Okay. Okay. I'll put the pumpkins out.

It’s a brisk, windy day here and trees are definitely convincing me to let go of summer. Plus it’s playoff season. Go Cubs, ya know.

September Tub o’ Books will be combined with October’s. Not only have I been busy getting the 2019 calendar ready (coming soon!), I have had limited reading and both have been political: Bob Woodward’s Fear and Madeline Albright’s Facism. Still reading them both. More on those later.

Today marks the anniversary of the 1950 debut of Peanuts, my all-time favorite comic strip even today, surpassing such other favorites as The Far Side, Baby Blues, Calvin and Hobbs, Doonesbury, and a half-dozen other really funny, really relevant stories drawn. Every week I am found cutting out 2-3 Peanuts a week to put in my journal because they make me laugh or sum up wisdom for the ages.

Case in point:

Keep looking up…That’s the secret of life.

In the book of life, the answers are not in the back.

Worrying won’t stop the bad stuff from happening. It just stops you from enjoying the good.

All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn’t hurt.

I can’t decide if I should sue somebody today or have another doughnut.

Being a dog is a full-time job.

You shouldn’t yell at somebody just before Christmas.

After all, there’s more to life than sitting in a Fresh cafe drinking root beer all night.

Never trust a poll where you come in ninth.

So thanks, Charles Schultz; you add something to my day each morning. I own Schulz, a biography but have been using it mostly for reference so far. Perhaps it needs to get on my (ever-growing) list to read. Maybe if authors stop writing new books I can catch up. You think?

And news on the Studio Shop Front: Soon, I will be sharing some sneaky views from my 2019 calendar, Tweet. No, not the social media kind. The other kind. Stay tuned. If you are not subscribed to the blog, perhaps now would be a good time? (It’s over there on the right. At the top. See it?) You will be the first to know when the calendar is at the shop, AND I am offering a special price for early orders, since I will need to tweak (that’s tweak, not tweet) the price a bit this year. (I’m sure you are not surprised to hear that EVERYTHING has gone up over these past 4 years, sometimes significantly: paper, postage, printing. Bummer, I know.)