CRAIG CONLEY (Prof. Oddfellow) is recognized by Encarta as “America’s most creative and diligent scholar of letters, words and punctuation.” He has been called a “language fanatic” by Page Six gossip columnist Cindy Adams, a “cult hero” by Publisher’s Weekly, a “monk for the modern age” by George Parker, and “a true Renaissance man of the modern era, diving headfirst into comprehensive, open-minded study of realms obscured or merely obscure” by Clint Marsh. An eccentric scholar, Conley’s ideas are often decades ahead of their time. He invented the concept of the “virtual pet” in 1980, fifteen years before the debut of the popular “Tamagotchi” in Japan. His virtual pet, actually a rare flower, still thrives and has reached an incomprehensible size. Conley’s website is OneLetterWords.com.
It's been said that avid readers always have books at their fingertips, but the real die-hards have books on their fingertips. Our champion on the other side of the world just snagged five of our publications. That one pictured at the bottom left is extraordinarily rare, and we frankly can't imaging how he got it: Armchair Time Travel: How to Alter History, Today. He also got The Care & Feeding of a Spirit Board, A Snowball's Chance in Hell, If a Chessman Were a Word: A Chess-Calvino Dictionary, and the little-known Six Degrees of Jubilation(a.k.a. Posted Chestnuts).
There's an ironic subliminal message in this book cover — the middle of the word "exposed," "pos," is highlghted by the box behind it, suggesting "positive." Spirit Rapping Exposed by John Henry Anderson, 1860. See Seance Parlor Feng Shui.
So silly, but we invariably wonder what folks are reading in their old photos. This woman in Eastern Kentucky's 1975 yearbook is reading what appears to be quite a scarce book today: the horse and girl novel Taffy's Foal by Elisa Bialk. The novel was already decades old in 1975, and we suspect that it wasn't required reading for a class. Perhaps it reflects something about this dorm student adjusting to her new life? The book tells of one Nancy Irwin, who lives in Kentucky with her grandmother on a horse farm until her father in Chicago remarries. Nancy is forced to leave behind her beloved mare Taffy, who is in foal. Nancy must adapt to living in the city, make new friends, love her mare from a distance, and learn to love her stepmother. Note that this student is using her stuffed animal as a pillow and is flanked by more literature.