by Charlotte Gray
All history books should be written like this - chock-full of primary sources and crisply-written, meaningful, moving histories that come from them. So far it actually is a really good model of how musuems should exhibit and write, and I'm already percolating ideas from it that could be worked into our galleries
The Museum Called Canada: 25 Rooms of Wonder
wrong
While the Beatles web radio station is freakin' genius and gets me through many a hard time at work, every now and then their comprehensive playlist freaks me out a little. Such as the Ringo-Willie Nelson duet I just heard. Eeek. Even worse than the ones with Linda McCartney on lead vocal - which I can usually deal with because they sweetly demonstrate just how enamored Paul must have been at the time.
Also, I saw an add for Constantine (which I keep forgetting is not another sword-and-sandal epic) and all of a suddent just got why people find Keanu attractive. Woah.
Also, I saw an add for Constantine (which I keep forgetting is not another sword-and-sandal epic) and all of a suddent just got why people find Keanu attractive. Woah.
a letter to Martha
Dear Martha,
I have just received the March issue of Living and feel I must write to express my concern with the magazine's depiction of your life in prison. While I am pleased that the publication is acknowledging your current sitaution, whoever wrote this has made you out to be a deluded zombie who blindly crochets, teaches yoga, and plans her garden with no real sense of what she's going through. Surely you are remorseful. I understand one must stay positive, focused on the future, and keep one's mind busy with enjoyable, challenging activities, but I think many of your readers would appreciate a note that tells us of what this experience has taught you, of how you may have changed, of advice you would give others.
How can you have a crochet hook in prison anyway? You can't even take them in carry-on baggage.
Additionally, thank your staff for the comment in this month's letters column about the safety issues surrounding leaving small kitchen appliances plugged in when not in use. You and my mother agree on this point and so, after recently having accidentally left my toaster oven on for four hours while not at home, I shall unplug.
Sincerely, and with recipe cards, garden tools, and freshly-laundered curtains in hand,
BW
I have just received the March issue of Living and feel I must write to express my concern with the magazine's depiction of your life in prison. While I am pleased that the publication is acknowledging your current sitaution, whoever wrote this has made you out to be a deluded zombie who blindly crochets, teaches yoga, and plans her garden with no real sense of what she's going through. Surely you are remorseful. I understand one must stay positive, focused on the future, and keep one's mind busy with enjoyable, challenging activities, but I think many of your readers would appreciate a note that tells us of what this experience has taught you, of how you may have changed, of advice you would give others.
How can you have a crochet hook in prison anyway? You can't even take them in carry-on baggage.
Additionally, thank your staff for the comment in this month's letters column about the safety issues surrounding leaving small kitchen appliances plugged in when not in use. You and my mother agree on this point and so, after recently having accidentally left my toaster oven on for four hours while not at home, I shall unplug.
Sincerely, and with recipe cards, garden tools, and freshly-laundered curtains in hand,
BW
Horatio Hornblower
Oh. my. gawd. I never thought I would find Napoleonic navy life so very interesting. I am completely hooked, not even because Ioan Gruffud is so dishy (that's a slow burn that took me unitl the middle of the third episode to find myself done in by) but because the character is so incredibly noble and because Ioan Gruffud plays him with such depth and thoroughness. It's not easy and clear to be Horatio, but it is true and right and decent. I can't give my parole about the simplest of things, but he can return to a Spanish prison to keep his - and inspire his crew to do the same? Wow. What the world needs now.
But I don't have several hundred more dollars, and even if I did, I don't want to spend it on a new garage door.
Owning is house feels like being responsible for a mystery novel that you will never, ever finish. Where does that hole go? Why is it there? What is that weird spot on the ceiling? Has it gotten bigger in the last month? Why does the bathroom have no outlets and no wall switch? Why is there a fireplace in the basement?
This morning I watched House Detective, which always makes me paranoid even if my house doesn't have any of the problems they show, and my heart went out to the young couple with the 1920s Dutch colonial farm house in upstate New York that had crumbling masonry and rotting woodwork. If one of the SUNYs comes calling, that could be me. As it is, I'm in my 1920s Cape Ann double gambrel that, after being mine for 20 months, has a new roof, new kitchen floor, a new back door, and half-informed attempts at gardening and window boxes. And it will shortly have a new bedroom ceiling, bathroom ceiling, and bathroom fan if I can just bring myself to sign the contractor's $2600 bid for that project.
(Note: I have no idea of $2600 is a lot for the project I want them to do, but I'm paying it because they are a wonderful woman-friendly, environmentally conscious, preservation-minded firm that I want to support. I don't think I can deal with another smoke-stained toothless man calling me "missy" and asks me if my dog ever goes huntin' while he pokes with a screwdriver at whatever he's there to assess.)
With that amount gnawing away in the back of my head this week, I was doing my regular morning thing of taking the car out of the garage, stopping in the driveway, parking and hopping back out of the car to close the garage door, and as I closed the door there was an enormous metallic THUNK. It's like the garage knew that I had been coveting an automatic door and decided to help me with the decision. This morning I went in the garage to see if I could fix whatever went thunk, and indeed I cannot - one of the big rusty springs on the door track had broken off, with the spring shot to the other side of the garage, tangled in a bag of plastic bowling pins (don't ask), and the formerly attached wire dangling among the wheels and track.
So, do I try to get this replaced now, hoping to save my car (which itself had $1400 in repairs in early December) at least a few weeks of wear in winter parking that it would be exposed to with the garage out of comission? Or do I suck it up, tarp the car when the weather dictates, and deal with it in the fall?
And also, why have I only just now noticed that there are footprints on the wood of my garage rafters and ceiling? Or a cigarette on the ground?
This morning I watched House Detective, which always makes me paranoid even if my house doesn't have any of the problems they show, and my heart went out to the young couple with the 1920s Dutch colonial farm house in upstate New York that had crumbling masonry and rotting woodwork. If one of the SUNYs comes calling, that could be me. As it is, I'm in my 1920s Cape Ann double gambrel that, after being mine for 20 months, has a new roof, new kitchen floor, a new back door, and half-informed attempts at gardening and window boxes. And it will shortly have a new bedroom ceiling, bathroom ceiling, and bathroom fan if I can just bring myself to sign the contractor's $2600 bid for that project.
(Note: I have no idea of $2600 is a lot for the project I want them to do, but I'm paying it because they are a wonderful woman-friendly, environmentally conscious, preservation-minded firm that I want to support. I don't think I can deal with another smoke-stained toothless man calling me "missy" and asks me if my dog ever goes huntin' while he pokes with a screwdriver at whatever he's there to assess.)
With that amount gnawing away in the back of my head this week, I was doing my regular morning thing of taking the car out of the garage, stopping in the driveway, parking and hopping back out of the car to close the garage door, and as I closed the door there was an enormous metallic THUNK. It's like the garage knew that I had been coveting an automatic door and decided to help me with the decision. This morning I went in the garage to see if I could fix whatever went thunk, and indeed I cannot - one of the big rusty springs on the door track had broken off, with the spring shot to the other side of the garage, tangled in a bag of plastic bowling pins (don't ask), and the formerly attached wire dangling among the wheels and track.
So, do I try to get this replaced now, hoping to save my car (which itself had $1400 in repairs in early December) at least a few weeks of wear in winter parking that it would be exposed to with the garage out of comission? Or do I suck it up, tarp the car when the weather dictates, and deal with it in the fall?
And also, why have I only just now noticed that there are footprints on the wood of my garage rafters and ceiling? Or a cigarette on the ground?
By the age of 32, I shall accomplish
the following.
Oh, wait. That's my friend Ted's list.
By the age of 32, I hope to have fixed the plaster on my bedroom ceiling, taught my dog to stop jumping up on people, tromped all over Washington DC, and visited, or at least seriously considered visiting, Buenos Aires, Russia, Scandanavia, Spain, or Australia (again).
If I make some major news magazine list of my nation's leaders and dreamers, well, that's just gravy.
Oh, wait. That's my friend Ted's list.
By the age of 32, I hope to have fixed the plaster on my bedroom ceiling, taught my dog to stop jumping up on people, tromped all over Washington DC, and visited, or at least seriously considered visiting, Buenos Aires, Russia, Scandanavia, Spain, or Australia (again).
If I make some major news magazine list of my nation's leaders and dreamers, well, that's just gravy.
way in which I am turning into my parents #37
Luci came home in the middle of the day yesterday and found the toaster oven on. Noooooo! I guess having set two toasters on fire in the past should have taught me to unplug them while not in use. But since they hadn't, this will.
I knew there was something wrong with him
The person we both know does not remember Gordon! Ha! His email, upon my description of Gordon as your typical white grad student boy who speaks slowly, was "No wonder I forget him! Slow homophobic pasty talker."
I say goodday sir!
I have just met a homophobic Canadian with no sense of humo(u)r. V disappointing. Let's call him Gordon. The world is small enough that Gordon and I know someone in common, someone who is one of my most favo(u)rite someones whom Gordon, it turns out, thinks little of. I have always thought that someone would have to be very dull and/or a halfwit not to like this someone, but now I am confused because Gordon is a grad student here (and therefore must have wits of somewhat more than half) and seemed to be affable enough. I could have put all that aside if he hadn't twice made borderline homophobic comments.
