Daily Dose of Life – 101 Things Update

3 Comments / 101 Things /

July has arrived and that means it is time to review.  June was a much busier month for my 101 things. That’s good because May’s inactivity made it seem like I might as well give up on this idea completely. 

The biggest and most important accomplishment – I READ THE MOONSTONE! FINALLY!  And I lived to tell about it!  I can die tomorrow with the list unfinished and be happy!

The blogroll got another update – I’m doing ok with this once a month update thing.  It’s still not a good solution, but it’s at least a solution.

I tried to call my brother…. doesn’t that count for something?  OK fine, I will try again and succeed before I add a little "1" to the list.  You people are tough.

Lots of new restaurants, I need to look back over the month and count them.  Lots of non-fiction and some audio books, too.  Again, I need to count those and update.  Did we go to a museum? It seems like we might have but, ummm I should have reviewed my calendar and my blogs before starting this update, eh?

We took the kids to St Augustine and do you think the Coral Castle is an unusual roadside attraction? I’m thinking it is.

July looks like it will be another good month for the 101 list, knock on wood.

How is your list coming?  Link me so I can go peek!

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Four and Twenty Blackbirds

2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Mystery, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

It’s official. I’m back to avoiding my Summer Reading Challenge list and doing a darn good job of it. Four and Twenty Blackbirds by Cherie Priest was an excellent read.

I believe this was recommended to me by someone I know at work who recently moved to Florida. She was compiling a stack of books set in Florida and this was one of them. I think that’s how I discovered it. I certainly had never been to the author’s blog, I would have remembered that.

I thought this was a young adult book, for some reason. Probably the cover art, which is interesting but with the blackbird and the headless women, just feels like a kid book, ya know? Well it isn’t, though I am betting there are some teens around here who would enjoy it.

The reviews on the back suggested this was a really creepy read and it would give you goosebumps. Well, I didn’t find it that scarey. (Why do reviewers feel the need to exagerate?

So, the story, let’s see… a line of women, they “have magic on them”, voodoo or sorcery (whichever you prefer), John Gray and the St Augustine priests. A bad guy named Malachi who wasn’t so much bad as misled and a wee bit nuts. Chattanooga, Macon, St Augustine and the swamps of south Florida. Go read it.

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The Crucible

2 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Classics, Fiction /

I’m on a roll and I like it! I finished book five from my summer reading challenge list – The Crucible!

I’m surprised that I’ve never read it and never seen a performance (either a play or a movie). I liked it and now am considering watching a movie, though I’d prefer to see a play. I wonder if any high schools will do it this year.

I’m really not a big Arthur Miller fan but this one redeemed him for me.

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Adam & Eve

5 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

Thank you Sassymonkey! Thank you for choosing such a good book for me to “steal” from your Summer Reading Challenge.

I like Mark Twain but have never read The Diaries of Adam & Eve before. I loved it all and cannot believe I have never read it. What was I waiting for? Very amusing, very Twain-like, very sweet. Very good. I even enjoyed the foreword and afterword and that never happens.
This was the fourth book from my Summer Reading Challenge, now onto number five!
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Valiant

2006, Children's Literature, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

Valiant, by Holly Black, was not nearly as good as Tithe. It tried but it just didn’t succeed – until the last few chapters. Those did make it worth reading.

As TW said, it felt like I’d read it before. The storyline was a little tired – bad thing happens to a girl, she runs off to NYC and finds some troubling people who take her in. Drugs (granted, these are faerie drugs) and crime and in the end, happily ever after.

I liked Val. I liked the Troll. I even liked Luis and Dave and Lolli and Ruth. The story was just a little tired. It’s a young adult novel though, so maybe 13 year olds haven’t already read a zillion of these stories? Maybe they don’t notice the same tired storyline? Maybe they simply see a modern faerie tale?

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Daily Dose of Summer – Coffee

3 Comments / Coffee & Tea /

I have been looking forward to summer for months. Since late January, actually. Summer officially arrived on Monday. Starbucks says so.
As much as I have enjoyed trying all of the Boca Java Bloggersfuel coffees, I have been looking forward to the arrival of Gazebo more. Last Thursday when Alex, a nice boy barrista I know, told me it would finally be in on Monday, I was THRILLED beyond belief.

TW and I happened to be standing at the counter waiting for our coffee on Monday morning when the delivery dude pushed his way passed us with his cart full of Starbucks boxes. It took me about 15 seconds and then I said MY GAZEBO is here! Little miss nutrition major barrista tried to ignore me and pretend like she didn’t know what I was TALKING about. She tried to PRETEND like she wasn’t going to rip those boxes open for me and sell me a bag right that red hot minute. She’s a mean girl and I will never dream about her and my sister going shopping together again – that will teach her, won’t it?

She was only mean for a minute and then she wiggled boxes around and wiggled more boxes around and found the one I needed. She ripped it open. She handed it to me. I bought it with my trusty Starbucks card (thus leaving me $2 short for our daily coffee on the card but what the heck) and I took my bag home happily.

I didn’t rush right home and make a pot. I finished the last of the Boca Java, a blend I did not really enjoy and TW hated the smell of. Today, however, I am making my Gazebo. And I am excited. What a perfect way to end June and kick off the very long and crazy month of July.

I wish Starbucks understood that summer doesn’t start in July for those of us in the southeastern part of the US of A. I wish Starbucks understood that and respected our needs and shipped our Gazebo in, oh let’s say, MARCH.

Now I’m off to enjoy my cup and listen in on a phone conference. Mmmmm summer.

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Daily Dose of Cupcake Toppers

Cupcake Toppers /

In honor of both Canada Day and Fourth of July, you get two cupcake toppers this week, yippeee! That’s your kind of celebration, isn’t it?

maplecandy.jpgFor the Canadians, you can top your cupcakes with mini maple leaves like the ones in the photo or make your own mini maple leaves with a maple leaf candy mold

f25.jpgFor the Americans, red white & blue star picks or how about mini 4th of July firecrackers? (this last link has a ton of 4th of July/USA related stuff to choose from.

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Cloud Atlas

5 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Fiction /

I finished Cloud Atlas and it feels like I’ve been trying to read it for longer than I had been trying to read The Moonstone. The first story, it didn’t grab me. The second story, much better and the third better still. Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, rather ho-hum but I stuck it out and I suppose I’m glad I did.

It was different. It felt a wee bit too full of itself, in places. A bit cliche’d and a bit contrived too. But different and interesting. I almost feel like I need to read it again. Like I missed something important, somewhere in those stories. Like maybe I’ll enjoy it more on the second reading. Unfortunately, there are too many books and not nearly enough time to go back and give it another shot. Maybe in my next life?
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Daily Dose of Stuff – Monday

1 Comment / Monday Meme /

Stuff_003_2
This is hard to see particularly since I wanted to photograph it in its "natural" environment… It’s a platter, maybe a silver platter that is really tarnished?  I’m not really sure.  It belongs to TW and she’s not here to ask.  It’s also too dark in the garage to really examine it well without a flashlight and I’m too lazy to do that anyway.  It’s also too heavy to really investigate properly so, this will have to do.

During one of the unpacking processes or during one of the garage clean up days, someone hung this platter up in the garage, between the washer and dryer.  It’s hung from a white wire shelf with a very thick silver chain.  Every now and then some funny teenager uses it as a gong to annoy me or annoy the animals.  The first time they did it, I was amused.  Now, not so amused.

What kind of weird stuff is in your house?  Is it as weird as this?  Or as weird as Em’s?

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