But Verify

The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them.
—     Ernest Hemingway
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On This Day In:
2020	In 50 States And Voting Against Trump
	A Two Steps Comparison
2019	My Last Must Be My Best
2018	Making Friends
	Day 28: A Normal Loss And A Headache
2017	Sea Worthy
2016	Rising Integration
2015	No Worries
2014	Devouring The Present
2013	But So Far…
	Twice Moved
2012	Just Like Bubbles
2011	Caring and Driving
	Achieve Greatly
2010	Unwise To Trust
	Attitude
	If The Mind Is Not Tired
	Irrationally Crazy
	2nd Pair – Shoe Review
	Ahnu – Gesundheit!
2009	As for me…
	Health Care Reform Now!!

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The Republican Party Can Survive Trumpism (If It Wants To)

The world breaks everyone, and afterwards many are strong in the broken places.
—    Ernest Hemingway
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On This Day In:
2020	Art Work
	One Person (Republican) Can Make A Majority
2019	Hopefully, Closer To Noon
	Can You See The Bottom?
2018	Stock Market Sets Another Record Under #DumbDonald
	#LyingDonald: About That Special Prosecutor Testimony
2017	We Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet
2016	But You Have To Learn It Feels Good
2015	Never Stop
2014	Caution
2013	Treat Her Like A Lady
2012	Build New Worlds
2011	I Grok Elegance
	Standing Relish

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Listening To A #IncompetentDonald COVID-19 Press Briefing

He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary.
—    William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway).
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On This Day In:
2019	I Am Doubtful
	Future Justice Looks Corporate
2018	True Measures
2017	Hoping For Tapes
	In It Now
2016	On Viewing This Mudball
2015	It Takes A Village
2014	In God’s Eyes
2013	We Root For Ourselves
2012	Like A Shark
2011	Discernible Virtue

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Mirror, Mirror

I like to listen.  I have learned a great deal from listening carefully.  Most people never listen.
—    Ernest Hemingway
[But to listen carefully is difficult when you’re in love with the sound of your own voice – like some…  Right, #AmnestyDon?    —    KMAB]
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On This Day In:
2015	Speaking With Forked Tongue
2014	The Code
2013	Eventually Formed
2012	Remember To Vote Tomorrow
2011	It Sounds Like Chaos Theory To Me

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Learning, Experience, Chances or Money

I thought I had paid for everything.  Not like the woman pays and pays and pays.  No idea of retribution or punishment.  Just exchange of values.  You gave up something and got something else.  Or you worked for something.  You paid some way for everything that was any good.  I paid my way into enough things that I like, so that I had a good time.  Either you paid by learning about them, or by experience, or by taking chances, or by money.  Enjoying living was learning to get your money’s worth and knowing when you had it.  You could get your money’s worth.  The world was a good place to buy in.  It seemed like a fine philosophy.  In five years, I thought, it will seem just as silly as all the other fine philosophies I’ve had.
—    Ernst Hemingway
From his novel:  “The Sun Also Rises“
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On This Day In:
2015	The Critical State
2014	Dawn, n.
2013	Ouch!
2012	Just Lookin’ Around
	Still Growing
2011	But Do You Want To?

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And Sets

The Sun Also Rises  —  book review
Today’s review is for the quasi-autobiographical novel: “The Sun Also Rises” (1926© / 1954©), written by Ernest Hemingway.  The book has three main topics: expatriate life in Paris / Europe; fishing in Spain; and, bullfights in Spain.  The book follows Jake Barnes, an American newswriter living in Paris as he, in turn, parties, goes fishing, and then goes to see the running of the bulls in Pamplona and the subsequent bull-fights.  The story revolves around Jake, his love interest (Lady Brett Ashley), and a handful of other suitors as they go through the several weeks covered by the book.  I’m told (by Wikipedia) the book is based on a handful of trips Hemingway actually took with some of his “Lost Generation” friends in the early 1920’s.
My reason for reading “this” book was (again) my fear of dying illiterate, that is, without having read (and shared in) some of the great works (thoughts) of humanity.  (Yes, I know everything I read is in English, so I can’t possibly make the claim of sharing “thoughts”, but reading English translations is the closest I will ever come on that front.)  Back to my fear…  I avoided most of “great” literature when back in grammar and high school because I found what little exposure I did get to be incredibly boring.  I have come to feel that without a smattering of life experience, one (or at least I) could not appreciate the range of emotions and experiences the authors were trying to convey.  They simply were too far outside of my realm of experience and so meant nothing to me.  I interpreted this as “boring” and so I’ve avoided “great” literature as much as possible ever since.
Back in February, I quoted the poet Ezra Pound, who once said, “Men do not understand books until they have a certain amount of life, or at any rate no man understands a deep book, until he has seen and lived at least part of its contents.“
And I think I mostly believed this.  Now, however, I’m sixty-one years old and it’s harder to use the same excuse.  And, yet, I’m finding it’s still true.
This IS another book which I’ve found boring and I think it’s simply because I can’t relate to it.  I’ve spent a few days visiting Paris.  I’ve done numerous dangerous (stupid) things in my life (not unlike bull-running).  I’ve been fishing.  And, in my early teens, I spent the better part of a whole summer watching bull-fighting on TV (both English and Spanish speaking channels).  Without actually having read the book, one would think I’d had enough common experience to be able to relate to the book.  But, in truth, I did not relate.  Or, at least, I didn’t feel like I did, which is probably the same thing.
So, all in all, I’ve now read a Hemingway, a Fitzgerald and a Steinbeck and found two of three uninteresting and a struggle to get through.  I guess it is possible I just don’t have the “socially literate” gene in me.  In any case, I will keep trying as occasionally I do enjoy one or another “classic”.
Final recommendation: tepid.  Who cares if a book is a “classic” if it’s such a struggle to get through.  My apologies to anyone who loves this book or who’s life was changed by reading it, but I’m just not feelin’ it.  If you’re one of these folks, drop me a comment, ’cause I’m not feelin’ it with you.
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On This Day In:
2015	About Character
2014	Your Gain
2013	Look Up
2012	Count Me In
2011	Pirates Four, Three Songs
	Sir Charles
	Look First, Not Last
2010	Par-a-diddle

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Apprenticeship

We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master.
—    Ernest Hemingway
New York Journal-American (11 July 1961)
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On This Day In:
2012	Curtain Rods
2011	A Living Force
2010	BART Rides – A Tipping Point

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Anew

All my life I’ve looked at words as though I were seeing them for the first time.
—    Letter (9 April 1945);
Published in:  “Ernest Hemingway: Selected Letters 1917–1961“
Edited by:  Carlos Baker
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On This Day In:
2012	Make Both
2011	Are You Happy Yet?

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