Thoughts from the Mountain Top

Yes, I'm a NASCAR fan.  If you're not, don't even bother reading this.  I don't need lectures on how I shouldn't be watching it as a liberal or how sports are stupid.  I like NASCAR, baseball and football quite a lot, although baseball games are the only ones I really enjoy live.  The rest I enjoy from the comfort of my living room. The boys in my life are at the race today in Loudon, NH.  It's the last time New Hampshire Motor Speedway will host a race that's part of the NASCAR "playoffs" known as The Chase.  This is the last year there are two races there - the only place that hosts NASCAR races in New England.  From now on, there's one race there, in July. The answer can't be the fans.  There are racetracks operating all over New England on a smaller level.  Joey Logano considers this his "home track" even though he's from Connecticut.  The only other places close to here that host races are Watkins Glen, NY, Pocono, P...

As a child, I absolutely adored the "Little House" books.  I still do.  I was surprised when I wrote at Epinions for all those years that some of the books hadn't been reviewed there.  I took care of that. The books were simply written for a child or young adult audience.  That is quite obvious when you read them from an adult perspective.  It's also interesting when you explore beyond the books and find out stories about the family that weren't selected to be a part of the books.  For that reason, I participate in several groups about "the REAL Laura Ingalls Wilder."  (Don't even get me started on the television show - about the only similarity are the names.) NPR recently published a story with the headline "Should We Read It To Our Children".  In some ways, this was a poor choice of a headline.  It was posted to the group by someone with an agenda of course (he would later rage against his tax dollars being used to support NPR).  Th...

I've made no bones about the fact that I am fairly liberal.  However, there are many people out there who are just as radical on the left as there are on the right.  I've written before about how some of the messages they are sending play exactly into the hands of those on the right who want to play divide and conquer.  It's a dangerous thing.  Some of the messages make me as disgusted with them as I am with the racists on the right. They proclaim loudly how "tolerant" they are - but the truth is they have their own biases.  Most of them are against religion.  I am a Christian.  I hate the mega-churches as much as they do.  I despise people who support candidates from the pulpit.  For as much as the accusations got thrown around that the Left treated President Obama as the "messiah", radical right-wing Christians are as bad (if not worse) when it comes to Trump. All that does not excuse the hate by many on the left for those of us who practic...