The little book “Chicken Soup With Rice” By Maurice Sendak is one of a set of four books collectively titled “Nutshell Library” published in 1962. I am going to scan my copy, that I received as a child, and publish a page a month. Why? Because the world needs more Maurice Sendak…and chicken soup with rice.
introduction /ĭn″trə-dŭk′shən/
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition
At the turn of the year I realized I have never put up a schedule for Off The Back Porch. First off, here is the reason for this site:
“I am a writer, photographer and artist. This blog will be a running commentary on country living, gardening, cooking, history, people, folklore, writing, reading, art, flora and fauna, photography, music, movies, traveling and whatever else I might be pondering off the back porch.”
I have been publishing this blog since March 2019.
My monthly guidelines for 2026 are:
Chicken Soup With Rice – I am scanning and posting one page a month from this charming book by Maurice Sendak.
Quote – I choose what ever quote I have liked for years or have recently come across.
My Artwork – I publish a piece I have finished and include a link to my site on Fine Art America.
Lyrics – I have published much of my adult poetry on this site and have moved on to song lyrics and occasionally poems by other people.
The Roundup – This is a leftover of sorts from a previous blog of mine. I usually include recent encounters I have had, things I have read, observations, a website I have found interesting and a recipe.
Image Of The Month– It could be from anytime on any subject.
Vintage Magazines- Last summer I bought a stack of old magazines from a local tag sale for a couple of dollars. I decided to scan the contents of whatever interested me and share. I will also include scans of some other old stuff I have sitting around.
Acreage Update– My wife and I currently live on an acreage in north central Iowa with a dog and a cat, and I share what has been going on around here once a quarter.
There you have it: my monthly writing schedule. I might also squeeze in a few other things, such as essays, travel logs, movie reviews and “whatever else I might be pondering off the back porch.” I hope you join me.
Another year of wide variety in my reading, which is what I aim for. My Dad passes on to me several magazines to read, along with Smithsonian and the Sunday edition of The Wall Street Journal. (I really enjoy the Review section) As I have written before I am usually reading 8 to 10 books at a time, which is why it takes me so long to complete one. I took the time to count this year, and I am currently involved with 13 books right now. My wife Shelly is perfectly happy reading one book at a time, bless her. Anyhow, here is what I completed in 2023. A few comments follow some on the list.
A Death In The Family By James Agee
A meditation on death and loss, with some interesting character studies on the side. For me this was not at all a sad read.
Bigger Secrets By William Poundstone
The Strange Career of Jim Crow By C. Vann Woodward
In Our Time By Ernest Hemingway
With a couple of exceptions Papas short stories have proven a better read for me than his novels. This, his first collection of short stories, is a masterpiece.
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test By Tom Wolfe
I could barely make it through this one. Wolfe can get so caught up in trying to relay the hippy-dippy mystical nonsense that was going on that I sometimes did not know what I was reading. I have read short pieces by him over the years that I really enjoyed, and I think I will try some more of his stuff despite this experience.
Crazy Horse And Custer By Stephen E. Ambrose
This might have been my most enjoyable read of the year. If you are interested I wrote about it here earlier this year.
I Was The Nuremberg Jailer By Col. Burton C. Andrus (Ret.)
Includes profiles of all the prisoners, the most interesting being Reichsmarschall Goring, who in the end cheated the hangman with cyanide.
Fear And Loathing in Las Vegas By Hunter S. Thompson
I got the idea while reading this that Hunter didn’t think some of the crazy things he does in this book were all that crazy.
All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Bright and Beautiful, All Things Wise and Wonderful, The Lord God Made Them All, Every Living Thing By James Herriot
I enjoyed his five main books very much. I was surprised by how much humor they contain.
Rocks All Around Us By Anne Terry White
An enchanting little book written for young people.
How To Live In The Country Without Farming By Milton Wend
One-Night Stands with American History By Richard Shenkman and Kurt Reiger
If you like to read about American history this is a fun book to dip into.
The Hunt For Martin Bormann By Charles S. Whiting
Sometimes it seemed the author went on a bit long in some places, but otherwise I enjoyed this probe into what happened to the missing Nazi Reichsleiter. Turns out after searching the world over it was discovered he never made it out of Berlin.
Eyewitness To America Edited By David Colbert
The subtitle to this book is “500 Years of America in the Words of Those Who Saw It Happen.” Very enjoyable and addictive.
Wisdom Edited By James Nelson
A 1950s documentary film project of interviews of prominent elders of that time by NBC are transcribed in this book. I found it fascinating.
Once again I kept track of all my reading for a year. The reading goal for 2021 was pretty much the same as for 2020, to make my way through the large library of unread books I have accumulated over the years. There were just a few books I started and decided not to finish, but all the rest made it on the list. My nine favorites are in bold.
One Hundred Dollar Misunderstanding By Robert Glover
Narrative of My Captivity among the Sioux Indians By Fanny Kelly
One Man’s Meat By E.B. White
Diane Arbus: An Aperture Monograph By Doon Arbus
The Bridge of San Luis Rey By Thornton Wilder
The World Without Us By Alan Weisman
The Magic Never Ends By John Ryan Duncan
Natural Cures They Don’t Want You To Know About By Kevin Trudeau
The World of the American Indian By National Geographic Society
The First Century By William K. Klingaman
Hermann Hesse Poems Translated By James Wright
The Greatest Presidential Stories Never Told By Rick Beyer
The Greatest Stories Never Told By Rick Beyer
Six Short Masterpieces By Tolstoy Translated By Margaret Wettlin
Schott’s Original Miscellany By Ben Schott
American Scripture By Pauline Maier
We Pointed Them North By “Teddy Blue” Abbott and Helena Huntington Smith
Twilight at Monticello: The Final Years of Thomas Jefferson By Alan Pell Crawford
Historical Viewpoints, Notable Articles from American Heritage, John A. Garraty, Editor Vol. 1 to 1877, 4th Ed.
The Road To Wellville By T. Coraghessan Boyle
365 Four-Star Videos By Leslie Hamilton
An E.B. White Reader Edited By Watt and Bradford
Best Known Works Of Robert Louis Stevenson
From Mexican Days to the Gold Rush By Marshall and Buffum
The Walking Drum By Louis L’Amour
One Day In The Life Of Ivan Denisovich By Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Telling Writing By Ken Macrorie
Folklore Myths And Legends Of Britain By Reader’s Digest
The Rockefellers By Peter Collier and David Horowitz
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter By Carson McCullers
Any Survivors? By Martin Freud
Selected Tales And sketches By Nathaniel Hawthorne
Soldier’s Pay By William Faulkner
I love reading year end and new year lists. For the first time I kept track of all the books I read during a year. I read both fiction and nonfiction, and the subject matter was all over the place, which I expect to happen again this year as I continue to downsize my library.
Contemporary American Novelists 1900-1920 By Carl Van Doren
In The Wake Of The Plague By Norman F. Canter
Thurber Country By James Thurber
The Apostle, A Life Of Paul By John Pollock
American Heritage, June 1966
Great Events of the 20th Century By the Editors of TIME
The Troll Garden By Willa Cather
What A Way To Go By Adele Q. Brown
The Medieval Establishment By Geoffrey Hindley
A Journal of the Plague Year By Daniel Defoe
A Lady’s Life In The Rocky Mountains By Isabella L. Bird
Five Chimneys By Olga Lengyel
Sweet Thursday By John Steinbeck
Profiles Of Modern American Authors By Bernard Dekle
In Dubious Battle By John Steinbeck
Trout Fishing In America By Richard Brautigan
Bend Sinister By Vladimir Nabokov
The Metamorphosis, In The Penal Colony And Other Stories By Franz Kafka
Laughing Space Edited By Isaac Asimov and J.O. Jepson
Smiling Through the Apocalypse Edited by Harold Hayes
The Great Gatsby By F. Scott Fitzgerald
Earth, My Friend By Peter Townsend
The Steamboat Bertrand By Jerome E. Petsche
Making and Using Dried Foods By Phyllis Hobson
A Pictorial History Of Westerns By Michael Parkinson and Clyde Jeavons
Black Elk Speaks By John G. Neihardt
Founding Brothers By Joseph J. Ellis
How To Live On Almost Nothing And Have Plenty By Janet Chadwick
The Indian Frontier of the American West 1846-1890 By Robert M. Utley
Listening Point By Sigurd Olson
Winesburg, Ohio By Sherwood Anderson
Death’s Acre By Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson
Never Have Your Dog Stuffed By Alan Alda
Oh What A Paradise It Seems By John Cheever
Unsolved By Kirk Wilson
Yankee Weather Proverbs By Peter Miller
Oroville California By James Lenhoff
Undaunted Courage By Stephen E. Ambrose
There’s A Man In The House By Harlan Miller
Off The Back Porch 