Book Review: Fun In the Garage on a Rainy Day

I am happy to share with you my review of a great new book for families and children (of all ages).

It is with great pleasure that I heartily recommend to any boy or girl—or to the parents of any boy or girl—the newly re-released book by Dr. Seymour Shrack, Fun In the Garage on a Rainy Day (©2011 Posthumous Press, Posternack, NJ, $24.99).

Shrack, long known for his long-winded speeches and his prolific scientific pontifications in numerous national medical and scientific journals, with this publication has managed to tame his usual sophisticated, academic and elaborate language and speak very effectively in the vernacular of children and tweens.

Children will thrill at the twenty "tricks," as he calls them (I say they are really more like “treats”) that Shrack describes in a down-to-earth manner.  For instance, he shows how to soften a wishbone so that it is impossible to break for the purpose of deciding who will be lucky.  Just imagine the fun that could lead to at Thanksgiving!  Other tricks describe how to create invisible ink (and how to make it visible again), how to make a cat's fur stand up on end (with no harm to the cat, of course), how to make gravel float (on water or in the air!), plus many more.

Shrack's little gem of a book will be the perfect antidote for those times when youngsters say they are bored, or when their parents are fed up with them playing video games or otherwise being glued to the computer.  Each trick is safe, uses no dangerous chemicals or matches, and can easily be preformed using common household items.

This reviewer especially appreciated the practical nature of the tricks Shrack describes.  Even though it is aimed at children, adults will find at least one trick which they, too, will want to try.  I found this particular trick to be very intriguing:  Shrack has devised a simple and effective way to pull an April Fools Day trick on a whole group of people; one trick, many victims.  You will want to get your own copy of the book to learn the trick.  But, here is a hint: it involves writing an article based on fictional characters gleaned from an episode of The Andy Griffith Show.  Perhaps you can already imagine how much fun that might be!

So be sure to look for your own copy of Dr. Shrack's book, Fun In the Garage on a Rainy Day, available at all the finest booksellers, as well as online book sources.  Looking for it is half the fun, and you will be glad you did, and so will your children.

This review is © 2011, James A. Harris

Take a Look at My Art Wall at Skyline Cafe & Art

If you have not yet discovered Skyline Cafe & Art you need to!  Just head out East on U.S. 33 from Harrisonburg, and you'll find it... directly across from the entrance to the Massanutten Development (beside Brown Memorial Church).

My paintings are displayed on a wall in the "Tea Room" just to the right of the front door.  After you have seen them (and perhaps made a purchase or two!), head on back to the dining room where you will find more art, jewelry, pottery, glass art, jams, jellies, etc.  Stop at the counter and order lunch, or at least coffee (they have wonderful coffee, and I particularly love their quiches).  Relax, chat with Lisa, the proprietor, or any of the other wonderful folks there. 

Meanwhile, here's a sneak peak at my work that's there.

     

         

Why I "Re-Create" My Earlier Paintings Upon Request

Since I only sell original paintings (and small greeting cards featuring those paintings), and I do not sell prints or reproductions (except in very rare cases), I am willing to re-create a painting that I have produced earlier.  The only stipulation I put on this is that the new work, while it will closely resemble an earlier painting, will be clearly different and unique, so both the owner of the first work and the owner of the second work will have their own special painting, and no else has another one exactly like it.

I sell my paintings for unbelievably reasonable prices because my goal is for ordinary people, those who might not otherwise feel they could afford to own an original painting, to be able to do so.  Most of my original works actually cost less than prints of other artists’ paintings, plus those prints have to be framed to be displayed in a person’s home.  I am able to sell for less in part because I usually paint on gallery-wrapped canvases, which are designed to be displayed without a frame, although an owner of my work can choose to frame it.  If my work is framed it is usually less expensive than framing a print, because acrylic paintings on canvas are not to be displayed under glass (the canvas and paint need to “breath”), and glass is often the single most expensive (and weighty) part of a traditional frame.  I know what I am talking about because I am a certified framer, trained by Michael’s Frame Shop, well-known for professional, well-done framing.

Today I completed two re-created paintings.  Visitors come webpage, http://jim-harris.artistwebsites.com/, look around and sometime find works marked as “sold” that they wish they had been able to own.  They send me an email from the site, and I then offer to paint them their own version of the painting they admired.  Below are the first and second paintings of two different themes.  I think you can see that while each of them are of the same subject, they are, in fact, different and unique.

I am very grateful to God for my talent, and very appreciative that others find my work worthy of their ownership.  - Jim

A LASTING IMPRESSION

A Story Appropriate for the Season of Lent:

I grew up in a small community in the mountains of Virginia.  The little church we attended was as simple and uncomplicated in its style of worship as the building that housed it: clean, uncomplicated, unsophisticated, and un-ceremonial.

I became a minister at age 26, and soon discovered how my home church had not prepared me to be a pastor of a more traditional (think “ordinary”) church.  The expectations of the small congregation I pastored in those early years were often for things with which I had no experience.

Nothing illustrates that better than what happened in my very first Ash Wednesday service.  Whatever my intentions and expectations may have been entering the pastoral ministry, as it happens I came to make a truly lasting impression in my very first year.

I had never in all my life been to an Ash Wednesday service, and since I was a student pastor (still in college at the time, after four years in the U.S. Navy) I had not yet taken any courses in how to do the service.  So, I sought the input of a retired minister who attended our services.

He answered all of my questions, and I prepared the service.  Un-fortunately I did not know all the questions that needed to be asked; which is what lead to my leaving a lasting impression.

I didn’t know to ask where I would get the ashes for the service.  It seemed like a no-brainer: I would have to burn something to create them.  And so I did.  I burned a couple of old bulletins that I found in the office, and then I ground the ashes into a fine grain with a mortar and pestle that my dad had given me.

I took the ashes and mixed them with water.  During the worship service I had the people line up for their ashes, where they would receive the sign of the cross on their foreheads.  This was to remind each of us that we were but dust, and we were sinners.  At the close of the service I had them wipe off their ashes because we have all, in fact, been forgiven through the death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ.

Here’s where the lasting impression was made.  I had mixed the paper ashes with water.  That formed the acid known as lye.  The acid reacted with the skin on our foreheads, and after the ashes were wiped off, a red rash remained.  Of course it was in the same shape as I had made the ashes: the shape of a cross.

Talk about witnessing!  Everywhere any of us went for the next few days, people knew we were Christians!  After that lasting impression was made the retired minister explained that we are supposed to burn dried palm fronds from the previous year’s Palm Sunday service and use those ashes, mixed with olive oil.

Never again have I left that type of lasting impression on Ash Wednesday.  I’ll never forget the comment of one of my young adult members the day after that service, when I was finally able to laugh about it.  He said, “You really made an ash of yourself last night, Preacher.”

So true, so very true.