Tag: random

Hump Day Happy — Late Edition

This has not been my day to do anything with photos, computers, or cameras, so I’m very late posting. I found something absolutely scrumptious on Flickr. If you want to see an iconic group of Barbies, including the delectable Audrey Hepburn, check out madalosso.laura’s Icons set.

People’s ability to create something fabulous for Barbie always awes me. I felt it on Sunday night when I saw Mark’s Oscar dress for Figaro, and again when I saw Timothy’s latest creation for Nikki. In person, Tim’s classic design gives the illusion of constant movement.

 

Nikki has agreed to be a doll and find you something from this book to be happy about if you comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25.

Hump Day Happy: Frog Version

I could use something to be happy about–even if it’s something YOU get to be happy about. So please comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25, and let the Great Circle of Frogs croak out an answer for you from this book. After all, legend has it that the frog brings happiness, good luck, joy, change, and prosperity.

 

A fountain grows in the Bronx

German romantic poet Christian Johann Heinrich Heine died on this date in 1856. A figure of religious and political controversy, Heine lived a fascinating life. The Lorelei fountain designed in his honor, originally intended to be placed in Düsseldorf, ended up in NYC’s Joyce Kilmer Park in the Bronx.

One of Heine’s more famous quotes is displayed in the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum in Jerusalem and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: Where they burn books, they will ultimately also burn people.

I must confess, however, that my favorite of his quotes was in his will, in which he left his entire estate to his wife only in the event that she remarry, so that “there will be at least one man to regret my death.”

Delayed Hump Day Happy

This right here is someone I like to call Oh No, I Would NEVER Keep You Awake All Night With My Crying and Barking.

Tyson sleeps in a crate at night because he can’t be trusted not to make an appetizer of electrical cords. This is never a problem at Tim’s. Thursday night when Tim went in the hospital, Tyson and Rex stayed at Tim’s with Greg, and Greg said Rex was fine, but Tyson had a little trouble falling asleep. Since Tyson was going to adoption day on Saturday, we moved his crate over here and he spent Friday night with us. He whimpered a few times, but nothing serious. Saturday night, I didn’t put them in their crates until 4 a.m., and they were too tired to care. Sunday night, Tyson barked and cried all night long, so Monday night, I just shut all four dogs in the room with us and let them sleep uncrated because I was too exhausted to listen to him.

When I told Tim what was going on, he said Tyson was upset because he couldn’t SEE us. So we moved Rex’s and Tyson’s crates into our bedroom, intending to let the boys sleep in their crates and Margot and Guinness sleep with us (as usual). This left us with only a small path to move through our bedroom, plus we have to keep one of the bedroom doors closed to make room for a super size crate. But we don’t care because it worked. The barking and crying stopped.

Now Rex and Tyson actually want to get in their crates, but they keep getting taken over by squatters. Today, I intended to do a bunch of stuff, including taking a nap. Guinness and Margot stretched out together in Rex’s crate, Rex curled up against my back, and Tyson had my legs pinned down in case I tried to escape.

He needn’t have worried. When I went to the hospital early this morning, Tim looked fantastic. While I was there, they moved him out of ICU and into a room. He’s on serious pain medication and is very sleepy, so I’m staying away in hopes that he can get rest. He’s doing really, really well. Later, I’m taking back his gum, Jolly Ranchers, phone charger, jammies of his own to wear, and whatever else will fit in my backpack.

Yesterday, I spent most of the day looking at this:

Except sometimes when the door would open and I’d see things like this:

Tim isn’t visible behind a curtain at the end of that long hall, but I could see his anesthesiologist and assistants giving him his thoracic epidural. A few vertebrae lower, and he could have given birth.

Speaking of babies…

That’s the baby from the King Cake Greg brought us last week from New Orleans. They can no longer put the baby IN the cake (lawsuits!), so they sort of stick it under the cake. Anyway, I didn’t eat so many slices of King Cake because it was delicious and I’m a hog. I did it to find the baby. Except Greg found it. Now the baby can find YOU something to be happy about–OTHER than Tim’s recovery and Tyson’s restful nights–from this book if you comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25.

Hump Day Happy

I once worked with a woman who loved and collected giraffes. But she pronounced the word with a long “i”: gEYEraffe. The rest of us would talk to her about giraffes, always pronouncing their name correctly, but that never fazed her. They remained gEYEraffes. It actually became kind of endearing after a while, so from time to time I pronounce them that way myself. Who knows; maybe giraffes prefer it.

If you want this gEYEraffe to look in this book and find you a reason to be happy in the middle of your work week, please comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25. And if you wish, you can tell me about mispronunciations you hear and like.

 

Hump Day Happy

When I graduated from college in the Middle Ages or whenever that mythical time was, it took me several months to find a job. Those were months I finally got to read as much as I wanted. If I’d liked a novel by an author I studied, I’d buy every piece of his or her writing I could find and immerse myself in it.

John Updike was one of the Johns from that time in my life: Irving, Cheever, Steinbeck, Knowles. Though some of my classmates took issue with Updike’s portrayal of women, I always felt he was one of those writers who held up a mirror for his readers. If we didn’t like what we saw, the flaw wasn’t Updike’s, but perhaps a reflection a little too precise for comfort.

What I most particularly liked about Updike was that I never felt any story was over. Certainly with his characters Harry Angstrom in the Rabbit books and Henry Bech, there was more story there, and time taught me I could count on Updike to tell it. Even for those stories he didn’t continue into other novels, his characters stuck around, giving me plenty to think about.

Like his novels, his short stories were beautifully crafted, making them not only a pleasure to read but a joy to teach. Though John Updike died on Tuesday from lung cancer at age 76, his work will keep him alive for generations.

If I’m correct, Updike was one of the writers who refused to believe that books are dead. I mean actual physical books that you can buy in a bookstore or check out from a library or keep on a shelf in your home. That which you can hold in your hands and smell its ink and test its binding and run the tips of your fingers over its paper.

Maybe I’m a dinosaur, because I still want books in my life. I like knowing I can walk into my living room right now and take out Rabbit, Run or Rabbit is Rich, and for a time, I can not only lose myself in Updike’s world, I can also connect in a tangible way with the girl I was at twenty-two who first turned those pages.

I see how books on tape, online publishing, or electronic devices like Kindle can keep reading a part of people’s busy, busy lives. I can even envision myself using something like Kindle for books I want to read once and don’t want taking up my very limited shelf space.

But… Today’s the birthday of one of my favorite artists, Jackson Pollock. I’m lucky that I can find paintings of his online that I’ll never be able to see in person. I’m even luckier that I own a book full of photographs of his paintings, because I like that book’s heft and its vivid photography. But nothing can compare to actually standing in front of a Pollock painting, seeing it whole and large and vivid, or stepping close and honing in on a one-by-one-inch square if that’s what I want to do. Sharing the same space with that painting is the closest thing I’ll ever have to standing inside a barn and watching the artist reach for cans of paint, and with deliberation and intent, pour them on canvas.

Holding a book in my hand is not only like holding a piece of art, but it makes me feel more connected to those moments when keys clicked or pen scratched paper and the writer created. Those pages, that binding, that ink–they are the tangible connection between the writer and me, and I want that connection with my favorite books.

In honor of my book-loving, dinosaur ways, this little guy is ready to get all wound up and find for you, if you comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25, something to be happy about from this book:

 

 

Thanks to codyfrizbeejr for the dinosaur.

I have to do this…

…it was the only way I could get something made by ‘Nathan.

So:

The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you.
This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

I make no guarantees that you’ll like what I make.
What I create will be with you in mind.
It’ll be done this year.

You have no clue what it’s going to be. Right now, neither do I.
I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.

The catch is that you put this in your journal as well. We all can make stuff.

ETA: Comments are now screened since I’ve gotten responses. And eventually you, my responders, will get your Becky-created items. Thanks for playing!

Hump Day Happy

Sir Tyson, who is fostered by Timothy through the amazing rescue organization Scout’s Honor,
is happy when surrounded by toy carnage.

Tyson will gladly find YOU something to be happy about from this book if you comment with a page number between 1 and 611, and another number between 1 and 25. Unless, you know, you hate dogs, happiness, and America.

Button Sunday

Writers take note: Mercury goes retrograde today. Googling “Mercury retrograde” can give you a lot of information about how that may affect you and your work. This year there’ll be four, instead of three, periods of Mercury retrograde:

Mercury turns retrograde January 11th, 2009 at 8 Aquarius
Mercury turns direct February 1st, 2009 at 21 Capricorn

Mercury turns retrograde May 7th, 2009 at 2 Gemini
Mercury turns direct May 31st, 2009 at 22 Taurus

Mercury turns retrograde September 7th, 2009 at 6 Libra
Mercury turns direct September 29th, 2009 at 21 Virgo

Mercury turns retrograde December 26th, 2009 at 21 Capricorn
Mercury turns direct January 15th, 2010 at 5 Capricorn