A Brief History of Cat Art

July 15, 2019

...oot Simple reader Annie tracked down Burbank for me. She says, I believe “Burbank” is J. M. Burbank: “A Favourite Cat” “The Gourmand” There is a bit about “A Favourite Cat” here: And this book has a section on Burbank Thanks Annie! Beyond the cat-centricness of this post, if you’re looking for a few hours to kill I can’t recommend The Studio enough. You can find the whole shebang here. Notable is how seriously the editors considered the art of cas...

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We All Have Our Triggers

Mr. Homegrown

July 29, 2019

Thoughtstylings

11 Comments

...ading the complete list of all the folks in Jeffrey Epstein’s leaked black book. One positive aspect of that list is that it’s a convenient roster of all the folks that, unlike Epstein, I’d least like to be stranded on an island with. It turns out that Epstein’s buddies include the new atheist gang and their promoter along with pseudo-intellectual publishing phenomenons such as Steven Pinker and Jared Diamond and, as a topping to the crap sundae,...

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Save the Foot! Save Lost Words!

Mr. Homegrown

August 2, 2019

Animals, Design, Thoughtstylings

...notes a response by author Robert MacFarlane’s and children’s book illustrator Jackie Morris that resulted in an elegant “wild dictionary” called The Lost Words: A Spell Book (public library). And, thanks to Brain Pickings, I now know how to link to books via your local public library....

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I’m Fed Up With Amazon

Mr. Homegrown

December 6, 2019

Thoughtstylings

11 Comments

...(which has always been very generous to Kelly and I as authors–placing our books prominently and hosting a book launch event for us). Right now I’m left with a problem. I’ve got hundreds of Amazon links embedded on this site and need to ponder what I’m going to do about that. When Amazon dumped California-based affiliates a few years ago rather than pay their taxes I switched to Portland-based Powell’s partner program but nobody used it. I’ve also...

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Bonfire of the Billys

Mr. Homegrown

January 27, 2020

Design

5 Comments

...uthor and woodworker Christopher Schwartz’s said in The Anarchist’s Design Book that, “it annoys me when I see an IKEA Billy bookshelf in a woodworker’s house.” Schwartz goes on to explain why, Yes, you get about 15 linear feet of shelving, plus a carcase that is ridiculously unstable. Only two shelves are fixed. So unless you secure the Billy to the wall (or other Billys), it will rack in short order . . . I say this with experience. When my wife...

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