Wow, everyone! It’s here! An intelligent alternative to liposuction! Now isn’t this just horrible? In the name of fairness, I know there are folks out there who genuinely need help getting control of their body mass index, and I wouldn’t insinuate that weight-loss difficulty is always due to laziness or lack of self control. I am sure of this. I know losing weight and getting fit aren’t easy to do. At the same time, though, we sure do see a lot of ads for cosmetic surgery or surgery alternatives floating around these days. I used to think that was a Hollywood thing- something for very wealthy and very vain people who didn’t think they could maintain their chosen career if they couldn’t try to look like the fountain of youth. Nowadays though- this came in a mailing of coupons for cat litter and fast food places. Which would imply that it is intended to draw in… what market? Everybody? Middle class coupon-clipping shoppers? I’m not trying to be unsympathetic, but are we so far gone that this is the mindset of John Q. Public now? This is what we can do instead of getting lipo…

Good grief.

Happy Mothers’ Day, everyone!
I know I could never really pay my mom back or list all of the ways that she sacrificed for me in my upbringing, but thank you anyway, Mom.

I love this poem. You can read the full text
“And here is your lanyard,” I replied.

He keeps thinking he should run errands, or do some housework, or start reading a book or something, but none of it sounds fun alone, so instead he’s just sitting there, willing the phone to ring. And the cheeseburger isn’t hot anymore.

My friend wrote a short eulogy for him which I share here:

In honor of Richie Havens’ life, I say Bravo. You crossed the lines against injustices and opened many eyes to them. Your music has a soul of its own and definitely worked towards bettering the world. You will remain in this fan’s mind and heart. Again I say Bravo.

I chose twelve words in all and sketched up an underwater coral reef scene. All those plants and fishy shapes made it really hard to hide the boxy shapes and straight lines in the vocab words I’d chosen, but the end result was pretty fun. You can download and print out your own by clicking here. I tested it on a pair of kids this morning- a brother and sister who are eight and nine, and they handed them back to me with their approval and assurance that they didn’t think it was too easy or too hard as well as a few notes scribbled on the backs about who finished first. I’m going to use it in class in another week, and will see then how the first graders handle it. I’m hoping it takes them a little under ten minutes to complete, while working in groups. If you try it, let me know how your kids fare.

I just don’t know how people can do that so much.

My husband and I have a few books that we reread every now and then, and among these are Tolkein’s The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings series. Without going into too much, I will say that I love these books, and find them not only to be a thoroughly enchanting read, but also to have great personal value. When the Peter Jackson movies arrived, I felt generally positive about them, in spite of some screenplay irritations (Why did we need all that Arwen and Aragorn stuff? WHY did we need Frodo and Sam to have a fight?), but by and large, it’s an “adaptation,” not a “transliteration.” The two media are too different for audiences to reasonably expect perfect fidelity. That’s just my feeling. My brother disagrees on this, and his thoughts are worth reading. Anyway, I’m only trying to say that I think I have a pretty open mind about necessary book-to-screenplay adjustments. Necessary ones. They are painful, but I can accept them.

But then there was The Hobbit. For this movie, it’s actually a good thing he took such initiative to move beyond the “necessary changes” idea and just hacked away, because The Hobbit wasn’t a very good book and that’s why nobody liked it very much. Right. That’s why no one ever reads it.

Stuff like this makes me scratch my head. How could such a good director let such a big project go so badly? Did screenwriters really think they were improving? Did everyone really think moviegoers wouldn’t mind that they all but discarded the original story? I suspect they thought neither of those things, but knew we would buy tickets anyway. It’s sad, but it happens. It’s the Citizen Kane syndrome: a small-time creator with big dreams of crushing the man makes something big happen, turns heads, becomes a force to be reckoned with, and slowly yields to the compromise that he initially spoke out against. I understand they wished to tie it in with the LOTR movie set, but the effort was really unnecessary, and the resulting final product is disappointing. I won’t detail my specific problems with it, aside from one pertinant change that my husband pointed out. The dwarves in the movie are reclaiming their home, as opposed to the ones in the book who are pursuing stolen gold. Doesn’t that make sense? Why not draw a little attention away from the pitfalls of greed? The entire movie is the child of gold mongering, and I find nothing surprising about the producers wanting to avoid the subject. Maybe they would have been better off doing so- is it better to admit you’re greedy and selfish or try to pretend you’re telling a pleasant little tale of lost orphans who want to go home and risk sounding vapid instead?
What do you think? Did you see the movie? If so, am I overreacting, or do you agree?

Anyhow, however the movie turned out, at least I got some good legos out of it. Hunny bought me Bilbo’s House a few days back as a present, and I share it below, just so that I can close this post on a positive note and also because I like talking about legos:

The design has a great balance of house and hill. It looks as cozy as Bag-End is supposed to be, complete with careful detail to the kitchen, of course. (There is a lot of food with this set.) This little kitchen stove and chimney are pretty cute, no?

My favorite detail, though, is this front window.

I love lego structures that are made up of creatively arranged standard pieces.

Yeah, that’s a cool window. This little bit of carefully organized plastic is altogether more appealing to me than the movie’s heart and soul, I’m sorry to say. If it weren’t for this acquisition, I would have ended my post telling you that I found virtually nothing of value in that movie. So very sad.

A Place That’s Fun is nearly ready for publication! I’m so happy and so excited to be talking about this project. The book is a collection of children’s poetry by Ichabod Ablegoose (aka Tom Nochera). The writing is fun and light hearted with a terrific read-aloud quality. I have read a few of them to my kids in class, and they ate them up- I mean, a Kazooing Elf? What’s not to love?

“Jik-a-loo, ick-a-loo, vegetable stew,
I’m the only elf in this world on kazoo.
My older brothers play the harp and the lute,
And elves are also well known for the flute.
I want to be known for something that’s new,
And that’s why I’ve mastered the tiny kazoo.

Click here to visit the author’s blog post about it. He has a clever and comfortable sound in his writing, that made it a genuine pleasure to illustrate, if not just to read. I’m sure you (and your kids, of course) will enjoy them as well.

The book will be about 70 pages long (we’re planning to price the paper copy at around ten dollars, or if you like ebooks, it will be available for around four dollars). The poems themselves range from being short and tongue-in-cheek, to sweet and family-minded, to narrative stories to whimsical nonesense verse.

Kyle is green,
And Bobby is blue,
But I’ve never heard of the color of Sue.
She says she’s a little bit like
Chartreuse.
(Maybe she’s got a screw loose.)

Please plan to get your copy of A Place That’s Fun when it becomes available! It won’t be long now before all the work becomes a reality, and we can’t wait to share it with you.

So, choosing which song to publish for this post was tough, because thus far I have loved every song I’ve heard from them. I mean, love. Real love from my heart. Accordian, ukulele, trumpet, and flugelhorn music. There is actually a guy in this band who plays the glockenspiel! This is music, my friend. Beirut has only been around for a few years, with a discography of about three albums and some eps, and already they have a pretty impressive record for creating a sound that is as flexible as it is original.

I had to include a second track- Sunday Smile. I hope you enjoy: