Upcoming Events:
Wednesday, 8 July, noon - Book Talk, An Apartment in Paris, Mount Horeb Rotary Club, Mount Horeb, Wisconsin
Monday, 13 July, 11:15 am - Book Talk, An Apartment in Paris, Verona Community Center, 108 Paoli Street, Verona, Wisconsin
Tuesday, 14 July, 7 pm - A Dialog on Writing with Dave Wood, Whitehall Public Library, 18560 Scranton Street, Whitehall, Wisconsin.
The Weekly Screed
by David Benjamin “Parents had nothing to do with school. Once you were out the door in the morning, your parents washed their hands of you. You became entirely the property of the school. St. Mary’s could do anything it wanted to me—hang me by my thumbs and tickle my feet—and Mom didn’t want to…
by David Benjamin “You have to be a man first before you’re a gentleman.” —John Wayne, McClintock (1963) MADISON, Wis.—A couple of women recently scolded me for broaching the question—sensitively, I thought—of whether, how and when a guy should compliment a gal on her appearance. In the news that very week, coincidentally, a wave of…
by David Benjamin “Whenas in silks my Julia goes,/ Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows/ That liquefaction of her clothes.” —Robert Herrick MADISON, Wis.—Is it chivalry, I wonder, or sly salacity? How, without making the wrongimpression does a 21st-century guy compliment a woman on how she looks, particularly if she’s a total (but fetching) stranger?…
by David Benjamin “How much of our lives, good and bad, should we credit to our personal decisions, and how much is just the inheritance of our culture, our families, and our parents who have failed their children? How much is Mom’s life her own fault? Where does blame stop and sympathy begin?” —J.D. Vance,…
by David Benjamin “An entire human life recorded on an intricate network of hidden cameras, and broadcast live and unedited, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, to an audience around the globe. Coming to you now from Seahaven Island, enclosed in the largest studio ever constructed, and along with the Great Wall of…
by David Benjamin “Some eighth graders … had set up fake TikTok accounts impersonating teachers… “… In the days that followed, some 20 educators—about one quarter of the [Great Valley Middle] School’s faculty—discovered they were victims of fake teacher accounts rife with pedophilia innuendo, racist memes, homophobia and made-up sexual hookups among teachers. Hundreds of…
by David Benjamin “What can I add that has not already been said? A person that thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat, or spend years being tortured as POWs are all ‘suckers’ because ‘there is nothing in it for them.’ A person that did…
by David Benjamin “We don’t go steady, ’cause it wouldn’t be right ”To leave your best girl home on a Saturday night.” —The Beach Boys, “I Get Around” MADISON, Wis.—Notwithstanding the moral clarity articulated in “I Get Around,” the Beach Boys are among the less appreciated ethical philosophers of the past millennium.…
by David Benjamin “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s ass …” Exodus, 20:17 And so it came to pass that the Republicans of Louisiana decreed that all classrooms in each school of every parish shall array the graven precepts handed to Moses by the Lord and shlepped down from the mount to…
by David Benjamin “Death’s gruesome face taunts:/ soulless eyes, crimson grimace. I really hate clowns.” ― Katherine Applegate MADISON, Wis.—Apparently, like its protagonist, the “Chucky” horror-film and TV franchise will never expire. I’ve just noticed promos for a new season of episodes featuring the further exploits of a homicidal boy doll who bears…