It was kind of cool for Central Texas, we have had intermittent rainy weather, which while a little mood-lowering, we have another, more logical side that rejoices in the water falling from the sky as we think back to almost a year of dry and dusty weather, where everything was crispy brown and even the poor birds and squirrels were panting in the heat, their water supplies nearly gone for the most part. A ghost town (or actually ghost foundations) emerged from one of the local reservoirs, having been covered by an artificial lake since the 1930s and rarely seen since. A tour company took boats out into the huge lake, or what is left of it, so that tourists could visit the site. It may be covered up again.

We have been left with one of the family's pet dogs for a couple of days. We took her out briefly to walk through a small copse of trees, many which were conveniently labeled for identification. However, we were dismayed that someone has defaced the names of the trees on some of the labels since our last visit, making them illegible. Since they were printed on a metal backing, we were astonished at the callous purpose of trying to render the little plaques useless. Our dismay was overcome when four or five deer were feeding in an isolated area amongst the trees, and while they regarded us very intently, they did not much more than flick there white tails as the pair of us outsiders regarded a couple of the tawny natives.

Here is a view out the window, a little damp itself. We will be watching the year-end shows on television, and leafing through some tomes. We have prepared some hot soup to offset the chilly weather in the 40s, and we are updating an old laptop with a new anti-virus edition and the dozens upon dozens of Widows updates that it has missed by sitting in the closet unused for months

We flagged the Charlie Brown Christmas Special for watching this year. A little pop-up came up on the television screen a few nights ago telling us it was time, we fiddled with our cable service, and it took a couple of minutes to get the right channel, we wanted the high-definition version.

We started with the scene where Charlie Brown confesses to being "depressed". And that is the crux of the whole show. That in the middle of the happiest time of the year, a supposed small child would confess to one of his peers (that would be LInus) that he was feeling down. And each year since the early sixties, that show has been on.

We only started watching it the last couple of years. And this year we could not finish watching it. It is a fairly short cartoon, but it set our teeth on edge. Maybe it is just us, because we checked on Amazon, and there are over 230 reviews of the special. That is a lot of people who grew up with the show. We did not grow up with it. We ignored it for decades. But now, out of nostalgia, we do look back on the halcyon days of yore, when conspicuous consumption was the rule, in the show they actually refer to an aluminum tree.

This year maybe things are not so conspicuous. But we feel from watching the television, that we should buy, buy, buy. And that is not a bad thing, not really evil, because the workers in the stores need their jobs too. We sell stuff here, mostly books, but maybe we should be reading more, or listening to our own compact discs, since the television is hypnotizing us with the endless parade of things that we don't really want. Here is our little version of a Charlie Brown sweater. We took the zig-zag line and made it like a stock market graph.

We think back over the many Christmases, and we know that they were not always filled with glee. It is the darker time of year. Even for people who do not celebrate Christmas. Maybe it is different in the Southern Hemisphere, there it is the beginning of summer.

Maybe we need one of those light boxes that we saw on the Doctor Oz show. They generate a high lumen light that dispels the seasonal blues from the shorter days. Actually here in Central Texas, we should just walk outdoors, We are just about far enough south in terms of latitude, that we could probably get some extra Vitamin D in our systems if we went out at mid-day. But we need to get out and get some Vitamin D.

We cannot complain since on the plus side, it has been raining here in Central Texas. The local streams are no longer bone-dry, though we look hopefully at the skies, since the reservoirs are still mostly emptying, even with the mild rains.

The last few days have been gray and cold. After all the record-breaking heat over the summer, it is a refreshing change, somehow we think we should be re-radiating the heat that we stored up during the last 6 months for so, but that is not working. It is probably all a matter of mental attitude. We saw a guy featured on a program about Barrow, Alaska, and when it was 30 below, he walked around in a tee-shirt. We don't know how he did it, because that is frost-bite weather, but he has somehow acclimated himself to it. He was interviewed by Jim Cantore on the weather Channel, just type in Barrow on their video search to see this remarkable man's adaptation.

Here is the special on DVD, available on Amazon for a reasonable price:

We have a cactus growing in our office. Actually it is more of succulent plant, native to the coasts of Brazil. We don't pay much attention to it, we water the plant when we remember. It does not have any spikes or needles, it is just a kind of thin, if somewhat jagged looking member from south of the Equator.

And then in the Fall (that would be Autumn to our British fans), we put it outside in the dimming light of the latter part of the year. That diminution of light and the shorter days causes our "Christmas Cactus" to begin forming buds, and within the last few days, they have blossomed into a resplendent collection of waxy white flowers, with just a hint of pink. We were lucky this year, because an overnight frost can actually kill the whole plant, but this year it only got down to the high thirties, and then we decided to bring the plant indoors for safekeeping.


The only problems is that the lights will throw off the flowering mechanism, so we may take it back outdoors as the weather oscillates between hot and cold, as it is wont to do in Central Texas in winter. We can have a balmy day in the 80s as befits a Southern climate, but a blast of cold air from the Arctic can mean ice in the birdbath a couple of days later.

This is probably the best year we have ever seen for our "Holiday Cactus" (for those of you who do not believe in or do not participate in Christmas). It is also called the "Thanksgiving Cactus", and in our case the buds had actually formed earlier than Thanksgiving.

Whatever you call it, the proper scientific name is a member of the genus Schlumbergera, though we have not identified the particular species. It is an epiphyte in its natural habitat, meaning that it is an "air plant" that lives in crooks of a tree. We have it planted in some old soil that has been around for years, and do not pay too much attention to it. Last year we left a flourishing pot of the plant that had grown from a little stubby segment into a pot-full, but we neglected to protect it from frost and the plant dissolved quickly into an unsightly ooze.

Here are some books about science if you are interested in such things. The pictures link to eBay:

Science Books - qsell

Buzz: The Science and Lore of Alcohol and Caffeine Medieval and Early Modern Science Vol. I Molecules Of Emotion: The Science Behind Mind-Body Medi The Boundaries of Natural Science - Rudolf Steiner Pbk Science Morality and Feminist Theory Fragments of Science, Being a Series of Detached Essays Design of Building Frames (Architectural Science) Optimal Design (Science Paperbacks)

Some people love the Christmas / Hanukkah / End-Of-Year / Winter Solstice celebrations so much that they hardly put away the decorations, before they start planning the next year's celebration.

When we are not reading books, we settle in for an hour or so after work hours to see what is on television, and we see the Red-Suited Wonder running all over the place already (that would be Santa for our international readers who may be unfamiliar with our customs).

He is equivalent to "Father Christmas", only he does not carry the switch that the some sterner European versions of Santa Claus carries. That is switch as in whip, not in on-off. Because, as we informed years ago, Father Christmas is also disciplinarian, and if their are naughty children, presumably he has the birch wooden switch at the ready.

At least that is what we are told by someone who had been born and raised in a couple of unnamed European countries. A quick search that we just did reveals that apparently there is a move to reform the custom, as it is too "frightening" in today's time for children, though we are reassured in any case, that even the sterner Father Christmas is never known to have actually used the whip / switch.

But we were certainly surprised to hear about it, it is a frightening enough prospect to contemplate given our contrasting benign and "jolly" American version of Santa who is usually pictured smacking his lips over a refreshing beverage.

And don't forget the holiday celebration begins officially with a Thanksgiving Parade in New York on this coming Thursday. We won't have a giant balloon, carried by a small army of volunteers, because we thought a giant inflatable book might be a little dull on network television.

We are not big celebrators of any of the holidays, because we are usually busy with the day-to-day details of running a book business. But between the ideas of a Black Friday and the newer Cyber-Monday, we feel we should make at least a symbolic holiday offering. Not exactly a "doorbuster", but in a virtual store, there are no doors, only "portals". And since people get rowdy on Black Friday in some stores, we skip the whole thing.

Not that we want to encourage excessive consumption, most of our merchandise is already attractively priced, especially since we have a lot of out-of-print items in our inventory, some of which are one of a kind.

And then  before you know it in six weeks, it is New Years, and the Rose Bowl parade marches through Pasadena. Our claim to fame is that we actually went to Pasadena a couple of times for the parade. It was fun. The pretty girls look you right in the eye and smile as they wave. You can also smell the perfume of the flowers on the floats as they roll by, and you can see the actual marshal of the parade in all of their resplendent glory.

We saw Jimmy Stewart one time riding in an antique car, while he was still alive, and, Ricardo Montalban was riding atop a big yellow pyramid float, having something to do with Mexico, since the pyramid looked vaguely like the one at Chichen Itza in the Yucatan.

We were able to pull the pictures ot that from storage, and maybe we will put them online for your holiday admiration later. There is nothing like a big parade. And there there is something about an aging Hollywood star, riding on an imitation of an ancient Mayan monument on wheels, with the faint aroma of diesel smoke from the floats' engines wafting through the air to create a memorable moment that we can recall decades later. We see he was wearing a trademark white suit, made famous in all those Fantasy Island television episodes.

In Montalban's defense he looked much better in the "Wrath of Khan" the Star Trek movie which was released around the same time. And his biceps in that movie looked marvelous, unlike our own pipestem, book-holding appendages. So, honestly, he looked better than we did, even though at the time, we were decades younger than him.

We won't be sponsoring a float this year, revenues are a little down, and once again, our float idea for a giant shelf of books on wheels was voted down by the higher-ups as just a little too staid. That is because about 95 percent of our merchandise is old fashioned, hold-in-your-hand books. We do sell other items like compact disks, even a few DVDs. We have a list of over a thousand items - look at the link at the very top of the page where it says "Books For Sale" and click there to see a giant alphabetized list.

We have had a mint condition CD of Tony Bennett Christmas songs sitting on the shelf for a couple of years now, and we cannot believe that someone has not snapped it up.

If you are a Tony Bennett fan, or know one, it is the only "new" (actually it is years-old, but it is still in the shrink wrap) copy on the Internet, at least the last time we checked. You can click on the picture link to be whisked to the My-Lynx Associates website, where you can sign up in a minute. It is also available on other websites such as eBay and Amazon, but on Amazon it is lumped in with a bunch of other sellers, so it is a little harder to find. The eBay link is below the My-Lynx Associates picture link, we have a little store there on eBay that goes by the name of hitechandantique.com.

Snowfall CD / DVD on eBay - qsell

Snowfall: The Tony Bennett Christmas Album (W/DVD)

We were out in the yard trying to capture the glory of the November moon back on the 11th. As the Winter season approaches, the moon conveniently rises higher in the sky, to seemingly compensate for the lower arc of the sun, as it migrates farther into the Southern half of the sky,

The darker and longer shadows of the day as the angle of light lowers in the sky is a sobering reminder of the approach of the Winter season. The days shorten, but then the moon moves higher, and around the full moon, it shines more brightly and longer. This month's moon is also referred to as the "Hunter's Moon", presumably because the folks who used to hunt would use the long nights to fill their larders for the approach of the cold weather. We have been watching the squirrels, and when we put out some seed for the birds, they are right there to gobble it up. And when we are taking our books to the Post Office in the early pre-dawn hours, we have to drive slowly and keep a watchful eye for deer, since they also are more active in the cooler weather of Fall (that would be Autumn for or British visitors).

This month's photo was taken in the later part of the evening, and we shot the moon through some leaves in a tree, which we thought would look artistic. It appears to us, that it is more like a pinkish tunnel through a tunnel of leaves. The camera seems to have picked up the distance to the tree leaves and photographed them in focus, with the sphere of the moon behind it more of a fuzzy glow than a circle. It is something we like to do however, since it marks the passing of a lunar month, and after a few full moons, we are in a different season.

(That would be Autumn Day for our British Followers)

It is fall, the temperatures have finally dropped in the last week or so from the 80s and 90s down to the 60s and 70s. We are located in Central Texas, and we had record breaking temperatures since May. But now we can go outdoors without a water bottle in our hands to replenish the water from our reactions to the heat. Right now we are filtering through our book stacks, trying to bring some order to our unsold inventory. Not very exciting a topic to blog about, but we are busy nevertheless with the quotidian details of running an online bookselling business. If we want excitement, we just look inside our books.

Here are some items for sale on eBay, they are on sale on our other sites as well, if you need to find out more, do not hesitate to use the "contact us" link above, and we will send you links to the exact item on other websites.

My eBay items - qsell

Saikano, Volume 4 by Shin Takahashi Whiskey Sour They Call Me Ranger Ray by Ramiro Martinez The Body Myth: Adult Women and the Pressure to be Perfe Feeling Good: Strength Training with Your Significant E Fanfare for Earth: The Origin of Our Planet and Life Self-Promotion for Introverts: The Quiet Guide to Getti Buzz: The Science and Lore of Alcohol and Caffeine The Improvement Guide (Signed by Cliff Norman with dedication) The Body Sculpting Bible for Men, Revised Edition: The

The moon is never quite the same from night to night, and for that matter from month to month. In the summer, the moon is lower down in the sky and comes up later in the evening. Then as winter approaches, it moves back to a higher arc in the sky, and around the full moon it complements the advancing darkness of winter by moving higher in the sky to more fully illuminate the longer night when the sun is below the horizon.

It helps and seems to complement the darker days of Fall and Winter with the dim, but still useful light. The moon is in "waning gibbous" mode as of now, so it is still up in the sky, a little more than half full right now, casting a dim glow over the late night landscape. Sometimes we come into the office in the middle of the night, and we can see the reflection of the moonlight across the outer walls, which are white.

Wikipedia even has a short article on the Hunter's Moon, last week's named lunar event, which according to them is the next successive full moon after the Harvest Moon, though we heard a meteorologist say that they were both the same thing.

This picture came out a little oddly with the leaves of a nearby oak tree seeming to cradle the moon in its branches.

Yesterday we started our reflections on why reading physical books is different than reading material on an electronic device that is either connected to the Internet, or how television affects concentration.

By way of explaining this odd situation: some people say that television programs are just a way of getting you to watch the commercials. We don't make any bones about it here - we sell books, a way of elevating your mind, entertaining your inner self, and doing it without the tears of boredom, or even worse, the prolonged anxiety of wondering what is on another channel. Or worse, changing your mental patterns into a semi-trance state. One study says that it can encourage slow-wave alpha state forms of awareness, which have certain characteristics that are different than ordinary waking consciousness.

We had a young associate come by, and when she watched we had to raise our voices to communicate, not because of the volume, but because her attention was so focused on the objects depicted on the screen.

Here are some comments on another blog:

Does watching TV make us stupid?

We don't think that television decreases intelligence, but it can perhaps increase distraction. That is why we always turn off the television in early evening and retire to the library for some old-fashioned reading. Here are some books that will develop your abilities in deep thinking:

Books for Deep Thoughts - qsell

Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics Little Bit of Wisdom, A: Conversations with a Nez Perce No Boundary by Ken Wilber The Power of the Pendulum (Arkana) Samurai Zen: The Warrior Koans by Trevor Leggett A Materialist Metaphysics of the Human Person

The rest of the country is talking about the Fall Foliage, at least on the Weather Channel, when the North American trees change color, and people get into their cars to observe the reds, yellows and browns of the early Fall (that would be Autumn to you Europeans, "Fall" is an American neologism.

We have said this before, that we can't help you here to build large abdominal muscles. We cannot help you remove wrinkles and fine lines from around your eyes.

Nor can we keep your food fresher or repair your fine china. That is what television infomercials are for. You can stare at a screen, as we do some late nights when sleep is elusive, hopefully keeping the yourself awake long enough to get sleepy again  in the middle of the night or on Sunday, when the stream of tears from repeated yawning is beginning to dampen your reclining sofa.

We are selling on our websites the antidote to those who have become weary of the flickering screen, since we sell old-fashioned, hold-in-your hands reading material, mostly out-of-print books.

That is the alternate universe of television, which has slowly taken over the world with its immediacy and its need to sell things. We watch it too, though we cannot believe what we see, or more precisely, we don't fully comprehend the purpose of why certain "shows" are on the air.

Here are some books about Science to make you think deeper thoughts. They are for sale on eBay and some of the other sites that we advertise on the right.

Books About Science - qsell

Medieval and Early Modern Science Vol. I Molecules Of Emotion: The Science Behind Mind-Body Medi Foundations of Futures Studies: Human Science for a New French for the sciences The Boundaries of Natural Science - Rudolf Steiner Pbk Science Morality and Feminist Theory Fragments of Science, Being a Series of Detached Essays Design of Building Frames (Architectural Science) Contributions in Marine Science, Volume 27, September 1 Graphology, or, The science of character in handwriting

Television has seldom lived up to its potential, one of the reasons we sell mostly books. Long time viewers may remember when television first spread around the country (in this case the United States for our international visitors), there was a fervent hope that culture, music, visual arts, would be expanded and the television networks would serve as a fountain of inspiration for many from the largest city to the smallest village.

And on Sunday mornings, there may be a few community based programs that might reach out to this lofty goal, but for the most on the cable channels, there are probably more extended pitches for health and beauty products than there are programs about the fine arts.

But we did learn something new this week. The narrator of this BBC clip almost wryly states "Self-confidence is everything", but as you may see, this is more than self-confidence.

Our business definition of self-confidence is knowing something so well, and having the strength of character that one may contradict a boss in a meeting without fear of repercussions.

But walking forward into a pride of lion's and interrupting their meal is something altogether beyond self-confidence. The editing and filming of this clip is superb, the long shadows of the late afternoon add some drama, and obviously the camera crew could not just stand idly by to get these shots of lions feeding on a wildebeest. One can admire the audacity and daring of the participants, and the fact that they can proceed so coolly and project such obvious ability that causes the lions to react so abruptly.

Just a note for the fastidious: vegetarians may not wish to watch the clip all the way through, since a dinner for lions is not a tidy affair.


Here are some items available on eBay, click the picture to see the sale item on eBay:

Latest Additions - qsell

Satchel Paige: Striking Out Jim Crow Wildcats: Street Smart (Wildc.A.Ts) Indian Lover: Sam Houston & the Cherokees Hand-To-Hand Fighting Manual ST-31-204 - Karate The Gilded Room: Decorating with Metallic Effects, from Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics Handbook of American Indian languages Manual Practico de Kung-Fu (Spanish Edition) Preacher Vol. 6: War in the Sun by Garth Ennis Ghost Music and Other Tales by Thomas Tessier Edge of Darkness by Troy Kennedy Martin Practicing Harm Reduction Psychotherapy: An Alternative Quantum Generations: A History of Physics in the Twenti Earthing: The Most Important Health Discovery Ever? The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smal

The "Big Bang Theory" television comedy series went into syndication last week, and suddenly there are different cable channels that are carrying the series. And so we hear the theme song over and over. Here are the first four lines:

We had a couple of promising days this week when the clouds rolled in, we took a break from listing books here on line. We went outside and looked up  at the clouds. On Tuesday there was a lot of upper air turbulence, and we saw what the meteorologists call "mammatus" clouds. There was distant thunder, we could see the lightning, but after a few tantalizing drops, the storm passed us by. But they certainly were unusual. We have had a prolonged drought in Central Texas, so clouds and rains leave us longing for a few drops.

Latest Additions - qsell

Reality and the Physicist: Knowledge, Duration and the Black Knights: The Story of the Tuskegee Airmen El Lenguaje de La Pasion La Boda (Spanish Edition) by Julie Garwood Facts and Mysteries in Elementary Particle Physics The Quantum Challenge: Modern Research on the Foundatio Medical Spanish in Pediatrics: An Instant Translator On The Track of Unknown Animals Five Lost Classics: Tao, Huang-lao, and Yin-yang in Ha The Experiential Dimension of Advaita Vedanta Asian Religions in Practice: An Introduction Buddhism Day by Day: Wisdom for Modern Life The Adventures of Ibn Battuta: A Muslim Traveler of the Fourteenth Century A Jew in Communist Prague: Adolescence (v. 2) Puppet Theatre in Performance. Everything You Need to K The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya: An Resistance, Parody and Double Consciousness in African Aztec and Maya Myths (Legendary Past) The Sutra of Perfect Enlightenment: Korean Buddhism’s G Introduction to Mathematical Statistics Irish Sagas El Libro De Los Libros De Chilam Balam Paulo Freire, His Life, Works, and Thought British Television Drama in the 1980s Firefighter!, Vol. 9: Daigo Of Fire Company M The Faith Once Given: The Apostles’ Creed Interpreted f Apologeticall Narration by Robert S Paul Estirandose (Spanish Edition) by Bob Anderson Path Of The Assassin, Vol. 15: One Who Rules The Dark Una perfecta desconocida by Danielle Steel The Lotus and the Grail: Legends from East to West Jazz Fest Memories From Medieval Madness to the Mitlamp: War and Society i Cancionero Mexicano (Tomo II) Valle De Sombras pbk (Nora Roberts Montana Sky translated into Spanish) Chilton’s Repair Manual: All U.S. and Canadian Models o Theoretical physics; applications of vectors, matrices, Building German Airpower, 1909-1914 Atomic migration in crystals by L. A Girifalco The Encyclopedia of Handheld Weapons

That is the excitement of an auction, another bidder could come in and raise the bid a little and walk away with 4 books. We get excited about the auction, but for different reasons. We still have to pay the shipping costs, and we had to collect these books and make them available. The widget below, if displayed on your browser will show you the number of current bids, and if you mouse over it will reveal other tidbits of information. The bidding is over, but we will leave this entry up for a week or so in case you are curious about eBay auctions. We started the bidding at a mere penny with free shipping.

We tried to center the moon photo of last night's full moon, but shooting in the dark without any illumination except the glowing orb above is a little difficult. And there is always the fear that there might be a biting ant to sting us as we kneel trying to adjust the focus and tripod.

We have a species here in Texas, a former visitor from South America who has taken up residence throughout the South, and parts of the Southwest, known by the species name Solenopsis invicta, (Order Hymenoptera, family Formicidae). The Fire Ant as they are commonly known as a firelike sting and are quite adaptable, and while our headquarters has not been bothered in several years, kneeling in the grass while adjusting a small camera tripod is always a little bit of a risk, especially in the almost complete darkness of a dark lawn at night.

But we persevered and got a photo for your admiration of the Central Texas moon during the traditional harvest time.

We were visiting the Texas State Cemetery in Austin yesterday when we saw the September 8th date (that would be today) date carved in a memorial stone, part of a larger memorial circle of stones that commemorate major events in Texas history. Provided below are a couple of photos of the stone, inscribed with the first paragraph of a "special report" that was issued later in the month, after the September 8th disaster back 111 years ago today in 1900.

The inscription in the photos is somewhat difficult to read in the photo taken in the midday sun, with the shadows from a nearby tree, so we provided actual words of the report following the photos.

It serves as a sobering reminder on a day when the capital city of Texas here in Austin and surrounding areas currently lies under the pall of one of the worst wildfires in Texas history. The Galveston Hurricane of September 8th, 1900 has its own entry on Wikipedia, and the quote below also also has a web page with extracts from the report on the NOAA website, which we provided a link to at the end.

The rest of the report is one of the most harrowing narratives we have ever read, written shortly after by a Galveston weatherman who barely escaped with his life (he was knocked unconscious and floated around in the storm and somehow still clung to a piece of debris), losing both his family and his possessions in what is considered to be the worst weather disaster in American history.




Here is the above inscription:

The hurricane which visited Galveston Island on Saturday, September 8, 1900, was no doubt one of the most important meteorological events in the world's history. The ruin which it wrought beggars description, and conservative estimates place the loss of life at the appalling figure, 6,000.

Here is the link to a longer extract with more details and beginning with the above quote from the NOAA website:

http://www.history.noaa.gov/stories_tales/cline2.html

Long time readers of this website know that we sell books in Central Texas. And for our domestic U. S. customers, they also know that there have been some big wild fires the last few days. We even heard from a European reader that the wildfires have made the news there, since the recent fires are being estimated as the worst in Texas State history.

We cannot say we are totally unaffected, since the sky is somewhat gray to the Southeast, and of course the television is filled with the information and updates about what is happening. The tropical storm that passed through New Orleans on Sunday sent high winds through Texas, as the system arced around and the dry air from the north was sent through Texas at a rapid clip. That wind, combined with very low humidities and a temperature of 102 degrees (around 33 degrees Celsius for our international readers, with velocities of over 75 km / hr). We hesitated to go to bed on Sunday night, since the winds were due to accelerate as a weather front was due to come in during the early hours of Monday, which was slightly cooler, but dropped the humidity to levels usually seen in the Sahara. We left the weather radio on standby and tried to settle in to a listless sleep.

We watched the news and weather closely, as the Governor of our state, Rick Perry flew back from a cancellation of a previously scheduled political appearance on Sunday to oversee the disaster planning.

On our planning, we tried to water the grounds around the My-Lynx Associates headquarters, but because the air was so dry, the water evaporated in a fairly short period of time, leaving just a few birds flying in to drink up the moisture in the pans and bird bath that we provide in this prolonged drought. The foliage and ground quickly lost any moisture in the dry, furnace-like winds. We know that in France, they have the Sirocco, which is a hot wind across the Mediterranean from the Sahara, and the people from Southern California have their semi-annual "Santa Ana" winds that blow through the mountain passes and accelerates and heats the air in the process. They will be familiar with the recent weather conditions here in Texas, though the actual cause differs, the result was the same.

The surprising part of this was that the high technology Doppler radar that the local authorities use to track weather actually picked up the smoke from the larger fires in the area. If you look closely at the map of the area east of Austin, in Bastrop county from this morning, the smoke is still visible as a small white shape by the screen label "Bastrop". That irregular polygon was much larger on Monday, and was not from any moisture, but rather an anomalous reading of the reflectivity of the smoke in reaction to the scans of the radar.

My eBay items - qsell

call me by my true names - Thich Nhat Hanh poems pbk The Saga of Tristram and Isond Hbk (1973 out of print) From Ship to Shuttle - NASA’s Endeavour pbk Studies in the Archaeology of India and Pakistan Applied Calculus With Linear Programming Family Evaluation You Can Go Home Again by Mcgoldrick Monica Um Brasil diferente: Ensaio sobre fenomenos de acultura Life and Death in the Ancient City of Teotihuacan: A Mo Bancarrota (capitulo 7) Y Como Reconstruir Su Credito Suenos Del Corazon by Violeta Chamorro Little Bit of Wisdom, A: Conversations with a Nez Perce Running an Agile Software Development Project Umar Ibn Al-Farid: Sufi Verse, Saintly Life Practical Algebra: A Self-Teaching Guide, Second Editio Living Through Dying: The Spiritual Experience of Saint El padre de Blancanieves (Narrativas Hispanicas) Simon Bolivar Hombre de Caracas, Una Biografia Drive Thru History - Rome If You Want To Handbook of Adhesives by Irving Skeist Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said Spider-Man The Icon: The Life and Times of a Pop Cultur Fulcanelli: Master Alchemist: Le Mystere des Cathedrale No Boundary by Ken Wilber

We have been quite listless here in Central Texas. Mainly because of the heat, we just passed a record for the number of 100+ degree days (That would be over 37 degrees Celsius for you metric fans, we still adhere to Farenheit.).

 We are presumably in the Dog Days, That appellation has been around in one form or another since the days of the ancient Egyptians, when they would calculate their calendar year by the helical rising of the star Sirius above the horizon. The stability of the date of the rising of the usually bright star allowed great accuracy across the centuries to their calendar calculations, which we found in a popular encyclopedia website as the "Sothic Cycle"

Later, as we understand it, the Romans gave the Dog Days the name because, according to one story, the poor canines in the house  of the ancient Romans would lay prostrate on the floor and try and keep cool by hugging the stone floors of the ancient city domiciles and panting away to keep cool, just as dogs in Central Texas do when they come in from the brilliant and often almost blinding heat.

The theory back in Roman times that the extra heat was from the extra intense brightness of the star brilliant star Sirius would supposedly also add a certain percentage of extra radiance to the dawn sky. In their way of ancient thinking they concluded that  the extra light would make the earth heat up by a certain amount, giving July and August the kind of listless heat that in pre-air conditioning days would cause entire cities to grind to a halt. And this would cause the inhabitants to flee the foetid streets for the coolness of the surrounding mountains.

We know that Sirius sort of goes down below the horizon for a period of time (around 70 days), and then becomes visible around this time of year, but our astronomical observations are limited, since most of the horizon is obscured by the lush oak trees that hug the nearby hills and valleys of where we are on the border of the "Hill Country" of Central Texas. So, we cannot make the actual observation of the star itself, since we cannot see the true horizon. But perhaps as time goes on, and we sell more merchandise, we will be able to construct our observatory. But we estimate, based on our latitude and calculations made in past years that the dog days are here already, and with the nearly record number of 100 + Fahrenheit days we have experienced that there is no end in sight to the heat until at least September.

The helical part of the "rising" apparently has nothing to do with a helix according to our researches, rather it is the proximity to the sun's rising (helios) rather than the corkscrew motion of a helix. We could not see that this interprtation of using the Greek word "helios" for sun is an accurate one. But all the definitions we could find all talk about the temporal closeness of the star's rising to that of the sun's rising.

This is something that is not apparent in studying the topic, it seems to be an implicit assumption of academic astronomers - that the near simultaneous rising of Sirius just before the Sun is "helical" or nearly simultaneous rising, meaning that the star shows up just before dawn.

It is one of the vagaries of our book-selling business. We can have an item for a long period of time, suddenly someone wakes up and says to themselves "I have to have that book today".

And some of our merchandise is beyond the category of "unique".

You would never see a book like the one we sold this wee on the "Antiques Roadshow", because it is a specialty item of little interest to the average television viewer, even the presumably slightly higher IQ demographic of the PBS viewer of Roadshow whose children are all "just a little above average" as one sometimes PBS guest host and regular NPR performer with his own long time radio show would put it.

Of course in this case the book is an early work on statistical sampling procedures, the same kind of sampling you would do in a fruit bin at the grocery store or the super market. You hold up a plum or a banana and you examine it for quality and lack of blemishes. It could be that maybe you even sniff it to see if it has a pleasant aroma.

That is sampling, albeit informal and unscientific, but it is an interesting exercise in the mathematical discipline of statistics and especially if are picky and systematically look for the best one, and perhaps you maybe even squeeze the avocado to check its ripeness. In a more organized and scientific way, that is what sampling in statistics is.

Say for example you have a generic widget and you want to ensure that the manufacturer has provided you with a quality product that meets a written set of specifications.

So instead of a piece of fruit, instead you might be inspecting lots containing millions of MREs for the troops (Meals-Ready-To-Eat), or submarine components, or parts of a tanks.

Back in 1950s and early 60s the American military standardized this sampling procedure for anything that they acquired, and they made the sampling procedure a hallmark of statistical quality modeling that is probably used in more sophisticated ways even today.

We had found a slightly worn copy that we aquired from a statistician and decided to sell it a couple of years ago. As they are wont to say in the movies for dramatic effect: "Lo and Behold",  it finally sold today, presumably to a statistician, or at least a fan of statistical analysis.

If you are the kind of person that cries in their pillow about losing the opportunity to buy such a work of historical importance (at least in the statistical field), there are on-line copies. If you want to know more about what you missed, then you can click below and hang your head in dismay at how much richer your life might have been if you had only known how rare this book was. Here is the clickable picture link a couple of paragraphs down to the recently ended eBay sale which has a pitifully obvious banner across the top of the page in highlighted in yellow my online friends.

This listing was ended by the seller because the item is no longer available.

 It was, in fact, the only copy amongst millions of books on eBay for sale. Avoid a repetition of this tragic possibility by reviewing our online merchandise and making a decision to buy the item that appeals to you. "Without delay" is our motto that you may borrow.

In closing, believe it or not, the general military standard has its own entry on Wikipedia, and it is illustrated by one of the tables from this very book (MIL-STD-105d), so you can still see a little of what you were missing when you passed on buying this classic work.

Wikipedia Entry on MIL-STD-105

Tomorrow is Independence Day in the United States. It falls on a Monday this year, since it is celebrated on July 4th, which falls on different days of the week. But we have been getting a steady flow of orders so we are puttering around in the office straightening up, and then when we get an order we get it ready for shipping on Tuesday.

The weather has been torrid, but there was the first named tropical storm, "Arlene" which has caused some havoc in Hidalgo, Mexico and other areas of Northern Mexico. All we can see are some puffy clouds in the balmy heat, which is a little better for outdoor activities, because they are pleasant to view. We like the clouds outside, they are Texas clouds, they often remind us of the opening scene of "The Simpsons" when the clouds part. We got inspired and decided to bring you the latest, freshest Texan clouds for you to admire. These are middle-of-the-afternoon-on-a-Sunday-clouds, they move and change moment by moment, you can see the intensity of the sun as it reflects off the clouds. They are always a little abstract, you can sometimes imagine that they have shapes. This one has what looks like a pointing finger on the upper left, with the finger sticking out of a folded hand.

Our world headquarters for My-Lynx Associates is located in Central Texas, in the United States. And we had a lot of 100 + degree days in June, so while it means low humidity with such high temperatures (that would be 38 degrees celsius for our international readers), it means that our frequent book buying trips in the area are subject to a little dizziness from the heat. We try and post new material every day, usually books, we have some CDs and a few DVDs. We have a comprehensive list of all items for sale on this very website. See our Books For Sale link above

We checked on a popular website that tracks web-site traffic and they claim we are nearing the 1,000,000 mark in terms of popularity. And remarkably, that we have cracked the 100,000 barrier in India. Since we have yet to have any sales in India, we are curious about that. It also says we are especially popular in New Delhi of all places. So if you are an Indian reader, be sure and leave a comment so we know that you are there. And if you decide to buy our books, maybe we will be able to finance a trip there.

We are not sure about our surging popularity on the Sub-Continent, we have some books on yoga practice, we have a book on Sanskrit grammar:

A CONCISE ELEMENTARY GRAMMAR OF THE SANSKRIT LANGUAGE

We recently listed a book by William Dalrymple:

Nine Lives: In Search of the Sacred in Modern India 

It is about living the sacred life in India, a portrait of some remarkable people living the most unusual lives in different parts of India. We have a philosophy book from India on classical Indian philosophical schools by Sharma:

A Critical Survey of Indian Philosophy

We have an audio CD, also imported from India, with a repetitive chant of the syllable "Om" which is very soothing titled the  Omkara Dhyana:

It says on the cover "Meditation for Pregnant Women", but really it is about 18 minutes of some soothing background music with a woman chanting "Om". It would be good relaxation for anyone, "expecting" or not. There is a short introduction on a separate track, but advanced yoga practitioners can safely live without the safety net and listen to the chant.

We have another fairly rare book on "Kashmir Saivism: The Central Philosophy of Tantrism" by Mishra about the philosophical / religious school. The book was printed in India, and is hard to find in North America:

We have been busy for the week listing new books. When we say new books, we mean new to the books store. for many of our books are used or out of print, so they are not defined as "new". We sell them on a variety of websites, which can be accessed by clicking the buttons on the right. Here are some of our recent eBay books, which are available on our other websites as well. For the most part.

My latest eBay items - qsell

Naval Campaigns of the Civil War by Paul Calore For Bill His Pinup Girl: The Shirley Booth & Bill B Actor’s Book of Contemporary Stage Monologues Terra Nostra by Carlos Fuentes Casting Might-Have-Been​s: A Film-by-Film Directory of A Tu Decides/you Decide: Sacale Todo El Jugo a La Vida/ta Ana María Matute: la voz del silencio Comanche Vocabulary: Trilingual Edition Se hace camino al andar Enjoy!: A Celebration of Jennifer Paterson -Tribute to Making Jesus Lord: The Dynamic Power of Laying Down You Matrix Theory By Gantmacher, Vol. 1 & 2. (2 Vols Hbk) EASTERN ARABIC AN INTRODUCTION TO THE SPOKEN ARABIC OF Reality Hunger: A Manifesto (Vintage) Hansel and Gretel Vocal Score (Dover Vocal Scores) Johannesburg: Images and Continuities : A History of Wo Discoveries of the Census of Marine Life: Making Ocean Behaviour and Social Evolution of Wasps: The Communal A

This is "A Shorter Finnegans Wake", an edited version of the original by James Joyce. While it is debatable if it our most difficult book in terms of mental rigor, since we also have engineering, mathematical and technical texts that probably are as weighty in terms of intellectual content. But this is a well-known literary work of fiction. We even had to correct ourselves when we listed the book, we unconsciously corrected the title to read Finnegan's Wake, with an erroneious apostrophe, and a short while later we had to correct our correction back to the original title without the apostrophe. As you can see from the title on the picture link below that there is no apostrophe.

We have looked at this "shorter" version at 256 pages, and it is still a literary row to hoe with the plow of insight and reason. It is written in a dream-like fashion, probably one of the earliest "stream of consciousness" variety of narrations, with only a couple of respites of ordinary prose inserted as extended notes. We have the distinct impression of riding a roller-coaster as we have peruse this for bedside reading.

Anthony Burgess of "A Clockwork Orange" fame did the editing and shortening of this text, with an idea of making the original work more accessible to the general public. His innovative techniques in that novel, and the surreal world of the near future that he exposited in that work, are equally applicable to this more difficult work.

We found this version, which is an old library copy that we are offering for sale, this is a 2nd printing from 1969, with the look-alike dust jacket of the original Finnegans Wake by Viking Press. We hesitate to present any selections, for fear of upsetting the proof-reading applecart, since many of the words are neologisms or adaptations from other European languages besides English. We find it possible to read a couple of pages at a time, though it requires some attention. If you want it, we have one of these less-than-plentiful copies of this rare shorter edition, though it will still be a literary challenge to today's computer and DVD distracted audience.

We have been baking in the Central Texas sun. Spring has come and gone, the heat of the sun is setting in. We pulled a little blue bird off of one of the children's books that we are preparing for sale - we hope it represents happiness to some of our readers, even if it is a little too sentimental for our tastes. If we could get a blue bird flying by our world headquarters, we will share it. They are becoming rare, but there is a local initiative to build blue bird houses specifically designed to encourage them to settle in the urban landscape.

Here is another photo of a recent visitor to our bookstore during the holidays. He is peering inwards through the window to see what we are up to. We have been working feverishly to add new merchandise to our online stores. We will put some links below to allow you to visit our eBay store, but they are most likely available on Amazon, and our own popular store - My-Lynx Associates.



The temperatures here in Central Texas are already summer-like, we may break 100 degrees Fahrenheit in the next few days. That would be 38 degrees Celsius for those of you who enjoy the metric world of measurement. We stay indoors with the blinds drawn to keep out the heat, but we do scurry out quickly to see if we can bring some more books back to our "book lair" where we write about the books that we find and sell them across the seven seas.

My eBay items - qsell

Down at Theresa’s - Chicago Blues : The Photographs of Los Liberadores de la Conciencia: Lincoln, Gandhi, Luth Inside the Bungalow: America’s Arts and Crafts Interior Anatomia De Un Plan De Negocio MacDonald World Air Power Guide The Pennsylvania Railroad; A Pictorial History The Arts of the North American Indian: Native Tradition Charley Patton (Blues Paperbacks) by John Fahey American Medical Association Handbook of First Aid and Como Vender De Otra Manera (Spanish Edition) Kansas City...And All That’s Jazz Jeep CJ Rebuilder Manual 1972-1986: Mechanical Restore

We sell mostly books. But with all the tornadoes and severe thunderstorms on the map this Spring (there had to be a hundred or more last night), we thought we better let you know what you need to stay alive. So we put a little link-widget below to Amazon to a radio gadget that we like to use and find handy when the weather gets rough.

We use the Midland WR-100. It is fairly easy to "program" - there are a couple of buttons that take you through the different menus that you need to set the time. It has an alarm, which we don't use, but the important part are the special county codes. It is very helpful that Midland recently set up some videos on their website to help you with short videos that explain how to in a step-by-step fashion learn the features of the radio.

The county codes are unique 6 digit codes that you can get from the NOAA weather site. We have it programmed for a few counties, but the manufacturer says to just use one county code. When the county code is entered, the radio will sound an alarm when bad weather (or anything else) is causing trouble in your neighborhood. It is called an "All-Hazards" type radio. We were checking the codes which are known as S.A.M.E codes. These allow you to customize the radio to your particular locale from a nation-wide network of radio transmitters, so that you can receive messages and audible warnings of different conditions specific to your area.

We have seen it featured a few times by reporters and meteorologists on both the local and national news the last week or so. They did not refer to it by name, but we saw the distinctive white low slung profile, and we knew it was the same radio. It is important to have one because if it is the middle of the night, the radio, if you set it right, will blast you with a loud tone to wake you from your slumbers.
 

Our sales appear a little off since Friday. Maybe people were a little frightened by the predictions of the end of the world on Saturday. We heard it repeated on television and radio, and on some popular websites, a regular drumbeat of doom and gloom. And we think that people when they get too excited maybe don't think about reading material, because our sales were down over the weekend. We have been humming merrily along until Friday evening and suddenly, quiet.

We watched something titled "The Nostradamus Effect" on the History Channel on Friday night. We don't have a copy for sale, but we will provide a link anyway. What a way to spend the day before Doomsday - watching a show on television about the end of the world. Well, nothing happened, except for some weather warnings on our weather radio, but we did not have to flee for our lives, the bad weather was a county or so over. We saw some lightning, a little thunder a few drops, but the poor folks further north had to deal with a couple of tornadoes, which made us a little restless on Saturday night

My eBay items - qsell

Molecules Of Emotion: The Science Behind Mind-Body Medi Firefighter!, Volume 6: Daigo Of Fire Company M Spanish for the Housewife The Law of Attraction In Action Episode I The Portable Beat Reader (Viking Portable Library) Chinese Boxing: Masters and Methods The Big O, Vol. 2 by Hajime Yatase The War of Art: Winning the Inner Creative Battle On to Berlin: Battles of an Airborne Commander 1943-194 More Blues Singers: Biographies of 50 Artists from the Jewish American Literature: A Guide to Reading Interest Suzuki Samurai, Sidekick, X90, and Vitara; Geo/Chevrole

We have had more daily visitors lately, our web visitors are coming by more frequently, or our prose seems to be attracting more and more people from around the world.

We don't want our heads to swell, as the American expression goes (meaning our egos have become unduly inflated). We have been laboring in the trenches, trying to reduce our prices (we sell books), this web site is the associated information that we post online about our comings and goings. If you folks like what we write, be sure to leave a comment or two to let us know if you want more. We do read our comment sections on a daily basis.

We set up a little gallery of items that have been recently put up for sale on eBay, some of them are for sale on the other sites that can be seen on the right. We put it down below. But we thought we would write a little about what we did since we last posted.

When we are uploading information about our books, some times we have to pause while a computing task completes. We then flick on the nearby television to keep up with the news. Daytime television in America has a lot of variety, but not much depth. There are syndicated comedies that we flip on, which for whatever reason are on multiple times a day on multiple channels. We observed that two in particular are quite prevalent: that would be a show about a psychiatrist with a radio show "Frasier", then the show about a Long Island couple and their extended family, "Everybody Loves Raymond", and in the evening sometimes playing at the same time on a couple of channels: "The Nanny". Actually that is three shows. But we try and guess what we could learn. Today there was a flash on a show called "Monsters Inside Me" about a guy from Long Island (we think), who went barefoot to the mail box every day and probably picked up a parasite that nearly killed him.

That was dramatic. The disease is transmitted by ticks (usually to rodents) and is called "Babesisios". Since its symptoms are almost the same as malaria, it is often misdiagnosed, but its range in Eastern Long Island, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket make it a little insidious, since it has only recently been acknowledged and because the microscopic parasite is hard to see since it tends to be hard to find within the body. It is spread by the same tick that gives people Lyme disease. We did a little on line research and found that here in Texas, that there is a similar form found in cattle.and was traditionally called "Texas Fever".

Our new stuff is pretty educational, we have a book on the "Beats" with many excerpts. We have a book called "Chinese Boxing" which is about an American's visit to Taiwan in the 50s and 60s to learn the secrets of Tai Chi and other lesser known martial arts. We have a book on creativity in the arts with the great name "The War of Art", which is a play on Sun Tzu's military work. We have a couple of nice, clean shop manuals which will tell you how to assemble and disassemble vital systems in both Audis and Suzukis. "On To Berlin" is about the role of paratroopers during World War II. And if you wake up in the morning feeling tired and groggy, there is a reference source "Sleep Apnea" to help you find out more about a breathing disorder that afflicts many and makes there life miserable.

Recent Additions On eBay - qsell

The Portable Beat Reader (Viking Portable Library) Chinese Boxing: Masters and Methods The Big O, Vol. 2 by Hajime Yatase The War of Art: Winning the Inner Creative Battle On to Berlin: Battles of an Airborne Commander 1943-194 More Blues Singers: Biographies of 50 Artists from the Jewish American Literature: A Guide to Reading Interest Suzuki Samurai, Sidekick, X90, and Vitara; Geo/Chevrole The Official Patient’s Sourcebook on Sleep Apnea: Direc Joni Mitchell Songbook: Complete Volume, No. 1 Audi 5000s Official Factory Repair Manual: 1984, 1985 G Fire in the Sky: The Walton Experience

Most of the time we are selling books. But sometimes we get visits that make us stop and take a look.

We were celebrating the Easter holiday with a family gathering at the My-Lynx Associates world headquarters a while back. (It is after all an online store, not a bricks and mortar book store). We were diverted from our mashed potato preparation duties by a green visitor who decided to look in on us. (And we were regarded with a cool, somewhat detached view, we have the pictures to prove it.) There used to be a TV show called "The Pet Psychic" where the host of the show would preform "readings" on the animals (usually mammals).

We found the show intriguing, because the owners of the pets seemed to react so favorably to the insights.

So, when little animals come around for a visit, we are always intrigued because they seem to have their own moods and expressions.

Below is a recent photo through the window of one of our visitors during the cool Easter holiday, when the sun was hidden. This lizard that came by seemed to be curious about us, and kept looking in the window. Later when someone opened the door, it actually came inside by the hinge at the top of the door and started running along the wall, before we ushered him out with a wave of our hands. You can see the camouflage of the creature, sort of white on the bottom that carefully matches the painted surface he is crawling on, and the green trees in the background, perhaps a relaxing combination for this creature, since he scurried back and forth for quite some time.

And you will note the fact that he is looking back at us, with some degree of what we take to be curiosity, giving us one eye of attention, and was twisting his head back and forth at us to get a better look. Reptiles have a kind of coolness to them, as well they might having ruled the earth in the days of the dinosaurs. They probably are still trying to get used to these new usurpers, the imperious mammals. They think they are hot! (Or at least warm-blooded)

We checked on a website about local lizards and we identified this as the Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis). an aboreal (tree-dwelling) lizard species.

It is harder to type a blog in a reclining position, though it is theoretically possible. Maybe in a few years we will have brain-scan devices that can intuit the words we want to type. They have been promising that as a possibility, using brain-waves to click on the keys. We wonder if the backspace key will become obsolete?

 But for now we are click-click-clicking our way across the keyboard on a weekend afternoon trying to drum up business for our online bookstore. We had a little mishap with our listings, Some of our eBay items were not listed automatically, so we had to go back and list them manually. They were already on sale on our other websites, but they did not show up on eBay.

So if you are dying to buy something on eBay here are an assemblage of items that have just become available as of May 7th (Saturday). As with all worldly things these are subject to prior sale or being removed from sale for various and sundry reasons (usually a sale on another website).  Here are our latest intriguing items, some out of print, or hard to find. We have a book on mysticism: Aum 1936, which is a 1980s reprint of a work by Helena Ivanovna Roerich. She accompanied her famous husband, Nicholas, across Asia in the wild and woolly days prior to World War II and can be certified as a hard-traveling adventuress in the days before Holiday Inns and fast food. These are numbered metaphysical reflections of hers from the 1930s.

We have Fire in the Sky which is a report of an abduction of a logger by extraterrestrials, which if we have time we will review in more detail.

We glanced at Chronicles of the Barbarians, and they are stories of rough-and-ready, pillage and plunder groups through the ages. What motivates them? What are their thoughts when they are not pillaging? You can find out here.

 

Latest eBay items - qsell

AUM 1936, Signs of Agni Yoga Harry Potter y La Orden del Fenix Massacres: A Historical Perspective Fire in the Sky: The Walton Experience The New History of the World by J. M. Roberts The Biophilia Hypothesis (A Shearwater Book) Karate-Do Nyumon: The Master Introductory Text Las Semillas De La Violencia (Espasa Hoy), 3rd edition Chronicles of the Barbarians Lakota Woman by Mary Crow Dog Bullying En La Ensenansa Secundaria: Como Afontarlo The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to The Sports

We labor for many hours to find some new material to sell to the world. That would potentially be you dear visitor. This is a blog about what we sell and incidentally to that what we do to find and place these items. There are pictures below that are links to the items on our own website.. You can see the precious pictures of the things that are within our grasp. And if you have grasping tendencies, you can have these books and compact disks for your very own. We are willing to relinquish our grasp. Some of our newest items are featured in the pretty grid that we laboriously hand crafted below in web page code.

Very simply put, they can be yours for the electronic exchange of a few paltry credits (as they say in the Science Fiction world). They are all available on our My-Lynx Associates website, but we also sell them on eBay, Biblio, Amazon, AbeBooks, Valore and so on (look to the right to see the buttons to whisk you there) - if you have an account with those websites, you will find the items listed there, for the most part. Ask us and we will direct you to the appropriate web page, since not every item is listed on every website, and some of our items are lumped together by item, so it may be confusing to find. But not on our own website (did you know it is called My-Lynx Associates?) We rule supreme there, and you can find items listed by title, author, even category.

The CD "Senegal Au Laser" is a long out of print compact disk, imported from France, perhaps the only one for sale across the internet - a veritable collector's items for those who cherish West African music. If you are a prince, sitting in your citadel, or you wish to curry favor with an Emir, Sultan, Potentate, Khan, Caesar, Duke, or other royal figure, you might want to consider this.

Perhaps you need a last minute gift for the new royal couple, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, we heard the position was just fulled. We don't know what happened to the old Duke and Duchess, maybe there are a lot of job vacancies for royals in the British Empire, now that the colonies have broken away from the motherland.

We just checked and it appears to have been vacant since the death of Prince George in 1904, he left no heirs. If we had known, we might have put in an application.

In any case, we will send it out promptly with a new plastic case with the original artwork, to ensure that you will be invited to the royal christening, and won't be left off the invitation list again.

Our Latest Additions of Editions
Title: 100% Zouk 1 Author: Various Artists ISBN/UPC: B00004URH1 Media: Audio Cd	Title: A Thousand Journeys: The Biography of La Author: Ken Winkler ISBN/UPC: 9781852301491 Media: Paperback	Title: African American Dance: An Illustrated H Author: Barbara S. Glass ISBN/UPC: 9780786428168 Media: Hardcover
Title: Archaeological Chemistry--II: [Proceedin Author: Symposium ISBN/UPC: 9780841203976 Media: Hardcover	Title: As Time Goes By Author: Ned Spurlock ISBN/UPC: B00480XZFA Media: Audio Cd	Title: AUM 1936, Signs of Agni Yoga Author: Helena Roerich; Natalie Rokotoff ISBN/UPC: B000V699AA Media: Hardcover
Title: Basic Physics: A Self-Teaching Guide (Wi Author: Karl F. Kuhn ISBN/UPC: 9780471134473 Media: Paperback	Title: Cajun Waltzes Author: Various Artists ISBN/UPC: 712136706427 Media: Audio Cd	Title: Duden, Grammatik Der Deutschen Gegenwart Author: Inc Distribooks ISBN/UPC: 9783411040452 Media: Hardcover
Title: Emergency Food Storage & Survival Handbo Author: Peggy Layton ISBN/UPC: 9780761563679 Media: Paperback	Title: Fire in the Sky: The Walton Experience Author: Travis Walton ISBN/UPC: 9781569248409 Media: Hardcover	Title: Foundations of Futures Studies: Human Sc Author: Wendell Bell ISBN/UPC: 9781560002710 Media: Hardcover
Title: Get That Cutie in Commercials, Televisio Author: Kandias Conda ISBN/UPC: 9780965506458 Media: Paperback	Title: India Bazaar: Vintage Indian Graphics (I Author: ISBN/UPC: 9783822826188 Media: Paperback	Title: Life of ''Big Foot'' Wallace: The Great Author: A. J. Sowell ISBN/UPC: 9780938349365 Media: Paperback
Title: Los Angeles y Tu (Spanish Edition) Author: Alejandra Kitchen ISBN/UPC: 9789706272461 Media: Paperback	Title: My Final Wishes Author: Bradley H. Davis ISBN/UPC: 9780970834102 Media: Paperback	Title: Ninja: The Invisible Assassins Author: Andrew Adams ISBN/UPC: 9780897500302 Media: Paperback
Title: Nymphs & the Trout Author: Crown ISBN/UPC: 9780517503362 Media: Hardcover	Title: Positive Charge / Gallagher's Glacier Author: Walt; Richmond, Leigh Richmond ISBN/UPC: B000B122R2 Media: Paperback	Title: Practical Modern Basketball (3rd Edition Author: John R. Wooden ISBN/UPC: 9780205291250 Media: Paperback
Title: Pretty Face, Vol. 5 Author: Yasuhiro Kano ISBN/UPC: 9781421516448 Media: Paperback	Title: Rosa Raisa: A Biography of a Diva with S Author: Charles Mintzer ISBN/UPC: 9781555535049 Media: Hardcover	Title: Senegal Au Laser Author: Compilation ISBN/UPC: Media: Compact Disc
Title: Simplicity: The Freedom of Letting Go Author: Richard Rohr ISBN/UPC: Media: Paperback	Title: Skip Beat!, Vol. 9 Author: Yoshiki Nakamura ISBN/UPC: 9781421510262 Media: Paperback	Title: South of the Sahara:Traditional Cooking Author: Elizabeth A. Jackson ISBN/UPC: 9780965520966 Media: Paperback
Title: Speed Secrets: Professional Race Driving Author: Ross Bentley ISBN/UPC: 9780760305188 Media: Paperback	Title: Spirit of the Pan Flute Australia Author: Ken Davis ISBN/UPC: B00006ILNK Media: Audio Cd	Title: The Author and The Source Author: ISBN/UPC: 656613540428 Media: Audio Cd
Title: The Complete Book of Frisbee: The Histor Author: Victor A. Malafronte; F. Davis Johnson ISBN/UPC: 9780966385526 Media: Paperback	Title: The Limits of Safety: Organizations, Acc Author: Scott Douglas Sagan ISBN/UPC: 9780691032214 Media: Hardcover	Title: The Phantom: Death In The Deep Woods Author: Ben Raab; Pat Quinn; Nick Derington ISBN/UPC: 9781933076065 Media: Paperback
Title: The Problem of the Puer Aeternus Author: Marie-Luise von Franz ISBN/UPC: 9780919123885 Media: Paperback	Title: The Stoning of Soraya M. Author: ISBN/UPC: 30206420128 Media: Audio Cd	Title: The Wireless Anatomy of Man and its Func Author: O.P., D.C., D.N. Randolph Stone ISBN/UPC: B0007HZ0H4 Media: Spiral-Bound
Title: We Europeans Author: Richard Hill ISBN/UPC: 9789074440059 Media: Paperback

We don't have time to read everything. But sometimes we grab a book and glance at the pages with the hope of distilling some tidbit or insight. We recently acquired a rather weighty tome, "The Labyrinth of Solitude", originally published in 1950 (we have a later paperback reprint), which is a collection of essays by the author Octavio Paz

"Popular language reflects this dualism by identifying solitude with suffering. The pangs of love are pangs of solitude. Communion and solitude are opposite and complementary. The redemptive power of solitude clarifies our obscure but vivid sense of guilt: the solitary man is "forsaken by the hand of God." Solitude is both a sentence and an expiation. It is a punishment but it is also a promise that our exile will end. All human life is pervaded by this dialectic."

The quote above reminds of the old "Twilight Zone" episode that has always haunted us. That would be the one titled "Time Enough At Last" starring Burgess Meredith as the  bank clerk "Henry Bemis". He survives a nuclear holocaust by having lunch down in the bank vault while reading a book. When he emerges he find that humanity is erased from the face of the earth. And while he first views his new-found solitude with despair, when he spies the public library, and the idea that he could spend the rest of his life reading the stacks of books, while opening the myriad cans of food left intact, he could find his redemption in having "time enough" to read to his heart's content. From the opening monologue:

Witness Mr. Henry Bemis a charter member in the fraternity of dreamers. A bookish little man whose passion is the printed page, but who is conspired against by a bank president and a wife and a world full of tongue-cluckers and the unrelenting hands of the clock.

In the bleak humor and unpredictable fate of the Twilight Zone however, he damages his glasses, and being terribly near-sighted, loses his ability to read the many texts that he has piled up on the steps outside the library.

This cruel fate kept us up late many nights (even before we had our book business), trying to rethink all of his actions, and all the possible alternatives to his "existential" dilemma of having time to read, but not having the ability to discern the characters on the page.

As we remember, one solution was a spherical gold fish bowl (minus the gold fish), that would allow the books words to be enlarged to the point where the text would be readable. Or alternatively a visit to the local optometrist's store might reveal some lenses that might serve as a remedy.

Since we are booksellers, we should remind our online visitors to always have a few physical "real-world" books handy, for those idle moments. Some people just sigh and stare into space when confronted with a long delay while waiting in a car-repair place, or a movie line or a government office.

We can go to the trunk of the car, or our own personal bookshelves and gaze forward into the time-tested paper pages of books. Who is to know if some day, our computers will grind to a halt, or a nearby static discharge or lightning or sun-spot will erase all our electronic knowledge? Or a sudden tornado or earthquake could plunge us into darkness because the power lines are down?

Then in a sense, we will be like Henry Bemis in his 1959 world of post-apocalyptic fantasy isolation. We may still have our fellow humans to regard, but those electronic readers may not function anymore, so we may be isolated from the vast realms of human knowledge that formerly resided in our books. And if you want to know more about solitude, we have just the book to help resolve your dilemmas and conflicts, you may click on the picture link below:

Here is a link to Amazon's web page featuring Season 1 of the Twilight Zone:

Posted by mylynx at 4/23/2011 8:00 PM | Add Comment