear in acclaimed stories exploring issues of race, class and power in American life.
NYTIMES

A couple books of his I’d recommend:
Rule of the Bone
When we first meet him, Chappie is a punked-out teenager living with his mother and abusive stepfather in an upstate New York trailer park. During this time, he slips into drugs and petty crime. Rejected by his parents, out of school and in trouble with the police, he claims for himself a new identity as a permanent outsider; he gets a crossed-bones tattoo on his arm, and takes the name “Bone.”

The Sweet Hereafter
In The Sweet Hereafter, Russell Banks tells a story that begins with a school bus accident. Using four different narrators, Banks creates a small-town morality play that addresses one of life’s most agonizing questions: when the worst thing happens, who do you blame?

The Sweet Hereafter was made into a movie, which I also thought was great, check out it’s IMDB page.

Simple and Basic Honey Whole Wheat Bread

INGREDIENTS:
1 1/4 cups lukewarm water
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/4 cup honey
3 1/2 cups Whole Wheat Flour
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast

DIRECTIONS:
Knead the dough until it’s smooth and just slightly tacky, about 8 to 10 minutes. Place the dough in a greased bowl, cover, and let it rise until doubled in volume, about 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

Deflate the dough and shape it to fit a greased 8 1/2″ x 4 1/2″ loaf pan. Let it rise, covered, until doubled, about 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

Bake the bread in a preheated 375°F oven for 35 minutes.

via King Arthur Flour

DIY Abortion, One Person’s Story

This must never happen again. At age 14 in the late 1950s I was seduced by a man of 32. A doctor told me “You’ve made your bed, now lie on it.” Pregnant and parentless, I went to a drug store and bought multiple medications labeled “Not to be taken by pregnant women” and took them in large quantities. The minuscule fetus was aborted. I was fortunate that I neither died nor had a deformed child, and that 12 years later I could bear within a happy marriage a wanted and loved child who would not otherwise have been born.

From comments section of NYTIMES.

Seinfeld Writing Prompts

Kramer gets a ticket for Jaywalking and decides to paint cross walks in the middle of every road. Elaine finds a key on her key ring she doesn’t recognize and becomes obsessed with what it goes to. Jerry and George find out they’ve slept with the same woman and try to find out who pleased her more.

Elaine can’t tell if the Gen-Z girl in her building is complementing or insulting her new bag. George claims he’s a gay man who has had multiple sexual partners to get vaccinated for monkeypox. Jerry is convinced that his new girlfriend draws on her freckles.

Elaine falls asleep with a towel covering 1 side leaving half a tan. Peterman thinks it’s a political fashion statement/Banyan starts doing funeral gigs & Jerry thinks it’s wrong/A cop car keeps following Kramer’s car but never pulls him over/The Wal-Mart greeter always greets everyone except George

Jerry dates a woman that claims to be a food connoisseur and “knows all the best places in NY,” but it’s all chain restaurants. George realizes each waitress at Monk’s brings him something different every time he orders “his usual.” Kramer, with the help of Newman mails himself to a penpal.

via:
RedditWritesSeinfeld

Elise Stefanik, Gumby, and Groucho Marx – Letter to Editor, NYTIMES

To the Editor:

Elise Stefanik’s Gumby-like transformation from moderate Republican to ultra-MAGA Trumpster is emblematic of today’s G.O.P., which has now given us George Santos. Malleability and dissembling have replaced honesty and conviction.

Groucho Marx famously said, “Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them … well, I have others.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/03/opinion/letters/elise-stefanik-trump.html

Herbert Lee – Civil Rights Activist

Herbert Lee (1912 – 1961) Herbert Lee, born on this day in 1912, was an American civil rights activist who fought for voting rights in Mississippi, where black people had been disenfranchised since 1890. In 1961, Lee was assassinated by a state representative. Lee was a charter member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in Amite County and had sought to enfranchise black Americans by encouraging voter registration.

In 1961, Lee assisted Bob Moses, a field secretary with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), in his efforts to persuade locals to register. His activities were met with threats of reprisal by the white community, and Lee became one of the movement’s earliest victims to white violence. On September 25th, 1961, Lee was murdered by Mississippi state representative E. H. Hurst (1908 – 1990) in broad daylight at the cotton gin while delivering cotton near Liberty.

Hurst killed Lee with a single shot to the head, but later claimed in court that he was defending himself after Lee attacked him with a tire iron. An all-white jury ruled that the killing was a justifiable homicide. In 1964, civil rights activist Louis Allen was killed after he informed federal investigators that his testimony in the case had been coerced on threat of violence.

Read more:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Lee_(activist) https://snccdigital.org/people/herbert-lee/

Bestsellers – Amazon Australia

https://www.amazon.com.au/gp/bestsellers/books

RecipeTin Eats: Dinner: 150 recipes from Australia’s most popular cook
Nagi Maehashi

150 dinner recipes. Fail-proof. Delicious. Addictive. The food you want to cook, eat and share, night after night.

Through her phenomenally popular online food site, RecipeTin Eats, Nagi Maehashi talks to millions of people a year who tell her about the food they love.

Atomic Habits
James Clear

People think that when you want to change your life, you need to think big. But world-renowned habits expert James Clear has discovered another way. He knows that real change comes from the compound effect of hundreds of small decisions- doing two push-ups a day, waking up five minutes early, or holding a single short phone call.

He calls them atomic habits.

Spare
The Duke of Sussex, Prince Harry

It was one of the most searing images of the twentieth century- two young boys, two princes, walking behind their mother’s coffin as the world watched in sorrow – and horror. As Diana, Princess of Wales, was laid to rest, billions wondered what the princes must be thinking and feeling – and how their lives would play out from that point on.

For Harry, this is that story at last.

With its raw, unflinching honesty, Spare is a landmark publication full of insight, revelation, self-examination, and hard-won wisdom about the eternal power of love over grief.

Lessons in Chemistry
Bonnie Garmus

Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing.

But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute take a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one- Calvin Evans, the lonely, brilliant, Nobel-prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with – of all things – her mind. True chemistry results.

Like science, life is unpredictable. Which is why a few years later, Elizabeth Zott finds herself not only a single mother, but the reluctant star of America’s most beloved cooking show, Supper at Six. Elizabeth’s unusual approach to cooking (‘combine one tablespoon acetic acid with a pinch of sodium chloride’) proves revolutionary. But as her following grows, not everyone is happy. Because as it turns out, Elizabeth Zott isn’t just teaching women to cook. She’s daring them to change the status quo.

It Starts with Us
Colleen Hoover

Before It Ends with Us, it started with Atlas. Colleen Hoover tells fan favourite Atlas’ side of the story and shares what comes next in this long-anticipated sequel to the #1 Sunday Times bestseller It Ends with Us.

Bestsellers – Amazon Germany

List via Amazon, translation via google:
https://www.amazon.de/-/en/gp/bestsellers/2022/books

The Child in You Needs Home: The Key to Solving (Almost) Any Problem
Stefanie Stahl

Everyone longs to be accepted and loved. Ideally, we develop the necessary basic trust during our childhood that will carry us through life as adults. But the insults experienced also leave their mark and unconsciously determine our entire relationship life. Successful author Stefanie Stahl has developed a new, effective approach to working with the »inner child«: When we make friends with it, amazing possibilities arise to solve conflicts, to make relationships happier and to find an answer to (almost) every problem.

Mimic: Psychological Thriller
Sebastian Fitzek

Do not be afraid! Except for yourself…

Sebastian Fitzek’s outstanding psychological thriller about a mimic resonance expert who can no longer trust herself when she is in dire need

A tiny twitch in the corner of the mouth, the smallest change in the pupil is enough for her to “read” the true self of a person: Hannah Herbst is Germany’s most experienced mimic resonance expert, specializing in the secret signals of the human body. As a police advisor, she has already convicted a number of violent criminals.

But just when she is struggling with the consequences of memory loss after an operation, she is confronted with the most terrible case of her career: A previously completely blameless woman has confessed to having brutally murdered her family. Only her young son Paul survived. After her confession, the mother manages to escape from prison. Is she looking for her son to complete her “death mission”? Hannah Herbst only has the short confession video to convict the mother and save Paul. The problem: The murderer on the video is Hannah herself!

Her only way out leads deep inside her…

The Song of the Crayfish: A Novel
Delia Owens

The touching story of Kya the march girl, of the fragility of childhood and the beauty of nature

Chase Andrews dies, and the residents of the quiet seaside town of Barkley Cove agree: the march girl is to blame. Kya Clark lives in isolation in the marshland with its salt marshes and sandbars. She knows every stone and seabird, every shell and plant. When two young men become aware of the wild beauty, Kya opens up to a new life – with dramatic consequences. In an intense and atmospheric way, Delia Owens tells us that we will always be the children we once were. And cannot oppose the mysteries and violence of nature.

The Only Book You Should Read About Finance
Thomas Kehl

Better now than never!

From now on there are no more excuses to put off building wealth. Investing your money profitably has never been easier than it is today. The book by the creators of the successful YouTube channel “Finanzfluss” picks you up and gives you impulses to take responsibility for your own financial situation and to spark enthusiasm for personal wealth accumulation. Former investment banker Thomas Kehl and journalist Mona Linke explain how you can use stocks and ETFs to passively build wealth and how it works.

The Cafe on the Edge of the World: A Tale of the Meaning of Life
John Strelecky

A small café in the middle of nowhere becomes a turning point in the life of John, an advertising manager who is always in a hurry. He actually only wants to take a short break, but then he discovers three questions on the menu next to the menu of the day:
»Why are you here? Are you afraid of death? Do you lead a full life?” How strange – but once intrigued, John decides to unravel this mystery with the help of the chef, the waitress and a guest.

Questions about the meaning of life take him far away from his boardroom to the seashore of Hawaii. Along the way, his attitude toward life and relationships changes, and he learns just how much can be learned from a wise green sea turtle. Ultimately, this journey becomes a journey to one’s own self. A book that is as lively and humorous as it is touching.

Anthony Hopkins Celebrating Sobriety

Anthony Hopkins Marks 47 Years Sober with Inspiring Video Message: ‘Celebrate Yourself’ from entertainment

“I just want to wish everyone a happy new year and also to say I’m celebrating 47 years today of sobriety,” began Hopkins, 84. “This is a message not meant to be heavy, but I hope helpful. I am a recovering alcoholic. And to you out there — I know there are people struggling.”
…

“But if you need help with any addiction or problem, talk to someone. Talk to someone you respect, whether it’s a counselor or to go to a 12-step program,” he advised. “There are 12-step programs all over the world, every city. … Twelve-step programs that can help you identify what you are. It doesn’t cost a thing, but it will give you a whole new life.”

Hopkins went on to say he’s “not a do-gooder” and joked he’s “an old sinner, like everyone,” but he has “the best life he could [ever] imagine.”

Anthony Hopkins Marks 47 Years Sober with Inspiring Video Message: ‘Celebrate Yourself’ “Wherever you are, get help. Don’t be ashamed,” the actor and recovering alcoholic said in an inspiring New Year’s video message PEOPLE magazine