Stuff in the Basement

What I knew about Madame Butterfly I could have written on the back of the ticket. Puccini?--a spicy Italian sandwich maybe. We were g...

Should I ever go to Italy again, I'd work harder at taking really fine pictures. This time I had the jitters. I wasn't a bit nerv...

The Basilica di San Marco has three huge domes, not just one--impossible as that may seem. All of them are mosaics, if you can even begin...

Rick Steves claims that the architectural style of St. Mark's Basilica, in Venice, is "early ransack" because so much of wh...

The idea of early mornings with a camera is to get to where you want to be somewhere around what's called "first light," of...

“But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy great peace.”  Christian piety is, by the standards of some, never good enough. “Give all ...

Museum display hoppers from the Homestead National Monument The worst grasshopper visitation we had was in July, 1876. One Sunday morni...

Literally millions of fundamentalist Christians believe the Christian faith is greatly imperiled in America, more than it's ever, ev...

It's meant to tell a story, to make the story come alive, and it does. You can't not look. This incredible relief sculpture is a...

"Damn, sometimes I get so pissed for what I fell for my first fifty years or so." It's a disturbing line to start the...