​Sometimes in the middle of the afternoon on a hot day, what one really needs is just a popsicle. That’s all Hyppo has on their menu. The day I visited their Saint Petersburg branch, there were 50 flavors listed on the board (yes, I counted; I’m weird), including flavors such as datil pepper cheesecake, maple pecan, honey grapefruit, cucumber jalapeno, avocado cream, and granny’s apple pie. Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans has nothing on these guys! Everything there is made from fresh fruit. My popsicle even had bits of apple skin in it. It was very good – much better than any pie my grandmother ever made. I thought of taking a picture of it to show you, but alas, I found it had already been eaten!

​This is a poem I wrote in 2008 about the motto of the granite state (New Hampshire). I imagine all my poetry set to music, though I am rarely able to create tunes of my own. This one I imagine to the tune of Born In The USA by Bruce Springsteen.

​Wake up early on saturday
Ben comes over says he wants to play
In a patch of woods near downtown
They were there running around
Grow up soon where does the time go
Seems no one here ever does or talks slow
Take a walk under the colored leaves
I'm at home and it feels great to be free

Oh, live free or die!
You know, live free or die!
The choice, is live free or die!
All the people cry live free or die!

Climb Mount Manadnock me and my girl
We reach the top and we're on top of the world
We see Dublin lake and miles of trees
A perfect place to watch the birds and the bees
We take a seat to count the clouds
Before too long we're alone in the crowd
She falls asleep snuggled close to me
We've got each other and I know that we're free

Mmm, live free or die!
You know, live free or die!
The choice, is live free or die!
All the people cry live free or die!

Somewhere out there is a man
Maybe at an international conference in Switzerland
While waiting, the people talk about their homes
Then they ask him where he comes from
Japan's got its sushi; France has its tower
Australia's got its wildlife; China's a rising power
But there ain't no better land under the sky
I hail from the land of live free or die
In New Hampshire, the summers are hot and the winter's so cold
But really, they're not as bad as you've been told
We love our motorcycles and we love our towns
And we love to eat ice cream all year round
The people are friendly, but not too much
We're all different, 'cause we're an independent bunch
In the two thousand election we were a red state too
Then four years later, we turned to blue
In New Hampshire, the trees change color in the fall
And you'll never ever hear anyone say y'all
People come from all around to buy our nic nacs
You know we hate to have a broad-based tax
We the people are as tough as granite
You know we wouldn't live anywhere else on the planet
We'll always fight for our soveriegnty
I love this land and I'm livin' free

Oh, live free or die!
You know, live free or die!
The choice, is live free or die!
All the people cry live free or die!

Mmm, live free or die!
You know, live free or die!
The choice, is live free or die!
I hail from the state of live free or die!

Oh, live free or die!
You know, live free or die!
One way, to live free or die!
All the people cry live free or die!

Mmm, live free or die!
I was born, to live free or die!
The choice, is live free or die!
You can't take me - live free or die!

Oh, live free or die!
You know, live free or die!
The choice, is live free or die!
All the people cry live free or die!

​Animals are everywhere. I see them even when I’m not on an official adventure. This one I saw outside the bank:

​This one I saw on the ceiling:

​This one I saw on the carpet:

​I also saw this fleck of lettuce on the carpet that flew away:

​My mother found a mole crab at the beach and put it in my hand:

​This animal was hiding in the upper-left of this photograph I took of some fungi while visiting New Hampshire in 2014. I didn’t see it until later.

​Here are a bunch of animals I saw in either Florida or South Carolina between 2013 and 2017:

These are only a few of the books I have read in my (way out) life:

The Story Of Psychology by Morton Hunt goes through the history of different approaches to studying the mind from Plato to phrenology to gestaltism.

Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder is an overview of the works of all the major philosophers including Socrates, Berkeley, and Kant. It is told in a fiction thriller format wherein Sophie’s teacher explains philosophy to her while mysterious things happen.

Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis touches upon Lewis’s theories of the nature of the trinity and other interesting things.

The Evolution Of God by Robert Wright first goes through (his contested version of) the history of religious thoughts and how the human conception of God has changed over time. He then proposes the true existence of an impersonal force for moral development as an emergent phenomenon of globalism that he submits as a compromise between atheism and theism.

How To Lie With Statistics by Darrell Huff details how salesmen, politicians, and others can present truthful data in very misleading ways. For example, some use correlation to imply causation. I read this when I was very young and I can’t stop seeing examples of this almost daily.

How We Know What Isn’t So by Thomas Gilovich goes beyond misleading presentations of data and touches upon psychological biases common to most humans.

The Great Political Theories (volumes one and two) by Michael Curtis contains excerpts and summaries of every major political theory and manifesto, such as Plato’s Republic and Hitler’s Mein Kampf.

Taking The Quantum Leap by Fred Alan Wolf is a simply-worded, illustrated introduction to quantum mechanics.

No They Can’t by John Stossel puts in an eloquent, easy-to-grasp, and fact-supported way the libertarian worldview.

The Metaphysical Club by Louis Menand focuses on the lives and theories of (mostly) American philosophers during the nineteenth century and on how much of it was designed to reduce conflict in the wake of the civil war. It also tangentially touches on some interesting different approaches to doing science.

On Second Thought by Wray Herbert details several cognition “shortcuts” human brains make in making perceptions. What is interesting is that not only are those afraid of heights more careful around heights, but they actually perceive those heights as higher than others do.

Culture Matters edited by Lawrence E. Harrison and Samuel P. Huntington is a collection of essays on how cultural values affect economic development in different societies.

Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan is about how the types of media common in a society affect the “sense ratios” of the people and therefore their approach to life. For example some people care nothing about hearing swear words spoken verbally, but put them into print and they freak out. Other people are the opposite.

Create Your Own Economy by Tyler Cowen touches on many seemingly unrelated subjects, but what I got out of it is how we are all partly autistic and the internet is making us more so by changing our “sense ratios” – though he does not use this term.

On Being Certain by Robert Burton is very pessimistic of intuition, presenting cases where the brain can be tricked.

Blink by Malcolm Gladwell is very optimistic of intuition, presenting cases where the subconscious makes split-second evaluations that later turn out to be right, even when we never know why.

The Physics Of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss is a great introduction to physics. It explains wormholes, warp drive, and why the “transporter” will probably always be impossible.

Jesus Among Other Gods by Ravi Zacharias details several ways that Jesus was completely unique as the founder of a religion.

Darwin’s Black Box by Michael Behe details several examples of “irreducible complexities” found in Earth life that could not possibly have evolved gradually without killing the organism and therefore must have been introduced fully-formed by an “intelligent designer.”

The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel details the corroborating and other evidence to support the accounts of the gospels.

Challenging The Verdict by Earl Doherty picks apart the arguments made in The Case For Christ and submits alternative theories and also claims Jesus never existed.

Not A Conspiracy Theory by Donald Gutstein is not worth much except as a list of who gives the money to promote libertarian or neoconservative causes. He gives progressives a free pass.

The Political Brain by Drew Westen misleadingly supports the case that liberals appeal to the intellect and conservatives the emotions while suggesting that liberals will do better politically if they refuse to have a dialogue and instead resort to accusing conservatives of having secret, nasty motives.

Wrongly Convicted by Saundra Westervelt and John Humphrys gives specific cases where justice went awry and suggests numerous measures that can be made for reform.

Soft Power by Joseph S. Nye Jr. explains the value for nations of cultivating a positive image in the world.

1421 by Gavin Menzies cites overwhelming evidence that the Chinese visited the coasts of North America and South America long before the Portuguese and Spanish. If lightning had not struck the Chinese capitol and started a fire two years later, we would all be speaking Chinese today.

When In The Course Of Human Events by Charles Adams makes the case that the Confederacy was (mostly) in the right and the Union was waaaaaay out of line. It also makes the case that the civil war was about much more than slavery and this has been ignored or even covered up ever since.

How The Irish Saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill chronicles the fall of Rome and how literacy and learning was kept alive only in monasteries, many of them founded by Irish missionaries across Europe.

Union, Nation, Or Empire by David C. Hendrickson is really good. The subtitle says it all: The American Debate Over Foreign Relations 1789-1941. Attitudes towards American relations with the world are compared and contrasted with attitudes towards relations between the states. The author makes the case that the USA should lead the world in joining together since we have had more practice in keeping multiple states in harmony and have learned from our mistakes.

Mapping Human History by Steve Olson shows how closely related the human species is and makes the case that “race” is very nearly nonexistent. It also covers prehistoric migrations.

Reinventing Knowledge by Ian F. McNeely and Lisa Wolverton details the different institutions and artifacts that information has been stored on and disseminated through to the next generation in different cultures and through history, such as how the first colleges and museums arose and evolved.

Sometimes treasures are hidden where you don’t expect. I was on my way north on 301 to Hillsborough River State Park in Thonotosassa in May of 2016 when I noticed John B. Sargeant County Park on the left. Since I had been to Hillsborough River once before and had never been to Sargeant Park, I decided to check it out to see if it was worth visiting. At first, it appeared to be nothing more than a very popular canoe-launching site. Not having a canoe, I wasn’t interested at the time (you can rent canoes there, but I didn’t have anyone to go with, either). When I found out there was also a boardwalk that stretched out to the river, I decided to stick around.

It was along the boardwalk as it cut through the cypress that I made my first serendipity. In the shallow pools on one side were many brown fish. Some were up to six inches long. They had black spots on the sides and when their nearly transparent fins caught the light just right, they flashed blue. I watched them lazily swim back and forth for a while. A little further, the boardwalk came to the river. This was the second serendipity. The sun on the trees made a beautiful, calming sight while I was sat on the benches in the shade. Numerous tiny water bugs caught the sun and made it seem as if the river was made of sparkling water. There was a good breeze that day and I was surprised at how few flies I had encountered in the woods. It is also apparently a popular spot to go fishing.

Across the river were several birds: an egret, a great blue heron, and two anhingas in a tree. This would prove to be a portent of things to come when I found my third serendipity. The Old Fort King Trail runs all the way from John B. Sargeant Park to Hillsborough River Park. It is open to hikers, bicyclists, and horses. I only went a third of the way before turning back, but along the brook in the forest I saw a turtle, an alligator, and five different species of large birds (I swear one bird was actually purple!). Unfortunately, my camera then wasn’t worth much and all I got were pictures of what look like blurry amoebas.

​Even the most boring stretch of woods can have hidden treasures in it that go unnoticed. If the giant orange butterfly didn’t dive bomb me at just the right moment, I would never have seen the large burrow at the base of the tree next to me. If one grapefruit hadn’t fallen out of the tree on the side of the path, I never would have looked up to see all the other grapefruit still growing. I also saw tangerines! The lesson of the day is that treasures are everywhere if you know where to look, and any outing can turn into an adventure.

This is a poem I wrote in 2007. I imagine all of my poetry set to music but I am rarely able to create my own tunes. This one I imagine set to the tune of Do They Know It’s Christmas by Band Aid. The ending I imagine sung to the tune of Give Peace A Chance by John Lennon over the fading chorus.

It's just another bad day
What more can you say
Your mother called you a name
And you hit her in the face
Then you went outside
But could find no place to hide
There's a whole corrupt world out there
And you don't even care
We've all become so full of hate
Is this just our fate
The callousness of the rich
Won't let them give an inch
And the covetousness of the poor
Means they will always want more
Our leaders bring us into war
But we don't know what for

Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
What we really need is love
And we don't have enough
Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
We need another Jesus
For this lost generation
We need someone like the Jesus from history
We need someone to love us
Not to correct the nation
We need someone to teach us how to love

Our world will never be short
Of heroes and their sort
They all propose their plans
And act on them when they can
But when they are overthrown
We forget they were ever born
Along comes another one
With nothing new under the sun
All the ideologies
Don't mean a thing to me
They say the system is good
But it doesn't work as it should
Our plans go astray
And our heroes go away
In the meantime we play
And quickly lose our way

Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
What we really need is love
And we don't have enough
Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
We need another Jesus
For this lost generation
We need someone like the Jesus from history
We need someone to love us
Not to correct the nation
We need someone to teach us how to love

He said that he'd be back
Now he's been gone so long
Until he returns
Who can right the wrong
But when he left us behind
Feeling so blue
He left himself
Inside of me and you

So don't ask who will take his role
We are his hands and feet
The love that the world needs
Is inside you and me

Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
What we really need is love
And we don't have enough
Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
We need another Jesus
For this lost generation
We need someone like the Jesus from history
We need someone to love us
Not to correct the nation
We need someone to teach us how to love

Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
What we really need is love
And we don't have enough
Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
We need another Jesus
For this lost generation
We need someone like the Jesus from history
We need someone to love us
Not to correct the nation
We need someone to teach us how to love

Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
What we really need is love
And we don't have enough
Who can lead us now
Who can help us out
We need another Jesus
For this lost generation
We need someone like the Jesus from history
We need someone to love us
Not to correct the nation
We need someone to teach us how to love

All the people say
Calvinism
Stoicism
Marxism
Hinduism
Aneurysm
Cataclysm
And all I'm saying is give Jesus a chance

All the people say
Give Peace a chance
My circumstance
Meditation Trance
Don't dirty dance
Pick on France
Auto accidents
And all I'm saying is give Jesus a chance

All the people say
Plato
Cicero
Marsiglio
Vico
Russeau
Montesquieu
And all I'm saying is give Jesus a chance

​Plants are everywhere! I see them even when I’m not on an official adventure. I sometimes like to imagine that I'm three inches tall climbing through the branches. Each is like a whole world. The following is a collection of photographs taken in Florida, New Hampshire, and Virginia between 2013-2017.

As it turns out, I’m not the only one who has written about living stuffed animals. J. S. Skye already has five books out featuring Flurry, a magically-animated teddy bear cub whose vanity (and bad luck) get him into all sorts of adorable trouble. Book descriptions of later episodes have him travelling back in time and fighting evil pandas. This is what caught my attention. The first episode is The Christmas Wish, and this is the one I read.

It is not elves, but living teddy bears that make toys at the North Pole for Christopher Kringle (who hates being called Santa). Every so often, he brings a new one to life. The bears live much as humans, getting married, living in heated houses, and eating (recreationally – they have no need of organic calories). They can even produce tears when sad. The first episode explains Flurry’s origins, his moving from the North Pole, and his meeting many friends.

The book is very sweet and the Flurry character is totally adorable. He gets so excited to go shopping that he runs out of the house without the list – but at least remembers to go back to hug his mother. He experiences many of the same sort of child-adult misunderstandings that my character Nathaniel does, and this gets him into trouble. Even the way his internal thoughts were described reminds me of my work. I liked it. Skye definitely captured the feeling of childhood and more than a little bit of the magic of Christmas.

I love cute stories about children, but cute stories about living stuffed animals from the north pole just might be better. As the series progresses, Flurry the teddy bear encounters Christmas magic, sword fights, and discovers his destiny. A great fantasy story.

In 2016 I went to Sunken Gardens in Saint Petersburg and had a blast. I walked down winding, interconnected stone paths between huge palms and trickling artificial brooks. I saw ferns, cycads, oaks, trumpet flowers, bamboo, bottle palms, orchids, bromeliads, and antler ferns. There were many kinds of flowers, berries, and all kinds of strange, unidentifiable things. There was even a rainbow eucalyptus tree. They do a good job of packing a lot of plants into a small area. Some of the trees and palms are quite big and it is a constant struggle between looking at the flowers at ground level and seeing some of the normally hidden sights high above.

The garden began when George Turner bought the land in 1903 and promptly drained the small lake there to make room for it. To this day, some parts of the garden are fifteen feet below street level. He filled it with flowers and exotic fruits. People loved it. In the 1920s he began charging people to stroll through. In 1999 the city of Saint Petersburg bought the place.

They even keep a few animals there. I saw different turtles (including one giant snapper covered in algae), koi, flamingos, parrots, macaws, and kookaburras. The parrots are kept in cages. I tried to teach them some Star Wars quotes, but had no luck.

​I could probably ramble on about each flower, leaf, bench, and trellis I saw for several more paragraphs, but it would be simpler if you just went yourself.

1825 4th Street North, Saint Petersburg, Florida
Sunkengardens.org

​This is a poem I wrote in 2005. It doesn't really mean anything. I imagine all of my poetry set to music but I rarely am able to come up with tunes of my own. This is one time I succeeded, but I don’t think it’s very good.

She's in trouble again
What a poor little girl
They're playing the blame game
And they pinned it on Beryl
Everything she does
Brings on the blame
Everything she doesn't
Brings more of the same
If it happens
Her fault it is
Poor little Beryl's in trouble
She always is

Hey, it's Beryl, poor troubled girl
Oh, you know it's true
She gets blamed for everything
That you and I do
She knows it's true
That sorry little Beryl

She's in trouble again
What a poor little girl
They're playing the blame game
And they pinned it on Beryl
Everything she does
Brings on the blame
Everything she doesn't
Brings more of the same
If it happens
Her fault it is
Poor little Beryl's in trouble
She always is

Everything must be somebody's fault
It can't be left to hang
At least that's what they always say
Blame must follow pain
Consequence escapes us
Leaving us free
We haven't a clue it all goes somewhere
We can't see
Some people in life
Always choose the shortest straw
While misunderstood,
They cross Murphy's law

Hey, it's Beryl, poor troubled girl
Oh, you know it's true
She gets blamed for everything
That you and I do
She knows it's true
That sorry little Beryl

We are the pirates
We've come to take yer gold
We'll take all yer jewels
But we won't take it all
because we never take a bath
We're rough
And tough
And rude
And crude
And lewd
And booed (booing in the background)
(sound mad)And stewed
And mooed
Mooooo!!! Who be the one that brought the cow on board?
We're pirates!
We're pirates!
We're pirates!
We're pirates!
We're pirates!
Arrrrrrrrr!!! Dance the plank!

Hey, it's Beryl, poor troubled girl
Oh, you know it's true
She gets blamed for everything
That you and I do
She knows it's true
That sorry little Beryl

Speed away into the sky
Leave your worries on the ground
Speed away to the furthest galaxy
Fly away at the speed of light
Don't let your worries drag you down
Just speed away and hold on tight
Bye bye bye bye
Bye bye bye farewell

After moving from New Hampshire to Florida, I missed the mountains. Florida is very flat and mountains are hard to come by, but it makes up for this with its clouds and sunsets. The clouds always seem so vast and detailed. Each is an entire world. The sunsets are spectacular and come in more colors than the autumn leaves up north. Over the years I have accumulated a few photographs walking around the neighborhood or out on errands. Only a few of these were taken in parks.
​
One afternoon at Walmart I saw this giant sneezing head in the sky:

​One morning at McDonald’s I saw that the thin cloud cover overhead was collapsing:

​In Florida I see more rainbows in one year than I saw in thirty years in New Hampshire:

​One day there was a green stripe across the sky just before sunset:

I've never seen anything like this in New Hampshire.

This is a poem I wrote in 2005. I imagine all of my poetry set to music, though I am rarely able to come up with my own tunes. This is one of the few that I might have succeeded in at least creating a tune for the chorus, though it sounds strangely familiar.

​Hey pretty girl
I love the way you are
So nice and sweet
You're my little star
We go well together
Like A lion and his roar
You've had a taste of my love, girl
But you'll never make it to the core

So close and yet so far
You just remind me
Of how I want her
So close and yet so far
You just remind me
Of how I miss her
Close to me

Don't take this the wrong way
I really like you girl
I grow fonder every day
'Cause you're such a whirl
Though there's nothing wrong
Not everything is quite right
You know that I'd love too
But don't ask me to stay the night

So close and yet so far
You just remind me
Of how I want her
So close and yet so far
You just remind me
Of how I miss her
Close to me

We've become best friends
And playing these games with you has been so much fun
But it hurts me to tell you
You just aren't the one
Though we comfort each other
Through our many hurts
And you're so very tempting
But you just aren't her
You just aren't her

So close and yet so far
You just remind me
Of how I want her
So close and yet so far
You just remind me
Of how I miss her
Close to me

I'm so sorry girl
I still like you
But you just can't compete
I look into your eyes
And she's not there
You just remind me...

After a tough day of exploring the mangroves of Weedon Island (actually a peninsula) for crabs and birds to photograph, I needed somewhere to eat. Noble Crust looked as good a place as any. Their tagline is: Seasonal Italian Southern Soul. I asked what this meant and was told that they make Italian-style meals sometimes using ingredients from the southern USA. It is seasonal because they use local, fresh ingredients that are in season, and therefore have to mix up the menu every few months. That sounded good enough to me.

​I love mushrooms, so I settled on ordering the mushroom pizza to share. It was amazing. Each slice actually got better as I ate it. The pizza was made with a thin crust cooked just short of burnt (the way I like my toast) and covered with mozzarella, parsley, and giant chunks of soft, juicy mushrooms. The only thing that could have made it better was red pepper flakes (which they provided).

Afterwards, I ordered something I don’t remember the name of because my eyes stopped on the word Nutella and wouldn’t move after that. What I got was sweet hazelnut madness. It had ice cream, cookies, hazelnuts, and was covered with Nutella.

8300 Fourth Street N, Saint Petersburg, Florida
Noble-crust.com