brainsplotch

Berlin Shuffle (Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz). This is another book that passed across my desk at the library and piqued my curiosity. Since I've been interested in German history more in the last five years than any time in my life, I placed a hold on it. This promises to be another of my "word vomit"-type book reviews. I want to get my thoughts down before I forget. Since Berlin Shuffle is a novel, I will avoid spoilers.  Allow me to cut to the chase and declare my enjoyment of this book. Berlin Shuffle , written in 1937, takes place in approximately 1929. At this time, Germany is a country reeling from World War I and the Treaty of Versailles, buried by draconian reparations it can't hope to repay, struggling with inflation and unemployment. So in this setting, we have several characters who for various reasons are beaten down by life in post-Great War Germany. These characters are as follows:  Fundholz is an older man (between 65-70) who is possibly/pr...

Amidst all the horrors taking place in Minneapolis right now--I swear that every week and almost every day the terribleness changes location--I managed to finish reading a book. It was just the sort of book I needed right now. When Winning the Earthquake: How Jeannette Rankin Defied All Odds to Become the First Woman in Congress (by Lorissa Rinehart) crossed my desk at work last month, I was quickly intrigued. I had never heard of Jeannette Rankin. In all the American history classes I took at an undergraduate, I don't recall ever hearing her name. This probably speaks to the way history was taught in the 1980s, and how women's stories were relegated to Women's Studies courses. It's a shame, because Jeannette Rankin was an incredible and inspiring person. I want to share my impressions of the book and of Rankin's life right here on this blog because for one, it's fresh in my mind and secondly, I want anyone reading this blog to seek out this book ei...

Oof, sorry about the buzzkill that was my last blog post. I was not feeling good that day, not that I'm that more upbeat today. I mean, we're still living under the Trump regime. How much happier could I get? I hope there's a day in the future where we can just say, "Wow, what a relief we survived THAT! What the heck was THAT about?! We lost our minds for [??] years." Do we have to live through some of the darkest years in American history in order to emerge into the light and a better future? Or am I delusional. All I know is I can't cave in to despair, particularly when our president is such a buffoon. (On the other hand, his buffoonery could get us into trouble if there aren't any adults in the room to reign in his worst implulses. For example, need I reiterate how batshit crazy this "take over Greenland" nonsense is?). After my lowpoint on Thursday morning, spending far too much time doomscrolling, I had a nice late afternoon and ...

I am sitting on the living room couch after work on Friday evening and I can feel the chill from outside. It's allegedly 19 degrees outside ("feels like 10" according to the weather app on my phone. All I know is it feels frigid, even in the house. I wrote that first paragraph almost two weeks ago and never got back to it. I'm still cold. Looking at social media news posts this morning, I found myself spiraling worse than I have in months. I had to look away for my own sanity. The depression and despair was overwhelming. Never in my life did I, in my wildest imagination, picture the United States lowered to such depths as we watch fascism and authoritarianism envelop us, while also making enemies all over the world. For example, the threats to invade Greenland are insane. We have elected--make that RE-elected, a madman. He is completely out of his mind and nobody in a position of power has the bravery to do anything about it.

Well, we made it through another year. With the way things are going in the world, and the barrage of nonsense that comes out of our presidential administration on a daily basis, that's no small feat. Here's hoping we all survive 2026, too. I have spent the bulk of today reading as much as possible to get my 2025 book total to a modest 30 titles. (Several of those are children's books that I've read while at work--so it's even less...well... "impressive" is not exactly the correct word. Maybe, "more pathetic"?) It's certainly paltry compared to people I know who routinely crank out 75+ books every year. When I see them post those statistics, I wonder what exactly they're reading and whether they do anything else in their lives other than read books. Then I can't help but ask how many of those are audiobooks. It all concludes with me feeling like an underachiever who should resolve to watch fewer movies and less television. But who am ...

I said I was gonna write another "Seattle post" and, as usual, didn't get on that when I should have. So here's part two of this very loosely based on Seattle theme. In this case, it's the band Screaming Trees. I wrote about the Trees a few years ago when bassist Van Conner died. I have been on a Screaming Trees jag recently after finding a cache of their CDs at my favorite local record shop, Flat Back & Circular. The CDs in question ar the 1985-1989 SST Records anthology, and the two Epic Records albums I didn't already have, Uncle Anesthesia and Dust . It reaffirms my opinion that the Trees were among the most under-appreciated, underrated bands of the '90s "grunge" era. I know "underrated" is thrown around too often, but it is wholly appropriate here. If Mudhoney were the most Stooges-inspired garage punk of the Seattle grunge bands, then Screaming Trees were the most '60s psychedelia-inspired (not that all of their songs ca...