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    Five Principles To Live By   1.  Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.  This is the modern language version of the biblical dictum: Love thy neighbor as you love thyself.  We are a human family and our neighbors live close-by; and in other lands....

On the road …again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Affinity With Tigers   Blame it on his favorite uncle.  As a youngster in short pants, the Footloose Forester sometimes heard his mother refer to her younger brother as Tiger; and in reality, her brother...

On the road… again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Great Books and Film Documentaries They say that if a book is worth reading, it is worth reading again.  Good books attract numerous readers, as measured by readership survey data.  Great books are measured not...

On the road… again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Taking The Dreaded Comps Students, past and present, loathe saying too much about the exams they endured.  The more difficult the exams, the less inclined most students are to dwell on them.  If a particular...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Heroes We Have Known Chau and Hahn Telling stories about other people is fraught with risk.  One risk is that they might be offended that something you have said might not be true; another risk is...

On the road …again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Picnic With Baboons In many of the popular game parks and reserves in Africa, the authorities go out of their way to provide amenities for visitors.  Quite naturally, a few picnic tables scattered here and...

  A Bastogne Tribute (Author Unknown) There was snow on the ground in South Jersey when, for the second year, I made my way out to the range to fire a Bastogne Tribute clip. As with the year before I left my SUV near the front gate, shouldered my M1, and made my...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Fresh Tuna Steaks   They say that there is nothing quite as tasty as fresh fruits and vegetables.  No argument about that. But when it comes to meats and fish, the chemistry involved is more complex...

On the road …again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   LAVA FLOWS AT GRANTS, NEW MEXICO As you speed along one of the broad highways of the US interstate system, it is easy to miss some of the most interesting things along the way.  Of...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   A Half-Bar of Soap One haunting memory of Africa will always be the unexpected and personal one-on-one encounter with a villager in a remote part of Mali.  The line of five or six mud huts did...

On the road...again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Mangoes For Elephants   No, this is not a footnote about the 2011 Fox movie production of the same genre.   The movie “Water for Elephants” was about a circus elephant that was abused and usually chained...

Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Self-Hypnosis For Well-Being Part II What do yoga, transcendental meditation and self-hypnosis have in common?  Only an expert could explain in a convincing, substantive way; but the Footloose Forester will venture his version of an answer : Each practice is a deliberate...

Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Self-Hypnosis For Well-Being Part I It was back in 1974 when an entirely new way of thinking invaded the brain of the Footloose Forester .  That was the time when a traveling clinical hypnotist on a lecture tour came to visit the...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Environmental Disasters For much of the last 30 years, the issue of the environment has become a political football, with political parties lining up on opposite sides of that football.  That is too bad; although the...

On the road… again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Petty Scams Being on the road…again and again…is to invite some scam artists who see every stranger as a possible mark.  You don’t have to go out of your way; they most often make it...

A Recipe for Becoming a Writer (The Brownie Principle)   Almost everyone likes brownies.  Oh, there may be a few health food devotees who distain sugary sweets of any kind; but most of us relish the mouthwatering idea of the universal treats that are small enough to assuage our guilt as...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Hurricane Sandy   Many tragedies of Hurricane Sandy during the latter days of October 2012 have already been told, one at a time.  Most stories, however, may never be told.  Those that have been most affected...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   Street Corner in Montmartre*   Le Consulat Restaurant, as it looked in 1963 If it is generally true, as it seems to be, that the older we get, the more we reminisce about the past; then...

On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia Chronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   The Serendipity Of Katherine’s Statue Serendipity has always been one of his favorite words. The dictionary definition of serendipity has a few variations; but in general, it means a pleasant, fortunate and unexpected discovery. Finding the...

  On the road…again! Afghanistan to Zambia C hronicles of a Footloose Forester By Dick Pellek   The Drunkard Mouse of Joburg   Thu was keen to visit Kimberly, South Africa, site of the most famous diamond mine in the world. So we arranged to take a vacation in South Africa,...