Rainy day here in beautiful western NC. Our second round of company is coming in today, one in the afternoon and two more early this evening. We are hoping the rain moves out of here in time for us to do the monthly gallery walk downtown this evening. Tomorrow morning I am having a breakfast for our guests and neighbors who are riding the Mountains to Coast one week bicycle ride beginning on Sunday. It has been a busy couple of days here as we had company Wednesday and Thursday. The gulfgal B & B is operating more efficiently that I thought it could.

Hope to be able to check in occasionally today and tomorrow. I enjoyed the theme of your music today, Tim.

I don't really follow domestic politics
very closely, but thought that those
who do might be interested in this
morning's announcement Boehner is
resigning not only from his House
leadership position but from Congress
entirely, effective Oct. 30.

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/56054cbfe4b0dd8503072837

And, oh, yeah, good morning Tim and
all. (-:

link

In another sign that U.S. states are recovering from the Great Recession, a handful are triggering mechanisms that repay taxpayers when coffers overflow, and the wealthiest are receiving the most.

At least seven states have such laws. Oregon this year paid back $402 million to taxpayers. Colorado and North Carolina set off similar triggers. The product of taxpayer revolts aimed at checking government’s growth, the laws typically call for a rebate or reduction in income-tax rates when revenue exceeds benchmarks.

I grew up with Astrid Lindgren's children books, before they were ever produced for TV. I only knew my books. I think I started reading them in 1956/7. "The children of Bullerby" with Lasse and Bosse.

Two new books with Astrid Lindgren's WWII diaries are published. Among other it says:

The second book, a publication of her wartime diaries, reveals how accurate this portrait was. Both works are contemporary literary documents that depict Lindgren as an author who used her humor to contend with the horrors of war, and as someone whose desire to tell stories was partly a result of the determination to keep her chin up in the face of adversity.

After hesitating for years, Lindgren's family decided to publish her diaries. During the war years, the author filled 17 notebooks with her diary entries, and pasted newspaper cuttings, food ration coupons and flyers in between the pages. She assiduously kept her diary for six years, interweaving the events of her own life with world politics.

In the first entry, dated Sept. 1, 1939, she writes: "The war began today. No one wanted to believe it." In the last entry, written on New Year's Eve in 1945, she writes: "I wish myself a happy new year! Myself and my family! And the entire world, if possible, but that is probably asking too much."

I still remember how my mother described the first day of WWII. She said she set at a small fountain in Berlin near her workplace enjoying the sun in her lunch break, letting her naked feet hanging into the water, when she heard of it. All she was thinking: "What? No way! Now what does that mean?" (She was 20 years old in 1939). She couldn't imagine what it meant. I think a couple of weeks later she did. My father had to go "Reich Labor Service", which involved digging deep ditches near the German/Dutch border. He was (21 years of age) and pulled out of his "apprenticeship" as an insurance broker in Hannover at a company. Afterwards he was drafted into the military. Boom.

Then both of them just thought about getting married asap.

Memories. I will read Lindgren's war diaries for sure. I like the idea that she was a bit of a radical.