If it's Thursday, it's Down

Aye, a faire Thursday afternoon, you Stroock's Books reader(s), you. 

We had some rain early this morning with much more on the way. Here are the latest New Jersey drought numbers. Look at all that green. We're doing great.  

So CIA director John Ratcliffe was in Moscow. Wonder what he was talking to the Ruskis about? 'This comes directly from the president,' clears throat. 'If you attack a NATO country we'll take these half dozen economic actions against you, declare a no-fly zone over Ukraine, and sink every ship in the Black Sea fleet? Comprende? Da? Good!'

Thursday Downer: this video on living with bipolar disorder seems about right. Or is it? We've never been as up as these people are describing. In some ways we're just naturally morose. Always have been. We do like the second cases' exercise regimen. Damn right exercise fights depression. God bless endorphins. Which is why we're hitting the gym in an hour despite a slightly sore knee. 

These people are on way too many drugs, in our opinion. We're on one, which we hate, despite what it does. We don't get high or low much anymore. We're steady. Even. Another word for our condition is numb. Reminder the highs are never as high as the lows are low, and we'd gladly give up the former even if it means losing the later. 

Campaign note, national: are normies really going to care who Hasan Piker is? In our opinion the GOP is counting way too much on linking Dem/DSA candidates to him. 

DOGE report.

An excellent day with the Battle of Ardee, yesterday. The chapter still needs work, clarification and articulation. But we are pleased. 

We read through a couple of problem scenes this morning. By the time we were through with 'em those scenes were a lot less problematic. 

We've got, like, two chapters left. And we need to write the Irish Ranger Wing raid and the conclusion. 

If it's Midweek, it's the Midweek Meander (with AC/DC asides)

A good midweek morn to Stroock's Books reader(s) everywhere except Canada. Bastards. 

Autumn looms. Right now, the temp is 59 degrees, American. Feels a bit early for such cool temps, even in New Jersey, no? 

We are sore from an afternoon at the gym. But we've two good (enough) nights of sleep. 

We are neglecting our lawn. 

We see no one bought Blooms yesterday. Thanks. We blame Canada.

This blog has no insights to offer on the passing of Dolly Parton. We're just not much of a Country music fan. Seriously, we can name, like three Dolly Parton songs. Three. Parton was one of those 'everywhere' celebrities of our childhood. We recently saw 9 to 5 for the first time in a couple of decades, a movie that was on cable all the time for a while. Parton is one of the reasons why that film is so much fun. Go ahead and give 9 to 5 a rewatch. Otherwise, kaddish. 

FB tells us that 11 years ago today we saw our last AC/DC concert, this one at the Meadowlands. Note, our previous AC/DC concert was at the old Giants Stadium just before they tore it down. AC/DC is on tour again, but we don't feel the need to see a show. They're old and so are we. 

Well how 'bout that! Back in Black just came on the radio here at Dunkin Donuts. Must be a sign. Easily one of the ten best chord progressions in rock. 

Related...2006...or our last good semester subbing. That autumn we were enamored with 1990s ACDC. Reader(s) should do themselves a favor and listed to 2000's Stiff Upper Lip. This is smooth yet gritty blues based album. Stiff Upper Lip was only six years old when we found it, but for us in 2006, 2000 might as well have been another planet. House, baby on the way, job, novel completed, a few magazines articles in print and many more coming. Seriously, click that link. 

We agree with this, 100 percent: 'Arguing against antisemitic lies is futile. Antisemitism must be confronted for what it has become: a political weapon against Jews and the Jewish state.' Go the full Andrew Breitbart. Turn the camera around and accuse the accuser. Of all the causes in all the world, why have you selected the Jews? Reminder, there is only one reason to oppose Israel. Just one. And it's ugly. Oh, and don't forget to bomb Gaza. 

Campaign note: we've spotted half a dozen Rebecca Bennett for Congress signs in our neighborhood. We're not surprised. Bennett's supporters are motivated, and who can blame them? She's a heck of a candidate. We also saw some Corey Booker signs. We didn't even know he was up for reelection. We've no idea who Booker's GOP opponent is. We did spot one Tom Kean sign. His campaign does strike us as aggressive, confident even. Kean has 100 percent name recognition, his father was a popular governor. He's also got a substantial money advantage. But money isn't everything.* 

DOGE report. 

We approach the tasks at hand with a mixture of ennui and resignation [Stop pronouncing ennui 'n-u-i'-Ed]. Get bent. 

Another chapter down in World War 1990: Thatcher's War. Today we read the Battle of Ardee chapter [Oh, fuck no -Ed]. Oh fuck no is right. 

We continue cleaning up the sub story in the 5th nuke novel. 

*Which is why GOP millionaire Doug Forrester was unable to buy himself the governor's mansion or a senate seat in the 2000s. 

Will Embraces Tuesday

All right, decent (enough) night's sleep. 

A good gym session, yesterday. All our numbers are down though. Is that fatigue or more likely age? One wonders. 

Autumn is creeping up on us. As we write this the temp is 55 degrees, Fahrenheit. In support of Trump's economic war on Canada, we're banning Celsius and metric numbers. Socialist bastards. Go eat a moose.

FB tells us that on this day in 2025 we moved Oldest Daughter into college. One year later she knows everything. It's like...[Dealing with 19 year old you?-Ed]. Exactly.

Campaign note: we saw a television commercial in which incumbent GOP congressman Tom Kean touts his support for Medicare and Medicaid. Memos must have gone out arguing that the Dem/DSA axis is vulnerable on healthcare, we suspect. The 90s GOP this is not. 

Unrelated...

Sometimes we feel like Sam Rothman at the end of Casino, putting down our pencil and staring forlornly into the distance as we recall the good old days; in our case our adjunct professor days. Sometimes we drive past Raritan Valley Community College and whisper, 'RVCC...RVCC...' We've even toyed with the idea of reapplying. 

A friend and former colleague who's still there urges us to do so. We came up with many reasons why we shouldn't. 'You are putting up obstacles to yourself,' our friend said. 'You're goddamn right we are,' we replied. 

Lord knows what's in our personnel file. We imagine an interview going something like this, 'It says here you resigned with three weeks left in the semester and when the department head said you can't do that you replied, "Just watch me" Pierre Trudeau style. And later when the department head told you might as well be saying "Do you know who I am?" you replied, "and?" Our words were something like, 'I bring a lot of value to this institution including dozens of articles and six novels and it's about time someone recognized that.'*

This Jason Arday scandal is giving us second thoughts. [Why? Did you think of offing yourself when it all imploded?-Ed] No but we had a stiff drink or three. The great Stephen L Miller supposes that large swaths of academia are defending Arday's plagiarism because they too are plagiarists. Miller is a lot smarter than we [Not hard to be-Ed]. No, Ed, it isn't. Plagiarism must be everywhere in academia.

We have never plagiarized. 

 And then there's all the woke craziness. 

All right, all right. If they called, we'd listen. 

They are not going to call. 

Our revenge has been literary. Won't some kind soul read Blooms?

DOGE report.

We read through the RAF aerial attack chapter in World War 1990: Thatcher's War. The ground invasion chapter awaits. We approach those chapters with...[Don't say it!-Ed]....great fear and trepidation. 

A decent round of editing what we already had in the 5th nuke novel's Soviet sub story. It's looking...okay, but we don't really know how we're getting to where we want to go. 

*The adjunct coordinator who triggered the crisis has one book in print with like, two reviews. Screw them. 

Keaned Out?

Aye, a new week here at Stroock's Books. [It's a new week everywhere-Ed]. It is, Ed. It is. 

Bah! Another rough night. No idea why. 

Yesterday was our 28th (!) wedding anniversary. What can a man say? Neither one of us wanted to celebrate. Heck, for our 25th anniversary we went to the Cheesecake Factory; with the girls. We wouldn't have had it any other way. 

Holy Tel Aviv, Haifa and Jerusalem. We knew Israel imported a lot of foreign workers, but not this many. The Jerusalem Post: 'Since October 7, 2023, Israel has been rapidly replacing its Palestinian labor force with foreign workers. 250,000 foreign workers are already in Israel, and their number is set to rise to 330,000.' Those jobs used to go to Gazans and West Bank People. Just another consequence of the war Hamas started.

Wow. A sign of good economic growth, no?  Israeli's economy is so strong it's got a labor shortage. Impressive, Bibi. Most impressive. Once again, we point out that only Bibi could have gotten Israel to where it is right now.

Report from New Jersey's 7th Congressional district. This race pits incumbent absentee Congresman Tom Kean Jr (he took off several months to check himself into the nuthouse and no one knew what was wrong or where he was)* against former Navy pilot Rebecca Bennett. Bennett is an excellent candidate, a clone of governor Mickie Sherrill, who won handily last year. 

Right now, Kean and Bennett are fighting the campaign on YouTube. We can't watch a video without seeing ads for both campaigns. Bennett is slamming Kean for taking a hundred days off while voting against paid leave (hard to argue with that). Kean is touting his work getting the SALT tax deduction limit raised (a big issue in affluent New Jersey). 

Also Kean is running ads pledging to defend Medicaid and Medicare. Which is an odd place for a GOP to be. Is this part of a national GOP strategy to claim the Dems/DSA will take away Medicaid and Medicare?

Anyway, the only poll we could find on NJ07 is from late June and shows Bennett winning 47-43. That's not bad for Kean, actually, given the circumstances. Kean, the GOP, and outside groups are certainly spending like he has a puncher's chance. Still, we think Kean's absence makes him extremely vulnerable. Bennett's ads on same are devastating. Advantage: Bennett. 

With Tom Kean after one of several phone bank sessions in 2020. He last that race.

From the Foreign Desk: Sir John A MacDonald

No Trade Deal for Canada

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney ran on a platform of getting a ‘fair’ trade deal for Canada, standing up to Trump and essentially portraying himself as Trump’s greatest rival. The Canadian Media have been falling all over themselves telling Canadians that Carney would easily get a deal and best President Trump. As of Saturday, that has not happened.

Trump told Canadians that he would impose a 50% tariff on a long list of Canadian products, including dairy, honey, certain automotive parts, furniture and wood products and…hockey equipment. It has long been a joke in Canada that Canada maintains a massive lead in Zamboni technology.

All joking aside, what does this mean for the Canada-US trade relationship? Quite a lot. Dairy products have long been an area in which the Canadian government provides massive tariffs against American products to protect the dairy industry in Quebec and, to a lesser extent Ontario. Most Canadians who live on the border with the US have a long history of buying milk and other dairy products in the US for the simple reason that they are cheaper. People farther from the border are stuck with the higher prices. This will cause severe problems for dairy producers in Quebec and Ontario, along with job losses.

In terms of lumber, there is a long and complicated trade dispute surrounding fees, crown land and whether Canadian industry is undercutting US producers. There is enough gray areas and differences in how the two countries manage the logging industry that an argument could be made either that the Canadian practices are unfair, or that American practices are. I’ll leave that to the international trade experts. With the caveat that even they can’t agree. Again, Canadian lumber and products are a huge export for Canada, but may not be anymore. More potential job losses.

Previously Trump also imposed tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum, which is another area that will cause pain for Canadian producers. The same with many auto parts. While some auto materials are exempt, others are not and this could cause a lot of layoffs in Southern Ontario where many of the Canadian auto plants are based. Closed plants and thousands out of work are never a good look for politicians.

One area that I would note that Trump is NOT imposing tariffs is an important one. Oil, gas and energy (electricity). I think the reason is that Trump is very much in favour of increasing oil and gas production in both the US and Canada, while Carney and the Liberals are, at best, ambivalent. Justin Trudeau was dead set against any further expansion of oil and gas production.

So, why did Canada not get an agreement to avoid tariffs? There are several reasons. To start with, as I have said, Carney has portrayed himself as Trump’s rival, and the Liberals are very much on board with this portrayal. Since Trump came into office, the Liberals have wrapped themselves up in the Canadian flag and claimed that they are great patriots. This despite the fact that when Trudeau was in office, they called the Canadian flag a symbol of hate, division and colonialism and claimed Canada was a “Post National Nation”. Whatever that is supposed to mean. Put simply, the Liberals have made it clear that they are Trump’s enemies, and are now very surprised and upset that he has begun treating them that way. This is not the way that other US President’s have behaved in the past. Even George W. Bush was…quite indulgent of this attitude.

Second, I think Trump has run out of patience with Canadian attitudes and behaviour. Which means for him there really isn’t a downside of imposing tariffs. From my own reading, I do see a change in attitude among many Americans towards Canada and Canadians.

Carney, I think, has decided that he can simply wait Trump out. Put simply, Trump will be out of office in two and a half years (despite the claims on the left that he will make himself a dictator for life). Should the Republicans lose heavily in the midterms in November, Carney may only have to hold out a few more months. He is betting that someone more “reasonable” will be in office shortly. What he has not considered is what to do if that does not happen, or if Trump’s successor is also a Republican and….not as friendly to Canada. In that situation, there is a long term threat to Canadian stability and the Canadian economy. And no one has said that these are the only tariffs Trump will impose.

There is another factor to consider. While the trade talks have been big news in Canada (front page news pretty much every day) until a trade deal wasn’t reached, it really wasn’t a very big deal in the US. The tariffs are on about $20 billion in Canadian products and affect somewhere between 5 and 10% of Canadian trade to the US. Which is 80% of the Canadian economy. So, this is 10% to 20% of that trade. Carney has announced he will match those tariffs. The problem for Canada is that while trade with the US is 80% of all Canadian trade, for the US trade with Canada is only around 10%. And reciprocal tariffs will affect far less than that. Maybe only 2% or so. The US can accept that loss. Canada cannot.

So, why didn’t Carney make a deal? The last reason. While the trade talks were underway, there was a poll in Canada. That poll (apparently) stated that if Carney got a trade deal with Trump, Canadians wanted an election on the deal. Try to imagine the Liberals, and Carney, running an election stating that Canadians should accept a trade deal with the person they have spent the last decade portraying as a huge threat to Canada. They wouldn’t do it. They wouldn’t even accept the pressure to run an election on such a platform. Canadian premiers (with the exception of Alberta) have made great hay out of removing US booze from Canadian shelves and refusing to put it back on even if there was a trade deal. The so called “Laurentian Elite”, those that most people are convinced really run Canada have made it clear that they are completely opposed to the deal.

Put simply, Caney refused a trade deal because a trade deal with Trump would have destroyed him and too many others politically. Carney would rather stay in power while destroying the Canadian economy and calling it “Patriotism”.

Saturday Updates

Baaaah. We swipe the air and drink our coffee. We're groggy and sluggish. Last night we awoke half an hour after falling asleep with the sweats and just a hint of a night terror. You know the scene in Apocalypse Now where Kurtz describes a snail crawling along a straight blade? That. Otherwise, we've no way to describe the feeling and sense of one of those things. We got to sleep though, and slept in. 

Baaaah again.

Chipotle last night, the girls insisted. We had too many chips, as one does. Honestly, we prefer the tacos and burritos Mrs. Stroock and Oldest Daughter make. 

Let's get to the Things, shall we? [Why do you sound like the Critical Drinker?'-Ed] Dunno. [There you go again-Ed]. The Critical Drinker is always right. 

We have read through the first half of World War 1990: Thatcher's War, again. We are not as pleased as we were with the first read through last week. 

The first half of Thatcher's War shows the World War 1990: Ireland aftermath, new violence of the Catholic and Protestant variety, crackdowns on both, invasion prep, and Bush administration machinations. That's just the kind of crap we find interesting. 

Right now we're approaching the second half of the novel with...[Great fear and trepidation?-Ed] great fear and trepidation. 

The Soviet submarine story is coming along just fine. The 5th nuke novel is 50,000 words. 

Friday Title Held on Request

Good Shabbos, Stroock's Books kibbutzim. 

We are sore from yesterday's workout, the second back of a back-to-back. Rower, elliptical, rope pulley. We are unsatisfied with this routine. Should we add a fourth? Maybe. But what? 

Yesterday we saw a young man at the gym wearing a Robotech T-shirt. We almost wept. Not kidding [You sure you didn't get your period?-Ed]. We wanted to hug him, but he probably would have thought that was weird. 'I'm sorry, sir. You're going to have to come with us,' said the officer. 

We had quite the deluge of rain yesterday with another such deluge coming this weekend. Good. The state still needs the rain. The drought situation has vastly improved though. Here are the latest drought numbers.

Reading Jewish/Israel news means seeing at least one story about a Juden hass attack here in the United States; every day. Here's the latest attack, this time in Florida. We really don't know what to do about this. Or what we should do if the unthinkable happens. Punch back, we guess. 

Related Jewiness...At the Jewish News Syndicate, Jonathan Tobin talks about the failure of Groyper and anti-Israeli candidates in the GOP primary. J.D. Vance should take note, Tobin says. Quite right. This blog remains committed to Ron DeSantis, who has almost no chance of winning the GOP presidential nomination. Oh well. In 35 years of voting, the candidate we supported has never won the nomination....Tsongas, Alexander, McCain, Giuliani, Rubio, Desantis...Hmmm we can't remember who we initially supported in 2012. Which does not speak well for him. Rick Perry?

DOGE report.

E-book sales are down but KU pages read are up. Make it make sense. Reminder, book sales are an art, not a science. 

Another chapter in World War 1990: Thatcher's War read through. One more to go before the invasion. Next week.

The Soviet sub story in the 5th nuke novel is coming along. A retired law enforcement officer reminded us that in the modern USA, counties have sheriff's offices, not small towns. Horror movies always get that wrong, he says. Small-town sheriffs are a 19th century thing. See for example. 

A Ruski friend who is reading The Great Nuclear War of 1975 series would like to see a story about an average Ruski. No cosmonauts. No sub skippers. Just your average Ruski. Now that is not a bad idea.

Thursday Downer

Good afternoon, everyone who reads Stroock's Books, you hearty band, you. 

We awoke tired and sore, baaaaah! Good session at the gym, though. 

War of the ants. New ant colony, new ant poison. And we saw the ants taking the poison yesterday. We shall terminate this colony, terminate with extreme prejudice. 

America's national debt has crossed the 40 trillion threshold. Congratulations. We came out of the respectable 90s GOP that was interested in reforming government, cutting costs, and balancing the budget. They said we would starve children and throw old people into the street. Sorry America, we tried. One day the debt will blow up the economy. When that happens we'll say we told you so. 

Ben Shapiro talks about Lindsey Clancy, the crazy Massachusetts woman who murdered her three children. Shapiro sounds to us like a man who has dealt with post-partum depression and mental illness before. The episode fascinated us. Clancy sought mental help, was in therapy, was institutionalized, was medicated. Hoo-boy was Clancy medicated. And still she...

Long term reader(s) will recall we ourselves are bi-polar, what used to be called manic depressive. In 2005 we were diagnosed by a doctor with medical degrees and everything. Manic depression (we hate the term bipolar) means one is up, and one is down, often randomly and joltingly.  In our experience the highs are never as high as the lows are low. Our first episode was probably 1986. We were 12. then 1988. Again and again...Boy did Ozzie ever get it right. 

When we heard Clancy was on a lot of meds we got the willies, the yips. We used to be on a lot of meds. An anti-depressant, a mood regulator*, another anti-depressant...At one point the doctor wanted to put us on one of those 'enhancers' or whatever they're called that are supposed to boost the other three. And that's when we put a stop to it. Where three pills failed four is not the answer. We're still on one pill. It's hard to quit. 

Lindsey Clancy took some of the stuff we took, and that's terrifying. No, we've never been tempted to strangle our children.   No, we've never heard voices in our head [Hey what about me?-Ed] You're not even real, Ed. We made you up and at one point fired you over Me-Too concerns. So no, we've no sympathy for Lindsey Clancy. She should be locked up at an institution for the criminally insane. For the rest of her life. 

DOGE report. 

We had a decent enough day with both projects. The things are coming along. We are making progress. 

*Because on top of the manic depression god thought it'd be fun to give us a hair-trigger temper. And proving he is nothing if not persistent, god gave us dyslexia too. We insist reader(s) click on over and read that. 

In Which Will Stoops to Conquer

At last.

Colin Salt has stopped blogging at Fuldapocalypse, it seems. He posted sporadically, making one wonder what the point was. And Salt had a knack for writing posts that were at once too short and too long. Where a sentence would do he often wrote a paragraph. Other times he would stop at one paragraph when he had fodder for a couple of more paragraphs - and a decent length post approaching 800 words - standard article length. 

Salt reviewed a few of our books. He didn't like them. Here's some of what he had to say about us at Sea Lion Press's forum (his publisher): 

That's good of him.

One sided, huh? What's the other side in the Israel/Iran conflict?

Maybe not, but we have a good reputation amongst the reading public. And that's what matters. 

Anyway, we out sell Salt, massively as shown by rankings and number of reviews. Obviously. We're up here with The Titans and Colin Salt is not. 

2006: the third day

Well, well, well. Guess what showed up this morning [Your period?-Ed]. Very funny Ed, you newt. No. We got gout. It's minor, so far, but nevertheless. [Nevertheless what? And what do you mean by newt?-Ed] Just nevertheless, and think about it. Newt...King Knutson or Knut...start playing around with the letters, babe.

The Israelis held their political primaries last night. The Jerusalem Post reports that Israeli politics remain deadlocked. The great Hugh Hewitt interviewed an Israeli journalist on the upcoming election. We learned a lot, and recommend reader(s) click on over. Personally, if we had a vote, we'd be persuadable, meaning we're up for grabs. 

On the one hand Bibi's done well and seeing him back in office would piss off all the right people. On the other hand the nation needs new leadership and a Haredi draft law. Only Gadi Eisenkot can deliver that. On the gripping hand neither bloc has a majority. Our guess is that were Eisenkot to beat Bibi head to head, President Herzog would give him first crack at forming a government and he could peel off a few Likud members. Who knows? We shrug and drink our coffee. 

Exit question: is it possible that Israeli polls are as broken as American polls?

In the wake of serial plagiarizer and fabulist Jasan Arday's suicide, many in the Yookay are calling for press regulation, censorship and 'Jason's law'. Quite right. The media is the enemy of the people. The media needs federal regulators, federal content editors, and a five day waiting period before filing a story. And ban anonymous sources. Reminder, fellow MAGA hats, there is no reason for the right to defend the media, even in this case. No reason whatsoever. Know your class enemies.* 

2006...Huh we weighed more then than we do now. This was the summer we began putting on weight. Eating a dozen perogies for lunch and chasing them with half a bag of Doritos will do that. We noticed that September on our first substitute teaching gig. We buttoned a nice pair of khaki pleats we wore the previous spring. Uh oh, we thought. We'd hang on to that weight for more than a decade.  By the time of our heart thing in 2015 we were pushing 270. 

This was also the summer we were really into the fall of the Philippines in 1942. We'd outlined a story about an teacher [Big surprise-Ed] with a legit 4F who lies his way into the army and ends up being in the Corregidor airborne assault (Rock Force) in 1945. Huh again. Maybe that's our stand-alone novel idea. 

Otherwise we were kinda bored and just waiting for the school year to begin. 

DOGE report. 

We did some work on the Soviet sub short story. Things were going fine and then we got stuck. We dunno. 

The World War 1990: Thatcher's War readthrough continues apace. We are nearing the, 'It is What it is, inshallah,' phase. [Meaning?-Ed] This is it. This is the novel. 

*If we saw, say, an ABC or NYTs reporter drowning, while we would throw [insert pronoun] a rescue buoy, we wouldn't jump in the water to help. We're not getting wet for those bastards. Enemy of the people. 

2006: the second day

Baaaaah! We swipe the air and drink our coffee. That late summer humidity has settled in here, bringing with it morning overcast, fog, and general dankness. While one has a few summer things left, this morning one finds oneself looking forward to the pastoral splendor of Yankee autumn. 

Envy us, Johnny Rebs. 

Three days in a row at the gym. We've done all of our exercise routines but have not yet decided how to reorganize and reorder them. After looking at summer beach pics though, we're cutting out crunches, leg lifts and the like. What's the point? They ain't gettin' results. 

2006...What was in the news? The Israelis were fighting Hezbollah in Lebanon and blew it. The Iraq War was raging. Little did we know the tide was already turning. That June the US killed AQI head Abu Zarqawi. Anbar Awakening had formed. The Dems were getting ready to romp in the midterms. History rhymes, they say. 

We'd finished A Line Through the Desert and were about to have a bunch of military history magazine articles in print. We decided to submit short stories to sci-fi and fantasy magazines and began doing so in the summer of 2006. We never even came close.** It was for the best. We'd written a very Mary Sue sword and sorcery short story and we're glad it's never seen the light of day. We dodged a bullet there, or a dagger anyway.

DOGE report.

We read through a couple of chapters of World War 1990: Thatcher's War. We're getting bored. Which means we're getting to where we need to get.

We did some research and scut work on the Irish Army Ranger Wing raid on Heath House. Soon?*

We read through the DEW Line story. Still not sure where things are going. 

We are plugging along on the Soviet sub story. This one will be interesting as it's the first time we've bounced between POVs in this universe. 

*This should not be as epic as the SAS raid on Moscow, but something more than the Norwegian army's raid on the Soviet held airstrip. 

**We have five short stories in print now [Show off-Ed]. 

2006: the first day

Good morning, Stroock's Books people. It's a brand-new week. 

A second day in a row at the gym. While it feels good to be back, we're thinking it's time to modify our workout routine. We don't know how though and are experimenting with combinations. 

Pro tip: don't complain when random packages of stuff the womenfolk ordered from Amazon or Walmart arrive. More packages will arrive today, as is their wont, and most certainly tomorrow. It's a biblical deluge of carboard and packing materials. The wise man just smiles and says, 'Yes dear'.

We've stopped reading the Israeli press. It's a hodgepodge of new sites presenting an incoherent jumble of stories. Half of the articles are analyses masquerading as news. Whatever. We're sick of thinking about it and are content to enjoy the rubble.

Related...more Juden Hass from the right. The bulk of the Juden Hass we get on Substack comes from that direction these days. They're just pissed that the latest man mom brought home from the bar was a Jew. Still, other than humor and yo-mama jokes, we really don't know what to do about the rising Juden Hass. We'll Jew harder, we guess. 

2006...this time 20 years ago we were waiting out the summer. 

We were looking forward to getting back to subbing at Bernards High School. Fall '06 would be a our last good semester there after a great two years. Beginning in January '07, well, we'd be Mister Mom.

We were meeting with a contractor to discuss finishing the back basement room at the Stroock Northern Strategic Direction. Living space expansion was necessary as the combined family had two kids and two more on the way. Mrs. Stroock was pregnant as was our stupid sister. 

When we returned home, we stopped directly at Barnes & Noble to pick up the latest copy Strategy & Tactics Magazine, which had our long treatment of the Duke of Marlborough on the cover. This was the beginning of a great run of magazine articles that would last years.

A Line Through the Desert was done and we don't remember what we were writing. We must have been working on a magazine article. Up Front at Zama is our best bet.

We were just good enough at guitar to play some chord progressions and leads. 

Our hair was approaching shoulder length. We'd cut it three days after Oldest Daughter was born. A mistake. We should have stuck with it till spring. We're too old for that crap now. Oh well.

Will's Good Idea for the Week of 8/16/26

Good Sunday morn to all Christians, except the C of E. Losers. Reminder, Britain is finished. 

Moving on [Please-Ed].

Blog traffic is way up. We've no idea why. As usual, Blogger stats tell us absolutely nothing we want to know about where the traffic is from, who's linking to Stroock's Books, etc, etc. The traffic is mostly bots and spam, we think. 

Yesterday we mowed the lawn. Got to the gym, which felt good. The scale says we're back down to 243 pounds or 17.3 stone. We won't convert that into Canadian, moose eating bastards. 

One of our critics has packed it in. Should we slam that critic? We think we should. But not today. [Why?-Ed] Why not? [Did not your late friend Kathy Shaidle* warn how draining and pointless internet flame wars ultimately are? -Ed] She did, Ed. She did. Still...[Still what?-Ed] We are loath to get down in the muck with the pigs. We get dirty and the pigs like it. But sometimes family business must needs be settled. We've done it before. [That was a good piece-Ed] So was this. We don't even remember who that guy was anymore. And sometimes it's personal. 

We find ourselves thinking of the past as is our lot [You do that too much -Ed], milestones, anniversaries and the like. Usually 20 years, not 25 is what matters to us. It's 2006 week all week here at Stroock's Books. Enjoy. 

Will's Good Idea for the Week of 8/16/26...

We had no breakthroughs on any future projects...we need to update that page, don't we? Remember, we're thinking of one standalone book, probably on a new platform. 

No breakthrough on To Liberate Mars. 

We do find our selves thinking about World War 1990: Ireland and the 5th nuke novel a lot. 

If we were to start a third universe, what would it be? 

*What's Warren Kinsella doing these days?

Saturday Updates

Ah, it's good to be back, as Tony Stark once said. 

A long trip yesterday with some traffic backup and a whining cat. Good times. Nevertheless, we are home where everything is just as we left it. 

The lawn needs mowing.

We needed a gym break, we got a gym break. The body feels tan, rested and ready. We'll think about possible new regimens today. 

What a trip, though. Two weeks at the Stroock Northern Strategic Direction in the Berkshires. We can't recall a better long-term stay. We come away pleased with the endeavor. And we'll be back Labor Day. 

And so begins the final phase of the Stroock summer. 

Our man in Norway sent us some very tasty Norwegian chocolate.

Otherwise there's not much to report. 

Let's move on to the things, shall we? 

The Things.

Okay, we really fixed up a lot of World War 1990: Thatcher's War. We read through half the book. More work remains. In fact the read through was so successful, we're going to do another read through this week. 

Also, we've figured out where Mr. Adams is staying during the war and how 14 Intel-the Group figures that out. The Irish Ranger Wing will strike once again. 

World War 1990: Thatcher's War is 72,000 words. 

We began another nuke story. Soviet sub, damaged by Coast Guard cutter, sends crew ashore to retrieve needed medical supplies, etc. Runs into angry and armed towns people. Reader(s) will get the drift. 

Finishing this story and the DEW Line story will get us close to 60,000 words. One more story, no? If you've ideas, let's hear them. 

The 5th nuke novel is 46,000 words. 

The Last Morning of the Second Week

Another fine morning to you all. Today the Stroock family will be returning home after a most successful two weeks amidst the Berkshire's pastoral splendor. 

Some HR lady/middle school vice principal type* here on the lake is circulating a letter protesting the 'excessive noise' from the Israeli summer camp. Lol, lighten up, lady. These kids spent large parts of the last three years hiding in safe rooms and bomb shelters. In other words, get fucked. 

Related...The great Steve Sailer asks, Are Jews an Ethnicity? Our answer to that question is, we don't know. Our 23&Me tells us we're 48.6 percent Ashkenazi Jew. Thanks, dad. We're actually darker complexioned than we look at first glance. But we've blue eyes and blond hair. Thanks, mom. Put us in a lineup with Jerry Seinfeld and Ben Shapiro and we'd stand out. Jews are of course a desert people. Even now, as we write this we feel the allure, the pull of the Holy Land.

We don't pay much attention to British politics these days. There's no point. The country is finished. But Nigel Farage (whom we're not even sure we support anymore, the wanker) was being investigated for some trumped up corruption charged, resigned his seat in parliament, ran for reelection - and romped. If one believes the charges against Farage, great. We've got some Arkansas real-estate opportunities you're going to love. 

DOGE Report. A kind of herky-jerky day where we never felt comfortable but never-the-less got a few things accomplished. 

FB tells us we posted this fifteen years ago today, 'Tentative story list: surfer dude in Vietnam, a German nat in the IDF, a defense of a Pacific island in 1941, a disgruntled Brit Merc in Africa (think Wild Geese), something Jake Bloom- I have no idea what, some Americans in the Philippine Insurgency C. 1902 and a sequel to To Defend the Earth called To Attack Mars.'

So that's what we were thinking about back then. Bear in mind we had two novels in print, A Line through the Desert and To Defend the Earth. Israel Strikes was but a gleam in our eye. 

We're off to pack and clean up. Wish us luck. We'll report from home tomorrow. Update...we have an old fashioned clothes washer here. You just dial to the setting you want, and that's what the machine does; 40-50 minutes. Our fancy hi-tech close washer at home seemingly ignores the settings we select and takes 60-90 minutes to do a load of wash. Smash the machines. 

*We looked up the author. Everything about her says, 'I'm a WNBA exec and I don't know what a woman is.'

Thursday: the Second Week

A very foggy good morning to everyone. The lake is covered by fog...oh, now it's lifting.

Another full day here at Lake Buel. Youngest Daughter has taken a liking to fishing and caught at least a dozen blue gills yesterday. Of course it's up to dad to unhook 'em. We boated. We kayaked while Middle Daughter paddle boarded. The Stroock family enjoyed its evening boat cruise. 

Hot Air reports on the Wisconsin primary vote tally fiasco. Subhead: in which NBC's Steve Karnacki realizes Trump was right about 2020. We love this story. God help us we do love it so.   Reminder: believing the 2020 election was fair is the conspiracy theory. Here we are at the Bedminster Stop the Steal* rally the Saturday after the 2020 election. We stand by every word. Trump won.

DOGE report.

We are struggling on. We've read through everything till the invasion of Ireland. That's half the novel. That half looks like what it's going to look like. It still feels a bit jumbled though. 

We had an idea for another 5th nuke novel story. A US navy destroyer sails into San Fransico Bay, and it's a nightmare. 

The other night we dreamt we were writing a story about a space cruiser skipper, that is a CA in space. And we liked it. 

Related...no real ju-ju for To Liberate Mars. 

We had an idea about a sword and sorcery novel. It's mostly just LOTR**, which alert reader(s) will have noticed has been on the telly a lot lately. Three siblings. Two princes have opposing personalities. A young princess is confined to doing princess things, as the Queen is long dead and she fills that role. The young princess has spent her life reading the great histories. In the continent-wide war that follows, she comes to advise her father, the King [Not bad-Ed.] I know, right? 

*Note how we sneak it we're an author. We come off as poised, reasonable, charismatic and handsome [Ew-Ed].

**Fun fact. We only tried reading The Lord of the Rings in the mid-2000s and we didn't like it. We didn't like it at all. Our inspiration would be Dennis L McKiernan's Mithgar - which is a LOTR knock off.

Wednesday: the Second Week

Hello stalwart Stroock's Books reader(s), and happy midweek. We're enjoying another fine morn here on Lake Buel. The sun is out. The fog is coming off the lake. The air is cool and dewy. The weed cutter is out and making a hell of a racket. 

We did some light yard work yesterday as we found a vine growing up the side of the house and attaching itself to the sat TV wires, which need to be reset. We ain't gettin' up there. Sorry, but we don't do roofs [He said 'roofs' in his dear neighbor's Minnesota accent-Ed]. 

Speaking of the Upper Midwest, DSA loon Francesca Hong narrowly lost the state's Democrat Gubernatorial primary last night, despite polling way ahead. That's the second big DSA polling miss (after El Sayed in Michigan). Pollsters don't know how to poll for the DSA, and the commie bastards aren't as strong as they think they are. 

Huh we saw on the lake FB group this note from the Israeli camp, 'Anyone planning fireworks this weekend? Would love to be prepared for worried campers...' That is, all those Israeli kids have the yips from 3 years of war and are jumpy around explosions. 

This blog is getting a metric-fuck-ton of traffic lately. Any of you newbies wanna buy an alternate history, science fiction, or military fiction novel? Start with something small and self-contained, like The Austrian Painter: What if Germany won the Great War?

Our childhood best friend, from like - the 80s, turned 50 yesterday. Those to lads are both fifty now. Remarkable.

DOGE report. We read through another couple of Thatcher's War chapters yesterday. One seemed rambling and disjointed. Which may not be a problem. We're making progress thought. Shoring up those chapters is the big task of the day. September 1...1 September...

Tuesday: the Second Week

Morning glory, as the great Hugh Hewitt likes to say. The air is cool with a slight breeze. The lake like glass. As we write this a wake border is passing across the water. The weed cutter is humming and droning down at the southeast section of the lake. The Israelis up the shore a making quite a racket this morning. They were having a great time last night, too. 

So yesterday afternoon we were sitting here on our deck, reading through World War 1990: Ireland's Armagh chapter, when we heard some stirring and rustling across the canal. We looked, stood up, and then knocked on the family room window. 'Look. Out. Side,' we said. 

For on the far bank of the canal was a large black bear, and two cubs following her. They walked along the bank to the beaver lodge, where mama-bear growled and poked around for a bit. The beaver was pissed and spent the next hour cruising the canal until he was satisfied the bears had moved on.

Look, like 99.56 percent of America, we don't care about the WNBA. We've watched part of one Indiana Fever game and admitted we were entertained. We'd watch another Indiana Fever game. But we remain in awe of the league's inability to get out of its own way. Two NBA vets are declaring for the WNBA draft. Good. More will follow, this blog predicts. The league is convening a meeting to determine what a woman is, we guess.

WNBA, you deserve this.

The racists and heterophobes in the WNBA resent Caitlin Clark because she's the most popular player in the league despite never winning a championship and, you know, being white and straight. Listen, butch, we got news for you. In the late 80s Michael Jordan was the most popular player in the NBA despite not having won a championship. In the early 2000s the NBA's most popular player was Alan Iverson despite same. Don Mattingly holds a mythic place in the hearts of Yankees fans despite...readers will get the point.

Imagine the late David Stern needing to hold a meeting to determine what a woman is or letting butch brutalize Caitlin Clark. Reminder, Stern dragged the NBA out of its moribund 70s and made Bird vs Magic the best sports rivalry of the decade. Mister we could use a man like David Stern again. We can't decide whether to end this post with 'Feminism is always bad for women' or 'WNB dalenda est'.

Monday: the Second Week

A fine morning here in the Berkshires where we begin our second week at the Stroock Northern Strategic Direction. We're not sure when we're returning to the New Jersey hinterland. Wednesday? Saturday?

The reinforcements have withdrawn. We've made a tentative agreement to gather once again here in mid-October and clean out the garage. We will also sit in session and make some decisions.

This being the Berkshires we've only heard back from 33 percent of the contractors we've contacted about doing some work on the house. A few plumbing matters need attention. Trees must needs be felled. We ourselves have done a fair amount of work around the yard and house, but only a fair amount.

The air is cool and still. So is the lake. The Israelis down the lake are making quite a racket. Sup with that? So's a truck down the road which seems to be perpetually backing up.

We got out twice for some boating yesterday. You know, put a couple of torpedo tubes on her, a quad-50, a 20mm, and you'd really have something there.

Glenn Reynolds marks the 25th (25th!) anniversary of Instapundit. From time to time herr professor has linked to our books, causing an 'instalanch", that is, a sales spike. Instapundit is still part of our daily read, and will be so long as the blog exists.

At Spiked, Brandon O'Neill says, 'There’s nothing the digital left loves more than an untimely death.' He goes on to list the left's depraved joy in the death and murder of various people with whom the left disagrees. We've seen it first hand from people we know. From people we like. We will probably see some prominent Dem deaths in the coming months. Hold your tongue, fellow MAGA hats. 'They do it to us' is no excuse. They are not our teachers.*

What Will's Watching: PBS's Billy Joel 100th concert at MSG. This blog is a huge fan of Billy Joel, of course. The man's music has been with us our entire life. We've seen him in concert a few times ourselves. We often complain about aging (and aged) rockers who can't do it anymore. But aside from missing a few high notes he wrote while in his 20's, Billy Joel can still do it. In fact, he brings it. We were thoroughly entertained. Fun aside, the girls learned about telethons, this being a PBS broadcast, 'And viewers like you.'

We've checked and it seems we've never had a Billy Joel Week here at Stroock's Books. We did write this. Also this Monday (not) Metal. We should have a Billy Joel Week. Alas, this week is not that week.

*Reference. Verbatim from Lion of the Desert. Had we knot sited, would that have been plagiarism? We don't think so.

Will's Good Idea for the Week if 8/10/26

Another glorious Berkshire morning to Stroock's Books reader(s) out there from Cambridge Bay to Tierra del Fuego [Wow-Ed]. We know, right?

We got out on the boat for some swimming and sun time. The skies finally opened up last night. 

The Stroock family + reinforcements and one very special guest ordered Chinese. Later the girls and their cousin + very special guest went for ice cream. 

So we've been reading about World War II in the Med, thank you Brian E Walter, and we had a thought about the Chinese navy vis a vis the USN. In WWII the Italian navy had plenty of good, well designed ships and seagoing know-how. But they lacked the Brit's 300 + years of operational history and doctrine. China is in a similar position, no? There is no substitute for the USN's 80 + years of operational history and domination of the Pacific. 

Oh, and Happy Nagasaki Day. They started. We finished it. 

Will's Good Idea for the week of 8/9/26.

New indy projects? Who can say. We can't. that is, we can't say what we'd want to write. A one off novel. More character driven. We have three start dates. 1 January, 21 June, 21 September 2027.