This Cracks Me Up -

Last night we got a wild hair and Mama took YaYa to the Demi Lovato concert. YaYa let her freak flag fly!! (FFF)

Mama (feeling very Mama-ish) enjoyed the ruckus and was especially moved by the quality of the opening act's voice - David Archuleta. The other Mamas there were a but stunned to meet someone who had never heard of David Archuleta. Hmmm... How much popular culture am I missing by not watching American Idol? (very small forehead wrinkle...then a shoulder shrug...)

I haven't let my FFF lately. Things have serious - lots of forehead wrinkling. I think I will put those concerns aside today and concentrate on smoothing out those wrinkles. I am going to learn to cook quinoa. So there.

ahhhhh

Mamarazzi Monday

Palo Duro Canyon - Spring 2008

I Got It From My Mama

A Facebook meme I got yesterday states: The BBC doesn't think we read!

(now I have looked at the BBC website The Big Read and I did not find any evidence the BBC believes only a few of us will have read over 6 of the books listed. So - grain of salt time...)

Anyway - the list is interesting and I had fun checking off those I've read and those I'm pretty certain I've read, (because surely (!) I read Hamlet in high school! Didn't we all? Or am I just having Mel Gibson movie flash backs?) This is not a list of the greatest books of all time, the BBC compiled this list in 2003, to determine the 100 best loved books.

Here's the meme:

The BBC believes most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here. How do your reading habits stack up?

Instructions:
Look at the list and put an 'x' after those you have read. (I added an m for "saw the movie" as well)

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen x m
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien x m
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte x m
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling x m
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee x m
6 The Bible m
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte x m
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell x
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman x m
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens x m (LOVE Ms. Havisham!)
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott x m
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy x m
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare (can't say I've read them ALL) m
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier x m
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien x (m - can't wait! eeek!)
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger X
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot x
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell x m
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald x m
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams x m
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh x m
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck x
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll x m
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy x
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis x
34 Emma - Jane Austen x m
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen x m
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis x m (sort of a repeat of 33?)
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini x m
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden m only (I know...)
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne x m
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell x
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown x m
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving x m-sort of, if you can call it a movie
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery x m
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy x m
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding x
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan m only...sigh..
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel x
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons x m
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen x m
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon x
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley x
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon x
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez x
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck x
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov x m
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold x
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas m...
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding x m
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville m surely...
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens x m
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker m...
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett x m
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Inferno - Dante
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray x m
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens x m
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker x m
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro m only..
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert x
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White x m
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom x
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle x (m soon!)
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery x
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas m...
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare x m
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl x m m
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

MY TOTAL = 57 Hmmm – 43 to go!

I already have several of my non-read books on the shelf, but for some reason have not picked them up - Catch-22 and A Confederacy of Dunces come to mind. Doh! It's OK - I plan to have them all read (and those on the greatest novels of all time list) by the time I am 90. My epitaph on the wall at James Coney Island? "She was well read and ate a ton of popcorn to boot"

So are we Dunces? (I mean in the sense that we don't read..) I like to think not! However, the stats for the "general population" are sobering... Minnesota Matron (one of my everyday blog reads - I am a big fan!) recently posted a link to a very disturbing article from Truthdig. Is it really possible that 80% of American Families did not buy one single book last year? Suffused with disbelief and drama -because I certainly don't know anyone like that! - I recited my horror to one of my work buddies who admitted that yes, she was one of the 80%. After gnawing on my foot for a while, making references to how much ROOM books take up in the house, we hung up and I decided that my book clutter was not so annoying after all.
Thanks to my wonderful book-aholic Mom! I have you to thank for the countless hours of adventure, romance, mystery, wonder and awe I have gleaned from my library. I hope I can promote the same passions in my children.

Exponential Times

It's a 6 minute long video, but just think, in a couple of years they'll put it on a microchip and insert it into the Microport in your skull and voila! you'll have an extra 5minutes and 55seconds to make chocolate chip cookies!



Love the music from "Last of the Mohicans". Always wanted to choreograph a ballet to this one... It's called Promentory.

Kookie Anyone??

What it's REALLY like at our house....


Doppleganger Take #2 or so...



Doppleganger Take #31 or so....



You can hear the voice of their horrified mother in the the background...

Love Thursday

                                                                      YaYa made this!


The World Has Changed
A poem written for these times by Alice Walker

The World Has Changed:
Wake up & smell
The possibility.
The world
Has changed:
It did not
Change
Without
Your prayers
Without
Your faith
Without
Your determination
To
Believe
In liberation
&
Kindness;
Without
Your
Dancing
Through the years
That
Had
No
Beat.
The world has changed:
It did not
Change
Without
Your
Numbers
Your
Fierce
Love
Of self
&
Cosmos
It did not
Change
Without
Your
Strength.
The world has
Changed:
Wake up!
Give yourself
The gift
Of a new
Day.
The world has changed:
This does not mean
You were never
Hurt.
The world
Has changed:
Rise!
Yes
&
Shine!
Resist the siren
Call
Of
Disbelief.
The world has changed:
Don't let
Yourself
Remain
Asleep
To
It.
--By Alice Walker for the Inauguration

Michelle says..

Ladies, You Know I Love This Man - But Oh My GAH! My Feet Hurt!!

This Day in History - Let Love Grow

My Dearest Children (Z and C) - I am so proud of you and am so glad you are both here to see this Day!! What an amazing world!

................................

It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation.

Yes we can.

It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail towards freedom through the darkest of nights.

Yes we can.

It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness.

Yes we can.

It was the call of workers who organized; women who reached for the ballot; a President who chose the moon as our new frontier; and a King who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the Promised Land.

Yes we can to justice and equality. Yes we can to opportunity and prosperity. Yes we can heal this nation. Yes we can repair this world. Yes we can.

And so tomorrow . . . we will remember that there is something happening in America; that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that we are one people; we are one nation; and together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story with three words that will ring from coast to coast; from sea to shining sea.

Yes. We. Can.

Text from President Barack Obama's speech at the New Hampshire primary, Jan 8, 2008. 

Thanks for the idea Meg!

Check Out This Girl's Placement!

Did you know that I was a dancer? Still am in my heart. Keep thinking I am going to go back to Ballet Class. Hmmm - maybe I will. (just as soon as I lose 20 lbs....hee hee! Vanity, thy name is Bonnie!)

Saw this just now on YouTube. Aria Alekzander is a member of the Corps de Ballet at Houston Ballet - her fouettes turns are amazing! Looks like she is having fun...



Enjoy!

Her page at Houston Ballet.

16 Things About Me

Brene memed me -

16 things about me

1. I prefer British Mystery to American Mystery. Seriously. :)
2. I am a vegetarian. Have been off and on over my life - but last year, I read "Skinny Bitch" and the conversion was complete.
3. I love to be "catnapped" – my cats rest on my legs – I pass out.
4. I am an introvert. I love interaction – but need lots of alone time to sort things out. I would much rather work a party than be a guest at one.
5. I got my first shotgun when I was 7 and now I am an animal rights activist!
6. I really dislike being around drunk people when I haven’t been drinking.
7. I love big goofy Great Danes.
8. My dream job would be Travel Writer for Lonely Planet’s Italy edition.
9. I love to learn – I would much rather hear about you than talk about me.
10. I believe in temporary geographic cures.
11. My favorite movie is Amelie.
12. I want to live in the country. Near a city. (with Ballet season tickets). And horses. And my Man. And Children.
13. I am a good mommy. I know how to love them and I know how to apologize to them.
14. I am perfect exactly as I am! Yeah!
15. I could live on chocolate and popcorn – for a while anyway...
16. My favorite philosophy book is a Theory of Justice by John Rawls. The root of all my political beliefs.

It's Girl Scout Cookie Time!!

Please buy from this poor shrinking violet of a child...

xoxo

Stand By Me

Happy New Year, Happy New Era! Let's get it on!

Yes We Did!!

Undecided???

I found this on some message board the other day - (can't remember which - Political Junkie that I am)



Closing Appeals

Dear America,

Mine.

Mine mine mine.

Me Me Me Me Me Me Me!

Mine mine mine mine mine. Mine. Mine. Mine. Mine!

In conclusion: Fear fear fear fear. Very scary fear!

Sincerely,

The Republican Party

P.S. If you liked Joseph McCarthy, you'll love us!

-

Dear America,

We.

Us. We. Together. Americans. United States.

Hope compassion equality inclusiveness competence.

Brains common sense community respect hard work accountability.

Action change responsibility. More viewpoints, smarter solutions.

In conclusion: Yes we can.

Sincerely,

The Democratic Party.

P.S. Vote.

Damn. I'm still undecided. (NOT!)

Cutest Halloween Costume Ever!

Just saw this in the Houston Chronicle...


Hot Hot HOT!!

Anne Lamott on Molly Ivins

A friend just sent me this piece that Anne Lamott wrote about her friend Molly Ivins. Boy do I miss her - especially this week!


What's missing from this election? Molly Ivins

The late buckaroo populist and freedom fighter would have had a ball with the insanity of this current news cycle.
By Anne Lamott

Oct. 03, 2008 | It breaks a girl's heart to know that Molly Ivins does not get to have a go at the Republican slate this year. I can see that big, rosy, sunflower face watching this all with astonishment and roaring with laughter. Ivins -- the legendary buckaroo populist, journalist, freelance hell-raiser and freedom fighter -- would be pounding her fists on the arms of her easy chair, stomping her feet as if listening to live bluegrass.

She would have had such a ball with Sarah Palin -- the trooper scandal, her love of moose (between buns), the flamboyantly botched television interviews, the bravery of people who hunt wolves for sport, from the air. Even though Molly was a Texan -- who would have been on guard for the sneering tone of liberal criticism toward anyone with a gun or a double-wide -- she still would have obliterated Palin as a faux populist wingnut with a tanning bed instead of a heart. She would have made great hay with the capacity of certain politicians to reinvent themselves in entirely new realities, as newfound populist Brotherman McCain has done, and his desperate, icky laugh of contempt might have raised some worries for her.

She would not have been happy with either McCain or Obama for opting out of public finance: She would mention Phil Gramm at the drop of a hat, McCain's chief financial guru, whom she always called the senator from Enron. I think she would have been intrigued by Obama, for all the game-changing aspects he's brought to the arena, for upending all the assumptions about whether someone could win with such a spooky name. She'd have cheered his speech on race, been amazed by his speech in Berlin. She'd have been pissed at the Democrats for not being as robust as they should have been on civil liberties, even as she reasserted her heartbreaking faith in American democracy, the faith that if we stuck together, we'd figure it out in the end. We'd somehow help the poor.

She would have celebrated the tidal roar of support from younger voters, who have the vision and stamina to fight for someone who would hold the nation's leaders to account, people who would fight to make this a country where it was once again safe to be a small child, or a very old person, which it has not been for approximately 7.6572 years.

She would have known all along that this election was going to be as tight as a tick. She would have had the sense to be afraid but to not let her fear hurt her. She would have done one constructive thing after another: Sent money to swing states, offered her car to volunteers from out of town, let young campaign workers sleep on her couch.

The last time I saw her, she was several weeks away from death, spending most of her time in bed, hanging out with her best friends and her dog. And you know what she was doing, off and on, the weekend I spent with her? She was working on her last column, about the need for Americans to fight like hell to stop Bush's proposed surge in Iraq. All she had at that point was a great ending: "We are the deciders. And every single day, every single one of us needs to step outside and take some action. We need people in the streets, banging pots and pans and demanding, 'Stop it, now!'"

She was also rereading parts of her favorite books when suddenly she wanted to have a dinner party, because I had never met her great friends, "Shrub" co-writer Lou Dubose or populist heavyweight Jim Hightower. This was a major obstacle to happiness for all concerned. She adored those two men, and I was commanded to call them. Unfortunately, Lou, her longtime collaborator, was out of town. So, instead, she told me Lou stories for half an hour.

No one loved her stories more than Molly, especially those about the art and absurdity of politics. This was part of her greatness. She reigned like a queen -- imposing carriage, great sense of style, with a mind and smile that radiated warmth.

In between trying to write her column, she would call out to me. "Associate Party Planner!" she would say. "Front and center! We have a problem!" So I would appear with the clipboard I had been issued, stretch out next to her and her dog, and we'd fiddle with our menu or grapple with the despair and bitterness of having discovered that none of the cloth napkins matched. Lou couldn't come, and two of the good plates chipped. We agreed: It was a nightmare.

Her brother Andy was in town, though, as was her great assistant Betsy Moon, with her boyfriend. Jim Hightower and his wife, DeMarco, could be there.

It was really not an ideal weekend for a party, what with her being close to death, unable to walk much anymore or to stay awake. Also, she had to get chemo that morning. But I ask you -- what are you going to do?

Obviously, have the party. Everything she loved, one more time.

Her niece and nephew came."I don't have any children," she once wrote, "so I've decided to claim all the future freedom-fighters and hell-raisers as my kin." And she adored these two (although later we conspired to set the table so that they got the two chipped plates).

She was so excited about her party that she insisted I make place cards.

She slept a lot the day of the party. The chemo had knocked her for a loop. But she managed to work on her column a little. I Googled it just a moment ago. Here's what she wrote, "About the only politician out there besides Bush actively calling for a surge is Sen. John McCain. In a recent opinion piece, he wrote: 'The presence of additional coalition forces would allow the Iraqi government to do what it cannot accomplish today on its own -- impose its rule throughout the country. By surging troops and bringing security to Baghdad and other areas, we will give the Iraqis the best possible chance to succeed.' But with all due respect to the senator from Arizona, that ship has long since sailed. A surge is not acceptable to the people in this country -- we have voted overwhelmingly against this war in polls (about 80 percent of the public is against escalation, and a recent Military Times poll shows only 38 percent of active military want more troops sent) and at the polls. We know this is wrong. The people understand, the people have the right to make this decision, and the people have the obligation to make sure our will is implemented."

She got up from bed a few times to sit with me at the table. We drank tea and ate dried cherries and told each other stories. She was such a performer, with that marvelous Texas Hill Country accent that used to get stronger with every drink. But she and I had both been sober for some time by the end of her life. Her stories were precisely delivered, and her face so in control, as if she had trained with Marcel Marceau. I can see her looking over the tops of her reading glasses -- mugging, mimicking, liberally using old lines even as she pulled new whoppers out of the ether. Sometimes being with her was like watching fireworks on a small scale. Finally, she'd lean forward to deliver the money line, while fluttering her eyelids, then throw herself backward into her chair, roaring up at the ceiling, as if she were laughing at God.

Then she'd lean forward again, hoping that you might have a story, too, and get the log rolling again.

I swear, she might be the only person who can help get me through these last 33 nerve-wracking days. She would not have taken Sarah Palin lying down. She would laugh her ass off, and do something every day to defeat McCain. She would eat with beloved friends, put people together who simply had to know one another, who might together be able to throw a wrench in McCain's Rube Goldberg machine. She makes me want to move around on the floor with her one more time, standing on her shoes like I used to with my father when I was a little girl, and he was teaching me how to waltz.

-- By Anne Lamot

Why oh Why is Nobody Talking About This?

This is our Annual Federal Discretionary Budget people!!! Does it look balanced to you? It doesn't to me!

The pie chart and the Priorities Campaign are the efforts of the "mavericky" Ben Cohen of Ben and Jerry's fame. I think it is something that should be THE talking point of this year's campaign. Why isn't it?

Another Political Video! yeah!

OK - this one is funny and SO well done! Love the pianist and the final chords!

Brain to Nowhere!

Commonality

The campaigns are getting nasty, the economy is tanking. I'm feeling BLUE.

Remember this?

Hilarity

As you know, I haven't blogged in a while. Been in a post-vacation, Hurrication, power-restoration, McPalin Nation stupor. I find little to laugh at - until NOW....

Sarah Palin Vlog: Debate Prep  (from 236.com)

Video no longer available on 236.com. Probably because it's not funny any longer. We have

MOVED ON!