Randomness

Consider this free flowing randomness – because I am completely numb.

One of my sorority girlfriends died last night. No explanation. She was home for Thanksgiving and her Mom went into her room to wake her up, and found her dead. She had diabetes, but it was under control, and she was otherwise in good health. Angie – your laughter was infectious – and your craziness unsurpassed. You were taken from us too soon. We will miss you. So, for those of you in close proximity to girlfriends – go give them a big hug and tell them how much they mean to you!


(A picture of my girlfriends at our reunion last year -- Angie is the red head, front row, in the middle.


On to other things not nearly as sad:

I had a wonderful Thanksgiving. The food tasted particularly yummy this year. All the same “traditional” accompaniments, but the family cooks (my mom and sister-in-law) really knocked it out this year. The bad thing about traveling “out of town” for Thanksgiving – no LEFTOVERS! Oh, how I wish I had a big turkey/dressing/cranberry sandwich! And some cherry pie!

My reading funk continues – I did not turn a page over the holidays. And it was splendid. No pressure to post, no pressure to finish anything. I am working on a Jane Austen Mystery by Stephanie Barron (Jane and His Lordship's Legacy); it’s quaint, and normally I could have finished it in about 2 days. Oh well. But remind me, next time I start a “series”– I need to start with book 1 not book 7.

Bob Stoops announced today that he is staying at Oklahoma. Thank you Bob! Notre Dame isn’t good enough for you. It’s been a heartbreaking Sooner football year. Ten weeks ago, when I was standing in Jerry Jones/Dallas Cowboy stadium before the kick off to the BYU/OU game, I could never have predicted the misfortune to envelope this football team. But, a season is always redeemed when you thrash OSU! Take that Pokes!

PTA responsibilities have consumed me. Anyone have experience planning a major fundraiser? I need serious help!

We still have lice in our house. When will these pests leave us! Luckily, they remain happily on my daughter’s head, and no other family members. But after three treatments, they still won’t die. I finally got a prescription treatment (to the tune of $60!!!) -- this better eliminate them once and for all.

And if that wasn’t enough – when we got home from our vacation – we found RODENT DROPPINGS all over the kitchen floor! Good Grief Charlie Brown! Terminix is coming in the morning. I’m done with vermin and all other creepy-crawlies.

Going Unplugged!

I saw this logo on A Bookshelf Monstrosity and thought I would implement it too!

Thanksgiving is time for family and friends -- and a time to turn off the computer. Besides, my parents still live in the '50s and wouldn't know what to do with a computer even if they had one (and I don't get my laptop for another week).

For a book recommendation: Try Louisa May Alcott's An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving -- we are reading it during our road trip.

Are you ready for some Turkey?!

In the spirit of Thanksgiving — I’m curious about your holiday traditions!

What’s your favorite side dish? (Daisy Mom: Spoonbread)

Afternoon meal? Or evening meal? (Mid afternoon)

Do you cook? Or a family member? (Always Mom!)

Do you travel? Or stay home? (Travel to my folks in 4 hours!)

Dark meat? Or White meat? (White for me, dark for my husband)

Sweet Potatoes? Or Mashed Potatoes? (Sweet with marshmallows; Mashed with gravy)

Real whipped cream? Or Cool Whip? (We usually have both on hand)

Pie: Pumpkin? Apple? Cherry? Pecan? (Pumpkin and my Mom's greatest cherry pie)

Special Thanksgiving activity? Afternoon Football? Christmas Lights? Sleeping? (All of the above!)

Have a safe, happy, food-filled and stomach-busting, Thanksgiving!

Reading 101

After failing to read my book club book for our November meeting, I’ve had to reevaluate my book selections of late. Over the past few weeks or months, I’ve felt OBLIGATED to read – book club, mother-daughter book club, challenge requirements – you name it. The joy of climbing in my big chair and turning page after page has been noticeably absent. Is it my book choices? Have job, family, PTA responsibilities, totally overwhelmed me that I can’t remember how to “read?” I feel burned out. And the noticeable absence of book reviews is evidence.

How do you get out of a reading funk? Or are reading funks not allowed?

I’m going to try this: I’m taking an inventory of all the unread books on my shelf and trying to assess what will give me the greatest pleasure – without taxing my brain too much. And brevity would be nice too. Under 300 pages. A length I know I can finish. My brain is fried. And my attention span is shot. (Although, I REALLY want to read Persuasion sometime over the holiday, not sure that qualifies?)

I’m blowing off all that is expected and indulging myself in brain candy, whatever that may be.

At least I can't get cavities this way!

(P. S. Persuasion is under 300 pages! Yippee for me!)

Remembering President Kennedy

46 years ago today, the country stopped, people mourned, and the world grieved. Today marks the anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's assassination. I feel like I should have memories of this event, with so many images available from that day, but I was 3 years from being born. Still I wonder, "What might have been?"

With this event and the recent death of Senator Ted Kennedy, I've personally committed to read at least one Kennedy-related book between now and the next anniversary on Nov. 22, 2010. Here are a few I'm considering:

JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why it Matters, by James Douglass

Grace & Power: The Private World of the Kennedy White House by, Sally Bedell Smith


A Thousand Days: JFK in the White House by Arthur Schlesinger


President Kennedy, by Richard Reeves


Conversations with Kennedy, by Ben Bradlee


My 12 Years with JFK, by Evelyn Lincoln


I'm not a conspiracy-theorist. I don't really know what happened that day. I don't think anyone ever will. I'd like to think that after 46 years with the advancement of technology we could better analyze the remaining documents or film or evidence. But I certainly would like to know more about the man and his presidency, and ultimately his death.

A Reader's Journal Spotlight

Many thanks to Booklogged at A Reader's Journal for her "spotlight" on Arkansas and Gerbera Daisy Diaries, and most of all, her very kind words.
Please visit her blog!

Book Review -- The Omnivore's Dilemma

The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan











DID NOT FINISH
Very rarely do I not finish a book. But life came crashing down on me this week and unfortunately, The Omnivore's Dilemma, was the collateral damage.

If I could rate the 50 pages I did read I would give it 4 out of 5 stars. Michael Pollan weaves an extraordinary story of the industrialization of our food. Considering the subject matter could get bogged down in minutia, he has a very easy writing style that is a pleasure to read. And I'm convinced he needs to write romance novels after reading his section on "corn sex!" Totally erotic, in a plant kind of way! I hope to revisit this book in the future. But I have to move on to other things.

Book source: Public library

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Book Group Night

It’s our last meeting of the year – we take December OFF for the holidays – and I feel like a failure! For the first time since being pregnant or having small, nursing babies, I didn’t finish the book!! Ugh! I usually save the book club choice until the last week before our meeting, so the details can be fresh in my mind. So far, my M.O. has worked – until this week. Everything that could go wrong did – including a child being sent home from school with LICE. My free hours for the past few days have been devoted to delousing everything in our house, including parents, children and furniture. I’m exhausted. And although the first 40 pages of Michael Pollan’s “Omnivore’s Dilemma” were utterly fascinating and disturbing, I just didn’t have the brain power to overcome my unforeseen obstacles. This was a week for a romance novel.

To make up for my lack of literary brain power, I’m making Pumpkin Dump Cake, a recipe I found through Amy’s Fall Recipe Exchange. It’s in the oven and smells scrumptious. We have a Thanksgiving Pot Luck for our November meeting. Hopefully my book groupees will forgive me my literary trespasses when they eat this cake.

Pumpkin Dump Cake

Here's What You Need:
1 (29 oz) can of Pumpkin
1 cup of sugar
1 (12 oz) can of evaporated milk
3 eggs
4 tsp. of pumpkin pie spices (or combination of cinnamon/nutmeg/cloves/ginger
1/2 tsp. of salt
1 box of yellow cake mix
3/4 cup of melted butter
1 cup chopped pecans

Here's What You Do!

First you're going to combine the pumpkin, sugar, evaporated milk, eggs, pumpkin pie spices and salt in a mixing bowl. Beat well. Pour this lovely mixture into a greased 9x13 glass pan. Sprinkle cake mix over the pumpkin mixture and then sprinkle in the pecans. Pour melted butter over it. Bake at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes. When you stick the knife into the center and it comes out clean, you're good to go! Make sure you keep an eye on it at the end as it'll burn easily. This will make tons of goodies for you (or 12-15 people) to enjoy!

Cross-over Authors

One of the benefits of shelving and re-shelving books at the library is becoming more aware of authors and their works. Additionally, I have been surprised to find authors that I associate with a specific genre, that also “cross-over” and write for a completely different audience.

Here are a few that have totally surprised me! Consider it my “who knew?” category.


Alexander McCall Smith

Best known for his No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency and Isabel Dalhousie mystery series – he also writes a Juvenile Fiction mystery series – Harriet Bean.

They look delightful! They are for 2nd – 4th graders.


Meg Cabot

What mother of a middle grade daughter isn’t familiar with Meg Cabot and all her Princess-themed books? She also writes adult fiction. What I didn’t know is that she writes a mystery series too: The Heather Wells Mystery Series.



And with a title like, “Size 12 is Not Fat” I think I will love her forever.

Sarah Dunant

I have Sarah Dunant’s Birth of Venus on my shelf. I think it was my 1st addition when I started my Goodreads list. I still haven’t read it. However, I’ve always associated her with Italian Renaissance historical fiction. I was totally surprised when I discovered that she writes a mystery series featuring a London-based private eye named Hannah Wolfe.

The 1st in the series is Birth Marks.


Aylet Waldman

I’m not sure if Aylet Waldman is better known for her fiction, her marriage to Michael Chabon or her one essay professing she loved her husband more than her children, which solidified her as a controversial writer. Her latest book, a work of non-fiction is, Bad Mother: A Chronicle of Maternal Crimes, Minor Calamities, and Occasional Moments of Grace. She’s also written adult fiction. What I didn’t know is she writes a mommy-lit mystery series featuring stay-at-home mom, Juliet Applebaum. The 1st in the series is called, Nursery Crimes.

There are several in the “mommy-track” series. I love this quote from Nursery Crimes:

“Anyone who tells you that having a child doesn't completely and irrevocable ruin your life is lying. As soon as that damp little bundle of poop and neediness lands in your lap, it's all over. Everything changes. Your relationship is destroyed. Your looks are shot. Your productivity is devastated. And you get stupid. Dense. Thick. Pregnancy and lactation make you dumb. That's a proven scientific fact.”

Thank you Aylet for voicing what I was afraid to express!

James Patterson

How many books has this man written?? Too many to count. And I haven’t read ANY of them. But I guarantee patrons at the library check out several of his books a day. But did you know he wrote Young Adult fiction too???


The Maximum Ride series is intended for 7th grade and older.

Finally, everyone knows Ian Fleming wrote all of the James Bond thrillers, but can you name his one contribution to juvenile fiction??

Do you remember this:


That’s been my biggest surprise of all!

What other cross-over authors are you familiar with or have you read? Are they successful at both? Or one more than the other?

Book Review -- Am I Not a Man? The Dred Scott Story

Am I Not A Man? The Dred Scott Story by Mark L. Shurtleff


My rating: 3 of 5 stars






Dred Scott: for me he was a forgotten footnote from an intro to Constitutional Law or American history class, taken so many years ago. Who was he? Why was he important? Why can’t I remember?

Mark Shurtleff, in his debut novel, Am I Not a Man? The Dred Scott Story attempts to answer those questions as he rediscovers the man, born a slave, who changed the course of history by suing, unsuccessfully, for the right to be free. In 1846 he sued for his freedom on the grounds that residing in free territory had made him free. Eleven years later his case reached the Supreme Court, where it was decided on March 6, 1857. Chief Justice Roger Taney read the majority opinion declaring that Dred Scott was not a person but a piece of property.

This novel is meticulously researched and enormous in scope: from his birth in Virginia, his ownership by the Blow Family, his travels with the Blows and his sale to Dr. Emerson, to his final judgment in a Missouri courtroom and ultimately, the Supreme Court, there is no detail spared in this narrative. The author seems to include every historical figure from Thomas Jefferson to James Madison to Andrew Jackson, Robert E. Lee and US Grant; even the Prophet Joseph Smith makes an unexpected and unlikely appearance. It was a soup-pot of characters including family genealogical histories and a myriad wives, husbands, friends, and in-laws. So many, I had a difficult time keeping them all straight.

As a parallel to Dred’s story, the author details the lives of President Abraham Lincoln and Roger Taney, the Chief Justice who would write the majority opinion in Dred Scott v. Sanford, denying Dred his freedom. As he explores the ancestors of these two individuals, somehow, in a work of historical fiction, our current president is mentioned. It was an awkward reference, that didn’t seem appropriate in a work of “fiction.” Similarly, the events of September 11, 2001 are alluded too after the British attack Virginia and Maryland – completely shocking me out of the novel.

However, one of the more successful sections of the book was the account of Peter Blow’s Virginia Militia service and Dred’s support as they and the militia defend Virginia against the attacking British forces during the War of 1812. The imagery of “Red Coats” marching through the mud as they advanced on Craney Island was extremely well done. The author also creates a vivid account of Dred’s relationship with his wife Harriet and their children, Eliza and Lizzie (although, I often wondered, “who names their children both essentially the same name – Elizabeth?”). Their love and devotion to each other and their daughters was tangible on the page. Additionally, and most importantly, the final chapters that detail the legal battle fought by Dred and his lawyers were paramount.

Although the range of this novel needed streamlining and editing, the author did a decent job in creating a life for Dred Scott, a man whose struggle has been forgotten by many in my generation.


Book source: publisher

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