Nacwolin’s Neighborhood

What's the first exhibit you visit at the zoo?

I boycott all Zoos. Animals were not put on the Earth for human education or entertainment. I refuse to be part of their exploitation and degradation. Animals should be free to live in their natural habitats and only under human care if it keeps them from extinction. I do not care about "the children" and any educational experience it may provide them. They can watch the Discovery channel. NO ANIMAL SHOULD BE CAGED OR CONFINED FOR ANY REASON.

Ray & Cody went out to the ranch hunting again today.  Cody missed one deer but got this big 4x5 mule deer.

 

Finished Under the Dome by Stephen King.

This is definitely my least favorite of his epics (in order: It, The Stand, then this), but it's still pretty good.

The town of Chester Mills (in Maine, but I bet you could've guessed that) is basically your average small town--until a dome is dropped on it.  Nobody knows why (our government doing an experiment? terrorism? aliens?) but why doesn't really matter when you're under a dome and completely cut off from the outside world.

As if the dome isn't bad enough, there are some less than savory people in the town (notably the second selectman Big Jim Rennie and his son, Junior).

It's a long book, and it covers a week in the life of the town.  (The dome is dropped a couple pages in.) 

It took me a while to get into this book (about 500 pages, or half the book) but I finished the other half of the book in about 24 hours.

Connections to other King stories:  Not really.  Castle Rock is mentioned, but that's about it. (There's also a character named Myra Evans, but it's not the same one from Needful Things.)

Movie version:  No (not yet?).

 

This last picture and the one of Blu's face were taken by my 6 yr old daughter.

 

 

This is of no interest to anyone but me, but here's a list of the books coming out next year that I'm excited to read (this will be updated, probably):

January:

5:  Captivate by Carrie Jones (sequel to Need), Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves, Some Girls Are by Courtney Summers, Noah's Compass by Anne Tyler, Not My Daughter by Barbara Delinsky, It All Changed in an Instant: More Six-Word Memoirs

12:  The Swan Thieves by Elizabeth Kostova, All Unquiet Things by Anna Jarzab  

19:  Dug Down Deep by Joshua Harris, The Mark by Jen Nadol

21:  The Brightest Star in the Sky by Marian Keyes

26:  Blood Ties by Kay Hooper

February:

1:  Possessed by Kate Cann, Numbers by Rachel Ward

2:  Secrets of Eden by Chris Bohjalian

10:  The Wife's Tale by Lori Lansens

16:  Horns by Joe Hill

23:  The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place by Maryrose Wood 

March:

2:  House Rules by Jodi Picoult, Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

9:  Arcadia Falls by Carol Goodman, So Much for That by Lionel Shriver, The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan

16:  Vampire Diaries:  Shadow Souls by LJ Smith, The Body Finder by Kimberly Dirting

23:  Every Little Thing in the World by Nina de Gramont, Caught by Harlan Coben

April:

1:  Cool Beans by Erynn Mangum, This World We Live In by Susan Beth Pfeffer (sequel to Life As We Knew It)

6:  Strange Fate (Night World) by LJ Smith

20:  Radiant Shadows by Melissa Marr

27:  The Last Time I Saw You by Elizabeth Berg, The Reckoning by Kelley Armstrong (Darkest Powers book), The Distant Hours by Kate Morton

May:

3:  The Red Thread by Ann Hood

4:  After the Kiss by Terra Elan McVoy, Lies by Michael Grant (sequel to Gone and Hunger)

25:  Heart of Valor by LJ Smith, Night of the Solstice by LJ Smith, The Lighter Side of Life & Death by CK Kelly Martin

June:

1:  My Name is Memory by Ann Brashares, The One That I Want by Allison Winn Scotch

10:  The Evil Within by Nancy Holder (sequel to Possessions) 

15:  Churched by Matthew Paul Turner, The Nobodies Album by Carolyn Parkhurst 

July:

13:  Live to Tell by Lisa Gardner, Broken by Karin Slaughter

I had the misfortune to watch this movie last night. I was so looking forward to it.  Apparently I like torturing myself.

How do these movies get made? How do they persuade talent to do them?  They're not even funny.

Here are my beefs.

1) It's always tight-ass, neurotic, cat-loving, super controlling women who are stunningly good looking but incapable of finding a man. Inevitably because their standards are 'just too high', [a] and they are just plain desperate because its been [insert time period] since they've had good sex.  The woman, though intelligent and educated is always extremely naive when it comes to 'how to get a guy' and has to enlist the help of all kinds of jaded or sex deprived friends to help her land a good one.

     This is just plain ridiculous.  Don't knock standards, they can be very helpful and protective, and can often be a sign that someone knows themselves, and what works for them, well. Also, Sex isn't the be all or the end all, nor is it the most important thing in a relationship. The single woman/cat lover cliche is SO VERY OLD! In this movie the main female character was portrayed in being so wrapped up in her ideals of a man and so desperate to catch him that she allowed herself to do all kinds of hi-jinks that were so anti her thoughtful and controlled character. Granted we all do stupid things from time to time, but you can't sell me on the idea that a T.V. producer who can make split second decisions on which camera to go to, and the best thing to say in a situation would not find an excuse to visit the powder room and remove her climax inducing panties before a business dinner, or feel the need to Cyrano de Bergerac her way through a baseball game date with earpieces, sounding to all the world like someone suffering from acute Turrets Syndrome.
2) It's always guys [b] who are the lowest common denominators of maleness.  Sex is the most important thing, and the more you get of it the better a "man" you are.  Men only put up with relationships for the sake of getting sex.  They think with their penis and as rude and crass as they want to be.

     Seriously.  Grow up! If this is all that you are going to be, we're well shot of you! Men take responsibility, Men give and receive, Guys take and callously use others. In this movie the main character not only disparages women who are lonely on a regular basis, but he repeatedly ignored his supervisors instructions on air, and basically only did what he wanted to do. Every once and a while you see a glimpse of a relationship with a young boy and his 'responsibility' to the kid, so you're led to believe that there is more to this man than you can see. COME ON!  The Diamond-in-the-rough guy is all played out.  There is something to be said for seeing the true person, but this is so far from that.  The guy likes who he is.  He hides the responsibility as if it is a  weakness, or something of less value.

3) The Guy helps the Crazy lady catch a Man by playing all sorts of mind games.

    This is the worst part of the romantic comedy for me. 

Just so we're clear.  I think relationships that come about by manipulation of the things you think will titillate your partner and obfuscation of who you really are, so that only the characteristics and traits he/she would like appear, for the sake of securing him/her are wasted time. 
I will never play games with someones affection, and I would walk away from anyone who does.  It isn't romantic to me.  It isn't funny.  It's cruel, and it will never build a relationship that lasts.  It ends.  Always. Either in an apology (if you have some character) or just walking away  after you've taken what you wanted (as witnessed by the main guy's answering machine messages in this movie).

What makes it even more frustrating for me is that I frequently work with teen girls who have seen this over and over and think that this is the way they're supposed to behave, or the behavior they're supposed to put up with.  They just get their hearts crushed in the process.

As you may have guessed I thought this movie was Drivel, plain and simple.  I just want to be able to watch one romantic comedy that doesn't make me want to curse.  They're just not funny.  They're just cruel and callous. I think I need to watch Wall-e to cleanse my palate.  At least robot's understand :)

Can I rate a movie with negative stars?

a) and sometimes they are just absolutely ridiculous ideals, I'll grant you that. They're so over the top. Tolstoy reading, Austen loving, long walks on the beach, love all animals but cats the best, etc.
b) guys are not men.  Guys are men in age only.  They live life as one big game, enjoying all they can get, never taking responsibility, expecting the world to revolve around them, consequences be dammed, etc.

The middle school wrestlers got to make a poster!  Cody thought it was so fun.  I just realized he's the only blonde in the whole group.

 

Suggested by JM:

“Life is too short to read bad books.” I’d always heard that, but I still read books through until the end no matter how bad they were because I had this sense of obligation.  That is, until this week when I tried (really tried) to read a book that is utterly boring and unrealistic. I had to stop reading.

Do you read everything all the way through or do you feel life really is too short to read bad books?

I've almost always completed books that I've started.  Maybe because I usually read books that have been well-reviewed or maybe because I'm generally an optimist and that even after a slow start I hope that it might get better, or maybe I have a stick-to-it-iveness that says if you're going to start something you might as well finish it.

Speaking of of finishing it, that does remind me of one of the few books I didn't finish -- "IT" from Stephen King.  Clocking in at over a thousand pages and at the apex of his drug-addled, no-one-will-edit-him 80s long windedness (Steve: more isn't always better) -- I plodded along in this for about 400 pages and then said, "No mas!"

Oddly, I know several people for whom this book was one of their favorites, but I couldn't stand IT.

A Pilgrimage to the Altar of Saint Helga

(for Andrew Wyeth)

But First Lunch

This room is a valley of flickering
firefly tumbleweed lights
between tall buildings

Lusty Lady – All Clothing 100% Off

winks the sign across the street

My son has found

a numerical pattern in the blinks

We are here to see Wyeth's Lady

clothed and unclothed

Helga in her incarnations

but first lunch

The waiter looks like Groucho Marx

Hear the sound of over fifty spoons and forks

the chatter of the crowd

my children's voices

Seeing Helga

We see Helga floating on velvet crush

her nighttime lake

Little trout of light swim

her body tide-pools

We see her in her Austrian coat

standing for hours in the snow

with great discipline

We see her with her braids

the nape of her neck naked

where spine joins brain 

a white triangle exposed

holy peephole

We see her smile creases

her blue eyes

slips of horizon over wild grass

and her hair

you can feel it

the soft order in those braids

We go home in dark and rain

the autumn trees light our path

every leaf

a flame

in a lantern

Lucy Simpson, Seattle, 10/15/2009