Green, yellow, and red leaves on the far edge of our local cemetery. November 5, 2025. 4:45pm eastern.

What are your favorite powers, abilities, aspects of #Superman? Not the kind that show up on his stat sheets (superstrength, X-Ray). I'm talking... Compassion  Kindness. Empathy Optimism  etc. And what is a #comic issue, page, or panel that shows him with that power, ability, or aspect?

"You there, boy! What day is it?" "It's the day Dick Cheney died, sir!" "Then I haven't missed it." *happiness intensifies* (Images from 'The Muppet Christmas Carol' with Michael Caine as Scrooge)

Well done, PA neighbors near and far: "Pennsylvania voters retain three state Supreme Court justices, preserving Democrats' 5-2 majority" www.nbcnews.com/politics/ele...

If you haven't voted yet, GO VOTE! (You wouldn't like Hulk when he's angry with you for not voting.)

Guess what? Your Friendly Neighborhood Mad Scientist was back at it after a long sabbatical. Teaching chemical reactions and simple machines today! (Some machine takeaways pictured).

#8 at my local polls. (But #1 in your hearts.)

It's that time of year again: Vote. (Hulk art by Joe Bennett; word balloon by me.)

Two Oxford professors believed that they accidentally time traveled — And saw Marie Antoinette at Versailles: www.atlasobscura.com/articles/tim...

This Buddha is still in repose in my backyard. And he has acquired a blanket of moss to help weather that November chill.

Moon photographed over the local cemetery just after 5pm on November 2, 2025.

It's the Friday #80s Flashback for the #Halloween weekend! I pulled a mega-Flashback (six songs) from the archives for you! bookendedbycats.blogspot.com/2025/10/frid...

Liza Donnelly of "Seeing Things" illustrated a short version Heather Cox Richardson's October 28, 2025, installment of Letters from an American: www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Urw...

"It was Halloween in the Fortress of Solitude. Trick or Treat, Superman." Action Comics Vol. 2 #13

Change one letter, ruin a candy. Almond Soy

Cory Doctorow calls Raymond Beisinger's new book, *9 Times My Work Has Been Ripped Off*, "a masterclass in how creative workers can transform the endless, low-grade seething about the endless ripoffs of the industry into something productive and even profound." pluralistic.net/2025/10/28/p...

Temporary collage with fallen leaves. My backyard. October 29, 2025.

Pour one out for a legend of rock radio: Pierre Robert (August 1, 1955 – October 29, 2025). RIP. 6abc.com/post/legenda... Image: Photo of Pierre Robert, promotional image from 93.3 WMMR (via Beasley Media Group)

Fallen to rest. 📸 6:00pm Eastern on October 28, 2025

"Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose" (The X-Files, S3 E4, October 13, 1995) is 30 years old this month, and it still holds up. Image: Bruckman (Peter Boyle) looks at a piece of evidence while Scully (Gillian Anderson) and Mulder (David Duchovny) stand in the background and observe him.

"Yes. Very much so. Books as role models." –Sol [Comic panel from DIE #16; Kieron Gillen (Writer), Stephanie Hans (Artist).]

I think Lex Luthor asked these questions in the wrong order. [Action Comics Vol 1 #658 - 1990] Image: Comic panel. Two people in undergarments enter a room and ask Mr. Luthor for help. Luthor replies with "What are you doing here? And WHERE are your CLOTHES?"

Gabor Maté [The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture, 2022]: // Were health professionals to take to heart information about social determinants, Canadian health expert Dennis Raphael mockingly suggests, they would stop issuing injunctions such as “Stop smoking,” ...

Remembering a backwards glance that could simultaneously hold so little and yet so very much. #GoodbyeMom #GoodbyeDad #StillSayingGoodbye Photo: Leaving my hometown in the rearview mirror after a weekend visit for my mother's funeral. Photo taken October 27, 2017.

// Look For The Helpers: How Chicagoans Are Supporting Their Neighbors Amid ICE Raids // Block Club Chicago | October 16, 2025 blockclubchicago.org/2025/10/16/l...

"100 Years of Women's Work, Reduced to Rubble" – Jessica Yellin and Rohan Montgomery on the history, and recent destruction, of the East Wing. newsnotnoisejessicayellin.substack.com/p/100-years-...

Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson claps back at reporter's use of "illegal aliens." Well done, sir!

“I am Count Dracula. I am really the bebop vampire.” –Philly Joe Jones (1958). Read Nate Chinen's deep dive into this jazz classic that's perfect for the Halloween season: How "Blues for Dracula" made Philly Joe Jones a Halloween hero www.wrti.org/wrti-spotlig...

On 10/24/2017, the day before my mother's funeral, I spent an hour or so reading DEATH POEMS in a tiny chapel within walking distance of my hotel room. I still recommend this book. And the 14-page sampler in PDF format is archived here: web.archive.org/web/20211025...

Time for another Friday #80s Flashback. And this week, we have Simple Minds with their 7th studio release, ONCE UPON A TIME, which turned 40 this week. It features the hits "Alive and Kicking", "Sanctify Yourself", and "All the Things She Said". #music bookendedbycats.blogspot.com/2025/10/frid...

The end of my 2025 sunflowers means there's a 2025 harvest of sunflower seeds. Here's to next year's crop!

I just read about "chickenization" and ... damn ... Amazon really is the dystopian nightmare we all contributed to along the way. pluralistic.net/2025/10/23/t...

Here's a photo from October 23, 2017. When I originally posted it, I wrote: "The road into town will never feel the same again. #GoodbyeMom"

"Every God I meet plays @$%# tricks on me. Divinity school must be a barrel of @$%# laughs." –Jenny JENNY SPARKS #6

Fanned out sun rays and cool clouds for tonight's sunset.

The end of my 2025 sunflowers.

"A secular democracy does not mean a society without faith; it means a society where no one’s faith — or lack of it — grants them power over others." Faith in Freedom: Why Secular Democracy Protects the Sacred and the Human by Gordon Gamm • 17 October 2025 thehumanist.com/commentary/f...

In Back to the Future, Marty and Doc jumped into future to October 21, 2015. So, on that date, 10 years ago, Eclectic Method gave us the "Back to the Future Remix"! www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7mr...

Earlier on this Monday, I spied a pair of snoozing bees in my patch of blanket flowers. When I checked again after 6pm, they were gone. I'm hoping they warmed up and moved on.

When you are feeling bad just remember that we are all made of same stuff stars are made of. Pendants in my etsy shop. Surly.etsy.com

New profile pic for this month's spooky holiday! (I'm wearing Court of Owls mask and skeletal gloves).

Post a remake that you love… I'm caught in 1978, trying to choose between "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" and "Heaven Can Wait" (the latter of which is a remake of 1941's "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" but with the original title of Harry Segall's unproduced play, 'Heaven Can Wait').

Me and my double-takes when looking at the news any more. Image: Comic book panel from page 24 of Superman Special Vol 2 #1. Sand Superman and Superman react to each other, the former with a "?" and the latter with "!"

// Google has suddenly confirmed privacy initiatives “are being phased out.” The Privacy Sandbox, now in its sixth year, has essentially ended just months after Google confirmed tracking is here to stay and there are no viable alternatives. // www.forbes.com/sites/zakdof...

I love that an actual book has "yeeted" as part of its title ... and it's also pretty much the plot. Book: "That Time I Got Drunk and Yeeted a Love Potion at a Werewolf" by Kimberly Lemming

// I made a Brainiac say "Yeep," so there's that. // Batman/Superman: World's Finest #42

"Rebellions are built on hope." Image: A collection of six Star Wars inspired protest signs, seen at No Kings rallies, atop a screen capture of ANDOR's Luthien with the caption "[visible happiness]".

Mark Bray has made his book freely available... [Copied from Battalion SAR] 📖 Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook files.libcom.org/files/Antifa... The author, a Rutgers professor who taught about fascism, received so many threats against himself and his family that they eventually ...

The fence part of our "Ghost and RIP" decoration fell apart after Halloween 2024. But I saved the ghost and the little tombstone-with-jackolantern, and I've reused them for 2025. Now, Doug Bonez gets to enjoy a spooky pedal tractor, and the tombstone piece is more of a hanging ornament.

Here's the latest Friday #80s Flashback, coming at you with a double two-fer of albums that recently turned 40 years old: LISTEN LIKE THIEVES (INXS), THE JETS, FALCO 3 (Falco), and LOVE (The Cult). #music bookendedbycats.blogspot.com/2025/10/frid...