This Is Stag Country

Posted on May 17, 2018 by JMN

Bee Kay Gooch had Kassidee, Krissee and Kooger quick and early. Kooger’s the baby. Bee Kay and Jason married Labor Day and Kooger came Christmas. Spyder Blunt, her stepdad, had a restraining order on Jason that year, but kid’s find a way, don’t they? I haven’t seen much of Jason’s parents since my Monty and Commander had that tiff at The Last Drop. Monty told me he was just joshing when he called Commander “Commie” — he didn’t think it through. I nearly cried when I saw the shiner Monty got. They tusseled for as long as it took both of ’em to fall down. The domino table broke Commander’s toe. He called Monty a sorry son of a so-and-so and drove home. That’s the last words they had. Marvel tried to get Commander to patch things up, but she said Commander just called Monty a horse’s petoot. Monty said Commander couldn’t tell shoe polish from Shinola. These men! Those kids favor their momma, though. Thank goodness! Jason’s no feast for the eyes, unless you like tattoos. But I’m here to tell you, Bee Kay has kept her figure. Her head-turnin’ days are not over yet.

stag country bbq sandwich

stag country bbq sandwich

(Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

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Social Math — UK

Posted on May 16, 2018 by JMN

Every June, The Thane of Thoth, a tavern, helps celebrate Chichesterton’s famous Regatta-on-the-Hogg by dropping the price of its brews by 12.5% for the third of a fortnight that couches the merriment.

Question: Speculate as shrewdly as your humble station permits on the following: Will Gerry Rattigan, the proprietor of The Thane, pass the savings on to Sir Alistair Chichester, or will he keep the difference for himself by charging full whack?

Hint: Gerry knows Sir Alistair, a Peer of the Realm, doesn’t give a jenny’s whinny one way or the other. Further hint: Base instincts are inherent in the cloth of which Gerry is knit.

Express your conclusion in boolean form, followed by elucidation whose chiefest virtue shall be a commanding brevity.

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“Tagg’s Island,” Sir Alfred Munnings, 1919.

(Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

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Becky Hammon

Posted on May 16, 2018 by JMN

“My job is to be the best that I can be, and if that changes your mind, then great. But I can’t be consumed with how you feel about me.” (Becky Hammon, 5′-6″-tall basketball champion and contender for top coach position of the Milwaukee Bucks. Quoted by Frank Bruni, NYTimes.)

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Humility

Posted on May 16, 2018 by JMN

Even a cursory look at following blogs uncovers so much good image-making and wordsmithing it humbles one. I ply in contrast what seems but a plodding literal depictiveness, a pyrrhic victory of method over invention, craft over creativity, sarcasm over substance, the strutting of personal nonsense on one’s tiny stage. I guess that’s why I often feature in my commentary the zany image created by Texas artist Tom Jones of the galloping rodeo lady balanced forefingeredly athwart the saddle horn. It suggests an implausible act of flaunting. No help for one’s sense of inferiority but to press on, grateful for the attention paid.

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(Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

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“Horseman”

Posted on May 16, 2018 by JMN

This gallery contains 1 photo.

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Supplication

Posted on May 16, 2018 by JMN

O Master, Boss,
Unique and only Sir,
We beg that Thine Almightiness (or His)
Flex His (or Thine) unending mercy to the uttermost
In righteous overlooking of our pitiable insufficiency,
Created though we be by Thee, O peerless Engineer.
Moreover beg we also that Thy Three-In-Oneness,
All-BeingBeer, All-Doing Doer, All-Knowing Knower, All-Owning Owner,
Try and convict and sentence our turdworthiness
To everlasting comeuppance without surcease of suffering
Save by Thy sovereign say-so and agreed-on decreed creed.
We hold ourselves in horror!
Flog and flay our flawed flesh if Thou wilt.
Thy will be done, whatever.
Beseech we Thee, notwithstanding, O Mono-Demiurge, O Mister:

Let fly if only a sliver of Thy bottomless compassion
In support of us, Thy sin-soiled product line.
Wholly in the name of the Father who art Thou,
And the Son’s name whose Father Thou art,
And the Ghost Thing’s name, and all Y’all’s name,
Forever and evermore. Absolutely.
One-hundred percent.
Believe me.
Amen.

(Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

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Thirty-Four Paintings

Posted on May 16, 2018 by JMN

(01) “Madonna of the Yardwinder”
(02) “Madonna With a Cat”
(03) “Madonna of the Pomegranate”
(04) “Madonna of the Carnation”
(05) “Madonna With a Vase of Flowers”
(06) “Madonna and Child With Saints Sebastian and Francis”
(07) “Benois Madonna”
(08) “Virgin and Child”
(09) “Virgin of the Rocks”
(10) “Virgin and Child With the Infant Saint John and an Angel”
(11) “Virgin Worshipping the Child”
(12) “Virgin and Saints Laurence and Remigius With the Christ Child and Infant Saint John”
(13) “Little Madonna”
(14) “Virgin and Child With Saint Anne”
(15) “Virgin and Child With Saint Anne and the Infant John”
(16) “Dreyfus Madonna”
(17) “Virgin and Child With a Bowl Of Fruit”
(18) “Madonna Doni”
(19) “Madonna Tadei”
(20) “Madonna of Bruges”
(21) “Mouscron Madonna”
(22) “Madonna of the Stairs”
(23) “Madonna Pitti”
(24) “Enthroned Madonna”
(25) “Ognissanti Madonna”
(26) “Madonna of the Magnificat”
(27) “Small Cowper Madonna”
(28) “Madonna and Child Enthroned With Saints Catharine, Peter, Cecilia, Paul, and the Infant Saint John the Baptist”
(29) “Madonna and Child With Saint John the Baptist and Saint Nicholas of Bari”
(30) “Ansidei Madonna”
(31) “Madonna of the Goldfinch”
(32) “Madonna of the Baldachino”
(33) “Alba Madonna”
(34) “Madonna of Foligno”
(Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

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HJN, Untitled Watercolor

Posted on May 14, 2018 by JMN

This gallery contains 2 photos.

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Eulogy on Mother’s Day

Posted on May 13, 2018 by JMN

[My mother died in 2016. This is from my remarks at her memorial.]

PERSISTENCE: SING IT THIS WAY

A memorial service unites you and us in a common undertaking to hold on, briefly, to someone who is departing. In some sense it’s a ritual of denial that we indulge in with your support. It says, “Don’t go. Don’t go yet.” As long as we are in this room, talking about Martha, thinking about her, hearing music that evokes her, we hold her, in spirit. Her going doesn’t have quite the finality that it will have when this ceremony ends. Then, life will go on, and each of us, in our way, will wrap ourselves around the hollow spot that she leaves, and start healing it, the way a tree heals itself around the wound of a lopped-off limb.

mother in houndstooth coat

Mother at the ranch looking like Hedy Lamarr. 1950s? (Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

(Copyright 2018 James Mansfield Nichols. All rights reserved.)

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“Rifleman”

Posted on May 12, 2018 by JMN
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