1. IT’S THE MAGNIFICATION THAT CHANGED history. 2. When Galileo Galilei first-lighted* his telescope more than four hundred years ago, he didn’t know that simple act would begin a new era for humanity. He certainly didn’t know that by deducing…
Author: Neal Ross Attinson
Neal Ross Attinson is one of those text-compulsives who feels naked without a keyboard, or at least a a pad and pen. He is unafraid of adverbs, loves astronomy and gastronomy with equally unabashed passion, and lives with/in an eclectic library in Sonoma, California.
Prosatio Silban and the Revealer of Secrets
PROSATIO SILBAN SIPPED AT HIS glass of white duliac, savoring the wine’s herbal essence, and continued to enjoy the Arrow-and-Wheel’s boisterous patrons. Rustic farmers occupied most of the plank tables, discussing the weather, the prospects, whose cows were ill and…
Pithyism #12a
ANYTHING CAN BE LEARNED, BUT not everything can be taught.
Prosatio Silban and the Ersatz Indigene
“A CHANGE OF CLOTHES IS not a change of man,” goes the old Uulian proverb – and neither is it a change of cultures. Prosatio Silban wiped the copious sweat from his hairless brow and sighed. He and his quaint…
What Maimonides (Or Was It Lao-tse?) Really Meant
“THOSE WHO KNOW, CHUCKLE.”
Prosatio Silban and the Proportional Mystery
SOMETIMES, EVEN AN ENCHANTER NEEDS a bit of mundane help. Prosatio Silban was sitting, chin in hand, at one of his galleywagon’s two tables-and-chairs in cosmopolitan Soharis’ eastern marketplace, watching potential customers walk by and wondering what he could do…
Keep It Under Your Hat
IT PAINS ME ON SEVERAL levels to do this, but I am currently wearing a tweed cabbie cap over my kippah. The reason is simple — a dear friend sincerely and greatly fears for my safety in an era where…
Prosatio Silban and the Evasive Death
STARLESS DARKNESS FILLED THE OBSERVABLE universe. Where am I? Prosatio Silban thought. He tried to make his voice work, but couldn’t find or even feel his throat. In fact, his entire body seemed to be missing. What am I? Only…
A Self-Defrocked Holyman In A Fantastic Land Ekes Out A Meager But Honest Living As A Mercenary Cook
PROSATIO SILBAN ONCE MINISTERED TO the souls of the Uulian Commonwell’s faithful. But now, his heartfelt devotion is to tend the palates and gullets he encounters on his journeys as a mercenary cook. Inspired by Don Quixote, J.A. Brillat-Savarin’s The…
Prosatio Silban and the Agreeable Disagreement
SOMETIMES, AND WITHOUT MEANING TO, religious faith can eat itself by blurring the lines between divine desires and human humbuggery. By which is meant, O Patient Reader, that while the Flickering Gods always have a clear idea as to what…
Read This (E)Book
THIS IS WHAT COMES FROM puttering about in a small morning with nothing else to do (thanks, PKD, for the reference): “Little-t truths for our and every time; a considerable consideration of considerings.” Pithyisms is, thanks to Smashwords, my second…
Prosatio Silban and the Sacreantal Reflex
IT BEGAN WITH A SIMPLE question: “What is the most challenging place you’ve ever visited?” “The place where I learned not to drink,” Prosatio Silban replied, raising a glass of blue duliac. “But you are drinking now!” pointed out his…