tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-117677452010-01-07T08:50:08.598-08:00BUY MY BOOKS AT WWW.LEONARDSTEGMANN.COM. NOW, DAMMIT!Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.comBlogger1091125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-9301805397443316282010-01-06T14:15:00.000-08:002010-01-06T14:33:05.767-08:00

My first mistake was renting Weeds. I’ve been noticing that Showtime has been coming up with some quality television series of late. Nothing to rival HBO of course (don’t be silly) but some good shows just the same. We’ve already caught up on all the seasons of The L Word and then whipped through David Duchovny’s Californication in about a week. Then we ordered the first season of Weeds and

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-6708803094691211032010-01-05T14:31:00.000-08:002010-01-05T14:59:40.971-08:00

Remember your first taste of coffee? Remember how you couldn’t believe how adults could consume so much of this harsh tasting liquid, and seem to enjoy it besides? And then you tried your first mouthful of Listerine, with a taste so vile that coffee suddenly seemed like sweet, dewy nectar in comparison.I am, of course, talking about the original Listerine, the stuff that tasted like something

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-25291013261461511462010-01-04T15:44:00.000-08:002010-01-05T11:21:10.330-08:00

Hey, when you were a kid did you used to catch lightning bugs in a jar? I ask because recently I’ve been wondering if they still make lightning bugs. I know I personally haven’t seen one in over forty years and was beginning to suspect that perhaps they’d gone the way of the dodo. Or maybe I haven’t seen one over the last few decades because their natural flight-path doesn’t happen to run between

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-11194894175079809132010-01-03T15:06:00.000-08:002010-01-03T15:34:05.874-08:00

“Without our traditions our life would be as shaky as a fiddler on the roof.”--TevyeIn this time of e-mails and texts, twitters and tweets, it’s become a rare thing, I think, when bad news arrives in the form of a regular old snail-mail letter. But arrive it did, and the old school method of delivery did nothing to soften the blow of this, my first personal tragedy of 2010.The letter read:The

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-65108707308647048092009-12-31T16:52:00.000-08:002009-12-31T17:03:03.482-08:00

You’re footloose and fancy-free, so how did you celebrate the arrival of the new year? Did you welcome it with a whimper, sipping sparkling apple juice and barely keeping those peepers open while Dick Clark counted down the seconds on the tube? Or did you send off 2009 with a bang, yelling yourself hoarse in the midst of a boisterous crowd, on your way to creating the mother of all hangovers

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-21533959036224132842009-12-30T14:58:00.000-08:002009-12-30T15:01:15.608-08:00

Everybody lies. If you just said, “I don’t!” well then, you’re a liar. And, as Shakespeare said, deceit truly is a tangled web we weave. Most of the time people don’t even realize when they’re being lied to. For example, did you question me at all when I attributed the famous “tangled web” quote to Shakespeare? You should have. It was Sir Walter Scott who wrote that famous line, and I knew it the

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-30377294780354170412009-12-29T14:45:00.000-08:002009-12-29T14:57:16.758-08:00

Quick, which American would you most like to see on a postage stamp? Ronald Reagan? (Someday someone is going to have to sit me down and explain the attraction of this guy. Is it just that in hindsight he looks pretty good in comparison to Bush? Well, who doesn’t?) How about a stamp featuring Pamela Anderson? (Insert “lick” joke here.) Jimmy Carter? Madonna? Mike Tyson?C’mon, tell the truth. Why

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-61942857421940554012009-12-28T15:18:00.000-08:002009-12-28T15:39:11.423-08:00

Is there anything more fun than local theatre? Sure there is— in fact thousands of things. But since I’ve vowed to limit the duration of these insightful missives to under novel length I won’t list them all here tonight. The local theatre here in Whoville puts on about eight productions a year. I usually manage to drag myself to two of them, always vowing that each will be the last time.And

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-54921811806568519762009-12-27T16:51:00.000-08:002009-12-27T16:57:17.916-08:00

Look, I’m not saying it’s a big deal. I’m just saying that if I had written the song My Favorite Things I’d be thinking about filing a lawsuit right about now.Oh, hi there. I didn’t hear you come in. Say, have you ever seen The L Word on Showtime? Well in truth I’m too cheap to get Showtime, but recently I’ve been ordering the DVD’s from Netflix and watching every episode, starting from season

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-60586721107787270252009-12-24T13:45:00.000-08:002009-12-24T14:07:56.666-08:00

There’s a website I visit just about every day. No not that one--a different, more wholesome one. The site offers a daily brain teaser as well as a trivia quiz about every third day. Some of the quizzes I don’t bother with, such as those involving topics that I don’t know anything about. (Yes, sorry to disappoint you but there are a few. Damn few, actually.) For example, as soon as I see the name

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-67886663966442049682009-12-23T12:29:00.000-08:002009-12-23T12:37:53.737-08:00

I had called the hardware store and the girl who answered had told me that they did indeed sell doorknobs, but she did so with a huffiness that I thought was uncalled for; as if I had called McDonald’s and asked if they sold hamburgers. OK, so perhaps I should have just assumed that a hardware store sold doorknobs, but I didn’t. Cut me some slack, babe.But now I had a dilemma. I was home alone.

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-34523060854337531912009-12-22T14:47:00.001-08:002009-12-22T14:58:05.389-08:00

Why am I still fighting this? By this stage of my life I should have long ago accepted that there are some things that I’m just not good at. Why can’t I just celebrate the many skills that I do have? You know, things like…well, you caught me off guard here. Give me a minute and I’m sure something will come to me. But there can be no doubt that if something is mechanical I should just leave it

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-78834178547796468252009-12-21T15:23:00.000-08:002009-12-21T15:34:09.051-08:00

Hey, did I ever tell you kids about my time as a rap artist? (I say, Commander, we really must be going…) Well gather round and let me regale you with another story from still another of my numerous yet equally unrewarding careers.Actually it wasn’t a career at all, and the music world must be thankful for that, eh? No, I was simply making a TV commercial when a local clothing store decided they

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-70067870559115063642009-12-21T06:39:00.000-08:002009-12-21T06:42:13.364-08:00

It’s a little hard to concentrate on this tonight, what with Spike out in the backyard yelling for her dopey cat. It’s a waste of time of course, as I’ve tried to explain to her for the last forty nights in a row. The cat will come home when the cat wants to come home. And she will come home, wagging her tail behind her. She always has. Always. Why? Because it’s cold out, there’s food here and

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-26214777437545688012009-12-17T15:02:00.000-08:002009-12-17T15:16:03.088-08:00

Well, there’s not a religious bone in my body and still I love Christmas. I like the lights and the music and paying fifty bucks to cut down my own tree. (And I don’t like hanging it upside down; not because it’s Satanic, but because it’s non-traditional. And stupid.) I like going to the mall and I like both the hustle and the bustle. I like cold air and hot chocolate. I like receiving Christmas

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-71029850292110387242009-12-16T17:11:00.000-08:002009-12-16T17:15:03.984-08:00

You can’t count on anything anymore. There’s no consistency, no continuity. The price of gasoline triples. Heroes of your youth die. Baseball teams leave town. It makes you long for a time sixty-five years ago, when FDR was always president and Joe Lewis was always the boxing champion. Well cheer up, my frazzled friend. There is still one thing on which you can rely.In my first book five years

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-67586195438350853942009-12-15T15:19:00.000-08:002009-12-15T15:37:34.263-08:00

I thought it might be interesting to take some time to explore the history of the key. Then I did a little research on the subject and realized I was dead wrong. Besides, I couldn’t find any information about the history of keys, but ended up reading several scraps of info on the history of locks, which I suppose is just about the same thing. And by the way, do you know which came first? If you

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-91582457526384496252009-12-14T15:59:00.000-08:002009-12-14T16:14:21.378-08:00

This is not going to be another tirade about how I’ve spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars on a little water turtle that I purchased on a whim five years ago for seven bucks. Well, maybe it will be a little bit, but I promise not to dwell on it.In addition to the basking lights, special food, three aquariums, UVB lamps, filters, timers, nutritional supplements and nets to scoop out his

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-63694323024615769832009-12-13T16:17:00.001-08:002009-12-13T16:31:21.483-08:00

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-19524114657459720432009-12-10T16:12:00.000-08:002009-12-10T16:25:16.162-08:00

Hey, remember a while back when I wrote that quiz about the differences between Florence Nightingale and Clara Barton? Of course you don’t. You wouldn’t remember it even if you had read it. Which you didn’t. Well I was reading You Can’t Go Home Again last night and saw that when giving examples of American writers Wolfe mentioned Sinclair Lewis and Upton Sinclair in the same sentence. And while I

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-59501447503300263312009-12-09T16:01:00.000-08:002009-12-09T16:13:49.028-08:00

The mailman must have knocked on the door while I was taking a shower. I do take them, you know. And so when I picked up my mail a short time later I found the dreaded green card telling me that an attempt had been made to deliver something, but since I hadn’t seen fit to answer the door well, tough toenails. So now if I wanted my piece of mail I’d have to drag my ass down to the P.O. and pick

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-44610356604315223082009-12-08T15:37:00.000-08:002009-12-08T15:47:40.800-08:00

You young’uns may not remember the song Ode to Billie Joe, but let me tell you it was a monster hit back in the day, the day being 1967. It was written and performed by Bobbie Gentry and for a short time it became a bit of a cultural phenomenon. Part of the reason, in addition to the fact that it’s a pretty good little tune, was the national debate that raged over some of the perceived mysteries

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-61827327690127277482009-12-07T14:58:00.000-08:002009-12-07T15:34:49.815-08:00

Good Ol’ Lenny, my childhood chum, has come through again. This time he has sent me a DVD of a John Lennon concert that took place in Madison Square Garden in 1972. (He also sent a video tape collection of the complete Abbott and Costello Show, bless him, a discussion of which we can save for a later date.)The Lennon concert was special for a number of reasons, not least of which is because it

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-75847408764268804552009-12-06T15:44:00.000-08:002009-12-06T16:14:51.599-08:00

It was supposed to be a Christmas present to me, but when Spike asked for the tenth time, “What is that thing you wanted again?” I looked it up myself on Amazon and found it now cost only $13, rather than the original $45 list price. So I bought it for myself.It’s a DVD-ROM that contains every National Lampoon ever published, a total of 246 issues. Including all the ads that comes out to 22,632

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11767745.post-42576124218466986972009-12-03T17:17:00.000-08:002009-12-03T17:33:36.022-08:00

Sweet Lorraine, who you might remember requested the alcohol quiz a while back, has now asked for a quiz about Superman. There may be some sort of alcohol/comic book link going on there, but so what? Who are we to judge? Besides, we all love Superman and have admired his blue hair and manly exploits ever since he first appeared in…ah, but let’s not give anything away. So get out your pencils,

Leonard Stegmannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15701067581545139890noreply@blogger.com4