K.P. Gresham's Blog, page 3
January 27, 2025
THE DAILY GRIND: COFFEE TIME!
by Fran Paino, a.k.a. F. Della Notte
Coffee is a staple of life all around the world. Something I can understand and agree with. In “Coffee Facts and Statistics,” Lark Allen offers fascinating stats on the American Coffee habit.
A once famous bishop said, “Americans may not consider themselves ‘addicted’ to coffee, but the average American is physically, biologically, psychologically, and…
January 20, 2025
Frosty Weather!
by Helen Currie Foster
Brr!! It’s so cold the foxes are prowling the front yard looking for snacks and the birds are up at dawn waiting for their humans to show up with the bird feeders.
Dawn and twilight, twilight and dawn: Out here in the Hill Country, planets and stars still visit regularly. Lately Mars (on Jan. 12 it came as close to us as it gets, every couple of years) has been showing…
December 20, 2024
In the Window or On the Table? What I Learned from Amor and Anton
By: Dixie Evatt
Ever since I read A Gentleman in Moscow (2016) I’ve considered Amor Towles writing style to be nearly perfect. So when my niece told me Towles was making an appearance at the Empire Theatre in San Antonio, I booked it. He was there to support the San Antonio Book Festival and to talk about his latest book, Table for Two. It’s a collection of six short stories plus a novella.…
December 10, 2024
Curious Animals and Recent Reads
by Helen Currie Foster
New reads! If, like me, you desperately miss John le Carré, consider A Spy Alone, the 2023 debut spy thriller by Charles Beaumont, a field operative veteran of Britain’s MI-6. https://bit.ly/3ZzHjHs His premise is fascinating: we know of the “Cambridge Five” who spied for Russia from the 1930’s to 1950’s—Kim Philby, Guy Burgess, Donald Maclean, Anthony Blunt and John…
December 2, 2024
AND IT’S CHRISTMAS ONCE AGAIN –
by
Francine Paino a.k.a. F. Della Notte
Thanksgiving fell at the end of November this year, making Christmas feel like tomorrow instead of a few weeks away. The urgency to get everything done makes it more challenging to stay in the true spirit of what Christmas is supposed to mean. Add to that the extreme commercialism that, despite our best efforts, most of us fall into at least a…
November 30, 2024
Stop Signs, Part I
by Kathy Waller
At the end of Thanksgiving Week, I’m sharing a story made from things I’m thankful for: a hometown the size of a broom closet; long, hot summers that started on June 1 and stretched clear to Labor Day; a visiting teenager who spent every spare minute reading Gone With the Wind; bobby socks and garter belts and petticoats; an ornery Presbyterian great-aunt and her ornery…
November 4, 2024
Smiling Damned Villain
by Dixie Evatt
O villain, villain, smiling damned villain…
That one may smile, and smile and be a villain.
— William Shakespeare
Lately I’ve felt as if I have a sesame seed stuck between my molars. Except instead of an annoying seed, it’s an idea I can’t let go of. It started when a group of fellow writers were talking about overuse of certain pat descriptors to express emotions.…
October 29, 2024
The Woods Are Lovely: A Passion for Trees
I’d love to hear about your favorite trees, and favorite tree-climbing.
Helen Currie Foster
October 29, 2024
The mystery is solved! In my search for what I recalled as “the “Blitzkuchen” once served at Schwamkrug’s outside New Braunfels, in the Texas Hill Country, I had the name wrong. It’s a blitz torte, not a blitz kuchen! Several readers sent recipes from German cookbooks indicating that “Blitzkuchen” is a quick cake, usually one layer only. My memory, though?…
October 21, 2024
WIND TURBINES - THEY DANCE!
Francine Paino a.k.a. F. Della Notte
Texas has over 15,300 wind turbines, representing 28.6% of Texas energy generation. These turbines have surpassed the state’s nuclear production in 2014 and coal-fired production in 2020. Windfarms dot the landscape from north to south, with the majority of the windfarms operating in South Texas, along the Gulf Coast, south of Galveston, and in the mountain…
October 14, 2024
A Halloween Story: Hansel and Gretel and Cuthbert and Me
By M. K. Waller
Shakespeare said, A sad tale’s best for winter, but this is only October, and in Texas, that sure ain’t winter. And I don’t feel like telling a sad tale.
Halloween is near, so I shall tell a scary tale, one about a wicked witch and innocent little children.
But with a reminder: Sometimes it’s the innocent little children you have to watch out for.
For you to fully appreciate the…
