THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER

“In Victorian America, death was discussed open and honestly, but the topic of sex was considered taboo.  In the United States today, it is just the opposite.” –from Widow’s Weeds and Weeping Veils.
Via TOCWOC.

“For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it, there is the instant when it’s still not yet two o’clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and the furled [...]

It’s happy now. Wasn’t on this day in 1836. The Alamo was under siege by the Mexican thousands and the Texians, despite today’s issuance of their proclamation of Texas independence, were about as disorganized and fractious as you might expect a fledgling government and its ad hoc military to be.
Four days from now, with the [...]

Getting old means time speeds up. The days fly by, the weeks rush past, pretty soon the season you were just getting used to is being replaced by another one.  And before you know it, you’re another year older and deeper in debt. Wait. That was a song lyric. I think. What is this phenom, [...]

It was inevitable. After two years of forcing Mr. B. to write in cursive (essentially because his printing is sloppier and much harder to read) he has developed a signature. Looping and swooping at the end.
More Dionysian than his late grandfather’s (which he has never seen) which was rather severe. Moreso even than mine [...]

I picked up a copy of this young adult cofee-table sized book filled with drawings and photographs at Mr. B.’s school’s book fair back in the fall. I’d heard of the original version by journalist Charles C. Mann and wanted to see how the new, largely theoretical research on Native Americans was being pitched to [...]

My dear mother, in one of her less-perceptive moments many years ago, turned from her dressing table to address my seven-year-old self with the following admonition: "Men work, women stay home."
In other words, I was to steel myself psychologically for being in harness until I finally collapsed in the traces, good for only one thing: [...]

Was reading a new genealogy narrative pulled together by a cousin of Mrs. Charm’s and came across the phrase of the headline. The description of this old technology wasn’t clear, so I searched it and came up with this which is. It also has some diagrams and a photo to reinforce it. Pretty ingenious.

Through an older cousin, Mrs. Charm has been learning about her paternal ancestry. An aunt already was pulling together the maternal side with a few interesting revelations but no scandals so far. Today Mrs. C. discovered her paternal great great uncle, Richard Jenkins Davis, an elder in the early Mormon church.
Born in Wales, he [...]

China’s experience with the unintended consequence of their one-family, one-child edict is quite amusing. We’ve struggled with some of that with Mr. B., of course, as probably any parent of an only child can attest. I took to calling him "your lordship" when he was a Terrible Two. But he’s improved.
Via the Seablogger.