Stuff 2 Know
July 23, 2019

Notes from around our human experience, including Philosophy 101, On This Date and an excerpt from one of my books. 

PHILOSOPHY 101
“We are going to sing so that they will remember this for the rest of their lives. There is no other reason to do it, folks, none.”
Garrison Keillor
Love Me

We will always be grateful for this quote because it utterly crystalizes what we try to do. A version of it appears at the top of whatever doc I’m writing on because if we are not writing so you will remember it forever and ever every time we sit down to ply this trade, then we are not writing, we are merely typing and we are wasting your time and ours. 

Those who believe that only those people who amuse or entertain or thrill us can do something memorable are wrong. Nothing is further from the truth. Every single one of us can do something memorable. Based on those whom we remember, it can be anyone. Sure, teachers and coaches and masters have left their mark on us, but so have sports officials, waiters and waitresses and auto mechanics. What those who have left their mark on us have in common is they were doing what they were meant to be doing with their lives.  

There is no other reason to do it, folks, none…

What are you doing that people will remember for the rest of their lives? As noted, what it is is of no consequence. We write. Bully for us. There are a lot of people who won’t read this, a loss they appear to be taking disappointingly well. No matter. It is sufficient that we wrote this because we would not be doing anyone any good if we hadn’t.  

Why you do something is all that matters. If you are acting because of force deep inside you, if you are following your heart and trusting your instincts, if you are  living the life you are meant to live, then you are doing yourselves and everyone around you the most good. 

Garrison Keillor is an American humorist. 

Running The Numbers
Our national debt as I write this is $22.525 trillion. and America has been at war for 10,809 consecutive days.

QWERTY
The machine that would eventually become the typewriter, then known as the typographer, is patented by American inventor William Austin Burt on this date in 1829. Burt had built his typographer to help out with the correspondence required in his job as a government surveyor. Burt also invented the solar compass and the equatorial sextant. 

Uh, We’ll Be Experiencing A Slightly Rough Landing
What History now refers to as the Gimli Glider, Air Canada Flight 143, lands without fuel at a former Royal Canadian Air Force Base west of Gimli, Manitoba on this date in 1983. All 69 people on board survived, though ten were injured during evacuation. Flight 143 was on it’s way from Montreal to Edmonton and plane ran out of fuel because the amount of fuel needed had been calculated in pounds instead of kilograms, resulting in the plane having less than half the fuel required for the trip.  

CHARTWATCH
#1 songs on this date in 1955:
Best Sellers In Stores – Rock Around the Clock…Bill Haley and His Comets (3rd of eight weeks)
Soul Chart – Unable to determine
Country Chart – In the Jailhouse Now…Web Pierce (21st and final week, tying country and Billboard overall chart record)
UK Singles Chart – Dreamboat…Alma Cogan (2nd and final week)
Album Chart – Lonesome Echo…Jackie Gleason (2nd and final week)
– Chart data courtesy of Billboard (US) and Official Charts Company (UK).

TODAY’S KAITLYN BOOK EXCERPT
From my latest novel The Angel and The Captain
In today’s episode, Angel and her Captain, plus Ma and Aunt Marsha

Dear me, this was nice. The Captain announced our arrival on an intercom and only after our reservations were confirmed were we allowed in. The entrance is right there as you leave the Pirates of the Caribbean so there were – eeek! – commoners languishing around, people not dining at Club 33 like we were, and some of them were straining their necks to see in. I sincerely hope all of them got the view they desired.
  The room we entered was smaller than I thought it would be. An old elevator, a replica of one Walt saw in Paris, took us to the second floor. The dining room was elegant, of course, with Disney art on the walls, but the Chancellor’s Room was nicer. First-class versus world-class.
   Mom and Marsha hadn’t had a toddy since the night before, so there was an immediate cocktail ration issued right after we seated near some large glass doors.
   Dinner was leisurely. The Captain’s friend sent over a bottle of champagne and we all had cocktails. After a while, our head server, a nice, gentle woman named Kim, accompanied by a young waiter, came with the amuse-bouche, which is, of course, pronounced amooz boosh. An amuse-bouche is a small appetizer offered to guests at fancy joints like this – and oh, I don’t know, the Chancellor’s Room – with the chef’s compliments. It translates from the original French as “entertains the mouth” and is intended to whet the appetite for the rest of the evening’s festivities.
   Tonight’s amuse-bouche, according to Kim, was a skewer of pork belly, topped with tomato jam. Don’t laugh. I know from experience that pork bellies often show up on fine dining menus even though it sounds gross at first.
   Mom and Marsha could not stop fretting over the menu! There weren’t any soup or salad choices, but there were several appetizer and entrée choices, of course, as well as three dessert options.
   “Oooh, those fancy-pants scallops…Marsha, look!” Mom said, as if Marsha couldn’t read the menu herself, which made the Captain laugh.
   “Scallops my ass,” Marsha said, pointing out the cranberry shortbread Muscovy duck pot pie.
   Personally, there was no doubt what Angel would be having. The Captain has turned me into a spoiled brat and my appetizer would have to be the artisan osetra caviar and my entrée the roasted foie gras. Sorry.
   Realizing decisions needed to be made before closing, Mom ultimately decided on the king crab-stuffed lobster tail, Marsha finally sighed and said could die happy now that she’s had the filet of pan-roasted Chateaubriand. My Captain had the foie gras, too. 

Click here to read more from The Angel and The Captain.

Stuff 2 Know
July 20, 2019

Notes from around our human experience, including Philosophy 101, On This Date and an excerpt from one of my books. 

PHILOSOPHY 101
His images are unforgettable because he was conceiving new forms and discovering new meanings, not just dutifully illustrating a predetermined text. He works by instinct…his independence of mind opening up new possibilities.
Miles Unger
Michelangelo: A Life In Six Masterpieces

Michelangelo (1475-1564), of course, is as talented a man as our species has produced, one of the few to reach the pinnacle in three distinct forms of human endeavor: sculpture, painting and architecture. He was not content to live the life of an ordinary artist. Sure, he could have become very wealthy taking money from his many patrons and doing as he was told, but he knew he had supreme talent and, equally important, he had a vision for how he wanted to use that talent and was willing to put whatever work was required into maximizing that talent. He paid his patrons little regard. He took their money, created whatever he wanted anyway and told them to take it. He answered only to his inner callings.

It’s easy to follow a predetermined life. Most people do, in fact. Be born, become an adult, earn a living, reproduce, die. If the weather’s nice, people will show up at your funeral and say nice things about you.

That is not all there is in this life, though and Michelangelo has lessons for all of us: find what you were meant to do and then go and do it. Find the talents you were issued at birth and put in whatever work is required to maximize them. Ignore the cacophony of outside distractions and answer your own inner calling.

He works by instinct…his independence of mind opening up new possibilities…

Our instincts and independence of mind will show us fresh prospects every day, all we have to do is let them. We may not live down the ages – or, then again, we might – but that is of no particular consequence. The lesson of following your heart and trusting your instincts are there for all of us, and its fruits are there for the taking.

Miles Unger is an American writer. The six masterpieces he refers to are: the Pieta, the David, the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, the Medici tombs, The Last Judgment (on the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel) and St Peter’s Basilica.

Running The Numbers
Our national debt as I write this is $22.514 trillion. and America has been at war for 10,806 consecutive days.

One Small Step
Apollo 11, man’s first voyage to land humans on another planet, lands on the moon on this date in 1969, fifty years ago today. The landing came after a descent that saw an unknown alarm almost cause the mission to abort and after radar wanted them to land in a boulder-infested area. Several hours later Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would spend two-and-a-half hours walking the lunar surface, becoming the first humans to walk on someplace other than Earth. The entire crew, including Michael Collins, would return to Earth on July 24. 

Anchors Aweigh
The USS Constitution, first launched in 1797, celebrates its 200th anniversary by sailing, in Boston Harbor, for the first time since the 1930s, on this date in 1997. Though a museum now, Constitution remains in commissioned service, the oldest commissioned naval vessel still afloat in the world. 

CHARTWATCH
#1 songs on this date in 1985:
Hot 100 – A View to a Kill…Duran Duran (2nd of two consecutive weeks)
Soul Chart – Save Your Love (For #1)…Rene & Angela (1st of two weeks)
Country Chart – Dixie Road…Lee Greenwood (only week)
UK Singles Chart – Frankie…Sister Sledge (4th and final week)
Album Chart – Songs From the Big Chair…Tears for Fears (2nd of five non-consecutive weeks)
– Chart data courtesy of Billboard (US) and Official Charts Company (UK).

TODAY’S KAITLYN BOOK EXCERPT
From my latest novel The Angel and The Captain
In today’s episode, Angel and her Captain are on their second date. Angel is telling the Captain a bit about herself. 

I was born in town and had always lived here. I didn’t talk about my dad at all, which may have given him a clue I didn’t have one. He bailed on us when I was three. I now know why, but at the time I didn’t because all Mom ever said was being a dad was harder for him than it was for others. When I was in middle school Mom stopped talking about him with her sisters. I’d hear them on the phone and when they visited, though they didn’t talk about him much. It took me a while to realize they weren’t talking about him at all anymore and maybe my dad was dead. I don’t know.
   And it doesn’t really matter! The Captain is not my dad; I wanted to do too many things with him, to him, in bed for that. For example, even though he was old enough to be my dad, I wanted this old man to fuck me and eat me out, but maybe not in that order.
   From the very start I felt protected and loved with the Captain. It was more than being attracted to him, which I was. It was a feeling of security that is hard to describe but the feeling is comforting because us girls need that.
   I went away for college but I moved back because I like it here. I majored in English with a minor in Rhetoric. People always asked if I was going to be a teacher or a writer, but I said no, I had no desire to do either of those things, I merely enjoy the English language and wanted to know more about it.
   I told him it wasn’t all that easy for an English major who had some zero desire to utilize her major to find the type of work that builds a career, but I was still young, even if 30 is getting closer and closer.
   The Captain said he had never married, which I thought odd, because I’d always wanted to marry before I was 30. I asked him if he wanted to get married now. I played it off by laughing so he wouldn’t know how serious I was. Because a girl needs a husband and if he was just looking for a twenty-something piece of ass, well, I’d probably give it to him because I wanted him, but you know. I wasn’t looking for something long-term and casual.
   Fortunately, he said yes, he was open to a good marriage, which was good to hear because I was, too.
   A good second date. His pass was stamped to continue on with the courting process. He was a grown-up, and I was ready to be one, too. 

Click here to read more from The Angel and The Captain.

Stuff 2 Know
July 18 2019

Notes from around our human experience, including Philosophy 101, On This Date and an excerpt from one of my books. 

PHILOSOPHY 101
…his life seemed to prove that the valorous were the favorites of fortune. He was simply inviting the [Constitutional] Convention to do what he had done repeatedly – to aim as high as possible and to strain every nerve to attain the goal.
John C Miller
Alexander Hamilton: Profile in Paradox

Alexander Hamilton, a certified Founding Father and the first Secretary of the Treasury, was a man who was not afraid to aim high. Hamilton had a definite and certain vision for the government of the United States (not to mention a vision for his social and political status) a vision so bold and audacious – a word that comes up from time to time with Hamilton – it drew the opposition of other great thinkers of the day, like Thomas Jefferson.

We should be aiming high, too, and this is easier than it may sound. Merely dispensing with the cacophony of outside influences and following our inner calling is sufficient. All of us – you, me, your aunt in Leadville – have things we were meant to do with our lives and the happiest lives are spent by those who do them. These things could cause us to live down the ages or merely be fondly remembered by those whose lives we touched, but this is of no consequence. A life spent on our path is all we need in this life. 

All we need is the wisdom to know what we are about, the courage to go where our hearts tell us and the patience to see it through to the very end. When we do that, we withdraw every possible benefit from our lives because our paths take us exactly where we are meant to go.

John C Miller is an American writer. 

Running The Numbers
Our national debt as I write this is $22.508 trillion. and America has been at war for 10,804 consecutive days.

Great Moments In Getting Along
Jews are expelled from England on this date in 1290, when King Edward I issues the Edict of Expulsion. The Edict was actually the culmination of two centuries of persecution of Jews because the English couldn’t get along with any better than anyone else. Jews would not be allowed to return to England until 1657, in no small part because England needed their money. 

Whoops…My Bad
United States Senator Ted Kennedy crashes his car into a tidal basin at Chappaquiddick Island, killing his passenger Mary Jo Kopechne on this date in 1969. Kennedy immediately left the scene and did not report the accident for ten hours, just before Kopechne’s body was found. Kennedy received a two-month suspended sentence for leaving the scene of an accident. The incident damaged Kennedy to the extent he was never able to run for president, though it did not prevent continued reelection to the Senate.

CHARTWATCH
#1 songs on this date in 1970:
Hot 100 – Mama Told Me (Not To Come)…Three Dog Night (2nd of two consecutive weeks)
Soul Chart – The Love You Save…The Jackson 5 (5th of six weeks)
Country Chart – He Loves Me All The Way…Tammy Wynette (3rd and final week)
UK Singles Chart – In The Summertime…Mungo Jerry (6th of seven weeks)
Album Chart – Woodstock…Soundtrack (2nd of four weeks)
– Chart data courtesy of Billboard (US) and Official Charts Company (UK).

TODAY’S KAITLYN BOOK EXCERPT
From my latest novel The Angel and The Captain
In today’s episode, Angel is making dinner for her husband and father for the first time.

It’s tough to find words to describe dinner. I mean, what can you say about a moment you had no right to ever expect to happen and might never happen again? Making dinner for my husband and father was something I never even dared to dream of. Why bother? There was no point to it because it wasn’t ever going to happen.

But it did! There was the usual selection of restaurants cities have, but the Captain was fond of saying you must take advantage of the circumstances that present themselves and who the hell knew when this chance would come again? 

It reminded me of the Captain telling me when I was old like he was I would probably want to be looking back on having seen my father than having not seen him. Well, when I was old like my Captain, heck, even on the drive home tomorrow, I knew I would rather be looking back on having made dinner for my father and husband than on having gone out for dinner. 

After I cooked the Italian sausage, I got the water going for the pasta and the sauce simmering, then I sat down at the table and asked my father to tell me about the day he abandoned me and my mother.  

I never knew. Mom never talked about the last day of her marriage and I never asked. And, frankly, I never had that burning of a desire to know. I was kind of curious, but I wasn’t losing any sleep at night wondering about it. I probably just wanted to make my father go through whatever it was it took to tell me about that last day. 

Click here to read more from The Angel and The Captain.

Morning Briefing
July 13, 2019

Notes from around our human experience, including Philosophy 101, On This Date and an excerpt from one of my books. 

PHILOSOPHY 101
Life is being on the wire. Everything else is just waiting.
Rick Wallenda

Every now and then life presents challenges, events that take us out of our norms and our comfort zones, putting us in a situation we’ve seldom, perhaps never, encountered. Invariably, this will be a circumstance where our very best is demanded, seemingly drawing on every skill and talent – and sometimes emotion – in our personal arsenal.

Life being life, this can be a challenge that came up suddenly from seemingly out of nowhere, or it can be a challenge we’ve spent an awful lot of time preparing for. It could be a moment where firmness with our children will produce dividends that will pay off for them many more times in their life, or it can be a challenge at work that must be met or it can be stepping on the field or court to officiate a ballgame that is as important to the players as it is to you.

What it is is of no particular consequence; it can be anything. What matters is that we have them from time to time in our life. Because when we have them we are generally showing ourselves and the world that we are trying to better ourselves, to do something we haven’t done or be someone we haven’t been. Because if we are not trying to be something better than we’ve been in the past then we are not making our time on this planet serve us, we are merely serving a sentence.

What wires are waiting in your life? When they appear will you have the courage to walk them, risking the acquaintance of the imposters known as success and failure, or will you take a pass, while others walk on theirs?

We cannot answer that question for you and you can’t answer it for us, but the answer determines whether we will ultimately be looking back at a life where we did well or a life where time was squandered.

Rick Wallenda is an American high wire artist. 

Running The Numbers
Our national debt as I write this is $22.489 trillion. and America has been at war for 10,798 consecutive days.

“There Is Tape In The Oval Office”
Alexander Butterfield, a former deputy assistant to President Nixon and then head of the FAA, reveals in Congressional testimony the existence of a taping system in the White House on this date in 1973. Butterfield knew about it because he had overseen its installation for the president. Butterfield had no role in the Watergate break-in or its coverup. Butterfield was also one of the few to correctly guess the identity of (in)famous Watergate informant Deep Throat as Mark Felt. 

Maybe Some People Got Fed, Maybe Some People Bought Guns
Live Aid, a dual-venue, multi-artist concert held to raise money for Ethiopian famine relief, is held in Philadelphia and London on this date in 1985. It is estimated that 1.9 billion people, about 40% of the planet’s population at the time, aw at least a portion of the concert. Phil Collins was the only artist to perform at both venues and it is still not entirely clear how much money went to relief and how much was siphoned off by Ethiopian leaders. 

CHARTWATCH
#1 songs on this date in 1974:
Hot 100 – Rock Your Baby…George McCrae (1rd of three consecutive weeks)
Soul Chart – Rock You Baby…George McCrae (2nd and final week)
Country Chart – He Thinks I Still Care…Anne Murray (2nd and final week)
UK Singles Chart – She…Charles Aznavour (3rd of four weeks)
Album Chart – Caribou…Elton John (1st of four weeks)
– Chart data courtesy of Billboard (US) and Official Charts Company (UK).

TODAY’S KAITLYN BOOK EXCERPT
From my latest novel The Angel and The Captain
In today’s episode, Angel and her older man Captain hit the sack on their wedding night. 

The tenderest love. 

I really made love to Angel on our wedding night. Sometimes it’s good to fuck her. She is the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen, and I’ve been naked in the same bed with a lot of, well a few, beautiful women over the years. My Angel is a complete freakazoid in the sack, too, and enjoys getting fucked and having her dirty old man whisper nasty things in her ear.  

But not tonight. On our wedding night it was the tenderest love. It was when I kissed her at the chapel after the drunk minister pronounced us “man and wiiiiffeee” and it was the tenderest love when I carried her to bed and laid her down and began making love to her. There was no hair pulling, no filthy names whispered in her ear, just a man in love with his woman. 

______

   To feel my Captain on top of me on our wedding night, to feel his legs spread mine, to feel his cock work his way inside me, it was love, a man making love to his wife on their wedding night and there isn’t a girl that hasn’t dreamed of this and there aren’t any guarantees it will ever happen, either.
  He really ate me out. Good God, that was the best feeling. I like seeing his old man head between my legs, so I propped myself on an arm to watch but it felt so good I was on my back again soon enough. The only downside is that I would not have dismissed out of hand sucking him off and swallowed my Captain’s load, but he’s old enough where that would’ve been it and I wanted him inside me.
  But that was it. It was perfect. The man I love on our wedding night. I was almost overwhelmed. Not every girl gets this. Some girls get married because they have to, or because they don’t think anyone else is going to love them or because they want regular cock or for other reasons that don’t include love.
  Our reason is love. Our good marriage was off to a good start. 

Click here to read more from The Angel and The Captain.

Kaitlyn Live
July 11, 2019

Good morning friends. 

AND THEY’RE OFF: We should all care about animals, and horses are deserving of our attention now, as Breeder’s Cup officials have announced their November championships are still planned for Santa Anita, the Los Angeles-area track where 30 horses died this past racing season (December-June). 

Now, thoroughbreds die regularly for our betting pleasure, but 30 is eight more than the track’s previous high, and most of them came before mid-March, causing no small amount of panic. And it’s true deaths fell to a more normal rate after Santa Anita halted racing for a couple of days in March, so maybe the industry will get away with it. Moving the Breeders Cup would have had a major, perhaps devastating impact on the sport. But boy, hardly as devastating an impact as even one horsie death at the Breeders Cup would have. Horse racing is dying anyway and closing out the year with a, some, high profile deaths might well close the coffin. 

Running The Numbers: Our national debt as I write this is $22.4 trillion. and America has been at war for 10,796 consecutive days.

More Crap: Significant birthdays on this date include John Quincy Adams (1767), Charlotte’s Web author E.B. White (1899), and the (sort of) legendary Brett Sommers (1924).

You’re In For It: Checking your horoscope for today, no, you are not as big a pain in the ass as you think, but you are neither as cute or funny as you think you are, either. Which means be careful trying to talk yourself out of that ticket. 

Can We Go Back To Politicians Dueling?: Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr murders former Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton in a duel in Weehawken, New Jersey on this date in 1803. The two had long been bitter rivals and while accounts vary, it is not unreasonable to conclude that Hamilton intentionally shot into the air while Burr intentionally shot into Hamilton’s chest. Burr was charged with murder in both New Jersey and New York, but didn’t stand trial in either jurisdiction and completed his term as vice president. 

Great Moments In Reading:  To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee is published on this date in 1960. Keeping it light with topics such as rape and racial injustice. Lee evidently felt she had said all she had to say as a writer, because her second novel, Go Set a Watchman, did not come out until 2015 and it is generally recognized as the first draft of To Kill a Mockingbird. 

CHARTWATCH: #1 songs on this date in 1981:

Hot 100 – Bette Davis Eyes…Kim Carnes (8th of nine non-consecutive weeks)
Soul Chart – Give It To Me Baby…Rick James (5th and final week)
Country Chart – Fire and Smoke…Earl Thomas Conley (only week)
UK Singles Chart – Ghost Town…The Specials (3rd and final week)
Album Chart – Mistaken Identity…Kim Carnes (2nd of three weeks)
– Chart data courtesy of Billboard (US) and Official Charts Company (UK).

PHILOSOPHY 101: He had real intelligence…a working, persistent mind. – Saul Bellow
Ravelstein

Intelligence isn’t the ability to use big words few understand or the ability to rattle off mindless facts or impressive figures. It is not retaining knowledge force-fed you by an ancient text or an enlightened master or a famous school. Intelligence is nothing more than the ability to learn, something all of us have.

Sure, some learning is in a formal setting, but most of what we know comes from outside a classroom, from how and if we heed the lessons life is teaching us. We learn every day when we put our experience to work for us, withdrawing every possible lesson –  both good and bad – from what nature and circumstance put in front of us. It’s using these lessons to build a foundation for knowing ourselves, from living the life we were meant to live, instead of merely conforming to what others expect from us.

…a working, persistent mind…

Our minds are like parachutes: they don’t do us any good closed. And it doesn’t matter what we choose to learn, either. All of us were issued assorted talents at birth and what interests me might well, probably will, bore you to tears. 

What matters is that we put our minds to work for us and for this we need diligence and courage. We must follow our hearts to what interests us and we must be prepared to learn the lessons that are presented to us. We must do this every day, too: we can’t accept life’s lessons one day and ignore them the next. Each day we must put the work required into knowing what we want to know and what we should know. When we do this, we will know ourselves, life’s great prize.

Saul Bellow (1915-2005) was a Canadian/American writer. In 1976 he won both the Nobel Prize for Literature and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. 

TODAY’S KAITLYN BOOK EXCERPT: From my latest novel The Angel and The Captain
In today’s episode, Angel and her older man Captain are having their usual Sunday dinner at Angel’s mother’s house. 

   “Had you ever gone to church?” the Captain asked.
   Mom shok her head as if she’d been asked if she’s ever sucked off a yak.
   “Haw! My husband left us. I had a three-year-old to raise and a living to earn, both on my own. When the hell did I have time? Sometimes I worked on Sundays, but usually we just enjoyed our Sundays to ourselves, didn’t we sweetheart?
   I smiled and nodded. Those were still pleasant memories.
   “Sometimes we’d go to the diner for an early dinner. You know, the one you took me to on our second date.”
   The Captain nodded and smiled. We still went there regularly, usually after one of his games, which pleased me.
   “I really liked it when we went to the nice hotel and window shopped.”
   Mom sipped her wine.
   “Those were not easy times,” Mom said plainly. Then she smiled a genuine, warm smile I had seen from time to time, but never too often, over the years. “Having you both over Sunday makes up for an awful lot, though.”
   Mom refilled our wine glasses.
   “So, tell me, what church did you go to?”
   The Captain told her and Mom nodded knowingly, which was funny because Mom knew as much about the local church scene as she did about applied physics. The actual church was irrelevant.
   Mom, it turns out, was really interested in our journey. She said she wasn’t surprised we had set out on it, she had sensed we were out of sorts and while there was certainly no way in hell she was going on this journey with us, she was happy to see us shopping around for a spiritual life.
   “Maybe there is a God,” Mom said. “I’ll tell you, sometimes I like to think there is. It’s awfully hard knowing you’re going at it alone in this world. Awfully hard.”
   “I don’t know…” the Captain said. My Captain is such a dork! He always says this when he is about to disagree with you! My Captain is relentlessly pleasant when he disagrees with you, too. He is so agreeable when he disagrees with you it will annoy you sometimes. “…maybe we are going it alone. I’ve never minded going it alone. Of course, that was before I was plied every Sunday with meatloaf and macaroni and cheese and wine.”
   We sat quietly for a while. I’ve always been comfy being quiet with my Captain. Well, maybe not always. I don’t remember much about our first date, but I do distinctly remember being scared stiff whenever someone wasn’t saying something. I knew immediately I wanted a second date – a lifetime, really – and I remember thinking he probably thinks I’m boring when I was quiet. I would learn, fairly soon, that the Captain does not require non-stop yapping. I would also learn, fairly soon, that I didn’t either, rare for a girl, I know. 

Click here to read more from The Angel and The Captain.

Live From Kaitlyn
July 10, 2019

Good morning friends.

We didn’t care about the baseball All-Star Game anymore than you did, but it was funny the scoreboard showed wrong pictures and misspelled names. Unless it was your picture that was screwed up, of course. It’s academic, of course, because attendance is down and people don’t care about baseball anymore anyway.

At Wimbledon, the ladies have the day off, while it’s the men’s quarterfinals on Centre Court and Court 1.  While the top three men’s seeds are playing today, three are seeded 20 or below and one is unseeded. Thrilling doubles action continues for all genders and gender combinations.

Our national debt as I write this is $22.4 trillion. and America has been at war for 10,795 consecutive days.

Significant birthdays on this date include William Blackstone (1723), Arlo Guthrie (1947), and Greg Kihn (1949).

Checking your horoscope for today, the SWAT team showing up at your house today should be regarded as an opportunity, not a threat.

Also from the almanac:

It’s Not The Heat, It’s The Heat: The highest official temperature ever is recorded on this date in 1913 at Death Valley, California, where the high was 134 F.  A previous all-time high of 136 in Libya in 1934 was decertified in 2012.

Well, This Should Stop All Drug Use Forever And Ever: All illegal narcotics use ceased on this date when former Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega is sentenced to 40 years in prison following his conviction on assorted drug and racketeering charges. He served 17 years before extradited to France where he was convicted of money laundering and sentenced to seven years in prison. He was later extradited to Panama, where he died in 2017.

CHARTWATCH: 
#1 songs on this date in 1971:
Hot 100 – It’s Too Late/I Feel the Earth Move…Carole King (4th of five weeks)
Soul Chart – Mr Big Stuff…Jean Knight (2nd of five weeks)
Country Chart – When You’re Hot You’re Hot…Jerry Reed (4th of five weeks)
UK Singles Chart – Chirpy, Chirpy, Cheep, Cheep…Middle of the Road (3rd of five weeks)
Album Chart – Tapestry…Carole King (4th of 14 weeks)
– Chart data courtesy of Billboard (US) and Official Charts Company (UK).

PHILOSOPHY 101
Only when we begin to trust ourselves do we begin to live.
Goethe

Life is not lived on the sidelines. Us humans are meant to do things and each one of was cut out to do certain things. Those that get on in this world go out and do those things. Doing this every day leads to a succession of good days, which provides the foundation for good years and you rack up enough good years, the next thing you know you are looking back at, and forward to, a well-lived life. Those that don’t sometimes end up staring at time wasted and talents squandered.

Only when we begin to trust ourselves…

Trusting ourselves is not easy because the task of following the path laid out for us by nature – by definition a path no one else can possibly take – is difficult. It means deviating from the status quo and the expectations others, and perhaps ourselves, have for us. It means leaving the comfort of the familiar for the uncertainties of the unknown.

It’s a journey we must take, though. When we do, when we are following our hearts and trusting our instincts instead of ignoring them, we are living the life we were meant to live – life’s great prize.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) was a German writer, scientist, lawyer, and statesman. His play Faust remains one of the most famous in human letters.

TODAY’S KAITLYN BOOK EXCERPT
From the Danielle short story from my novella The Benjamin Chronicles.
In today’s episode, Benjamin is about to seduce Danielle. Years earlier, he had dated Danielle’s mother Brenda, while simultaneously being seduced himself by Brenda’s mother Valerie and Valerie’s own mother, Joan. 

   “How much?” Benjamin asked.
   Danielle was taken aback slightly. It was plain no one had ever offered her money in exchange for sex before.
   After a few seconds it was equally obvious she wasn’t rejecting the matter out of hand, either. She was obviously considering it.
   “A thousand dollars,” she said, as if she routinely issued quotes for access to her body.
   “All right.”
   The pair stood there for a couple of seconds.
   “You have a thousand dollars on you?” Danielle asked.
   Benjamin shook his head dismissively.
   “No, not me, silly. You. You pay me a thousand dollars.”
   “I pay you?” Danielle’s tone was incredulous.
   “Yeah. You can afford it, plus you’re the one who’s half-dressed and wearing six-inch heels.”
   They were standing between the bed and armoire. Benjamin reached out with an index finger and ran it from her chin, down her throat and between her large, firm tits. Then Benjamin took off his coat and started removing his tie.
  “What makes you think I pay for sex?”
   It runs in the family, that’s why.

Click here to read more from The Benjamin Chronicles.