This was the first perfect day of the year, from a weather point of view (or at least from mine). It wasn’t just “sort of warm if you overlooked the frigid undertones.” It was genuinely warm, without any equivocation or small print. You probably would have preferred yesterday, since my thermostat is set a little warmer than most people’s, but I think you would have agreed that today was nevertheless the caterpillar’s overcoat (1920s slang cribbed from P. G. Wodehouse).



If you’re deeply conflicted (like all good Americans) by my critique of reports on the Prince Caspian movie yesterday, and want a good reason to see the movie in spite of my carping, Dirty Harry at Libertas gives a strong argument here.

We are nothing if not openminded here at Brandywine Books. Our openmindedness is the same as that of America’s greatest educational institutions—we present a broad range of opinions stretching all the way from people who almost agree with me on the right to people who almost agree with me on the left.

It seems to have fallen off the news radar today, but I meant to mention this story yesterday. The wildfires described are located precisely in the area where I lived, when I lived in Florida. I had a mobile home in a park on US 1 in Malabar, and my parents lived in Palm Bay. I’m not actually in touch with anybody down there anymore, but I pray my old friends haven’t suffered any loss (assuming any of them are still in town).

It’s all Florida scrub down there, and from an ecological point of view a wildfire every twenty years is the best thing that could happen. I can say that, of course, because I don’t own any property there anymore.