Q Books

Mr. Thomas' book is required reading for anyone interested in understanding the political climate that forged NATO.

We had a set of eight books; a true Character building set; a good teacher for kids and parents as well. Our family was so blessed! I feel it has changed me for ever; this is a set the American family needs today. YES! I feel America needs the true power of Gods word in the home. Here is a simple way to get a powerful message from Gods heart to each member of the family. Lesson Example: When you open the book on the left hand you have the song:
Puff, Puff, Puff

"They have a double heart,
And a double face,
they flatter with their lips;
they lie and then embrace!
Chorus:
"Puff, Puff, Puff;
Their nose is in the air.
Huff, huff, huff,
they never seem to care."

"They are proud and haughty,
with their mouth they fuss,
"our life is our own...
No Lord or boss for us."

"I will arrise says the Lord,
I will keep you safe,
They who huff and pufff at you,
I'll put in their place!"

"My words are pure as silver;
Proven, faithful and true.
What I said that will I do,
I'll keep my Word to You.

(Bible verse and color page on the right hand side of page.)
Psalms 12:5b
.."Now will I arise, saith the Lord; I will set him
in safty from him that puffeth at him."

If you can find any one of this set you will be blessed and
your family as well.

Other books in this series:
Promise in songs
Psalms in Song
Psalms for School
Psalms for sleeping
Proverbs for Fun
Proverbs for School
Proverbs for Family
and
Psalms for Fun

There a a few books in the field of "Pastoral Theology" that maintain their relevance over the decades and Jim Glass' book is absolutely one of them. Jim was for many years the Dean of Lancaster Seminary and he fortunately never forgot the lessons he learned while he himself was a parish minister.
I am now retired from parish minstry, but I cannot think of any single book that was more influential on how I "did" ministry. In do no recall the language he used, but one thing Jim spoke about, as an example, was need to "pay the rent." Every parish, like every person, has a unique set of what I call "signs of caring." For example, the first time my (German) wife got sick after we were married, I made her some toasted white bread, put cinnamon sugar on it, cut off the crusts and sliced it in four rectangular pieces. But when I took it to her, she said, "What the heck is that?? You cut off the best part!" I was crushed because I thought I was doing something extra special to make her feel better -- why? -- because my mother did that for me when I was a child. But she was a refugee after WWII and you did not waste anything! Also, I learned that when she is sick, a cup of freshly brewed chamomile tea would do more than anything else. It still works. Chamomile is THE German cure-all for just about anything.
In the parish, Jim says that one of the most immediate challenges is to learn what your parish regards as "signs of caring." You can do all kinds of thing that YOU think are signs of caring, but they may never "take." He gives as one example a rural parish he served. Fairly fresh from seminary, he was used to staying up late at night and getting up late. But he was astute enough to find out what the patterns were in that place. There was one central post office and a large number of his parish' people gathered there every morning to pick up their mail at about 7:30 A.M. He could not recall having gotten up that early, but he decided he needed to learn. So he would get up, drink a quick cup of coffee, show up at the Post Office to chat with his people, listen to their problems and joys, and then go back to his home and sleep for a few hours more. The people were immediately convinced that he was a hard working, caring pastor. He called this a part of "paying the rent." There are a certain number of things which belong to the core expectations of any given parish, which "say" their pastor cares. After that you can do just about anything and people are OK with it.
In one parish I served, for example, the search committee made it clear to me that they and others in the congregation did NOT want the minister to call on them unless invited. "Cold calling" was experienced as "insensitive." On the other hand, from about 10-12 in the morning, people would drop into the church office and expect that the pastor would be out in the outer office ready to greet and listen to them. Once I learned that, it gave me an amazing leeway on the use of my time otherwise.
This is juat one example of the very practical kind of "stuff" that Jim packed into this wonderful little book. If you can get a copy, do so. You will be doing yourself and the people of your church a favor!!!!

Mark Hinshaw proposes a departure from the typical "American Dream" - rather than the single-family home with a nice big yard for the kids, he proposes living in the urban center, surrounded by a vibrant, living city. His proposal is attractive for all ages - from the very young who learn about the diverse and interesting American melting pot, to the very old who no longer have reflexes quick enough for driving, but who have plenty of good years remaining to enjoy and contribute to the lifescape around them.

This is a great interview, and I also highly recommend his book, True Urbanism.

There is nothing quite like this in the literature of recovery from alcoholism. Jane S. is an alcoholic, manic depressive, sober since October 1970, active in the NCA under Marty Mann, a Corrections professional, past AA Trustees' Committee member on Corrections, active in all levels of AA service work, a former rehab counselor, a participant in the Kirk Seminars at the CAAS at Brown -- in short a woman of a truly remarkable breadth of experience and knowledge in recovery from alcoholism. Her book takes some of its inspiration from Marty Mann's Primer back in the 1950s, but it is aimed at helping answer present questions, in the present world, and it does a remarkable job of it. To me, as a scholar in the field, the book's greatest achievement is in the blending of the author's long personal and AA experience with knowledge of current biomedical and other scientific research -- to me as a literary critic, it is in capturing the author's very personal voice. Perhaps, in the not-too-distant future, along with the little black book (Twenty-Four Hours a Day), we will have this little gray book as a key to recovery from alcoholism. No better description has come my way of what life in AA is like, and what keeps AAs sober. Very highly recommended.

I have seen plenty of vocabulary materials for the SAT, but this set of cards is the overall leader of the pack. First of all, there are about 2700 words that are covered, which is quite comprehensive. The sheer number of words doesn't quite reach the 3500-word level of Barron's Basic Word List (in the Barron's SAT manual), but these cards are superior to the Basic List because they are organized by category of meaning, instead of the tedious alphabetical organization used in the Basic List (and the small font of the Basic List doesn't help either). I also appreciate having the word parts (roots, suffixes, and prefixes) on the special cards, plus the memory cues provided on the main cards. If you are aiming high on the SAT, I would recommend learning all of these cards, as well as the additional words covered in the Basic List. Then you will be in a very good position to know every single word on the SAT.

It has lots of information by a well-informed author. I have shared it with friends who are monster movie buff's and people who have felt "different" during their life time. This is a fun book, even for those of us who prefer boy-girl relationships. Great fun...

I was so happy with the lovingly-written "Q Guide to Designing Women" that within two days after receiving it, I'd already read it twice.

As a writer who has worked with Linda Bloodworth-Thomason since the show's original run in the late '80s, author Allen Crowe has all the inside scoop, and so his book is full of fun facts! I thoroughly enjoyed reliving the series thru this vivid book -- so much so that I'm now clamoring for the series to come out on DVD so I can go rewatch each episode and check for the elements Allen points out in each one.

For fans of "Designing Women" -- or just those interested in deconstructing what makes good comedy in general -- the utterly thorough and enjoyable "Q Guide to Designing Women" is a must-read!

Hinds, Patrick. "The Q Guide to New York City Pride", Alyson, 2007.

Everything You Need to Know

Amos Lassen and Literary Pride

You may wonder why someone who lives in Little Rock, Arkansas would be interested in New York City Pride. I asked myself the same question before I began to read Patrick Hind's "The Q Guide to New York City Pride". The answer is quite simple. Little Rock is in its infancy regarding gay pride and we are trying to pull off a big pride celebration this year. Anything that goes on somewhere else can give us ideas of how to make it better for us here. Additionally, New York City is one of the gayest cities in America and stands tall in the history of gay life so there is much to be learned from a book like this. And let me say further that in this small volume there is a lot of information as can seen by the book's subtitle "Stuff You Didn't Even Know You Wanted to Know...about the landmarks, people, and events that defined queer culture". In 146 pages there is a great deal of our history and explanations on why we do certain things. Hinds has done his job well.
This is a fun book as we go behind the scenes and learn both facts and trivia about The Big Apple. We get to the soul of the gay movement and we feel pride to be part of the rainbow.
Hinds takes us to Greenwich Village, one of the world's most popular gay meccas and an important part of our history. The gay liberation movement began there and the Village still thrives as the heart of American gay cultural life. Our literary tradition began in the Village as well and many came out of the closet there. We see how gays organized in the Village to make the world a better place for us to live in. We learn of the beginning of the sexual revolution and the part we, as gay people, played in it and we see our response to the AIDS epidemic. Finally we learn what gay pride is and how we should act with pride. There is a history of the bars of we York and we meet the people who were instrumental in changing the course of American gay history. The book instills pride because we learn of those who worked so hard so that we can have what we have today.
This alone is amazing. In a slim little book there is a lot of our past as well as our present and future. There is also a great deal of fun trivia and you can pick up facts that otherwise you may never have known or been aware of. New York as a "fabulously queer past" and Hinds shares it with us. It's all here and it is all very readable. We owe it to ourselves to know what is in this book. Just today I met a 27 year old gay man who had never heard of Stonewall and had no idea of who Christine Jorgenson is (not that she is from New York). It is our duty to reclaim our past in order to have a better future. After all, isn't that what pride is all about?

We were bought this book by a friend with two sons who lives in the UK. My son loves this story, it is sweet, funny and the illustrations are great.