For Bo (Updated with Picture, No Thanks to Blogger)

Oh, this is funny. I can't even think of a good opening line. It's a good thing I'm not doing this for a living, eh? So, Bo has been hammering me because I've been a Very Bad Blogger and haven't posted since the Dawn of Time. ::Appropriate Look of Contrition:: Sawwy, honey. Does this mean I can count you as my first groupie? (insert appropriate ASCII winking face here) Really, I've just had Writer's Block and Performance Anxiety. (Ya know, the British have something with the Capitalization of Certain Important Words in a sentence. I heart it.) Firstly, I am just not my best during the very long SoCal summer months (it can last through October down here.) Heat and sweating make me irritable. Add to that the universal worries about blithely hurling a third of our income back into the face of corporate America, dealing with the vagarities of the Tween mind, wallowing in the guilt of an ineffectual housekeeper and failed birthday card sender, and various and sundry petty little distresses (petty because, hello, I've got it so good compared to the majority of the world)and you've got the longest run-on pity party known to the literary world. Yeah. So. Hey, it gave me something to write!

(insert Clever Segue here)

My fabulous best friend from high school, Mandy, took time out of her busy schedule (2 adorable, very active boys!!) to find and scan some pictures of us/me from high school. The picture above (Ed. note: or, more accurately, the picture that will appear above whence Blogger decides to cooperate. Please check back later.) perfectly illustrates that I am a geek and always have been slightly goofy. This is probably why I didn't date much. Mandy called this one "Teri and the Cool Guys". Notice who is smiling in a most uncool manner. I am, I think, looking very good in my Banana Republic shirt and Levis, though. Too bad I couldn't scowl.

In other news, The Girl is getting her tonsils out tomorrow, poor kid. But since this will require copious amounts of ice cream therapy, she's not too worried anymore. Bonus for me: I get a couple of days of no talking back. I will only have to endure the eye-daggers.

So, dear readers (and Bo!), I will bring this long awaited post to a close.

Live Long and Prosper.

Thursday Thirteen #1

Thirteen books and/or authors that I read over and over again.

I am a voracious reader. My mother read us the entire Little House on the Prairie series when I was 5 or 6. I still have the first book that was my very own. (The name escapes me, but when I find it I'll post it because it is a fabulous book.) I have spent many a happy hour immersed in times and lands and galaxies far, far away.

1. C.S. Lewis - The Chronicles of Narnia I was given this series when I was 9, and have read it all at least 30 times. Yeah, I love it.

2. Terry Pratchett - Mainly his Discworld Series I have always loved sly, subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) British humor. This guy is a master. I could gush on and on and on. But I've got a time crunch here, so I won't. But really. He's the best.

3. Patricia A. McKillip - You'll see a fantasy/Sci-Fi trend here. I get lost in the worlds this woman creates, they are so vivid. If I had to choose, my two favorites would be Winter Rose and Ombria in Shadow. But don't make me pick.

4. Joan D. Vinge - The Snow Queen Obviously story is the most important aspect of a book, but atmosphere is a big reason why I'll read one more than once. The world in this book relies heavily on the sea, which I love.

5. Tad Williams - I recommend Tailchaser's Song and the Otherland series.

6. The Time Traveler's Wife - I've read this twice, so far, and I cried harder the second time. To call it an achingly poignant love story wouldn't do it justice. Warning: it has some rated R moments.

(Intermission: I have to be somewhere at 2pm, so for now I'm not going to link the rest. I might come back later to do it.)

7. Ray Bradbury - particularly Dandelion Wine, The Illustrated Man and The Martian Chronicles. The man is a master.

8. James Herriot - All Creatures Great and Small and the others that came after. Another series that colored my childhood and completed my transformation into a rather young anglophile.

9. Guy Gavriel Kay - All his books, but especially Tigana. In fact, I'm going to start it again today.

10. Anne McCaffrey - The Dragonrider Series My freshman Honors English teacher introduced me to some fine fantasy/Science Fiction and this series is one of the best.

11. Soul String by Midori Snyder - When I was younger my dad worked for a newspaper and would come home with boxes full of the review books. This was in one of those boxes and I think I've read it at least 5 times. Atmosphere + Story = Multiple Read!

12. Ellen Gilchrist - She writes about the sometimes wretchedness of humans and the human condition with compassion and a certain gold tinged nostalgia.

13. Vladimir Nabokov - especially Ada or Ardor, Pale Fire and Lolita. This man was the reigning master of luminous prose.

Well, there you have it. This time I went the "deep insights into my soul" route. If I do it again, I'll try to go for the funny. ;)

(whoops - forgot to say: This autolink is for Thursay Thirteens, this time)



And muchas gracias to Kelly of Diary of the Nello and Nello Design for the lovely free banner!!

The Preamble To My Thursday Thirteen

Bobealia over at The Cat's Me'Ass and I have been promising to tag each other with a meme, if one of us gets tagged by someone else. (Nice awkward sentence, there.) Well, Bo decided to take the bull by the horns and has commanded me to do a Thursday Thirteen. Mine would have been up sooner, but you all know about my case of fatal procrastination. And (The Spouse will be so thrilled to hear this), I inadvertently slept in today. Admittedly I was up until 1am. Then the she-devil cats woke me up at 5:30am. I could not get back to sleep. Did I fire up the computer and do my Thursday Thirteen? Nooooo, of course not. I laid in bed watching what passes for music videos these days. I got a little sleepy, so I said to myself "Self, why don't you close your eyes for a bit and then get up at 8?" Try 10. Oops.

While you wait for me to get my act together go check out Bo's Thursday Thirteen, cuz it is totally hilarious.

Out Of Left Field

Holy cow, I can't believe it's been almost 10 days since I last posted. It's the whole superconductivity thing, as I have already explained. Ok, so anyway, today is just gonna be lightnin' fast. I was over at Amethyst Grove (girlfriend doesn't even know I lurk over there, but she's makes the cutest aprons and is into vintage stuff, therefore, I am a lurkiloo)and she posted about a website with the cutest, sassiest, mostest gorgeous tableware. EVER. I'm so weirdly excited. An insight into me: here are some of the things that make my materialistic little heart sing.

The One In Which I Whine. But Only a Teeny Bit.

I am positive that higher temperatures slow down my thought processi. And the pooky part is that it isn't even August. Gah. So that's my excuse for the lack of posting. The superconductive fluid in my cranial cavity needs cool temperatures to insure that my brain function is what it should be. (And a shout out to anyone who reads Terry Pratchett's Discworld series and gets the reference.) On top of that, I think I inhaled killer mold spores while cleaning (finally!!) out my closet. This has made my froat hurt. ::sniff:: And today, the sneezing. For the love of all that is holy - THE. SNEEZING. ::sob::

As an interesting side note: I Image Googled "fainting" and, seriously, 95% of the pictures were of Tennessee Fainting Goats. Step away from the breeding of freak, mutant fainting goats, people. For all our sakes.

Happy 4th O' July

National Archives - "The Charters of Freedom"