A raw, cold day!  Brrrrr. But now I'm sitting by the fire, warming myself with the happiness that comes with sharing these links with you.  

Practicing gratitude is an important skill, and good for everyone:

Has the body of Michel de Montaigne, famous sixteenth century French essayist, been found?  It would be a big deal for admirers of his work, full-on fans and simple respecters, among whom I count myself.

A piece by Jamelle Bouie on the new TV version? adaptation? extension? of the graphic novel Watchmen, which first appeared in the year I was a senior in high school and affected me a great deal. Bouie points out the real question: what kind of a society requires its heroes to be masked?

A link, posted on Thanksgiving, that offers nine charts explaining how the world is getting better--literacy, education, poverty, life-span, on all sorts of metrics, humans are living better lives.

I had no idea that our word "Jerkey" (as in beef jerkey) is derived from the Incas--it's originally, scholars think, in the Quechuan language, "Ch’arki".  Pretty fascinating.

Night night!