2024 Book One: American Brutus John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Conspiracies by Michael W. Kaufman

This is the fifth book I've read about John Wilkes Booth including My Thoughts be Bloody about the rivalry between John Wilkes and his brother Edwin. 

This book focuses on the Lincoln assassination and its aftermath. I was most interested in Kaufman's accounts of the investigations and trials of the conspirators. 

Of course, investigative methods of the 1860s were primitive compared to those of today. But the investigations were sloppy regardless of the era. There was competition rather than cooperation and coordination among the various investigators. Detectives' notes were sloppy and fragmented; evidence was lost.

The trial was held by a military commission whose members initially focused on attempting to tie Booth's actions to Confederate officials. The lead prosecutor was also the commission's legal advisor--conflict of interest much? The defendants had trouble obtaining legal counsel and the counsel once obtained had insufficient time to prepare. The government made all the rules and changed them at will. Testimony was taken behind closed doors. Evidence was withheld from defense attorneys, and some prosecution witnesses were outright lying. 

I liked this description of the aftermath of the assassination. "Like a slow-burning flame, awareness of the shooting built momentum as it swept through the house, and the audience, at first at a low simmer, started to boil."

American Brutus is a fascinating, in-depth account of a tragic era of American history--another book I wish I could discuss with my father.

Tuesday Miscellanea

After a week of sub-freezing temperatures, it's warming up. The "January thaw" has stopped the "Arctic blast." It's so nice to shed the snow boots and the heavy winter coat.  At least for a while. Temperatures will be flirting with 60 at the end of the week. The thaw is timely as one-third of the winter is now over. 

I returned to the New Canaan Nature Center after missing two weeks. I was sad to learn that Jasper died. I thought he was one of the younger birds there. I'll have to get more of the story,

Then Tupelo flew at my head. That was a bit of a shock; he's never done anything like that before.

Today we watched Murder on a Honeymoon (courtesy of TCM.) It's a fun mystery and the third of the Miss Withers/Inspector Piper movies and the last one starring Edna Mae Oliver. The cast includes Leo G. Carroll and Lola Lane. It was horrible to see Willie Best credited as Sleep 'n' Eat. 

I'm almost done with my book American Brutus. My next book will be Bette's latest.    

TCM Presents: Roadblock (1961)

I was scrolling through the TCM schedule and saw Roadblock starring Charles McGraw and recorded it. 

McGraw is insurance detective Joe Peters who encounters a beautiful "chiseler" Diane Morley (Joan Dixon) at the airport when he's returning from a successful business trip. He's attracted to her but she tells him he's not in her league and she's aiming for the World Series. 

They meet again in Los Angeles and suddenly they're in love. But Joe doubts he can keep Diane on his $350 a month salary after she's been with a rich gangster. Suddenly the (previously) straight shooter Joe gives Diane's ex inside information to rob a train for a third of the take. Then suddenly chiseler Diane decides she doesn't need all that money after all. 

It's a good film, that's weakened by the characters' sudden decisions that go against everything previously established in the film. 

McGraw is perfect in the lead. I had never seen Joan Dixon before; I thought she did a good job. One of the co-stars was Louis Jean Heydt who I wrote about here.

Author Speak

I went to another Author Speak for Bette Bono and her latest collection The Second Chance Store & Other Stories. Previously, I've attended two others. Bette has now written two novels and two short story collections. I'm envious yes, but I need to use her example as inspiration. 

2023 Goals Review

I achieved only two of my annual goals.

I am proud that I finally made 150 gym visits for the year. I figured that goal was reasonable based on three visits a week. Last year was the first time I even got close at 143. I realized at the beginning of December that this could be the year I achieved my goal. And I did it, even though I had to go the gym the last six days of the year to do it.

The second success is my version of Dryuary. I didn't drink from January 2nd until Valentine's Day. A side goal was to drink only on weekends. I didn't succeed there (especially around the year-end holidays) but I am drinking much less often during the week, and I'm happy with that. 

Now onto my failures (sigh): reading, blogging, writing, and making art.

I wanted to read 40 books this year: I only read 29. I read 33 in 2021 and 35 in 2022. I'm disappointed that I regressed, but I feel a little better after reading this. Apparently, I'm in the 90th percentile of book reading U.S public. Not too shabby.

Another goal was to write 200 blogposts; I wrote 148. I find it easy to let days go by without posting. I read somewhere you should post at least three times a week. I barely missed that. 

Let's move on to writing and making art. I failed miserably here. My writing goal was to spend at least two hours a day writing, editing, researching, blogging, journaling and in that time produce 200 new words. I did this--maybe--a handful of times.

Another goal was to spend two hours a week making some kind of art. Another big failure. 

I need to continue to think about 2024 goals. 

Family Time

I had a family-oriented weekend with a baby shower for my niece? (my nephew's wife) on Sunday. Jeff's sister (the mother-in-law) came by Saturday night to spend some time with Jeff. We ate Chinese take-out for dinner. 

As I was driving home from the shower Sunday afternoon, one of my cousins called. I phoned her back when I got home, and we talked for 45 minutes, after not speaking for over a year. I had also heard from a nephew Saturday afternoon. 

Maybe it's a sign that we'll all have more family time in 2024.

Books Read in 2023

1.    Social Crimes by Jane Stanton Hitchcock

2.    Your Corner Dark by Desmond Hall

3.    Mystic River by Dennis Lehane

4.    The Tudors in Love by Sarah Grirstwood

5.    All This, and Heaven Too by Rachel Field

6.    The Cabinet of Dr. Leng by Preston & Child

7.    Caught in the Revolution by Helen Rappaport

8.    An Imperfect Spy by Amanda Cross

9.    The Princes in the Tower by Alison Weir

10.    Kindred by Octavia E. Butler

11.    In the Time of Butterflies by Julia Alvarez

12.    An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

13.    Booth by David Robertson

14.    Votes for Women American Suffragists and the Battle for the Ballot by Winifred Conkling

15.    The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

16.    Catherine of Aragon The True Queen by Alison Weir

17.    The Last Tsar The Live and Times of Nicholas II by Edward Radzinsky

18.    Killers of the Flower Moon The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann

19.    Round Up the Usual Suspects the Making of Casablanca--Bogart, Bergman, and World War II by Aljean Harmetz

20.    The Accidental Suffragist by Galia Gichon

21.    South The Story of Shackleton's Last Expedition 1914-1917 by Sir Ernest Shackleton Edited by Ernest King

22.     bird by bird Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott

23.    One for the Money by Stephanie Plum 

24.    Manhattan Noir Edited by Lawrence Block

25.    Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel

26.    Dead Mountain by Preston & Child

27.    The Sisters The Saga of the Mitford Family by Mary S. Lovell

28.    The Sisters of Henry VIII by Maria Perry

29.    The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde

My goal was to read 40 books this year. Obviously, I fell way short. I've been thinking about why I failed. There wasn't just one reason. I read a lot of things online rather than books. Some books took me a long time to finish. There were times I just wasn't thrilled with my options. I wish I could have at least made it to 30.

My favorite book, by far, was Kindred. I also loved The Cabinet of Dr. Leng, bird by bird, and Dead Mountain. Honorable Mention: Killers of the Flower Moon and Round Up the Usual Suspects the Making of Casablanca.

2024 So Far...

...sucks. Blunt, but true. The main thing is that our friend is in the hospital as I mentioned. It was worse than I realized: he was in intensive care. The weird thing is that we had just seen him for the first time in about a year two days before he was hospitalized.

Compared to that, everything else is a minor annoyance. I haven't been feeling well--I've been exhausted. I can't seem to get out of my way to accomplish anything. 

Even as I write this, I feel guilty for being so petty, when our friends are dealing with so much. 

Welcome 2024

Trying to be positive here after my last negative post about 2023. 

We had a nice, quiet New Year's Eve: Chinese takeout with our friend Cynthia, and switching between all the New Year's Eve shows. We liked the Nashville show the best, although I was happy to ace the Vanderpump Rules quiz on CNN (was there any doubt?)

Today I made Christmas breakfast again. Later a dinner: duck breast with a berry sauce, sweet potato, and a vegetable medley with broccoli, red pepper, carrots, and garlic.

I was thinking that 2024 is a blank slate to be filled with positive things. 

Unfortunately, I just heard bad health news about a friend of ours. Sigh.

2023: Good Riddance

2023 wasn't a good year. Many of our family and friends have had health problems, although the younger generation had good news (births and pregnancies.)

I actually scrolled through 2023's posts looking for good news. I didn't find anything noteworthy, which is sad. It's not that the year was an unrelenting disaster, but the good wasn't anything great. 

Maybe it's the wrong attitude--to look for great things. I should be happy with the good and work harder to get to the great.