“This is the day we pay homage to all those who didn’t come home. This is not Veteran’s Day; it’s not a celebration; it is a day of solemn contemplation over the cost of freedom.”
Category Archives: News
In Memoriam – Tina Turner, 1939-2023
“Sometimes you’ve got to let everything go – purge yourself. If you are unhappy with anything… whatever is bringing you down, get rid of it. Because you’ll find that when you’re free, your true creativity, your true self comes out.”
I have a personal – albeit tenuous – connection to Tina Turner. My father worked for a printing shop in downtown Dallas for most of his adult life. In the early 1960s, before I was born, he met Turner and her then husband, Ike, when they came to town ahead of a series of shows they had scheduled. The couple was just getting started in their career together, and the shop where my father worked landed the contract to print up tickets and various promotional materials for the Turners. My father had never heard of them, but recounted they were polite and professional, arriving in business attire as was customary at the time. Ike, he said, did most of the talking. He never saved any of the stuff he printed for them, so he had only his recollection of the meeting to relay in the following years.
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Happy Mother’s Day 2023!
“Giving birth is like taking your lower lip and pulling it up over your head.”
Image: Morgan Johnson
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May 2023 Literary Calendar
Events in the month of May for writers and readers
Get Caught Reading Month
Short Story Month
- May 1 – American Cheese Month; Arthritis Awareness Month; Asian American and Pacific Islander Month; Be Kind to Animals Month; Better Sleep Month; Couple Appreciation Day; Global Love Day; Indian Heritage Month; Jewish American Heritage Month; Labor History Month; May Day; Mental Health Awareness Month; Military Appreciation Month; Mother Goose Day; National Allergy and Asthma Awareness Month; National Anxiety Month; National Loyalty Day; National Meditation Month; National Pet Month; Phone In Sick Day
- May 1-7 – Hurricane Preparedness Week
- May 2 – International Harry Potter Day; Poem on Your Pillow Day
- May 2-8 – Children’s Book Week
- May 3 – World Press Freedom Day
- May 4 – Greenery Day; National Day of Reason (U.S.)
- May 4-10 – Red Cross Week
- May 5 – Nellie Bly’s Birthday; Cinco de Mayo (México); Europe Day; National Cartoonists Day; National Silence the Shame (about mental illness) Day; National Space Day
- May 6 – Sigmund Freud’s Birthday; Free Comic Book Day
- May 6-12 – National Nurses Week
- May 7 – Tchaikovsky’s Birthday; World Laughter Day
- May 7-13 – National Pet Week
- May 8 – Peter Benchley’s Birthday
- May 9 – J.M. Barrie’s Birthday; Peter Pan Day
- May 11 – Irving Berlin’s Birthday; Salvador Dali’s Birthday; Martha Graham’s Birthday; National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day
- May 12 – Limerick Day
- May 14 – Mother’s Day (U.S.)
- May 15-21 – Dementia Awareness Week
- May 16 – Love a Tree Day
- May 19 – Nora Ephron’s Birthday
- May 20 – Eliza Doolittle Day; Flower Day
- May 22 – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Birthday; Sherlock Holmes Day
- May 25 – Robert Ludlum’s Birthday
- May 27 – Dashiell Hammett’s Birthday; Ian Fleming’s Birthday
- May 29 – Memorial Day (U.S.)
- May 30 – National Creativity Day
- May 31 –Walt Whitman’s Birthday
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Earth Day 2023
“The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.”
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Happy Easter 2023
“The real reason Easter is on a different day each year is because sometimes it’s difficult to remember which lie you told.”
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April 2023 Literary Calendar
Events in the month of April for writers and readers
Child Abuse Awareness Month
D.E.A.R. (Drop Everything and Read) Month
Defeat Diabetes Month
Dog Appreciation Month
Earth Month
Genocide Awareness Month
Global Astronomy Month
International Guitar Month
Mathematics & Statistics Awareness Month
National Alcohol Awareness Month
National Card & Letter Writing Month
National Humor Month
National Poetry Month
School Library Month
- April 1 – April Fool’s Day; Education & Sharing Day; International Fun at Work Day; National Greeting Card Day; National Love Our Children Day; National Loyal Day; Reading Is Funny Day
- April 2 – Hans Christian Anderson’s Birthday; International Children’s Book Day; National Reconciliation Day; Nature Day
- April 3 – Jane Goodall’s Birthday; Independent Artist Day
- April 4 – Maya Angelou’s Birthday; National School Librarian Day
- April 5 – Booker T. Washington’s Birthday; Passover
- April 7 – William Wordsworth’s Birthday
- April 8 – Buddha’s Birthday
- April 9 – Easter; National Unicorn Day
- April 10 – Joseph Pulitzer’s Birthday
- April 12 – Beverly Cleary’s Birthday; Tom Clancy’s Birthday
- April 13 – Celebrate Teen Literature Day; Scrabble Day
- April 15 – Corrie Ten Boom’s Birthday; Leonardo da Vinci’s Birthday; Rubber Eraser Day; World Art Day
- April 16 – National Librarian Day
- April 17 – International Haiku Poetry Day; Thornton Wilder’s Birthday
- April 18 – Newspaper Columnists Day
- April 21 – Charlotte Bronte’s Birthday
- April 22 – Earth Day; National Day of Puppetry
- April 23-29 – National Library Week
- April 23 – William Shakespeare’s Birthday; World Book and Copyright Day
- April 25 – Guglielmo Marconi’s Birthday; National Library Workers Day
- April 26 – John James Audubon’s Birthday; National Library Outreach Day (formerly National Bookmobile Day)
- April 27 – National Tell a Story Day; Take Action for Libraries Day
- April 28 – Great Poetry Reading Day; Harper Lee’s Birthday
- April 29 – Independent Bookstore Day
- April 30 – Day of the Child; Honesty Day; National Animal Advocacy Day
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Happy Saint Patrick’s Day 2023!
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March 2023 Literary Calendar
Events in the month of March for writers and readers
National Reading Month
Small Press Month
- March 1 – Fredric Chopin’s Birthday; Plan a Solo Vacation Day; World Compliment Day
- March 2 – Theodore Seuss Geisel’s (Dr. Seuss) Birthday; Read Across America Day
- March 3 – Alexander Graham Bell’s Birthday; I Want You to be Happy Day; If Pets Had Thumbs Day; World Book Day (Ireland and UK)
- March 4 – National Grammar Day
- March 6-12 – Read an E-Book Week; Return Borrowed Books Week
- March 7 – National Cereal Day
- March 8 – Be Nasty Day
- March 9 – Amerigo Vespucci’s Birthday; Get Over It Day; Popcorn Lover’s Day
- March 10 – Everything You Do Is Right Day; International Day of Awesomeness
- March 11 – Worship of Tools Day
- March 14 – Albert Einstein’s Birthday; Johann Strauss’ Birthday; Learn About Butterflies Day
- March 15 – Everything You Think Is Wrong Day; Ides of March
- March 16 – Everything You Do Is Right Day; Freedom of Information Day
- March 17 – St. Patrick’s Day
- March 19 – Let’s Laugh Day
- March 20 – First Day of Spring(Northern Hemisphere); First Day of Fall (Southern Hemisphere);(Northern Hemisphere); First Day of Fall (Southern Hemisphere);’.; Extraterrestrial Abductions Day; International Day of Happiness; World Storytelling Day
- March 21 – World Poetry Day
- March 22 – As Young as You Feel Day
- March 24 – Harry Houdini’s Birthday
- March 26 – Robert Frost’s Birthday; Tennessee Williams’ Birthday
- March 29 – Smoke and Mirrors Day
- March 30 – I Am in Control Day; Pencil Day; Vincent van Gogh’s Birthday
- March 31 – Johann Sebastian Bach’s Birthday; René Descartes’ Birthday
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Happy Valentine’s Day 2023!
“This fire that we call Loving is too strong for human minds. But just right for human souls.”
Image: Jean Baptiste Robie, A Still life with Flowers and Raspberries
Chief Writing Wolf 