Smile for Today ~

"Life is what happens to us while we are making other plans."
~ Thomas La Mance

"It takes a long time to become young."
~ Pablo Picasso


"We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star.  But we can understand the Universe.  That makes us something very special."
~ Stephen Hawking

Check us out.  Value Books like new ~ Categories:  Science, Discovery, Exploration, Military, History, Classics, Poetry, Philosophy, Cultural, Inspirational, Nature, Hobbies, Travel, Humour, Health & fitness, Canadiana, Children's & Youth.  Our back room is filled with fiction, shelved alphabetically by author.  Each book is checked and cleaned.  No musty, smoky or chewed books!  Yes, we do take books for a credit toward half of your purchase; however, they must be resalable and recent (within the last couple years.)  With a few exceptions, we do not give credit for hardcover fiction or most large coffee-table books.

The Neat Little Bookshop is proud to feature books by local authors.  These books are new ~ Canadian retail prices.

 

"Don't speak unless you can improve the silence."

~ Spanish Proberb.

(From our friend, Elizabeth Barker.  Elizabeth always tended to be quiet.)

"A Christmas Carol is the most televised, filmed, recorded, radio-broadcast, animated, digitised, burlesqued and set-to-music work in Dickens's entire output (and almost certainly anyone else's), It is additionally by far the most often alluded to."

"Dickens chose A Christmas Carol for the first of his public readings, those bravura performances which so dominated his later career, kicking off in Birmingham on the day after Boxing Day of 1852.

"As a story, not only has A Christmas Carol never died, but it transcends national frontiers and artistic genres."  Dickens's story has inspired readings, movies, music, opera, strip cartoons, novels, plays.  There are annual performances by local theatre groups, puppet versions, T.V. films.  Dickens's characters live on in versions that the author could never have imagined.

~ Charles Dickens ~ A Celebration of his life and work by Charles Mosley.

December 1843 A Christmas Carol
December 1844 The Chimes
December 1845 The Cricket on the Hearth
December 1846 The Battle of Life
December 1848 The Haunted Man

1852 -66 The Christmas Stories

The Cricket on the Hearth

Photo: Wikipedia

A Christmas Carol

"One of the greatest successes of Dickens's career, and the only non-novel of his still widely read, A Christmas Carol started as a frankly commercial project to counterbalance the disappointing early sales of Martin Chuzzlewit.  Dickens conceived it in October 1843 and had finished it by early December.  Part of the time he had spent visiting his now married sister Fanny in Manchester, his chief purpose there being to raise funds for an educational institution to benefit working people.  He gave a speech (alongside the MPs Richard Cobden and Benjamin Disraeli, a future Prime Minister) in which he pointed to ignorance as the parent of misery and crime.  Ignorance and Want are the two feral children the Ghost of Christmas Present reveals to Scrooge in A Christmas Carol."

~ Charles Dickens, A celebration of his life and work.  Charles Mosley, Worth Press Ltd. 2011

Tomorrow:  Charles Dicken's Christmas Books

New Release ~ "FINAL DESCENT The Loss of the Flagship Erie" by Robert D. Schweyer is a well-researched and well-written account of a DC-3 crash in Ontario near St. Thomas in 1941.
The aircraft was an American Airlines passenger plane that went down under mysterious circumstances leaving no survivors.  At the time, this was the worst air disaster occurring in Canada.  "Final Descent" casts light on the early days of air travel and how the basics of air safety we have today were formed.  This book is available in our shop at $18.95.

Trimming the Tree
 
Again we trim the Christmas tree
And gaily deck each bough,
A loving task of many years
As it was then, 'tis now.

[...]
When the task is done we reminisce,
About the trees of the past.
We loved each one, yet vow this one
Is nicer than the last.

And as we gather round the tree,
Remembering other years,
There is a glisten in our eyes,
Perhaps from joy, from tears.

And while reflections of the past
Set every tree apart,
'Tis the same old Christmas spirit
Reflected in each heart.

~ Wilma Willett Fuchs

"Get over it!"
~Ideas from LIFE'S Too SHORT to Fold FITTED SHEETS by Lisa Quinn

Is your house beginning to look like a Where's Waldo book?

• Choose quality over quantity.
• Keep sorting, eliminating, dumping and organizing.
• As you see results, you will be motivated to keep going.
• Traditional toy boxes are black holes.  The smaller toys settle at the bottom. Get the kids a few bins and sort by categories.
• Kitchens are notorious for having redundant appliances, gadgets and food items.  Unless you are Wolfgang Puck, there is no reason to have three food processors and eight spatulas.
• Are you hoarding items that you may need one day?
• Do certain items have sentimental value but you don't want them out in plain view?  Take photos for memory's sake.
• Place two large bins, baskets or bags in your home.  Label the containers "Throw Out" and "Give Away"  Take five minutes a day to find items you no longer need.  When containers are full, throw out or put in your car.
• Paid too much for something?  Embarrassed to admit you made a costly mistake?  Keeping that item is another mistake.  Get over it.