Short History of Tractors in the Ukraine by Marina Lewycka

This will be a reviewette. A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian was fun. It was amusing. Occasionally I think about the characters. The story revolves around a daughter and her old widowed dad and her dad's gold-digging not-quite-mail-order but nearly so new wife.

Dad is also writing a short history about Ukrainian tractors and large portions of the manuscript are included. I suspect that the tractor story and the (not)love story share deep thematic connections, but I was too beleaguered to catch it. There must be some deep something-er-other that I missed, as the book has been translated into a zillion languages and won big prizes, and I would count it as beach reading. So, surely, I have missed something.

How about if you give it a go, and fill me in?

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Friday Poetry is here!

This week, Friday Poetry is hosted right here.

Because I have small children that require food and cuddles and attention every 2.5 minutes, the round-up will happen in fits and spurts throughout the weekend. Probably I'll have it done just in time for y'all to lose interest and move on to other things.

Sharing originals:
Lisa Chellman has contributed an original poem, "_dent_ty Theft"
Laura Shovan shares original poems by both of her kids. One is a personification poem inspired by Calef Brown's "The Runaway Waffle." The other is a metaphor poem, "My Family is a Snare Drum."
Wild Rose Reader (Original Winter Poems)
Jill Corcoran (Original Poem)
Schelle shares an original poem inspired by Monday's Poetry Stretch: Dragonfly.
David E at fomagrams has surprised himself that he is writing poems instead of showcasing others; he is sharing one with us that captures a moment from the inauguration.

Speciality poems:
Susan Writes (poetry from incarcerated teens)
Laura Salas (15 Words or Less

Silly poems
Jama is in today with "This Little Piggy Went to Market" which she paired with roast beef sandwiches for lunch :)!
Janet (C is for Cookie)
Nandini (The Walrus and the Carpenter)

Seasonal poems:
Wild Rose Reader (Original Winter Poems)
Becky at Farm School (Phyllis McGinley on January)
Tiel Aisha Ansari (Winter Geese)
Shelf Elf (A Dust of Snow)
Fiddle posted, in honor of a son's birthday and at his request, Snow in the Suburbs by Thomas Hardy.

Furry Poems
Mary Lee asks us if we too harbor a secret Dog Wish.

Billy Collins
Kurious Kitty talks about Billy Collins\' Ballistics
Yat-Yee (Billy Collins)

Elizabeth Alexander
Julie Larios has a poem by Katha Pollitt over at The Drift Record, plus a few thoughts about Elizabeth Alexander's "Praise Song for the Day."
MotherReader (video of Elizabeth Alexander with Stephen Colbert)

About writing
Carol Wilcox's poem this week is in honor of two YA librarians from Greenwich, CT.
Jenny ( a first time participant) shares a poem about Re-Reading Frost

Not poetry - but about poetry
Just One More Book! Children's Book Podcast (Falling For Rapunzel)

Not yet sorted
John Mutford shares a Langston Hughes.
Jennifer Knoblock at Ink for Lit shares the poetry behind a couple of favorite hymns.


Stacey (I left my head)
Sara Lewis Holmes (Tales From Outer Suburbia)
Tricia (The Seedling by Paul Laurence Dunbar)
Katie
cloudscome (e.e. cummings)
Laura Salas (Bling, by The Killers)
Linda
Stenhouse Publishers (Flight to Limbo)
Sylvia (Remembering friends)
Kelly Polark
Mike Thomson (Suheir Hammad)
Chicken Spaghetti (Phyllis McGinley)
Tracie Zimmer
susan
Blue Rose Girls (Children of Our Era by Wislawa Szymborska)
info@thewritesisters.com
Karen Edmisten shares some Updike, who passed away earlier this week.
Little Willow
msmac
Angela Redden
Liz in Ink -- Patchen
Mary Ann Scheuer
Kelly Fineman (epigrams)
Jennie (The Red Wheelbarrow)
Sweetness and Light (Poe and Burns)
Miss Erin (hope)
Barbara of the Write Sisters shares a poem of Harold Pinter
douglas florian
Christy Lenzi
Sarah (thereadingzone)
Tabatha (the Paradelle)




Here is the coding if you want to include a button with a link to this week's round-up on your post.

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edited to add that I may just get real sick and never actually finish formating this and that I bet no one notices or cares. Am I wrong about this?

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need ideas

Okay wise and knowledgable readers. I need freezer dinner ideas that work for this:

No chocolate, nuts and shellfish . . . and please go easy on the
dairy, soy, wheat.

And of course the minute I read that, all I can think of is crab-stuffed flour burritos in cheese sauce with breadcrumbs and nut topping. With Chocolate Soy milk pudding for dessert.

Help!!

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works for me: iTouch task organizer: Omnifocus

I can't even begin to tell you how much I like my iTouch task organizer, Omnifocus. I enter my tasks, and tag them according to Which Project they are part of (home life, school GOP, help others, kid stuff, etc.); Where they get done (yard, computer, town, campus, etc.); When they are due and any other notes.

Then, I can pull up all the things I need to do soon.

or

all the things I need to do at here, there, or anywhere.

or

all the things I need to do for Project XYZ.

The location part is particularly nifty, as I can set the locations of different errands with GPS and then Omnifocus will list all the things I need to do while I am in that part of town. No more getting home and remembering that I forgot to drop off the library books or pick up the Rx.

Boy-oh-boy does this work for me.

My other Works for Me posts.

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sorrow

Please pray for the Vekveds, for the grandparents who our neighbors and for the parents with whom we used to be in a Bible Study. My heart is breaking for them: 7-year-old girl dies after accident on Hannegan Road.

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if only I could sew

I am mostly a very capable and confident woman. But sewing brings me to tears. I quiver just thinking about it.

One nice thing about arthritis -- and it is the only nice thing -- is that it completely lets me off the hook about conquering this fear. It's official. I don't sew. I won't sew.

But if I could, I'd sew these.

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iFlipr and Prima Latina Flashcards

If you are using the Prima Latina curriculum for your kids' home-schooling, and if you have an iTouch or an iPhone, you can get the iFlipr application for about $5 and use our Prima Latina flashcards. No more paper cards to make and carry around.

Of course you an use this flashcard application for iPhone or iTouch for anything you want to learn, as you get to enter the data yourself, or use someone else's cards. If you want to use our flashcards, here is the link to Prima Latina flashcards Chapters 1-3 with more chapters to follow.

Anytime we have downtime and I have my iTouch, (which is ALWAYS because I LOVE IT and it is SHINY and NIFTY and I LOVE IT -- oh, sorry), anyway, when I am not flipping out, we can do our Latin flashcards.

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timid and mild

Okay, help me understand our daughter.

On the one hand, she appears to have very little self-confidence in that if she doesn't know how to do something, she will just freeze until someone bigger than she comes and tells her. Her 'try' muscles are virtually non-existent. (This is particularly hard for me as I don't understand and generally dislike a 'quitting' attitude.) She displays -- in most areas -- a desire to be led, to follow someone else and to please them.

Yet, on the other hand, she has no qualms about contradicting someone in authority. If she thinks blah-blah and I think bluh-bluh, she doesn't -- even for a second -- consider that she may be wrong. She just flat-out boldly contradicts me.

Her cheekiness is appalling, and this in spite of fact that it is on our "hit list". With Dandy we are working on integrity issues; with her it is respect issues.

Anyway, it seems odd to me, that she is so meek about things that she really is capable of, and so impertinent about things that she really ought to be silent on.

Any clues?

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older child adoption issues: lying

As you know, Dandy has a very weak grasp on the principles of honesty and trust and integrity. And yes, we do know that he lived in survival-mode for most of his life and came by these issues honestly (so-to-speak) and so forth. But we can hardly launch him into the world without trying to alter these habits.

Can you imagine? He is good-looking and charming and desperately needs intimate female affection and has nary a qualm about lying to get what he wants and is very impulsive and is always looking for the next new thing.

Right. So you just locked up your daughters (wise of you). We really really need to modify some of these factors. We've been working on the lying.

And this morning a teeny tiny step of progress was made.

Last weekend he told a whopper and we had a long long talk (after he spent the day forking my vegetable garden as discipline). I drew him a picture of our family, cozied up inside a circle of trust. When he lies, he breaks a gap into the circle and steps outside. HE STEPS OUTSIDE. That part is important, because -- regardless of how much we miss him -- he is outside the cozy circle by his actions. I can't un-do that.

In fact, pretending that everything is okay would be doing a great disservice, setting him up to expect that he can betray trust and life goes on unaltered.

I also told him that when we have to confront the lie, the door back into the circle closes a little more with each new lie. But that, if he confesses the truth before we inquire about it, he steps back in. The circle is still tattered, but at least he is on the inside of it.

(My hope and expectation is that he will be able to shorten the time-span between stepping out and stepping back in to where they happen in the same breath. I think this is more realistic than trying to eliminate the reflexive lies in the first place.)

. . . Mom, it's really bugging me that I lied to you yesterday . . .

Then he and I role-played many situations, some silly and some serious, in which a lie was told and confessed and things were okay. Sometimes he was the liar, sometimes I was. So he got a good dialogue memorized which he can use for the confession part, and a realistic idea of what might happen after a confession.

Yesterday I found a bag of unauthorized snacks open on the counter. Both kids denied it and I pretended to buy their (his) lie, hoping that he would use the opportunity.

YES!

This morning he came in and said, "Mom, it's really bugging me that I lied to you yesterday about the sunflower seeds."

It was bugging him. That sounds like a fledgling conscience, doesn't it? I am encouraged.

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kitty rain coat

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top 16 iTouch applications

Well, someone had to do it: try a bunch of iTouch apps and let you know about them. Here are the results of my in-depth and obsessive-compulsive dedicated research:

Fun

Pandora Radio: I can't describe it any better than this:

You pick a song, album or artist and Pandora immediately builds a whole "radio station" around it, endlessly streaming complete tunes from top artists. You can even tweak your station by giving songs a thumbs-up or thumbs-down. ~ Time

It is also available for your home computer. Who needs Sirius?

Koi Pond: just what it says, with the option to shake the iTouch and feed your Koi.

iChalky: a silly stick man that rattles around your screen

Literary

Shakespeare: all of the plays and quite a few sonnets and poems, for your reading pleasure. Because you never know when you might need a fix.



Stanza: And if the bard didn't do it for you, here you can read, oh, 100,000 other titles, for free. Who needs a Kindle?

Useful

Omnifocus: this is the organizer of my dreams. I enter my to do list by both project and location. For example, drop off files at college in north end of town. Omnifocus will sort my tasks by location, or project, or due date. Super easy to use and learn and I am really happy with it. Not free.

ShapeWriter Pro: type without lifting your finger. The program interprets your tracings into words and is remarkably accurate and easy to use. Free trial and/or 9.99 purchase. Huge WOW factor.


Shopper: easy-to use grocery list with categories and a 'note' feature to remind yourself to use that coupon you've been carrying around or to record prices.

Memory Stick: lets you use your iTouch as a wireless spare hard drive.

Practical

GoogleEarth: you need this on your home computer too. If you ignore the rest of this list, fine, but you need to go get GoogleEarth.

Simple GPS: attaches the current location of your iTouch to whatever app you are using: GoogleEarth, Twitter, whatever you wish.


If Found, please: displays your contact info and a plea for the return of your iTouch should someone find it.

myLite: turns your iTouch into a SOS flashlight, or just a regular flashlight.

WiFinder: finds WiFi and hooks you up.

Social

Tweetie: basically Twitter for the iTouch. Tweet and be tweeted.


Facebook: add Facebook on your iTouch.



These are all available through your iTunes App Store.

So, I ask you, what did I miss?


Was this post useful? If so, please Digg It!

iTouch
appstore
iPhone

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not much of a box to soap from

I follow the blog of one of my favorite former students who is both thoughtful and articulate. He arrived to me in already gifted -- I'm not trying to take credit for him, that goes to his parents. Anyway, Kyle said this today, as part of a longer post on Gaza.

But I'm an outsider, so it's easy for me to take a side and criticize. Until I personally engage in that situation, I don't have much of a box to soap from. What's left then, but to mourn?

If you get discouraged about the future of our country, drop by Form & Function and take hope.

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How cute is this?

Old pic, but worth sharing again.

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first day in the garden

Ouch!

We have 9 6x6 foot garden beds. Today we forked-and-turned 3 of them, spread dead leaves on top, and re-covered them with old rugs, newspapers, tarp, what have you. One bed of clumpy muddy soil we dressed with fresh goat poop and hay, a tray of worms from my highly productive worm farm, and a tarp. One bed, also full of clumpy muddy soil, we filled with sticks and branches from last year's prunings for a bonfire (another day). That leaves us 3 more beds to fork and cover tomorrow.

My goal is to have each bed augmented and fluffed and protected from pounding rain and opportunistic weeds, so that when it is time to pop seeds in, all I have to do is that, pop seeds in.

Last year, we hand-shoveled these beds up from old meadow and tilled and raked and worked ourselves silly. Not this year.

How is your garden?

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iTouch & mobileme

For months now, I've been walking around saying that I need an external hard drive as my internal one, the one Gad gave me that I used to consider to be a well-functioning brain, is not so reliable anymore.

Well I went and got one, an iTouch. I can type my ToDo lists into it, and my calendar, and we can play music on it, and (if I am near Wireless) it works as a little computer, so I can check on my class and on my email accounts; all 17 of them. Okay not really that many. Just

1. The msn one that my honey and I share and that most of my friends use and that I get all my adoption list-serves on.
2. My official college one that I get official school email on.
3. My Gmail college one that I get student email on.
4. My Gmail GOP one that I get, well, duh, GOP email on.
5. A handful of other Gmail accounts.

Okay, it isn't 17, but it was still too many to check. But no more! I used the Gmail settings to have Gmail go get all my email from all the different places, tag it, and gather it into one place on Gmail. That is my main place from which I read and answer email, even though you may send it to -- or my return address may show from -- some other email address.

But it gets better (or more boring) depending on your perspective. Because I DO NOT want to be opening Gmail on my iTouch -- too much to download -- I then forward my entire Gmail box to Mobile Me. I can read it and delete it on MobileMe (keeping that inbox lean) and everything is stored on Gmail for future reference. SWEET!

MobileMe gets better. It keeps my calendar, contact list, and emails synchronized between my laptop and my iTouch. So if I add an event in one, it automatically updates in the other.

One small part of my life is feeling orderly.

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cleaning dog barf - guest post

My friend Kim at Hiraeth sent me this email. We actually specialize in pee and mice around here, but Kim said I could share it with you in case you need it:

I think it was you who asked a while back about cleaning a mattress or couch after someone threw up. (I hope I remember this right or you're going to think I'm nuts!!!)

Anyway, Ivy threw up all over our bed this morning after she had emptied her water bowl and eaten her chow. YUCK. It was a big, wet mess-soaked the mattress. This is what I did; after I stripped the bedding, I washed the surface of the mattress with warm, soapy water and then got up as much of the moisture as I could with towels. Then did it again. After that, I sprinkled on a fair amount of 100 Mule Team Borax (my laundry booster of choice) and rubbed it in.

I left it there all morning and half the afternoon. When it came time to put the clean sheets and blankets back on the bed, I vacuumed up the borax and it was amazing. No spot. No smell. And it was dry. This wasn't the first time Ivy yacked on our bed and the other time left a stain, so I tried getting the stain damp, applied the borax, waited about an hour and vacuumed. Stain is gone and the spot is clean and dry.

Ta da!

I love it when stuff works.

Heheheh.

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twit this

Do you twitter? Do you read blogs?

If the blog you are reading has a TWIT installed, you can tweet your blog recommendations straight out to to twitter.

(My Dad is thinking that I am babbling by now.)

Try it. Click on the Twit This birdie down below and then all your tweetie friends will read this post and install twits on their blogs and so on . . .

and so on . . .

and so on . .

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ouchy eye drops

We had to do the ouchy eye drops at yesterday's eye doc visit. I basically have to sit on her and wrap her arms in a straight-jacket style while the nurse drops the nasty stuff in. She opens her mouth to get a lungful for the scream, and Dandy pops into it a chewy caramel chocolate. Dandy and I get chocolate too, for enduring the trauma of seeing her so distressed.

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NJ Kids With Nazi-inspired Names Removed From Home

Three New Jersey siblings whose names have Nazi connotations have been placed in state custody, police said.

If the weird names are the only reason the kids have been taken by the state then this is outrageous.

Yes, the names are weird.
Yes, the parents are idiots.

and

Yes, they have a constitutional right to be weird and idiotic.

I don't like what they have done.

But I'll defend their right to do it.

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the back story

To All My Valued Employees,

There have been some rumblings around the office about the future of this company, and more specifically, your job.

As you know, the economy has changed for the worse and presents many challenges. However, the good news is this: The economy doesn't pose a threat to your job. What does threaten your job however, is the changing political landscape in this country.

However, let me tell you some little tidbits of fact which might help you decide what is in your best interests.

First, while it is easy to spew rhetoric that casts employers against employees, you have to understand that for every business owner there is a Back Story. This back story is often neglected and overshadowed by what you see and hear. Sure, you see me park my Mercedes outside. You've seen my big home at last year's Christmas party. I'm sure; all these flashy icons of luxury conjure up some idealized thoughts about my life.

However, what you don't see is the BACK STORY:

I started this company 28 years ago. At that time, I lived in a 300 square foot studio apartment for 3 years. My entire living apartment was converted into an office so I could put forth 100% effort into building a company, which by the way, would eventually employ you.

My diet consisted of Ramen Pride noodles because every dollar I spent went back into this company. I drove a rusty Toyota Corolla with a defective transmission. I didn't have time to date. Often times, I stayed home on weekends, while my friends went out drinking and partying. In fact, I was married to my business -- hard work, discipline, and sacrifice.

Meanwhile, my friends got jobs. They worked 40 hours a week and made a modest $50K a year and spent every dime they earned. They drove flashy cars and lived in expensive homes and wore fancy designer clothes. Instead of hitting the Nordstrom's for the latest hot fashion item, I was trolling through the discount store extracting any clothing item that didn't look like it was birthed in the 70's. My friends refinanced their mortgages and lived a life of luxury. I, however, did not. I put my time, my money, and my life into a business with a vision that eventually, some day, I too, will be able to afford these luxuries my friends supposedly had.

So, while you physically arrive at the office at 9am, mentally check in at about noon, and then leave at 5pm, I don't. There is no "off" button for me. When you leave the office, you are done and you have a weekend all to yourself. I unfortunately do not have the freedom. I eat, and breathe this company every minute of the day. There is no rest. There is no weekend. There is no happy hour. Every day this business is attached to my hip like a 1 year old special-needs child. You, of course, only see the fruits of that garden -- the nice house, the Mercedes, the vacations... you never realize the Back Story and the sacrifices I've made.

Now, the economy is falling apart and I, the guy that made all the right decisions and saved his money, have to bail-out all the people who didn't. The people that overspent their paychecks suddenly feel entitled to the same luxuries that I earned and sacrificed a decade of my life for.

Yes, business ownership has is benefits but the price I've paid is steep and not without wounds.

Unfortunately, the cost of running this business, and employing you, is starting to eclipse the threshold of marginal benefit and let me tell you why:
I am being taxed to death and the government thinks I don't pay enough. I have state taxes. Federal taxes. Property taxes. Sales and use taxes. Payroll taxes. Workers compensation taxes. Unemployment taxes. Taxes on taxes. I have to hire a tax man to manage all these taxes and then guess what? I have to pay taxes for employing him. Government mandates and regulations and all the accounting that goes with it, now occupy most of my time. On Oct 15th, I wrote a check to the US Treasury for $288,000 for quarterly taxes. You know what my "stimulus" check was? Zero... Nada... Zilch.

The question I have is this: Who is stimulating the economy? Me, the guy who has provided 14 people good paying jobs and serves over 2,200,000 people per year with a flourishing business? Or, the single mother sitting at home pregnant with her fourth child waiting for her next welfare check? Obviously, government feels the latter is the economic stimulus of this country.

The fact is, if I deducted (Read: Stole) 50% of your paycheck you'd quit and you wouldn't work here. I mean, why should you? That's nuts. Who wants to get rewarded only 50% of their hard work? Well, I agree which is why your job is in jeopardy.

Here is what many of you don't understand... to stimulate the economy you need to stimulate what runs the economy. Had suddenly government mandated to me that I didn't need to pay taxes, guess what? Instead of depositing that $288,000 into the Washington black-hole, I would have spent it, hired more employees, and generated substantial economic growth. My employees would have enjoyed the wealth of that tax cut in the form of promotions and better salaries. But you can forget it now.

When you have a comatose man on the verge of death, you don't defibrillate and shock his thumb thinking that will bring him back to life, do you? You defibrillate his heart! Business is at the heart of America and always has been. To restart it, you must stimulate it, not kill it. Suddenly, the power brokers in Washington believe the poor of America are the essential drivers of the American economic engine. Nothing could be further from the truth and this is the type of change you can keep.

So where am I going with all this?

It's quite simple.

If any new taxes are levied on me, or my company, my reaction will be swift and simple. I'll fire you. I'll fire your co-workers. You can then plead with the government to pay for your mortgage, your SUV, and your child's future. Frankly, it isn't my problem any more.

Then, I will close this company down, move to another country, and retire. You see, I'm done. I'm done with a country that penalizes the productive and gives to the unproductive. My motivation to work and to provide jobs will be destroyed, and with it, will be my citizenship.

So, if you lose your job, it won't be at the hands of the economy; it will be at the hands of a political hurricane that swept through this country, steamrolled the constitution, and will have changed its landscape forever. If that happens, you can find me sitting on a beach, retired, and with no employees to worry about...

Signed,

The Boss

I'm still trying to find who authored this, so I can attribute it,
but I've had no luck thus far. Do you know?

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happy things

We're having a great week:

1. I'm planning my fall vacation with my best girl-friend.
2. I opened my Winter contract and found out that I got a raise! More than enough to cover my much-coveted iTouch -- which I probably won't go buy, but I could if I wanted to.
3. Thanks to Uncle Greg, we have found a Shop class for Dandy. A nice old duffer will be teaching Dandy wood-crafting skills on Friday afternoons.
4. I got a Golden Comment on a post. Honestly, I take a lot of flak for being a tough teacher; encouragement like this just puts me on cloud 9.
5. We are refinancing at 4.125%. This reduces both our monthly payment and the length of our loan. Gotta love that.
   

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a day late

Apparently yesterday was National De-Lurking Day and I MISSED IT! It was my big chance to find out who y'all are (especially the mysterious South Dakota reader) and I forgot all about it.

Maybe

just maybe

if you are feeling really nice

and want to make me all happy and glowy inside

you'll de-lurk today.

Just tell me who and where you are and why you read.

Or tell me about your favorite pet.

Or anything at all.

Pretty please?

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Baked Cream Cheese Cake Topping

Spread this onto any spice cake. Trader Joe's Gingerbread cake works especially well with this.

Baked Cream Cheese Cake Topping
Microwave till soft:
1 package Cream Cheese

Add:
1/4 C sugar
1 egg
dash of nutmeg if you wish

Spread over sheet cake.

Combine:
1 Tb sugar
1/8 t nutmeg or whatever spice you used earlier

Sprinkle over cream cheese and swirl with fork. This is just for pretty.

Bake as usual.

Since it has eggs and cheese in it, I count the cake as breakfast food.

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What have I done?

I got this from my cousin Sandy's blog. Stuff I have done is in bold. Stuff in normal font I haven't done. Stuff in italics I don't want to do or am unlikely to do.


1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you can afford to charity
7. Been to Disneyland/world
8. Climbed a mountain
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm - same cousin arranged for the BEST STORM EVER during a family reunion in Nebraska. Thanks again Sandy.
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child - two actually
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18. Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train - in Italy, with my mom.
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitch hiked - through northern France, by myself.
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping - it was really really dark and I ran very very quickly. I promise.
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied - what has money to do with satisfaction?
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
41. Sung karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt - as a little girl, thanks to my Aunt Carol and Uncle Denny
43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant - does a bag of McDonald's count?
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris - why is Paris on here 3 times?
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud - gardeners play in the mud every spring
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Had surgery
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Gotten flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten Caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had your picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee

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Pop Quiz

Okay, all you bookish sorts. Big Prize (free book from my Book Mooch listing) to whomever can answer this question.

Why, after the titles of some books at Amazon, are the letters (P.S.) included? Here are some examples:

• One Hundred Years of Solitude (P.S.)
• Daughter of Fortune: A Novel (P.S.)
• The Complete Stories (P.S.)
• Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life (P.S.)
  

These are all trade paperbacks, the larger size often with the textured cover, but I can't find any confirmation of this, nor explanation. Any clues?

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Run by Ann Patchett

I received a nice hard-cover copy (with a red marker ribbon even!) of Run: A Novel as a Christmas gift. It's so nice to get books during the cold dark time of the year. I curled up with it on one of our (many) snowy, blowy, rainy, floody days and read it straight through.

It's the story of a widowed man and his 3 children as they work through some relationship snags. One child is home-grown, the other 2 are adopted and are of an other race. Through some odd circumstances, they are thrown together with the biological mother and her daughter and they work through their new contacts with varying degrees of poise and grace.

It was interesting and well-told. Have you read her other book? Bel Canto? I had similar impressions of this one as I did the other -- that her character-development skills and the grace of her word-crafting exceed her plot. That is, I got to know all her people really really well -- they are real to me -- but the story didn't need to be told. I wish I could merge her talents with Douglas Jacobson who wrote a fascinating story with flat characters: Night of Flames.

Is it just me that feels this way about Ann Patchett? What do you think?

And again, if you know me in RL and want to borrow this before I list it on BookMooch, let me know.

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Friday Poetry Where Children Live by Naomi Shihab Nye

I am teaching World Literature this quarter for Washington State Community Colleges. I've not taught this before and am having a lovely time reading the anthology and selecting the readings for the quarter. Here is one of my recent finds, which appeals to me both as teacher and mother.

Where Children Live

Homes where children live exude a pleasant rumpledness,
like a bed made by a child, or a yard littered with balloons.
To be a child again one would need to shed details
till the heart found itself dressed in the coat with a hood.
Now the heart has taken on gloves and mufflers,
the heart never goes outside to find something to do.
And the house takes on a new face, dignified.
No lost shoes blooming under bushes.
No chipped trucks in the drive.
Grown-ups like swings, leafy plants, slow-motion back and forth.
While the yard of a child is strewn with the corpses
of bottle-rockets and whistles,
anything whizzing and spectacular, brilliantly short-lived.
Trees in children's yards speak in clearer tongues.
Ants have more hope. Squirrels dance as well as hide.
The fence has a reason to be there, so children can go in and out.
Even when the children are at school, the yards glow
with the leftovers of their affection,
the roots of the tiniest grasses curl toward one another
like secret smiles.

~ Naomi Shihab Nye

Here is the coding if you want a button with a link to this week's round-up. <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://6traits.wordpress.com/2009/01/09/poetry-friday-red-sled/"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://lh5.google.com/image/chndlrsblog/RmBFj-SN_DI/AAAAAAAAB34/at3HZsHcKd0/poetry%20friday%20button%20-%20fulll.JPG" alt="" border="0" /></a> :: this post is part of the Friday Poetry roundup hosted by Picture Book of the Day.

Yours in pleasant rumpledness (wouldn't that be a great blog name?),

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Yesterdays flood pics? Piddling compared to today's Whatcom County flood pictues

And I thought yesterday's pics were dire.

• Aerial pics of Whatcom County
• Ground pics of Whatcom County

Kind of makes me nostalgic for the snow.

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How Wet Is It?

Somehow, after a look at these pics from my county, my little soggy basement doesn't seem so bad.

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overheard

From upstairs:

Chickadee: G'night, I love you.
Dandy: I love you too.

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Magical Thinking: True Stories by Augusten Burroughs

This was an awkward read for me. Augusten's life is so different from mine and his meanness disturbed me. I didn't like it in the same way that I didn't like Wally Lamb's She's Come Undone, which is probably my most-hated book ever.

The difference is that Wally Lamb's books was fiction, and Augusten Burroughs' book is not. So, whether I like it or not, Burroughs lives his life and has the courage to put it into print, and I have to grant some credit for that.

Yes, Magical Thinking: True Stories is funny. Yes, it was intriguing. I felt a bit like a tourist reading it. Much in the same way that I was an embarrassed sojourner whilst reading certain parts of Jeffrey Eugenides Middlesex or whist walking around Amsterdam's sadly fascinating red-light district. Augusten's life is sordid and mean and he doesn't seem to notice or mind. I felt sad after reading his book.

One of my Christmas gifts was Oliver Van DeMille's A Thomas Jefferson Education: Teaching a Generation of Leaders for the Twenty-first Century, which came highly recommended from my cousin (who is a published poet you know). I will review the whole book later, but for know I want to share with you the four classifications of stories: bent, broken, whole, and healing.

A. Bent stories portray evil as good and good as evil. Such stories are meant to enhance the evil tendencies of the reader, such as pornography and many horror books and movies. The best decision regarding Bent stories is to avoid them like the plague.

B. Broken stories portray accurately evil as evil and good as good, but evil wins. Something is broken, not right, in need of fixing. Such books are not uplifting (in the common sense of the word), but can be transformation in a positive way. Broken stories can be very good for the reader if they motivate him or her to heal them, to fix them. The Communist Manifesto is a broken classic; so are and The Lord of the Flies and 1984, In each of these, evil wins; but they have been very motivating to me because I have felt a real need to help reverse their impact in the real world.

C. Whole stories are where good is good and good wins. Most of the classics are in this category, and readers should spend most of their time in such works.

D. Healing stories can be either Whole or Broken stories where the reader is profoundly moved, changed, or significantly improved by her reading experience.

Magical Thinking: True Stories? Broken.

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The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus

Oh yes, this was unmitigated fluff, though I did enjoy it.

The Nanny Diaries describes the experience of a nanny working for an family in New York. My question is, are there really people who live such materially-rich and relationally-shallow lifestyles? They probably feel sorry for me in my rural domestic life, and I feel sorry for them in their friendless marriages.

I would count this as beach reading, and as such, it is a good one. Entertaining and not sullied by gratuitous sex. If you know me in RL and want to borrow it, let me know, otherwise I'll be listing it on BookMooch.

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the great purging

We are purging. Thus far we have purged the playroom and my office, yielding one big box to give to charity (from the playroom) and a yard & leaf bag full of trash (from the office).

Dandy and I cleaned out 2 of my 3 desks (when I get overwhelmed I just set up a new desk and close up the old one). I now have a "classes I am teaching/my personal writing" desk, and a "pay bills and keep the kids' records" desk, and an empty project table.

I have only just begun the great purging. I refuse to spend my year wrestling with stuff.

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The Collector by Luci Shaw

Another beautiful Luci Shaw poem.

The Collector

In our house, the first of January
heralds a resolute simplicity. No,
not just the clean calendar on the
kitchen door, nor the new date
on letters; not even the bundling out
of the dry tree with its trail
of needles to the back porch,
but a return to routine. Clearing
the Christmas clutter
signals renewal, a re-ordering;
it is a woman taking off jewelry
before scrubbing the kitchen floor.

And so I lift away the mantel’s
necklace, a cedar swag pointed with
blue berries and white lights.
Down comes the rosy ribbon from
the decoy duck’s neck, the holly sprig
from the antique scale (my husband
was weighed on it when he was born),
the scarlet candles, riskily lop-
sided from all December’s burnings.

For myself, and for this shelf
across the fire-place brick,
I plan a chasteness free of dust
and trivia–a candle-stick or two,
a copper bowl, paired pottery crocks
to anchor arcs of bittersweet.
But with a barely noticed stealth
the wooden width accumulates
its own decor: a spendthrift of screws,
shipping labels, old lists,
a brass bell turned silent–its
clapper tongue plucked out by
the root; a pulled wishbone,
a curious knot of wood, an envelope
scribbled with verse, and in april,
part of a robin’s egg chipped
from the sky. Disorder spreads
so surely along the mantlepiece,
that by early June I feel as though
the only things I’ve failed
to keep there are
my New Year’s resolutions.

~Luci Shaw, from WinterSong: Christmas Readings by Madeline L’Engle and Luci Shaw

Here is the coding if you want a button with a link to this week's round-up.

<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://readingyear.blogspot.com/2009/01/poetry-friday-roundup-is-here.html"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://lh5.google.com/image/chndlrsblog/RmBFj-SN_DI/AAAAAAAAB34/at3HZsHcKd0/poetry%20friday%20button%20-%20fulll.JPG" alt="" border="0" /></a>


:: this post is part of the Friday Poetry roundup hosted by A Year of Reading.

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Carmelized Butternut Squash

We have spent the day with My Gift's parents, eating yummy food that I did not prepare, which is always my favorite sort.

This recipe is from The Barefoot Contessa cookbook:

Carmelized Butternut Squash

Heat oven to 400.

Trim off the ends and cut into 1 1/2 inch cubes:
2 butternut squash

Melt together:
6 Tb unsalted butter
1/4 C light brown sugar
1 1/2 t kosher salt
1/2 t freshly ground black pepper

Combine with squash cubes and spread onto baking sheet.

40 to 55 minutes.

Very yummmy. Did I mention that I ate too much? I probably will never need to eat again.

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