Top Ten Christmas Books

Now that we've finally entered my absolute favorite season, I've pulled out all our Christmas books (a collection that's ever expanding). I'm always looking for more titles to add (and I have added a few new ones this year), but I also have several stand-bys that I don't think I could ever not read during the Christmas season. So, below, are our Top Ten Christmas Titles (and please feel free to leave a comment recommending a new one for us to try!):

In no particular order...

1. The Story of Holly and Ivy by Rumer Godden, Illustrations by Barbara Cooney
This is one of my all time favorite stories, regardless of the holiday--it never fails to make me ball and then feel all gooey and happy with the world. The story is particularly resonent if you were one of those little girls who had a doll who you truly loved and saw not just as a toy, but a friend. Now, to some who never had that, that might sound a bit creepy, but for those of us who had that sort of attachment, this story will totally touch your heart.

2. The Polar Express written and illustrated by Chris Van Allsburg
This is a true Christmas classic that I have adored since I was a little girl. It's one of those books that is written so well, illustrated so beautifully, that it reaffirms, very easily, your love for illustrated storybooks. This biggest appeal for me in this story is the idea of always believing Santa Claus and never letting your faith in him waiver, even when everyone around you let's go of their own.

3. The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree: An Appalachian Story by Gloria Houston, Illustrated by Barbara Cooney
There is something beautifully simple about Barbara Cooney's illustrations in this book that make the words by Ms. Houston all the more poignant and perfectly sweet. This book never failed to make my mom cry as she read it to me every year, and now, as I read it to my little girl, I shed my own set of tears. While the book is obviously meant for children, there is an undertone in the story about the sacrifices parents make for their children and for each other, and it is those sacrifices that showcase the love and truest meanings behind Christmas.

4. The Wild Christmas Reindeer written and illustrated by Jan Brett
Jan Brett is the queen of Christmas stories and this is my absolute favorite of hers. It's a story about perseverance and friendship, and also tells a good story about how one should approach people (or reindeer) in a cooperative situation. I thought of this story all throughout my student teaching (especially when I was at the high school level) and tried to use it as a metaphor for how I needed to work with my students. On another note, the illustrations are awesome, especially the little side panels that help track the days until Christmas and show off all the hard work Santa's elves are putting in.

5. A Little House Christmas by Laura Ingalls Wilder, Illustrated by Garth Williams
In this little mini-collection you have three stories from three different "Little House" books. It's lovely to capture those sweet moments, when times were simpler, the pleasures somehow smaller but bigger at the same time. These stories bring you to a different place and time, and that is so much fun!

6. Robert Sabuda Pop-Up Books
There is something incredibly whimsical about a pop-up book, and Robert Sabuda's Christmas books are simply amazing. We have three of these and truly enjoy reading them and playing with the very interactive pictures.

7. The Tiny Star, by Arthur Ginolfi, Illustrated by Pat Schories
This is one of the first Christmas books I remember reading as a little girl and my favorite "reason for the season" type books. It's about a tiny star that gets her glow after warming a new born baby in a stable (we can all guess who that baby is, right?). It's so sweet and very subtle in it's message (something I can admire in any form of literature).

8. Santa's Secret Helper, by Andrew Clements, Illustrated by Debrah Santini
I think this book was one of my mom's favorites to read to me (and I enjoyed it, too!). Have you ever wondered how Santa could possibly get to all those houses all over the world in one night? This book has the answer, which it reveals in an ever charming guessing game of who the secret helper could possibly be.

9. The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson, Illustrated by Judith Gwyn Brown
So, while it's a chapter book (a book I plan reading over time with Lizzie when she gets a bit older), it's one of the best books ever because it combines all of my favorite things about childhood literature: fun characters, an interesting plot, and a good, wholesome message (there is not a ton that is terribly wholesome in the world any more, and kids' books, especially Christmas books, are one of those wholesome things that remain).

10. The Littlest Angel by Charles Tazewell, Illustrated by Paul Micich
Are you ready to ball your eyes out, but to feel so incredibly uplifted afterward? This book is...amazing, but it can be so hard to read. The idea is that a little angel boy, who just can't seem to get anything right, is trying to decide what to give the Christ child when he is born. The story is short, but so rich with detail in both the writing and the illustrations, and when you read it (something to read only once a year, on a special night for your family, I think), you will be blown away and filled with such love and appreciation for why we are truly celebrating Christmas.

Top Five

It's that time again! Another prompt from Mama Kat--two weeks in a row! Go me! 

Here is the prompt I chose this week: Five Things. List 5 things we don't know about you, 5 things you're knowledgeable about, 5 things you know nothing about, and 5 things you believe.

Five Things You Don't Know About Me:

(First of all, since I'm one of those open book sorts of people, it's hard for me to come up with this stuff, but I'll give it a whirl.) 

1. I have a little brother with Asperger's Syndrome. It's actually surprising I haven't talked about this before, because the "issues" my brother and family has dealt with has significantly shaped my life (including my meeting my husband), but I haven't yet felt compelled to blog about this. 

2. I was a flaming, unabashed Communist/Anarchist when I was 15. I'm not entirely sure if I knew what either one of those things were, except it meant I kept a notebook filled with that anarchy A symbol and political cartoons that I'd drawn, consisting mostly of conservative political figures hanging themselves. I was such a pleasant teenager. 

3. I won the school-wide geography bee in 6th grade and actually went to the statewide geography bee but went out in the first round. Did you know the capital of South Korea is Seoul? 

4. I seriously considered converting to Judaism in middle school. 

5. I played with American Girl Dolls and Barbies until I was about 15 (when my childhood abruptly ended and I decided I needed to take down the American government). 

Five Things I'm Knowledgeable About:

1. Autism and Asperger's Syndrome. (See #1 above.) 

2. The similarities between John Milton and William Blake (Renaissance poet and Victorian Era poet; both awesome). I wrote a pretty sweet research paper comparing the two. 

3. Nirvana (the band). I spend most of high school convincing myself I was Kurt Cobain reincarnated...despite the fact he died when I was six. 

4. Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. I put these two things together because I don't want to take up the last to spots on my list with my extreme nerdy-ness. 

5. Babywearing. I am the ultimate salesman for all my slings and SSC (soft-structure carrier). 

Five Things I Know Nothing About:

1. Quantum physics. And I so badly want to be an expert. 

2. Seoul, South Korea. 

3. How to parent a little boy (or a teenage girl, for that matter). 

4. Karma Sutra (something DOH would very much like to change). 

5. Twilight (and I'd like to keep it that way...though, I will admit, I did read the entire first book, have forgotten much about it, and, again, would like to keep it that way). 

Five Things I Believe:

1. Karma. It's there, deal with it. 

2. Nothing is black and white, nothing is ever really clear. Life is too fluid for complete certainty on anything, but sometimes you just need to make a decision and go with it. 

3. My family. Together, we're capable of anything. 

4. This world was created with love. By whom or what I'm still pondering (though I've got some ideas), but there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that this is a place made for and with love, we just need to connect ourselves to it. 

5. Santa Claus. I don't care what anyone else says, he's real. 

But Why?

I've made a lot of decisions in my life that have given my mother pause. Making those kinds of decisions have sort of become a past time for me over the past six or seven years. And while she eventually adjusts to the decisions I make (for the most part), she likes to make a bit of noise during the adjustment period.

Now you might wonder why I, a grown adult, cares about what my mom thinks. Well, why does any care about what their mother thinks? Because you love her. Because she birthed you and raised you and took care of you. Because she instilled important values in you from a very young age. Because you respect her opinion.

But sometimes you have respectfully listen to her opinion...then ignore it.

A couple of days ago I wrote about wanting to do a home birth. I know this is an event (if it takes place at all) that is some time off. But time moves quicker than we'd like sometimes, and I've become one of those, as I put it in an e-mail today, one of those weirdo planner people. So, today, I got in touch with a local midwife regarding her policy on doing home births with women who have previously had c-sections. As far as she's concerned, it's a go.

Now, it's not written in stone that the midwife I contacted today will be the midwife I approach several months down the road when I'm potentially pregnant (there are a few in the area and I plan on meeting with everyone to get a feel, though, being one of those "vibe" sort of people, I got a "vibe" with the one I contacted today, so we'll see), but she confirmed for me something I needed to be confirmed before I could go on dreaming about the birth of my next child. I needed to know that a VBAC at home was a least a possible option, if nothing else. And now I have that information and I can rest easy for a bit.

But I don't know if my mom will be able to. I mentioned the idea of a home birth to her tonight. There are certain subjects my mom will shut down on. Tattoos, my sexual history, previous decisions I've made that she's still uneasy about, and current decisions I'm in the process of making that she's uneasy about. Home births fit into the last category.

I mentioned home birth and she sort of shrank into herself. I could almost see the barrier she put up and knew immediately I should have backed off almost before the word, "What?" passed through my lips.

"It just makes me nervous. Is it safe if you've had a c-section? Maybe you should talk to a doctor first."

Translation: "Aw, crap. This AGAIN?!"

You see, whether it's a decision to make a butt-load of cookies or a baby, once I decide I'm going to do something, that I really, really want it, then it happens. (I mean, the one stipulation is that I have to really, genuinely, completely want it, and I have to have a feasible way of doing it--thus far, the option of having a home birth seems entirely feasible and right now it's something I really, genuinely, and completely want.) My mom knows this about me, and you'd think by now she'd just give up and roll with it, but I suppose that would be like asking a fart to not smell (not that I'm implying that my mother's persistence is...fart-like, but I suppose it can be just as annoying, though slightly more endearing).

So, I guess this next part is for my mom and for her desire to worry and argue and try to get me to not only hear her side of the story, but to also completely agree with her. This is my answer to her yet unsaid, "But why?"

Unlike some people who turn to home birth after a c-section, I did not have a horrible experience. In fact, I would say it was a really great experience...considering I was in a place where all I cared about was getting that baby out of me safe and healthy. And for some people, that's all that matters, for whatever reason, and that is totally and absolutely okay. It's great even.

I have become not one of those people.

As I've grown up over the last few years, parented my child, read, watched, listened, I've realized that for me, I want the birth of my next child to be the most intense and emotional experience I can possibly make it. It was difficult for me to muster the emotion I wanted when my daughter was delivered. I was fighting sleep, not unbound excitement, when I saw my child for the first time, because I was so drugged (which was completely necessary, because I was having major surgery at the time). While I didn't have a huge let down, like many women describe after having an unplanned c-section, I've instead had this feeling of slight disappointment eating away at me.

I don't want to say things "went wrong" at Lizzie's birth, because how could they? I was given a healthy and beautiful baby girl. But, in many ways, I feel as though I was NOT a participant in her arrival. I was just the vessel and everyone else did the work.

And therein lies the problem.

For a very long time (like, my entire life), people have done a lot of hard things for me. My dad helped me a lot with hard science projects and math homework. Mom helped me with chores, projects, and other responsibilities. Up until a year ago, family members drove my butt around because I was too chicken to get my driver's license (I was also an incredibly bad driver). Nice things were bought for me. I inherited money to pay for things that we otherwise would have had to save for a very long time for. Even school, where I powered through under my own steam while raising a child and keeping a home, came easily too me. A lot of things have been handed to me or haven't been difficult for me to obtain. And my daughter, who I would not trade for anything under the sun, was also handed to me.

I'm trying very hard to change that. It's nice to have people to help you, but I don't want that help to be my plan A. Going into my first pregnancy I knew (I promise I really, really knew, even if it wasn't what I thought I wanted) that I would have a c-section. A lot of things contributed to this thought process, which I'm not going to go into here, but we'll leave it with the fact that I had that expectation and it only grew stronger as I got closer to my due date and eventual birth of my daughter. Perhaps, subconsciously, I knew this birth would be one more thing that I would have excessive help with.

So, why go over the top and do a home birth rather than just insist, with an OB that I have a VBAC, or even go to a birth center or have a midwife in a hospital? Well, I haven't ruled any of those things out. I may find that for whatever reason, an OB is my only option. Or I may decide that I would prefer to be at a birth center rather than my home. Or I may decide to be at home (and right now, I'd really rather be there). The point is, I want to be in a place where my desire to give birth to my child on my own terms is respected the very most while keeping myself and the baby as safe as possible. At the moment, I do not feel a traditional hospital setting is the most conducive to that IF I'm having a normal, healthy pregnancy. The statistics and my personal experiences simply do not mesh with my current desire to have an unmedicated, midwife attended, vaginal birth. And to me, an unmedicated, vaginal birth is a decision that represents the obtainable goal of me making a plan, figuring out how to execute that plan, and having the outcome benefit both myself and my family.

I know I've written a lot, and I hope that I don't sound ungrateful for the wonderful things I have been given in life, and I hope, as each day passes and I take on more and more responsibilities, I start to earn those wonderful things. I appreciate and love and respect my mother immensely, and I get why she worries. And I hope she knows that I don't resent her or anyone for what I've been given. I simply feel blessed for it all. But now I want to make something for myself, to do it myself, and while there are a million little things I've started to take on by myself, I want to start claiming some bigger things, and this birth, however far off into the future, is one of those big things.

There's No Place Like Home

Have you ever had that feeling of just boiling over with excitement about something? Where your whole body sizzles with an idea and you feel like you're on fire with passion for it.

That is what I'm feeling right now regarding home birth.

NOT a home birth. A good one (thought slightly frustrating), but NOT a home birth. 

Weird thing to get all excited over, but I am really, REALLY excited by the idea.

It's...what I want.

And I know a big part of this excitement has to do with the fact that I am currently having humongous amounts of baby fever. And another part is the fact that I'm currently reading Ina May's Guide to Childbirth and am loving the birth stories (which are making me ball in the middle of the teachers' room at work). But, I think this is genuine excitement fueled by a genuine desire to do something good for myself, my future child, and my family.

This is something I think I can do and I know I want to do.

Of course, in order for one to have a home birth, one needs to be pregnant (which I'm most definitely not), but...but...that could be happening at some point. Soon. Ish. (Or several months from now.) Kind of.

But, regardless of my fetus status, I can't quite get over how enthused I am about home birth. I know I need to do more research. I know I need to make sure DOH is completely on board (I've all ready run it by him, and while he thinks I'm nuts, he's basically said that if it's what I want, then that's what we'll do). I also need to know if it's even financially feasible. BUT, the benefit of not being pregnant right now (and not running the risk of being pregnant any time soon), is that I've got plenty of time to research. And obsess. And enthuse. And blog about it.

:-)

Christmas Yumminess

It is my most favorite, favorite time of year: Christmastime!

With Thanksgiving behind us (which, by the way, was just as relaxing and fun as I had hoped), I finally feel free to really delve into all things Christmas-y.

One of the biggest and oldest staples of this time of year in my family is the baking of the Christmas cookies. My mom and I are sweets junkies and we are especially fond of all the baked goods Christmas tends to produce. While Mom and I are by no means professionals, we make a mean cookie and always have a blast getting together on a weekend to get the baking underway. Usually we spend a weekend trying to get everything baked. It makes for a rather stressful time, and by the end of the weekend we feel exhausted. This year, because I'm living way closer to home (twenty minutes versus an hour and a half!), we've decided to stretch the cookie baking out.

This past weekend we threw together some dough (lemon sugar cookies, regular sugar cookies, chocolate sugar cookies, peanut butter blossoms, and cinnamon reindeer cookies). Next weekend we'll make more cookies and dough and freeze them until the time comes when we distribute cookies to friends and coworkers as gifts of good cheer during this wonderful time of year.

Lizzie with her new apron (and snow boots!), ready to  help bake some cookies!

Lizzie and me!

Lizzie and my mom!

Perhaps next week I'll add some pictures of cookies...don't come back too hungry!

Picture Perfect

Last weekend our friend/amazing daycare provider/photog expert, Megan, took some great pictures of the family. We hadn't ever had our pictures taken as a family by a professional (and Megan certainly is that--she did so awesome) and it had been about three years since we had last had any sort of family shots (at our wedding!). With Christmas fast approaching, I decided this year we would do something different and rather than take some pictures myself (which always end up a bit shoddy) or torturing Lizzie with a trip to the sub-par Wal-Mart picture people, so I asked Megan if she would do our pics.

Well, they came out amazing. I am NOT photogenic (unless I'm doing weird webcam pictures where I can fuss for twenty minutes over how I'm holding my head), but despite my general sort of whale-ish-ness, I felt the pictures came out wonderfully. They were all taken outside of our house, which, I think, makes them that much more special, and I really feel Megan snagged some wicked sweet shots.

I gotta say, we're a pretty cute family :-)

A Traditional Thanksgiving

It's been a while since I've done a prompt from Mama Kat. In honor of the big day tomorrow and my desire to actually write something that isn't about books that I haven't read or the life I wish I had (i.e. the life of a glamorous stay-at-home-mom), here's what I've got:

2.) What traditions do you carry on with your family each year?

This is a year of breaking traditions and starting new ones. A year of finally, finally feeling like we're doing the holiday for our family and not someone else's (though, I suppose our extended family is our family, but you know, it's not quite the same thing--they don't have to deal with the cranky toddler and man after a long and crazy day).

Over the last five years, since DOH and I were first together, we've been battling how to arrange this frenetic time of year. Who's house do we go to? If we go this place at this time, will we be able to go to the other place? Should we eat there and not at the other? Who are we more comfortable offending by not eating their food/not staying quite as long? (Somehow my family seemed to always get the short end of the stick on that one, mostly because they wouldn't get offended, I'd just hear, "I wish you could have stayed a bit longer, Kirsten," fifty-billion times.) And after having Lizzie, it only got that much worse, because, of course, both sides of the family wanted the only grandchild/great-grandchild at their table for her first (and second, and third, and fourth...) Thanksgiving.

The Thanksgiving Day traditions of olde (and I use the "e" to emphasize how old I really mean, like six or seven years ago old, when I still had braces and stuff) were much more Norman Rockwell-esque. I'd force my brother to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade with me. We'd stay in our P.J.'s until noon. Mom would be busy in the kitchen. My dad would be off picking up last minute supplies. Later on, everyone, my parents, brother, grandparents, and a smattering of my aunts and uncles (depending on who was around or what state we were in, Maine or Massachusetts), would gather around the dining room table with every sort of food you could ask for, we would gorge ourselves, then laze about the house, football game on, maybe play a game of Skip-Bo or Phase 10, then around 7 or 8 o'clock the adults would break out the wine and leftovers, gorge once more, and pass out in recliners and on sofas. It may seem small, but it was perfect. I was a weird sort of teenager in that I enjoyed being around my family, even my parents, and I cherish the memories and, even more than that, the feeling of safety, comfort, and happiness that I felt when I was around them on these special days. Plus, it paid off having all those adults loosened up, because I ended up having plenty of spending money when I would hit the stores with my friend in Newburyport, MA the following Saturdays (per tradition) to do some personal Christmas shopping and enjoy Starbucks (which, I swear, we did not have in Maine at the time).

But, as I said from the start, this year is different. It's not going to be like Ye Olde T-Day, where it's one house, one day of relaxation, one awesome freaking parade (which I will MISS for the first time EVER this year). But it's also not going to be the Thanksgiving Marathon and stress-fest it's been in years past. We still go to the two sides of the family, but we've coordinated it in such a way, that we've allotted at least a couple hours at each house and we end the night a mere twenty minutes away from home (as opposed to an hour or more). While those wonderful feelings of safety, comfort, and happiness have been a bit fleeting over the last few years, I can already sense (in an almost a Zen like way), that tomorrow will be different. It will begin a new era of Thanksgiving traditions and Thanksgiving days that Lizzie can look back upon and have the same feelings stir inside her own heart I felt growing up, where she feels the love and comfort of her families and is lucky enough to have the day with both sides.

But could someone please record the parade for me?

I'm Thankful For Books

So, I've read a few more of these books. And a quick note on Wide Sargasso Sea--if you've read Jane Eyre and liked Roderick, chances are, you're not going to like this book.

401. Pilgrimage – Dorothy Richardson
402. The Joke – Milan Kundera
403. No Laughing Matter – Angus Wilson
404. The Third Policeman – Flann O’Brien
405. A Man Asleep – Georges Perec
406. The Birds Fall Down – Rebecca West
407. Trawl – B.S. Johnson
408. In Cold Blood – Truman Capote
409. The Magus – John Fowles
410. The Vice-Consul – Marguerite Duras
411. Wide Sargasso Sea – Jean Rhys I thought this book SUCKED
412. Giles Goat-Boy – John Barth
413. The Crying of Lot 49 – Thomas Pynchon
414. Things – Georges Perec
415. The River Between – Ngugi wa Thiong’o
416. August is a Wicked Month – Edna O’Brien
417. God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater – Kurt Vonnegut
418. Everything That Rises Must Converge – Flannery O’Connor
419. The Passion According to G.H. – Clarice Lispector
420. Sometimes a Great Notion – Ken Kesey
421. Come Back, Dr. Caligari – Donald Bartholme
422. Albert Angelo – B.S. Johnson
423. Arrow of God – Chinua Achebe
424. The Ravishing of Lol V. Stein – Marguerite Duras
425. Herzog – Saul Bellow
426. V. – Thomas Pynchon
427. Cat’s Cradle – Kurt Vonnegut
428. The Graduate – Charles Webb
429. Manon des Sources – Marcel Pagnol
430. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold – John Le Carré
431. The Girls of Slender Means – Muriel Spark
432. Inside Mr. Enderby – Anthony Burgess
433. The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
434. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
435. The Collector – John Fowles
436. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest – Ken Kesey
437. A Clockwork Orange – Anthony Burgess
438. Pale Fire – Vladimir Nabokov
439. The Drowned World – J.G. Ballard
440. The Golden Notebook – Doris Lessing
441. Labyrinths – Jorg Luis Borges
442. Girl With Green Eyes – Edna O’Brien
443. The Garden of the Finzi-Continis – Giorgio Bassani
444. Stranger in a Strange Land – Robert Heinlein
445. Franny and Zooey – J.D. Salinger
446. A Severed Head – Iris Murdoch
447. Faces in the Water – Janet Frame
448. Solaris – Stanislaw Lem
449. Cat and Mouse – Günter Grass
450. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie – Muriel Spark
451. Catch-22 – Joseph Heller I kept a notebook filled with my favorite lines from this book
452. The Violent Bear it Away – Flannery O’Connor
453. How It Is – Samuel Beckett
454. Our Ancestors – Italo Calvino
455. The Country Girls – Edna O’Brien
456. To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee Another book I hated in high school, but I think it had more to do with the teacher
457. Rabbit, Run – John Updike
458. Promise at Dawn – Romain Gary
459. Cider With Rosie – Laurie Lee
460. Billy Liar – Keith Waterhouse
461. Naked Lunch – William Burroughs
462. The Tin Drum – Günter Grass
463. Absolute Beginners – Colin MacInnes
464. Henderson the Rain King – Saul Bellow
465. Memento Mori – Muriel Spark
466. Billiards at Half-Past Nine – Heinrich Böll
467. Breakfast at Tiffany’s – Truman Capote
468. The Leopard – Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
469. Pluck the Bud and Destroy the Offspring – Kenzaburo Oe
470. A Town Like Alice – Nevil Shute
471. The Bitter Glass – Eilís Dillon
472. Things Fall Apart – Chinua Achebe So good!
473. Saturday Night and Sunday Morning – Alan Sillitoe
474. Mrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris – Paul Gallico
475. Borstal Boy – Brendan Behan
476. The End of the Road – John Barth
477. The Once and Future King – T.H. White I've read most of it....
478. The Bell – Iris Murdoch
479. Jealousy – Alain Robbe-Grillet
480. Voss – Patrick White
481. The Midwich Cuckoos – John Wyndham
482. Blue Noon – Georges Bataille
483. Homo Faber – Max Frisch
484. On the Road – Jack Kerouac
485. Pnin – Vladimir Nabokov
486. Doctor Zhivago – Boris Pasternak
487. The Wonderful “O” – James Thurber
488. Justine – Lawrence Durrell
489. Giovanni’s Room – James Baldwin
490. The Lonely Londoners – Sam Selvon
491. The Roots of Heaven – Romain Gary
492. Seize the Day – Saul Bellow
493. The Floating Opera – John Barth
494. The Lord of the Rings – J.R.R. Tolkien Love forever. 
495. The Talented Mr. Ripley – Patricia Highsmith A trip. 
496. Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
497. A World of Love – Elizabeth Bowen
498. The Trusting and the Maimed – James Plunkett
499. The Quiet American – Graham Greene
500. The Last Temptation of Christ – Nikos Kazantzákis
501. The Recognitions – William Gaddis

A Good Read(s)

Here's the next set of books (I haven't read). A lot of these are books or authors I've heard of or have read (Douglas Adams, J. M. Coetzee, Ian McEwan, Toni Morrison), but, I dunno, between required college texts (which seemed to include a lot of pre-Victorian literature) and my own personal love for prolific and slightly epic fantasy series, I haven't gotten around to a lot of the "modern classics." But I have read some of these. Surprisingly.

201. The Beautiful Room is Empty – Edmund White
202. Wittgenstein’s Mistress – David Markson
203. The Satanic Verses – Salman Rushdie
204. The Swimming-Pool Library – Alan Hollinghurst
205. Oscar and Lucinda – Peter Carey
206. Libra – Don DeLillo
207. The Player of Games – Iain M. Banks
208. Nervous Conditions – Tsitsi Dangarembga
209. The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul – Douglas Adams
210. Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency – Douglas Adams
211. The Radiant Way – Margaret Drabble
212. The Afternoon of a Writer – Peter Handke
213. The Black Dahlia – James Ellroy
214. The Passion – Jeanette Winterson
215. The Pigeon – Patrick Süskind
216. The Child in Time – Ian McEwan
217. Cigarettes – Harry Mathews
218. The Bonfire of the Vanities – Tom Wolfe
219. The New York Trilogy – Paul Auster
220. World’s End – T. Coraghessan Boyle
221. Enigma of Arrival – V.S. Naipaul
222. The Taebek Mountains – Jo Jung-rae
223. Beloved – Toni Morrison
224. Anagrams – Lorrie Moore
225. Matigari – Ngugi Wa Thiong’o
226. Marya – Joyce Carol Oates
227. Watchmen – Alan Moore & David Gibbons
228. The Old Devils – Kingsley Amis
229. Lost Language of Cranes – David Leavitt
230. An Artist of the Floating World – Kazuo Ishiguro
231. Extinction – Thomas Bernhard
232. Foe – J.M. Coetzee
233. The Drowned and the Saved – Primo Levi
234. Reasons to Live – Amy Hempel
235. The Parable of the Blind – Gert Hofmann
236. Love in the Time of Cholera – Gabriel García Márquez Good, but weird. The whole May/December relationship between second cousins sort of did me in. 
237. Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit – Jeanette Winterson
238. The Cider House Rules – John Irving
239. A Maggot – John Fowles
240. Less Than Zero – Bret Easton Ellis
241. Contact – Carl Sagan
242. The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood Love. It. Also loved Oryx and Crake. 
243. Perfume – Patrick Süskind
244. Old Masters – Thomas Bernhard
245. White Noise – Don DeLillo Very strange. Probably not a book I would have read on my own had it not been assigned my Freshman year of college. 
246. Queer – William Burroughs
247. Hawksmoor – Peter Ackroyd
248. Legend – David Gemmell
249. Dictionary of the Khazars – Milorad Pavi?
250. The Bus Conductor Hines – James Kelman
251. The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis – José Saramago
252. The Lover – Marguerite Duras
253. Empire of the Sun – J.G. Ballard
254. The Wasp Factory – Iain Banks
255. Nights at the Circus – Angela Carter
256. The Unbearable Lightness of Being – Milan Kundera
257. Blood and Guts in High School – Kathy Acker
258. Neuromancer – William Gibson
259. Flaubert’s Parrot – Julian Barnes
260. Money: A Suicide Note – Martin Amis
261. Shame – Salman Rushdie
262. Worstward Ho – Samuel Beckett
263. Fools of Fortune – William Trevor
264. La Brava – Elmore Leonard
265. Waterland – Graham Swift
266. The Life and Times of Michael K – J.M. Coetzee
267. The Diary of Jane Somers – Doris Lessing
268. The Piano Teacher – Elfriede Jelinek
269. The Sorrow of Belgium – Hugo Claus
270. If Not Now, When? – Primo Levi
271. A Boy’s Own Story – Edmund White
272. The Color Purple – Alice Walker
273. Wittgenstein’s Nephew – Thomas Bernhard
274. A Pale View of Hills – Kazuo Ishiguro
275. Schindler’s Ark – Thomas Keneally
276. The House of the Spirits – Isabel Allende
277. The Newton Letter – John Banville
278. On the Black Hill – Bruce Chatwin
279. Concrete – Thomas Bernhard
280. The Names – Don DeLillo
281. Rabbit is Rich – John Updike
282. Lanark: A Life in Four Books – Alasdair Gray
283. The Comfort of Strangers – Ian McEwan
284. July’s People – Nadine Gordimer
285. Summer in Baden-Baden – Leonid Tsypkin
286. Broken April – Ismail Kadare
287. Waiting for the Barbarians – J.M. Coetzee My first introduction to Coetzee in AP English. We also read Disgraced, which I rushed. 
288. Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
289. Rites of Passage – William Golding
290. Rituals – Cees Nooteboom
291. Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
292. City Primeval – Elmore Leonard
293. The Name of the Rose – Umberto Eco
294. The Book of Laughter and Forgetting – Milan Kundera
295. Smiley’s People – John Le Carré
296. Shikasta – Doris Lessing
297. A Bend in the River – V.S. Naipaul
298. Burger’s Daughter - Nadine Gordimer
299. The Safety Net – Heinrich Böll
300. If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler – Italo Calvino

Gettin' My Cuddle On

For a lot of different reasons, when Lizzie was a baby, we decided to cosleep. It just worked. But then, as she got older, more independent, she moved herself out and into her own space.

And now she's back. It's not every night, and sometimes it's not until the wee hours of the morning (which is convenient for DOH and I, wink, wink, nudge, nudge), but when she climbs up into our bed and snuggles up between us...I can't imagine anything better. Maybe it's because I've been gone so much due to work (something I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about it), but I don't dislike the idea of the "family bed" in the way I thought I might when I first heard about the concept.

But this isn't even really about that.

It's not about a parenting style or choice. It's about having your sweet little one snuggle up next to you, give you kisses and tell you you're, "the best mama." All the cuddling and hugs and kisses and sweet words we missed out over the course of the day are more than made up for in those last moments before sleep. It's about having that physical connection again, especially at an age where you're lucky to get a quick cuddle in before your little Roadrunner sprints off to the next activity.

It's so easy to forget, as we play with and take care of our kiddos, day in and day out, that they're growing, and that they will soon become even less and less available for those squeezy tight hugs and extra wet and earnest kisses.

The things I love best about my daughter will constantly change, but one that never will is her cuddled up next to me, sleeping soundly, knowing she is safe.

Maybe It's Time to Take Care of those Library Fees...

Agh! Just one book! And I feel like such a loser for not having read Hitchhiker.

301. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams
302. The Cement Garden – Ian McEwan
303. The World According to Garp – John Irving
304. Life: A User’s Manual – Georges Perec
305. The Sea, The Sea – Iris Murdoch
306. The Singapore Grip – J.G. Farrell
307. Yes – Thomas Bernhard
308. The Virgin in the Garden – A.S. Byatt
309. In the Heart of the Country – J.M. Coetzee
310. The Passion of New Eve – Angela Carter
311. Delta of Venus – Anaïs Nin
312. The Shining – Stephen King
313. Dispatches – Michael Herr
314. Petals of Blood – Ngugi Wa Thiong’o
315. Song of Solomon – Toni Morrison
316. The Hour of the Star – Clarice Lispector
317. The Left-Handed Woman – Peter Handke
318. Ratner’s Star – Don DeLillo
319. The Public Burning – Robert Coover
320. Interview With the Vampire – Anne Rice
321. Cutter and Bone – Newton Thornburg
322. Amateurs – Donald Barthelme
323. Patterns of Childhood – Christa Wolf
324. Autumn of the Patriarch – Gabriel García Márquez
325. W, or the Memory of Childhood – Georges Perec
326. A Dance to the Music of Time – Anthony Powell
327. Grimus – Salman Rushdie
328. The Dead Father – Donald Barthelme
329. Fateless – Imre Kertész
330. Willard and His Bowling Trophies – Richard Brautigan
331. High Rise – J.G. Ballard
332. Humboldt’s Gift – Saul Bellow
333. Dead Babies – Martin Amis
334. Correction – Thomas Bernhard
335. Ragtime – E.L. Doctorow
336. The Fan Man – William Kotzwinkle
337. Dusklands – J.M. Coetzee
338. The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum – Heinrich Böll
339. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy – John Le Carré
340. Breakfast of Champions – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
341. Fear of Flying – Erica Jong
342. A Question of Power – Bessie Head
343. The Siege of Krishnapur – J.G. Farrell
344. The Castle of Crossed Destinies – Italo Calvino
345. Crash – J.G. Ballard
346. The Honorary Consul – Graham Greene
347. Gravity’s Rainbow – Thomas Pynchon
348. The Black Prince – Iris Murdoch
349. Sula – Toni Morrison
350. Invisible Cities – Italo Calvino
351. The Breast – Philip Roth
352. The Summer Book – Tove Jansson
353. G – John Berger
354. Surfacing – Margaret Atwood
355. House Mother Normal – B.S. Johnson
356. In A Free State – V.S. Naipaul
357. The Book of Daniel – E.L. Doctorow
358. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas – Hunter S. Thompson
359. Group Portrait With Lady – Heinrich Böll
360. The Wild Boys – William Burroughs
361. Rabbit Redux – John Updike
362. The Sea of Fertility – Yukio Mishima
363. The Driver’s Seat – Muriel Spark
364. The Ogre – Michael Tournier
365. The Bluest Eye – Toni Morrison
366. Goalie’s Anxiety at the Penalty Kick – Peter Handke
367. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Maya Angelou
368. Mercier et Camier – Samuel Beckett
369. Troubles – J.G. Farrell
370. Jahrestage – Uwe Johnson
371. The Atrocity Exhibition – J.G. Ballard
372. Tent of Miracles – Jorge Amado
373. Pricksongs and Descants – Robert Coover
374. Blind Man With a Pistol – Chester Hines
375. Slaughterhouse-five – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. There was an awesome inside joke in my AP English class regarding this book.
376. The French Lieutenant’s Woman – John Fowles
377. The Green Man – Kingsley Amis
378. Portnoy’s Complaint – Philip Roth
379. The Godfather – Mario Puzo
380. Ada – Vladimir Nabokov
381. Them – Joyce Carol Oates
382. A Void/Avoid – Georges Perec
383. Eva Trout – Elizabeth Bowen
384. Myra Breckinridge – Gore Vidal
385. The Nice and the Good – Iris Murdoch
386. Belle du Seigneur – Albert Cohen
387. Cancer Ward – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
388. The First Circle – Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
389. 2001: A Space Odyssey – Arthur C. Clarke
390. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? – Philip K. Dick
391. Dark as the Grave Wherein My Friend is Laid – Malcolm Lowry
392. The German Lesson – Siegfried Lenz
393. In Watermelon Sugar – Richard Brautigan
394. A Kestrel for a Knave – Barry Hines
395. The Quest for Christa T. – Christa Wolf
396. Chocky – John Wyndham
397. The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test – Tom Wolfe
398. The Cubs and Other Stories – Mario Vargas Llosa
399. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez
400. The Master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov
401. Pilgrimage – Dorothy Richardson

Why A Kindle Might Be a Good Investment

Here is the next hundred book segment from the list of "1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die". I'm really embarrassed to say I haven't read ANY of the books on this list. I've read quite a bit of Margaret Atwood's books, the same with Ian McEwan, but I haven't gotten to the novels listed here. I also own Thomas Pynchon's novel Vineland, but I haven't gotten around to cracking it open. 

101. Silk – Alessandro Baricco
102. Cocaine Nights – J.G. Ballard
103. Hallucinating Foucault – Patricia Duncker
104. Fugitive Pieces – Anne Michaels
105. The Ghost Road – Pat Barker
106. Forever a Stranger – Hella Haasse
107. Infinite Jest – David Foster Wallace
108. The Clay Machine-Gun – Victor Pelevin
109. Alias Grace – Margaret Atwood
110. The Unconsoled – Kazuo Ishiguro
111. Morvern Callar – Alan Warner
112. The Information – Martin Amis
113. The Moor’s Last Sigh – Salman Rushdie
114. Sabbath’s Theater – Philip Roth
115. The Rings of Saturn – W.G. Sebald
116. The Reader – Bernhard Schlink
117. A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry
118. Love’s Work – Gillian Rose
119. The End of the Story – Lydia Davis
120. Mr. Vertigo – Paul Auster
121. The Folding Star – Alan Hollinghurst
122. Whatever – Michel Houellebecq
123. Land – Park Kyong-ni
124. The Master of Petersburg – J.M. Coetzee
125. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle – Haruki Murakami
126. Pereira Declares: A Testimony – Antonio Tabucchi
127. City Sister Silver – Jàchym Topol
128. How Late It Was, How Late – James Kelman
129. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin – Louis de Bernieres
130. Felicia’s Journey – William Trevor
131. Disappearance – David Dabydeen
132. The Invention of Curried Sausage – Uwe Timm
133. The Shipping News – E. Annie Proulx
134. Trainspotting – Irvine Welsh
135. Birdsong – Sebastian Faulks
136. Looking for the Possible Dance – A.L. Kennedy
137. Operation Shylock – Philip Roth
138. Complicity – Iain Banks
139. On Love – Alain de Botton
140. What a Carve Up! – Jonathan Coe
141. A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
142. The Stone Diaries – Carol Shields
143. The Virgin Suicides – Jeffrey Eugenides
144. The House of Doctor Dee – Peter Ackroyd
145. The Robber Bride – Margaret Atwood
146. The Emigrants – W.G. Sebald
147. The Secret History – Donna Tartt
148. Life is a Caravanserai – Emine Özdamar
149. The Discovery of Heaven – Harry Mulisch
150. A Heart So White – Javier Marias
151. Possessing the Secret of Joy – Alice Walker
152. Indigo – Marina Warner
153. The Crow Road – Iain Banks
154. Written on the Body – Jeanette Winterson
155. Jazz – Toni Morrison
156. The English Patient – Michael Ondaatje
157. Smilla’s Sense of Snow – Peter Høeg
158. The Butcher Boy – Patrick McCabe
159. Black Water – Joyce Carol Oates
160. The Heather Blazing – Colm Tóibín
161. Asphodel – H.D. (Hilda Doolittle)
162. Black Dogs – Ian McEwan
163. Hideous Kinky – Esther Freud
164. Arcadia – Jim Crace
165. Wild Swans – Jung Chang
166. American Psycho – Bret Easton Ellis
167. Time’s Arrow – Martin Amis
168. Mao II – Don DeLillo
169. Typical – Padgett Powell
170. Regeneration – Pat Barker
171. Downriver – Iain Sinclair
172. Señor Vivo and the Coca Lord – Louis de Bernieres
173. Wise Children – Angela Carter
174. Get Shorty – Elmore Leonard
175. Amongst Women – John McGahern
176. Vineland – Thomas Pynchon
177. Vertigo – W.G. Sebald
178. Stone Junction – Jim Dodge
179. The Music of Chance – Paul Auster
180. The Things They Carried – Tim O’Brien
181. A Home at the End of the World – Michael Cunningham
182. Like Life – Lorrie Moore
183. Possession – A.S. Byatt
184. The Buddha of Suburbia – Hanif Kureishi
185. The Midnight Examiner – William Kotzwinkle
186. A Disaffection – James Kelman
187. Sexing the Cherry – Jeanette Winterson
188. Moon Palace – Paul Auster
189. Billy Bathgate – E.L. Doctorow
190. Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
191. The Melancholy of Resistance – László Krasznahorkai
192. The Temple of My Familiar – Alice Walker
193. The Trick is to Keep Breathing – Janice Galloway
194. The History of the Siege of Lisbon – José Saramago
195. Like Water for Chocolate – Laura Esquivel
196. A Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving
197. London Fields – Martin Amis
198. The Book of Evidence – John Banville
199. Cat’s Eye – Margaret Atwood
200. Foucault’s Pendulum – Umberto Eco

All I Wanna Read is You

On Pinterest I found a link to a list of 1001 books you must read before you die. I have no real idea who started the list and whether or not they have any authority in saying what are must reads, but the books that are the list (or what I've read of the list thus far) that I'm familiar with are all pretty amazing books. Anyway, I've decided to go through the list in segments, see what I've read, and then maybe add some more books to my list of "Wanna Reads" (as if I need any more). Finally a simple and fun project that can be quickly/easily accomplished (you'll notice I've offed my other two projects--there's just no time to record everything I'm doing in those two areas!). 


Here is the first 100: 

1. 2000s
1. Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
2. Saturday – Ian McEwan One of my fave McEwan novels
3. On Beauty – Zadie Smith
4. Slow Man – J.M. Coetzee
5. Adjunct: An Undigest – Peter Manson
6. The Sea – John Banville
7. The Red Queen – Margaret Drabble
8. The Plot Against America – Philip Roth Fascinating
9. The Master – Colm Tóibín
10. Vanishing Point – David Markson
11. The Lambs of London – Peter Ackroyd
12. Dining on Stones – Iain Sinclair
13. Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
14. Drop City – T. Coraghessan Boyle
15. The Colour – Rose Tremain
16. Thursbitch – Alan Garner
17. The Light of Day – Graham Swift
18. What I Loved – Siri Hustvedt
19. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – Mark Haddon If you know anyone on "The Spectrum", this is a great read.
20. Islands – Dan Sleigh
21. Elizabeth Costello – J.M. Coetzee
22. London Orbital – Iain Sinclair
23. Family Matters – Rohinton Mistry
24. Fingersmith – Sarah Waters
25. The Double – José Saramago
26. Everything is Illuminated – Jonathan Safran Foer
27. Unless – Carol Shields
28. Kafka on the Shore – Haruki Murakami
29. The Story of Lucy Gault – William Trevor
30. That They May Face the Rising Sun – John McGahern
31. In the Forest – Edna O’Brien
32. Shroud – John Banville
33. Middlesex – Jeffrey Eugenides
34. Youth – J.M. Coetzee
35. Dead Air – Iain Banks
36. Nowhere Man – Aleksandar Hemon
37. The Book of Illusions – Paul Auster
38. Gabriel’s Gift – Hanif Kureishi
39. Austerlitz – W.G. Sebald
40. Platform – Michael Houellebecq
41. Schooling – Heather McGowan
42. Atonement – Ian McEwan The end made me ball my eyes out
43. The Corrections – Jonathan Franzen
44. Don’t Move – Margaret Mazzantini
45. The Body Artist – Don DeLillo
46. Fury – Salman Rushdie
47. At Swim, Two Boys – Jamie O’Neill
48. Choke – Chuck Palahniuk
49. Life of Pi – Yann Martel
50. The Feast of the Goat – Mario Vargos Llosa
51. An Obedient Father – Akhil Sharma
52. The Devil and Miss Prym – Paulo Coelho
53. Spring Flowers, Spring Frost – Ismail Kadare
54. White Teeth – Zadie Smith
55. The Heart of Redness – Zakes Mda
56. Under the Skin – Michel Faber
57. Ignorance – Milan Kundera
58. Nineteen Seventy Seven – David Peace
59. Celestial Harmonies – Péter Esterházy
60. City of God – E.L. Doctorow
61. How the Dead Live – Will Self
62. The Human Stain – Philip Roth
63. The Blind Assassin – Margaret Atwood Margaret Atwood is my hero, and this book rocks my socks
64. After the Quake – Haruki Murakami
65. Small Remedies – Shashi Deshpande
66. Super-Cannes – J.G. Ballard
67. House of Leaves – Mark Z. Danielewski
68. Blonde – Joyce Carol Oates
69. Pastoralia – George Saunders
71. 1900s
70. Timbuktu – Paul Auster
71. The Romantics – Pankaj Mishra
72. Cryptonomicon – Neal Stephenson
73. As If I Am Not There – Slavenka Drakuli?
74. Everything You Need – A.L. Kennedy
75. Fear and Trembling – Amélie Nothomb
76. The Ground Beneath Her Feet – Salman Rushdie
77. Disgrace – J.M. Coetzee I loved this book
78. Sputnik Sweetheart – Haruki Murakami
79. Elementary Particles – Michel Houellebecq
80. Intimacy – Hanif Kureishi
81. Amsterdam – Ian McEwan
82. Cloudsplitter – Russell Banks
83. All Souls Day – Cees Nooteboom
84. The Talk of the Town – Ardal O’Hanlon
85. Tipping the Velvet – Sarah Waters
86. The Poisonwood Bible – Barbara Kingsolver
87. Glamorama – Bret Easton Ellis
88. Another World – Pat Barker
89. The Hours – Michael Cunningham
90. Veronika Decides to Die – Paulo Coelho
91. Mason & Dixon – Thomas Pynchon
92. The God of Small Things – Arundhati Roy
93. Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden
94. Great Apes – Will Self
95. Enduring Love – Ian McEwan
96. Underworld – Don DeLillo
97. Jack Maggs – Peter Carey
98. The Life of Insects – Victor Pelevin
99. American Pastoral – Philip Roth
100. The Untouchable – John Banville

Hanging In There

You may or may not have realized this, but work, apparently, takes up a lot of time. Like, a lot. As does parenting a small child (and dog). Thankfully I'm currently only a part-time wife due to DOH's intense work schedule, leading me to seeing him, like, never. However, I still wind up cleaning up his crap...hmmm... (You'd think with only half the wifely duties I'd only have to clean up half the mess.)

And speaking of messes, there is my house. Or, the house underneath the mess that currently occupies it (Occupy Wall Street, you've got nothing on my dirty laundry). I'm feeling slightly overwhelmed. No body enjoys coming home to a disaster each day, but, also, no enjoys cleaning up a disaster when they've been up since 5:30 AM and aren't getting home until 5 PM. I'm sort of feeling like I'm fighting a battle, and a battle that I'm losing badly.

Now, of course, I tell myself that maybe more would be accomplished if I didn't spend so much time, you know, going on Pinterest (and thereby somehow feeling like a productive person without actually having to do anything) or Facebooking. But, of course, both of those activities require limited energy and I can still play babies with Lizzie at the same time (for the record, I do not Facebook or pin stuff the entire time I play with my kid...just most of it). Plus, I can't cut out the real quality time I spend with my daughter and husband (when he's actually around). The bedtime routine is crucial on so many levels, including ensuring that my kiddo actually sleeps. Cooking and eating a vaguely wholesome dinner is important, too. Even if we can't all make it to the table at the same time, it's nice to have a meal and to sit down and eat and and talk to one another. Those both take up a lot of our evening time (and forget the morning--I'm all ready running around like a crazy person).

I'm just feeling as though I don't have time to do anything else that matters to me. In addition to, like, wanting to clean the house, I'd love to do some projects around here, too. Like finally wallpapering and/or painting the downstairs and upstairs bathroom and hallway. Or working the piece my mom and I started together (super cool, but totally top secret). Or sewing the advent calendar I want to be finished in time for December 1st (yeah, good luck with that one). OR actually writing here, on my blog. There is a whole huge list of things I'd like to be doing but am having limited luck doing. It sorta blows.

Well, before I take up more crucial moments of actual energy, I should go do something...else.

Is anyone else feeling like their precious time has been sucked up by some sort of vortex. (And have I asked this question before? Clearly I need better time management.)

Hello Snowtober!

Well, some of you may have heard about (or experienced!) the little Nor'Easter we got here in New England. Wow, did we get nailed at our house. We woke up this morning to about a foot of snow in our yard, which, by the way, blows away a huge record for snow this early in Maine. White Halloween's are not unheard of here in Maine, but not stuff like this. Some parts of the state reported getting as much as 18 inches (and parts of New Hampshire and Massachusetts reported as much as two feet!).

Anyway, here is how we spent our morning:

I. Am. MAD!!!! Halloween Edition

Okay, so, all three of our pumpkins, including Lizzie's special one from my mom and our jack 'o' lantern are gone. Stolen and smashed on the side of the road.

I am *insert expletive here* livid.

So, so, soooooo freaking mad.

I know it's Halloween. I know it's what some jerk-off, a-hole people do. I know some people think it's funny.

But I don't care.

What kind of idiocy/cruelty does it take to trek down a looooong, completely unlit driveway to someone's house, steal their pumpkins (including a jack 'o' lantern, which, to me, implies there are little kids involved, and you are therefore stealing a young child's pumpkin, which is just plain MEAN), and then pointlessly smash them in the road in front of their driveway.

Honestly, and I'm sorry if this makes me sound totally lame and over the top, but it makes me feel unsafe. If they don't have a problem coming up on my porch, why not in my house?

Again, I know that this can be something that "just happens" this time of year, but it's really disheartening to know that I can't put a fricking pumpkin on my porch without worrying it's going to lure in some jerk who will smash it to pieces.

And poor Lizzie cried forever over it. I'd like to make who ever did this sit and watch a poor little three-year-old girl ball her eyes out, crying for her pumpkins, saying that she'll never be able to have a pumpkin again because they'll "get lost" again.

I AM SO MAD ABOUT THIS!!!!!!

And I know there is nothing to do, so I'm writing this completely pointless blog post, that will solve nothing, but maybe make me feel a little bit better.

Perhaps I'll just leave this note taped to our next jack 'o' lantern:

#8 is sort of my favorite. 

Uh-Yuh

I have a small obsession with accents. There are some I love, some I hate, and I love talking about cultural differences in speech (as you'll see from the beginning of the above video). I was inspired by this blog, which was interesting to read/watch, because the author is Canadian (so there are definitely a few differences in pronunciation). I know my accent probably doesn't come out as strongly in this video, but seriously, you get me going (especially at work), and the New England-y sounds come out. I can't say I have a Mass. accent any more, but my way with words hasn't quite formatted itself to the Mainer ways, so I tend to just say I sound like I'm from New England.

Anyway, go ahead and take a listen and let me know what you think! Oh, and please excuse the sort of creepy internet stalker lighting, my webcam blows.

Maybe A Cool Idea

When my family first moved to Maine, we lived with my grandpa for a year. He lived down a dirt road, where the houses were spread out, most of the neighbors were gone during the year, and the road ended at a nice sandy little beach. If that doesn't sound enough like a kid's dream land, get this: there were these really pretty little paths that snaked through the woods, starting just after my grandpa's house and ending just before the lake. What's more, they were open to the residents of the "neighborhood", so it was perfectly fine for me to run up and down those paths by foot or bike as much as I wanted. They were maybe the coolest part of living with my grandpa (besides, you know, getting living with my grandpa--who is, coincidentally, really cool).

The reason I bring this all up is because I would really love for their to be paths on our property. You see, we have about three acres going here, and while much of it is opened up (and filled with crazy huge gardens that are going to take the rest of my life to tackle), we have nice little swaths of woods that are within our property line on either side of the house. 

Wouldn't it be neat to create a little path that travels along the outskirts of our property, line it with pretty shade-loving plants, and maybe even lanterns and solar-powered string lights? I think that would be so freaking awesome! It also might make us the coolest house to hang out at in the world. It has such a wimsical fairy-Harry Potter-Midsummer's Night Dream groom to it. 

Okay, as if I wasn't convinced before, I am now. We're totally doing this. 

When You Feel Like Caca...

I deem this to be a seasonable suitable picture to describe how I currently feel, though I am not puking.

Do you:

a) Curl up in a ball and cry
b) Tell your husband, even though it's completely unwarranted, that he's a big loser (you even do the whole L on the forehead thing--feel free to start singing "All Star" by Smash Mouth)
c) Call your mom up crying and beg her to take your small child, mostly because you're sick, but also because she ripped your diploma and when you got mad she simply replied that if you put her in time out she'd rip up more of your diplomas (ha, as if).
d) Take it like a woman and just deal and move on with your day.
e) You do a, b, and c and tell anyone who can actually do d they can go take a flying leap.

Yes, yes, I'm proud to say I selected e from that little quiz. Do I get an A or what? I hate feeling like crap, and I hate feeling like crap because I feel like crap even more, if that makes any sense. Basically, I hate succumbing to my weaknesses. I've been sick for about...a month now. Whether it's a persistent bout of colds I'm receiving from my little snot rag friends at school (I say this with love), seasonal allergies, or a combination of all three, at the  moment, I'm left with what could very well be the onset of bronchitis and an ear infection.

Woot.

Now, that all sounds pretty cruddy, and it is. And up until today, I've powered along. I've showed up at work. I've taken care of my family (though the house is in a bit of a decline, mostly because I slog my but home at about 5, cook a meal, then crash somewhere until Lizzie's too tired to play any more, then drag her to bed with me). I've been attempting to help my husband with the house training of our new puppy (some success at this point, but it's been really hard to remain consistent). Anyway, all this requires a lot of energy, of which I do not have a great supply.

So, now, as I begin to see the very rocky bottom of this situation (possibly getting just a tiny bit sicker than I've been so far) these two things occur to me.

1. DOH goes back to work today, rendering him virtually useless until Wednesday night (long 12-hour shifts doing incredibly stressful work--I tend to let him be on work days). 
2. There is a very good possibility my car will not start in the morning. Just sayin'. 

I'm trapped. And alone. 

The alone part (at least I'm alone for now) doesn't bother me so much. Mom came and took Lizzie for the day. I slept for a couple hours (hence how I am able to muster the strength to write this blog post). It's actually kind of nice, though I did end up feeling really bad/guilty when my mom showed up to get Lizzie (who, of course was thrilled to be rid of me). As crazy busy/into things Lizzie is now (it's actually worse than when she was a toddler--the smarty-pants and curiosity factor have been boosted times a million, and she's so independent, so she's into every freaking thing), the house feels empty without her in it. And the car business? Let's just say I'm dumb and it could have been avoided had I taken certain precautions (like stopping to get gas), but I'm sure the situation will resolve itself...somehow. I just don't like the uncertainty of the availability of my car. 

Maybe worst of all, DOH is sick, too. And I want to cuddle when I'm sick. He doesn't want to be touched. We spent a half an hour of me slowly trying to rest my arm across his chest or trying to snuggle up to him, and him then pushing me a way, saying, "Stop. Watch this show with me." Larry the Cable Guy? He can git himself done (that sounded way wittier in my  head...). Somehow DOH thinks watching a comedy special with him is the same as being tenderly wrapped in his arms. Not so much. 

Okay, well, now that I've hacked my brains out and can see that according to the clock I have now let enough time go by that I can use my inhaler (thank goodness for drugs), I'm going to go do that. 

If you don't hear from me soon, assume I've been affixiated (I really feel like this is a word, but spell check keeps telling me otherwise--I am choosing to ignore)  by my own windpipe. 

What I've Never Done

Here's a prompt (I haven't done one in a while) from Mama Kat.

I'm 23 years old.
And I've never:

1. Left the United States (sad, I know

2. Eaten a kumquat

3. Gone surfing

4. Read Gone with the Wind

5. Appeared on television 

6. Spoken a foreign language fluently

7. Occupied Wall Street

8. Remained unshowered for longer than a day

I'm pretty sure this is my mother-in-law

9. Permed my hair

10. Seen Forrest Gump

11. Supported the New York Yankees

12. Gotten into a fist fight

13. Been to the top of Mt. Washington

14. Made fudge successfully

15. Been to Disney World or Land

16. Gone clubbing

17. Peed in public (like, in the open--I use public restrooms all the time)

18. Lived on my own

19. Been tattooed 

20. DIY'ed a really cool project

21. Served in a political office

22. Purchased a gigantic chicken