Okay, let’s review what you just did: 1. You willingly went beyond the terminus page of the rabbit hole where Indy gave you the BeagleSword. 2. You’re on dangerous ground whenever you pass beyond the terminus page. Things in questionable taste – such as colorful language, sales presentations, political opinions and religious discussions – happen […]

As you know, I occasionally give the wizard a page in the rabbit hole to say things he would hesitate to say in the Monday Morning Memo. This is one of those occasions… I keep motivational speakers, as a rule, in the same mental category as multilevel marketing, country music and NASCAR. There is something about […]

Man of La Mancha, 2014, is about to begin in Stratford, Ontario. Two dozen Wizard of Ads partners are there. To understand the play, Man of La Mancha, you must first recognize that it departs from Cervantes’ book, Don Quixote, in several ways. Among these is that – unlike the book – the play has […]

  The best book review, in my opinion, is a few random samples of the type of word-banging a reader will find between the covers of the book in question. That being said… Although Canberra is one of the largest cities in the nation and one of the most important planned communities on earth, it remains Australia’s […]

It’s not cheap, but this wine is highly recommended by Wizard Academy campus superintendent Sean Taylor, shown here. When the play was over and we had clapped for the performers until our hands were raw, we sadly stood and walked back into our left-behind lives.  

There’s a scene near the end of the play, Man of La Mancha, in which Sancho Panza is at the deathbed of Alonso Quijano, his friend who had miraculously become the adventurous knight errant, Don Quixote de La Mancha. When Alonso seems to recover and boldly announces that he and Sancho will again take to the road to […]

These are the Wizard of Ads Partners who made the trip to Stratford, Ontario, to see the Tony Award-winning musical, Man of La Mancha. The scene is in the private dining room of the Mercer Hall Inn, owned by Academy Cognoscenti Dave Martin. Here’s a photo of Dave 10 years ago (left) when 200 of us […]

On Fri, Sep 19, 2014 at 4:57 PM, Tom Grimes, President Plenipotentiary of the Worldwide Worthless Bastards wrote: Your sacrifice is noted sir … but you come from brave Remember-the-Alamo stock and are a known seeker of truthier truth … the real question underneath this is … what is the appropriate occasion to slam that $80 […]

On Fri, Sep 19, 2014 at 4:33 PM, Daniel Whittington <daniel@wizardacademy.org> wrote: There are many aspects of tasting things that my inherent skeptic responded to with “bullshit” when I first encountered them. I find myself being dragged against my Texas nature into my posh family background as I discover that most of them are actually true.  I […]

I didn’t get to hang with the Whit-Brit last week because I traveled to Stratford, Ontario to see Man of La Mancha with the wizard and the princess and Sean Taylor and a couple of dozen Wizard of Ads partners. But while in Canada, I was CC’d on a bit of correspondence beween Tom Grimes, President […]

A 3-day festival with happy alumni speakers tossing golden nuggets to attendees. Learn and laugh and live with us. Get a preview of the live music curated for the event by Vice Chancellor Whittington. In preparation for his first visit to The Toad and Ostrich Pub at Wizard Academy, Cognoscenti Tim Miles felt he should […]

The just-released Edison Report indicates that 72 percent of all Americans over the age of 13 are reached by Broadcast radio (AM/FM) each day. 90 percent of all Americans over the age of 13 are reached by Broadcast radio (AM/FM) each week. Among listeners 18-24, Internet radio accounts for 29% of listening. Broadcast radio (AM/FM) […]

Feminine… Alto… Rich harmony with all the edges rounded. This Orin Swift blend from Spain is made from Garnacha, Tempranillo, Monastrell and Cariñena grapes. The vines are all 60 to 100 years old. It’s called Locations E-2 Spanish Red Blend. Single vineyard wines are like original paintings. The artist’s effort either paid off or it didn’t. There is […]

This is the Train Station in Jumilla, Spain. Juan Gil grows Monastrell grapes near here. In France, they’re called Mourvèdre. Although this wine is very young (2012,) it tastes calm, relaxed and old. It tastes happily aged. The music of this wine is Rod Stewart singing They Can’t Take That Away From Me. Hoarse. Mellow. Silver-grey twilight.

Sicily is an Italian island in the Mediterranean Sea. Have you ever seen a prettier vineyard? Sicily isn’t known so much for its wines. Sicily is known for other things. Like Sicilians, for instance. Nero d’Avola is a type of grape indigenous to Italy. Weirdly, it thrives in hot, dry climates.  Wait. How can a fruit packing so […]

Whittington sings his version of Mount Seir (say-eer,) a hymn of ancient Israel. Listening alone is Jacob Harrison, a professional ad writer. The venue is The Toad and Ostrich, the alumni pub at Wizard Academy.

I bought the Sofia rosé last week because it was incredibly pretty: the bottle, the label, the color of the wine – all of it. I bought this week’s obscure wine for precisely the opposite reason. The only wine label that might be more generic than this one would simply say WINE in stenciled, black […]

Before becoming a poet, a Wizard of AdsTM and a writing instructor, Peter Nevland was an engineer at Motorola. Andrew Backus is a geologist and the living embodiment of Doctor Doolittle. The number of injured animals Andrew has rescued from the roadside would overflow the San Diego Zoo. When I saw Peter talking to Andrew […]

Okay, I like pretty bottles with interesting labels. That’s what attracted me to this wine. And it’s a Rosé. Not a red. Not a white. Is that obscure, or what? One sip and I knew the song: Astrud Gilberto singing Corcovado. Musically light and bright but with a lyric darkness. Soft, sad, summertime at night. Very […]

Why I refuse to deal with advertising committees: 1. Committees force you to spend precious time and energy debating things that should not have to be discussed. Every committeeperson feels it’s their job to question and challenge and make demands, even when they have no idea what they’re talking about. 2. These tedious debates cause […]

I like to imagine this guy as a buddy of Leonardo da Vinci.

Wizard Academy’s vice-chancellor has been a professional singer-songwriter since before he was old enough to drive, so when he began playing his new cover of Rare Earth’s 1971 hit, “I just want to celebrate another day of livin’,” I picked up my iPhone and snagged the second half of it for you. The cognoscenti will […]

Whittington’s office becomes The Toad and Ostrich pub at 5pm every Friday. Last week the gang discussed song lyrics and told impossible stories. Now that I think about it, that’s what they do every week. The guy in the hat silhouetted against the window is Tom Trine, the academy’s new groundskeeper and guardian. Whittington is looking […]

This Lady, of plaster and wood and paint, is one of the strong ecological factors of the town of Loreto, and not to know her and her strength is to fail to know Loreto. One could not ignore a granite monolith in the path of the waves. Such a rock, breaking the rushing waters, would […]

“I mistrust the judgment of every man in a case in which his own wishes are concerned.” – Daniel Webster Here’s a fellow who decided to do a mash-up of that Dead Poets Society monologue with some scenes from the iPad Air ad. Strangely, it works. Look and see and feel, why don’t you?

“We must constantly look at things in a different way. Just when you think you know something, you must look at it in a different way. Even though it may seem silly or wrong, you must try. Dare to strike out and find new ground.” “Despite what anyone might tell you, words and ideas can […]

Do you remember when Steve Jobs was nudged out of Apple, then asked to come back in 1997 to save the company from the brink of bankruptcy? In this 1997 video, Jobs gives us a glimpse into the strategy he would use to propel Apple to its current position as #5 among the Fortune 500. […]

I didn’t get to hang out much with Brittington this week. I traveled with Wizzo to Vancouver. He let me order the wine each night! I’ll tell you about it next week in The Beagle’s Guide to Obscure Wine. Here’s a look at that sparkling city from Room 714 of the Fairmont Pacific Rim. I […]

TheBeagleSword was patting me on my head and the rabbit hole was a jury of five. You heard the carnival music on the carousel video. But Devin Wright spoke of “a fancy night in the dirty South.” Play the vid and you’ll see what he means. – Indy

Yes, Jean Backus was PhotoShopped into the photo above. I lifted Jean’s image from this snapshot of her with the Naked Cowboy in Times Square. Neither of the photos on this page have been altered. They’re both the real deal. It’s important to be the real deal, don’t you think? 

Jean Backus wrote, “The music you hear when you ride the merry-go-round at the carnival.” Let’s compare the odd similarity of her impression to Wright’s “A fancy night in the dirty South” and Whittington’s “Sweetness up front, then road dust,” and Harrison’s “Comes on strong, gritty, ends suddenly,” to Nevland’s reference to meeting a cowboy buried […]

“Dark and Brooding” is what Princess Pennie said when she tasted it. Sometimes I ask the Princess for a second opinion when I’m not entirely sure of my own. I never ask the wizard, though. He gets frustrated when you don’t agree with him. The Princess echoed my own opinion word for word, like she was a […]

Whenever Richard Cory went down town, We people on the pavement looked at him: He was a gentleman from sole to crown, Clean favored, and imperially slim. And he was always quietly arrayed, And he was always human when he talked; But still he fluttered pulses when he said, ‘Good-morning,’ and he glittered when he […]

  Rabbit Hole Insider Alert: This photo will be at the top of next Monday’s Memo. Hmmmmm….. 

Eric lands a quick peck and there you have it; the laughter after spontaneous clowning. Just sayin’. Indy   

Serena and Her Lion by Emily McPhie “When I began this series of children with large, ferocious animals,” says Emily McPhie, “I had intended it to be about the purity of imagination, about how children have such freedom in their dreams while adults are tied to reality and familiar things. Of course, I couldn’t attain […]

It’s funny how the mind works. Pennie said the jasmine at Engelbrecht House was filling the air with perfume… Jasmine. Jazzman. Filling the air with perfume.

“A learned institution sent an expedition southward, one of whose many projects was to determine whether or not the sea-otter was extinct. In due time it returned with the information that the sea-otter was indeed extinct. One of us, some time later, talking with a woman on the coast below Monterey, was astonished to hear […]

The Invisible Heroes contains 133 stories you were never told. Stories that will make you stand taller, smile wider and raise your eyes to the far horizon. When that fat book is published, I’ll likely be branded a romanticizer by serious students of history who will accuse my stories of being incomplete. These people will […]

      On their first wedding anniversary, Jackie gave John a poem she had written: Meanwhile in Massachusetts Jack Kennedy dreamed Walking the shore by the Cape Cod Sea Of all the things he was going to be.   He breathed in the tang of the New England fall And back in his mind he […]

“Phrenology:Mother” by Morwenna Catt Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers Aunt Jennifer’s tigers prance aross a screen, Bright topaz denizens of a world of green. They do not fear the men beneath the tree; They pace in sleek chivalric certainty. Aunt Jennifer’s fingers fluttering through her wool Find even the ivory needle hard to pull. The massive weight of […]

Was it the Pills or Was It Robert and John? At the far left is the official police photo of the Marilyn’s nightstand on August 5, 1962, the morning her body was discovered. Norma Jeane Mortenson June 1, 1926 – August 5, 1962 Unsure of her place, Marilyn drifts from room to room in Engelbrecht House, another […]

Buccaneer’s Wooden Angel This 37-inch original wooden sculpture was carved by an unnamed sailor back in the days when pirates ruled the Caribbean. A break in the wood – just below her eye – makes it appear as though she is weeping. Pennie and I were at a poorly attended antique auction when this carving was sold […]

Lillian Leitzel dreamed of flying. She grew up and lived her dream. People born in the year that Lillian died (1941) are now approaching 80 years old. Time doth also fly. Lillian is remembered in the Lowry room of Engelbrecht House. Another angel, broken. How many kinds of breaking can there be?  

Quixote Shadow Angel This original oil by Thomas Moreau, 1965 adorns the Dan Roitman room in Engelbrecht House This painting flowed from the imagination of an artist who saw Don Quixote as a broken shadow angel back in the days when the Beatles ruled the world. Trippy, don’t you think? Purchased for Wizard Academy by Michael Keesee

Sue Lyon was 14 years old when she was cast in the role of Dolores Haze, the sexually charged adolescent who was the object of an older man’s obsessions in Stanley Kubrick’s 1962 film, Lolita. Only 15 when the film premiered, Lyon became an instant celebrity and won a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer […]

“And There Was A Great Cry In Egypt” by Arthur Hacker, 1897. – Exodus, chapter 11 The angel of the first Passover occupies the Rapaport Room in Engelbrecht House. A gift of Andy and Lindsay Vance. Broken by her grief, she is doing what must be done.

Jacob Wrestles With An Angel Rembrandt, 1659. This, the moment when Israel emerged, hangs in the Dror Yehuda room of Engelbrecht House, another gift of Andy and Lindsay Vance. At the end of a long struggle in the darkness, Jacob broke the angel and was broken by the angel. He was then renamed Israel, “because you have […]

Engelbrecht Angels of Music This 56 inch x 42 inch original oil by K. James adorns the JP Engelbrecht room in Engelbrecht House, a gift of Barbara and Lawrence Smith. An angel with one wing makes music with a man playing a stringless instrument. They’re joined by another one-winged angel in the upper left corner of the painting. […]

Wounded Angel Painted by Hugo Simberg, 1903. Voted the National Painting of Finland, you’ll find it in the Mark Effinger room of Engelbrecht House. A gift of Roxanne Pearce. Throughout his illustrious career, this painting was always Simberg’s favorite The boy on the right makes eye contact with the viewer. Haunting, isn’t it? The video […]

Graffiti Angel. Broken. by Banksy, the British graffiti master, hangs in the Roitman room of Engelbrecht House. A gift of Gair Maxwell. “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or […]

The Other Wing. A gift of Carol Stalcup. Hidden in the Kessler room is the missing wing from Dreamer, Lost In Sleep, the one-winged angel on the previous page.

Sculpted by Adolph Alexander Weinman, Descending Night made its debut at the World’s Fair of 1915, the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco. The original Descending Night was purchased by William Randolph Hearst (Citizen Kane) and resides in the Hearst Castle in California. A 1917 casting from the original mold was purchased in 1994 by […]

Hollywood’s Broken Angel is remembered in the Courbat room of Engelbrecht House Her name was Lillian Millicent Entwistle, “Peg” to her friends. She was born in 1908. At the age of 19, Peg married Robert Keith, 10 years older than she. Too late she discovered that he had been married before and had a 6 […]