A House Without Books???

"A house without books is like a room without windows. No man has a right to bring up his children without surrounding them with books, if he has the means to buy them. It is a wrong to his family. Children learn to read by being in the presence of books. The love of knowledge comes with reading and grows upon it. And the love of knowledge, in a young mind, is almost a warrant against the inferior excitement of passions and vices."

~ Horace Mann (1796 - 1859) American Education Reformer, U.S. House of Representatives, brother-in-law of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Quotes are Tremendous, Charlie E. Jones, Executive Books, 1995.

Thought for Today:

"With the fearful strain that is on me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die."

~ Abraham Lincoln, (1809 - 1865), 16th American President

(Week of the G8 and G20 Summit, Toronto, Ontario, Canada 2010.)

Your Smile for Today:

"A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It is jolted by every pebble on the road."

~ Henry Ward Beecher, Social reformer, clergyman, author, sister of Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Robert Munsch ~ "Kids Get Up and Leave"

"Kids either keep laughing, or, if they don't like the story, they get up and leave. That's the honest feedback I depend on."

Children's author, Robert Munsch, made up 519 stories over two years and read them to kids in the day-care center where he worked at the time. Out of those 519 stories, he had ten "good stories."
"For a story to be worthy of becoming a book, it must pass a series of tests," Munsch explains. He tells it in the city, in the country, in the north of Canada, the south and then into the Arctic. "Sometimes a story isn't publishable simply because it's too tightly woven into one particular community" he says. *

Every Wednesday is Story Hour in The Neat Little Bookshop. We can vouch for Munsch's theory. Kids love books. They love a good story read with enthusiasm ~ and they get up and leave if they don't like the story.

For first-time authors this is helpful advice: Read aloud to a live audience. (Find Thumper the Rabbit in the red towel; Gizmo the Pekingese on the stool.) You may have to click on photo for larger image.

*Meet the Authors and Illustrators, Deborah Kovacs and James Preller, Scholastic 1991.

Family Holidays

(For larger image, click on photo ~ Lorna)

"FOR MY FATHER ~ Every man needs a hero. I was born to mine."

Maury Allen, American sportswriter, author (b. 1932) Book dedication to his father.

Where Have you Gone, Joe DiMaggio? The Story of America's Last Hero.

Clarke, Irwin & Company Limited, 1975.

A Day Without Laughter

"The most wasted of all days is one without laughter."

~ e. e. cummings, Edward Cummings (1894 - 1962) American poet, author.

Jeremy Henatyzen, author of A White Pebble, the first in a trilogy of literary fiction, takes a break to talk about his sequel A Black Pebble.

We will be following this story to see whether Luther is dead or alive!

Your Smile for Today

"Life is mostly froth and bubble,

Two things stand like stone ~

Kindness in another's trouble,

Courage in our own."

~ Richard Harris Barham, English novelist (1788 - 1845) Ingoldsby Legends

South of the rattling bridge, we begin our day walking on the banks of the Grand. Spend a few minutes of leisure time in nature and begin the day with greater optimism.
Hourly, the park activities progress. The walkers, joggers, boaters, fishermen and lovers of water arrive.

The river bank in Cayuga is dedicated to past councillor and Kinsman, Robert Baigent, a hands-on guy who was once seen in his busy day digging the hole for the park street light.

A Song of Joys

'O the sweetness of the Fifth-month morning upon the water as I row just before sunrise toward the buoys..."

~

A Song of Joys, Walt Witman, American author (1835 - 1910)

Photos: Canada Geese, The Grand River, Cayuga

Skirting the river road, (my forenoon walk, my rest,)

Skyward in air a sudden muffled sound, the dalliance

of the eagles,

The rushing amorous contact high in space together,

The clinching interlocking claws, a living, fierce, gyrating wheel,

Four beating wings, two beaks, a swirling mass tight

grappling,

In tumbling turning clustering loops, straight downward falling,

Till o'er the river pois'd, the twain yet one, a moment's lull,

A motionless still balance in the air, then parting,

talons loosing.

Upward again on slow-firm pinions slanting, their

separate diverse flight,

She hers, he his pursuing.

~

The Dalliance of the Eagles, Mark Twain, American author (1835 - 1910)

Photos: The Grand River, Cayuga. Long shadows of early morning ~ Lorna

Click on photos for larger image.

The Chip Wagon, Talbot Rd. (Hwy # 3, Close to the bridge.) Home of the healthy~ Coming Soon ~ Janice Burger! Details as soon as we have them.

We think Janice's burger is turkey on rye with lettuce, tomato and various other options including currie sauce.

Our theme of Health and Fitness caught up with us!

Cayuga trainer, Janice Jacobs, nudged us until this morning we checked into her class. No excuse for not getting into shape. Janice bends, bounces, shakes and lifts weights (yes, weights. You can choose 4 lb., 3 lb., 2 lb. or even 1 ~ go heavier if you wish...)
For over an hour, starting 9:00 a.m. sharp, every Wednesday morning, Janice "dances" her way through a fun workout.
To get to TC's Gym, find the Cayuga Stephan's V & S Department Store on Hwy. # 3 (near Hwy.54 or Munsee St.); go to the parking lot behind.
TC's Gym, 8 Mckay St., E.
905-772-9117

tcsgym@mountaincable.net
Tomorrow: Janice has a healthy turkey burger named after her.

Click on photos for larger image.

Your Smile for Today:

Work:

"The happiest people do not necessarily have the best things. They simply appreciate the things they have."
~ Warren Buffet

"Nothing is really work unless you would rather be doing something else."
~ James M. Barrie

"Nothing is particularly hard if you divide it int0 small jobs."
~ Henry Ford

"Don't stay in bed, unless you can make money in bed."
~ (Who else?!) George Burns

Treasury of Wit & Wisdom, The Reader's Digest Association, Inc., 2006

Community Closet, a new business on Cayuga Street, has everything from garden tools to a Sunday suit! Come by and visit the friendly staff.

HOURS:

Tues. & Wed. 10 - 4
Thurs. & Fri. 10 - 6
Sat. 10 - 3

5 Cayuga St. (The Blue Space)

Organized and operated by Community Living, Community Closet is a welcome neighbour, serving the community, asking the question, "What is in your closet?"

Their changing window features items for sale ~ Always something interesting. You can see it from the stoplight on Hwy #3. (They have BOOKS too!!)
For more information, call 905.772.3344. Ext. 227.

(Click on photos for larger image.)

Town of Haldimand has joined Facebook. The profile is hours old but the content is prehistoric. Check out Jeff Ballin's amazing photographs of the turtle. Up close and personal ~ look into the very old face of a snapper. Watch him walking. Who said turtles were slow!

Log in to Facebook. Search Town of Haldimand Tourism and follow the latest happenings around town.

Jane Austen Tested Prose on Visitors

According to author Eric Burns, any author who truly cares about his work will read it audibly. "The writer will make sure there are no missed beats to distract us from his literary designs."
"He will pick up his typescript,...listen as [the words] ascend from the page, bouncing off the walls of his study and back again, returning to him in what is, in terms of cadence, their natural state."

"I find it necessary," John Steinbeck (1902 -1968) once said of his recitations, "for the sake of the rhythms."

Jane Austen (1775 - 1817) regularly held formal presentations in her parlor, serving tea and biscuits.
"As Miss Austen reads to friends and visitors, her eyes flit up, work the room, monitoring the effects of her prose. Is anyone yawning, looking away, scratching an imaginary itch? How many people are leaning forward hanging on the next words?

The author is like a comedian trying out new material on a weeknight at the Improv, sensitive to any nuance that will tell her whether it plays poorly or well."
Charles Dickens (1812 - 1870) travelled doing readings, tempering his work based on the mood of the time.

Moliere (1622 - 1673), the French playwright, got an initial reaction to his plays by reciting them to his cook.

Burns' observations leaves one wondering if our modern-day readings afford the author feedback of any kind or are book "signings" and readings simply photo-ops and promotions for books yet to be "tested."

Eric Burns, The Joy of Books, Prometheus Books, 1995.

Your Smile for Today:

"Nothing is as real as a dream. The world can change around you, but your dream will not. Responsibilities need not erase it. Duties need not obscure it. Because the dream is within you, no one can take it away."

~ Tom Clancy, American novelist, (1947 - )

Ian Klepetar leaves an encouraging message everywhere he goes: Save on Gas. Bicycle.

We caught up with Ian in the bookshop. Sweatband securing his long hair in 85 degree heat, he left Tillsonburg this morning ~ and before many people are awake, he had already bicycled to Cayuga. We didn't ask where he eats or sleeps. (He did volunteer that his mother wouldn't approve of his hygiene.) He filled up his water bottle in the bookshop.

Ian and his family, including his Mom, along with a few friends have an impressive program called Bicycle Benefits, advocating the benefits of bicycling. They have enlisted over 750 businesses in less than three years. Ian left Madison, Wisconsin a week ago ~ his destination, Ithica, N.Y. via Fort Erie.

~

Sign up with Ian at http://www.bicyclebenefits.org/ Click on Our Team for pictures and profiles.

By the way, Ian's favourite book is Walden, H. D. Thoreau. "Thoreau is good company," he said.

"Critical Mess*," a phrase coined by a New York collector, may describe the habitat of most hopeless book lovers. In that particular collector's case, it was thousands of almanacs, old periodicals and booklets.

Herb Martindale, original owner of The Neat Little Bookshop, left us with only one wise piece of advice, "Don't accept everything that everybody brings to you."

We have stopped giving credit for books that are out of fashion and come a dime-a-dozen. However, being book lovers, a good clean book of any genre seems to deserve shelf-space. So we go on quietly making history on Cayuga Street ~ stepping over boxes and piles of books ~ looking more like the original Neat Little Bookshop everyday. Herb would be proud of us.

*A Splendor of Letters, The Permanence of Books in an Impermanent World, Nicholas A. Basbanes.Perennial/HarperCollins Publishers, 2003.

Life ~ Emily Dickenson

~

If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
or cool one pain,
or help one fainting robin
onto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

~ Emily Dickinson, American poet (1830 - 1886) Life

Lilacs, Mount Olivet, Ontario. Photo by Lorna