Archives

Tonight we read Winnie-the-Pooh

Jan19

Tonight we read Winnie-the-Pooh in honor of the birthday of A.A. Milne. I love Winnie-the-Pooh, maybe because I often feel like a “bear of very little brain.” I also love this article by Sam Torode from Boundless magazine about how he discovered Winnie-the-Pooh in college. No, Pooh wasn’t in college; Sam Torode was.

Favorite quotations:

“It’s a litle Anxious,” Piglet said to himself, “to be a Very Small Animal Entirely Surrounded by Water. Christopher Robin could escape by Climbing Trees, and Kanga could escape by Jumping, and Rabbit could escape by Burrowing, and Owl could escape by Flying, and Eeyore could escape by – by Making a Loud Noise Until Rescued, and here am I, surrounded by water and I can’t do anything.”

“And how are you?” said Winnie-the-Pooh. Eeyore shook his head from side to side. “Not very how,” he said. “I don’t seem to felt at all how for a long time.”

Pooh looked at his two paws. He knew that one of them was the right, and he knew that when you had decided which one of them was the right, then the other was the left, but he never could remember how to begin.

“Well,” said Pooh, “what I like best — ” and then he had to stop and think. Because although Eating Honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn’t know what it was called.

“I don’t see much sense in that,” said Rabbit. “No,” said Pooh humbly, “there isn’t. But there was going to be when I began it. It’s just that something happened to it along the way.”

And if you don’t see much sense in this blog, just remember that there was going to be sense when I started, but something happened along the way!

Winnie-the-Pooh can be borrowed by member families from Meriadoc Homeschool Library.

Today is Rudyard Kipling’s birthday,

Dec30

Today is Rudyard Kipling‘s birthday, b. 1835, d. 1936. This quotation seems appropriate to our times:

Oh, East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet,
Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat.
Ballad of East and West.

I’m still reading Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman. So far, my favorite quotation from GoA is this:

A question that Wilson asked of Foch during his second visit in January 1910, evoked an answer which expressed in one sentence the problem with the alliance with England, as the French saw it.
“What is the smallest British military force that would be of any practical assitance to you?” Wilson asked.
Like a rapier flash came Foch’s reply, “A single British soldier–and we will see to it that he is killed.”

This might be a good strategy to use with regard to the French and Germans in Iraq. Unfortunately, “honor” is a rather quaint term these days, and avenging one’s countryman is out of fashion. If a single French or German soldier were killed in Iraq, I have a feeling that the French or the Germans would do two things: (1) run as fast and far as they could and (2) blame the Americans for not having provided enough security.