Not-yet-published pieces, stories, essays, rants, and random strangenesses

“Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many....

Note: I originally wrote this essay for the blog “BLT Is Not Just a Sandwich“—a place to discuss the Bible, other Literature, and its...

The Hindu god Shiva (who has nothing whatsoever to do with sitting shiva) is usually depicted as one of the members of the great Triad,...

Today, Judge Judy was eviscerating a teenager who was lying about breaking the window of a pizza shop. She called him a fool, and accused...

This afternoon I received a call from the hospice bereavement counselor. She was lovely, and asked all the right questions: about mood...

When you look back on your failed romantic relationships (and most of us have had one or two), was there a time when you knew, with...

Actually, it’s not a test. It’s a program that looks at your It’s wrong, of course, at least in my case. It says: Likelihood of you being...

I confess: I am an inveterate slob. The ADD experts say many ADDers are slobs, though of course they use fancier language;...

From an online forum: Many of my friends in their 30s are starting to play around with psychedelics again. Mushrooms & LSD. I guess we...

As much as I would like to say I’m a thoroughgoing pagan, albeit one with synchretist tendencies, there are certain times of the year...

My childhood home was not particularly large. A few years ago I happened to see it up for sale (by its fifth or sixth owner, I think),...

One of my recurring nightmares involves a scenario in which there are several dogs in my care, usually one large and several smaller...

A substitute teacher in the town of Land-O-Lakes, Florida (just east of Tampa on the west coast, and one of the shooting locations for...

My parents were bowlers. I grew up in bowling alleys, both duckpin and tenpin lanes. League play, always. Dad even managed a lane for a...

Margaret White, the psycho mother of Stephen King’s Carrie, immortalized in the film I should’ve killed myself when he put it in me....

I am pleased to announce that The Inclusive Bible: The First Egalitarian Translation It is a completely new translation of the Bible from...

These parents believe horses and shamans can unlock their son’s autistic mind. This is their journey of discovery by Tim Rayment The...

By BENEDICT CAREY The New York Times | July 31, 2007 In a recent experiment, psychologists at Yale altered people’s judgments of a...

The news report was bizarre on so many levels. First, the opening salvo: “An amusement park in China has built what it claims is the...