Monday, April 30, 2012

Put Me in Coach

I have my eyes on summer.  I've given up hope for any semblance of remaining spring (and cooler weather) and with Saturday's bbq, my palate has turned to summer cuisine.  Enter How the Hot Dog Found Its Bun: Accidental Discoveries and Unexpected Inspirations That Shape What We Eat and Drink by Josh Chetwynd.  As journalist, baseball player, and attorney, I suspect he may have learned a thing or two about the dog.

If that book doesn't have you sliding for home, perhaps consider his book released in 2011, The Secret History of Balls: The Stories Behind the Things We Love to Catch, Whack, Throw, Kick, Bounce and Bat.

Mr. Chetwynd has a (long) way with words but the books seem just quirky enough to add them to my book list.

Sunday, April 29, 2012

Re-Miss

Great thing about the weekend - getting to visit with four members of the GBC.  It made my heart happy.

Not so great thing about the weekend - post-race stairs (and a sunburn).

Hope this weekend you had time to laugh, to read, to rest, and perhaps tackle a goal.

Thursday, April 26, 2012

We Are Family

Reminder that next month's book will be The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson.  Did anyone make it to Parnassus to hear last night's reading?

Here's a link to Mr. Wilson's site.  It was a pleasant surprise to learn he lives in Sewanee.

Happy end of week reading!

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Wait a Minute, Mr. Postman

This morning I did my bi-weekly walk to check the mail and discovered three stacks (4 wide and 20 high) of phone books.  My first thought: thanks for not bringing one of those to my door.  Second thought:  who would actually want a phone book?  And then:  I wonder if anyone has tried to make art with phone books.  Of course they have.

Exhibit one:  Kristiina Lahde and "Hive."  The link will take you to page #2 which illustrates the scale of the piece.  Be sure to check out page #1 for a closer view of those familiar ads.  Ms. Lahde was educated and primarily exhibits in Canada.  Two other pieces which caught my eye are "Retread" (for obvious reasons if you know my career progression) and "I Love You".

Cuban American Alex Queral takes phone books in a different direction by use of knife and acryllic.  His sculptures are amazing and I had to read twice to be sure they were actually phone books.  It would be hard to pick my favorite from this selection.

So if you get that familiar yellow delivery to your door, pause before recycling.  Perhaps it's just an art project waiting to emerge.

Sunday, April 22, 2012

Louvre It or Leave It

I used airport time to see if I would grown any more affection to Sleeping with Paris.  I really haven't, and in fact, when I returned home, I just wanted to eat ice cream.  It's a long story to explain how the two of those are connected and as I likely only have your attention for a paragraph or two, it's not worth attempting to draw the straight line.  Save yourself the Amazon/library checkout and use the time for something a bit more worthy (and perhaps set in a different city).

Hope your weekend was cool, refreshing, and a little chocolaty.

Friday, April 20, 2012

The World is Your Oyster

“For every man in the world functions to the best of his ability, and no one does less than his best, no matter what he may think about it.”
― John Steinbeck, The Pearl
      (From Good Reads)
A Pearl for a Pearl.  Today's Friday photo from Shanghai.

Smoggy Shanghai, 2007

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

What Rhymes with Paris?

I am looking forward to the account of the latest GBC meeting.  Trains, Twain and reading water.

In the interim, here are a couple of links from NPR to get you through any mid-week doldrums (and to give you possible career ideas with your old typewriter).

The Poem Store - located on a sidewalk near you (if you're in San Francisco)

3 Books on the True Nature of Paris - to keep you from using your Continental one-click to buy a ticket

Bonne journée!

Monday, April 16, 2012

Where the Heart Is

She was born Chloe Wofford and wrote her first novel at 39.  Many of her stories have roots in Loraine, Ohion, the town in which she was raised. This Guardian interview with Emma Brockes published Friday is a great look into the life of Toni Morrison and her soon to be published Home.  

Sunday, April 15, 2012

I like Paris in the Springtime

Yesterday I was distracted by suit-shopping and comet-tracking.  Apologies for the miss in my usually even days of posting.  Saturdays are for random things (and runs), right?

In my dive back into the digital book world, I borrowed Sleeping with Paris by Juliette Sobanet from the Amazon lending library.  While my body sat in the extremely stark waiting area Thursday, my mind wandered down the Seine, into various arrondissements, and finally settling on a hard wall near Notre Dame eating a croque monsieur and wondering which ice cream I will have for an afternoon snack.  I miss Paris.  [Side note:  this yearning was intensified this morning after seeing pics of GBC T1m's croque monsieur.]

The book is a definitely chic lit.  Scorned woman leaves US life and flies to Paris alone.  Enter hot Parisian male with skinny jeans and a couple of other women with similar (former) love lives.  This is about as far as I've ventured.  I've already lived part of this story already:  jobless, lonely US woman leaves US life to fly to Paris alone to volunteer in small French town.  Enter French gypsy male (baggy jeans) who nicknames me "Hulk Incroyable" because I can't lift the same amount of firewood and deems me unsuitable marriage material because my parents don't own enough land. 

Perhaps I need my own book.

Happy Sunday and happy reading!

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Sit-n-Spin

This morning I will be on lock-down at a physician's office for about three hours.  Perfect time to read.

Of course, my thought (and first world problem) this morning:  which book do I start?  Should I slide in another nonfiction?  Do I want a funny read? (Okay, yes, but is that appropriate given the circumstances?)  Do I challenge my brain or give myself a little spring candy?  At this point, I'm undecided but I am abusing the "One-Click" download.  Options.

In the end, I'll need to take a little guidance from Wordsworth and just "begin."

[And just before I hit "Publish," my brain said, "Maybe you can just knit."]  

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

I'm Your Huckleberry

A reminder that the next meeting of the GBC is soon approaching.  This month's theme is "Choose your own Mark Twain" which should bode for some fairly interesting quotes and I would venture at least one member in period costume.  In this vein, I will submit mine a bit early:
"To Whom It May Concern - Parties having need of three thousand two hundred and eleven feet of the best quality zinc-plated spiral-twist lightning-rod stuff, and sixteen hundred and thirty-one silver-tipped points, all in tolerable repair (and, although much worn by use, still equal to any ordinary emergency), can hear of a bargain by addressing the publisher."
              - Mark Twain from "Political Economy"

Sunday, April 8, 2012

I Feel Lucky

For a Sunday Easter morning, I wanted to add an inspired read to our reading lists.  This morning's selection is When I Fell From the Sky by Juliane Koepcke.  Juliane was seventeen and the sole survivor of a 1971 plane crash which took 91 passengers, including her mother.  BBC News has a synopsis of the flight survival here but it is a bit of a spoiler for any of you, like me, who were born a little later than this piece of history.  [Author's note: I plan to read this before I go hang-gliding for the first time.]

Hope your day is sunny, full of chocolate bunnies, multi-colored eggs, good friends, and a little inspiration.  

Friday, April 6, 2012

Bus-ted

Somewhere in Southeast Alabama is a place that time, but not books have forgotten.

Southeast Alabama
April, 2012
Happy Good Friday.  May you reading time this weekend be plentiful.

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Blooms

AsI have learned it's National Poetry Month, I no longer feel guilty about forcing multiple stanzas on you in a week.  (Don't worry, I won't overdo it.)  For a funeral day however, this one seemed appropriate.

Today's selection from Poets.org:
The Orchid Flower
  by Sam Hamill 
Just as I wonder
whether it's going to die,
the orchid blossoms

and I can't explain why it
moves my heart, why such pleasure

comes from one small bud
on a long spindly stem, one
blood red gold flower

opening at mid-summer,
tiny, perfect in its hour.

Even to a white-
haired craggy poet, it's
purely erotic,

pistil and stamen, pollen,
dew of the world, a spoonful

of earth, and water.
Erotic because there's death
at the heart of birth,

drama in those old sunrise
prisms in wet cedar boughs,

deepest mystery
in washing evening dishes
or teasing my wife,

who grows, yes, more beautiful
because one of us will die.

Monday, April 2, 2012

For A & N

Despite sunny weather, it was a gray weekend.  I seem to pair loss with poetry so today's start is taken from the Poetry Foundation.

Leaves Fell
    - Juhan Liiv 
A gust roused the waves,
leaves blew into the water,
the waves were ash-gray,
the sky tin-gray,
ash-gray the autumn.

It was good for my heart:
there my feelings were ash-gray,
the sky tin-gray,
ash-gray the autumn.

The breath of wind brought cooler air,
the waves of mourning brought separation:
autumn and autumn
befriend each other.

Taken from Leaves Fell by Juhan Liiv : Poetry Magazine