Yes I do get commissions.

So click here and buy the book:The Wolves in the Walls

Money I need money cause I have no job and I am broke. Money.

Ok, Mike, great.

Wolf. And Wolves.

Cool. I like it.

I'll buy the book. Do you get commissions, by the way????

...by the way, the mascot of my home town (and of the town football team) in Italy (Avellino) is a wolf (LUPO, in Italian).

http://www.avellinocalcio.net/main.asp

Once more:

"There are wolves in the walls," she told her brother.

"Bats," he said.

"You think it's bats?" she asked.

"No," he said. "I think you are!"

And he laughed for a long time at his own joke although it had not been a particularly good one.

The Wolves in the Walls by Neil Gaiman

Also the Wolves in the Walls website.

And, tonight at least, I was up drinking with our new housemate and some of her friends.

Ummm, just remember if we ever have a Scrabble reunion game, we use the Scrabble dictionary for checking words.

Giulio, the only words you can use from that poem are (in an oddly poem like way):

In this world cruel that herd for so she weep eve and no to and was yet the of whom.

The rest are just words that Chaucer made up and no one else have ever used. Damn, dirty Chaucer.

yeah, right Jeff....



Troilus and Criseyde: Book V (722-728)
by Geoffrey Chaucer


In al this world ther nis so cruel herte
That hir hadde herd compleynen in hir sorwe,
That nolde han wopen for hir peynes smerte,
So tendrely she weep, bothe eve and morwe.
Hir nedede no teres for to borwe.
And this was yet the worste of al hir peyne,
Ther was no wight to whom she dorste hir pleyne.

Those definitions are completely made up! Here's the "real" definition of Wopen:

Dictionary definition for "Wopen"

What can I say...

WE WERE TOO GOOD FOR YOU GUYS !!!!!!!!



P.S. Thanks again for the enlightenment, Mike, though you should be in bed @2:30am

Wopen (p. p.) Wept.

Wopen \Wo"pen\, obs. p. p. of Weep. Wept. --Chaucer.

Wopen 1. wept.

Good thing it isn't in the Scrabble Dictionary or we would have been in trouble.

Maiko and I kicked asses in Scrabble.

Remember the word "ewe'?

I remember this one time I woke up at like 3:30am and I heard the scant pitter-patter of little footsteps in the walls, right near the head of my bed. I sat up, curious as to what may have been going on - was a mother squirrel bringing acorns up to her young? (As an aside, the squirrel probably got the acorns from the basement or maybe even the first floor). Anyway, I got up and quietly went upstairs, following the faint pitter patter of footsteps and I snuck up on the cage.........and it was Guilio! He was in the cage, laughing and drinking a little thing of espresso! Caught in the walls!

Does anyone remember when Guilio tried to use the word "wopen" in Scrabble? I will never forget it........

Thanks for the enlightenment, Mike!

Wow, Giulio is on a first name basis with Martin Luther King, jr.

Actually, "I have a dream...," was repeated 8 times in the speech. I always liked this sentence the best:

"I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."

Unfortunately they don't live in that world, but hopefully they will one day soon.

The only thing I remember is that the 'cage guy' kept emptying the cage from animals every other day....

Anyway, I never knew what was Martin's dream, I just knew he had a dream... Finally I now know the rest of the sentence:


...that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

More excerpts:

"Do you think I should tell the rest of them," she said, "that we have elephants living in the walls of our house?"

The Wolves in the Walls by Neil Gaiman

------

G- No I don't remember how many were finally pulled out of our walls. But I believe there were possums, raccoons, squirrels, and maybe a skunk or two.

But luckily none of them came through the walls and into the house, cause then you know what they say.....

....then it's all over.

And we all would have had to sleep in my old broken down Honda.

hey guys (especially Ann and Mike) do you remember by any chance how many racoons and squirrel were caught in the cage on the roof of 53 Brentwood?
They were all living between the walls of the house...

Continuing excerpts from a children's book for adults

"There are wolves in the walls," she told her mother. "I can hear them."

"No," said her mother. "There are no wolves in the walls. You must be hearing mice, I suppose."

"Wolves," said Lucy.

"I'm sure it's not wolves," said her mother. "For you know what they say.....If the wolves come out of the walls, then it's all over."

The Wolves in the Walls by Neil Gaiman

"Today's failure is a dramatic reminder of the importance of the uninterrupted flow of power to the health, safety, and well being of our citizens and the defense of our country.
"This failure should be immediately and carefully investigated in order to prevent a recurrence.
"You are therefore directed to launch a thorough study of the cause of this failure. I am putting at your disposal full resources of the federal government and directing the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Defense and other agencies to support you in any way possible. You are to call upon the top experts in our nation in conducting the investigation.
"A report is expected at the earliest possible moment as to the causes of the failure and the steps you recommend to be taken to prevent a recurrence.

Lyndon Johnson to the chairman of the Federal Power Commission, after the Great Northeast Blackout on November 9, 1965. 30 million people were without electricity for as long as 13 hours.

The Economist of London notes: In less than two years the United States has occupied two Muslim countries with a combined population of more than 50 million. Afghanistan "remains a failed or nonexistent state" where "the government's writ does not extend much beyond Kabul" and "local warlords, deep into the heroin trade, wield the real power." In Iraq, where a U.S. general says the current condition is "war, however you describe it," there are 161,000 occupying troops, of which 148,000 are American. The largest contingent of the other 13,000 are British and the other 18 participating nations have sent on average a few hundred.

George F. Will
August 19 © 2003 The Washington Post Company

This is from The Copenhagen Post, 14 august 2003.

A young Italian tourist was murdered and is the latest victim in a long list of violent assaults.
Copenhagen's reputation as a safe and peaceful place to visit lay in tatters this week, as police hunted for the murderers of a young Italian backpacker who was savagely stabbed to death in the Norrebro district of Copenhagen over the weekend.

Witnesses said that he became involved in a violent confrontation with two youths, possibly as the victim of a mugging. He was stabbed in the ribs.

After struggling free, Giurra ran towards a taxi stopped at the Blogardsgade-boulevarden junction.

He showed the taxi-driver his bloody stab-wounds and pleaded with him to call the police.Three young passengers in the taxi claimed they did not have a mobile phone - which later proved to be false - whilst the taxi driver said he was unable to summon assistance, 'because his radio wasn't warmed up.'

Giurra continued along Aboulevarden. Once again, he was confronted by his attackers who, this time, stabbed him repeatedly until he collapsed in a pool of blood.

Although paramedics managed to keep him alive, Giurra died in hospital the next day.

What’s your hidden flame?

I feed a flame within, which so torments me
That it both pains my heart, and yet contents me:
'Tis such a pleasing smart, and I so love it,
That I had rather die than once remove it.

Hidden Flame, John Dryden.

It's 2003, Jeff!

Virtual Town !

Congrats, Maiko! Wow. Good luck with that! Did you say that Gulio is in town when you said "G and M are back in town?"

Rooms filled. Katherine M. will be moving in on the first. A non-married female living in the house again. Hooray. She's a PhD student at BU in Computer Science. (So the streak of would be doctors and actual doctors continues)

Maiko, congratulations. I am in Boston, but I leave for New York tomorrow and then for Old Williamsburg on Friday. My friend Andrew is getting hitched, they will be living in DC too, so more reasons for me to visit. Then I will be in Philly for a Radiohead concert and back to New York for some beach time.

No, I am not currently looking for a job. I'm lazy.

Again another bomb in Iraq, again another US soldier died. Now, it might be true the US won the war, but to paraphrase J Heller, the fact is that Iraqi soldiers are not dying anymore, while American soldiers are.

The question: What is raw spelt backwards.

Now I start understanding a bit of Dutch. Yesterday I was able to ujderstand this sentence written on a wall; the translation is something like:

If war is the answer, ... what was the question?

If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut.

Albert Einstein in the Observer 15 January 1950

This is from Bartleby Daily: August 6, 2003

I never think that people die. They just go to department stores.

Andy Warhol

... And if you came this way,
Taking any route, starting from anywhere,
At any time or at any season,
It would always be the same: you would have to put off
Sense and notion. You are not here to verify,
Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity
Or carry report.

Little Gidding, T. S. Eliot