by david allan van nostrand | Jul 27, 2026 | Actively observing, Human Behavior, The Wayback Machine, The world around us
As the story goes, Jasper Maskelyne outfoxed the Germans by making the Suez Canal disappear. From my safe distance high atop Civilization’s Hill of Knowledge, built on all the things we’ve learned in the 85 years since 1941, I feel confident that the Suez Canal is...
by david allan van nostrand | Jul 20, 2026 | Americana, Human Behavior, The Wayback Machine, The world around us, Young moderns
My concept of hobos was taught me by tv. The first I remember was a hobo that came thru Mayberry. Opie liked him right away, but the hobo turned out to be a ne’er-do-well that was teaching bad habits to the gullible kid. Andy put a stop to it, of course. TV and movies...
by david allan van nostrand | Jul 13, 2026 | Americana, Items in the News, The 1960s, The Wayback Machine
Hank Ballard and the Midnighters didn’t sing moon-June-spoon songs like most white bands. Their songs were considered by many to be raunchy, a catchall word that captures things earthy, sexual, and vulgar. Their 1954 song Annie Had a Baby was salacious (“She can’t...
by david allan van nostrand | Jul 6, 2026 | Actively observing, Items in the News, The world around us
Burmese pythons are ambush hunters that can grow to be as much as 19 feet long in the wild in the Florida Everglades. Females are five or six feet longer than males and may lay as many as a thousand eggs over a typical life span. Burmese pythons rarely move about,...
