Dutchsinse, and other useful weather and earthquake links

From our guest contributor, Judith Cosby, also known as "Mom"... Thanks Mom!

I've been a dutchsinse fan since early April. I check his site at least two times every day. Also, of course, USGS (united states geologic survey) and PNSN (pacific northwest seismic network), NOAA, intellicast, wunderground & wondermap, and accuweather, along with Reality Check: Nuclear News Now (for Fukushima and Fort Calhoun and Los Alamos) --and Omaha.com/flood and also the Corps of Engineers site at www.nwo.usace.army.mil for water levels at the dams on the Missouri River. Also Arnie Gunderson's videos at fairewinds.com (the "e" is important), and of course, Democracy Now, Russia Today (RT news), Spiegel Online (Germany), NHK (Japan), BBC, Al Jazeera (AJ is strangely totally silent on Nebraska and Arizona--news blackout with them just like with MSM USA-- hmmm), Christian Science Monitor is excellent, thoughtful, and articulate, Democratic Underground, enenews, legitgov, Daily Kos, altnewsreport.wordpress.com, corbettreport.com (two Ts) . . I think that's most of the best ones. . . Japan Quake Map of course, oh, and if you don't know about it yet, check out IRIS--global earthquake graphics! And just for fun, as a break from earthquakes, rampant fires, rising rivers and disaster news, I periodically go to Cloud Appreciation Society.com--especially check out "undulous asperatus"-- the "new" clouds (actually have been around for at least the last two years) but they're also a significant "uptick" recently-- they are spectacular! Eerie, unreal, sometimes scary, but also awesome and beautiful.

Weather Channel sucks. Fox News is an absolute outrage of pablum and propaganda, misdirection & disinformation. msnbc, etc., is mostly crap and distraction and silly celebrity news. General Electric owns 49% of NBC (and thus msnbc), and Westinghouse is a major corporate presence at CBS, I believe, and guess who manufactured all these nuclear reactors???
So I guess it should be no surprise that MOST of what is going on is NOT reported anywhere on American MSM. -- It's quite the little research project I've been involved in, now for four months. I have massive notes. You'd be really proud.

Dutchsinse is right about the "uptick" -- Did you know that Thursday, July 14th, there were

39 74 earthquakes just in the Virgin Islands alone? (M 2.5 - 4.0) --And yesterday (July 15th) there were 22 significant quakes along the entire west coast of South and North America ! !

From Chile's M 6.0; to Argentina 4.3, border of Chile and Bolivia 5.3; Baja 4.1 and 3.5; Southern California M3, 2.8, 3.1, and 3.0; Los Angeles 2.5; San Francisco 3.3; Northern California 2.6 and 2.5; Oregon 2.2; Washington 3.2 & 2.2, one on top of the other about 30 miles N.E. of Everett; and then southern Alaska, central Alaska, (was northern Alaska in there? Can't remember, and I still don't know how to pull up two pages side-by-side or flip back and forth between selected pages) anyway,
Alaska & the Aleutian Islands: 3.8, 2.9, 3.1, 4.0, 2.7, 2.8, and a 3.5 ***.(That's 23, so I guess one of those Alaskan ones was after midnight--24:00 Co-ordinated Universal Time and thus the 16th) But anyway, WOW. -- Not to mention the entire other half of the Ring of Fire, which is lit up like Las Vegas on acid with even more and even bigger EQs.

About the time you get here Monday night, or maybe the next day or two (July 19/20) Typhoon Ma-On (winds 132 mph with gusts to 161 mph, and with snow in the center (in July!) may be hitting southern Japan. Poor Japan.

"May you live in interesting times" is beginning to look like the understatement of the century.

Meanwhile, in Walla Wonderland, the earth doesn't move under our feet, and we have had a beautiful (albeit late) spring, and by and large wonderful weather. Looks pretty calm and safe to me, especially compared with most everywhere else. Roses are in bloom.

Georgette Who? Meet the Author Who Outsells Rowling, Dickens & Patterson

From ABE Books:

The Unknown Ajax
Georgette Heyer

Unless you are a reader of historical romance, then there is a good chance that you will be unfamiliar with Georgette Heyer. Who is she? For a start, she’s one of AbeBooks’ top 10 bestselling authors during the 15-history of this company.

Last time we looked she was behind Shakespeare, C.S. Lewis, Agatha Christie and Stephen Kingbut ahead of J.K. Rowling, Charles Dickens and James Patterson.

We have sold a huge number of this English novelist’s books because 1) she is loved by people who love love stories, and 2) many of her books are out-of-print so used bookshops fulfill the demand from her legion of fans.

Heyer (1902-1974) also wrote detective fiction but her real legacy is historical romance and especially regency romance. The author conducted meticulous research to ensure accuracy of whatever period she was tackling. She had a substantial library of reference books to ensure her descriptions of clothing, customs and real-life events were correct. Even if do not know Heyer, you will have seen her covers – the handsome hero and beautiful heroine posed to embrace.

Heyer’s debut novel The Black Moth was published in 1921 when she was still a teenager. Her first commercial success was These Old Shades - released during Britain’s General Strike of 1926 - which received no adverts or promotion of any sort and yet still sold like hot cakes. The success of These Old Shades without any publicity convinced Heyer that she did not need to court reviewers or journalists in any way and she never did. Heyer’s first trip into the Regency period was Regency Buck in 1935. It’s easy to compare these novels, usually featuring wealthy upper class characters, to Jane Austen’s work.

The Conqueror, as in William, is one her best known pieces of historical fiction, which she published in 1931. A year later her first thriller, Footsteps in the Dark, was published. During the 1930s, she produced a thriller and a romance each year with the love stories paying her bills. Bear in mind, her mysteries were competing against the works of Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers.

Her romance sold well during the Great Depression and World War II when she offered escapism – dashing highwaymen, handsome dukes, beautiful maids etc - to millions of readers. Her later years were dominated by money and tax troubles. She switched publishers, sold the rights to some of her best books for a pittance, had to review books and sold her stories to magazines.

Perhaps her many imitators were the biggest indicator of her influence. These copycat writers were almost to be expected as Heyer launched the regency romance genre.

Asking prices for first editions of Heyer’s thrillers, which always had smaller print runs, can reach four figures. The most expensive Heyer book ever sold by AbeBooks was a first edition of Death in the Stocks for $2,400.

There are a several biographies about Heyer, including Georgette Heyer’s Regency England by Chris Teresa and The Private World of Georgette Heyer by Jane Aiken Hodge.

Here are the two Heyer novels we have listed online currently, and I am quite sure we could easily acquire others for any interested parties:

Add to Shopping Cart 1 . Faro's Daughter; Georgette Heyer ARROW (RAND) 2004 0099465590 / 9780099465591 PAPERBACK Very Good 0099465590 Very good. No dust jacket as issued. Clean text, tight binding, light wear to exterior. Support Pacific Northwest Independent Booksellers! 288 p. Price: 11.35 USD

Add to Shopping Cart 2 . The Foundling by Georgette Heyer; Georgette Heyer G.P. Putnam's Sons 1948 Hardcover Good Good. No dust jacket. ~clean text, tight binding, light wear to exterior 380 p. Price: 13.25 USD

Literature is a luxury; fiction is a necessity. --G. K. Chesterton

“Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.” -Albert Einstein

Graceful 3D Trees Cut into Discarded Books

Cleverly returning a hint of their paper based origins, artist Kylie Stillman takes old discarded books and carefully carves inverted bonzai tree reliefs in their pages. Her works come at a time when book art and carving are gaining in popularity, yet her works stand out as unique examples in the young trend. The Australian artist got her start at carving books in 2006 when she trimmed a bird into a discarded tome; she later gave her birds a place to sit, progressing to potted plants and now her current tree carvings. For her latest work featuring trees carved in stacks of boldly colored paper, see her website kyliestillman.com.

A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don't need it. --Bob Hope