Unruh

Jack Unruh was a fine artist who did the best, or at least the most interesting, illustrations for many magazines , especially ones of the Time- Life Group, for over 50 years. One of his last regular assignments was doing the pic for the humor column by Bill Heavey at the end of Field and …

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What I know about Spooks

This started as a comment in “Secret Agent Man” responding to a crack by Tim, but when I realized it was “too long” ( since WHEN?”) I decided to make it a post, with illos. Les Murray is a Catholic redneck, something of a naturalist, and the best poet Australia ever had.I have two big …

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Why I may NEVER be rich…

What’s that? Oh, a Jack Unruh illo, for a piece I had published, that I sent in un- asked for, “over the transom”. In SI. In 1980. When Pat was still editor. And I didn’t follow up. Because I didn’t know how. Thank God Gray’s was only a subway stop away….

The Girl with the Brook Trout Tattoo

My separated- at- birth friend from Savannah, Gil Tracy, recycles Larsen’s title with these shots of his daughter Julia, a French scholar, fishing in North Carolina…hey Russ Chatham, take a look at these! i UPDATE: Here is a poem about Julia’s tattoo by her grandmother, who was a friend of Flannery O’Connor’s, and appears in …

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Conundrum

At first I was interested in this catalogue, but the longer I looked at it, the more uneasy I became. The kits for analysing owl pellets were fine. But what is with the artificial FEATHERS? I know, it is illegal to pick up feathers.It is also STUPID for it to be illegal to pick up …

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Carlos’s Sparrow Sauce

Just like my paternal grandmother’s, which she used on Polenta. “Makes a nice-a sauce”, she would say as she caught the sparrows in the pigeon loft by swatting them with a broom or popping them into a brown paper bag and whacking it on a beam. I have never felt more Italian……. Here she is …

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