Musings & Perusings and Goines 0n have been published

Publication Date: Dec. 24, 2025

75th Birthday Gift Fulfilled

By Moristotle

On January 8, 2018 , in his post, “An Immodest Proposal: A Birthday Surprise Ruined in 750 Words," Geoffrey proposed that I put together a collection of my writings in book form. On several later occasions I apologized for not having yet acted on the proposal, which came from Jennifer as well. Now, at last, I can announce that I have completed the project. Or, rather, Geoffrey and I have completed the project, because he provided consultations and invaluable editing without which I might neither have completed the project nor have achieved as good results as I think we did.
    Musings & Perusings: A Moristotle Reader is available in both paperback and ebook on Amazon. 

Publication Date: Dec. 23, 2025

Goines Has Delivered!

Almost two years ago, after his retirement from blogging, Goines submitted the manuscript of his book Goines On: A self-portrait in fictional vignettes to an agent in the William Morris Endeavor agency. He never heard from the agent, so he decided to self-publish the book along with Musings & Perusings: A Moristotle Reader. Goines is grateful to everyone who encouraged him along the way and helped him get the Goines On book out. He hopes his words of acknowledgment in the book’s front matters adequately convey his thanks.
    Goines On: A self-portrait in fictional vignettes is available in both paperback and ebook on Amazon.

Both books can be accessed from my author page on Amazon.

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Copyright © 2025 by Moristotle

Moristotle 80th Birthday Interview

Interviewed by Geoffrey Dean

I posed a number of probing questions to Moristotle recently. His answers give us new insights into his mind and heart, while on a lighter note, they also helped me figure out what to give him for his 80^th birthday tomorrow!

     Thanks to my sister, Jennifer, for taking the photos above.

What three (or more) words would you use to describe yourself?

Skeptical, optimistic, helpful. I’m surprised how easily those three words came, and how confident I am of them….No, those came too fast; they need qualification, elaboration.

Three “little Siegfrieds”

 

Siegfried Dean as a pup

12 years later
all still beloved

By Moristotle

[Originally published on December 18, 2009.]

[The woman] who sold us our beloved Siegfried back in March [2009] has announced the availability of three more “beautiful Cream/White puppies.”

In Your Dreams: A bedtime serenade – The Bach Arioso

For Jennifer on her birthday, from Geoff & Dad

By Geoffrey Dean

[Originally published on Jennifer Neumann’s birthday two years ago: December 31, 2016, without a subtitle.]

A few months ago, roughly coinciding with our daughter Vera’s arrival, I put together a playlist of classical pieces that I considered suitably sleep-inducing. After mining my own memory for appropriate selections, I enriched our nighttime listening repertoire with a few “readymade” albums, such as “More Bedtime Serenades.” This compilation came up as I searched for one of my favorite pieces by J. S. Bach, the “Arioso,” which is perhaps best-known and most widely performed today as a cello solo with piano accompaniment. This is the version heard on More Bedtime Serenades, in an interpretation by Janos Starker that to me brings home the sense of Arioso as “almost an aria” – a piece striving towards full-fledged aria status, and almost getting there. Starker’s is a lyrical interpretation that still retains a hint of the spoken quality that was also an important element of Baroque music and the “rhetoric” behind it.

An Immodest Proposal

A Birthday Surprise Ruined in 750 Words

By Geoffrey Dean

Cover Design by
Jennifer Dean Neumann

The project started in my mind as a collection of Moristotle poems that I could read to his granddaughter. Of course, he could read them to her himself, or record them for her, or even write new poems for her, but these are other projects and not how the one I’m writing about here evolved. I got my sister involved early, and we agreed that the goal was a full-fledged publication of the “Selected Poetry of…” sort that we would present to Moristotle on his birthday in 2018. I’ll call this Plan A.

Seventy-four (74)

“They say it’s your birthday!”

By Moristotle

It was about three months before his 75th birthday when my father died. The fact that he died when he was the age I am today has been giving me pause for some months.

First Monday with Characters

What long legs Envious has!

Edited by 
Morris Dean

Bettina Sperry, off to the races

While work on the farm had been settling down during the hot days of August, focus on my racehorse heated up significantly. There is so much more to horseracing than appears. Horses themselves can pose problems and race unpredictably, as has been the case with my boy. Horseracing is arguably hard on the people involved, for myriad reasons, though from the outside this can be conceivably difficult to understand. It is a world of constant problem solving, competition, and working towards improvement in racing – at the slow pace of one race at a time.
    I am also enjoying Franklin Hill's new thoroughbred foal [see photo]. Her name is Envious. At just a few months of age, she is gorgeous. She's a rough and tumble foal, and is mean spirited. She has been biting and kicking since day one on the farm. She recently left for her new home where she will be managed professionally during the months ahead. She is clearly a racehorse in the making.

First Monday with Characters

Edited by Morris Dean

André Duvall, in accompaniment & solo

Last week, I performed with four other musicians in the second annual Peanut Butter & Jelly Concert for the Mid-South Food Bank, which services over thirty counties in West Tennessee and Northern Mississippi. We raised several pounds of non-perishable items, as well as a good supplement of cash donations, for the Food Bank. For the majority of the concert, I accompanied three of the performers, including soprano Kallen Esperian. Kallen is dearly loved in Memphis and is sort of our “home town” opera star, having performed in almost all the major opera houses in Europe and toured with Pavarotti many years ago, and we were very fortunate to have her come and support our efforts. I also played some solo works for piano and organ for this concert.

First Monday with Characters

March 25, 1942 - March 31, 2014

Edited by Morris Dean

Jack Cover, in memoriam
Jack died one week ago today, at home, in Raleigh. His obituary in the Raleigh News & Observer mentions some activist work of which he was rightly proud and which he liked to recount:

Jack was honored to be a delegate to the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church USA, where he became acutely aware of the church's injustice to LGBTQ members. He served two terms on the Board of More Light Presbyterians. He campaigned vigorously for More Light in the last fifteen years of his life, seeking equal treatment for LGBTQ members within the Presbyterian Church. Jack learned to knit just so he could make rainbow scarves [he's wearing one in the photo] for awareness of More Light issues. He was a strong supporter of peace and justice causes, and was disappointed that he was too weak to risk arrest as part of the NAACP-organized Moral Monday protests during the summer of 2013.

First Monday with Characters

Edited by Morris Dean

The Rogers, staying close to home

Hello from Costa Rica!
    A certain part of our road has been washing out over the years. It became so bad they at last had to do something. They dumped a couple truckloads of rocks to fill the hole and covered it with dirt. I’m not saying they will not get around to fixing the road, but it took two years to get the rocks dumped.

First Monday with Characters

Edited by Morris Dean

Madison Kimrey, on stage

This month I'm looking forward to marching in Raleigh on February 8th and appearing in Les Miserables opening at the Paramount Theater in Burlington on February 21st. Last month I gave a speech at Girls World Expo to encourage other girls to get involved with the issues that are important to them:

First Monday with Characters

Monumento a Pau Casals en Barcelona

Edited by Morris Dean

Geoffrey Dean, en España

Every year it’s a special hope of mine that I will not be in Sofia for the Christmas craziness in the Bulgarian capital, and this year I took special measures to make that happen. Inspired by Eric Siblin’s book about the famous Catalan cellist Pau Casals (Pablo in Spanish) and the Bach cello suites (the two stories are interwoven in an engaging journalistic style), I decided it was time to visit some of the places he lived. So we took a budget flight to Barcelona on the 19th, and on my birthday we went down the Catalan coast to En Vendrell, where Casals was born. We also visited Sant Salvador, where he summered at his beachfront villa in the 20s and 30s, and in time for Christmas eve we traveled to Prades in the French Pyrenees, where Casals lived in exile after Franco came to power. On the 26th a friend surprised us by taking us to the ballet in Monte Carlo—Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, choregraphed by Jean Christophe Maillot, was a completely engrossing celebration of movement, color, and holiday humor!

First Monday with Characters

Used to be Left Hand Canyon Road

Edited by Morris Dean

Chuck Smythe above the Great Flood

On Monday night, September 23, it began to rain. The forecast was a few hours of light drizzle. We woke up the next morning to a driving, tropical downpour, the sort that just doesn’t happen in Eastern Colorado. It continued all day Tuesday, all day Wednesday. On Thursday it rained the longest and hardest I’ve seen since New Zealand, nine inches in a single day. It rained all day Friday.

First Monday with Characters

Edited by Morris Dean

The Neumanns, at anchor

The Pineapple people have had a very busy month, what with the football preseason, a trip to Sonoma County to see Yo Yo Ma on his "Goat Rodeo" tour and a little bit of boating thrown in. We haven't taken the big boat out all month and hope to make up for that in September, starting with being anchored out for the four-day weekend ending today. This is our three-year anniversary of owning Pineapple Girl II, and what a great three years it has been. We are really looking forward to relaxing and sure feel like we need it after the hectic summer we've had.

First Monday with Characters

Edited by Morris Dean

Jim Rix, on bad-hair day

The purpose of a hat used to be to protect the head from sun in the summer and cold in the winter. Now it's to turn this

First Monday with Characters

Edited by Morris Dean

Paul Clark, aka motomynd, in growing family in North Carolina

In a bit of news that may be every bit as petty as it sounds, I am very pleased to announce that not only did my step-daughter not yet dethrone me as fastest half-miler in the family, but I almost had to carry her back from a trail run because I goaded her into a speed workout on hills. Next month we go back to track workouts and I am doomed, but this month age and guile again trump youth and superior athleticism.
    Oh, we did have additions to the family: The resident white-tail does that hang out in our backyards in NC and VA both gave birth to fawns in June and paraded them out for formal introductions.

First Monday with Characters

The new Bay Bridge to San Francisco
from the upper floor of Tom's building
[Transamerica Pyramid far right]

Edited by Morris Dean

Tom Lowe, unmobile

This has been the Spring of my discontent. Back around Xmas I injured a toe while navigating my living space in the dark, and the recovery process, complicated by my diabetes, has gone very slowly. In the meantime I been wandering from doctors office to doctors office working out a strategy to solve this mess. Latest effort is physical therapy, followed by acupuncture to increase circulation when my doctor returns from China. After a couple of weeks the mix of techniques seem to easing the tightness and pain.

First Monday with Characters

Untitled work by Susan C. Price

Edited by Morris Dean

[Though the date above says Monday, it's Tuesday afternoon as I finish and publish this column. For an explanation, see the update on myself, the last "character" reported on below.]

Susan C. Price at the easle

why on earth would i want to update my character this frequently? i'm retired...the only BIG changes...can be icky

First Monday with Characters

[Click to animate]

Edited by Morris Dean

Siegfried at home at home
    About time we included Siegfried in our updates!

First Monday with Characters

Painting by
Susan C. Price
[Click to enlarge]

Edited by Morris Dean

André Duvall almost ABD
    André is in a doctoral program in music at UNC Greensboro. "ABD" stands for the limbo a doctoral student is in when he has done "all but dissertation."

I felt quite overwhelmed one week recently, since I was preparing to take, and then did take, my doctoral comprehensive exams. For three days, I wrote for 7-8 hours each day in an isolation booth, cancelling all of my classes/teaching duties; the two weeks leading up to those exams involves quite a large amount of studying, followed by a lot of catching up just this last week, after the exams were over. I feel I did well on them; it will be a couple of weeks before I hear the results from my committee. Glad to have that behind me!