Objective 24 "The objective of the Defense Department was clear to me from the start: To defend the nation at minimal risk and minimal cost, and, whenever we got into combat, with minimal loss of life." McNamara’s In Retrospect. The second part of objectives is that they must be measurable. One of my fatal mistakes in writing curriculum.
Objectives 329 "Such a general formulation of our objectives is not sufficient [re
November 303 November. "Cattails hold high their brown candles...." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 311 November. "We think of it as the silence, the winter silence; but it really isn’t silent at all...merely...quiet...distinction between silence and quiet makes all the difference...this is the quiet of the year, not the silence." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 312 November. "...the oak leaves are leathery in texture and color...." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 318 "Sunset, twilight, dusk, darkness, all by six on a mid-November evening, late autumn’s summary of serenity." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 320 "...November owls make memorable nights...aren’t frightening, but they make one appreciate having a roof and a door." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 301 " The owls are the voices of November nights...a chilly sound, a dark and frosty sound that hints of ice and snow...a fireside sound, one that goes with wood smoke and sheltered evenings." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 301 November." ...winds that rattle the latch." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 302 "November brings long, chill nights of glittering stars and restless, whispery leaves." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 302 November. "...a world reduced to elemental patterns." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 303 November. "On the twigs where the skittering leaves were live and green in June and July, buds are already set and visible, promise of next April and May and green again." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
November 304 "Beaver Moon…by November’s time of full moon the beavers, wise in the ways of the seasons, were ready for winter…dams were sound, their ponds were full, their houses snug and well supplied with food; and any countryman with half the sense of a beaver had his own establishment similarly prepared." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year.
November 311 "There is no chorus of birdsong…no scratch, rattle or buzz of insects…chittery chipmunk has finished his hoarding and settled down to quiet sleep…chattery squirrels go about their treetop business without challenge or palaver…the winter crows hold no conventions, are content to announce their presence…doesn’t add up to silence, but after the sounds of summer and early autumn, it certainly is quiet…that this is the quiet of the year, not the silence." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year.
November 315 "Nobody likes a winter snowstorm in mid-November; nobody likes the weatherman for permitting it." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year.
November 315 "…the leaf-crisp evening of the year." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year.
November 300 "November is simply that interval between colorful October and dark December." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
Nostalgia 534 "This couple rode in an old fashioned square sleigh, which had served them twenty winters, and stood twenty summers in the sun, beside their door."
Nostalgia 323 "As I went back alone over that familiar road, I could almost believe that a boy and girl ran along beside me, as our shadows used to do, laughing and whispering to each other in the grass." Cather, My Ántonia
Noon and Midnight 512 "Now comes the noon-tide hour—of all the hours, nearest akin to midnight; for each has its own calmness and repose."
Nobility 121 "Noble is that noble does." German. Dictionary of Foreign Terms. If his acts are noble, he is noble.
Night 513 "Now the old toll gatherer looks seaward, and discerns the light-house kindling on a far island, and the stars, too, kindling in the sky."
Night 87 "The night had broken them into all the isolated units that actually they were." Mailer, The Naked and the Dead. The night brings a sense of isolation.
New York City 207 " New York is the only city in the world where you can get deliberately run down on the sidewalk by a pedestrian." Russell Baker. Portable Curmudgeon.
New year 683 The new year, personified, speaks: "But I, cried the fresh-hearted New Year, I shall try to leave men wiser than I find them."
Neoclassicism 110 "I speak what appears to me the general opinion; and where an opinion is general, it is usually correct." Austen,
Nature 129 "Man contrives machines that turn out countless duplicates; but nature is not a machine." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. Somewhere I read somewhere that no two leaves from the same tree are the same.
Nature 130 Nature: "Change, constant, unending change within the framework of the familiar, the enduring." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. Change within a framework of consistency.
Nature 158 "We destroy the trees and banish the grass at our own peril" Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. Without nature, there will be no people.
Nature 199 "But if you become too arrogant, forgetting that you are a junior partner, a thunderstorm may box your ears or a tornado may make you think twice about human omnipotence." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. When people think they control nature, nature reminds them otherwise.
Nature and life 356 "...heartening, both in its repetition and in its enduring truth--as long as the sun shines, rain falls, water flows, and green leaves work their miracle there is life, there is hope." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The repetitions in nature are reassuring.
Nature and Man 117 "And in April, man is here only to see and listen and participate, not to manage or administer." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. Man needs to learn his place within the framework of Nature.
Nature 73 "The idea that song must have meaning and beauty a purpose doesn’t wear well out in the open, especially in spring." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. Does everything in nature have a purpose?
Nature 73 "Life, we say, came out of the ancient seas, and it can survive only as long as it maintains a minor sea within itself." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The importance of water to life.
Nature 92 "There are the complexities of catkin and raceme, of pollen and petal, of stem and spreading leaf, all packed within the waiting bud that is smaller than a baby’s fingertip." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The complexity of the bud.
Nature 96 April. "Few things in this world are newer, and look newer, than the tiny leaves as they start unfolding from the buds." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year
Nature 106 "The trees and the grass not only cool and help clarify the air we breathe but constantly restore oxygen to that air." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The importance of trees and grass to life.
Nature 415 "They say it rained forty days and forty nights once in the old days, and that was terrible; but during the winter of 1880-81 it snowed twice forty days; that was more terrible…from the 15thof October when it began, until after the middle of April." Rölvaag, Giants in the Earth. Truly Terrible Snow.
Nature 60 " ...she leaned back in the buggy and let her tired spirit be absorbed in the Nirvana of the incomparable sky." Sinclair Lewis,
Nature 10 "The color of that mysterious chlorophyll which makes food of water and air and sunlight even now, even when the sunlight is thin, when lakes are ice and frost seals the earth." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The miracle of Chlorophyll.
Nature 60 "The bud and the egg can wait, for a safe temperature or a precise span of daylight." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The miracle of Nature.
Nature 70 "Water is the basic broth of both blood and sap." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The miracle of water.
Nature 309 "See how goldenrod and asters add to the aerial cargo, and know a few of the meanings of infinity, numbers that make counting a meaningless mumble." Borland, Twelve Moons of the Year. The spread of seed and the concept of infinity.
Nature 191 "There came a drowsy, sun-filled interval…nothing but golden haze…quiet, bereft of all life." Rölvaag, Giants in the Earth. An interval in nature to savor. .
Nature 241 "Man she [the prairie] scorned; his works she would not brook." Rölvaag, Giants in the Earth. A malign view of nature toward mankind.
Nature 339 "That night the Great Prairie stretched herself voluptuously; giantlike and full of cunning, she laughed softly into the reddish moon: 'Now we will see what human might may avail against us….' ” Rölvaag, Giants in the Earth. The prairie personified.
Nature 340 "But the plague of locusts proved as certain as the seasons; all that grew above the ground, with the exception of the wild grass, it would pounce upon and destroy; the grass it left untouched because it had grown here ere time was and without the aid of man’s hand…." Rölvaag, Giants in the Earth. Nature and the locusts and the grass personified.
Nature 902 "The wood-paths shall be the aisles of our cathedral—the firmament itself shall be its ceiling!"
Nature 9 "Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed." Francis Bacon. 1620. Gross, ed.
Nature 9 "Nature is the art of God." Sir Thomas Browne, 1642. Gross, ed.
Nature 123 "Nature, in her indifference, makes no distinction between good and evil." Anatole
Nature 259 "Nature creates nothing in vain." Aristotle. Greek. Dictionary of Foreign Terms. That's something to think about.
Nationalities 94 " ...declared that the Dutch were a parcel of avaricious wretches; the French a set of flattering sycophants; that the Germans were drunken sots, and beastly gluttons, and the Spaniards proud, haughty and surly tyrants, but that, in bravery, generosity, clemency, and in every other virtue, the English excelled all the world." Oliver Goldsmith. “On National Prejudices.” 1763. Gross, ed. Essays.
Names 242 "Among the…of
Names 242 "In Siam it used to be difficult to ascertain the king’s real name, since it was carefully kept secret from fear of sorcery; anyone who mentioned it was clapped into jail…king might only be referred to under certain high-sounding titles, such as 'the august,' 'the perfect,' 'the supreme,' 'the great emperor,' 'descendant of the angels,' etc." Frazer, The New Golden Bough.
Names 243 "For Ra had many names, but the great name which gave him all power over gods and men was known to none but himself." Frazer, The New Golden Bough.
Names 211 Fanny on Edmund’s name: "To me the sound of Mr. Bertram is so cold and nothing-meaning—so entirely without warmth or character! –it just stands for a gentleman, and that’s all; [whereas the name “Edmund”] is a name of heroism and renown—of kings, princes, and knights; and seems to breathe the spirit of chivalry and warm affections." Austen,
Myths 1310 "Children are now the only representatives of the men and women of that happy era; and therefore it is that we must raise the intellect and fancy to the level of childhood, in order to re-create the original myths." “The Wayside: Introductory” ” Hawthorne, Tanglewood Tales. In order to appreciate the ancient myths, we must have the wonder of a child.
Myths, giants 1328 "There seemed nothing else to be expected, but that, the next moment, he [the brass giant] would fetch his great club down, slam-bang, and smash the vessel into a thousand pieces, without heeding how many innocent people he might destroy; for there is seldom any mercy in a giant, you know." “The Minotaur” Hawthorne, Tanglewood Tales.
Myths, Minotaur 1324 "…a Minotaur, which was shaped partly like a man and partly like a bull, and was altogether such a hideous sort of creature that it is really disagreeable to think of him." “The Minotaur” Hawthorne, Tanglewood Tales.
Myth, scene 1468 "…Medea tossed the contents of the gold box right down the monster’s wide-open throat; immediately, with an outrageous hiss and a tremendous wriggle—flinging his tail up to the tip-top of the tallest tree, and shattering all its branches as it crashed heavily down again—the dragon fell at full length upon the ground and lay quite motionless." “The Golden Fleece” Hawthorne, Tanglewood Tales. Medea 1, Dragon 0..
Myth, Ulysses 1406 "These [hogs] must certainly be my comrades, said Ulysses; I recognize their dispositions." “Circe’s Palace” Hawthorne, Tanglewood Tales.
Myth, war 138 "The confusion spread wider and wider; each man smote down his brother, and was himself smitten down, before he had time to exult in his victory." “The Dragon’s Teeth” Hawthorne, Tanglewood Tales.
Mythology 32 "For such was the rule of the Sanctuary [of Diana of the Woodland Glade]: A candidate for the priesthood could succeed to office only by slaying the incumbent priest in single combat, and could himself retain office only until he in turn was slain by a stronger or craftier...could fling his challenge only if he had first succeeded in plucking a golden bough from the tree which the priest was guarding." Frazer, The New Golden Bough.. Gives new meaning to the expression "Hired to be fired."
Mythology and word origins 427 " In Greek the various kinds of corn were called by the general name of 'Demeter’s fruits,' just as in Latin they were called by the 'fruits or gifts of Ceres,' an expression which survives in the English word cereals." Frazer, The New Golden Bough.
