20-Word Fiction: Listen to Your Teachers

Greetings from the Hartford Public Library here in Hartford, Conn., which is not actually where we are blogging from but we expect they have every novel from Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk, which have been translated into English.

Speaking of Turkey, today's image is of the famed Hagia Sophi, a state museum in Istanbul, Turkey, where actress Ashley Judd visited yesterday (we learned this from one of her tweets) which started as a Byzantine church before being converted to a mosque by the Ottomans.

Here is today's 20-word fiction which we are writing while listening to Brahms........:

"My religion professor said to be a true intellectual, one must read the Holy Bible and the Koran. Maybe so."

http://www.hplct.org/

Presidential Quotes: Dwight D. Eisenhower

We are keeping it simple tonight, but we do want to tell blog-readers that we had the opportunity to visit the Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, Kansas, last year, and it's a very neat place. The center also has Ike's childhood home and his grave. It should not be confused with the Eisenhower Public Library District, which is located a few states over in Harwood Heights, Illinois.

Here is Eisenhower's quote:

"Any man who wants to be president is either an egomaniac or crazy."

http://www.eisenhowerarchives.gov/

Ten People Who Will Decide Who Becomes President (4 of 10)

Today, we continue our series, which had its last entry back in July?! on ten possible people who could decide this election. Today, we look at the swing state of Colorado, with this fictional librarian.

Name: Nancy Rose

Occupation: Librarian

Residency: Loveland, Colo.

Age: 49

Party Affiliation: Independent Who Leans Democratic

Will Likely Vote For: Obama

Loveland, Colo., is located some 40 miles north of Denver; the city is located in Larimer County. Cecil Guiterrez is the mayor of the 14th largest city in Colorado.

In 2008, Larimer County voted for Barack Obama by a 55-45 margin; the eventual president won by even bigger margins in San Miguel County (Telluride) with 78 percent of the vote and Boulder County with 73 percent of the vote. But, rural parts of Colorado are heavily Republican as is Colorado Springs, which has a large evangelical base and is home to the Air Force Academy.

President Obama gave a stump speech at the University of Colorado just days before the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte; the 2008 convention was in Denver.

http://www.coloradodems.org

http://www.barackobama.com

http://www.coloradogop.org

http://www.mittromney.com

http://www.denverlibrary.org/

Cuneyt Arkin vs. Chuck Norris (1 of 4)_ The Best Actor of 1979 Was....

We had intended to start this series on Friday, but we fell asleep at the Richmond Public Library in Richmond, Va., (yes, this is a joke).

But, since Chuck Norris is always trending well thanks in part to his very radical far-right political comments. such as a recent one stating that if President Barack Obama is re-elected, we shall have 'a thousand years of darkness.'

We are also featuring this series with Cuneyt Arkin, the Turkish matinee idol who turned 75 on Friday, who could be called 'the Turkish Chuck Norris," given that he has been in many action films with right-wing themes.

For this series, we are going to ask who won an Oscar during a given year that Norris made a film. We start off with 1979 when Norris made "A Force of One," which was one of the early hits for the now-72-year-old 'actor.'

Earlier this year, we were able to attend a Chuck Norris birthday bash at the Shadowbox Microcinema in Roanoke, Va.

Which actor won a Best Actor Oscar in 1979; was it?:

A) Dustin Hoffman

B) Jon Voight

C) Peter Sellers

D) Jack Lemmon

E) Al Pacino

http://www.chucknorris.com

http://www.chucknorrisfacts.com

http://www.theshadowboxcinema.com

http://www.richmondpubliclibrary.org

http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com (for entry on Cuneyt Arkin)

PSA- Return Your Library Books!

Today's Public Service Announcement is a relatively straight forward one: Be sure to return your darn library books!

I actually saw a copy of Kurt Vonnegut Jr.'s anti-war classic novel "Slaughterhouse Five" at the Shenandoah County Prison Library in Woodstock, Va., a few years ago. I should add I was NOT an inmate there, but merely visiting the institution as a newspaper reporter.

To this day, I wonder how often that book is 'checked out' there.