Randy | December 31, 2019
On the Long Winter’s Night of 29 December 2017 I proclaimed this morale booster. The Fire Without and the Fire Within By LFM It’s only just started, but coming to pass Is a Winter as cold as a well digger’s ass. Yet it’s still not extreme if the truth’s to be told, For it used […]
Randy | December 30, 2019
“You’re dying but you don’t have to cooperate so enthusiastically with the process.” ~ Leonard Cohen Back on Day 4, Season 10 of our annual Dark Sentiments series, I wrote,“If ever human flesh were formed to personify the Truth that only in darkness can one see the light, it’s Leonard Cohen.” I will forever stand […]
Randy | December 29, 2019
This Long Winter’s Night is dark indeed, coming as it does hard on the heels of yesterday’s preamble. Be warned that it will deal with extremely adult entertainments, the plurality of that word serving to set apart what follows from the distinctly singular “adult entertainment”, which term has come to define all things that are […]
Randy | December 28, 2019
A Long Winter’s Night is the perfect time for telling stories around the fire, and often those take a reflective bent on where things are, how they got here, and where they’re going in that handbasket. We’re doing that tonight to the chagrin of those younger members of the assemblage who suffer the stories of […]
Randy | December 27, 2019
Point of Vantage By LFM The higher that you climb a Tree, The thinner are the branches, And he who keeps ascending finds The slimmer grow his chances. Climbing Trees will teach a lad The need for solid roots, The virtues of a Trusty branch For questing hands and boots. A Tree will offer refuge […]
Randy | December 26, 2019
The story you are about to hear was written by Frederick Forsyth as a Christmas gift for his Wife Carrie who wanted a ghost story. A former RAF pilot himself, the dutiful Husband veered wide of the usual terrestrial hauntings and delivered what you will hear tonight. The Shepherd is set on the Christmas Eve […]
Randy | December 25, 2019
Merry Christmas Aulde Sotts one and all, Gods help us, every one! I pray you will all find some peace today, and in that spirit present you with this selection of seasonal offerings to punctuate your day.
Randy | December 24, 2019
I have written here a number of times of Krampus, the dark side of the good cop, bad cop equation that is the reality of the visit from St. Nicholas, predominantly blamed on Austrian Christmas tradition. Most particularly, on this day in 2015, I presented A Krampus Carol, in which I said in part — […]
Randy | December 23, 2019
When I was growing up in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, long before the cultivation of Christmas Trees as agricultural operations had become a major industry, my Father had innumerable friends and customers who owned woodland we were granted freedom to harvest our annual Balsam Fir from. It was a big deal because my Father had high […]
Randy | December 22, 2019
Welcome back to the hearth Goode Reader, and this incarnation of A Long Winter’s Night. The Winter Solstice stole upon us at 12:19 Atlantic Time this morning and today offers 14 minutes short of 7 hours less daylight than at the occasion of the Summer Solstice in June. The bittersweet news is that it all gets […]