Chautauquan's second year begins

Happy 2013 everyone! I'm excited to begin my second year of one of my very favorite activities...LT! I love having visitors so hope you'll stop my, and leave a note, often.

My reading goals this year are to:
- read at least 75 books
- continue working toward reading all winners of Pulitzer Prize for fiction
- continue working toward reading at least one book by each winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

books read in 2013
1. All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren
2. What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets by Michael J. Sandel
3. The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter
4. The Habit by Susan Morse
5. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
6. Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz
7. Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain
8. Vipers' Tangleby Francois Mauriac

Pulitzer Prize Winners (for fiction) read in 2013
1. All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren (1947)
2. The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter (1966)

Pulitzer Prize Winners read before 2013
1. The Bridge of San Luis Rey (1928) by Thornton Wilder
2. The Magnificent Ambersons (1919) by Booth Tarkington
3. The Stories of John Cheever (1979) by John Cheever
4. The Optimist’s Daughter (1973) by Eudora Welty
5. The Able McLaughlins (1924) by Margaret Wilson
6. His Family (1918 – first award) by Ernest Poole
7. Early Autumn (1927) by Louis Bromfield
8. The Reivers (1963) by William Faulkner
9. A Death in the Family (1958) by James Agee
10.The Good Earth (1932) by Pearl Buck
11.Angle of Repose (1972) by Wallace Stegner
12. A Visit from the Good Squad (2011) by Jennifer Egan
13. Tinkers (2010) by Paul Harding
14. Olive Kitteridge (2009) by Elizabeth Strout
15. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2008) by Junot Diaz
16. The Road (2007) by Cormac McCarthy
17. March (2006) by Geraldine Brooks
18. Gilead (2005) by Marilynne Robinson
19. The Known World (2004) by Edward P. Jones
20. Middlesex (2003) by Jeffrey Eugenides
21.Empire Falls (2002) by Richard Russo
22. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay (2001) by Michael Chabon
23.Interpreter of Maladies (2000) by Jhumpa Lagiri
24.The Hours (1999) by Michael Cunningham
25.American Pastoral (1998) by Philip Roth
26.Independence Day (1996) by Richard Ford
27.The Stone Diaries (1995) by Carol Shields
28.The Shipping News (1994) by E. Annie Proulx
29.A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain (1993) by Robert Olen Butler
30.A Thousand Acres (1992) by Jane Smiley
31.Rabbit at Rest (1991) by John Updike
32.The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love (1990) by Oscar Hijuelos
33.Breathing Lessons (1989) by Anne Tyler
34.Beloved (1988) by Toni Morrison
35.A Summons to Memphis (1987) by Peter Taylor
36.Lonesome Dove (1986) by Larry Mcmurtry
37.Foreign Affairs (1985) by Alison Lurie
38.Ironweed (1984) by William Kennedy
39.The Color Purple (1983) by Alice Walker
40.Rabbit is Rich (1982) by John Updike
41.A Confederacy of Dunces (1961) by John Kennedy Toole
42.Humboldt’s Gift (1976) by Saul Bellow
43.House Made of Dawn (1969) by N. Scott Momaday
44.To Kill a Mockingbird (1961) by Harper Lee
45.The Old Man and the Sea (1953) by Ernest Hemingway
46.The Grapes of Wrath (1940) by John Steinbeck
47.The Yearling (1939) by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
48.Gone With the Wind (1937) by Margaret Mitchell
49.Arrowsmith (1926) by Sinclair Lewis
50.So Big (1925) by Edna Ferber
51.One of Ours (1923) by Willa Silbert Cather
52.Alice Adams (1922) by Booth Tarkington
53.The Age of Innocence (1921) by Edith Wharton

note: the year in parenthesis is the year the book won the Pulitzer Prize

Books by Nobel Prize Winners read in 2013

1. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse (1946)
2. Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz (2002)
3. Vipers' Tangle by Francois Mauriac (1952)

Book by Nobel Prize Winners read before 2013

1. Ernest Hemingway (1954): A Moveable Feast, The Sun Also Rises, Old Man and the Sea
2. Pearl Buck (1938): The Good Earth
3. W. B. Yeats (1923): A Poet to His Beloved: The Early Love Poems of W. B. Yeats
4. William Faulkner (1949): The Reivers
5. Doris Lessing (2007): The Sweetest Dream
6. Gunter Grass (1999): The Box: Tales from the Dark Room
7. Rudyard Kipling (1907): Captains Courageous
8. Yasunari Kawabata (1968): Snow Country
9. Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1982): Love in the Time of Cholera
10. Mario Vargas Llosa (2010): The Storyteller
11. Sinclair Lewis (1930): Main Street, Babbitt, Arrowsmith
12. John Steinbeck (1962): The Grapes of Wrath
13. Saul Bellow (1976): Humboldt’s Gift, Herzog
14. Toni Morrison (1993): Beloved, The Bluest Eye
15. John M. Coetzee (2003); Disgrace

note: the year in parenthesis is the year the author was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature

Hi Reba! I've starred you. I hope your 2013 reading year is a good one!

Thanks Susan -- look forward to seeing you here and on your thread!

Reba, I am leaving a star behind so that I can find my way back again. Looking forward to following you in 2013!!

Hi Reba! I can't wait to see what good reads you find in 2013! Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! Sounds like some good reading ahead.

Halloo! I'm going to follow along to see how your Nobel Prize reading goes. I tried to get through the list about a decade ago, and made it through perhaps 20 books or so before getting burned out on it. I'm wishing you much more success, lol!

Hi Reba - Found and starred!

Reba - found you, starred you, happy new yeared you!

Reba, starred you, happy New Year!

Looking forward to following your Pulitzer and Nobel reading journey, Reba!

I selected this book from my TBR about a week ago because it was small and I thought I might finish it before the end of the year. This sneaky little thing has 464 pages and VERY small print. As a result it will be my first report of the year...when I finish it.

Hi Mamie, Amy, Jim, Kati, Paul and Julia -- so happy to see you back! Kathy, thanks for joining. I'll be stopping by to drop a star on your thread and look forward to following your reading. Diana, welkom!

Had a great NY Eve with dinner at Red Door then Les Miserables and home in time to see the ball drop in Time Square (on the west coast replay). Watched the Rose Parade this morning. Off to Salute to Vienna at Symphony Hall this afternoon followed by dinner at Cafe Bleu. Perfect changing of the years! Hope you're all having an equally fine time.

found ya Reba!! Sounds like a great couple of days :)

Wow! What an exciting New Year's Eve/Day. Did you like Les Miserables? I've heard great things about it. We had a quiet New Year's Eve with a few friends over, and today the boys and I are watching the City of Ember movie on DVD. It's back to work and school tomorrow, so it is nice to have a quiet last day of break.

Stopping by to star you so I can keep track of what you're reading. Hope your New Year is starting out to be a good one.

Reba

My partner and I saw Les Miserables a few evenings ago. I loved it!!!!! I had no idea that Hugh Jackman, Russell Crow and Anne Hathaway could sing so well. I liked everything about the movie. I hope it gets well deserved awards.

Happy New Year!

Sneaky you to make the picture of your sneaky little book so small that we can't read the title on the spine!

You've had a much more exciting ringing in of the New Year than I have--been home wrapping up old threads and setting up new ones the whole time! ;-)

Looking forward to following along with you on the Nobelists journey.

Actually Roni I find that photo kind of freaky the way it turned out here -- my hand looks deformed and, although it looks old, it really doesn't look deformed in real life lol The book is All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren. I like it alot...it's just so much bigger than it looks.

I had mixed feelings about Les Miserables. I liked it and understood a lot of detail about the story that I had missed when seeing it on the stage (I haven't read the book) but it was long (not helped by being at a rather uncomfortable theater), I got tired of looking at everyone from REALLY close up and I actually didn't care much for a lot of the singing -- Samantha Barks as Eponine being a major exception. She has a wonderful voice and did an excellent job IMHO -- wish she'd had a bigger role. So I guess it suffered a bit from too high expectations on my part (based on my memories of a fantastic production I saw in L.A. many years ago).

We have had been a really nice beginning for 2013 though :-) Hope you all have had too.

Hi Tina -- welcome. Just went to your profile page and read about your home library -- oh I'm SOOOO jealous. I would love to have a real library at home...and then an annex for stacks, wow. We live in a condo and while I have a large bookcase in each of our three rooms, we're very nearly out of shelf space and there isn't much room to add shelves. Your place sounds heavenly.

Hi Reba, why did you live in Holland for 7 years? Did you work here?

Reba, yourself, Linda (92007) and I are all slowly munching through the Nobels. If we do manage to meet up this year I'll pass the both of you a couple that you don't have in your collections.

Reba..thanks for your comments about our "library"....I only wish we could live within its confines. However, the stacks of books are falling all over the place again. We do now however own 2 Nooks and a Kindle, and are gradually weaning ourselves away from buying any more paper books. If we can stick to the library and inter-family swaps we may be able to gain control of the collection before the kids have to call in the "Hoarders" cleaners!

Diana -- in a "former life" I was married to a Dutchman. We moved to the Netherlands because we both wanted to live there. First year I worked on learning Dutch, then I worked for Dun & Bradstreet for a couple of years translating reports from Dutch to English and as secretary to the Director. In the middle of it all we spent a couple of years in England and when we moved back to NL I went to Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht for a degree in planologie. In the end the ex-spouse wanted to move back to the U. S. (everyone assumed it was me but actually I was very happy in NL) so we moved back to my home state of California.

Tina -- I bought a Kindle a few years ago in part to help control the book storage problem. I find I love it for travel but miss having the physical books around afterward. I'm pretty good about "only" buying Pulitzer winners, Nobel writers books, signed first editions I get from Book Passage, and books by my favorite authors in paper form ... still, the physical TBR stack is starting to get worrisome (although nothing like those of other LTer's I read about).

Morning Paul -- I'm looking forward to keeping track of the reading of those tackling Nobel winners' works. I wonder if there are more of us lurking out there. A book exchange at the meet-up sounds fun but is there a book you don't already own?

I liked the map I saw on a couple of other sites so decided to do one for myself. Think my travel-lust shows?

Here's another one -- my list making affinity sometimes outs itself in maps

and finally...

Reba, I like how you made the transition between years. We mostly stayed home, but did go out to a favorite local restaurant. I was pleased to have time to read in the new year.

Love your maps. I am assuming they are maps of your travels. I am using the maps on my thread to track my year's reading. I hope to see a lot more red before the end of the year!

Hi Reba, I read All the King's Men a couple of years ago and loved it. I believe it was a five star read for me but yes, it's a chunkster. I've got your thread starred so I can follow your reading.

Love those maps, Reba! I also enjoy traveling but am mostly limited by where work sends me. At least then it's their nickel not mine :) I''ll have to look into doing the maps, though I suspect it will show me far less well-traveled than I think I am...

Hi Donna -- cool idea about tracking your reading on the maps. Are you recording where the story takes place or where the author is from or some other option that isn't coming to me at 10:30 p.m.?

Hi Bonnie -- glad to hear you liked All the King's Men. I'm really enjoying it too but had to laugh when I realized just how big it really is because my copy looks so small.

Hi Katie -- the maps are funny in a way. I have been in two Russian cities, for example, St Petersburg in the far west and Petropavlosk in the far east but it highlights the entire huge country -- makes quite a splash for really small visits.

Reba, the maps look great. (It did take me a while to work out what the third one was - shame on me. But I was looking at it on a tiny screen last night). When were you in New Zealand?

We spent 10 days in New Zealand in 1990 (which I was just stunned to realize was 221/2 years ago!!!). What a beautiful country and what lovely, kind people. We definitely need to go back...it's just so far.

Lion's Brand just posted this pattern for a knit cowl on Facebook, Reba.

http://lby.co/x8ojFJ

It also is about twice as long as I make them, although they show it wrapped twice, but I like the pattern and you can, of course, stop at any length.

ETA 100 best free knitting patterns

http://is.gd/migjyz

>31 RebaRelishesReading: I am very impressed with your map, Reba. If I mapped my own travels, you would need a magnifying glass to find the red!

>27 PaulCranswick: Paul, that's a lovely sentiment, but I think you might reconsider promising to bring books to your US meet-ups. Can you imagine the luggage you would need to haul?

Roni -- Thanks for the link to Lion's Brand -- I do love their homespun yarn and would definitely do the cowl in that if I lived in a cold climate. In San Diego it would be much to warm for me. I think it would look good in my yarn too though -- looks like it's done in seed stitch which I was thinking about so may just do that when I get to the reknit.

Hi Linda -- full travel maps are the result of age and itchy feet :-)

Reba, you got it right on your first guess. I'm charting where the story takes place. My current book is set in Australia so I'll get a big splash of red for a relatively short book.

Donna, that's a really cool idea. I'll look forward to checking out your map.

Reba, I ran across this picture this evening and it seems that a lot of the longer cowls are meant to be worn several ways. I thought this illustrated it nicely--looks very good on her, but for me, I'll just make mine shorter!

Gosh, I couldn't get away with those longer styles. I'd look like I was trying to breastfeed a pair of hippos.

Roni I always read your ID as Ronin Cats. Which is awesome.

Love the cat -- making me laugh out loud!!

Roni, I somehow can't imagine myself in a cowl that long...perhaps because I'm not young and slim and beautiful. I'm going for a short one next time.

Thought my computer had crashed tonight. It was on but the monitor wouldn't come out of sleep mode and I couldn't get computer to turn off. FINALLY, after many return visits to try again I managed to get it to turn off and, when I turned it back on, everything seems fine. WHEW!! Not only had I not planned on the cost of a new computer right now I also hate the hassle of getting everything transferred over and up and running.

I finished All the King's Men tonight but it's much too late for a review now...I'll just say it's a wonderful book.

I think reading All the King's Men is enhanced if you know a bit about Huey Long who was nicknamed "The Kingfish" and served as governor of Lousiana from 1928 to 1932 and U. S. Senator from 1932-1935. He was a controversial Robin Hood figure who believed that the end justifies the means. Here's a paragraph from the Wikipedia article on him:

Long created the Share Our Wealth program in 1934 with the motto "Every Man a King", proposing new wealth redistribution measures in the form of a net asset tax on corporations and individuals to curb the poverty and homelessness endemic nationwide during the Great Depression. To stimulate the economy, Long advocated federal spending on public works, schools and colleges, and old age pensions. He was an ardent critic of the Federal Reserve System's policies. Charismatic and immensely popular for his programs and willingness to take forceful action, Long was accused by his opponents of dictatorial tendencies for his near-total control of the state government.

.
Author Robert Penn Warren took pains in the preface to say that his character Willie Stark is not based (at least not solely) on Huey Long ... but with the basic story of Long that I know it's hard to believe.

So, back to the book. It was published in 1946 (and awarded the Pulitzer in 1947) after having started as a play (never published) begun in 1937-38. It's set in the 1930's in Lousiana and, I think, does a good job of evoking the setting through the language it uses (which is cringe worthy to the modern ear). The main character is Jack Burden, aide to Governor Willie Stark. We share Jack's life from when he leaves the university just short of a Ph.D. in History until middle-age. We get a close-up view of Louisiana politics of the age through which we are made to reflect on the choices society always must make. Pragmatism vs. idealism, good vs. evil

Some of the descriptions in the book are lovely IMHO -- here's a sample

...a big pale apple-green moth, big as a bullbat and soft and silent as a dream--a Luna moth, the name is, and it is a wonderful name--came flying in. Somebody had left the screen door open, and the moth drifted in over the tables and chairs like a big palegreen, silky, live leaf, drifting and dancing along without any wind...

.
I found the several main characters to be well drawn and compelling, the story interesting and well-paced and the book thought provoking. It's old but not dated. I highly recommend it.

Nice review, Reba. I have this one on my shelves so maybe this year...?

I'll look forward to seeing what you have to say about it.

All the King's Men sounds like a great book, Reba! I passed up a copy of it at the Haunted Bookshop yesterday. I may have to go back and see if it is still there.

I have heard about 'All the King's Men' for so many year, I can't believe I haven't read it yet. Your review pushed it on to my wishlist. Very nice job of tying it all together!

Reba, your computer's extended sleep mode sounds like a nightmare! Glad she's up and running again.

I own a copy of All the King's Men and have read several rave reviews now. Maybe, like Katie, this will be the year I get around to reading it. Thanks for the background on Huey Long and that great quote. Yup, this will be taken under careful consideration to read it this year.

Reba - A lot going on over here my well travelled friend.
hahaha on the books - I have catalogued some 8,500 books which is a fair reflection of my collection and that only puts me in 203 rd place according to the Zetigeist. Now I know some people have huge wishlist entries but even so; first place is at over 40,000 books so I have a way to go.
Bringing a few books with me shouldn't be a problem - I won't hand carry.
Maps are sooooo impressive but I have a query. The first map would indicate that you have been to Canada but the third map seems to say not?
Have a lovely weekend. x

Hi Amy, Julia and Donna -- nice to see you and glad you're moving {All the King's Men up on your TBR list. I think you'll be glad you did.

Paul -- Glad you like the maps. The third one shows which Canadian provinces I have visited (all the ones that abut the U. S. plus the NE ones). I've been to Canada many times and love it.

My thread is so far down on the chart even I have a hard time finding it :..(

All caught up here, Reba! LOVE the maps - you DO like to travel!! Also greatly enjoyed your comments about All the King's Men - onto the WL it goes.

Hi Reba, have a nice weekend!

Reba, how great to find a five-star read so early in the year!

Hi Mamie, Diana and Susan -- lovely to check LT and find messages on my thread. Yes, it was great to find a 5-star first thing especially because for the first 50 pages or so I wasn't at all sure i was going to like it.

I am having a lovely weekend. Weather is beautiful, I had a long walk this morning followed by a nice read. Finishing up my lunch-time apple then planning to head back to the book. Hope yours is great too.

Hope you are ready for today's rain, Reba!

Actually hadn't paid attention to the weather forecast for a couple of days so it was a surprise! Beautiful right now though. Hope you have a restful, fun day.

OK I've overcome my resistance to really long books and put both Wolf Hall and Pillars of the Earth on my Kindle for taking along on spring trip.

I still haven't read Wolf Hall (maybe you'll inspire me!) but Pillars of the Earth is an all-time favorite of mine. It is long but it reads really fast and just sweeps you up in the story.

Thanks Katie -- you're upping my courage :-)

I find that longer books when they're good move much, much faster than shorter books that are not so good.

Good point Deborah -- and, actually, some of my favorite books are quite long still somehow I have a hard time getting myself to pick the really big ones up

I used to love love love longer books.. more bang for the buck I though. Maybe I still feel that way deep down.. but my ability to stay focused has gone awry lately :P and it looks like I am opting for funny over fat?

"opting for funny over fat" -- so many funny thoughts come to mind with that phrase -- but I don't think I'll go there.

I just finished my first book for this summer's Chautauqua today: What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets by Michael J. Sandel. It's a most interesting book which the book jacket summarized so well I'll have to just quote it:

(Sandel) provokes an essential discussion that we, in our market-driven age, need to have: What is the proper role of markets in a democratic society--and how can we protect the moral and civic goods that markets don't honor and that money can't buy?

In this thought-provoking book, Dr. Sandel argues that the U. S. has moved from being a market economy to being a market society and that, in the process, we have allowed many things to be subject to market forces that shouldn't be. He cites two types of reasons, the fairness argument and the corruption argument. He asks:

And so, in the end, the question of markets is really a question about how we want to live together. Do we want a society where everything is up for sale? Or are there certain moral and civic goods that markets do not honor and money cannot buy?

Although at first glance it may not seem likely, the book is very readable. It provides a number of examples of things where it is counterproductive to allow the market in to those where the nature of the good is changed in fundamental ways. I found some of the examples to be interesting but not things that would greatly disturb me and others to be things I would care about, but I agree with the author that these are decisions that require some community thought and discussion.

Reba, did I miss the title of the book somewhere? Sounds interesting...

Good catch, Katie -- I'll go back and fix that. I was also reading a piece about the book in the Chautauqua list that I read it for which was so much better put than what I wrote that I was tempted to just copy it out. If you're interested go to http://www.ciweb.org/education-clsc/#Week_Four

Thanks for that link!

You're quite welcome. Hope you had a good day today.

That sounds interesting, Reba. It's a debate that's going on in the UK too.

I found it very thought-provoking. Much more so than the short stories I"m reading now.

Reba - That last book looks interesting. On the subject of doorstoppers - I read Wolf Hall last year (and its sequel Bring Up the Bodies), and I loved both of them. Mantel's style takes a bit of getting used to in the beginning - the key is to remember that most of the time when she uses the pronoun "he" with no reference, she is referring to Cromwell. Once you get used to her style, the reading goes much more quickly, but it is a bit frustrating in the very beginning.

Sandel's book sounds very interesting, Reba. His premise is something I haven't thought about before in the specific context of market forces. Economics is an area that I always feel I should learn more about.

He's actually a professor of government at Harvard so it's a combination public policy/economics book. I really hadn't thought about several of his examples in that light either which is why I found it so interesting. It's a pretty quick read (aboutg 200 pages) and I really recommend it.

What Money Can't Buy sounds like an interesting read, Reba! Since I work in a business college, I always feel like I should be able to intelligently discuss the limits of markets. (We have plenty of people who can talk about their upside!)

#67 glad to see those two books on your list! I loved them both!

I read The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter, a rather long (495 pages) short story collection over many months and, I must admit, was glad to reach this end this afternoon. I've said before that I'm not a fan of short stories. When they revolve around a central character, as in Olive Kitterage it's different and I can enjoy them (as I did with Olive), but this collection did not fall in that category. The Collection includes 27 stories (2 of which are more novellas) all with different characters and different settings. Really the only thing they have in common is that they are all somber stories of people with difficult lives. Just not my cup of tea I'm afraid.

Two new books found their way to my house today: Silent House by Orhan Pamuk and Red Sorghum by Mo Yan. Both are by recent Nobel Prize winners. I have to read The Habit for my face-to-face book club next but then...which shall I choose?

I'd choose the Mo Yan book :) Happy weekend, Reba!

Happy weekend to you too -- and thanks for the advice. Have you read Red Sorghum?

No, I haven't, but I've read enthusiastic reviews :)

Maybe by this time next week I'll have something to add to them :-)

Stopping in to wish you a weekend that is full of fabulous, Reba!

Thank you Mamie -- hope yours is too :-)

Oh my, how did this happen?? *looking around innocently* Another book has appeared in front of my door *blushing*. A copy of Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz

(I know I'll never keep up with Paul but three books in two days when I already have a big stack and I'm not counting Kindle books seems a lot to me)

Fatelessness has made it onto my wish list, thank you. Will you be reading it soon?

I plan to...reading for face-to-face book club right now then I'm going to do a Nobel winner's book but I'm not sure which one.

Had a wonderful dinner tonight starting with this greens, fuyu persimmon, dried cranberry, hazelnut and proscuitto salad. Then I had apple cider glazed Scottish Salmon with apple and cranberry crustatta for dessert. All really yummy.

Then on to the Symphony where we heard Rossini's Overture to La gazza ladra, Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor and Nielsen's Symphony No. 5. Nuvi Mehta (Zuban's nephew) does an interesting pre-concert talk which we sometimes manage to get to (we did tonight). After introducing the Rossini he told us that Rossini had loved good food and good drink but when he was in his 70's it started to catch up to him. His doctor told him he needed to back off on the wine, women and song. Rossini said "but doctor, I write the songs". Doctor said "well, which of the other two would you be willing to give up?" After some thought, Rossini responded "depends on the vintage".

With that I wish you all a good night. Sleep well. Hope your evening was as pleasant as mine.

Love the sound of the cider glazed salmon. I wouldn't mind glazing myself in the stuff as it happens.
Great story about Rossini - I thought those chaps took themselves so seriously but obviously not.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend, my dear.

Sounds like a perfect evening, Reba. My husband and I often talk about wanting to go to more concerts as a regular thing rather than on just "special" occasions, but we never seem to actually do it. I am a sucker for opera, and we have a beautiful new opera house in Dallas, but it seems the fundraising for that has disinclined many of the big donors to donate to the regular operations and they've cut back the number of productions they do each year. Sad.

It's a tough time for the arts I'm afraid. We have subscribed to the San Diego Symphony for years, which means 6 concerts per year. We also enjoy their Summer Pops series but have been at Chautauqua for the past 4 summers and missed it. San Diego also has an opera company but their tickets are so expensive we don't go often. We have started going to the Opera at the Movies that the New York Met does. Live opera in the movie theater with, as a bonus, interesting interviews with principals in the production during intermission. It's a different experience that opera in the theater but we like it and it only costs $20 per. Before hubby's sale intake got restricted he also loved the idea of having popcorn while watching opera but that's over now...may be part of the reason we haven't been yet this season.

97- How was that salad dressed? I have all the ingredients sitting at home, and was wondering what to fix for dinner? Absolutely awesome presentation!

I want to know how in heck Tina just happens to have those ingredients lying around her kitchen?!?!

And you are right about the arts landscape around the country. My best friend loves those NY Met productions at the movies but I have not been to one. I will look for them around here - thanks for the recommendation.

That does sound like a lovely evening, Reba! And the salad looks delicious.

Tina -- it had a light vinegarette on it -- a gentle white vinegar and maybe light olive oil without much spice in there. It really was beautiful and delicious.

Katie -- do give the Opera at the Movies a try. I was resistant at first but once I went I really like it -- as it's own thing if not as a "real" opera (I can be slow to accept change sometimes I"m afraid)

Hi Susan -- it was indeed a very nice evening spent with good friends and loving spouse I should mention

Wow - I am 100+ messages behind! Sorry to check in so late, Reba!

Hi Stasia -- you're welcome whenever you arrive! Glad to see you.

Reba...thanks for the hint on the dressing, I think however, that Tutu is passing on any food....I had a flu shot, but I seem to have caught some sort of buggie bug, and any thoughts of food are not doing good things to the old gastro=intestinal track. I sucking on ginger ale and may try some camomille/peppermint tea a little later. Meantime, I've marked that salad....it really did look scrumptious

and yes we always have prosciutto, all varieties of nuts, dried cranberries, mixed greens on hand. I just happened to have persimmons because I was going to make hubbie's favorite cookies and never got around to it, and we'd just mentioned last night that we had to do something with them before hey rotted.

Reba - Your evening sounds lovely - both the food and the music. I spent last night at a minor league hockey game. We were celebrating my younger son's birthday. We took four of his friends, so we had a lot of hot dogs and nachos. I've got to say that I'm a little jealous of your salad. :)

Hi Reba, just catching up here but I'm a little green seeing how you spent your evening. How absolutely wonderful all the way around!

Hope you feel better soon Tina. Better in time to finish up those fuyu's. A salad I make frequently during the fall is Boston (bibb) lettuce, fuyu's, pomegranate seeds and pistacios. I make a light vinegarette with a mix champagne vinegar and pomegranate vinegar. It's really good too.

Hi Amy and Bonnie -- thanks for stopping by :-)

Walking through the neighborhood next to ours this morning we found a neat new used-book store. They had a lot of beautifully bound books there and a nice selection.

A new used-book store is something to celebrate!

Oh, that store looks charming!

That's a new one for me, Reba!

They just opened. It isn't big but has a nice collection of books -- plus paintings and a lot of antique model railroad cars. It's on Fort Stockton just west of Goldfinch.

I selected The Habit for my face-to-face book club based on a one paragraph description of it in the Book Passage newsletter. I don't have that paragraph any more but it was something about being funny and dealing with an adult woman whose mother decides to become a nun. The book club was just forming and I didn't know how serious the readers would be so I thought it would be a good choice. I enjoyed it but had I read it in advance I wouldn't have selected it for a group I don't know well because it has quite a few religious and political comments in it. Book club meets Wednesday night so I can report on how they felt about it after that.

Susan Morse is happily married to David Morse, a successful character actor with a long list of familiar credits. They have three children who are in their late teens during the period of the book.

The book is a memoir of two years during which the author's mid-80's mother was having serious health issues and the author was called upon to take over health care management, transportation, bill-paying, etc. It's a typical sandwich-generation dilemma. The relationship has been rocky before and now they're forced to spend long periods of time together in the car, waiting for medical appointments, etc. The mother has changed religions several times and just before she becomes ill she has become a devout member of the Eastern Orthodox church. As the book opens she is becoming a nun.

Having been through the sandwich generation years with a mother and mother-in-law who needed assistance I could relate to many of the challenges faced by this family, although my own mother and m-i-l were not nearly as colorful as Ms. Morse's mother is. I don't think there is a comparable term for a "coming of age" novel when it deals with late-life issues but, if there were, it would apply here. Ms. Morse deals with those challenges openly, fairly and lovingly which is what makes the book a warm, gentle read. If you've been there you'll smile and grimace in sympathy. If you're in the middle of it right now, it will probably feel good to know there are others out there. If you haven't reached that point yet you'll find it amusing and perhaps be better prepared if you find yourself the meat in that sandwich someday.

What a great new bookshop, Reba! And The Habit sounds interesting (but your touchstone links to something else).

The Habit sounds good... and a new used book store in town? yay!

Thanks for pointing out the touchstone issue Susan. It seems there's nothing in the system for this book so I just took the touchstone out.

And "hi" to you and to Kath. Yes the bookstore is great. It's in an apartment that was most recently lived in. It's right across the street from a coffee kiosk which, I hope, will help them. It's not all that big but has a lot of great titles, all in beautiful shape and many in delux bindings. One room is dedicated to books about WWII which the owner bought as one collection. There's only room for half of it to be on display.

I'm looking for The Fishing Fleet. It isn't available in e-book form here. San Diego Library system doesn't have it. It wasn't at the new book store. I did find it at Amazon but would rather buy it locally so planning a trip to Barnes & Nobel in a bit to see if they have it.

A trip to the bookstore is always a good plan :)

B&H doesn't have The Fishing Fleet either so had to resort to good ole' Amazon. I did find a copy of Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse at B&H and am planning to retreat now to my reading chair.

Herman Hesse was born in the Black Forest area of Germany in 1877. His parents had served as missionaries in India as had his maternal grandparents. His mother's family, with whom he was raised, was strict Pietist while his father came from a happier, Baltic form of Christianity. As a child Hesse was headstrong, very intelligent and he loved music. He attended seminary from 1891 to 1892 but that ended when he ran away. He showed signs of serious depression as early as his first year in school and after attempting suicide in 1892, spent some time in mental institutions. In 1895 he started work in a book shop, writing in his free-time and in 1896 his first poem was published. After his first novel Peter Camenzind was published in 1904 he was able to support himself as a writer although his life remained turbulent to the end. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946 and died in 1962.

He published the novella Siddhartha in 1922. The main character, Siddhartha, the son of a Brahmin scholar, sets out on a journey of self-discovery. He spends time as a shramana, a wandering spiritual ascetic, and then becomes a follower of the Buddah. He concludes that enlightenment does not come from learning so he leaves and becomes a wealthy businessman enjoying all of the pleasures of a material life. When that too fails to bring inner peace he moves on once more.

There are connections to the Buddah in the book that go far beyond the fact that the main character spends time as his disciple. First, the name Siddhartha was the name Buddah was born with. Second, the life-path described in the book is much like that of the Buddah. Finally, according to Wikipedia, "The novel is structured on three of the traditional stages of life for Hindu males (student (brahmacarin), householder (grihastha) and recluse/renunciate (vanaprastha)) as well as the Buddha's four noble truths (Part One) and eight-fold path (Part Two) which form twelve chapters".

The subtitle of the book is "An Indic Poem" and the beautiful writing absolutely reflects that (Hesse was also a poet, of course but Rika Lessing also deserves credit for the translation). It is a book that is a delight to read from many perspectives: beautiful language, thought-provoking philosophy, and a charming story
Here are a couple of samples for you.

"Siddhartha had a single goal before him, one and one only: to become empty, empty of thirst, empty of desire, empty of dreams, empty of joy and pain. To die away from himself, no longer to be I, to find the peace of the emptied heart, by thinking away from the self to stand open to the miraculous: this was his goal"

"When someone seeks, " Siddhartha answered, "then it happens all too easily that his eyes will see only the thing he is seeking, that he cannot find anything, cannot let anything in, because he is always thinking only of that thing he seeks, because he has a goal, because he is possessed by the goal. Seeking means: having a goal. But finding means: being free, being open, having no goal. You, Venerable One, may indeed be a seeker, for, striving toward your goal, there is much you do not see which is right before your eyes."

"One can convey knowledge but not wisdom. One can find wisdom, one can live it, one can be borne by it, one can work wonders with it, but one can neither speak it nor teach it."

Face to face book club met tonight to discuss The Habit. Concensus was that they liked it, especially the perspective it offered on the health care industry -- hmo's, medicare, various levels of residential care, etc. Just thought I'd mention what the others thought :-)

Your review reminds me that I've been meaning to read Siddhartha for ages--I really need to move it toward the top of the tbr! Thanks for the reminder :)

Hi Jennifer, thanks for stopping by. Yes, do move Siddhartha up on your list. It's a really quick read (about 120 pleasant pages) and I think you'll be glad you did.

I made some really yummy roasted parsnip and carrot soup yesterday. Can't wait to have some for dinner tonight :-)

Hi Reba, I've gotten behind on LT this week, so just stopping by quickly to say hello!

I remember a lot of my friends reading Siddhartha in high school but I never did. Until your review, I wasn't even sure what the story was.... Nice review, btw!

#128: The soup sounds lovely, Reba! I had a butternut squash soup for lunch, but shop-bought. It said "New" on the container, but they've had it for a while, so I looked at the label and it said "Now with more squash". And it does seem to have more squash :-)

Reba - It's funny; you make the most enchanting sounding soup; you are one of my favourite people in the group; I cannot stand Herman Hesse!

Have a wonderful weekend.

Hi Katie, thanks for stopping by and thank you for liking my review.

Susan -- I like all of the soups like that, especially butternut squash but this one was really good too. I made it for a group I belong to that was trying to decide which soup to enter into a soup-cook-off. They chose mine but there were a couple of other ones that were really good especially a sweet potato soup which I was afraid would be too sweet but was just wonderful.

Paul -- Glad the soup sounds good to you although if I lived in a place as warm as KL I would never eat soup. Sorry you don't like Hesse. This is the only thing I've read of his but I really liked it.

I enjoyed the cold weather but, still, it's nice to have our normal San Diego weather again. We had a nice walk on Shelter Island (really a man-made peninsula) this morning.

Imre Kertesz won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2002 for "for writing that upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history". Fatelessness, Kertesz' first novel, was published in 1975 and first published in English in 1992. I read a more recent translation by Tim Wilkinson which was published in 2002, the year Kertesz won the Nobel Prize for Literature. He was born in 1929 and was himself imprisioned in Buchenwald as a young man.

Fatelessness is a semi-autobiographical novel about a 14-year-old boy, Georg Koves, in Budapest in the last year of WWII. Georg is a bright boy whose parents are divorced. He lives with his step-mother and father in a secular Jewish home. He is a typical teenager and doesn't particularly think of himself as Jewish, in fact, he accepts some anti-semitic viewpoints that he encounters in the broader Hungarian society of the time. After his father is sent to a "work camp" he is required to leave school and work at a local gas plant. He rather enjoys his time there and forms friendships with the other boys who are forced to work there but one day on his way to work he encounters a road-block where all Jews are rounded up. He is sent first to Auschwitz then Buchenwald and finally Zeitz. His friends are scattered to other camps and he finds himself completely alone with people he mostly can't communicate with, because he doesn't speak Yddish or their native tongues, and with whom he really doesn't identify. It takes some time for the reality of his situation to sink in but ultimately he endures, and witnesses, brutality and depravation and, in fact, comes very close to dying. He does survive and makes it back to Budapest where he tries to explain his experiences in words which I found very thought-provoking.

The book is written in a remarkably matter-of-fact, unemotional style that makes it very powerful. More powerful, in my opinion, than had it been written in a more usual style. Without hesitation I give it 5-stars.

'Fatelessness' sounds quite gripping, Reba. What a wonderful review. That one will have to be added to the wishlist.

I completely agree with your review and rating of Fatelessness, Reba. A very powerful and thought-provoking novel. I have several others by Kertesz in the queue.

yes, high school.. that's when I read Siddhartha ..

I read Siddhartha in college--it was quite one of the IN books for university students in the 60s.

Hi Julia - nice to "see" you. I'm sure you'll find Fatelessness worth the read.

Hi Linda -- glad you stopped by and glad you agree about Fatelessness and I'll be interested to see how you like other books by Kertesz.

Hi Kath -- did you like Siddhartha?

Hi Roni -- I can imagine Siddhartha was "IN". I remember reading The Prophet at Mutant Message Down Under in the same sort of way.

Reba, I read Siddhartha many years ago and remember thinking I should reread it on a regular basis. Yeah, right...it hasn't happened yet. Maybe that's why I lack the wisdom I was yearning for.

I'm glad your book selection was a hit with the new group. It always makes for a better evening that way. You have so many beautiful places to walk in San Diego. I especially like the walk that led to that little gem of a bookstore!

Hi Donna! We do have nice places to walk...even without driving to them. Shelter Island does require a short drive but we had dropped out neighbors at the airport which is in that direction so we decided to take advantage. We're only a few blocks from Balboa Park (San Diego's biggest urban park) and do often walk from home to there. I'll have to take a photo of that some day.

We tried a Haitian restaurant last night to "test" it as a site for my f-2-f bookclub meeting next month. We're reading Breath, Eyes, Memory and we've started meeting at restaurants that are related to the book in some way (a bit of a stretch sometimes but fun to work out a connection). This is an obvious fit and I think it's going to be fun.

Mmmmm, that looks delish! (what is it?)

I added Fatelessness to my WL when Linda reviewed it Reba, and your excellent review has just served to make me wonder why I haven't made more of an effort to find it. I love the idea of your book club eating at restaurants that correlate to the book you read. That Haitian food looks delish:)

I'm adding Fatelessness to my Wishlist too. I've read several books about WWII and the Holocaust lately. It is a powerful story and I find it interesting how different authors convey the horror using different approaches.

I'll be interested to hear what your Book Club thinks of Breath, Eyes, Memory. Danticat is one of my favorite authors, but I haven't read that one. The food looks delicious!

Oh, I loved Breath Eyes Memory. What a great book.

Amy glad to hear you like Danticat -- especially since our tastes tend to be similar. I do highly recommend Fatelessness and it's a really quick read.

Katie -- also glad you like Breath Eyes Memory. I like to read my book club books right before the meeting so won't be starting it soon although I ordered it on-line and it came in 2 days so I already have it.

Kathy -- actually it looks better than it was I'm afraid (not that it was bad). Main dish was pork fried with onions and peppers -- tasty but rather dry. The cole sla was great but REALLY spicy. I like spicy food but this had been looking for the fire extinguisher. There were some little fried breads -- sort of like wheat hugh puppies and the big flat things in the front are fried plantains which were pretty starchy. It was fun though and the owner was really sweet.

Bonnie -- this will be the fourth time we've eaten out with the book club and it is fun. Biggest problem has been that it's often hard to hear each other because the restaurants are noisy. It won't be a problem with this one though.

Hi Reba, I hope you'll have a wonderful new week!

Thank you Diana, you too! Are you getting some of the snow that's been hitting England this weekend?

Yes we are, and today we had icy rain too.

Diana, I hope you're able to stay inside and have a cozy day.

Glad The Habit worked out at your new book group. A new used book store, dangerous and wonderful.

Eating in a place that is somehow connected to the read with your book club sounds really nice :)
I agree.. a new, used book store could be tempting!

Hi Lucy. Yes the new bookstore is wonderful but on closer inspection I think they have many collectors editions so I probably won't be buying much although I will be sorely tempted every time I'm there.

Hi Kath -- we only started eating at a related restaurant 3 months ago. It's fun and adds to the event but it can be very hard to hear plus sometimes it's a bit of a challenge to think of an appropriate restaurant. For example, with The Habit we ate at the "Local Habit" which had nothing to do with Eastern Orthodoxism or Assisted living.

I thought I would share some of San Diego's fine public art with y'all (that's for all y'all Amy and Katie). This is a peace bell that was given to San Diego by sister city Yokohama. It stands at the end of Shelter Island where we took our walk on Saturday.

I just finished Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk. It's had rave reviews but I'm conflicted about it. I'm going to have to let it settle a bit before I do my report.

Wow, that was fast. I ordered Vipers' Tangle from Amazon yesterday and found it in front of my door today!

Amazon folks must have discovered a new energy drink this week--I ordered a book late late Monday night, and it came with our mail today!

Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk came to me from the Book Passage last June and finally got selected from the pile this week. The cover quotes Karl Mahlantes as saying: "This book will be the Catch-22 of the Iraq War. Instead of skewering the military, however, it skewers the society responsible for sending it to war, namely us." I haven't read "Catch-22" so I can't comment on the comparison, but Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk does do a good job of reflecting how war is marketed and how fervent Americans can become on little, often inaccurate, information.

The hero, Billy Lynn, is a 19 year-old high school graduate who got into some trouble and is offered the choice of joining the Army instead of facing felony charges. He becomes part of Bravo squad who encountered enemy fire on a mission in Iraq while a Fox News team is imbedded with them. One member of the squad dies in Billy's arms and another is badly injured. The news footage goes viral and the squad is brought back to the U. S. for a 2-week leave/PR tour. With the exception of a flash back of Billy's visit with his family the day before, the entire book takes place during a Dallas Cowboy's game on Thanksgiving Day during which the squad is being hailed as heros.

Both during his visit with his family and his interactions with members of the public at the football game, Billy, and the other squad members, experience disorientation based on the difference between the reality they experienced and the perception of the American public. The squad members know they just did what they were trained to do, that it all happened so fast there was no time to consider any other alternatives. They were on auto-pilot. The public, on the other hand (not to mention the owner of the Cowboys and others who are exploiting them for business purposes) wants them to be heros. For all ol this, I loved the book.

At the same time, however, there were things that bothered me. I found the language wearing. Also, much of the time Billy is presented as a typical teen-aged boy (he is 19 after all) driven by testosterone and still not worldly wise yet from time to time he has insights that seem far beyond his years. Finally there is a "romance" that really is beyond belief and, imho, totally unnecessary to the story.

FInally, a couple of quotes:

About his last phone conversation with his mother before they return to Iraq after she says "Well, I'm sure you're busy, so I'll let you go.":

...Maybe the last time they'll ever talk -- not to be dramatic about it -- and she's giving him the bum's rush, her own son. Not that she means anything by it, he knows. This is simply her lifelong habit of moderation at work, her need to tamp everything down to the routine, the modest, the tepid everyday. He understands the whole concept of boundaries, but there's a point where this mania for normalizing turns toxic.

Billy's opinion of the press:

They don't even have to take notes, just hoover up his words with sleek little recording gadgets that look like protein bars. Merely by standing there they manage to be incredibly annoying, a middle-aged bunch of mostly big-assed white guys dressed in boring-as-hell business casual, such a sad-fuck sampling of civilian bio-matter that for a moment Billy is actually glad for the war, hell yes, so much better to be out there shooting guns and blowing shit up than shuffling around like scenery on a bad sitcom. God knows the war sucks, but he sees no great appeal in these tepid peacetime lives.

HELP-- I want to update "currently reading" on my profile page and I can't remember how nor find it even after MUCH searching. How does one do that? "Update profile" only gives me the top half of the page.

All The King's Men has been on the tbr pile for a long time. Each June I attend a conference in New Orleans and I'm very interested in the politics there.

I know there is, and always has been, a tremendous amount of corruption.

I believe you can change the currently reading setting by going to the book and scooling down to that specific category.

here you go:

Under collections, you can note various categories.

http://www.librarything.com/work/272823/book/69826812

THANK YOU LINDA!! That has been driving me crazy.

Happy me, The Fishing Fleet arrived today. I had already selected Vipers' Tangle for my next book but The Fishing Fleet will follow that. Can't wait!!

Nice review of Billy Lynn, Reba. It's been on my radar for a while now, but I'm still undecided about it. May be a good one to get from the library...

Happy to help. I hope your day is lovely.

I hope you enjoy The Fishing Fleet, Reba! And Linda, thank you for the "currently reading" solution. I have been trying to do that too and it's been driving me crackers too. I appear to be the world's slowest-ever reader of The Count of Monte Cristo.

I know what you mean Susan -- I was "reading" A Visit From the Goon Squad for 4 years lol

Thanks Katie. I think it's worth reading but I don't "love" it like many other readers seem to. I ran across the cover letter from Book Passage that came with in this morning. They described it as satire. They quote the NYTimes as calling it "a gripping eloquent provocation" and the San Francisco Chronicle "a bracing, fearless and uproarious satire of how contemporary war is waged and sold to the American public". Nancy Pear of NP says "one of the most moving and remarkable novels I've ever read". I'll be interested to hear what you think.

Reba, thanks for checking up on me so regularly during my bout of stomach flu! It is appreciated. Today is a great day to lay about the house and recuperate, with all the rain. I'm glad I'm not out in the traffic.

No joke. I left (barely on time) for a meeting in Kensington this morning only to find the ramp from 163 north to 8 east closed. Had to get a bit creative to get where I was going. Saw news reports of the semi that turned over on 15 south this afternoon. All by all, a big mess and I'm very happy to be at home. Spent a couple of hours with Vipers' Tangle this afternoon which was really nice. Hope you had something good to read and that you're in the "regaining strength" part of the recovery now.

Hi Reba, een fijn weekend gewenst!

We had wicked weather yesterday, too. 4-6 inches of snow.. and SO so so cold.
I am not looking forward to trekking out today :P

Oh, how disappointing - I rather dislike very 'discriminating' second-hand bookstores. You know you won't find any treasures.

Reba, I hope you can have a weekend at home, free of traffic snarl-ups and filled with good books.

Hi Diana, Katie, Lucy and Susan. Thanks so much for stopping by. I'm assuming, Lucy, about the bookstore but afraid it will have more precious books than I'm able to buy. I'm going to go have a good look around one of these days though.

We're having a lazy morning, looking out at fog and rain. We are planning to go out to lunch, drop by a great video store to see if they have No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency (we don't get HBO but I really enjoy the books and we'll be in Botswana in a couple of months) and then pick up a few things at Trader Joe's. It's Saturday so hopefully the roads won't be TOO bad, but CA roads do get oily between rains and therefore slick when it rains. That coupled with drivers who aren't careful and it can get interesting out there.

Are you going to go to the new Trader Joe's in Mission Valley or the one in Hillcrest? Take care!

New one in Mission Valley -- it was a zoo just like Hillcrest, but then, grand opening was yesterday. I usually make a point of doing TJ's on week day mornings and it's clear that's going to have to continue.

I heard about Vipers' Tangle by 1952 Nobel Prize winner Franciois Mauriac on Paul's thread and selected it as part of my personal challenge to read at least one book by each Nobel Prize winner. The story is written in the form of a letter of "confession" by a dying man. In it he tries to analyze what has caused him to be so lonely. In modern terms, why his family is so disfunctional. Where the lack of love, sometimes presence of hatred, jealousies, etc. have come from. He triesd to be honest with himself about where he has contributed to the problem and opens himself to the idea that the problems can be resolved and the chasms bridged.

I stared at the vines and said nothing. I was a prey to sudden doubt. Is it possible that a man can live for nearly half a century noticing one side only of the person who shares his life? Can it be that, from long habit, he picks and chooses from among her gestures and her words, keeping for use only those that feed his grievances and perpetuate his resentments? There is a fatal tendency in all of us to simplify others, to eliminate in them everything that might soften the indictment, give some human lineaments to the caricature that our hatred craves in order to justify itself...

Another very enjoyable and worthy read.

We got Ladies No. 1 Detective Agency DVD today. So far we've watched the pilot. It's delicious and the characters (with the exception of the barber next door) are all exactly like I had envisioned them from the book. Lovin' it.

A friend posted this -- thought it might help those of you who are planning trips to California this year lol

I love it, Reba, even though I don't get all the jokes :-)

Some of them really aren't jokes, just location of well-known things. The combination of tongue-in-cheek and irreverently named things tickled me...but them I'm a native which may make it funnier. Glad you enjoyed it too, though.

I'll be visiting "Shamu" in the summer for a library conference.

When is the conference? We'll be gone much of the summer but a meet-up might be possible.

Went to the farmers market this morning for the first time in a month or so and found local strawberries. I'm SO happy :-)

Oops, don't tell my hubby! He insists on buying every strawberry he sees, even if they aren't sweet. I hope yours are, but they usually aren't very this time of year.

We went to The Chicken Pie Shop for breakfast this morning--huge omelets.

Loved the map!

I had no idea Chicken Pie Shop did breakfast. Just went to taste a strawberry -- pretty good but they'll get better :-)

Those strawberries look yummy! I'm hoping I locate the guy selling the strawberries from Plant City, Florida this week. Of course, he may be on a run to get more.

love the California map! I showed it to my daughter, who thinks she wants to go to school in California. She picked out the Hippies, Garlic and Otter section.

That map could come in very handy methinks; not!
So pleased that you enjoyed Viper's Tangle.

Lori -- when you're here in the summer they'll be better than they are now.

Hi Rhonda -- sounds like your daughter is thinking UC Santa Cruz -- great school.

Paul -- actually the map is pretty accurate, just irreverent. But still, you'll get better advice in person from those of us who live here.

Good to know. Our strawberry season here in Morristown is rather short-lived. It peaks in May. I need to get a supply this year and make some more jam since I'm about out (as is the rest of the family). I also want to freeze some with the juice and sugar for strawberry shortcake and other uses! Of course, I love just eating them too!

Our local strawberries start now and last through about October. They're at their best in a month or two and stay good to the end. It may be a bit hard for you to take enough home for freezing though lol

We'll have to hit the farmers' markets this week ourselves and see what we can find, Reba. Maybe La Mesa on Friday.

Is that a good one? We always go to Hillcrest although we did try Little Italy once and sometimes if I really need something I go to Mission Hills because it's mid-week.

As to tea cozies, you're right you don't need one with a 2-cup pot. In cool weather I often make a big pot about 3:30 or 4:00 in the p.m. and we work on it until dinner. I made a cozy 40 years ago or so and it works really well. I'll post a photo tomorrow. It isn't quilted but it does have batting between two layers of fabric (thin fabric like you would use to piece a quilt from).

Glad you're fully recovered and hope you enjoyed the beautiful weather today.

LOL'd at the Cali map!
And oooh'ed and ahhh'ed over the strawberries in February...
Our farmers markets are May - November... and have a very limited time of actual eatables. But that is
the reality of the locale. le sigh.

Kath -- glad you enjoyed the map. I got a good chuckle out of it myself. Yes, we're lucky here in So. Cal to have weather that permits us to grow fruit and veg year round. Our farmers markets go year round too although not everything is there all of the time. We used to start getting strawberries in Febuary but they have some new varieties that start earlier now. They aren't as good as the later ones but after a few months off I'm willing to compromise :)

Hi Reba, love your map of California. I visited San Diego a few years ago and loved just about everything about it except the high prices (at least compared to what we pay around here). Fresh strawberries while we're shoveling snow?? Well, that sounds awfully good to me.

I have Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk on my iPad and I hope to get to it sometime soonish. I see you had some quibbles with it so it will be interesting to me to see how I like it (or not).

Hi Bonnie -- Some prices are pretty high here. I notice differences especially in housing and restaurants when we're travelling. But then, we have very low heating and A/C costs (we rarely use either) and don't have to own winter clothing so that helps :-) I too will be interested to see how you feel about Billy Lynn. I liked it, I just didn't love it.

Roni --here's my tea cozy. I made it when I lived in the Netherlands in the 1970's and still enjoy it. It has batting inside but isn't quilted. The cottage goes around the whole thing with down spout, more cats, more windows, a door, etc. It does a great job keeping the tea pot warm which reminds me that it's about time to go and make a pot :-)

I can't see the cozy!

I envy your weather. :)

Not showing up, Reba! Probably a typo somewhere.

Really strange because it' right up there in full color on mine. OK I"ll try to edit and see if it gets better.

Did that do it?

Yes, there it is! How cute!

Thanks Roni. I like it and, like I said, it keeps the tea warm. I made a pot at 4:00 yesterday and when I got home at 7:30 it was still nice and warm.

Hi Reba! Lots has been happening over here. I enjoyed your review of Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk. I liked the book a lot, but I agree that the girlfriend scenes seemed a little unlikely. Your strawberries look delicious. I'm so jealous. Right now we're covered with snow. Seems like it will be a while before Farmer's Market time!

Awwww. Is that a little puppy in the cottage window?

Hi Amy -- I'd love to share some of the strawberries with you but doubt they'd take mailing too well :-) Glad you didn't have to go to the U today through the snow. Hope your evening is cozy and warm.

Hi Kathy -- no it's a kitty actually There's another one in the open door on one end, but no dogs. Which is too bad because although I like cats a lot I prefer dogs.

:) cute cozy!

Hi Reba! In the book I've just finished there was a reference to Lake Chautauqua. I looked it up and clicked the pronunciation icon, so I can finally say your user name :-)

Reba, those strawberries look very tempting. We are starting to get Florida berries in the local supermarkets, though they don't look as luscious as the ones in your picture. A native Californian, huh? It's good to know that not everyone is a transplant. The map was a hoot!

Thank you Kath -- so glad you like it

Susan -- How fun that you read a book that mentioned Lake Chautauqua! What was it? Glad you can say my "name" now :-)

Hi Donna. The strawberries are pretty good but not as good as they will be. I just get excited when the local ones come in that I eat them even if they aren't at their peak. Glad you like the map and, yes, for my age group it's unusual that I"m a native.

Reba, it was Rudyard Kipling's American Notes and he just mentioned it in passing. He's the third grumpy English person whose memoirs of the US I have read this year :-)

Reba - I'm all caught up here now, and what a delightful time I have had. I have added several books to my WL - Siddhartha and Fatelessness. I absolutely love how you write your reviews - I learned a lot. I need to investigate Breath, Eyes, Memory because I have not heard of that. I laughed out loud at you and Susan discussing how long it appeared you had been reading the books in your "Currently Reading" category - too funny! And I LOVED the California map and your lovely tea cozy. So sorry that I had fallen so far behind, I will be careful not to let it happen again.

Susan -- ah, Kipling...I may not go there then. I wonder if there were any English visitors in that age that liked America.

Hi Mamie -- nice to see you here and thank you so much for kind words re reviews. I stress that I don't do a good job so it's nice of you to say that. Glad you liked the map and cozy. Breath, Eyes, Memory was an Oprah pick I'm told. I hadn't heard of it either but will report around the 19th since book club meets on the 20th. I'm promising myself to stay current with my currently reading from now on...except when I don't have good access to internet which will be happenin this spring.

Ohhhhh strawberries!

I love the CA map and have to copy to send to Mr. Sibyx.

Hi Lucy -- glad you like the map. I copied it from a friend's Face Book post so please copy and pass it on. Wish I could send you some strawberries :-)

Wow, major busy day. Ran errands this morning then drove up to Oceanside to meet friends for a long lunch then back to Hillcrest to meet other friends for a movie (saw "Quartet" which I would recommend especially for the older ones of us) and then went with them for a soda while they had dinner. Just now got home...need some quiet, feet-up time.

Oh yes, found my latest book from Book Passage in the mailbox when I got home: A History of the Present Illness by Louise Aronson. It's short stories :(

Love the tea cozy! Hope you are having a great weekend with time for tea and reading.

Thank you Rhonda . I hope you do too.

I did get outside this morning with the sun, and grubbed the grass out around my rosebushes, put down weed cloth and mulch on top of it to try to keep it down. Hope you had a good one. Your Friday certainly was busy.

Ran a few errands during the sunshine and was home by the time the clouds came. Good day. Hope you got some feet up/reading time this afternoon.

We went out to brunch today at a new restaurant. I love their wall art ... many of those are actual book spines (OK I could never cut up a book, I'll admit, but it did look really cool). The stacks extend all the way to the floor but the table was in the way of showing that part. Brunch was really good too.

That's really cool, Reba!

That's such a neat wall! It'd be fun if the black were chalkboard, too.

Ahem! Name of restaurant, please!

Brooklyn Girl. It's on Goldfinch between Washington and Fort Stockton. We liked the ambiance AND the food.

Hi Katie and Kathy -- yes, it would be fun if the black was a chalkboard. In this case it isn't. I was thinking I would love to do something like that in our house -- no idea where, however.