The Next Dark Age
We're in it Now
In the Dark Streets Shineth, by David McCullough
It seems like cheating to count this for any reading challenges, as it was so short. I picked it up at the clearance sales last year, so I knew it was a slim volume. I didn’t realize that it was mostly pictures.
However, it is a nice little story about Winston Chruchill secretly heading to the U.S. to see President Roosevelt after Pearl Harbor was attacked. He spent the holiday in Washington, attended the tree lighting and church service with the Roosevelts and then spoke at the President’s holiday radio address.
So, this is a nice book to have in my library, but it didn’t run as deep as I’d hoped.
Blankets 64 – 68
It is Starbucks night for Project Linus and I finished this month’s stash. I am now officially recording these out of order, as when I loaded my last two pics from the camera, I found three blankets that I’d finished earlier and not posted.
You can’t tell from this pic, but that yarn matches the blue-green in blanket exactly. Loops & Threads Impeccable in Sea Green.
This was one of the Red Heart variegated yarns. Monet, I think it was.
I started using the Caron One Pound white yarn. I can’t say I like it any better than Lion Brand Pound of Love yarn, except that it doesn’t tangle as much.
Same yarn.
Caron Simply Soft yarn in Soft Blue.
I expect to be picking up a new stash of fleece tonight!
The Fat Man: A Tale of North Pole Noir, by Ken Harmon
Book 61 of 50 Book Challenge, Book 5 of the Holiday Book Challenges
I found piles of this one at Half Price Books, all with remainder marks as thought it was the title that didn’t fly last season.
It was awesome.
Gumdrop the Elf leads the Coal Brigade until Santa fires him. Then a guy is murdered using Ralphie’s Red Ryder BB gun and Gumdrop is the prime suspect.
You don’t get to be the leader of the Coal Brigade by being the shiny happy elf, so you can guess how this goes.
Pretty much every pop-culture Christmas reference is made at some point in this one, and it is kinda dark for awhile. For example, Kringle Town has a shadow land called Pottersville. Tiny Tim drives the ferry between the two. The Misfit Toys live on their island and there are rumors that a Misfit Mafia is stealing the “good” toys.
Not to go all SPOILER but the end is rather warm and fuzzy and true-meaning-of-Christmas-y.
This book is the most fun I have had in this challenge.
Quick Road Trip with Alex
The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum opened in 2002 and I hadn’t been down to see it yet. My nephew Alex, age 6, digs the presidents so I asked if he wanted to go to Springfield with me to see the museum. He was in.
We decided that we would leave after the Bears’ game. After the first series, I told Alex that if we decided the game was going to be bad, we could leave early. Two series later, Johnny Knox was down and we were out the door.
We stayed at the President Abraham Lincoln Hotel in downtown Springfield. One must pay $7.00 a day to park there, if you can believe it. There were exactly two cars in my level of the lot at 4:30 p.m. yesterday. We checked in and the first thing Alex did was look out the window, point to the Hilton towering over us and say, “I’m glad we aren’t staying there.” The second thing he did was unpack. He started with his mouthwash:
He was all pleased that he packed his own bag and remembered his mouthwash. (I had flopped on the bed to see if the Broncos were losing.)
Then we went to dinner. I asked Alex if he wanted to eat in the hotel or go out and find something else. He opted for the hotel so that he didn’t have to put his coat back on. I didn’t offer up room service. And I am glad I didn’t because this was the Christmas Tree in the hotel restaurant:
I wouldn’t have wanted to miss it. And we both ate for less than 20 bucks which made up for having to pay for parking.
The next morning we had breakfast and set out. We checked the walking map and found that the “Lincoln Library” was two blocks from the hotel. But when we got there, we found that it was actually the public library of the city of Springfield. Alex was cool with it, because he liked this mural that we saw there:
He actually read the plaque, but I wasn’t listening because I was staring holes into the city map. Six or seven blocks in the other direction and we found it:
There were several exhibits and movies and artifacts, but the boy is only six so we didn’t get the full effect. Also, there is a lot about death and dying – between the war and the sons and the assassination itself. There was even a replica of the coffin lying in state in the capitol rotunda that Alex said “creeped (him) out”. But the White House portico was very nice:
The gift shop rocked. And do you know what that boy picked out for a souvenir? An Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum pocket watch. A pocket watch! If he were older, I’d have to called poseur on that. But for a six year old? Plus 1 to coolness.
Then he was done and we made tracks home.
Winter Rant
My office building has revolving doors on each side. There are, of course, handicapped accessible doors with the automatic opening button next to them. These double as emergency exits.
Some people like to use this door, because it is faster than using the revolving doors. They seem to have forgotten the purpose of revolving doors:
To keep the cold air out and the warm air in the building. (Or the reverse, in the summer.)
People seriously continue to do this in the winter. I stopped eating in the glass ceilinged atrium because of the general chill and frequent gusts of cold air.
So. I went to Noodles tonight before heading to the library. Noodles has a set of double doors for people to enter and exit..and a side door that leads to the patio-area in the summer. For some reason – I presume it is the fire code – this thing is unlocked in the winter.
Two jerks used it while I was eating. Apparently, they think that because they have their coats on, it is ok to blast the cold air in on the rest of us. Because I am cheeky, and a seriously regular customer, I stopped by the register and found the manager on my way out. I said:
“For the suggestion box: I wonder if you wouldn’t mind putting a ‘Use other door’ sign on the side entrance..”
I hadn’t gotten all of the words out when she said, “I had one on there for five days. You have no idea how many people ignored it. I saw people read it and then go out the door anyway. I tried locking it. Someone broke the lock on the door…”
Broke. The. Lock.
(It’s fixed now, so don’t get any funny ideas.)
People. It is winter now. Winter is long. Winter is cold. Please show some consideration for the people around you. Use the proper doors. And close them behind you.
Blanket 63
I had to look up my blanket count, it has been so long since I have posted – meaning so long since I have finished a blanket. Two reasons: this is a fully crocheted blanket, as is the other I started on the road. And I have been working on the scarves for my grandfather’s church. But Starbuck’s night is next week and I have a couple more pieces of fleece to finish, so I’d better get moving.
This was Loops & Threads Impeccable yarn in Navy and Aran. Doesn’t really stand out, but it meets the qualifications of gender neutral colors and large enough for an older kid.
Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor, by Lisa Kleypas
Book 60 of 50 Book Challenge, Book 4 of the Holiday Book Challenges
I accidentally read a romance novel. I don’t know how it happened. I thought it was about a little girl that lost her mother and found her voice and her joy again at Christmas. It was really about an uncle/guardian and the new lady in town who happens to be a young widow that has opened a new toy shop on one of those islands off the coast of Seattle. Next time, I must really read more than two lines of the jacket summary.
It wasn’t a bodice ripper by any stretch, and for most of the novel it was pristine near to Jane Austen. And then it wasn’t. And I found myself thinking, “Really? You knew that dude was a player and didn’t even consider the birth control?”
It has been a really long time since I read a romance novel.
All of the characters were perfectly pleasant – even the girlfriend that was ditched. There wasn’t very much conflict, which was fine, too. The “Christmas” connection was pretty weak, but that was ok. But I think I gotta go back to the Christmas murder mysteries now.
The Christmas Train, by David Baldacci
Book 59 of 50 Book Challenge, Book 3 of the Holiday Reading Challenges
I had never read Baldacci before, but understand he writes crime/thriller type books. So I was interested to see what he did with a Christmas theme.
Not a thriller.
The concept is interesting enough…man of a certain age takes a cross-country train to meet his girlfriend for a holiday in Lake Tahoe. He meets all sorts of people going to meet family, or not. The Amtrak staff made for awesome characters, and if someone will tell me right now that the cross country trains really have staff like that I will book my ticket right now. Then things start to disappear and the weather turns. All good stuff.
Except that I didn’t find our hero to be all that likable and the plot really seemed to be about The One That Got Away.
(sigh)
The climax of the tale is our hero lying in the blizzard with his love waiting to die. Seriously. And I wouldn’t want to spoil the punchline for you.
At Eight Months
At eight months, Gibbs is a teenage boy that is always hungry. He is either running around like a crazy dog or asleep. Or scavenging for snacks. In fact, yesterday he made his first snack swipe. My mother left spinach dip on the coffee table while we were in the other room.
Thus we are reminded that there is a difference between puppy-proofing a house and dog-proofing a house. He hasn’t discovered the wonder of garbage cans yet, but that can’t be far behind.
Gibbs was most confused by the loss of Spooky the Cat. But he is having a good time with Kiwi the Grey:
She is teasing him. About ten seconds after I snapped this, he jumped to the floor and she flew to her perch. And he came back and lay down for a Bears Game Nap:
He knows several commands: Sit, Wait, Off, Come, Go to Your Place..and his Leave It isn’t half bad. We are working on Lie Down and have just started on Paw.
We haven’t been to the dog park lately, but Gibbs continues to go to Doggie Do Rite three days a week. He has gotten better at meeting people, but still doesn’t like strangers in the house. Christmas ought to be fun.
The more time I spend with dogs, the more I think that a having a well socialized pet is at least as important as having an obedient one. I am optimistic that Gibbs will be both.
Wrapping for a Good Cause
Last year was the first time I sponsored holiday gifts for a child. There are lots of non-profits out there that collect wish lists from families that don’t have extra cash for holiday gifts and hook them up with people that have some to spare. I took two lists and went shopping and it was lots of fun.
I like shopping.
I didn’t realize that Glenview Youth Services had such a program until I read about it in Patch.com. But I clicked over, sent an e-mail and received the information. Again, I sponsored two kids and dropped off the loot last weekend when they were sorting through the gifts. This week is the wrapping and I volunteered this morning.
I headed over to the NIPSTA building, where they are staging the gift program. They have plenty of tables set up with wrapping paper and boxes and other supplies. The staff and regular volunteers (as opposed to my one-day “event” volunteering) bring over the gifts that were selected for children in a particular family and then we wrap.
GYS is very careful to label every item so that the right gift goes to the right child, so we completed the gift tag before wrapping the gift. Once while working on a big family, my table found a couple of gifts with lost labels and the staff went back to the database printouts to confirm the match. “No guessing” was the motto, which I appreciated. And I particularly enjoyed the gift tags that were handmade by other kids.
I learned that reversible wrapping paper is cool. It has patterns on either side that are thematically similar, but not exactly the same. Particularly if you are pressed for space, that is good stuff. When I made that comment onsite, another volunteer said, “They have been doing this for years and have it down to a science.”
Hm. So does Santa Claus.
Wrapping is scheduled to continue through December 14. If you are interested in helping out, here is a link to the program page. If I were going to name one supply that they could really use, it would be gift boxes. We were going through those quickly today – particularly the ones for the winter coats. And they can always use more wrapping paper!
The Next Dark Age 