BLOGGING: Advent Blog Tour Welcome

I am taking a different approach to my stop on the tour. I have included a cookie recipe below, but I love trivia and quizzes, so my present for you is a riddle:


What Christmas carol is this?


1. Move hither wards, the entire assembly of those who are steadfast O Come All Ye Faithful
2. Ecstasy towards the terrestrial sphere Joy to the World

3. Hush, the celestial messengers produce harmonious sounds. Hark the Herald Angel Sings
4. Creator, cool it, you kooky cats God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen

5. O tatterdemalion ebony atmosphere O Holy Night

6. The thing manifested itself at the onset of a transparent day It Came Upon a Midnight Clear

7. Embellish the interior passageways Deck the Halls

8. Tintinnabulation of vacillating pendulums in inverted metallic resonant cups. Silver Bells

9. Hey, minuscule urban area south of Jerusalem O Little Town of Bethlehem

10. Nocturnal time span of unbroken quietness Silent Night

11. This autocratic troika originates neat the ascent of Apollo We Three Kings of Orient Are

12. The primary carol The First Noel

13. Natal celebration devoid of color, rather albino, as in a hallucinating phenomenon for me I'm Dreaming of White Christmas

14. Valentino, the roseate proboscis wapiti Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer

15. Diminutive masculine master of skin-covered percussionistic cylinders Little Drummer Boy

16. O nativity conifer O Christmas Tree

17. What offspring abides thus? What Child is This?

18. Removed in a bovine feeding trough Away in a Manger

19. Proceed to declare something upon a specific geographic Alpine formation Go Tell it on the Mountain
20. Thoracic- Squirrel Diet Barbecue Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire

21. Obese personification fabricated of compressed mounds of minute crystals Frosty the Snowman


And if your vocabulary is great, or even if it's not, check out http://www.freerice.com/, to improve your vocabulary and donate rice to people who need it. It is weirdly addictive, and good for you and others. The rice is distributed by the United Nations World Food Program (WFP).

PS: If you highlight the space after the carol, you will find the answer, but don't peek until you know it. How many did you get right?



Christmas Cookies Too

I love to bake, and making cookies at Christmas is an important tradition to me. It's the only time I take the extra care, and add a trimming or decoration or take the time to posh them up. If I am feeling short on time, I make these shortbreads since they don't have to be rolled and cut. It's important to mix them as long as it says if you want them to melt in your mouth.

These cookies remind me of my maternal grandmother. We liked to bake together, and at one point, her son (my uncle) dated one of the authors of the cookbook. My grandmother always had many copies of these cookbooks around, and she baked from them a lot. So do I now, and it reminds me of those times.

Whipped Shortbreads from The Best of Bridge cookbooks

Ingredients:
1 cup butter (do not use margarine)
1/2 cup icing sugar (powdered sugar)
1 1/2 cups flour

Instructions: Cream butter and sugar. Add flour and beat for 10 minutes. Drop from small spoon onto cookie sheet. Decorate with maraschino cherry pieces if you wish or sprinkle with colored sugar. Bake at 350 F. for about 10-12 minutes, until bottoms are lightly browned. Makes about 3 dozen small cookies. This recipe doubles well.

Thanks for stopping by, and I wish you a Merry Christmas. I've been enjoying this Advent Tour and I'd like to thank Marg and Kaliana for organizing us. It's nice to share traditions and recipes and get to know this little community a bit better.


Here's the guide to the rest of the tour, and don't forget Chris (Stuff as Dreams are Made on), who is also hosting today.
10 December - Dewey (The Hidden Side of a Leaf)
11 December -Suey (It's All About Books)
12 December - Chris (Book-a-rama)
13 December - Jill (The Well-Read Child)/Stephanie (The Written Word)
14 December - Robin (A Fondness for Reading)
15 December - Alyssa (By The Book)
16 December - Rachel (A Fair Substitute for Heaven)
17 December - Literary Feline (Musings of a Bookish Kitty)/ Stephanie (Stephanie's Confessions of a Book-a-holic)
18 December - Dev (Good Reads)
19 December - Callista (S.M.S. Book Reviews)
20 December - Tiny Little Librarian (Tiny Little Librarian)
21 December - Carla (Carla Nayland Historical Fiction)/ Susan (Reading, Raving, and Ranting by a Historical Fiction Writer)
22 December - Carolyn Jean (The Trillionth Page)
23 December - Booklogged (A Reader's Journal)
24 December - Kailana (The Written World) / Carl V. (Stainless Steel Droppings)

MEME: Christmas Contest

I found this meme at Chris of book-a-rama fame. They want lots of participation, so complete the meme and link back to them following the link below. You could win something!

Book Binge Christmas Contest

The Christmas Season is upon us and we have one burning question: Have you been naughty or nice this year? Regardless of your answer, we are inviting our lovely readers a chance to win an eBookwise eReader! All you have to do is answer a few simple (okay, 10) questions on your blog/journal and leave the link to your Meme in this post. If you don't have a blog or journal, you can email us your answers. The winner will be chosen on January 5th, so you can enter up until 11:59pm on January 4th.

Merry Christmas!
XOXOCasee, Holly, Isabel & Rowena

Christmas Meme:

1. What is your favorite Christmas romance to re-read each year? Bridget Jones' Diary. It begins and ends at Christams time in the book, with Mark Darcy wearing the horrible reindeer jumper.

2. What is your favorite Christmas movie/show? It used to be A Christmas Story, but I have to replace it with Love, Actually now. Touching and funny and wonderful, with Colin Firth and Hugh Grant.

3. What is your favorite Christmas cookie? Frying Pan Cookies. Even more important, is my favorite Christmas candy: Peanut Butter Balls.

4. When do you start Christmas shopping? I'm an early starter, in October, but I never finish early. I'm still out the week before trying to finish up.

5. Do you re-gift? It may have happened before. But not to you.

6. What is your favorite Christmas song? Do They Know It's Christmas? by BandAid. What can I say? I'm a child of the 80s.

7. When do you get your Christmas tree? Just the week before, as it is a real tree.

8. Wrapping presents: Love it or hate it? I love buying all the pretty paper and bows, but the actual work is usually last minute and rushed, so, no fun.

9. Who is the hardest person to buy for? My husband. He never wants much, and if he wanted anything, he would just buy it for himself anyway. All he really wants is to golf more, and that is hard to wrap up under the tree.

10. Christmas tree: Real or artificial? It's always been real, but I am not opposed to artificial at all.

BOOK: The Cricket on the Hearth by Charles Dickens

The Cricket on the Hearth by Charles Dickens

Christmas Book Challenge, book #2

Fiction or non-fiction? Genre?
fiction, genre would be classic novel, and Christmas!

What led you to pick up this book?
I saw booklogged and 3M chose it for the Christmas Book Challenge and I know they pick great books. Also, a person should read Dickens at Chrismas, right?

Summarize the plot, but don't give away the ending!
John, the Carrier, brings home a stranger to his little cottage, of wife, Dot and Baby. The grumpy owner of a toy factory is planning to marry a pretty young thing.

What did you like most about the book?
Dickens is remarkably readable, and humorous. There was a lot of emotions, and interesting characters, including the secondary ones, and there was some supernatural/fairies and recognizing the values of home. (and it wasn't too long)

Have you read any other books by this author? What did you think of those books?
I read a short story by Dickens, and I really don't know if I've ever read A Christmas Carol, because it is so ubiquitous, but that story is also in my collection from the library, so I might get around to it as well. Dickens wrote some huge-ass books that scare me in their volume.

What did you think of the main character?
I liked John the Carrier. I guess he's the main character. He was an older man who married a young girl and he adored her. He may not have been educated, but he was a solid, good man who appreciated what he had in life, and faced everything with a very good nature.

Any other particularly interesting characters?
Tons. Dickens had the best imagination for names: Tilly Slowpoke, the nanny; Baby; the Cricket; Gruff and Tackleton, the toy owner; and the narrator! Who was that guy?

Share a quote from the book:
I never remember to write those down.

Share a favorite scene from the book.
The scene with John and Gruff and Tackleton after John had his eventful night with the Cricket. John makes all the right decisions, for all the right reasons, and it is why this book is so heartwarming and famous.

What about the ending?
Excellent. It's a Christmas book, and famous for being heartwarming, so it's all about the ending. Dicknes comes through, for sure.

Anything else?
Don't read wikipedia before you read this book, because I accidentally found out the plot and what happens before I read it. Don't do that. I still enjoyed it, because it was still enjoyable to read how Dickens would get us there, but I think I missed out a bit on the revelation.

MEME: Booking Through Thursday

This week’s question is suggested by Island Editions:
Do you have a favourite book, now out of print, that you would like to see become available again? (I have several…)

I don't know. I don't buy a lot of books; I've bought more in the past two years than I've most likely bought in my life. I've always been a library reader. And the library tends to have older editions of books, so I don't even know what books are out of print.

The only books I can think of would be the Bruno and Boots series, beginning with This Can't Be Happening at MacDonald Hall. But even those, I unpacked from the basement when my son was ready to read them. They are not readily available online as new books, but there are plenty at the library!

I have tried to buy some of the Noddy books by Enid Blyton a few years ago, and they are not easy to find, but they are also not politically correct, which is why they are not being reissued. We found a few when my son was little and the TV show was on CBC and PBS.

ETC: Snow Day!

Prince Edward Island is pretty much shut down today. Woo hoo!It's the best snow day of all, because it is not just the schools that are closed, but the government offices, even the liquor stores! I sent my daughter out with the camera, because she was playing outside and she loves to take pictures - she's 7. All pictures by Rachel.

So what will get accomplished on this free day? I have a whole list of things that I'd love to get done, but seeings how it is already 11 AM and I just got dressed, I may be a little too ambitious in my head.

• correct 64 sets of physics labs
• read Lolita - I have 100 80 pages left
• make some Christmas cookies or squares
• read the Christmas Advent Blog Tour
• make a real supper

I looks like a Mario Kart tournnament is beginning in the basement, so it is more peaceful here in the living room.

*must start correcting!*

.....but before I begin, I'll just read a few pages of my book, or maybe I'll start The Cricket on the Hearth for the Christmas Book Challenge - it is a free day after all, and we are not going anywhere.

Happy Snow Day Everyone!

SHORT STORY MONDAY: A Child's Christmas in Wales

A Child's Christmas in Wales by Dylan Thomas

More 'getting in the spirit' reading with this classic story. What an adorable book, so well written, and it is just like your own remembrances of Christmas' past, with different years blending into one, different stories, making you think - When did that happen? But it doesn't really matter, because it is the blending of all those events that combine to give you the warm fuzzies about Christmas, and that cause me to wonder how my own children's memories of Christmas will combine.

My edition was beautiful, with illustrations by Trina Schart Hyman that contributed to the over all feel of the book, although there was something about them which reminded me of The Great Brain books, but that didn't detract too much. Thomas describes the presents, both useful and useless; the music, and carolling; and the aunts and uncles. But he is a poet, so it isn't even what he says as how it says it. And this might just become a Christmas tradition for me.

CHALLEGE: Man Booker Challenge

Dewey must believe in that old adage 'good things occur in threes' because she is hosting three challenges for next year. Yes, I said three. I'm most interested in the Man Booker Challenge, but she is also hosting a Graphic Novels Challenge and The Printz Award Challenge, for young adult novels. The Printz one will stay on my radar because I signed up for Joy's Young Adult Challenge, so I'll have to look into that a bit more. The Man Booker Challenge is to read 6 books that were winners or short listed for the Man Booker Award.

I already planned to read the following Booker Winners for the Booker Challenge and Bookers are one of my categories for the 888 challenge:

• Amsterdam - McEwan
• The Remains of the Day - Ishiguru
• The Life and Times of Michael K - Coetzee
• Disgrace - Coetzee
• The True History of the Kelly Gang
• The English Patient
• Last Orders - Graham Swift
• The Gathering - Anne Enright
• Hotel du Lac - Anita Brookner

Maybe I'll just read 6 shortlisted books. Books from the short list that intrigue me include:

• The Night Watch - Sarah Waters (chunkster)
• Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell (1% well read)
• Oryx and Crake - Margaret Atwood (end of the world)
• Family Matters - Rohinton Mistry (1% well read)
• Atonement - Ian McEwan (book awards)
• In the Country of Men - Hisham Matar (notable)
• Mister Pip - Lloyd Jones (Orbis Terrarum)
  

I can easily read 6 from this list of books.

challenge wrap up here

UPDATE: November Reads

November was my slowest reading month this year, with only 7 books completed. Midterm exams took their toll on prime reading time. I imagine December will slow as well, what with shopping and wrapping and Christmas baking. But all in all, I've read so much more this year that I can't believe that I'd consider seven books a slow month.


Canadian Book Challenge - 2, puts me at 4/13
Books to Movies Challenge - 2 and done.
nyt notable books challenge - 1 (I'm doing extra credit now)
2nds challenge - 1/3 (I'm worried about this challenge)


best reads - a boy of good breeding, Hockey Dreams


123. Irish Stories for Christmas - John B Keane
122. The Hours - Michael Cunningham
121. One Good Turn - Kate Atkinson
120. Monkfish Moon - Romesh Gunesekera
119. Gods & Monsters - Christopher Bram
118. Hockey Dreams - David Adams Richards
117. a boy of good breeding - Miriam Toews

Challenges left for 2008 2007:oops!
2nds Challenge: 2/3 looks tricky, but The Plague is short and Mercy would be fast.
Something About Me: reading Lolita now to finish up
50_books top 20: Lolita and A Prayer for Owen Meany, with no intention of reading LoTR
NYT Notable Books: I read the 6 I said I would, but I have 2 more that I bought that I'd like to finish this year before the next one starts: Lisey's Story and Special Topics in Calamity Physics
Christmas challenge: read 1/2, should be easy to finish
A - Z book: I read all but X, so am considering this done
A - Z author: I still have Q, U, and Y. If I consider 25 to be completed, I might be able to squeak this one out.

BOOK: Irish Stories for Christmas by John B Keane

Irish Stories for Christmas by John B Keane
Christmas Book Challenge

I should have known that a book of Irish stories would not necessarily be an uplifting set of Christmas stories. I thought they would be more like Maeve Binchy - modern, happy, heartwarming stories. These were good, but more in the vein of Angela's Ashes, set during or around the wars. So, a tad more depressing, but still interesting. More stereotypical Irish, poor, drinking stories. Keane can turn a phrase and some passages had me chuckling. There was even a page at the back of the book to decipher terms.


My favorite story was the one with two wren-boys (mummers who go singing and entertaining on St Stephen Day, or the day after Christmas) but who are so geared up, preparing to go, planning from the last year with anticipation, that they drink too much and fall asleep and don't wake up until the next day, and miss all the fun.

MEME: Booking Through Thursday

Do you get on a roll when you read, so that one book leads to the next, which leads to the next, and so on and so on?
I don’t so much mean something like reading a series from beginning to end, but, say, a string of books that all take place in Paris. Or that have anthropologists as the main character. Or were written in the same year. Something like that… Something that strings them together in your head, and yet, otherwise could be different genres, different authors…

I don't read books that have any noticeable theme. Sometimes I will try to read a series from the start, but I find I need to take a break from the same characters one after the other.

It may not be planned, but I think I automatically find connections from one book to the next, even if those connections might only be in my head. Or two books might not be one after the other, but in some way in my head, I find parallels. For example, I read Tomorrow by Graham Swift and On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwen and I certainly tied them together in my head. I think because I read them close together they seemed similar.

One of the first Booking Through Thursdays that I participated in was like this: connect 5 books on your bookshelf, one after the other, by some means that makes sense to you. It was really fun, and we should do it again! I did mine here a while ago.

UPDATE: NaNoBloMo

Well, I tried. I didn't officially sign up for this, because I didn't want the pressure of people knowing I was trying to post something every, single day. Same way I quit smoking years ago, I didn't admit that was what I was doing, I just wasn't smoking as much. Same with posting. I didn't announce it, but here I was, blogging everyday. And then, November 23rd. It was a great day, but busy. And I knew I'd be busy, and yet completely forgot to prepare a post. Boo, me.


We had a family wedding on Friday night at 7pm, and I worked all day, and got my hair done (straightened) and then we hosted a little happy hour to get some food in our bellies* before the wedding. And the computer just got ignored.


We had a wonderful time on Friday night, and then that caused Saturday to be a complete write off, as the four of us - me, my sister and our husbands, could barely summon the energy to eat, let alone look after our kids. That's how great cousin memories are developed - the parents are having too much fun to pay any attention to the kids. And then I didn't blog on Saturday either, since I'd already lost my mojo.


Reading update:



The books I want to finish before the end of the year and the actual number of days and my reading rate seem to be an inverse function right now, see graph on left. I made a list of books I really want to finish, in some sort of priority order:

• Lolita by Nabokov, reading now
• Irish Christmas Stories by John B Keane, reading now
• The Plague by Camus
• Mercy by Jodi Picoult
• Another Christmas book: The Cricket on the Hearth
• A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
• Lisey's Story by King
• Special Topics in Calamity Physics

I average about 8 books a month, but some of these are whoppers. But good books, really good reads, never seem that long. Here's hoping some of these are excellent.




* my brother in law thought we should go out to eat at a restaurant before the wedding since there wouldn't be a sit down meal. I surmised that the h'or derv's served at the fancy hotel reception would be substantial enough if we ate some snacks before we went. He was leery, and it would have been on me if he didn't get enough to eat. Thank goodness they brought around trays with bacon wrapped scallops, among other food. I was right, and I told him so.

UPDATE: Books to Movies Challenge Completed

Lights! Camera! Action!

With at least a week to spare, I completed the Book to Movies Challenge. I still have a few more I'd like to read, but they won't get done in time to be added to this list officially.


Here's my list of books, linked to their reviews:

Gods and Monsters by Christopher Bram
Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler
The Hours by Michael Cunningham

Interestingly, I haven't seen any of these movies. I usually try to read the book first if I can, and I haven't been watching too many movies lately. Strange how I can't seem to commit to watching a two hour movie, but I will read umpteen books instead. I guess I have my priorities straight!

A few books I still want to read include:


A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving (movie called Simon Birch)
Shaking Hands With the Devil by General Romeo Dallaire
The Last King of Scotland


Of the books I read, I liked Gods and Monsters bests. It had great atmosphere and characters, and reminded me of the movie Ed Wood, starring Johnny Depp. It was kind of creepy and could have been a part of the RIP II. The movie I'd most like to see is The Hours because I think I'd actually like the movie better. The other two were good books, but caught me at the wrong time because I couldn't get into them. I never got lost or absorbed enough to fly through them.



Thanks to Callista at SMS Book Reviews for hosting this great challenge. I still have more of these to read, and if you want any suggestions, she's been posting all the reviews so you can see if your favorite book has been made into a movie, or what the book that your favorite movie is based on was like.

SHORT STORY MONDAY: classic stories

"An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" by Ambrose Bierce

subtitle: Famous Short Stories I Have Never Read But Should Have

part 1 of many

I chose this story from my Norton Anthology because I remembered a reference to it from a Lost episode. The better read I become, the more allusions make sense to me. When you recognize the reference, it adds a whole other layer to the experience, and now that is making me very nervous for the whole Lost show, because this allusion makes the surrealness of Lost all the more explainable. I have to give away the ending to discuss this short story, because the ending is the story, and it is a twist, so if you haven't read this already, you better not read anymore.

"An Occurrence" takes place during the American Civil War, and describes in gory detail the hanging of a Confederate sympathizer who has been set up for capture. After Peyton falls off the bridge in the noose, it breaks and he hits the water, and manages an escape. After wandering the woods for a while, he finds his home, and this scene was the same scene as in the movie Gladiator, when Russell Crowe is dying and imagines his estate, with his wife as he runs to her just before he dies. The final scene in this story is as jarring as a noose breaking a neck.

I liked this story, it was easy to read, and as I read the explicit details of the hanging and what happened to the body, I felt the need to check the date of the story. It felt modern, and graphic, and I was very surprised to read the date as 1891. So violence and graphic descriptions aren't new to the last twenty years, they have always been around. I like knowing that this plot twist, so famous in many other shows and movies probably started with this story. Now I want to go back and rewatch all the references to "The Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" that I never understood before. Especially that Lost episode.

Some pop culture references that I recognize: taken from Wikipedia

In 2005, Kurt Vonnegut referred to "Occurrence" in his book A Man Without a Country as one of the greatest works of American literature, and called anyone who hadn't read it a "twerp".
In 2006, Bierce's story was referenced on an episode of the ABC television series Lost entitled "The Long Con".
At the end of "My Occurrence", an episode of the TV series Scrubs, it becomes apparent that the lead character has imagined many of the events of the episode as he does not want to believe that a friend has cancer.

BOOK: The Hours by Michael Cunningham

The Hours by Michael Cunningham

Pulitzer Winner 1999
Books-to-Movies Challenge

Three parallel lives are followed through a single day in each life: Mrs Brown, a 1950s housewife who is reading Mrs Dalloway; Clarissa, known as Mrs Dalloway who is living the life, in present day New York, from Mrs Dalloway, the novel; and Mrs Woolf, the author who is writing Mrs Dalloway in 1920s England. Hmm, perhaps I should have read Mrs Dalloway first? I'm pretty sure I missed a lot of the symbolism and parallels that connect this book to Mrs Dalloway. While I usually firmly believe in reading the book first, in this case I think the movie would stand alone better than the book. Now I need to see the movie and see if I am right.

Themes of suicide are throughout; the prologue details the author Virginia Woolf's drowning suicide, Mrs Brown is contemplating it as a means of escaping the life she feels trapped in, and Clarissa deals with the death of a friend. I read about other themes and important symbols at the Sparks notes site. This novel will be discussed at Bookawards Yahoo Group during the month of December and I expect to discover some interesting ideas and themes during that discussion.

However, any book of only 225 pages that takes me over a week to read must have some problems. I didn't connect enough with the story and the characters because it was so busy being important, with symbols and parallels. Not to say that I wasn't interested, because I did want to see how all three stories connected in the end and I would like to read Mrs Dalloway, I think, if only to see where this book came from. But overall, this book was just an okay read, nothing wrong, just not a book that I will rave about or remember too much from. I applaud the author's ambition, and with enough prior knowledge and background, I think I would have enjoyed it more. But there was no prerequisite listed on the cover, and I think there should be.

MEME: Booking Through Thursday

Joanna and Brad are asking about “connecting words,” and they don’t mean conjunctions like “and” or “but.” No, what they’re looking for are unique, or treasured words that we’ve found out and about in our daily travels, words that might not be common usage, or often heard, but which struck a chord for some reason.

This is unorthodox, of course, but here’s the thing: if you link back to Joanna’s post (which is where the rules are written), you’re eligible to win a prize. Not to mention joining in some great conversation about interesting words.

At first, I thought this was just words we've learned that are unusual. My example was going to be plethora, but somebody took it already! I was in university and working a summer job, along with my husband to be. We worked with an unusual guy, who was, well unusual. He said he had seen a movie the night before, Three Amigos, and they used the word plethora and he didn't know what it meant. Neither did we, but we were intrigued. So we looked it up and used the word everyday for quite a while. Now we use plethora when ever we can, because it is such a great word.

But reading some other posts has changed my focus. It's those words that become legend in a family, are used in a different context, and I know we have a ton of those words and phrases in our house, as my husband has a great vocabulary and is a quick wit. And he is from a family with colourful phrases.

Two, four, out the door, six, eight, we won't be late - said on the way out the door

You did that {fruit} justice - it is well eaten

fill your boots - if you like, help yourself, have what you want

bed lunch - a snack before bedtime

dress the bed - put on the sheets, make the bed

flat cheese - a processed cheese slice

fill your gob - eat a lot

When I visisted Joanna's site, linked above, I got a different view of this task. It can also be words that we've discovered on the computer that we haven't heard, or that we've used and others need us to explain. Words from around the blogosphere I've found and liked:

enbiggen - make the picture larger

flist - short form for friends list at livejournal, represents all your friends. ex - I've been a bad flist-er because I haven't been posting lately.

slash - from fanfic places, to describe the pairing focus of a story. Harry/Hermione

Now I've just been from Brad's site, and I have another perspective of what they mean. It can be words you've read that you like how they describe something. There are a bunch of British words that I love how they describe things, but I don't have the person who wrote them or I haven't kept track of exactly where they are from. And I can't really think of them right now either, because I haven't brought them into my daily life. I read them and then they disappear, until the next time I read them.

wanker - an idiot

edit: appatently wanker doesn't mean what I thought it did. Just goes to show you that reading a word in a book and understanding its context are two different things. I hope I didn't offend anyyone.

FUN STUFF: typogenerator

I just found the coolest place, called typogenerator. While surfing around, at laura's site, I found this cool generating site, and I can't stop! I just keep trying more and more, and getting the neatest images.


See what I made:



and this:
I can't seem to stop. Be careful, images may be copywrited, so don't use for commercial applications.

LIST: Television Shows

I might read a lot, but I also watch a lot of television. I play on the computer in the living room, so I manage to combine those two activities at the same time. Some of my favorite shows are:

• The Amazing Race: This is possibly the best reality show, although I prefer the term game show. I like that you lose based on your own results, not based on friendships or bad behaviour. It's just your own skills. And of course, I would do really well on the race, only they don't allow Canadians to compete. I would race with my sister, and on our cruise last year, we pretended we were racing when we would be getting in lines or finding meeting points. The countries, the challenges or tasks, and of course Phil. The editors rock on this show.


• Cold Case: The cases themselves can be a little corny or contrived, but the team of investigators, led by the best boss and toughest cop, are what make this show special. The relationships between the cops and their dysfunctional lives are very touching. And I always cry in the last musical montage, showing how powerful images and music can be.


• Brothers and Sisters: I've always liked dramas and family shows, like thirtysomething and Once and Again. And this show has Rob Lowe, looking very presidential, like he learned how to be, on The West Wing. The family is real, or as real as a rich Californian family can be, but they fight and drink, and gossip and talk all the time and are there for each other. Funny and drama and did I mention, Rob Lowe?


• House: Again, it is not the medical story, I find them quite gross at times, but it is the relationships between the characters, especially House and Wilson. Wilson and House make one of the best pairings on TV. I am particularly liking the new 'numbers', auditioning for a spot on House's team of doctors, AKA the Cottages. I am not missing Foreman, Cameron and the Blond guy too much.


• Seinfeld: We are still enjoying the old reruns of the funniest show ever on television. I was in on this from the get-go, and can remember watching the first few episodes, like the one with 'the levels' that Kramer was going to put in his apartment. We use so many of the phrases from this show around our house. We used to torment our children in the car, when they would ask 'How much longer?" We always replied, 'Five, ten minutes" with just the right accent. Do you remember that episode?
• Survivor: Again, I remember watching the very first episode. I thought when I read the preview, that it sounded so stupid, but within the first half hour, I was calling to my husband and telling him how great the show was. Of course, Richard was the best player, because he figured it out first, how to win. But then, people who won afterward, like Brian, and Tom, who won when everyone already realized how the game was played, also deserve a lot of credit. Some seasons aren't as good as others, but overall, they keep it fresh and find a way to keep me interested.
• The Daily Show/The Colbert Report: I shouldn't be watching these shows because they don't come on until midnight here in the Maritimes, damn that Atlantic Time Zone, which is way too late for a little girl who has to teach the next day, but they are so funny. The writer's strike is hurting these shows so much, and I love how they manage to be humorous and informative at the same time.

There are many other shows that would fall into my second tier of shows I like to watch. I'll talk about those other shows another day. Oh, wait, one more show that my kids would say is my favourite show.

• Compass: Our local CBC news hour show. We let the kids pretty much have control of the television during the day, but at 6:00, I get the control and get to watch the first 10 -15 minutes of news, and the weather with Boomer for the next day.

MEME: Reading Habits

I copied this meme from chris at book-a-rama by way of dewey . I'm not running out of things to blog about, but the middle of the week is a little tricky if I haven't finished a book recently.

1. Do you remember learning to read? How old were you?
I don't remember learning to read. I do remember trying to teach my 3 year old sister to read when I was six, in grade 1. If I knew how to read, she should learn too. I guess I've always tried to be a teacher.

2. What do you find most challenging to read?
Big thick books, Austen/Hawthorne/type writing, magic realism doesn't do much for me at all.

3. What are your library habits?
I keep a list of TBR at my library's online resource; I request books if I can; I used to browse and wander, but my reading is mapped out too far right now for impulse reads; I usually have at least one or two books out from the library

4. Have your library habits changed since you were younger?
I've always borrowed from the library.

5. How has blogging changed your reading life?
wow, that's a huge question! I never wrote reviews before, but I kept a list of books read for the past 8 years. Reading challenges are new this year, so I have expanded my reading genres quite a bit.

6. What percentage of your books do you get from: New book stores, second hand book stores, the library, online exchange sites, online retailers, other?
From my librarything data, I've read about 60% of my books this year from the library. The other 40% is about 20% on line retailers, 5% new book stores, 5% second hand book stores, and 10% borrowed from friends/received as gifts.

7. How often do you read a book and NOT review it in your blog? What are your reasons for not blogging about books?
I'm still pretty new, so I have blogged about every book I've read. Or have I? How will you know?

8. What are your pet peeves about ways people abuse books? Dogearing pages? Reading in the bath?
Oops, I dog-ear books, and I would read in the bath. I don't have any pet peeves like that. I don't like when people give away the ending when they review books, without a spoiler warning.
9. Do you ever read for pleasure at work?
Unfortunately, no. If I had a job with regular lunch hours, I might read then. But I have a library at work, and a librarian who believes the school library should have books for the teachers too, so she gets some with more adult content than just young adult. She keeps some books in her office for mature readers. so I may not read at work, but I get some books to read for pleasure at work. And bonus: no late fees.

10. When you give people books as gifts, how do you decide what to give them?
So much depends on the person. I have a good idea for my husband and children what they like to read, since I supply their books for the most part anyway. My mom would be trickier. She would probably request a book, or I would get her one from a series she is reading. My dad would be the same, but I would have an idea of an author he would like, and he would try anything to read. It gets tricky beyond that. I would have to have read the book already for the most part, unless they requested it.

SHORT STORY MONDAY: Buying a Fishing Rod for My Grandfather by Gao Xingjian

Buying a Fishing Rod for My Grandfather by Gao Xingjian

collection of short stories

This is a slim collection from the Nobel Prize Winning author Gao Xingjian. I'm pretty sure I'm doing his name wrong, but 3M is counting this for an X author, so that's good enough for me!

I confess that Nobel Prize winning author brings me connotations of 'boring' and 'too deep' for me to get, and unfortunately, this book lived up to my expectations. I think these are the kind of stories people talk about when they say short stories leave them missing something. These stories have an added distance in that very few characters are ever named. There is a distance from each story that doesn't allow you to get involved.

"The Accident" describes a bicycle-bus accident on a busy city street. It was accurate in describing the scene, and describing how the witnesses all react, each reading their own life into what they observe. But not much actually happens, and we don't find out anything that happens to the victims. I think it is supposed to represent the impersonal aspect of living in large cities, and how we witness events and never find out what happens after it's over. Then the narrative suddenly switches to a philosophical analysis, and tries to explain how it might not have happened and accidents aren't statistics and it ended so weirdly.

But not as weird as the title story. I don't even know what that one was about. A man is reflecting on his childhood and grandfather, but then the narrative becomes jumbled and there are references to not finding his home, and deserts and lakes and sand, and then he is describing a soccer game in the middle of a two page paragraph. I guess he is watching TV and dreaming about his childhood. That might actually explain it, but doesn't help me because I don't like reading about dreams in stories; they are weird enough when they are my own, and then to try and interpret someone else's dream. Blah.

Summary: I think this book is deep, and probably good for big thinkers, but I don't want to have to work that hard on my reading. The stories I read can have layers, but the top layer has to make sense, or I won't bother looking below the surface.

BOOK: One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

New York Times Notable Book 2006

randomhouse book for review

I like books like this: a murder mystery, with a seemingly unconnected cast of characters. The first half of the book is spent setting the stage and I felt like a juggler keeping track of all the people and motives and backstories. And then, gradually, people become connected and the story really picked up.

Jackson Brodie is the main character, I suppose, and according to the back cover, he was the investigator in Atkinson's last book, Case Histories. I would mention that it wouldn't be required to read the first book, as I didn't feel I missed any back story in reading the sequel, but I would be very interested in seeing what happens with Jackson next. Jackson witnesses a road rage incident that sets off the chain of events and characters. A meek writer, an obnoxious comedian, a dirty rich developer, his fed up wife, and a few Russian immigrants round out some of the characters, along with a tough female detective for Jackson to butt heads with.

Although it felt a little long, the action is continuous and a thread of humor is woven throughout so that I enjoyed reading it a lot. The summer arts festival in Edinburgh provides the background, and Atkinson kept my interest with so many different characters.