What if the whole Bruce Willis scenario in The Sixth Sense were much more than M. Night Shyamalan’s greatest hit film? Caron Goode is playing a true life, though living, role of Wills’s character, investigating the minds of children who might possibly see ghosts.

The psychologist says that her efforts stem from her own childhood experiences, and she’s out to discover whether or not the imaginary friends that so many kids have are actually the spirits of the dead instead. She’s even written a book, Kids Who See Ghosts: How to Guide Them Through Fear, about it.

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When I was a kid, I had this incredibly morbid book about spontaneous human combustion.  It was written in as lurid a fashion as possible, had a collection of glossy photos in a central inset, and put forth the most preposterous theories with great enthusiasm.  I'm pretty sure I bought it out of the nickel box at someone's garage sale.  

(Sometimes I wonder what my parents were thinking, letting an eight year old girl read a book about spontaneous human combustion.  Maybe they didn't notice, or maybe they were just happy that I read books at all.  Certainly I doubt they realized that I was both compelled to read it, and suffering from nightmares where I woke up with half my body burnt and reduced to ash.)


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I have written a Fantasy Trilogy and the first volume is now available on Amazon, but only on Kindle.  A free Kindle for PC app is available there and the first 70 pages of my novel are available to anyone with the app as a preview.  There are hundreds of other free titles there that are complete. I would greatly appreciate any who takes the time to read the free preview and see if they are interested.   If you know who Bran, Pug, and Fitz are then you will like my novel.                                                                      &nbs

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Jeffrey McGowans book is about his experience in the military for over a decade. While this in itself is not that impressive - many people serve their whole lives - the book tells the story of a gay man living his secret life under the Don't-Ask-Don't-Tell policy. This policy has made it impossible for a member of the military to be open about his sexuality while still serving his country - even mentioning that you gay or lesbian is grounds for automatic separation from the institution.

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In 2005 a woman goes to a bar, planning to drink and party.  Turns out the "Girls Gone Wild" video team is there.  Signs are posted.  However, she refuses to sign the consent form.  If there is a more clear way to signal "I do not consent" than refusing to sign a consent form, I can't think of it.

As she's dancing, the video camera is moving through the crowd.  As she turns away from the camera, a hand reaches out from behind it and pulls off her shirt. 

She says "No no no no," pulls it back up, and turns away.  Again - that's a pretty clear sign of not giving consent.  Saying "no" and putting your top back on.  

But somehow she ends up on the Girls Gone Wild tape anyway.  And when she sues?  The jury finds in favor of Girls Gone Wild.


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July 25 is a perfect day to go out and enjoy the merry-go-round. A Sunday this year, it affords most families the chance to hit the park and, if there’s still one left (as my old favorite park no longer has one), show their children—as well as the parents themselves!—a good old-fashioned time on the merry-go-round. If there is a carousel or carnival near you, that’s a great opportunity as well.

I have a wonderful story about a merry-go-round. In fact, I wrote about it in junior high, much to the delight and disgust of my classmates. Reading it aloud was some of the most fun I’d ever had in school to that point!

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Tomorrow, July 24, is the day everyone gets to sigh with collective relief because they don’t have to come up with new jokes to entertain people with. Okay, maybe those of us who aren’t comedians don’t really lose sleep over such things, but there is a joy in recycling old jokes, isn’t there?

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If you watched the free 20 minute online "Story of Stuff" documentary and thought "That's great, but I wish it was drier, and more packed with an overwhelming volume of information," then this book is for you!  I hate to sound catty, but it's true.   Sadly, this book takes everything that made the documentary great, and does the exact opposite.

Charitably, The Story of Stuff (the book) could be said to be a companion piece to the documentary.  A tome for those who watched the movie and wanted to dispute the facts.  A dense brick of text, thick with footnotes, heavy on policy wonkery and clunky writing.

The genius of the "Story of Stuff" documentary is that it was told in plain English, without a lot of judgment - just the facts.  It was illustrated with an animated style of ink brush figures that are both charming and clean, giving a lot of white space to the screen, which lets you focus on what's being said.  


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Today I stumbled across a hilarious blog post on a dad blog about the Serendipity Book series.  Apparently these things are still in print, and blogger Holmes' sons constantly insist that he read them at night.

Holmes' disdain for the remarkably long-lived works of author Stephen Cosgrove and illustrator Robin James is perfectly understandable.  I mean, the thing is, kids have no taste.  Certainly no discretion in the way of literature.  It's only as we grow old that we learn to avoid things which have the moral printed right there on the cover.

That's literal, in the case of the Serendipity books.  On every cover is a helpful call-out box titled "The moral of this story is:" For example, the moral of The Wheedle on the Needle is, "Cooperation can solve almost any problem."


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The Fart Police- from Diary of a Wimpy KidAs a kid, I loved journals of the fill-in-the-blank variety and have a sneaking suspicion that young want-to-be writers and artists will find themselves delighted by the challenge of filling up the pages of the "Diary of a Wimpy Kid Do-It-Yourself" book. "Diary of a WImpy Kid Do-It-Yourself Book" is the first book that I've read in Jeff Kinney's  series of books.


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