Friday Unrelated Information

1. Now that the first decade of the 21st century is almost over, I'm finally getting with it: I have a Flickr account now. None of my own photos are in it; it's more like a virtual inspiration binder for decorating and projects. (It started because I needed to see two different pillow fabrics next to each other.)

2. I've been idly going through real estate sites, just to see what I'm up against (a lot), and the "remarks" on each house on the Chapman Richard site are hilarious:
Careful, Cat May Attack If You Try To Touch
DO NOT LOCK THE DOOR ON THE INSIDE OF SUN ROOM.
Great Fixer-Upper, House Is Uninhabitable

3. And finally, with the solstice approaching, here's a column from The Guardian by poet Jeanette Winterson about embracing the dark and using it for reflection, being "dark without being melancholy, brooding without being depressed."

Party Season

Reading the J. Peterman catalog as a teen and coveting the Silk Taffeta Ball Skirt, I imagined that grown-up life meant lots of parties that looked like this, not budgets and grocery shopping.




Despite the lack of lipstick and bouffants, it's still pretty good to get older.

(Images are by Tom Palumbo, of Paris in 1962. You can see the whole set here.)

This Is A Big One

Between changes in my life, changes in my goals, and just running out of steam, I think I will only have about a 50% success rate on my 29 Things (a full report is coming, as are 30 Things for next year).

But yesterday I accomplished the one that meant most to me (#2): I made the last payment on credit card debt that I've been carrying for years, and which I've been repaying for the last three. It was a lot of debt. I was stupid. It was really hard to be on such a tight budget. But now: Debt-free! I can finally consider adult things like home ownership.

Tuesday Project Roundup: The First Thing I Learned To Sew

I learned to sew in 4-H, as organized by my mother, when I was about 10, maybe younger. The first real project--after lots of sewing on paper without thread--was a drawstring bag. Twenty years later, here I am making drawstring bags again:


These are shoe bags and a lingerie bag, all meant to help with packing--so your packed clothes don't get dirtied by your shoes and you can tell what's been worn and what hasn't. They were for my sister-in-law's birthday last Saturday, which I forgot to mention here; she's been traveling a lot so I thought this would be practical.

I have to admit that I didn't remember my first 4-H bag training for these. I had to use an online tutorial to walk me through the first one, but it all came back for the next two. (Granted, it's a bag, not rocket science, but I tend to cling to directions so I was happy to just cut and sew by the end.)

Ten Days To Go

Presents: wrapped.
Christmas cards: addressed.
Packages: mailed.
Menus: planned.
1977 American Ballet Theater version of The Nutcracker: watched.

This version aired a lot on PBS when I was in my teens, and I thought it was the most magical thing in the world. I'm sure a lot of that had to do with Barishnykov, because when I put in the DVD yesterday the soft-focus 70's-ness of it all was slightly less than magical. But then the real dancing started and I decided that Mikhail could be my imaginary boyfriend again.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. As I've been full of the Christmas Spirit not having to work two jobs, I've been watching Christmas movies. Holiday Inn was in the queue this week and so I got to see the original rendition of "White Christmas." Which was followed by a number for Lincoln's birthday featuring Bing Crosby in blackface. Ugh.

2. I've found a blog about working on and living in old houses from the 40's through the 70's: Retro Renovation. It even has tips on what to do with a pink bathroom!

3. The mittens performed admirably at the company party last night, even though it was SEVEN BELOW at Soldier Hollow--and that's not counting the windchill from tubing.

"Improbable, beautiful and afraid of nothing"

Here's something from Mary Oliver that the Writer's Almanac had posted last weekend. It works in birds, and winter, and being a better person--just right.

Starlings in Winter
by Mary Oliver

Chunky and noisy,
but with stars in their black feathers,
they spring from the telephone wire
and instantly

they are acrobats
in the freezing wind.
And now, in the theater of air,
they swing over buildings,

dipping and rising;
they float like one stippled star
that opens,
becomes for a moment fragmented,

then closes again;
and you watch
and you try
but you simply can't imagine

how they do it
with no articulated instruction, no pause,
only the silent confirmation
that they are this notable thing,

this wheel of many parts, that can rise and spin
over and over again,
full of gorgeous life.
Ah, world, what lessons you prepare for us,

even in the leafless winter,
even in the ashy city.
I am thinking now
of grief, and of getting past it;

I feel my boots
trying to leave the ground,
I feel my heart
pumping hard, I want

to think again of dangerous and noble things.
I want to be light and frolicsome.
I want to be improbable beautiful and afraid of nothing,
as though I had wings.

Pretty. Also, COLD.

I was out this morning sweeping off the little bit of snow that accumulated and making sure the bird feeder was uncovered and full, and it looked like this:

(Maxfield Parrish, "Winter Night Landscape [Study]." Oil on board, 1956-58.)

I hope all the birds and the strays and the people who were out last night are OK. I actually got a recorded call from Utah Power yesterday evening saying to stop unnecessary power use to accommodate demand due to the extreme cold, and to consider lowering thermostats "five to ten degrees." Um, no. But I didn't use the space heater last night, because I am a good and obedient citizen. I noticed all the neighbors kept their Christmas lights on, though.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Knit Faster

So in between Secret Gift Knitting/Sewing I've been working on another pair of those Twilight Mittens for myself--except this time they fit and I like them. (The saga of the last pair: I lost my place in the cables, they didn't match, and they ended up too small even after I blocked them, so I gave them to a non-knitting Twilight-loving co-worker who thought they were awesome.)

But this pair fits--I went up to larger needles and nice chunky yarn. The left one is done; I'll finish this right one tonight, because I need to wear them to the company Christmas party Thursday, which involves sledding.

Nothing Says Christmas Like A Horn Section

Just yesterday I was wishing that there were more Christmas soul albums, and then I discovered Otis Redding covering "White Christmas." Released posthumously as a single with "Merry Christmas, Baby," this is the second-most awesome Christmas song ever. (Here's the most awesome one.)


Also: Nothing gets one excited for Christmas more than NOT working two jobs in December.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Christmas is coming--do you have a nativity set that uses Helvetica yet? If not, you could try this minimalist one.
2. I've been reading a re-print of Elsie De Wolfe's The House in Good Taste, first published in 1913. It's fascinating to read a decorating book published without a lot of pictures. Despite it being nearly a century old, there's a lot of good points made.
We are sure to judge a person in whose house we find ourselves for the first time, by their surroundings. We judge their temperament, their habits, their inclinations, by the interior of their home. We may talk of the weather, but we are looking at the furniture.

Maybe This Is Why I Like The Cosmos Series So Much Lately

Today's Writer's Almanac featured this poem (and also a description of the "Stella shouting contest, also known as the 'Stell-off'" that's part of a Tennessee Williams festival--the Writer's Almanac is nothing if not varied):

Stars

by Freya Manfred

What matters most? It's a foolish question because I'm hanging on,
just like you. No, I'm past hanging on. It's after midnight and I'm falling
toward four a.m., the best time for ghosts, terror, and lost hopes.

No one says anything of significance to me. I don't care if the President's
a two year old, and the Vice President's four. I don't care if you're
cashing in your stocks or building homes for the homeless.

I was a caring person. I would make soup and grow you many flowers.
I would enter your world, my hands open to catch your tears,
my lips on your lips in case we both went deaf and blind.

But I don't care about your birthday, or Christmas, or lover's lane,
or even you, not as much as I pretend. Ah, I was about to say,

"I don't care about the stars" -- but I had to stop my pen.
Sometimes, out in the silent black Wisconsin countryside
I glance up and see everything that's not on earth, glowing, pulsing,
each star so close to the next and yet so far away.

Oh, the stars. In lines and curves, with fainter, more mysterious
designs beyond, and again, beyond. The longer I look, the more I see,
and the more I see, the deeper the universe grows.

I have a long way to go, and I'm starting now --
out in the silent black Wisconsin countryside.

Advent Calendar

The Big Picture blog has started their photo-a-day countdown to Christmas this year, again using images from the Hubble Space Telescope. A new photo is added every day here.

I think Carl Sagan would approve. My dad loaned me the book Cosmos to go along with my watching of the show, and here's my holiday thought for this season:

The Cosmos may be densely populated with intelligent beings. But the Darwinian lesson is clear: There will be no humans elsewhere. Only here. Only this small planet. We are a rare as well as an endangered species. Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious. If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Let's Hear It For Four-Day Weekends

I got so much done over the weekend: Finished a knitted accessory that was supposed to be a gift but won't fit the intended recipient (I'll try again); started over on a new pair of Twilight mittens for myself (Twilight, I wish I could quit you); sewed something secret for a holiday gift; sewed my Liberty peacock-print dress; and finished the beige cardigan.

Here's the dress:


And here's the cardigan:



Funny thing about the cardigan--I re-did the front three times to get it perfect. Then I got to the knitted border and collar and I used a smaller needle so it wouldn't droop. I over-compensated, though, so the border came out a little short and tight, which is why the bottom flips up in that little diamond fold. I told myself that I like the "adapted" shape--and I do--but it's not how it's supposed to be. I may end up re-doing the border...I'll wear it first and see.

Quite A Weekend For Authors

If you had a birthday over the last day or so and you want to be a children's book author, you have good company: Yesterday was the birthday of Louisa May Alcott (Little Women), Madeleine L'Engle, and C.S. Lewis. And today is the birthday of L.M. Montgomery (Anne of Green Gables) and Mark Twain.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Since it' now officially the "holiday season," I will tell you about my new favorite festive drink: Make an Old Fashioned, but use a clementine instead of an orange. Tasty!

2. Speaking of whiskey (and really, when are we not?), the two cases of scotch under a hut used in Shackleton's 1909 expedition are now a little less buried in ice, so the maker of the scotch wants to drill them out. Drill, baby, drill!

3. And finally, someone has probably already forwarded this to you, but it is too awesome not to post. The Muppets present Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody."

Happy Thanksgiving

I am thankful to have a job, and central heating, and things to read, and a clean cat.

I won't post tomorrow but I'll have some things for Friday, including a Muppet video and some talk about whiskey.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Finally, Some Progress

This week I stopped repeating the same part of the beige cardigan, finished the back, and got the sleeves sewed up, too.
Now I just have the front trim and collar to do--I don't think I'll have enough yarn left for a belt, but I'm OK with that.

And I'm planning an elaborate cabled sweater (Thing #22) to start before the year is out. I think I'll use an Elizabeth Zimmerman pattern, who is famous for being an awesome knitter, yes, but for also coining the knitter's equivalent of "Keep Calm and Carry On": Knit on with confidence and hope, through all crises.

Knit on.

WWCSD?

The more I watch Cosmos, the more I like Carl Sagan. Here's the opening voiceover from Episode 8:

The sky calls to us. If we do not destroy ourselves, we will one day venture to the stars. There was a time when the stars seemed an impenetrable mystery, but today we have begun to understand them. In our personal lives, also, we journey from ignorance to knowledge. Our individual growth reflects the advancement of the species. The exploration of the cosmos is a voyage of self-discovery.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. The documentary Grey Gardens showcases some of my deep-seated fears (being old and poor, becoming dependent on someone else, turning into a crazy cat lady), so I had some reservations about watching the HBO film about the same characters, but it was very good. I recommend it, if only to better understand how crazy cat ladies get that way.

2. An interview with Cormac McCarthy in the Wall Street Journal reveals that he drinks what I drink, when I want gin (which is often): Bombay Gibson, up. And that he writes the way I do, when I don't have a deadline:
"I get up and have a cup of coffee and wander around and read a little bit, sit down and type a few words and look out the window."

3. And finally, here's a map of Holme's London, with notes about what adventure happened in each mapped point. It's very thorough.

Today, We Need More Cats

You've probably heard of Cash4Gold, but have you heard of Cats4Gold?
It's (a) real (site)! www.catsforgold.com

I'd do it.

It's So Nice To Have A Cat Around The House

They can help you with small home improvement tasks, such as putting in a new shelf and re-organizing your broom closet.
Yeah, this shelf is solid, mama.

And they can inspect your cooking utensils, so make sure they're all OK.
Uh, this one has a smell.

(He's not usually allowed up on this counter, but the rearranging created so much excitement that he had to check it out.)

Tuesday Project Roundup: No Progress, But No Mistakes, Either

After I put up a picture of the in-progress cardigan/vest two weeks ago, I noticed I'd gotten off on the pattern on the left front about six inches from the top (it looks like a bumpy line on the right side in that photo). I debated just leaving it, but the point of hobbies--besides being relaxing, of course--is that I'm in control, dammit, so I ripped back and started that part of the front over.

Except the second time I tried to do it, I got it too long and had to rip back again; and the third time, I made the same mistake and had to rip back one more time. The fourth time was the charm, though. So two weeks later, I'm essentially at the same point. But it's mistake free!

In other news, I'm making a dress out of this fabric. It's a pattern I've made about 6 times, so I'm not too worried about messing this one up.

"...my heart is closing like a fist..."

A Monday sort of poem: Part of "Mayakovsky," from Frank O'Hara's Meditations in an Emergency, as quoted in Season 2 of Mad Men, which I am re-watching:

Now I am quietly waiting for
the catastrophe of my personality
to seem beautiful again,
and interesting, and modern.

The country is grey and
brown and white in trees,
snows and skies of laughter
always diminishing, less funny
not just darker, not just grey.

It may be the coldest day of
the year, what does he think of
that? I mean, what do I? And if I do,
perhaps I am myself again.


(The title is from part 2 of the poem but I'm quoting part 4; I found the whole thing online here. Frank O'Hara was a musician, too.)

Friday Unrelated Information

1. If you've wondered what comes after "host of archangels" and "coven of witches," check the Index of Supernatural Collective Nouns.

2. I was reading an old J. Peterman catalog last night, from 1994 (what, of course I kept some of them) and here's part of the description for a silk taffeta ball skirt: "Is there just too much elegance, too much barely containable romance in your life? Of course not. Read on."
Oh, 1994 was a simpler time, when I believed ball skirts would lead to balls and J. Peterman could sell something called the "Afghan Rebel Hat."

3. What I would like to do, too:

Something To Ponder

"One of the hardest things to look at in this life is the lives we didn’t lead, the path not taken, potential left unfulfilled. In stories, those who look back — Lot’s wife, Orpheus and Eurydice — are lost. Looking to the side instead, to gauge how our companions are faring, is a way of glancing at a safer reflection of what we cannot directly bear, like Perseus seeing the Gorgon safely mirrored in his shield."

(From a NY Times opinion piece. I had dinner with an old friend last night and we were going through the list of mutual acquaintances.)

Music For Hobbies, Music As Hobby

I've been out of touch with the classical music world ever since I graduated college, and the only classical CD I've bought this year has been Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, but back in the day I loved to listen to chamber music on the Saint Paul Sunday Morning radio program.

As I was doing some sewing a few weeks ago, I thought, "Why not see when that program is broadcast so you can start listening again?" They've dropped "Morning"--it's just Saint Paul Sunday now--and even better, you can stream all the programs online. Which is how I discovered that vocal group Anonymous 4, the experts on early music, had branched out into American shape-note, folk, and gospel songs. In 2004. Yes, out of touch.

But the happy news is that I now have a bunch of free music to catch up on, and whatever Anonymous 4 sings is magical. (Here's that 2004 broadcast.) Every program gives you all kinds of good stuff to listen to, with enough background discussion with the host to jog your memory (if you, say, got a degree in all this) or teach you something new.

Also: Happy Veterans Day to all the veterans out there!

Tuesday Project Roundup: It's Flannel Season

This was a fun, free weekend project: I'd made this skirt before, using a pattern by a designer/blogger that I follow that was published in last year's Stitch magazine. I had the right yardage of this plaid on the project shelf, abandoned from another project, so when I saw the designer's plaid version, I had to make one, too. (She matched up her plaids better than I did, but I bet her fabric wasn't woven crooked.)
Cat and cat food are not included with this skirt.

Happy Birthday, Carl Sagan

Today Carl Sagan would have been 75 years old. You can read about him on Wikipedia (did you know that "a Sagan has been defined as a humorous unit of measurement equal to at least four billion"?), watch all of the Cosmos series on Hulu, or watch the "re-mix" below, which was up on kottke.org last month. Despite the Auto-Tune, it's meant in a spirit of love, not mockery, and I bet Sagan would have liked it.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Funny! And alarmingly true to life! The Emotional Hokey-Pokey.

2. I can't tell if this iPod speaker is a real product or a joke ("It looks frightening and it IS frightening"?), but I always click links that say, "Wall of sound."

3. The Where the Wild Things Are movie is at Brewvies now, starting tonight. I might have to put that on the agenda tomorrow if I can get all the final gardening done.

Science Or Science Fiction?

On BLDGBLOG, I read a long and fascinating interview yesterday with one of the engineers on the Yucca Mountain project. The interview is matter-of-fact, not political, but it's really interesting. I learned that Yucca Mountain is being built to a standard of a MILLION YEARS, which brings up all sorts of issues: How do you even label something for that kind of future? As the interviewee says,

We have looked very closely at what WIPP is doing—the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico. They did a study with futurists and other people—sociologists and language specialists. They decided to come up with markers in seven languages, basically like a Rosetta Stone, with the idea that there will always be someone in the world who studies ancient languages, even 10,000 years from now, someone who will be able to resurrect what the meanings of these stelae are. They will basically say, “This is not a place of honor, don’t dig here, this is not good material,” etc.

[...] Of course, there’s also a little bit of fun involved here: what is the dominant species going to be in 10,000 years? And can you really mark something for a million years? What we have looked at, basically, is marking things for at least 10,000 years—and hopefully it will last even longer. And if this information is important to whatever societies are around at that time, if they have any intelligence at all, they will renew these monuments.

I love it when science seems more like science fiction, like the Large Hadron Collider going back in time to prevent itself from ever being made. Doesn't the modern-day Rosetta Stone sound a good construct for a sci-fi story?

(I was also struck by this engineer's optimism--because I have my doubts about whether anything will be around in 10,000 years.)

Secret Parent Wisdom

So remember the new bird feeder from last week that the birds weren't going near? It was a topic of discussion on Sunday's visit to my parents. My dad asked me if the feeder had any glass, and I said yes, two sides of the feeder's rectangle were glass. Then he speculated that maybe the birds were getting a reflection when they approached the feeder, which was scaring them off.

Monday morning I filled the feeder up completely, thus blocking all the glass with seed. And now, on Wednesday, there have been at least three different brave birds eating from it, and a lot more doing a fly-by to check it out!

Seriously, first my mom saved the day with her cat knowledge, and now Dad is an amateur bird scientist. Does National Geographic have a special secret issue for parents? Or is it the fact that they have 30 years more experience than me?

Tuesday Project Roundup: How About Some Pictures On This Blog?

I have a picture of the beige cardigan, which has grown two fronts and just needs a back and trim.


And I have a picture of Toby enjoying his heater last night.

(And I have good news about the Twilight mittens: I finally blocked them and I was able to get them more of the same size, so they might not be a total loss. No picture of those, though.)

Feeling Better

When I'm sick, the first thing I do is stop drinking coffee. It just doesn't sound good, and that's kind of like a jug of wine not sounding good to Jack Kerouac (i.e., unlikely). But I got some rest and some Sudafed and October, The Worst Month In Recent Memory, is finally over, so this morning the coffee was back on.

As Dorothy Draper says, "A lot of worse things can be said of a woman than 'she gives you a good cup of coffee.'"

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Carrying over the Beatles post from last Friday, here's a flowchart of the lyrics to "Hey Jude" (click for big):
2. And because I can't get enough of iconic bands from the 60's, last night we watched Gimme Shelter. No, I don't want to dress like Mick Jagger now, but the movie has the best version of "Love in Vain." Enjoy.

I Have A Cold

Turns out that a month with travel and lots of stress not only makes you unfocused and uninspired (and wanting to spend money), it also makes you really susceptible to the common cold. I am looking forward to the afternoon off and some Chinese food for dinner. And that's all I got today.

#$%&! Snow

Yeah. It snowed. There's snow on the ground and it's cold. I happened across a blog about people who stay year-round at McMurdo station in Antarctica; the latest post is welcoming back the seasonal people, of which my uncle is one. Here's the blog: frozensouth.com. I suppose we can read it and think that it's not that cold here yet. Yet.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Ending Badly, Like All Twilght-Related Things In My Experience

I finished the "Bella" mittens, as inspired by the film Twilight, but they're kind of a flop: Because I knit the first mitten while traveling, its cables weren't even, which meant they didn't match the second mitten. The first mitten's top I had to extend to accommodate my fingers, but because of the cable length on the second one, that top worked OK--giving me mittens that are fraternal twins, not identical. But I'm not happy with my work on them, and overall, they're a little snug.

Obviously, this is all my own fault, but it's easy to blame Twilight itself. And the sort of "Was that it?" feeling I had when I finished these mittens is very, very similar to the feeling I had when I finished the book/movie. So I'm blaming Twilight.

Get With It, Birds

Last week the bird feeder I'd been using for 2.5 years here fell down somehow, which broke the glass and put it out of commission. So last weekend I comparison shopped and got a new, deluxe feeder, one that holds about a metric ton of seed and has a roof and drainage and even two baskets for suet cakes.

I thought the birds would be all over their upgraded feeder (and the suet), but no. In 8 days, no bird has landed on it. The sparrows' consternation the first two days was almost funny--while I assumed they'd get over it. Now it's just strange. I have taken to shaking all of that seed out of the feeder to the ground, where the birds will finally eat it.

I don't think I've lost any bird visitors--and the quail are really happy about all that seed on the ground--but what should I do? Just wait it out? Enter into a contest of wills with the sparrows? It says something about my mental state lately that I think that's a fine plan.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I've had an unfocused, uninspired week, which is why the blog has suffered: I'm not interested in my latest projects and I'm only reading self-help books, so I don't even have anything good to quote here.

2. But there's always Salinger...in my opinion, Franny and Zooey IS a self-help book, just better written. Here's Zooey at the end talking about detachment, the theme of the week:
You can say the Jesus Prayer from now till doomsday, but if you don't realize that the only thing that counts in the religious life is detachment, I don't see how you'll ever even move an inch. Detachment, buddy, and only detachment. Desirelessness. "Cessation from all hankerings."

3. And finally, I wish this t-shirt used a better font, because I really love the sentiment:
"I knit so I don't kill people." Amen.

Author Trivia

Did you know that Jean-Paul Sartre was a Nobel Prize winner, and he refused it? And that the Swedish Academy said, essentially, "Well, you're still a Nobel Prize winner, even if you don't accept the award." Fun times in 1964. (Today's post courtesy of The Writer's Almanac. You can read more about why Sartre refused the award here.)

[Whenever I think of Sartre, I always think of "The Jean Paul Sartre Cookbook," a satire that someone posted in the early days of the internet and my friends and I found in high school. Oh, we thought that was the cleverest thing. Satire! Sartre! Beginning French class! Good times.]

A Cartoon

Because I it's the 200th anniversary of Poe's birth this year. And I like ravens.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Some Sewing Again

As I finished this dress, it seemed like a long time since I had sewn something else. My short-term memory is really shot lately (I couldn't remember what I did Saturday night when someone asked me yesterday) so the last sewing project before the quilt was a blur, but it turns out I was right: This is the first dress since the beginning of September.


Here's a more detailed shot of the pattern, which I made in December, as well. This time I remembered to lengthen the sleeves and added a belt. The gingham makes it feel very French New-Wave to me...that, or The Womenfolk's album cover from 1964*

*I didn't even know this group existed until two weeks ago, when I was going through my dad's old (mint) vinyl looking for some new music.

Let's Talk About Shoes

Instead of talking about our feelings today, let's talk about brown shoes that aren't too high-heeled. After watching Help! Thursday night, I did some major googling to find a pair of boots like they were wearing in that clip I posted Friday. While all the ankle boots for women this season seem stuck in 1986, I found some: They're Florsheim, for men.


Sometimes I am happy to not have tiny ladylike feet, because a men's size 7 is a women's size 9. My only hesitation? A size 7 isn't available from a site that offers free shipping and returns, so I'd be gambling a little that they'd work.

What do we think about these mod boots? They'd look great with jeans, but not so much with skirts or dresses. But they're a decent price (unlike these $350 boots of magic from Sweden) and I had a pair of jodhpur boots in college that I loved. Also, I could pretend I was a Beatle.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Check out the Letters of Note blog, which posts scans and transcripts of, well, notable letters. The variety and historical background is really fascinating.

2. I watched Help! last night and now I want the sofa, the chair, and John's boots from this clip:


3. And here's something from McSweeney's that tickled me (click through to read the other two-thirds of it):

What to Expect: The Third Decade

Keep in mind that all adults reach their developmental milestones at their own pace. It is important not to compare your adult's rate of development to that of his peers. The following list is meant only as a guideline and not as a cause for alarm.

By thirty-years-old, your adult will probably be able to...

Feed and maintain a house pet
Hold down a job
Maintain eye contact while speaking
Refrain from discussing high school
Cook a meal (three-course)
Make small talk
Forgive his family
Acknowledge other viewpoints (social)
Detect and respond to ambiguity
Finish school

I Love Stories About The Large Hadron Collider

From a NYTimes article about the latest escapades at CERN (other than terrorist physicists):

A pair of otherwise distinguished physicists have suggested that the hypothesized Higgs boson, which physicists hope to produce with the collider, might be so abhorrent to nature that its creation would ripple backward through time and stop the collider before it could make one, like a time traveler who goes back in time to kill his grandfather.

Really, what commentary do I need to add to that? Read it all here.

Get One Last Trip To The Farmers' Market In

They're winding down for the season, as is the garden. I'll make it a two-poem week and post this one about the harvest. (Now I'm going to think "human brains covered in red oilcloth" when I cut up the last tomatoes to freeze.)

Harvest

by Louise Gluck

It's autumn in the market—
not wise anymore to buy tomatoes.
They're beautiful still on the outside,
some perfectly round and red, the rare varieties
misshapen, individual, like human brains covered in red oilcloth—

Inside, they're gone. Black, moldy—
you can't take a bite without anxiety.
Here and there, among the tainted ones, a fruit
still perfect, picked before decay set in.

Instead of tomatoes, crops nobody really wants.
Pumpkins, a lot of pumpkins.
Gourds, ropes of dried chilies, braids of garlic.
The artisans weave dead flowers into wreaths;
they tie bits of colored yarn around dried lavender.
And people go on for a while buying these things
as though they thought the farmers would see to it
that things went back to normal:
the vines would go back to bearing new peas;
the first small lettuces, so fragile, so delicate, would begin
to poke out of the dirt.

Instead, it gets dark early.
And the rains get heavier; they carry
the weight of dead leaves.

At dusk, now, an atmosphere of threat, of foreboding.
And people feel this themselves; they give a name to the season,
harvest, to put a better face on these things.

The gourds are rotting on the ground, the sweet blue grapes are finished.
A few roots, maybe, but the ground's so hard the farmers think
it isn't worth the effort to dig them out. For what?
To stand in the marketplace under a thin umbrella, in the rain, in the cold,
no customers anymore?

And then the frost comes; there's no more question of harvest.
The snow begins; the pretense of life ends.
The earth is white now; the fields shine when the moon rises.

I sit at the bedroom window, watching the snow fall.
The earth is like a mirror:
calm meeting calm, detachment meeting detachment.

What lives, lives underground.
What dies, dies without struggle.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Patterns

Today I mean patterns as in the designs formed from repeating groups of stitches, not the schematic for making an object.

There's a popcorn pattern on the beige cardigan:

And there's a horseshoe cable pattern on one finished Twilight mitten:

The cables got a little off on this one because I had to keep stopping and starting on the plane, and I had to fudge the top to make it longer to accommodate my fingers, but I'm actually kind of liking it. Maybe it will gaze at me in science class and make me flustered.

In Need Of Re-Posting

I know I put up this poem last year, in the heat of the election and seasonal change and economic apocalypse, but let's put it up again this year, for another time of transition:

"How to Like It," by Stephen Dobyns

These are the first days of fall. The wind
at evening smells of roads still to be traveled,
while the sound of leaves blowing across the lawns
is like an unsettled feeling in the blood,
the desire to get in a car and just keep driving.
A man and a dog descend their front steps.
The dog says, Let’s go downtown and get crazy drunk.
Let’s tip over all the trash cans we can find.
This is how dogs deal with the prospect of change.
But in his sense of the season, the man is struck
by the oppressiveness of his past, how his memories
which were shifting and fluid have grown more solid
until it seems he can see remembered faces
caught up among the dark places in the trees.
The dog says, Let’s pick up some girls and just
rip off their clothes. Let’s dig holes everywhere.
Above his house, the man notices wisps of cloud
crossing the face of the moon. Like in a movie,
he says to himself, a movie about a person
leaving on a journey. He looks down the street
to the hills outside of town and finds the cut
where the road heads north. He thinks of driving
on that road and the dusty smell of the car
heater, which hasn’t been used since last winter.
The dog says, Let’s go down to the diner and sniff
people’s legs. Let’s stuff ourselves on burgers.
In the man’s mind, the road is empty and dark.
Pine trees press down to the edge of the shoulder,
where the eyes of animals, fixed in his headlights,
shine like small cautions against the night.
Sometimes a passing truck makes his whole car shake.
The dog says, Let’s go to sleep. Let’s lie down
by the fire and put our tails over our noses.
But the man wants to drive all night, crossing
one state line after another, and never stop
until the sun creeps into his rearview mirror.
Then he’ll pull over and rest awhile before
starting again, and at dusk he’ll crest a hill
and there, filling a valley, will be the lights
of a city entirely new to him.
But the dog says, Let’s just go back inside.
Let’s not do anything tonight. So they
walk back up the sidewalk to the front steps.
How is it possible to want so many things
and still want nothing? The man wants to sleep
and wants to hit his head again and again
against a wall. Why is it all so difficult?
But the dog says, Let’s go make a sandwich.
Let’s make the tallest sandwich anyone’s ever seen.
And that’s what they do and that’s where the man’s
wife finds him, staring into the refrigerator
as if into the place where the answers are kept-
the ones telling why you get up in the morning
and how it is possible to sleep at night,
answers to what comes next and how to like it.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Have you heard this? First Conde Nast shuttered Domino magazine (which I miss so much, as next year I start advance furniture buying for The House To Come), and now Gourmet will fold after November--the same Gourmet that's been around since the 40s and been home to writers such as MFK Fisher (not to mention the online cocktail gallery). Damn.

2. It's John Lennon's birthday. He would have been 69.

3. I just learned that ravens can live up to 40 years in the wild; the average raven lifespan is between 15 to 25 years, depending on your source. (Collective noun for ravens: An unkindness.)

"A Love Of One's Fate"

Yesterday, the poem featured on The Writer's Almanac was called "Amor Fati," a phrase I didn't know. Wikipedia gave me some good stuff:
[The phrase] is used to describe an attitude in which one sees everything that happens in one's life, including suffering and loss, as good. That is, one feels that everything that happens is destiny's way of reaching its ultimate purpose, and so should be considered good.

Nietzsche used the concept and phrase a lot; Wikipedia also gave me a good quote from him:
My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. To not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it...but to love it.

I like this concept of amor fati. There has been a lot to deal with in my life lately and I think this is a good approach to it.

In other words...SERENITY NOW!

Serves Me Right To Complain About Private Jets

Remember my last business trip? Yeah, I'll wear all the booties you want if you don't make me fly to Orlando and back and arrive both places after midnight. Oh, the humanity.
But I'm home now. And business trips=salary. So I really shouldn't complain about this one, either.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Plane Knitting

The beige cardigan is coming along, but I decided it was too big to take with me on the plane. So I started some mittens with some leftover yarn I had and am working on those on the flights. However, they are mittens inspired by the movie Twilight.

Yes, I saw the movie. The can't-look-away-train-wreck part of me even had to go and read the book after that. I am thoroughly embarassed to be boarding the Twilight Mittens Train. But these will be plum! And will look good with my coat! And I left the first page of the pattern that shouts "Bella's Mittens" at home, so maybe no one will know.


(Top photo from the movie; bottom photo from the pattern.)

Or maybe when I'm finished, my mittens will sparkle and declare their undead love for me. We'll see.

Two Pieces Of Information With a Blues Brothers Tie-In

The first: Saturday night Mr. Isbell and I saw Inglourious Basterds at Brewvies, and a lot of the time I couldn't help but think, "Illinois Nazis. I hate Illinois Nazis."



The second: While I never had to be a juror last week, that trip to Florida I was worried about is happening tonight and tomorrow. So I'm hitting the road and Toby is currently sitting next to my overnight bag, looking worried.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Happy birthday, Wallace Stevens (1879). I'll try to remember this quote when I'm feeling overwhelmed: "Everything is complicated; if that were not so, life and poetry and everything else would be a bore."

2. Go visit myvintagevogue.com before Conde Nast makes them take down the site for copyright infringement. Some of the dresses are so timeless:

3. I agree with this: "What we need is a word to describe 'nostalgia for things we haven’t even experienced.' Things like transistor radios, soda counters, and rabbit-eared televisions. Wes Anderson is a connoisseur of this sensation. No doubt the French have ten different words for it." (From here, a blog about the production of Where the Wild Things Are.)

Happy Tocktober!

How did it get to be Tocktober already? Before you know it, it will be Nosevember.