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Women’s Writer Meme

4 Comments / Meme, Reading Lists /

The first Literary Luna-day was held today! Yea for Literary Luna-days!  I wonder what next week’s will be… I guess we should work on this week’s before we start thinking about that, shouldn’t we?  This one is the Women Writers Meme!  Just BOLD those you’ve read, ITALICIZE the ones you’ve been meaning to read and ??? the ones you have never heard of.

Allcott, Louisa May–Little Women
Allende, Isabel–The House of Spirits
Angelou, Maya–I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Atwood, Margaret–Cat’s Eye
Austen, Jane–Emma
Bambara, Toni Cade–Salt Eaters
??Barnes, Djuna–Nightwood
de Beauvoir, Simone–The Second Sex
Blume, Judy–Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret
Burnett, Frances–The Secret Garden
Bronte, Charlotte–Jane Eyre
Bronte, Emily–Wuthering Heights
Buck, Pearl S.–The Good Earth
Byatt, A.S.–Possession
Cather, Willa–My Antonia
Chopin, Kate–The Awakening
Christie, Agatha–Murder on the Orient Express
Cisneros, Sandra–The House on Mango Street
Clinton, Hillary Rodham–Living History
Cooper, Anna Julia–A Voice From the South
Danticat, Edwidge–Breath, Eyes, Memory
Davis, Angela–Women, Culture, and Politics
Desai, Anita–Clear Light of Day
Dickinson, Emily–Collected Poems
Duncan, Lois–I Know What You Did Last Summer
DuMaurier, Daphne–Rebecca
Eliot, Geroge–Middlemarch
Emecheta, Buchi–Second Class Citizen
Erdrich, Louise–Tracks
Esquivel, Laura–Like Water for Chocolate
Flagg, Fannie–Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe
Friedan, Betty–The Feminine Mystique
Frank, Anne–Diary of a Young Girl
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins–The Yellow Wallpaper
Gordimer, Nadine–July’s People
Grafton, Sue–S is for Silence
Hamilton, Edith–Mythology
Highsmith, Patricia–The Talented Mr. Ripley
hooks, bell–Bone Black
Hurston, Zora Neale–Dust Tracks on the Road
Jacobs, Harriet–Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
??Jackson, Helen Hunt–Ramona
Jackson, Shirley–The Haunting of Hill House
Jong, Erica–Fear of Flying
Keene, Carolyn–The Nancy Drew Mysteries (any of them)
Kidd, Sue Monk–The Secret Life of Bees
Kincaid, Jamaica–Lucy
Kingsolver, Barbara–The Poisonwood Bible
Kingston, Maxine Hong–The Woman Warrior
Larsen, Nella–Passing
L’Engle, Madeleine–A Wrinkle in Time
Le Guin, Ursula K.–The Left Hand of Darkness
Lee, Harper–To Kill a Mockingbird
Lessing, Doris–The Golden Notebook
Lively, Penelope–Moon Tiger
Lorde, Audre–The Cancer Journals
Martin, Ann M.–The Babysitters Club Series (any of them)
McCullers, Carson–The Member of the Wedding
McMillan, Terry–Disappearing Acts
Markandaya, Kamala–Nectar in a Sieve
Marshall, Paule–Brown Girl, Brownstones
Mitchell, Margaret–Gone with the Wind
Montgomery, Lucy–Anne of Green Gables
Morgan, Joan–When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost
Morrison, Toni–Song of Solomon
Murasaki, Lady Shikibu–The Tale of Genji
Munro, Alice–Lives of Girls and Women
Murdoch, Iris–Severed Head
Naylor, Gloria–Mama Day
Niffenegger, Audrey–The Time Traveller’s Wife
Oates, Joyce Carol–We Were the Mulvaneys
O’Connor, Flannery–A Good Man is Hard to Find
Piercy, Marge–Woman on the Edge of Time
Picoult, Jodi–My Sister’s Keeper
Plath, Sylvia–The Bell Jar
Porter, Katharine Anne–Ship of Fools
Proulx, E. Annie–The Shipping News
Rand, Ayn–The Fountainhead
Ray, Rachel–365: No Repeats
Rhys, Jean–Wide Sargasso Sea
??Robinson, Marilynne–Housekeeping??
Rocha, Sharon–For Laci
Sebold, Alice–The Lovely Bones
Shelley, Mary–Frankenstein
Smith, Betty–A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Smith, Zadie–White Teeth
Spark, Muriel–The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
Spyri, Johanna–Heidi
Strout, Elizabeth–Amy and Isabelle
Steel, Danielle–The House
Tan, Amy–The Joy Luck Club
??Tannen, Deborah–You’re Wearing That?
Ulrich, Laurel–A Midwife’s Tale
Urquhart, Jane–Away
Walker, Alice–The Temple of My Familiar
Welty, Eudora–One Writer’s Beginnings
Wharton, Edith–Age of Innocence
Wilder, Laura Ingalls–Little House in the Big Woods
Wollstonecraft, Mary–A Vindication of the Rights of Women
Woolf, Virginia–A Room of One’s Own

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Booking Through Thursday

Favorites, Meme /

Booking Through Thursday

This week’s questions were suggested by Kim.

  1. Do you have a favorite character(s)? Again with the favorites? A million favorites! Today let’s go with Dexter!
  2. What book/author is he/she/it from? Darkly Dreaming and Dearly Devoted
  3. Why do you like this person–what is it about the way he/she was written that drew you to them? He’s a good kind of evil, sort of like me
  4. Is there something more you would like the author to tell you about them? Of course but I can wait for future installments of the Dexter series to have all of my questions answered!

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Daily Dose of Questions – Chickens

10 Comments / Questions and Answers /

I don’t own chickens.  I’ve never owned chickens. In fact the only chicken experience I have had is with Mr Jones’ chickens and that experience isn’t something I’d consider to be "good experience".

Mr Jones and his family moved into the Reverand and the Piano Teacher’s house (after they moved out) which was next door to my house growing up.  It was a good neighborhood, mostly.  Normal suburban 3.5 kids, 2 cars in the drive and stay at home moms.  No farm animals except at the farm which was on the fringe of the neighborhood. 

Mr Jones brought some of those big metal barrels to his backyard and after awhile we realized what he was doing with those barrels.  He was turning them into houses for his chickens and his one lone, very loud, rooster.  The neighborhood was not pleased with Mr Jones and his chickens.  My parents weren’t thrilled either.  Property values and stuff. But they weren’t willing to sign any petitions or do whatever it is you did back in the 70’s when one of your neighbors brought home chickens.  I was willing to sign that darn petition though because my bedroom was very close to Mr Jones backyard and that rooster was loud.  And I was a teenager who liked to sleep past 6am every now and then.  (Now that I think about it, Mr Jones and his rooster might be the reason why I can rarely sleep past 6am now!  I wonder if the dude still lives there?  I should go and tell him how his rooster totally ruined my sleep, for life!)

Anyway, that’s it.  My only chicken experience.  Growing up in a middle class subdivision with Mr Jones and his chickens next door. 

The reason I’m telling you about Mr Jones and my lack of chicken experience is because I have noticed an alarming trend in blogs.  All of you people in the blogosphere seem to have chickens!  And I don’t!  I’ve never had them.  (TW would like to have some but ummm no)   I’m wondering if you have to have more chicken experience than I have in order to be a real blogger.  Am I going to have to give in to TW’s chicken dreams in order to be accepted amongst you amazing chicken owning bloggers?   Do you chicken blogging people still like me, even if I don’t do chickens? 

I wonder if podcasters have chickens.  Maybe I should try my hand at podcasting instead?

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Tithe

2006, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale was a nice little young adult DARK fantasy novel. A pixie changling, black knights, some faery queens, kelpies and just about any other fae being you can think of are included here. Completely fun and probably a little scarey at times for young readers just venturing into DARK fantasy faerie worlds. Oh and there’s some gay boy stuff tossed in for good measure, too. Pay attention the DARK descriptive I keep using. It is dark. This is not a light-hearted aren’t the faeries cute sort of tale. There’s a line about how the sunset looks like slit wrists in the bathtub, a pretty dumb but interesting line and an example of the type of “shock” writing in here.

This isn’t a series but there is another by the same author called Valiant: A Modern Tale of Faerie. I guess I’ll try and reserve that at the library too.

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Daily Dose of Candy – Twizzler Tweeterz

2 Comments / Foodie, Holidays /

twizzlertweeterz.jpgI like Twizzlers. I like them quite a bit. Only the regular flavor Twizzlers, none of the funny flavors. I’m a Twizzler purist. TW often buys me “new” Twizzler products and I don’t really like them. The most recent “new” Twizzler purchase is unfortunately on the “I don’t really like them” list, too. It’s unfortunate because they had potential. Sort of a combination of Twizzler Nib (though the pieces are smaller than Nib size) and jelly beans. But no, the combination doesn’t work.

twizzlers_001.jpgFirst problem is that the coating is all cracked and grainy. Maybe that’s due to our Floridian existance, it was 97 in the car yesterday. Do you folks up north where it’s freezing have cracked and grainy Tweeterz shells? The next problem is that it’s overkill. Too much sweetness. What I like about Twizzlers is they are sweet but not too sweet. Adding the jelly bean coating was too much for me.

Another blogger doesn’t agree with my assessment. HMPH!

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Daily Dose of Starbucks – Blackberry

9 Comments / Coffee & Tea /

I’ve been looking forward to today for quite some time because today was the official launch of the Starbucks Blackberry Frappuccino.  YUK!  No I haven’t tried it, the YUK! comes from the tasting of the Green Tea Frappe last summer.  I cannot imagine the Blackberry is going to improve on that so YUK!

You’re probably wondering why I’ve been looking forward to this launch since I’ve said YUK! three times already.  I’ve been looking forward to it because of the Blackberry syrup.  I have wanted to try the Blackberry syrup in all of the iced tea/lemonade drinks because I think THAT would not be YUK!  And I was right!

Mikey made me a tall Green Tea Lemonade with Blackberry syrup and it was good.  Tomorrow I will ask a barrista to make me a tall Passoinfruit Lemonade with Blackberry syrup and I bet it will be good, too.  I think TW is going to try the Green Tea Blackberry Frappe so I’ll get to taste it and tell you it’s YUK! from experience.  Check back tomorrow for that riveting review.

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Daily Dose of Stuff – Monday

1 Comment / Monday Meme /

Monday_1

The real question is not necessarily what’s this doing in my house because we do have children and children have stuffed animals.  The real question probably isn’t even what’s this doing in my bedroom either since both TW and I have stuffed animals in here that belong to us.  The question is a combination of the two with emphasis on "this"… What is THIS doing in my house?  It’s here because my darn daughter has not managed to get pregnant yet.  I can’t really complain much since up until a few months ago I’d have had a fit if she’d called to tell me she was pregnant.  And almost immediately after I’d given my blessing, the sperm donor headed off to Baghdad or wherever it is he’s playing with guns in the heat for the president.

OK so the elephant is not directly related to pregnancy except that TW and I saw him at Walmart in December of 2004 and I did not buy him.  I almost immeidately felt regret but when we next went to Walmart, it was gone.  A year goes by and Michelle and I did our mommy and me Christmas shopping trip and there it was at Walmart.  I bought it.  And I’ve pretty much regretted it ever since because the thing is big.  And it takes up a lot of room.  And it looks at you with those weird eyes.  And it’s a reminder that I’m still not a grandmother nor likely to be one soon and that stinks because then I start thinking I should just have my own baby and forget about grandchildren.  And that idea also stinks.  So, what IS this elephant doing in my house????

Looks like I’m first this week – where is Lee?  Why aren’t you blogging about weird stuff that is in your house?

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The Understudy

2 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Chick Lit, Fiction /

The Understudy was a cute little bit of fluffy chicklit – if the main character is a man, can it still be chick lit???? It’s was an “understudy” sort of book – a not great but waiting in the wings to go on, perfectly acceptable sort of book. I liked the ending. Boy didn’t really get the girl. Boy didn’t get his big break and become the star he always knew he could be. No nice neat ending.

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Daily Dose of Life – Update

7 Comments / 101 Things /

April snuck up on me.  I wonder if these monthly updates of my 101 Things to do in 1001 Days list will fall by the wayside sooner rather than later?  Maybe monthly is too often?  But if I stop doing it monthly, will I just stop trying to stick with the list?   I don’t know but it’s something else to think about it.

Not a huge lot of progress this month unless you call donating an awful lot of money to charity, painting RJ’s room and quitting smoking progress.  I’m not sure that I do.  None of those things seem all that unusual or surprising and in the scheme of things, not all that difficult.  (The whining about nicotine is purely cosmetic, I wouldn’t want anyone who has struggled with qutting to feel like I’m in some way superior because I didn’t struggle, hahahaha!)

I am pondering the whole "read classics" thing.  I realized a couple of weeks ago that I don’t really know what that item means to me.  I’m not sure whether I want to read classics I’ve never read before, re-read old favorites, re-read classics that I hated. I’m not even sure how I define the genre "classics".    I’ve got a bunch of "classics" reading lists to look at to try and figure it out.  In other words, I’m dragging my feet on that whole classics thing while I define for myself what it means.  I’m good at dragging my feet on things and even better at justifying the dragging.

This month I suspect we will see the RJ dresser completed, J’s room will be painted, more non-fictions will be read and more money donated.  I’m not sure about any others. 

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Daily Dose of Diet – Lentils

6 Comments / Diet and Exercise, Foodie /

Last week TW sent me this link to Red Lentil Soup.  My reaction was YUK.  I don’t much care for lentils and I really really hate soup.  TW said, Yea I know but it’s something different.  So I saved the link.  On Monday I AIMed TW and asked her what she wanted for dinner this week, she said that "Slashfood lentil thing".  I sighed and made sure to add all of the necessary ingredients to my shopping list and made sure to include that "Slashfood Lentil thing" in the menu when Michelle and I created it.

Yesterday was suppose to be that "Slasfhood Lentil thing" but I couldn’t face it.  I’d already cooked once with Michelle, cleaned up that mess, helped her with a truly messy chemistry experiment, cleaned up that mess and dealt with Michelle and the sewing maching.  I told TW I couldn’t face the "slashfood lentil soup" and she said "Huh? I hate soup and I hate lentils! Why are we having lentil soup???" I sent her the link, sent her the AIM log where she specifically said "that lentil thing" and we argued about it a bit and laughed about it a lot more.  And then, we had avocado salad sandwiches instead (they were good but I went overboard with the jalapenos a wee bit). 

Today we had the "Slashfood Lentil thing" and even though it absorbed more of the liquid than it should have and became that "red lentil thing" and really not "red lentil soup" at all, it was good.  We wanted flatbread to go with but Publix had none so we just got pita instead.   A definite success.  Particularly because we don’t like lentils or soup.

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