Farewell 2011

2011 is not a year I want to kick in the fanny.  It was a year that had it's ups and just little downs- a good year.  I am actually looking forward to 2012 primarily because Ned totally has his grump on today.  He is something of a gremlin and not a cute elf at all.  We are off to do something spur of the moment, I think involving donuts or ice cream to send the year off with a smile.  I could do frozen yogurt, maybe that is what it will be.

I am starting my 2012 reading challenge.  I have a Wyoming book and a West Virgina book picked, but am going to push them off until after Alabama.  I have decided not to keep in alphabetical order, but also Ellen is reading "To Kill A Mockingbird" in January.   I can't not re-read it, I am already breaking my plan of no re-reads.  I think Juno will be taking the reading challenge with me.

A Christmas Story

Thursday afternoon last week my neighbor called to tell me that an animal had trashed their front porch.  It had chewed up their umbrella and left prints all over the door trying to get in.   They are not pet people at all.  She asked if we had any trouble to which I replied nope.  Friday afternoon we went to the Carbon Leaf concert in Annapolis and when we got back around 6:30 there was a pit bull sleeping on the door mat.  I told the kids to stay in the car and tried to approach the dog, it lunged at me a little bit.  I couldn't chance it, so backed off.  I went to the back door and then rushed the kids through the front door.  I decided to deal with it the next day, hoping the dog might return to where it came from.  The next morning I found the dog still sleeping curled up on my door mat.  I really felt bad, because I knew it could not have eaten anything in ages.  I called my neighbor and told her the whole story.  I looked outside and the dog was gone.  My neighbor called and said it had moved to their mat.  She went out and fed her and was able to pet her.  Turns out she was the sweetest dog and came in the house to hang out.  The big problem was it is a holiday weekend and no agencies were open to take the dog.  The poor little girl was covered in scars.  She had also had puppies at some point.  There was probably a reason the dog had run away.  My neighbor's daughter found a home for the dog on Christmas Eve night.  The family sent a picture of the dog sleeping on the bed.  My neighbor had washed the dog for the new family.  It was a happy story.  I haven't heard the dog's name, but it was tentatively going to be Hartley. 

Knits and Fits

Ned has been bursting at the seams with excitement over meeting his pen pal.  He has been writing back and forth since September.  They do the writing at school, but one of the letters made it home in his backpack.  His pen pal is 22 years old?  I ask Ned's teacher why this is so.  The kids are penpalling with kids that go to Towson University, but don't know ANY english.  Their reading and writing comprehension is that of a 2nd grader.  Yesterday was finally the big day to meet.  Tuesday night Ned was planning his attire and telling me what he and his pen pal were going to do.  "We are going to play on the playground, just run around together.  We are going to knit.  We are going to sit, knit and talk."..........no way was I raining on this parade, but knit?  Unfortunately, yesterday was poring down rain.  So instead they played rugby in the gym and had a fabulous time.  Later in the year Ned's class is selling finger-knitted scarves to raise money for charity.  Ned has knitted quite a few of these, most of them are about 15 feet long.  Let me know if you would like one.

Riley died just after Christmas last year, but everyday for his entire life he had one meal a day.  My ex-husband had strong opinions on everything when dogs should eat.  I always found it slightly cruel, I can't imagine eating only one meal.  About eight months ago I decided to start feeding Hoover twice a day.  The first day, I know he thought he had died and gone to heaven.  The funny thing about it is he can't get the extra meal into his doggy brain.  Every time I pass by the door he thinks it is time for his second meal.  He bounds up and stands by his bowl having a fit of excitement.  It really is cute, such a small thing has brought such great pleasure. It is the least I can do for someone who brings our family so much joy.  I wish I had done the same for sweet Riley.  p.s you-know-who feeds his new dog twice a day. 

Nifty-Fifty and No Refrigerator Art

The McD fourth grade teacher set up a large, blank U.S. map in between bookshelves in his classroom.  He has books that feature each state, approx. 400 of them that the kids can choose from and read.  After a book is read, he takes a picture of the cover and posts it to the corresponding state.  I am sure he did this last year when Ian was in his class and I just did not notice.  Today I studied his map and books for quite awhile and decided this would be my 2012 personal reading challenge.  I read from 50-60 books a year, so this will be perfect.  I thought about reading by region, but knew I would choose all the southern states first.  I really love southern writing.  I am going to start backwards, which means I need a good book that takes place in Wyoming.  I have until Jan. 1st to choose.  Send me suggestions.  I think I will tell myself no re-reads, even though I want to re-read "Handling Sin".  This project will curtail my fantasy reading, but the choices in that genre are somewhat slim right now.  Maybe by March I will be to L and can read the new Sookie Stackhouse book.

I met the cutest little old man in the waiting room of Hopkins.  He was dressed very dapper and reading "HP and the Goblet of Fire".  I had to strike up a conversation.  He told me the series was his comfort reading and I totally agreed with him.  His copy was battered, creased and folded - well loved.  

The kids and I really enjoyed the book "The Inventions of Hugo Cabret".  The movie has just been released and it is a fabulous movie.  It is so rare to find a movie as good as the book.  I also found out today that the author has a new book out, name escapes me, and it is even better that Hugo.  These are not books for an e-reader, you have to read them in hard copy.

I am saying farewell to my two years of refrigerator art.  I got a new fridge that won't hold my quilts.  I haven't even made November yet.  I enjoyed doing this project, but it will be okay to let it go.  I am not sure what to do with all those little quilts anyway.  I wish I could finds some motivation to finish a large quilt.  My poor sewing room is missing me.  Buying a new refrigerator was the greatest thing ever, I can't believe I waited so long to do it.

Run Out of Words

I haven't been posting lately.  I feel I have run out of words.  My entire life I have written words in my head, but right now they have vanished.  At night I write novels and forget them when I wake up, this has always been the case.  Lately, no stories, no words - zip, zilch, nada.  I go to bed unable to construct a story to fall asleep.  I am sleeping well, just not surrounded by characters.  My buckle has not been swashed by pirates.  I have not scaled Mt. Fuji.  I have not had tea with Thomas Jefferson in Paris.  I haven't been on an archeological dig in ages.

I can't seem to muster interest in relating the oddities of people around me.  For example, on my way back from San Diego after passing through the body scan machines the woman in front of me said, "you can smell the radiation!"  I didn't have a snappy answer for her.  My response was, "radiation doesn't have a smell."  You know what, having been radiated almost thirty times I do know what it smells like -NOTHING.  It feels like torture, but has no smell until you smear burn cream on black flaking skin.

I could tell you about Ned's very important story,  a "true story" according to Ned. There once was a boy with very dry skin.  It was very serious.  It was on his neck.  In fact it was really lint.   I had no words for him after he told me this story.  This is up there with Ellen's poem, I bought a duck for a buck.  I didn't tell him about the beauty of dryer lint after you have washed brand new colored towels.

I don't even have the words to tell you about getting fake eyelashes.  It was a spur of the moment decision and one I felt quite foolish about.  Truthfully and vainly, I derived great pleasure from the eyelashes and the fact that people even noticed them.  All was swell until the first little cluster of three fell off at dinner.  With a final hurrah they all jumped ship except for maybe six of them.  Now it just looks weird.   As heroine of my own stories, I always have long, lush eyelashes.

I don't know, maybe all the words are crowded and stuck into a little brain cranny.  Perhaps the words are all shoved to the side by homework, laundry, shopping lists, missing socks, unfinished/unstarted quilting ideas, and worry over holding an imploding body together.  I miss my words.