Author Archives: smellincoffee

Unknown's avatar

About smellincoffee

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

WWW Wednesday + Best Teacher

Posted on June 10, 2026 by smellincoffee

WWW Wednesday WHAT have you finished reading recently? To Rescue the American Spirit. WHAT are you reading now? A surprise SF title and A Time to Heal by Gerald Ford. Also trying to finish Kennedy and Nixon. Oh, and I … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | 9 Comments

Teaser Tuesday, brought you by yet another dead president

Posted on June 9, 2026 by smellincoffee

“Christ, Jerry, isn’t this a wonderful country? Here we can talk about this and you and I can be friends, and eighteen months from now I’ll be going around the country kicking your ass in.”That, I thought, was a one … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged | 6 Comments

To Rescue the American Spirit

Posted on June 6, 2026 by smellincoffee

While I hadn’t planned to read Thedore Roosevelt until I’d finished off Garfield, etc,  the ladyfriend bought this for me and I  found it fairly absorbing – as in hey, why not spend two hours after work each day reading … Continue reading →

Posted in history, Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

A Radical Exercise in Liberty

Posted on June 5, 2026 by smellincoffee

The Declaration of Independence: A Radical Exercise in Liberty  is a unique work,  as it is a history of how the Declaration came to be – not only politically, but philosophically. It begins as formal history,  recounting the early 1770s … Continue reading →

Posted in history, Politics and Civic Interest, Religion and Philosophy, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

WWW Wednesday + Long and Short Reviews Prompt

Posted on June 2, 2026 by smellincoffee

Today’s prompt from Long and Short Reviews is, unique YouTube videos we have seen lately. But first, WWW Wednesday! WWW Wednesday WHAT have you finished reading recently? The Letters of JFK, edited by Martin Sandler. Very nearly finished with Brad … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Teaser Tuesday

Posted on June 2, 2026 by smellincoffee

“When you talk to [John F. Kennedy] or see him you always have the impression that his big white teeth are ready to bite off a huge hunk of life. There is determination in his green Irish eyes. He has … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , | Leave a comment

The Lettahs of JFK

Posted on June 1, 2026 by smellincoffee

Having finished listening to George H.W. Bush’s family read his personal letters and diary entries across fifty years in All the Best,  I could not very well refrain from the temptation of reading JFK’s letters.  The Letters of JFK, however, … Continue reading →

Posted in history, Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Moviewatch, May 2026!

Posted on June 1, 2026 by smellincoffee

BUCKLE UP! May 2026’s moviewatch is….eclectic. Or, as President Bush might say, eckalectic. “Oh, God, he’s doing presidents again” you say? Yes. Yes, I’m doing presidents. And other stuff! Frost/Nixon, 2008.   Watching this because I’m fully in the presidential … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

May 2026 in Review

Posted on May 30, 2026 by smellincoffee

So ends the merrie month o’ May; the green buds are no longer swelling, but bursting into full flower. Summer is here, what I….lovingly….call the Great Sticky Siege. The outside world is quickly becoming not a place of warmth and … Continue reading →

Posted in General | Tagged | 11 Comments

All the Best, George

Posted on May 29, 2026 by smellincoffee

. All the Best is a collection of Bush Sr’s letters, diary entries and emails, prefaced by him and read to varying degrees by his family — including “Bar” whose first particular entry is heartbreaking. As a 1990s kid, there … Continue reading →

Posted in history, Politics and Civic Interest, Reviews, World Affairs | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment