Hobson's Choice
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
War for Christmas
From a gentleman at BP today, pumping gas at the same time as me, upon seeing our bumper sticker:
"My son's going back to Iraq for the third time on December 28th. All his growing up, I taught him to fish and hunt and play football. I didn't raise him to disintegrate people. It's hard on his daddy. This Mr. Bush has got him in a hell of a quandary."
12:52 p.m. - 2006-12-20
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I wonder as I wander
Background: When I was a little girl, each December I would tease my dad by telling him that I had gotten him an empty cigar box for Christmas. And now we've got Eleanor saying this, too.
I think I may know what I'm getting for Christmas. Yesterday, Eleanor and I were browsing in the underwear section at Sears as I had been thinking that the holidays should be a little more uplifting (if you take my meaning). All of a sudden, Eleanor's eyes lit up.
"Oh," she said, "we got you a...a...a... empty cigar box."
8:30 a.m. - 2006-12-20
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Fifth Night of Hanukkah
Hanukkah party tonight. Cool stripey candles on the menorah. Discovered that Fisher Price makes a Hanukkah Little People Set. Despite not being Jewish, I may have to have it.
Have decided that I love latkes and would like to eat them every day. Maybe not quite as much as my cool neighbor Heather's son Cory (age 15)who ate around 10 of them.
Also got lots of hugs and kisses from Lydia, the two year old hostess of the party.
Eleanor's comments on the event which thrilled her by carrying on past her bedtime:
"I've got a teeny tiny dreidel of my own."
"I love menorahs."
"I love it when I get those 'gimels.'"
"I am the best dreidel player ever."
Trust the Gentile child to appropriate a ritual and then make it her own.
But all this is to say that Seth, who is as in love with Eleanor as a three year old can possibly be, should be pretty happy about the turn of events this evening.
And I feel pretty good about Eleanor's quiet attention as the candles were lit and blessings sung. It's not every day that a West Virginia kid gets to see rituals outside her own sphere, and I'm grateful. Thank you, Melanie and Hoyt.
9:15 p.m. - 2006-12-19
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Problem with the Yarn Shop
Okay, it's not the problem with the yarn shop; it's myproblem. Whenever I walk out of the yarn shop, I am inevitably carrying the yarn and project that the yarn shop ladies want me to knit. Unfortunately, my purchase rarely bears any relation to what I walked into the shop wanting to knit.
I think I understand what's going on. In the 21st century, knitters are supposed to hip, edgy, and smart-mouthed. We stitch and bitch, after all. The knitting shop ladies will raucously tell me what they want me to knit, and I'm supposed to talk back. I'm supposed to come right back at them until I get what I'm looking for.
But I'm a girl who was raised to respect authority. So when I'm confronted by women who have been knitting for decades longer than I and who speak with authoritative sass, I buckle.
And I walk out the shop, prepared to knit my first sweater:
(a) on circular needles (I would quit knitting for good if circular needle were the only option. I hate them!)
(b) knitting from the neck down. My first sweater can't start at the bottom, like a normal piece of knitting?
(c) in cotton. Cotton! Unforgiving, unpleasant, repetitive-stress-inducing fiber.
(d) on size 5 needles. Apparently, so that it will take me decades to produce my first child's sweater.
I need to get a knitting backbone. And probably to stick with A.C. Moore and trust that I'll be able to figure the pattern without help from the yarn shop ladies.
8:37 a.m. - 2006-12-16
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note to Self
Jenny, do not go to Kmart. We go through this every few months. You think to yourself: maybe I could find it at Kmart. I could avoid the crowds and union-busting at Walmart (or "W"). I might get something really cheap; it would save time. Listen up: it has been years since you found what you were looking for at Kmart. Every time you go, you come out empty-handed and frustrated, full of vows to remember this experience next time. But you don't. So here it is in print: DON'T GO TO KMART. Also, even though there are only 6 people in Kmart at any given time, there are all in a slow-moving line.
8:21 a.m. - 2006-12-16
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, you spamster!
In my effort to keep you abreast of interesting developments in the world of spam, I report the following e-mail.
Sender: Candida Burton
Subject: The parts initially look white and dead-looking and then become inflamed.
Now that was a message I wanted to open.
8:19 a.m. - 2006-12-16
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why Can't We Call It....
I don't remember if we were listening to NPR the other night or if I were ranting about some arcane mapping problem involving elderly caregivers and their grandchildren, but the upshot is this: Chris has a suggestion for the feds. It will help out the majority of citizens who are not paid to remember always the difference between Medicaid and Medicare.
-- Why can't we just call them "Medi-Old" and "Medi-Poor"?
8:17 a.m. - 2006-12-16
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Publication Day!
Three Cheers for Chris Green in 2006. The second book he edited this year arrived from the publishers today.
Titled Radicalism in the South since Reconstruction, co-edited with Rachel Rubin and Jim Smethurst, and published by Palgrave-McMillan, the book is available from Amazon.com just in time for your holiday gift-giving. At $69.95, it does qualify for Super Saver Shipping.
In Radicalism, you can read Chris's essay on Don West, poet/labor activist/teacher/preacher, and his work in the 1930s. About the collection of essays, Helen Lewis (living saint of Appalachian Studies) has said: "This book uncovers some lost history of radical political activity in the South, dispelling the image of the South as conservative, provincial and unconcerned with the problems of poverty, inequality, unemployment which plagued the region. Thanks to Smethurst, Green, and Rubin for disturbing our ideas of the South and adding to our knowledge of Southern politics and history."
For those of you looking for more "economical" and perhaps less scholarly gift ideas, consider Coal: A Poetry Anthology. The official description calls it: "An anthology of poetry on the subject of coal in southern West Virginia and eastern Kentucky--coal miners, their families, their communities, their environment, their goverance." A couple of years ago, Chris and the good folks at Blair Mountain Press put out a call for coal poetry; after reading thousands of poems, this anthology is the result. Gurney Norman (another living Appalachian saint) says: "Coal gathers and reveals a living literary tradition that is directly connected to America's working people who do the real work of our society. As soon as I read the first poems, I felt the power of the words coming from the heart of the nation. The voices in this book utter the experience of coal miners and their families in the Appalachian coal fields in the 20th century. Most of the old time coal miners are gone, but these poems... restore them and inspire us to face the challenges of our times as bravely as they faced theirs"
At a very affordable $15 (and then you'd have the excuse to buy that $10 book you've been longing for, just so that you could get the SuperSaver Shipping), your holiday dollar couldn't go farther. Each poem costs pennies, and you're supporting a great small press, Blair Mountain Press
So hip hip hooray for Chris Green and the fruits of a long year's labor!
5:58 p.m. - 2006-12-12
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Christmas Knitting Season Closed
I'm kind of in shock. At 10:21 in the morning on December 10th, I'm declaring the Christmas Knitting to be Done. I don't know quite what to do with this. It sorts of lacks the excitement of knitting until you leave town for the relatives.
On the other hand, I now get to spend Christmas knitting myself a pair of silk/alpaca/merino blend socks (from the Clearance table at A.C. Moore!) and working on my Afghan for Afghans
Here's a picture of the Christmas knitting. More detailed pictures will be posted in January once recipients have opened their packages.
10:21 a.m. - 2006-12-10
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How stalkerish is it?
Yarn Harlot Stephanie Pearl-McPhee is going to be on Knitty Gritty, and I'm seriously considering paying the extra $5 to get the DIY station and see her on it.
And now, sinus surgery has sealed the deal. I will be paying the $5 to get all the extra cable stations for a month. I'm going to be off my feet for many days. I've always said that if I were ever on bedrest again (and I think this qualifies), I would call up the cable company and say, "Sign Me Up For Everything. Uzbeki tv? I want it. Canadian Broadcasting? Definitely. Al Jazeera? Fine. Just fill my tv."
10:45 a.m. - 2006-12-09
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bad Reader
Once Eleanor's in school all day, we're going to invest in a computer armoire so we can keep my office in the dining room. For now, though, it makes sense to have my office in the most isolated room in our house with adequate electricity: the back bedroom with no heat.
I have fingerless gloves, and I have a space heater. Even so, on days where the temperaturs stay in the teens as they have this week, my fingers and toes get tingly. I can tell that today may be a warmer today because I can't see my breath.
All this is to say that I'm working on the laptop when possible and staying away from my office (where the internet connection). My blog may be erratic, and worst, I'm not getting to visit all my friends' blogs. For the months of December and January, I'm a bad reader, but hopefully not a bad friend.
10:40 a.m. - 2006-12-09
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wanted: Reading and Watching Material
Kind readers, it's official; in a few short weeks, I am "going under the knife" for excavation of my deviant (or deviated) nose. Ironically, though my nose from the outside appears about as cute and perfect as you would want it, inside it is a mass of obstruction, scar tissue, and meandering deviated cartilege.
So I turn to you for recommendations on what to read and watch during my recovery. Apparently, I will be in bed and miserable for several days, and I'm looking for light-hearted entertainments to distract me. Ideal reading material would be simple enough that a narcotic-addled mind could understand and that I wouldn't lose track of the plot as I dozed off in a lortab-haze every ten minutes. And -- and this is key -- it shouldn't be so funny that I laugh s hard enough to make drinks spew out of my nose. I have a feeling that there's going to be enough "stuff" coming out of my nose that I don't want to add anything else to the mix voluntarily.
10:34 a.m. - 2006-12-09
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
Other diaries: > |
