Category Archives: Lists

Dad’s and My Reading Challenge for 2009 [Updated]

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Alternating 19th century and/versus contemporary novels.

January: “Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens

February: “The Broom of the System” by David Foster Wallace

March: “Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson

April: “Then We Came to the End” by Joshua Ferris

May: “Dracula” by Bram Stoker [this is a re-read for me]

June: TBD/Contemporary “Motherless Brooklyn” by Jonathan Lethem

July: “Vanity Fair” by William Makepeace Thackeray

August: TBD/Contemporary “Netherland” by Joseph O’Neill

September: “A Pair of Blue Eyes” by Thomas Hardy

October: TBD/Contemporary “The White Darkness” by Geraldine McCaughrean

November: “Nostromo” by Joseph Conrad

December: TBD/Contemporary “Undiscovered Country” by Lin Enger

Upcoming Albums to Buy in 2009

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Jan 20: Bon Iver “Blood Bank” (EP)
Jan 27: Franz Ferdinand “Tonight”
Feb 3: Ben Kweller “Changing Horses”
Feb 3: Nous Non Plus “Menagerie”
Feb 17: Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit (self-titled)
Mar 3: U2 “No Line on the Horizon” (we’ll see if I actually buy this)
Mar 3: The Boy Least Likely To “The Law of the Playground”
Mar 24: The Decemberists “Hazards of Love”
Mar 31: Great Lake Swimmers “Lost Channels” (or just “Channels” acc. to some sites)

À la Nick Hornby, books in/books out for December.

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Bought:

  • Disquiet, by Julia Leigh
  • Among the Thugs, by Bill Buford
  • Shakespeare Wrote for Money, by Nick Hornby
  • Shadow’s Edge, by Brent Weeks
  • Throne of Jade, by Naomi Novik

Read:
  • The Lover’s Knot, by Clare O’Donohue
  • Deaf Sentence, by David Lodge
  • The Trial, by Kafka
  • Tender Morsels, by Margo Lanagan
  • A Circle is a Balloon and Compass Both: Stories about Human Love, by Ben Greenman (stories)
  • A Spy in the Family; An Erotic Comedy, by Alec Waugh
  • Black & White, by Dani Shapiro
  • If the River Was Whiskey, by T. Coraghessan Boyle (stories)
  • Silver Wings for Vicki, by Helen Wells
  • Disquiet, by Julia Leigh
  • The Scarecrow and His Servant, by Philip Pullman

Live Tunes: Winter.

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At this point last year, I had already gone to all the concerts I would be going to. Oddly, it’s December 26, but I still have some live music left to see in 2008!! But I’ve only bought tickets to one thing so far in 2009, which is equally odd. I better start checking concert listings!!

Dec 27: My Morning Jacket!!! (The rescheduling of the October show that got cancelled.)
Dec 31: The Sea & The Cake! (with Cathy coming to visit! Yay!)
Feb 7: Griffin House (with Steph coming down for the night! Yay!)

Things I am no longer attending.

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  • Office Christmas Parties. (Did I tell you about the time my married friend chose the office christmas party to announce how in love with me he was? And that wasn’t even the worst one!!)
  • Any kind of (but particularly Holiday) parties that are 99% couples with or without children and 1% single people, that being me. No fucking thanks.
  • Baby showers where I am the only crafty gifter.
  • Non-family weddings. (I originally said “Weddings” in general and then that year like 7 of my stupid cousins got married and I had to cave. Jerks.)

You can go ahead and invite me if you refuse to believe it. But I ain’t comin’.

Re-entry sucks. But it’s better with packages.

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I pretty much have everything sent to the secondary browsing location given some dodgy mail room issues on the home front. Look at all I had waiting for me when I returned from Staycation!

  • Two skirts from Wrap that were on super super sale. I am all about skirts these days. Too fat for all my pants! 🙂
  • 15 copies of the same book for my Christmas packages. I gave up on stressing over a million specifically tailored to people’s tastes presents when I read about this family that came up with a better idea: everyone in the family picks their “favorite” thing from the past year and they send out the same package to everyone on their list. Since round here “everyone in the family” = “just me”, I pick a CD, DVD and book that I loved in the last year and everyone gets the same one.
  • 12 balls of yarn, six one color, six another, for a super secret project that is not really Christmas related, and given the timing anyway will most likely be a “winter” rather than “holiday” gifting.
  • My Moo-produced Christmas cards using three photos I took on a freeeeezing day last December.
  • A Simply Photo print.
  • Pushing Daisies season 1 and Bones season 3.
  • One of the options for my 2009 calendar. I am still waiting on the other option to arrive from the Eggplant who apparently does not realize the urgency of already having your 2009 calendar when it is now December 8, 2008. Criminy.

It was a good mail day, eh. 🙂

Last Meal on Earth.

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So KC and I took a cooking class once where they made everyone say what their last meal would be (or desert island meal, either way). EVERY person in the class, sans moi, said “Steak”. Seriously? Steak?

COME ON!

1. Chocolate Cake. (preferably using my grandma’s chocolate sheet cake recipe, but I’m open to others.) And if there were no chocolate cake left in this world…

2. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins. And if there were no…

3. Pam’s Sweet Potato Casserole (there’s brown sugar and pecans and all kinds of goodness. It’s out of this world.)

4. Pizza. Pepperoni preferably. Sausage and green pepperolives (wow, that was SOME typo) alternately.

5. Then, I guess, MAYBE, steak. Although I’d probably prefer a big juicy bacon cheeseburger with avocado or fried egg, depending on my mood.

À la Nick Hornby, books in/books out for November.

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Bought:

  • The Lover’s Knot (A Someday Quilts Mystery), by Clare O’Donohue
  • Deaf Sentence, by David Lodge
  • Hurry Down Sunshine, by Michael Greenberg
  • Smells Like Dead Elephants, by Matt Taibbi
  • The Historical Novel, by Georg Lukacs
  • The Way of Shadows, by Brent Weeks

Read:
  • The Oxford Book of Short Stories, edited by V.S. Pritchett
  • The Way of Shadows, by Brent Weeks

Tea

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Hot

  • Oregon Chai. I buy the dry packets from World Pantry.
  • Gen-mai Cha. It’s a japanese brown rice and popped corn tea. I buy it from Upton Tea after the Eggplant recommended them.
  • And my latest addiction, Celestian Seasonings Mandarin Orange Spice. Bought randomly at the grocery store the other day.

Cold
  • Iced tea, SWEETENED. And I mean SWEETENED. But only if it’s Luzianne, like my Grandma used.
  • Uji-Shimizu. A matcha/sugar mix. From Ippodo Tea Co. Soooo good.

Decision-making criteria.

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Totally stealing this entry from Sashi. As one does.

As the wishy-washiest of Pisces out there, even the smallest of decisions can take years for me to make. Fortunately as I’ve gotten old(er) and cranky(er), I’ve been able to streamline the process. Turns out the Eggplant’s insane brother and I are working off a similar set of questions.

  1. Does it require me to leave the house? (The nice warm house with internet and cable TV?)
  2. Can I take a nap instead?
  3. Are you going to eat that?
  4. Can it be accomplished from a lying-down position?
  5. Is it less than an arm’s length away?