Michael Shay's Hummingbirdminds

Part 2 of Word Back: America I explore word choice in "Make America Great Again." What was America like in my youth? Was it all fu...

I began to write this Word Back column as Memorial Day weekend began. I was making fun of what America has become in 2025 but forgot about w...

"Have you ever heard of a thing called fluoridation, fluoridation of water? Do you realize that fluoridation is the most monstrously co...

I awoke thinking of Walker Percy's "Love in the Ruins or The Adventures of a Bad Catholic at a Time Near the End of the World....

Baltimore's H.L. Mencken may have been the most quotable of newspaper reporters. Some comments are crass and insensitive. Others dug dee...

Blame my errant imagination. As I read "Glorious Exploits," a new novel by Irish writer Ferdia Lennon, I kept hearing Roddy Doyle....

Not enough people have seen "Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb." It's satire, sure, with a ...

I don't have a hangover, that's the main thing. Many prior St. Patrick's Day holidays involved drinking and then hangovers. Some...

Satirist P.J. O'Rourke passed away this week. His humor writing, especially during the National Lampoon era, influenced my writing. Nat...

All this book-banning makes me think of all of those books I read that might meet disapproval now from the GOP Know Nothings.  When I was in...

A new year brings new challenges, such as how are we going to save our republic from the Trump Cult and The Big Lie? Voting is a good start....

I received a head's up notice from friend and traveling writer/performer Ken Waldman. He has a new Kickstarter project for his 20th boo...

As of 11:30 a.m. on Friday, Nov. 6, we don't yet know the result of the presidential election. We do, however, know the result of Ken Wa...

We live in absurd times. A Reality TV show star is president. He is a narcissist who is never wrong about anything but is wrong about everyt...

It's been more than a month since I posted here. I guess I could say that I'm in the midst of a dry spell. That wouldn't be accu...

"That's some catch, that Catch-22.  "It's the best there is." Those lines stuck in my head in 1969 and never left...

I read Adam Johnson's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about North Korea last spring. "The Orphan Master's Son" is a humorous...

According to our insurance agent, it would cost a lot to rebuild our house if it was destroyed by a tornado or other insurable natural disas...

I love good satire. Problem is, readers don't often get it. Good satire is usually presented as a straightforward news article or opinio...

It could have been Any Town, U.S.A., but it was Hanna, Wyo. A satirical post on National Report carried news that the Affordable Care Act...