Author Archives: smellincoffee

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About smellincoffee

Citizen, librarian, reader with a boundless wonder for the world and a curiosity about all the beings inside it.

Occupation to vocation

Posted on May 29, 2025 by smellincoffee

For someone my age, I have had surprisingly few jobs: over half my working life has been at the same place! I volunteered in the soundroom at my parent’s church as a teenager, though that doesn’t really count considering the … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Teaser Tuesday & WWW Wednesday

Posted on May 28, 2025 by smellincoffee

ALTOSTRATUS is a bit of a boring cloud. Sorry if that sounds mean, but its featureless, overcast sky just hangs around, with little to say for itself. The most exciting thing Altostratus ever does is lightly drizzle. (Cloudspotting for Beginners) … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Original Sin

Posted on May 26, 2025 by smellincoffee

It was fairly obvious to critics of the Biden administration that the president was in cognitive decline and increasingly unfit to hold office, despite the barrage of Sharp as a Tack! statements emanating from DC’s faithful handmaidens, the corporate press. … Continue reading →

Posted in Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews | Tagged , , , | 8 Comments

Coming to Palestine

Posted on May 24, 2025 by smellincoffee

Given the current horrors going on in Gaza, and that Israel/Palestine is largely a blind spot for me, I figured this was worth a look, especially given that I haven’t read anything on the subject since Peace not Apartheid (2007!) … Continue reading →

Posted in history, Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews, World Affairs | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

WWW Wednesday

Posted on May 21, 2025 by smellincoffee

WHAT have you finished reading recently? Memories from the Microphone, a history of baseball broadcasting. WHAT are you reading now? I’ve been nibbling at a few books this week, but am most committed to Provoked, a history of DC/NATO vs … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | 8 Comments

Audiobook Number Crunching

Posted on May 20, 2025 by smellincoffee

Audiobooks have become a regular part of my reading life in recent years, prompted by one of those free trials that resulted in me discovering how a strong narrator can transform a book. Since then I’ve been and on/off again … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , , , | 10 Comments

Top Ten Book Featuring Travel

Posted on May 20, 2025 by smellincoffee

And as usual, by top ten I mean “the first ten that occurred to me”. But first, the customary tease: The U.S. military is also a “self-licking ice cream cone,” as American GIs called it in Vietnam, dedicated to its … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | 16 Comments

Memories from the Microphone

Posted on May 19, 2025 by smellincoffee

Memories from the Microphone is a history of baseball broadcasting that begins with primitive radio and follows broadcasting into the maturation of radio and television networks. In this, it’s also a partial history of how radio and television developed as … Continue reading →

Posted in General, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Assault by Fire, plus a DNF

Posted on May 17, 2025 by smellincoffee

As a kid, my friends and I often pretended to be soldiers and play-acted in the woods and fields as we might were we actually being attacked. We crawled on our bellies through the grass, took cover behind trees, looked … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , | 4 Comments

Red Metal

Posted on May 15, 2025 by smellincoffee

Something wicked this way comes. In Taiwan, the pro-China candidate has been assassinated, ostensibly by militants who want to protect the current anti-China candidate from not being reelected. China is threatening war and loading troopships as a reprisal. The Russians … Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments