Worth a Thousand Words

Paul Weller by Edward B. Gordon

Daybook

Outside my window
The trees are green and I see maybe a leaf or two that is changing color. It will be Thanksgiving before they really change in force, if they do at all.
~~~
In my thoughts
I miss Hannah and Rose. I wasn't missing them for some time ... but today, I miss them!
~~~
In Thanksgiving
For my good life and family and how rich it is with God in the middle of it.
~~~
Kitchen meanderings
Planning another Khmer stir-fry this week ... a simple pork and green bean dish. We'll see if I actually make it or not.
~~~
Using my creative powers
Not sure if I'm using creative powers on this but I definitely am trying to keep myself on schedule and disciplined enough to ignore distractions. I'm realizing that my day is full of them and most are self-imposed. Bad, bad Julie D!
~~~
Stacked up

• Calico Palace by Gwen Bristow: revisiting an old favorite
• Shapers by Robert R. Chase: dropped into the middle of a situation that is probably the most unique and original view of an alien species I've ever read. Fascinating. Really fascinating.
• My Cousin, the Saint (review copy): loving this book. How the author manages to combine Italian history, the Italian immigrant experience in the U.S., the poor Italian parish priest experience, food writing, and faith ... well, he's good, let's just say that. Very good.
• Pope John Paul II: An Intimate Life (review copy): finished this actually. Excellent. Now I must write the review.
• The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch (reading a chapter in the evenings with Tom, when we remember): funny and inspirational. I hope that if I were faced with such dire news I'd react as he did.

~~~
Couch potato
Ignoring those stinkin' Cowboys ... the usual things at home from the VCR: House, Bones, Pushing Daisies, Chuck. We gave Life on Mars a Try and I found it interesting although somewhat claustrophobic when he'd hear from loved ones over the television or radio. I felt trapped along with him. That was not such a good feeling but I believe it is particular to my reaction. I'm going to be continuing with it.

From the library-Michael Palin's Sahara which we're halfway though. I continue to be fascinated by how very differently people live right now at this moment from the way that I do.
~~~
In my ears
The Adventures of Jimmy Dale, The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman, proofing this week's podcast.

Caught up with Alderpod which is an interesting fantasy with a bit of steampunk folded in. The author surprises me time and again by having the characters react realistically in stressful situations as opposed to the idealistic way that I expect the strong female, the lad coming into his own, the bard on his first mission ... to react.
~~~
Around the house
Very, very slowly I'm cleaning up corners or bookshelves or tabletops. And they still stay cleaned off!
~~~
A favorite thing
Right this second? My husband. (That whole second honeymoon thing, you know.)
~~~
An extra tidbit
I have become the Queen of Canned Dogfood. (Also of canned cat food.) We're catering to our sweet old boxer who is slowly fading away from cancer. We joke that it's the canned Alpo keeping her alive. She's always a chow hound no matter what. The cat has finally become pleased now that I've tried Fancy Feast. She eats every bit, as opposed to the Iams tiny bits of fish (or whatever) where she laps up the liquid and disdains the solids.

What's Missing from this Stamp?

Of course, you noticed. We all noticed. They have removed the cigarette from one of the most famous photographs of Bette Davis. I like the way Roger Ebert comments on this:

... Yes reader, the cigarette in the original photo has been eliminated. We are all familiar, I am sure, with the countless children and teenagers who have been lured into the clutches of tobacco by stamp collecting, which seems so innocent, yet can have such tragic outcomes. But isn't this is carrying the anti-smoking campaign one step over the line?

Depriving Bette Davis of her cigarette reminds me of Soviet revisionism, when disgraced party officials disappeared from official photographs. ...

The great Chicago photographer Victor Skrebneski took one of the most famous portraits of Davis. I showed him the stamp. His response: "I have been with Bette for years and I have never seen her without a cigarette! No cigarette! Who is this impostor?" I imagine Davis might not object to a portrait of her without a cigarette, because she posed for many. But to have a cigarette removed from one of her most famous poses! What she did to Joan Crawford in "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane" wouldn't even compare to what ever would have happened to the artist Michael Deas.

Read the whole thing here.

Worth a Thousand Words

Bloch Building by Hey Jules

Question of the Day: on the side

You can have only one condiment for the rest of your life. Which do you pick?

We're not talking seasonings like salt, pepper, and herbs here. This is about mayo, mustard, ketchup, hot sauce and the like.

The Matrix, Light Sabers and ... The Vote Reaper

I can't help it. This guy just cracks me up ... (via John C. Wright).

In Which Nations Shoot the Breeze

From the hilarious Wondermark Lite. Click on the cartoon to enlarge or click through the link to read it at Wondermark Lite.

Worth a Thousand Words

Achilles tending Patroclus wounded by an arrow
Identified by inscriptions on the upper part of the vase. Tondo of an Attic red-figure kylix, ca. 500 BC. From Vulci. (Source: Wikipedia)

You Know, I Never Thought of It LIke That!

Leave it to John C. Wright to point out ...

In other words, if your whole political economy is based on putting a burden of debt on unborn generations, does not the existence of your political economy rest on the idea that the unborn generation shall and must come to be? If the Big Brother you worship and serve cannot remain solvent, indeed, cannot survive at all, unless the next generation outnumbers the current, is it not treason to Big Brother to remain infertile? ...

Read it all here.

Worth a Thousand Words

Wild Autumn Beauty
Taken by the talented DL Ennis at Visual Thoughts

I am increasingly approving of The Nutrition Diva

She is part of the Quick & Dirty Tips podcasting family. I enjoy several of those podcasts as a matter of fact.

What makes me point out The Nutrition Diva? She uses common sense. And science.

I like that.

For instance, I had fallen prey to high fructose hysteria (to my shame, as I now realize) and she helped shake me into common sense (emphasis added):

... As is so often the case, a little chemistry helps makes things a lot clearer. Table sugar, or sucrose, is actually made up of two types of sugar molecules; it’s about equal parts glucose and fructose.

Regular corn syrup, the kind that you can buy on the grocery store, has a different profile. It’s much lower in fructose than table sugar. You heard me correctly: Corn syrup is naturally quite low in fructose. And that makes it a poor substitute for table sugar. Things made with regular corn syrup don’t taste the same as things made with table sugar.

The breakthrough for food manufacturers came when they figured out how to produce a corn syrup that was higher in fructose. High-fructose corn syrup actually has about the same amount of fructose as regular table sugar—making it a viable alternative for food processing. Because corn syrup is so much cheaper than cane sugar, manufacturers quickly adopted it and high-fructose corn syrup has largely replaced cane sugar in manufactured foods.

But here’s what gets lost in the high-fructose hysteria: Foods and drinks made with high-fructose corn syrup are, in general, no higher in fructose than foods made with regular sugar. But they are cheaper. ...

Or this bit of information about how much water to drink? Now, this one I knew. But it was refreshing to hear a little known bit of information being brought to light through a venue that is fairly popular (or so I'd bet):

... I bet you’ve heard it said that you need to drink at least eight glasses of water a day in order to stay properly hydrated. Perhaps you’ve also read that by the time you feel thirsty you’re already in an advanced state of dehydration, or that most of us are chronically dehydrated. Chances are also good that you’ve been told that drinking caffeinated beverages like tea and coffee cause you to lose more fluid than you take in.

What would you say if I told you that all of these widely held truths are little more than urban legends?

I can almost hear your shocked expressions! The dehydration myth has become so firmly entrenched in our collective consciousness that it may indeed come as a surprise to learn that there is very little scientific support for any of these notions. ...

Yep.

You don't have to listen to the podcast if you'd rather read. Full transcripts are available for each show.

Now This Would Make for an Interesting Shower

When a woman in Marino, a small Italian town south of Rome, turned on her kitchen tap, she got a spurt of wine instead of water. "Miracolo!" she shouted, and ran outside to tell others. Word quickly spread, and soon residents all over town were filling bottles and containers with Frascati, the local white wine made from trebbiano and malvasia grapes.

... Plumbers were supposed to have connected the 3,000 liters of Frascati to the town fountain for the annual harvest festival, but they accidentally hooked it to the water supply instead....

Story from Slashfood as well as a nice piece of art as illustration.

Looking Both Ways

You Know You're a Republican If ...
You favor free speech,
except for burning the flag or criticizing U.S. military policy.

You Know You're a Democrat If ...
You favor free speech,
except for ugly words about minorities, the disabled, or endangered species.

You Know You're a Republican/Democrat If...

Audiobook Review: The Standards of Creation

My review can be found at SFFaudio. This is right up there with T.M. Camp's "Assam and Darjeeling" as one of my favorite books of the year. I don't want to give anything away but I believe that Christian sci-fi fans are going to be especially delighted at some of the twists of this story. I know that I was!

Worth a Thousand Words

Motts: 1st Completed Commission Piece by Neil James Hollingworth

I not only love this artist's painting style but the fact that companies are still commissioning artwork. Nice.

It's All Downhill From Here ...

A midweek joke, thanks to Terri. I am heading out now to do a little investing ...

If you had purchased $1,000 of Delta Air Lines stock one year ago, you would have $49 left.

With Fannie Mae, you would have $2.50 left.

With AIG you would have less than $15 left.

But, if you had purchased $1,000 worth of beer one year ago, drunk all the beer, then turned in the cans for aluminum recycling REFUND, you would have $214 cash.

Based on the above, the best current investment advice is to drink heavily and recycle.

A Little Useless Information

It is a very sad thing that nowadays there is so little useless information. -- Oscar Wilde

FLAIR • When first used in Middle English, the word had nothing to do with fashion, it referred to a heightened sensitivity to smell. It comes from the Latin fragrare, a verb meaning "to produce an odor." The same root generated the English word "fragrance."

The Word Origin Calendar

Hope and Imagination

I didn't watch the debate last night or even remember it was on until reading the paper this morning.

We had the privilege of being invited to the annual seminarians' welcome dinner. It was a silent auction/live auction/door prize gala event.

I was surprised to find out that our diocese seminary also educates seminarians from other cities such as Austin, Houston, and Little Rock.

I was also surprised to find that having fifteen seminarians enter this year was considered big numbers and good news. Perhaps that is because I have been used to reading about the big numbers in places like Denver and Nebraska. However, with the old bishop out and the new bishop in, everyone is confident that many more vocations will be nurtured in the near future.

I was not surprised to hear the overwhelming and thunderous applause for Monsignor Duca, now the bishop of Shreveport, but solidly from Dallas before that. He is well known and loved. It was a pleasure to hear his talk as he is a simply wonderful homilist.

He remembered how he first became attracted to the priesthood when he was in his early teens. Then he spoke movingly of how much he appreciated not having his dreams swatted down by his family. As he put it, he was allowed to imagine what the future could be. His imagination could range far and, as he put his hope in God, it could come to fruition for him to be where he is today.

This is something that Tom and I have seen on a much lesser scale. I recall some friends telling us that their son wanted to study music. Then the mother asked if we thought that they shouldn't discourage him and turn him toward something more practical.

Our position has always been that if kids can't dream when they are young, when will they dream at all? How does one get in the habit of it if not allowed to be bored and daydream during summer vacations ... and then to go on and dream bigger and more realistically when a teenager? That is when the fire of inspiration takes hold of a soul. It is when one discovers a true love lurking deep down that can't be found without listening to the voice of imagination and dreams.

Those dreams may or may not ever come to pass in the way we imagine. However, not allowing the child to follow their own star, to use a hackneyed phrase, to have their own successes and failures, is to do them a grave disservice that they may regret their entire lives.

We argued compellingly on behalf of their son's music, needless to say. That attitude is why we have one daughter studying Wildlife and Fisheries Science and another studying Film Editing. Practical? Mmmmm ... not so much. An expression of who each of them is and what they love? Indubitably.

To look at a priestly vocation any differently is equally regrettable. As Msgr. Duca put it, "Think of a time when a priest touched your life in a positive way. It might be a big moment you remember or a series of small events. Think of how it changed your life and how that good priest has changed the lives of others. Now look at your son. How could you not want him to do that for others?"

Of course, that is paraphrasing. It was much more heartfelt and eloquent and I was glad that everyone was looking at him so I could blink back the tears in my eyes.

That made it even more of a pleasure to speak with a former classmate of Hannah's, Zack, who is embarking on discerning his vocation. What a nice boy he is. I couldn't get him to speak up about himself because he was so interestedly asking questions about Hannah and her studies. His mother told me later that whatever he discerns, they are proud of him. And she added, as any good mother should, that if he discerns his vocation, "He would be a good one. He really would." She had an eager smile in her eyes and it was easy to see that Zack was not one of the young men there who had to battle their families simply to get to the seminary.

We would all do well to have that eager attitude about any vocation for ourselves and for our families. God's future, his plans, are always so much bigger and more surprising than anything we can imagine. It is we who box ourselves in with vain attempts to "be practical" and safe.

As Msgr. Duca reminded us, we need to have hope and imagination.

And, to dig a bit further back, to another well loved Catholic priest, we need to remember, "Be not afraid!"

Question of the Day: Bradbury vs. Gaiman

Jesse brought this up on SFFaudio's podcast and we had a spirited email discussion about it.

Result?

I may wind up on that podcast next Monday. They'll be sorry when they see just how often I interrupt ... but I would try to behave myself.

Anyway, I now bring the question to you, many of whom are devoted science fiction readers.

Which would you choose?

Living in a universe without Ray Bradbury writing.

Or living in a universe without Neil Gaiman writing.

For those in the know, who are clutching their brows in an agony of indecision, I feel your pain. Congratulations! You are true sci-fi geeks.

For those, like my husband, who are laughing at the idiocy of being in agony over this question. Congratulations! You are not sci-fi geeks.

I will put my answers in the comments box later, since I've had the benefit of pondering this question. Though, to tell the truth, it took me, like Scott on the podcast, about two seconds to come up with my answer and justification for it. As it did Hannah, who agreed with me ... I knew I'd raised that girl right!

Worth a Thousand Words

Ural Owl
Taken by Remo Savisaar.
Click through on the link for his blog and more stupendous nature photography.