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I’m replacing it with chocolate, and a handful of my lakehouse, frozen blueberries for a quick mid-day snack.
Turns out, the survival of probiotics through the stomach when they are carried in through chocolate is three times greater than the survival rate of probiotics eaten in yogurt.
Read more about Maramor Chocolates and why they’re so good for you, here.
According to the calendar, we still have some 19 or so days until summer is over. But the onslaught of back-to-school, parent meetings, and the unseasonably chilly weather have set our mind into believing that winter has settled in. The Labor Day weekend doesn’t help either; we all know it’s summer’s final dance.
In reality, we still have time left, and you might as well make yourself a lemon shakeup and dance. Nothing can put me into the mind-frame of summer like a light and easy summer read. Reading a novel, is what Joseph Campbell once referred to as an escape from ordinary life. And in this time of watching summer come to a close, couldn’t we all use an escape?
The books are here in alphabetical order, so feel free to browse and jump around… I won’t tell, which order I prefer… from best to last… because I just don’t know!
Rich. Rich, vivid and intimate. The story begins with a woman, wife and mother, coming to terms with the fact that her very presence took a life. But something else is amiss; this she knows, but will not name — until her life moves so out of control that she finally names the fear that grips her — yet is holding her hostage. Meanwhile, we are taken on a journey to the past where friendships and relationships were formed, and mistakes were made, leading to a future that can no longer be supported in this life. Things must change, and they do…
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Vintage)
OK. I have not read this one yet; and this thriller/crime is not usually my cup of tea. However, the friends that are raving about this book are not, I thought, thriller/crime cup of tea books either! So, based on the recommendations of friends, the raving reviews, The Dragon Tattoo is going on my list. (And, why is the word VINTAGE tagged on at the end?)
Good Things
This book made me laugh out loud, all the way through. Although, I did carry a sense of self-identification with Deidre, the suddenly un-employed heroine, who finds herself alone at a friend’s lake house where conditions were so bad that she had to spend her first night sleeping in the car. (Remember my first week at the lake?) Deidre stumbles along, trying to recover financially after her own TV show was cancelled, and ends up making muffins for a restaurant just for the cash. Soon, she finds that love, and an abundant career, were right under her nose, all along. This was the uplifting book of the summer.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
I’m still waiting for this from the library… It must be good.
Nice to Come Home To
Beautifully written story about self-discovery, this story is masterfully written with metaphor, a hint of the novel Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, and the belief that we cannot plan for everything. Life sometimes steps in and pulls us into that place where we can dance our way through to the right spot. The author has intelligently placed words in the story early on that lead us to the end… Pru, Flowers and their various names, and eventually peach, without a capital P. You’ll soon discover that there’s more to this story than the sentence you’re reading, Plus, Rebecca Flowers, the author, has her own blog, and came up with a cheap and easy way to feed her own kids; a dinner solution that I think you’ll love.
I love (notice the present-tense use of this word — I’m still carrying it around in my heart) Sarah Addison Allen’s book, Garden Spells, for its blend of magic, gardening and food, and the rally of women supporting each other and themselves. The Sugar Queen is again a blend of magic and food, and the transformation of Josie — who finally finds her voice. I love Sarah Addison Allen.
The Time Traveler’s Wife
Read soon, before you see the movie.
And there are more… please add to the list…
And, how I found my favorite Vacuum Cleaner
I’ve have spent the last 10 days culling vacuum cleaner reviews on the Internet; and it has not been an easy task to separate the fluff from the hard-core vacuum cleaner reviews. Here, I’ll share the results of my days of research in hopes it may help you when you begin your quest for the ultimate vacuum cleaner. With four boys in the house, my dream of a clean house is always a work in progress. I work hard cleaning; I expect my tools to work just as hard as I do. My 10-year-old Miele Canister is ready to retire to the lake, it’s still working fine and I’m in the market for a new vacuum cleaner — this time, an upright.
I have hardwood floors, and my house is three stories tall, with a finished basement. I have steered clear of the Dyson
For guidance, I shut down the computer to “test drive” a few vacuum cleaners. I went to several of the traditional specialty vacuum cleaner stores, the kind that sells commercial vacuums, right along the high priced consumer ones. There, I found the Dysons all lined up in the window, and a bowl of white baking soda to use for demonstrations, sat right on the counter.
I watched the salesman pour the baking soda onto the floor, and then run the Dyson over the dust. I watched the dust swirl into the Dyson canister with gleeful satisfaction. The powder was gone… or so I thought. Next, he pulled out the SEBO Felix Premium Classic Upright Vacuum Cleaner w/ Electic Power Head, made by a German company called Sebo
Just to be sure I wasn’t dreaming, I had to run home and look up the Sebo Reviews
This vacuum is beyond my wildest dreams…
While the stocks plummet, as we read the details about our close brushes with terror, and as we sit cold and wet from this bipolar spring weather, we need a reminder of grander times; when romance pulsed like a fever; when elegance and luxury enticed the fingertips and the taste buds; when Americans were not afraid to build those grandiose, elaborate dreams.
The World Premiere, BalletMet Columbus of The Great Gatsby, is this Friday, showcasing the story that so ironically parallels our own previous times of extravagance and opulence. Go get dressed up, have some fun and see this.
The ballet’s saucy energy is evident with the Tango and The Fox Trot, clearly indicating that Jimmy Orrante, the show’s choreographer, has lifted the flirtatious up and off the pages of Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel. Extracting the key elements from The Great Gatsby was Orrante’s biggest challenge. Yes, of course, he read every word. Without the use of Fitzgerald’s prime tool — words – Orrante choreographed the novel to reveal the turmoil of the characters, and their life-altering choices. While the era easily lends itself to dance, the characters’ motivations are complex. The ballet centers on the simmering love triangle between Gatsby and Daisy and her husband Tom. Key to Orrante’s interpretation is the influence of the social and economic values of the era, which ultimately lead Daisy away from her love for Gatsby.
During the sneak preview, complete with Pineapple Upside Down cake, Orrante had still not finalized some of the dance steps, allowing us a brief peek at how this master, recipient of a Choreography Award from the Princess Grace Foundation, works. While he clearly has his own vision, Orrante pulls on the magnetism of his dancers to create an interactive swirl of romance that allows the dancers, with precision, to show us exactly what Orrante wants us to see. I can only imagine how memorizing the production will be once the dancers are wearing their glitzy costumes.
Once again, costume designer Rebecca Baygents Turk uses her clever talent of balancing the dancer’s need for movement, while staying true to the glitz of the dresses and stiff tuxedos we associate with the 1920s. Rebecca, I could put you to work making some batman costumes that, finally, do let the kids fly. If anybody can do that, Rebecca can.
You can expect to see a generous sprinkling of what we associate with the roaring ’20s, complete with bootlegged parties, big cars and careless dancing. There’s a bit of nostalgia in the elaborate sets — including Goerge Wilson’s humble gas station. And most importantly, plenty of seductive, flirtatious, and energetic dancing.
Let the arts do their job; let them transport you this weekend to a different era, and inspire some of your own latent dreams. Get your tickets, here.
There is the agony of chauffeuring the kids from soccer practice to play date, and then there is the ecstasy.
This book, Garden Spells by my new wanna-be-best friend, Sarah Addison Allen , has blissfully-entertained me, via Book on CD as I have transported my kids from points A to B to C to C and D…
Check out this little tid bit from Sarah Addison Allen’s bio page:
Garden Spells, my mainstream debut, didn’t start out as a magical novel. It was supposed to be a simple story about two sisters reconnecting after many years. But then the apple tree started throwing apples and the story took on a life of its own…and my life hasn’t been the same since.
There is one cardinal rule we Moms must never break, for the sake of sanity. Those kid CDs full of their favorite tunes do not work in the car. Only in their rooms.
Books on CD can get you through weeks of monotonous carpools. You can usually find a great selection at your library. Of course, the trick is to find a book that entertains your passengers as much as you. Garden Spells did that by introducing a little 5-year-old girl, Bay, who drank milk with sugar, with her favorite food, Pop Tarts. Of course, there’s also Evanelle, who thoroughly delighted my kids because she just “hates summer.” Little do they know why.
Yes, there were a few times when I did have to shut down the CD because the dialogue got a little, how do we say it, too hot for little ears, but there are pause buttons designed for that exact purpose at your convenience with a push of a fingertip.
Once, at a particularly climatic moment, we were almost home. I had to bypass my driveway, because I literally “could not put the steering wheel down” and ran an extra errand just so I could hear what would happen next.
Sometimes, it’s the little things that get us through the day. So thank you again, Sarah Addison Allen, for the passion you put in my little Volvo. And also, thank you for the recipes. Mabye I can work up some spells up of my own.
My friend, who is a high school English teacher, was lamenting her reading of the Twilight series, which her students begged her to crack open. (Actually, we don’t talk anymore; we just email each other.) She wrote, this “is so poorly written but I can’t put the damn thing down now.”
The work of a teacher is harder than I imagined; especially when you must endure poor literature, but I give her credit for attempting to peer into the world of her students. There is some satisfaction that she is finding in the gesture, and for the bridges it connects.
I left my computer, crawled under my covers and was so relieved that I am still reading Jhmpa Lahiri’s collection of short stories, Unaccustomed Earth. As I delved deeper into the book that night, I was tempted to email my friend back to tell her to throw Twilight down, and instead to start reading, along with her students, Lahiri’s star-reviewed book. But then, I stopped myself, as the material echoes The Catcher in the Rye
Her students came to mind precisely because Unaccustomed Earth explores the minds of teens, children, resenting and rejecting their parents view; and then suddenly finding themselves integrating those very facets of their parents into their own adult lives.
When my son asked me, “What makes her such a great writer,” I found myself at a loss for words. Indescribable. The architecture under Lahiri’s work is almost invisible — as is all great literature. Her sentences are about the present moment, yet still somehow reveal a unique, almost tainted, perception, culled over pivotal past events in the lives of each character. Each revelation is a new layer, as the core of each player is exposed. How does she deliver so much detail around her fictional characters, yet not bore me? Why do I want to know more about each person?
Great writing does the work of suddenly making the reader aware that this random story is truly about him. A rare birds-eye view of your own life that may allow you to alter your course of action, and take a path you may have not considered. Or, you could stop, now that you’ve seen where you’re headed. Is there relief that you will catch yourself from falling off the brink, now that you’ve seen what could lie ahead? Or, are you still bewildered by where you see your life heading?
Unaccustomed Earth is only one example of a book that does this; although this book does that job perfectly, there are so many great works of literature that accomplish this goal. But perhaps, Unaccustomed Earth paints a picture teenagers are not ready to accept. Maybe it would miss them entirely, as many of them are just discovering their parents view, and are all too eager to reject it. For some people, Twilight may be the greatest literature of all time. Just depends where you are in life.
I’m still in that luxury state. I’m just far enough into the Unaccustomed Earth to know how delicious Lahiri’s writing is, but still a long distance from the ending. Usually, at that point, I began to twaddle in my reading, pushing away the finality of the book as much as I can. But, I’m not quite there yet.
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