Paddington Bear’s Birthday!

I made an unnecessary run to the library today.  I was supposed to volunteer, but found that when I pulled into the parking lot, I was the only one there.  The sign on the door reminded me that the library was closed for Columbus Day.  So I dropped my book in the book-drop, and went home.

However, when I arrived home, I found that the library had remained closed on one of the most important literary holidays of the year.  Today, October 13, 2008 is the fiftieth anniversary of Paddington Bear.  This bear who knew how to give a hard stare, who loved orange marmalade, and did a spot on rendition of Gene Kelly’s dance from Singing in the Rain is fifty-years-old.

So while I agree that the rest of the world should stay home from work today to celebrate this important international figure, I feel it is the library’s responsiblity to celebrate all day long.

Books of color

I realized that I had an addiction to books around the age of nine.  That was the first time that one of my teachers scolded me in front of the class for reading a book under my desk, rather than paying attention to the math lesson.  I remember that it was one of the American Girl books.  Molly to be exact.  she never was my favorite, so if one of my books was going to be taken by Mrs. Robiack, it was probably a good one to lose.

It was about a two or three years after I had my first book taken from me in school that I read a book called A Little Princess.  In it, a father describes the reading habits of his daughter in such a way that I was forced to realize that that it was me.  He said that Sara gobbled her books like a little wolf.  That has always been me.  But the problem is that I wish I didn’t.  I always hate finishing a new book that I loved.  After all, I’ll never read it for the first time again.  Any new readings will not hold the same magic as the first.  I might learn to know the characters better and find new aspects of the theme I missed the first time, but it’s never that first reading of “What will happen next?!”

I think this is a left over quality of reading stories mainly for plot.  When I was younger I read pretty much anything I could get my hand on as long as I found the story enjoyable.  Plot is what drives the young reader.  That’s why Babysitters’ Club, with their cookie cutter stories and characters work.  Each book is about what happens, not how the characters deal with it.

A Little Princess is a perfect example of this.  I loved this book when I was younger, but I have to admit that today I think I would find Sara Crew to be a bit insufferable.  She of course was brilliant, and fantastically rich, and more motherly than most adults at the age of 11.  When she is struck with tragedy, after a few weeks/months of sadness, she becomes determined to be noble, and pretends that she’s a princess throughout this suffering, and of course wins the day.  I’m not opposed to the winning of the day, but she was so perfect that I wonder what girl could look at this character and say, yes that’s me.  I like characters who screw up sometimes, and even frustrate the reader a bit.  After all, who doesn’t frustrate people sometimes?  So I find today that I like books about characters a lot more.  The plot is still important, of course.  It’s when I can find books with both aspects that they become colorful.

When authors manage to paint characters and stories for me, that’s when books become silvery and deep scarlet and warm gold to me.  I know that won’t make sense to most, but the books with the most beautiful colors are the ones I love the most.

ads aren’t sweet (too lame?)

My parents are to blame for the looks of confusion and even offense I recieve when watching TV with a person for the first time.  Convinced that comercials don’t need to be watched, my parents are some of the biggest proponents of the mute button.  To get my brother and I to comply with only a modicum of complaint (especially during prime christmas gift searching season) we’d play “What are they selling here?!”

We’d watch the comercial with the sound off, and we’d have to guess the product.  This started out with pretty simple answers – car, shampoo, Pretty Pretty Princess – but eventually became more involved.  Soon we were deciding if the comercial was selling sex appeal, fear of germs, or that parents are stupid.  This one is usually only seen on networks with a high cartoon frequency.

So now that I am programmed to hit the mute button whenever a show goes to comercial.  I usually have a book ready when I’m alone, or I’m prepared to discuss the plot/characters if others are with me.  However, I have found that this behavior is not always appreciated by friends.  According to everyone except my parents, comercials should be left alone.

But yes, the point.  I sometimes do not always reach the mute button.  I have on occasion watched a commercial.  What I’ve been noticing lately that one of the ideas most sold in commercials is that men are dumb.  I love my husband, and believe that he is one of the more intelligent people I know.  So no, I do not believe that this is true, but I’m convinced that the ad agencies of the world do.  Or that at least they are using this idea to sell everything from cleaning supplies to tax help to high fructose corn syrup.

Alternative sweeteners are only the latest to jump on the “men are idiots” band wagon.  Now we can see women condesendenly informing men that they have nothing to fear from non-sugar sweeteners made from corn.  Silly men.  So why are we making fun of men?  Well as we can’t make fun of anyone else, men are the only ones left.  If the roles were reversed and the man acted condesendingly towards the woman, there would be complaints.  Ages are off limits as are races, and this is how it should be.  But why are poor men left out in the cold.  True some might say that as they’ve sort of won the life race over the past few decades, so maybe they can take a few swift kicks in the pants in the ad world.  But still, couldn’t we find a better way (other than the idiot factor) to sell products?

sidebars and biscuits

I’ve decided that I find google a bit scary.  I’ll admit that I am a fan of the iGoogle page.  I enjoy my NPR headlines and my literary quotes of the day.  Granted, I never could get the “Pearls Before Swine” (Do you italicize comic strips?) widget to work, but such is life.  But yes, I like Google.  And Gmail makes me especially happy.  It is organized enough for me, and I like the chatting aspect, so all is well.  But I can’t help but be a bit creeped out by the sidebar ads.

I got an email from Sarah today.  She told me that Stephenie Meyer will be on the Ellen show this week.  On the sidebar were ads for travel guides through Markham, and info about Sarah Palin.  I’ve had others, where a friend asked about my engagement ring, and there were ads for the ring.  ESL classes were advertised when Ruth detailed a class for me.

Google I enjoy you.  But the Big Brother aura is just creepy.  I have almost forgiven you for promoting that English teacher’s hell of a site – Wiki – as a main source of research on your search engine.  But my overly giddy emails about Vampire authors should be private.

On a less technology centered note, I’m finding myself a bit addicted to baking.  I’m home a lot, and while Project Runway is a lovely guilty pleasure, there is only so much you can take – same with laundry and cleaning bathrooms, though the guilty part only comes in when I neglect these in order to bake.

So I find myself in the kitchen a lot, arguing with myself about whether or not Lazy Cake is a good idea.  Would banana bread be a shining moment in my husband’s crappy day?  I don’t want him to have a crappy day.  I just want him to be happy about banana bread.  So now in our kitchen is the remainder of upside-down pear gingerbread, the end of a loaf of oatmeal bread, 5 Lazy cupcakes and here I am contemplating whether it would be easier to convince Greg that baked oatmeal, banana bread of biscuits that Ruth gave me the recipe for would be a better thing to have in the house.  I’m banking that the baked oatmeal from the weight watcher’s book would be the easiest sell on the “oh look sweetie, a healthy breakfast” spin.  But those biscuits taste like melting clouds of happiness. What is a girl to do?

Forgive the lameness of that last metaphore, but when I last ate them in the kitchen of the K-House, I was dancing around moaning in delight in a most unseemly way.  In a house dedicated to Christian living, I fear that gluttony almost got ahold of me as I devored savory biscuits in utter joy.

moping on the first post

When I read the beginning of the book Julie and Julia, I understood what the writer meant.  No I didn’t have my revelation standing on a subway platform with a crazed homeless woman banging her head against the sidewalk.  Instead, I had my moment of realization while watching Project Runway and trying to decide whether or not I was going to venture to get the iron and ironing board out of the closet.  This doesn’t come from a lack of love of ironing.  The two times I have ironed, I actually enjoyed it.  But as my mother lugged hers out of the closet in as many times as I have fingers, I never really learned how to actually do the deed.  And while I was happy enough to happily flatten scraps for an art project, actually subjecting my pretty new placemats to a heated hunk of metal is a different story all together.

But the point is, I understand that moment when you feel like your not doing anything useful and even if you are, it’s sort of sucking the life out of you.  The difference is, she started a project, and I am still in that stage of wandering around wondering if and what I should do.  If I start a project, what if I don’t finish it?  What if I don’t like it?  What if I suck at it?  What if it’s just plain silly or stupid?  I know these are all pretty dumb questions to ask when it’s about starting a completely selfish project to just make my day brighter, but you see, that’s where I get stuck.

But perhaps this is the first step.  I have admitted that I need something that is somehow fulfilling.  True, I also need a job.  And oh yes, I’m terrified of this whole process too.  I need a place to start.  I feel like I’m on the edge of the game candyland.  It’s time to play, and I’m ready to start.  However, I keep worrying I’m going to get stuck in the Molasses swamp, or be repeatedly sent back to the gum drop guy.  What if I can’t get started, and even if I do, I always end up back with the lame candy that the cheap people hand out on Halloween.  I feel like my analogies of crappy candy and board games are making it clear that it’s almost 11:00.

Maybe this will be a push.  If I don’t find some sort of project, I will have to be content with bad analogies, and what former English major wants that?  So with that I say good night.  Perhaps projects or ideas reveal themselves better in the morning light.