Another year, another (frightful!) cake

This year's "Carnage Cake" carried the Forest Gump-like theme: "life is like a box of chocolates, you never know when alien parasites will attack you and eat your (edible gummy) heart"...I know, dreadful! But we have our Island of Doom, our Sacrificial Virgin to the Volcano, our Giant Japanese Crab eats a Power Ranger...the theme must go on... I just want to know if next year's "21" cake means I'll be off the hook and can just buy the boy an ice cream cake?

Sunday Quote

Don't think about the future.

Just be here now.

Don't think about the past.

Just be here now.

-Ram Dass

My new vocation

A bit stressed lately. Which has led to the thoughts of a new vocation when I become miraculously independently wealthy. After a Saturday afternoon in the insanely crowded Maritime, the calm place was with the jellies. Sun coating the walls and the music of the bubbling tanks. A researcher was doing something with eyedroppers and water and papers (ph testing?) that looked intensely absorbing and calming. All the noise of the (horridly shrieking) children and noisy families faded. Yes. I will grow jellies. In the morning I will hang out with the jellies. We will sit in the sun. I will read them poetry. We will bask and bathe and bliss out. We will be jelliful.

Sunday Quote

Be entirely tolerant or not at all;

follow the good path or the evil one.

To stand at the crossroads

requires more strength than

you possess.

-Heinrich Heine

Happy Anderbo-ing

Happy to say some poems of mine are up on Anderbo site:

anderbo.com

I am in great company - if you are not already familiar with this great online collection/literary journal/internet magazine, you will be adding it to your favorites.

While you're (hopefully) reading my stuff - check out Crow's Fault by Lauren Shapiro (love it) and Katheleen M. Kelley's poems ...and well, all of it. Then pour some more coffee and move on to the fiction. Good, good stuff. Happy reading.

Sunday Quote

It is the still, small voice that the soul heeds, not the deafening blasts of doom.

-William Dean Howells

Time to start thinking CAKE

The oldest son was the baby of the family for ten years until his brother came along. I made him a dinosaur cake when he was five or six and somewhere along the way starting making him "the cake". Only he gets a special cake - and having shifted from baby to middle child, it only seems fair that once a year there is a reminder that he is still just as special to me...because these are labor intensive. Will look for others...unfortunately some of the best older ones (such as the Evolution cake and the Island of Doom are not in the computer...) these two were the Surrender Earthlings cake and the Son and his Girlfriend save the World Playstation come to life cakes. His next cake to be made shortly.

Funk-a-delic

Or slightly losing my mind. February mixed with the end of a long haul of a rough...not so much the end but the light at the end of it, little faltering spotty wavering thing but still...a light. And so, I am in a complete funk. Snow predicted, and did I mention it's still F*ebruary. And I need to stop goofing around on FB and websites and all of it which is the online equivalent of doing laundry as an excuse and actually finish the rough.

And yet really have to share this way cool thing...

And one more - fave guy poet artist Douglas Florian, huge giant love, and didn't even know he had a blog. Too fabulous. So maybe not everything is awful. Maybe I am in a funk but I am funk-a-delic.

Sunday Quote

I bow to the One who has no color,

I bow to the One who has no beginning.

I bow to the One who is without fault,

I bow to the One who is incomprehensible.

I bow to the One who has no treasure,

I bow to the One who is indestructible.

I bow to the Bountiful.

I bow to the Unlimited.

- Sacred Song of the Sikhs

Great news and horribly sad news in one day

The great news is that Neil Gaiman's book, The Graveyard Book, won the Newbery. I loved this book, my 22 year old daughter just loved this book, and I imagine scores of teens and adults and a few preteens will love this book. Great to see such a terrific book and author honored.
On an entirely separate note, the horribly sad news is that two librarians from the Perrot Memorial Library in Greenwich, CT were killed in a hit and run accident Wednesday morning on their way home from the Denver ALA conference. An enormous loss to the library community and a loss beyond words, I am sure, to those who loved them.

Jane Austin and the Zombies...

Jane, we hardly know you...at least not like this. My son emailed this to me and I nearly fell out of the chair...depending on your sensibilities, it's either brilliant or the most awful thing ever. I am, of course, emailing it to everyone I know as well as trying to think up variations - To the Lighthouse (Woolf) becomes Run to the Lighthouse to Escape the Zombie hordes...Far from the Maddening (Zombie) Crowd, The House of Mirth becomes the House of ...well you know. Any suggestions?

that kind of beauty

that plastic bag in the tree

Sunday Quote

The Selkirk Grace

(attributed to Robert Burns)
Some hae meat and canna eat,
And some wad eat that want it;
But we hae meat, and we can eat,
Sae let the Lord be thankit

Pilgrimage to Kearny

On the eve of Robert Burns' 250th birthday, the trek to Kearny, NJ where scores of Scots get their food fixes. I remember my Dad, my Aunt Annie, my Uncle Jimmy (all gone and greatly missed) would pull up the driveway and we'd know we could find the white cartons tied with string...black pudding, meat pies, bridies, currant cakes...great treats. So off we went today and now we're set for our Burns' party tomorrow between our fetch and the cooking done tonight - Cockaleekie soup, Albannach Orange Fancy (a cake), and a Renfrew Lemon Pie Cake (supposedly will taste like both, hmmm). Am going to try to cook oatcakes tomorrow morning...will let you know how the recipes turned out. And yes, no haggis for us! We'll address the groaning table but not the haggis (not fans). My sister bringing over a Mince pie (so if all my desserts are dreadful, I know we'll still feast! ) The fish and chips at the Argyle were terrific by the way . Now to practice my (terrible) Scottish accent for the poetry reading section of the dinner.

A story, photos, and a calming pretend.

I like this story from another inauguration a lot. Love the duet at the end.

And this around the world photoblog site is sublime armchair travel.

and here is something wonderful. Pretend.
You are right there as he swims by.
There. Don't you feel better?

Hail to the Chief

I am loving seeing the word President in front of this man's name.

President Barack Obama.

Wow, that sounds Terrific!

blog anniversary

I had it all planned when I realized that January 15th would be my one year blog anniversary. I would muse about how much I've come to enjoy blogging, maybe a link to a great poem, how I had a shaky start from November to January where I deleted everything I wrote until I found my blog footing, and how I have come to love taking the photos more than writing the posts, oddly enough, but I love sharing things I come across even more.

However, the 15th was a meeting of area youth services librarians, it was snowing, and then days passed, my oldest son went back to college, and I finally solved a timeline problem in the YA, and I've been getting all psyched about my Prez being sworn in. So it was late at night in bed - and I thought two things - one was oops - forgot blog anniversary and two - I probably should remove the batteries from my old, hardly used anymore Canon before they leak.

Ah, the heady workings of the creative brain.

Anyhoo, the least I can do is a link to a great poem. Cheers!

Sunday Quote

Empower me

to be a bold participant,

rather than a timid saint in waiting,

in the difficult ordinariness of now;

to exercise the authority of honesty,

rather than to defer to power,

or deceive to get it;

to influence someone for justice,

rather than impress anyone for gain;

and, by grace, to find treasures

of joy, or friendship, of peace

hidden in the fields of the daily

you give me to plow.

-Ted Loder

Night Ride Home

Stumble-upon talent

Here is one of my new favorites, courtesy of the always terrific VSL which brings great finds to my e-mail constantly.

This great stumble-upon was when I was hunting down an old favorite tune on YouTube which I couldn't find exactly...Anyone can whistle when Lee Remick sang it - just amazing. The song sung by others has never quite right for me but - here it is sung by someone I kept clicking past (calling herself Miss Broadway Dork was part of it) but finally I checked her out...and she became another happy stumble-upon.