Kickass and the Morning Maze by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper starts every morning looking out across the parking lot at the schools and the streets and the many distant buildings, and then marveling at how everybody...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

Photo by Bill Stokes

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Kickass and Saving Beagles by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, would be traitorous to his species if he did not encourage the keeper to at least acknowledge the chaotic scene that has been playing out at the dog breeding and research fa...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/20/k...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Review of "Sirat" « The Pen in Hand Blog "Sirat" is a hypnotic, absorbing road film that magnetically pulls the viewer not only into the rhythms, vibes, and flows of the people involved, but into the vastness and emptiness of the desert itse...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies

Illustration by Michael DiMilo

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Kickass and the Wisconsin River by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper and Phyllis’s relationships with rivers has been long and varied, and in the keeper’s case fraught with challenge, particularly with the Wisconsin River w...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

Photo by Bill Stokes

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/19/k...

Kickass and Stormy Daniels Weather « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, cooperates with the keeper and Phyllis as they try to help others deal with the hack that put the Stormy Daniels Weather Service on the net in place of the old National Weat...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/18/k...

Dialogues on Confusions of Grandeure: What Would Jesus Do? « The Pen in Hand Blog Saw it, glanced, but now see it more clearly with DC’s image. Have read it is AI generated and I’m quick to believe that... an AI fart in church.

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring The Fabulous Dadbots

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Kickass and the Hereafter by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, noting that dogs have delegated their hereafter administering to humans and they are therefore all going to heaven—the dogs not the humans, the keeper, as he gets ever close...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/17/k...

Kickass and Having a Book by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that the keeper joins Phylis in announcing that the keeper will no longer be working long hours on “Oh, The Women!” his novel about women saving the world from the r...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

Photo by Bill Stokes

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/16/k...

Peeling the Orange by Geoff Carter « The Pen in Hand Blog Setting all this aside, all that defines a corrupt, avaricious, self-centered, narcissistic, disgusting, cruel, murderous, and criminal human being, what do we have? What’s left? A man who is still un...

The Pen in Hand Blog

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Kickass and Hailstorms by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper and Phyllis puzzling over the reason behind the baseball-sized hail that pounded down at various locations late Tuesday.

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/15/k...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reminds the keeper that he is a lucky man in that when he forgot it was his and Phyllis’s 7th wedding anniversary until it was too late to really celebrate it, so had Phylli...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/14/k...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: The Ten Best Baseball Movies « The Pen in Hand Blog The movies have had a long and storied history with baseball. The game, the players, and the history are a source of constant fascination, and the diamond is an area where the hopes, fears, and ambiti...

What's Your Favorite Baseball Movie?

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies
Illustration by Michael DiMIlo

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/13/t...

Kickass and Old Drivers by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper and Phyllis winding up their long relationships with vehicles with a faithful Subaru that rests docilely in basement parking until there is a medical or s...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/13/k...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Review of "The Testament of Ann Lee" « The Pen in Hand Blog While "The Testament of Ann Lee" explores and displays all brands of rapturous ecstasy, it does not preach, and it does not lecture. It simply is. It washes over the audience, immersing us in the comm...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies

Illustration by Michael DiMilo

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/13/t...

Kickass and Cow Party by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper in lamenting the demise of yet one more sign of spring—the “cow party” which was the day the cows, after a winter of standing in cramped stalls, were turned...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

Photo by Phyllis Stokes

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/11/k...

Kickass and the Lumber Camps by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that the keeper and Phyllis with their lumber camp experiences and remnant exposure, are often awed in contemplating that dramatic brief time in history when brave—f...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

Photo by Phyllis Stokes

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/12/k...

Kickass and Menopause by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper wondering how he might upgrade the evolutionary status of old men to match that of old women who, after they are no longer able to bear children, are still seen by the one and only evolutionary demand as contributing to the increase in the population of the species.

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/10/k...

DIalogues on Life During Wartime: The Price of Opportunity Costs « The Pen in Hand Blog Trump has no business managing a war. He cannot seem to overcome his petty jealousies, affronts, and emotional constipation. The fact he refused President Zelensky’s offer (out of wounded, no doubt) t...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring The Fabulous Dadbots

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Kickass Goes to Prom by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, consults with the keeper about just what to do about April being the prom month after Phyllis says she has no interest in going to the prom because it hurts her feet to dance, especially as an inept dancing keeper is likely to step on her toes.

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

Photo by Bill Stokes

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/09/k...

A Night at the Opera by Geoff Carter « The Pen in Hand Blog My wife and I went to the opera for the first time this last week, attending a performance of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly at The Lyric Opera of Chicago. While I have been exposed to opera, it never really struck a chord with me (pardon the pun). Butterfly was part of my father’s record collection, and he used to play it quite often, but I never really listened. My loss.

The Pen in Hand Blog

Photo by Geoff Carter

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Kickass and the Sparrow Egg by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, passes along news from the keeper that the sparrows have made a bid to participate in the egg business conducted by Phyllis as she distributes eggs from the flocks of grandd...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

Photo by Bill Stokes

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/08/k...

Kickass and Being Somewhere by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Under the rubric that “everybody gotta be somewhere,” the keeper is not anxious to trade places with anyone this morning, with the possible exception of a White House fumigator and any one of the youn...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/07/k...

Kickass and Remembering at Easter by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper and Phyllis and their Easter dinner guests in a post ham-dinner stupor lingering over dessert and coffee exchanging childhood memories.

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/06/k...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Review of "The Perfect Neighbor" « The Pen in Hand Blog "The Perfect Neighbor", a 2025 feature documentary, is extraordinary for its groundbreaking use of natural or “found” footage. Director Geeta Gandbhir uses a combination of police bodycam footage, int...

The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies

Illustration by Michael DiMilo

geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/06/t...

Happy Easter from The Pen in Hand!! « The Pen in Hand Blog Well done, you wily wabbits!!

Happy Easter from The Pen in Hand!!

Photos by Geoff Carter

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Kickass and Marsh Hawk Eggs by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper in noting on this Easter morning that maybe one of the reasons he has lived so long is to give him time to make amends, or at least apologize for some of th...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/05/k...

Kickass and Sexy Saturday by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that the keeper, in his careful study of this day between Good Friday and Easter, designates it as “Sexy Saturday.”

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/04/k...

Kickass and Diversion Scheme by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper, in his efforts to use diversion to help with deodorizing the Trump zoo stench, shares a boyhood memory of spending two days to buy BBs when the clerk at ...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/03/k...

Kickass and Double-Breasted Suit by Bill Stokes « The Pen in Hand Blog Kickass, the doorstop dog, reminds the keeper of his responsibility in guiding the Easter style dress parade, an honor which he earned many years ago by purchasing the very last double-breasted men’s ...

The Pen in Hand Blog featuring Bill Stokes

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geoffreymalcolmcarter.com/2026/04/02/k...

Breathe by Geoff Carter « The Pen in Hand Blog This sense of renewal and rebirth tinged with an overriding sense of determination and purpose was evident when we attended the latest No Kings March in Milwaukee. Thousands of citizens fed up with th...

The Pen in Hand Blog

Photos by Geoff Carter

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