The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Suess →

The Cat in the Hat, by Dr. Seuss (Theodor Geisel), was first published in 1957. It is a story about a tall human-like cat who dresses in a red & white striped hat with a red bow tie.  

With his companions, "Thing One & Thing Two,” they try to entertain some neighbors and wind up wrecking the house.  Finally, the Cat uses a unique tool to clean everything up. He then says goodbyes and disappears just before the children's mother walks in.

The book offers lessons that need to be learned. For example, The Cat in the Hat is about stranger danger. Although it may seem fun to let a big cat into your house, maybe you should think twice before you do. That's just common sense for all ages.

This is the book that made Dr. Seuss famous. It kicked off an emphasis on beginning readers’ books. The focus on imagination for the characters and the ease of reading resulted in these books being read repeatedly. OK, the truth is they are often read every night.  Many kids learned to read from them.

Characters: The Cat in the Hat,

Thing One, Thing Two, Sally, Sally's Brother, Fish & Mother

The moral of this story might be “Be careful inviting neighbors over! or Beware of who you let in the house.

#Children’s Literature

Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell →

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(See the “Taking others for Granted” article in the Positive Thoughts section for more on what the Meaning of this Book is?)

It is 1933, and it will be 10 + years before Orwell publishes Animal Farm and 1984, both of which will warn of the dangers of totalitarianism and promote his beliefs in a fairer society.  In his book, Down and Out in London & Paris, he writes about poverty and how he survived.

Orwell was a tutor in London, but he went to Paris. He has no job when he arrives, and he cuts back on food and later pawns his good clothes to get by for a few days. He finds an old friend Boris, a fat Russian, but he is also out of work.  They struggle for weeks, and eventually, the two of them finally do find work-Boris as a waiter and Orwell as a dishwasher. Find work- Boris The dishwashing job is 14 hours a day of cleaning in the sweltering heat of kitchens on the bottom floors of the hotel basements.  

Orwell's Paris experience with poverty was eating at restaurants, living in rented rooms, and working in almost prison-like circumstances; no mention is made of goals or desires.  He can see that there are few opportunities to rise above where one starts in life. He describes drinking on a Saturday night as the "one thing that made life worth living.” At one point, a murder happens right outside where he is sleeping, and he tells us that within three minutes, he has gone back to sleep, not wanting to waste time over it.

Boris talks Orwell into going to another hotel to work because of the promotion to maître d’ he can get. Orwell follows him, but the new kitchen, where he is still a dishwasher, is even more hot and cramped than before. He now works 18 to 20 hours a day and makes less. Finally, he is so demoralized that he returns to London, which comprises the book's second part.

Orwell describes London’s poor as mobile, unable to rent or stay in a job long, but forced to wander from shelter to shelter across London. When he arrives back in London, his plans to be a babysitter for a wealthy family fall through. He has no money and must pawn his best suit again.  He finds that he must join others wandering from shelter to shelter and living off food that is barely fit for human consumption, living as a beggar and a tramp. The hunger and filth are with him constantly, and he feels the challenge of being considered disagreeable to others.

When the book ends, Orwell can get the job he had initially planned.  His closing remarks are that poverty is a condition best to be avoided.

This book will add to how you see George Orwell's books Animal Farm and 1984.  This autobiography precedes those books and suggests how his viewpoint on society may have evolved. 

Quotes by George Orwell

“It is curious how people take it for granted that they have a right to preach at you and pray over you as soon as your income falls below a certain level.” 

“The stars are a free show; it doesn't cost anything to use your eyes.”

 “Within certain limits, it is true that the less money you have, the less you worry.” 

“It is fatal to look hungry. It makes people want to kick you.” 

“Dirt is a great respecter of persons; it lets you alone when you are well dressed, but as soon as your collar is gone, it flies towards you from all directions.” 

The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell →

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The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, by Malcolm Gladwell: The subtitle is really what the book is about.

Most events start with little things, and then, a step at a time, a point is reached when an enormous consequence follows.  All the little things over time caused the tipping end, and the change was significant and even a surprise. When the change comes, it is referred to as the moment of critical mass, the threshold, and the boiling point.

The question is how to identify when that point will be reached? Gladwell says that the three components of the Tipping Point, or three agents of change, are “The Law of the Few, The Stickiness Factor, and The Power of Context.”

"The Law of the Few" is the 80/20 principle where 20% of the people involved in a project will bring about 80% of the results. Gladwell says that the key is in understanding the skill sets of the 20% and if enough individuals with the needed skill set are working on the project.

“The Stickiness Factor” has to do with the project’s message.  What is it about a message that will make it memorable? Sesame Street and Blue’s Clues use repetition in their characters, resulting in an enhancement of retention. 

“The Power of Context,” Gladwell says, has to do with influences on human behavior and the changes as one moves from birth through adulthood. Age, genetics, thoughts, and feelings reveal attitudes and values.

The Tipping Point looks for those times when an idea, trend, or social behavior spreads like wildfire. It is the boiling point when ideas take off. Gladwell takes this phenomenon and shows how he thinks it changes people’s feelings about change.

Is Covid 19 and the Pandemic a Tipping Point? Time will tell, but some examples are already evident. Small businesses are predicted to see at least a 20% reduction as many go broke. In the restraint category, some have expected that 85% of the independent restaurants will go broke, and some but not all of that business may move to the chains.

In many trade categories, it seems clear that the survivors will be the financially strong businesses; some are just anticipating their competitors to fold and to be able to assume their market share. This may push prices up. Debt for all business sectors will be dramatically increased, and the previously expected expansion of automation may be severely slowed down.

Malcolm Gladwell of COVID-19: If I had to identify the best thing that could come out of this, it would be a resurgence in the profile and importance of the public health community.*

see article*

Malcolm Gladwell: The lesson of the COVID-19 pandemic THE WORLD AFTER COVID-19 - with Malcolm Gladwell April 9, 2020. Click the link to see the original article

The Tipping Points Quotes

“There is a simple way to package information that can make it irresistible under the right circumstances. All you have to do is find it.”

 “Look at the world around you. It may seem like an immovable, implacable place. It is not; it can be tipped with the slightest push — in just the right place .” 

“The idea that epidemics can rise or fall in one dramatic moment — is the most important because it is the principle that… permits the greatest insight into why modern change happens the way it does.” 

 “When it comes to epidemics, though, this dis proportionality becomes even more extreme; a tiny percentage of people do the majority of the work.” 

“To create one contagious movement, you often have to create many small movements first.”

The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde →

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuZ5zchKCS8 See my youtube video on this also.

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Dorian Gray is a handsome, selfish young man who Basil Hallward is painting. While he sits for the painting, he is introduced and has ample time to listen to Lord Henry Wotton, who expounds his hedonist views of life, admiring Gray’s beauty.

Hallward, a very moral man, is excited to be painting the handsome young man who has become the inspiration his art needed, and the result is that his painting becomes his life’s masterpiece. Lord Henry seeks to influence young Gray and take over Hallward’s friendship.

Gray is a willing student of Lord Henry's "new" hedonism, and the result is that he begins to indulge in every pleasure and virtually every 'sin' he can conceive of.

With the finished painting at his home, Gray sees the striking beauty of the image, and as it influences him to covet it, he begins to fear that it will fade and fears and even expects that his sinful lusts will lead to the erosion of his physical beauty.

This leads Dorian to desire and express that he would sell his soul to ensure that the picture, rather than he, would age and fade as he sins. The wish is granted, and Dorian pursues a life of amoral experiences, including destroying many he meets as he satisfies his lusts.

He stays young and beautiful but his portrait ages and records every sinful act becoming more disgusting and uglier as they are committed. After years of watching the painting reflect the horror of his life’s activities, he hates it.

The painting ultimately leads to Gray’s death, but the story leads to many questions and assumptions. One more obvious question is whether it is accurate to connect being beautiful to mean that one is good and if being ugly implies that one is evil.

The book presented a view of sin’s impact very effectively, using the portrait as the symbol of degradation.

"A Higher Loyalty" by James Comey?

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A Higher Loyalty, by James Comey, has three essential questions on the covers inside the front flap. What is ethical leadership? How do you do what is right instead of what is expedient? How do you maintain loyalty to the values of the institutions you have sworn to protect, the values you have dedicated your entire life to upholding, even if that loyalty comes at your own expense? The answer to these questions is what this book is about.

Of all the many books that have come out after the 2016 election that take positions on the political climate, this one stands unique. Say what you want about James Comey’s motives, and everyone seems to do just that; he can’t win and has found himself with this book on genuinely unusual ground, where all sides can find reasons for concern.

That hard place is the real power of this book. The book is very well written and easy to read, and his life story could have been an excellent book even if he had never mentioned Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. His story is a testimony to a person who sincerely cares about the three questions raised on the inside cover. It would be easy to drift off into comments about the Bush, Obama, and Trump administrations. The strengths and weaknesses manifested in the stories Comey presents are invitations to jump into partisanship ranting, even or maybe especially, in a review.

Comey seems to have measured everything in his career against a template of right and wrong, as he understood how it existed at the time. Some reviewers have used this to be critical of his motive. Political books are hard to review because, for many people, the answer is one they are seeking only to prove rather than find. It is assumed that good and evil have picked sides. It is easy to say and unfortunate that many feel a greater good is worth sacrificing a less critical interest because, after all, the other side is pure evil. For them, it isn’t perfect and evil. It is taking sides.

Comey’s book is about what happens when that standard approach of using a political vantage point is ignored, and someone dares to state that good and evil exist on all sides. Sorting out interest from sin requires a higher standard, which the book "A Higher Loyalty" does.

At the very beginning of the book, his Author's Notestartst saying. “WHO AM I TO TELL others what ethical leadership is? Anyone claiming to write a book about ethical leadership can come across as presumptuous, even sanctimonious.” James Comey’s book gave us good answers and his choices show that evil is no respecter of political parties.

Thank You, James Comey. Thank you for showing us authentic leadership and consistent respect for values. Thank you for this extraordinary book.

I am not convinced about your timing, however.


Initially read and reviewed in 2017. Re Reviewed in 2020. As impressed as I was the first time with Comey’s effort to find suitable and wrong in his views, It seems like he could have waited until after the election to dump on Hillary. It was a stiff price for the country to pay, some, not many, would say.