MySpace


MySpace.com | rss | sign in
Dale Lund, A.A.S.



Last Updated: 10/20/2009

Send Message
Instant Message
Email to a Friend
Subscribe

Gender: Male
Status: Married
Age: 60
Sign: Pisces

City: BRANSON
State: Missouri
Country: US
Signup Date: 11/19/2006

Blog Archive
[Older      Newer]
 /  / 
Sunday, October 18, 2009 

Category: Life
The front-page article about me in the Branson Tri-Lakes News on October 14, 2009, can be found at http://oldelephantwings.blogspot.com/2009/10/spider-mail-man.html 


2:32 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Thursday, October 08, 2009 

Category: Life
10:06 PM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Friday, October 02, 2009 




Awhile back, I committed myself to reading every Pulitzer Prize winning fiction book from the year of my birth, 1949, to the present. It had always taken me a long time to get through a book, I had always preferred non-fiction, and I knew nothing about the Pulitzer Prize, so it was a strange challenge for me. I wondered if my reading would get caught up to the present in my lifetime.

Well, only about six years later, I did it! I've read every one, from 1949's winner Guard of Honor to 2009's winner Olive Kitteridge--sixty years of award-winning books. Now I can simply wait each year for the new Pulitzer fiction book to come along, meanwhile reading scores of other books I want to read--mostly non-fiction.

I won't go into my critique of the Pulitzer Prize choices. Suffice it to say, while many of them are excellent books and a joy to read (The Travels of Jamie McPheeters, Lonesome Dove, etc.), many others are a pain to get through (A Fable, American Pastoral, etc.) and if not for what by then I considered a duty I never would have finished them. But what I did get from this challenging project was the discipline to read regularly and never to leave a book unfinished, the ability to read faster, and the relief of knowing that I can complete in six years what I was afraid I wouldn't live long enough to complete.

You can find very brief comments I've made about each book at
 
http://oldelephantwings.blogspot.com/search?q=Pulitzer

3:51 PM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 

Category: Pets and Animals
Sometimes during a heavy rainstorm a colony of ants will seek refuge in a rural-type mailbox. Desperate people, finding thousands of ants climbing through their mail, will get out the poison and spray. Then they wind up with a sticky box full of countless ant carcasses. The best way to get rid of the ants is simply to leave the mailbox open. The ants, not liking the light and the vulnerability, will immediately begin to move out, and will soon be gone, eggs and all, leaving no trace that they were ever there.
11:29 PM 
1 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Tuesday, September 01, 2009 

Category: News and Politics

Despite the wonderful, stress-relieving way Naked News presents the news, the Toronto-based station's commentary on August 31, 2009 was disconcerting. Anchorwoman Katherine Curtis presented the naked truth about the current situation in the United States, and in China. Here is the transcript of the commentary:
"Our prognostication record here at Naked News has been pretty good this year. We forecast the bankruptcy of one or more U.S. auto makers. We forecast the election of Barack Obama four month before the election was held. And not only did we forecast the winner of the last Super Bowl, we gave you the exact score. In plain English, you don't get Nostradamus-style riddle predictions from Naked News.
 
"Now we're looking into our crystal ball once more, and things don't look good for the United States. I believe we're seeing the last days of the United States as the world's undisputed military and economic superpower. Soon that position will belong to China, if it doesn't already. I recently read my national newspaper's business section and saw there were no fewer than five major stories in one day about China and its business ventures, acquisitions and trading restrictions. China is buying up natural resource companies around the world. Its gross domestic product is expected to rise nearly 8%. Compare that to the roughly 2.4% projected for the United States. China is apparently planning to purchase 43 billion dollars worth of overseas energy companies this year alone.
 
"China is proving that, even in a global context, a managed economy can be much more effective than the free market system. That is a scary concept to us free market thinkers, and it's our own fault. Unlike the U.S., China has grown rich by selling products cheaply while, at the same time, restricting what and who can sell into its market. We have to wonder why the U.S. government isn't fighting China's protectionist policies the way they do with, say, Canadian beef and lumber. We also have to wonder why more, ordinary Americans aren't fighting back.
 
"Despite the fact that imported Chinese goods are often, as we discussed in a previous commentary, cheap, largely because they're dangerous, Americans continue to choose cheap over safe. This is also seriously undermining North America's own manufacturing jobs, the life blood of much of the country, for short-term benefits. It's a vicious cycle. Even in good times, Americans want cheap goods, and the cheapest goods come from China. Then American workers suffer job cuts when local manufacturers shut down, and Americans can then only afford cheap goods. While China becomes richer and more powerful, Americans are presiding over their own demise."

As I listened to the commentary, I knew it was true. I had seen it coming, and I remembered the event that guaranteed it happening: Bill Clinton's signing of the China trade bill on October 10, 2000.

Many Americans thought President Clinton should have been impeached for lying directly to us on television, denying having sex in the White House with Monica Lewinsky. But this behavior could be compared to a little boy disgracing his family in a small town, and lying about it so he hopefully wouldn't get into trouble. But when Clinton handed our market, and our future, over to Communist China, it was not simply another juicy soap opera to disgust Americans, it was treason, and for this he should have been not only impeached but imprisoned.
The following is a direct quote from Bill Clinton on the occasion of signing the China trade bill: "Trade with China will not only extend our nation's unprecedented economic growth, it offers us a chance to help shape the future of the world's most prosperous nation and to reaffirm our own global leadership for peace and prosperity."
 
I hope history books in the future, if there is one, will also record the naked truth about Bill Clinton. Today President Barack Obama has shown evidence of having much of the same agenda as President Clinton, bringing back several Clinton people to fill his cabinet. Perhaps our Nation will begin to heal politically in 2012. Hopefully it will begin to heal spiritually now. And it just might be, that the same history books in the future that tell the truth about Clinton will also tell the wonderful and inspirational story of how the American people, by prayer, discipline and perseverance, restored the American dream.
11:53 PM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Monday, August 03, 2009 

Category: Goals, Plans, Hopes
Before I retire, it looks as though I'm going to finish my goal of reading every Pulitzer Prize winning fiction book from the year of my birth (1949) to the present. So now I've made a reading list of books I want to read after I retire on April 1, 2011 or before. Of course the list isn't complete; there will often be a book that comes along that will insert itself into it. And some on the list I've already read, but want to read again (they're marked with an *). Here's the list:

America, I Like You - P.G. Wodehouse
At the Origin of the Christian Claim - Luigi Giussani
Augustine of Hippo - Peter Brown
Beat Poets - ed. by Carmela Ciuraru
The Beats: A Graphic History - Harvey Pekar
Charles Peguy: Basic Verities
The City of God - St. Augustine
Clown - Emmett Kelly
Compendium: Catechism of the Catholic Church*
The Confessions of Saint Augustine
Don Quixote - Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra*
Eden Regained - Herbert Webb*
Emmett Culligan on Water
Ends of the Earth - Roy Chapman Andrews
Explorations in Awareness - John Aiken*
Floodtide of Fate - Olav Dunn
The Hypnotism Handbook  -  Cooke and Vogt
In the Company of Crows and Ravens - John Marzluff
In the Fullness of Faith - Hans Urs Von Balthasar
Jaws of Death: Gate of Heaven - Dietrich von Hildebrand
Jesus of Nazareth - Pope Benedict XVI
King Kong - DeVito and Strickland
Leopardi - Selected Poems
Letters from Steven - Steven Newman
Liberalism is a Sin - Felix Sarda y Salvany
The Life of Christ - Giuseppe Ricciotti
The Life of Father De Smet, S.J. - E. Laveille
Life-Rails - Scott Walker
Life with Father - Clarence Day*
Little Britches - Ralph Moody*
Lord of the World - Robert Hugh Benson
LSD: My Problem Child - Albert Hoffman
The Master of Hestviken (four books) - Sigrid Undset
Morality, Memory and Desire - Luigi Giussani
My Life as a Small Boy - Wally Cox
Never Trust a Naked Bus Driver - Jack Douglas
The New World of Faith - Avery Dulles
Of Norwegian Ways - Bent Vanberg
Our Father's Plan - William Most
Pollyanna - Eleanor Porter
Pollyanna Grows Up - Eleanor Porter
The Portal of the Mystery of Hope - Charles Peguy
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies - Austen and Grahame-Smith
Rally Round the Flag, Boys! - Max Shulman
The Religious Sense - Luigi Giussani*
Seasons of Grace - Gail Fitzpatrick
The Secret of Santa Vittoria - Robert Crichton*
Serendipity - James Wallace Hamilton*
Theology and Sanity - Frank Sheed*
The Theology of the Body - John Paul II
The Trinity - St. Augustine
The Truth of Catholicism - George Weigel
Wake Up, Stupid - Mark Harris
Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories - Jean Shepherd*
Washington's History - Harry Ritter
What Catholics Really Believe - Karl Keating
Where We Got the Bible - Henry Graham
Why the Church? - Luigi Giussani
The Wind from the Mountains - Trygve Gulbranssen
The Wonderful Adventures of Paul Bunyan - Louis Untermeyer*
Zorro Unmasked - Sandra Curtis


1:31 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Saturday, July 18, 2009 

Category: Friends

Before getting married, when I lived alone in an apartment, there was a knock on the door. I opened it and there stood a man not much older than I, whom I didn't recognize. But obviously he recognized me, for he said with enthusiasm, "Hi, Dale!" and as he walked right in, added, "It's been a long time!" We shook hands like old friends, and I was beating my brain trying to figure out who this guy was. He plopped down on my couch, as though he was sure I wanted him to, and I sat down in a chair opposite him, trying to act as if I was seeing an old friend, but still not knowing who he was. He began visiting with me, and I was about to come right out and ask him who he was, when he grinned and said, "Paul's outside."

He turned out to be Tim, a guy who worked for my brother Paul. And Paul is a genius when it comes to practical jokes. He sent Tim in to act like my old friend and totally confuse me. I went to the door and let my mischievous brother in, too, and the three of us had a good laugh.

(By coincidence, Tim wasn't a stranger to me after all. Neither of us knew it during that visit, but when I was in the Army, stationed in Korea, I put an ad in Seattle's underground newspaper, "The Helix," for hip people to write to me. More than a hundred responded, including Tim, and I still had the letter he sent me.)

Well that was a great practical joke, but I thought of one better. What if the joke was on Tim? What if Paul had taken Tim to the apartment of a stranger, telling him his brother lived there, and told him to do just what he did? And when Tim finally watched enough confusion and grinned and said, "Paul's outside," what would he do when the person asked, "Who's Paul?" and Paul would be nowhere to be found?
　
10:48 PM 
1 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Saturday, July 18, 2009 

Category: Life

 

My sister Linda was five when I was born, old enough to help take care of me when I was a baby, yet young enough for us to fight when we were growing up. We were the youngest two of five children, and somehow managed to live in the same house as we watched our older siblings get married and move away.

I was Linda's obnoxious little brother. One episode lodged in both our memories was the time Linda and I were so mad at each other that I threw a pair of scissors at her. She ducked and the scissors broke the window. When our parents came running and got after me for breaking the window, I told them it was Linda's fault because she ducked.

But there were good times, too. She and I would walk downtown to see movies. We made a makeshift dollhouse and played with that together. We celebrated our dog's birthday by putting a candle on canned dog food and donning party hats. And for a Halloween costume contest at a bonfire in town, Linda made herself up to look like a black mammy, and Mom made a full-body pig costume for me, and at the contest Linda held me in her arms. We won a football.

But as Linda struggled her way through teen age and began doing teenage things, I constantly criticized her activities, etc., calling her a "beatnik." She did have good taste in boyfriends, though, most of the time, and I especially liked George, who gave me a secret ride on his motorcycle. But when finally Linda brought her future husband, Ron, home to meet her parents (and obnoxious little brother), while Ron was bending over looking at something Dad was showing him, I hauled off and kicked him in the rear as hard as I could. Since Ron was trying to impress, he didn't do anything about it, but of course Linda never forgot it. Ron turned out to be a great brother-in-law to me, a very good friend who put up with all my craziness.

Over the years, Linda and I have grown closer and closer. Mom and Dad have passed away. Our sister Gloria died all too suddenly. And now, several months ago, Ron died after a long bout with cancer. Besides my own wife and children, Linda is now my closest relative--close in love and closest in distance, with 324 miles between us.

Now my family and I live in the Ozarks, and sometimes I think it's a natural Ozark phenomenon for its inhabitants to become poorer and poorer. I plan to retire, finally, in less than two years, and meanwhile we were down to one, 23-year-old, unreliable car, that lately has been conking out and refusing to start. We've had to watch our money disappear into taxicabs, trying to commute to work (there's no mass transit here). And I was worried about what sort of transportation problems we'd have when I retire.

I wasn't the only one depressed. Last week Linda emailed me, saying that she's been feeling down lately and wanted to come visit us during my three-day weekend to play games with her brother, listen to our old records, etc. We were excited. When she came, I had her pick me up at work, since our car was still giving us problems, and Linda came in a 2003 Chevrolet Venture van she had just bought for herself. It was beautiful and full of modern features we had never even seen before. My wife Micki and some of our kids were with her. And on the way up the highway to pick up our son and take him to work, Linda asked me, "Do you have a two-car discount on your insurance?"

"Well, yeah," I said, "but we don't have two cars."

She said, "Yes you do."

Her being depressed was not true, but only a ploy, an excuse for her to come without us suspecting anything. Really she was very excited and delighted to be helping us. My sister Linda bought us a van and brought it to us--the nicest vehicle we've ever had. How happy I am that, long ago, Linda ducked.
12:26 AM 
1 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Sunday, June 28, 2009 

Category: School, College, Greek
Last night my son had a bloody nose. I told him he should tip his head back, and he told me that that's a common misconception. It's been found that if you do, you then swallow your blood, and that if you swallow two pints of blood, you get sick. This got me to thinking about the brontosaurus. I avidly studied the dinosaurs when I was young, and the brontosaurus was one of the most well known among them. Now it's been found that it was a mistake in skeletal reconstruction and there was never such a creature as the brontosaurus. And I loved studying about other planets in our solar system, and learned how many moons each planet has. Jupiter had twelve. Saturn had nine. Well, Jupiter now has sixty-three known moons. Saturn has forty-six. I'm thankful that Earth still has only one---only one moon, and at least one inhabitant who wonders why the hell he ever went to school.
9:18 PM 
3 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate
Saturday, June 13, 2009 

Category: Writing and Poetry
In a past blog I told about my hobby of reading every Pulitzer Prize winning fiction book from the year I was born, 1949, to the present. When I began, it was a challenge for a slow book reader like me to catch up to the present before I die; but it looks like I'll have no trouble after all (God willing). After finishing each book, I jot down a brief comment about it, and I thought I'd share these comments with you. As I finish the books not yet read, I'll edit this blog by adding my comments.

GUARD OF HONOR (1949, Cozzens) - Too much characterization. Not enough plot.
THE WAY WEST (1950, Guthrie) - Very good. You ride right along with them on that hard journey.
THE TOWN (1951, Richter) - Excellent book. Very different, and not predictable. Prose flows.
THE CAINE MUTINY (1952, Wouk) - Excellent. Couldn't put it down.
THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA (1953, Hemingway) - Profundity in simplicity. Inspires one to write.
A FABLE (1955, Faulkner) - Terrible. Not recommended, except as a cruel joke. Beautiful words, but what did they say?
ANDERSONVILLE (1956, Kantor) - Very good book, yet depressing and too long. Kept interest, but relieved when finished.
A DEATH IN THE FAMILY (1958, Agee) - Simple, very descriptive, very realistic. Good book.
THE TRAVELS OF JAMIE McPHEETERS (1959, Taylor) - Wonderful work! Like Huckleberry Finn. Couldn't put it down. Was sorry it ended.
ADVISE AND CONSENT (1960, Drury) - Unexpectedly excellent! Makes me more patriotic, more conservative, and interested in government.
TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (1961, Lee) - The excellent movie was faithful to the book, and the book contains more good story and meat than the movie.
THE EDGE OF SADNESS (1962, O'Connor) - Very good. Slow moving, seemingly without plot, but toward the end couldn't put it down. Moving.
THE REIVERS (1963, Faulkner) - No reader should have to learn how to make sense of an author's writing. Nevertheless, after not understanding much of the beginning, finally learning how to read around Faulkner's parentheses, the book made sense once the trip began, and it turned out to be an enjoyably good story.
THE KEEPERS OF THE HOUSE (1965, Grau) - I liked this book. Well written, it gives you thoughts to carry with you.
COLLECTED STORIES OF KATHERINE ANNE PORTER (1966) - It's my understanding that stories must have endings. The Collected "Stories" of K.A.P. is a misnomer.
THE FIXER (1967, Malamud) - A book full of suffering and with no ending.
THE CONFESSIONS OF NAT TURNER (1968, Styron) - A disturbing book--well written.
HOUSE MADE OF DAWN (1969, Momaday) - The many flashbacks are sudden and confusing--hence boring.
COLLECTED STORIES OF JEAN STAFFORD (1970) - An OK book, well written, but only a few of the stories did I get caught up in.
ANGLE OF REPOSE (1972, Stegner) - Took patience to get through it, but it's good. Neat mix of past and present.
THE OPTIMIST'S DAUGHTER (1973, Welty) - Easy to get through. Causes one to think about his own life more.
THE KILLER ANGELS (1975, Shaara) - Superb book--hard to put down. Sparked new interest in the Civil War.
HUMBOLDT'S GIFT (1976, Bellow) - Seemed a long time to get through. Had trouble relating to the characters, and perhaps this is a good thing.
ELBOW ROOM (1978, McPherson) - Some stories flowed; the last one stumbled. Was happy to finish the book.
THE STORIES OF JOHN CHEEVER (1979) - Flowing style, some stories pulled me in, many didn't--but it took forever to get through it.
THE EXECUTIONER'S SONG (1980, Mailer) - Book was too long, but it kept my interest.
A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES (1981, Toole) - Wonderfully enjoyable book. Inspires me to write. This is my second reading of it, and I was sorry to see it end.
RABBIT IS RICH (1982, Updike) - Even pornography can somehow earn a Pulitzer.
THE COLOR PURPLE (1983, Walker) - A well-written and inoffensive presentation of feminism and lesbianism.
IRONWEED (1984, Kennedy) - Increases your care for "bums." Good book.
FOREIGN AFFAIRS (1985, Lurie) - A boring book for bored women, except pages 140 and 173.
LONESOME DOVE (1986, McMurtry) - The book I dreaded for its thickness turned out to be my favorite Pulitzer so far. I slid enthusiastically through its 820 pages.
A SUMMONS TO MEMPHIS (1987, Taylor) - A waste of time.
BELOVED (1988, Morrison) - Sections are not chronological and their transitions are so subtle that I kept losing track of where (when) I was. Contained some terrible images of slavery and its desperate result. Didn't end right.
BREATHING LESSONS (1989, Tyler) - Anne Tyler is a great studier of people. Enjoyable book--and thoughtful.
MAMBO KINGS PLAY SONGS OF LOVE (1990, Hijuelos) - A boring book by a horny author.
RABBIT AT REST (1991, Updike) - A bit slow at times, but generally good. Better than "Rabbit is Rich."
A THOUSAND ACRES (1992, Smiley) - Good book, as my reading speed shows. Takes you through a gamut of emotions.
A GOOD SCENT FROM A STRANGE MOUNTAIN (1993, Butler) - Good, easy-to-read book of short stories increasing appreciation for our Vietnamese immigrants.
THE SHIPPING NEWS (1994, Proulx) - Good book. Liked the Newfoundland setting. Although strange, was easy to relate to.
THE STONE DIARIES (1995, Shields) - Lack of organization in writing enhances the realism of this woman's life story.
INDEPENDENCE DAY (1996, Ford) - Boring book about a character I have nothing in common with. The only action was a boy getting hit in the eye by a baseball. Pulitzer???
MARTIN DRESSLER: TALE OF AN AMERICAN DREAMER (1997, Millhauser) - I sailed through this book, and it will stay with me.
AMERICAN PASTORAL (1998, Roth) - Seemed disorganized, with too much dwelling on distractions. Boring. No plot--just an upsetting situation. No real ending, after all that.
THE HOURS (1999, Cunningham) - If you can get past the idea that life is futile, and if you like homosexuality, you'd probably like this book.
INTERPRETER OF MALADIES (2000, Lahiri) - Very good writing! A delight to read these short stories. Especially liked the last two.
THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER AND CLAY (2001, Chabon) - Jews and especially homosexuals guaranteed it a contemporary Pulitzer win. Okay book, but not as good as its cover.
EMPIRE FALLS (2002, Russo) - Good book. Good author. I liked it. Not mind-blowing, but life expanding nevertheless.
MIDDLESEX (2003, Eugenides) - There is a lot in this book!  Worthy of a Pulitzer.  Either this is a true story, or the author is a genius.
THE KNOWN WORLD (2004, Jones) -  With the subject of black slavery assuring its Pulitzer, this book bounces around but comes together at the same time.  I liked the ending.
GILEAD (2005, Robinson) -  Unusual book for a Pulitzer--a Christian book--written as a diary of a minister, a letter to his young son he is too old to raise.  Being the son and grandson of ministers, I could relate to this book and it's made me more thoughtful.
MARCH (2006, Brooks) -  Excellent book taking place in and around the Underground Railroad and the Civil War--a must-read for fans of Alcott's "Little Women."
THE ROAD (2007, McCarthy) -  Excellent book--easy to read and hard to put down. If you want to appreciate more what you have, read this book.
THE BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF OSCAR WAO (2008, Diaz) -  Despite the fact that you need to know Spanish to get the full meaning of this book, despite the cussing, despite there being more abortions in it than quotation marks, I can't say that I disliked the book. It's a depressing read, about a family curse, but I couldn't help liking Oscar.
OLIVE KITTERIDGE (2009, Strout) -  A life-changing book, good reading all the way through.
1:31 AM 
0 Comments
(Add Comment) |
Translate