December 17, 2006
Easy Ave.
This weekend was notable for its lack of demands. Stuart’s office Christmas party, where we both behaved well and ducked out early. Britt for dinner last night, and I cooked roast chicken, squash and onions from our new cookbook, and we had a wonderful evening by the light of the Christmas tree. And then today we watched Curtis’s copy of A Muppets Family Christmas and ate sugar cookies. I continue to drabble. Later, I plan to do it in the tub.
November 5, 2006
New Editions
Last night at Katie D’s bachelorette, guests received Shakespeare’s Complete Sonnets, which I thought was a pretty fantastic gift. And today I picked up A History of Love by Nicole Krauss, which I am excited to read.
October 27, 2006
Fun Without Prairie Fiction
We had a grand old time last night at the echolocation Halloween Party, and we were truly humbled by the amazing costumes assembled there. We didn’t dress up. We are lame. I did, however, give my secret party trick the light of day (or night?) and composed two spontaneous folk songs- one about the Filthy Federlines and the other about robotic dogs (naturally). They were received warmly and I did so enjoy the night out. On the walk there, my mind was shouting to the beats of my feet, “Need drink. Need drink. etc.” Drink was had. Delicious.
In my previous entry, when I mentioned that The Diviners was one of “those books”, I meant that it is a book I intend to be revisiting as long as visiting hours are open. What I had neglected to realize, of course, is that it is also one of “those books” in the sense of the dreaded Prairie Fiction. Remember how Prairie Fiction nearly drove me to defenestration one month ago? Now, it is distinctly possible that my Prairie Fiction issues are linked to my menstrual cycle, but I think there is something further than that. I learned recently about certain types of fiction that cause post-traumatic stress disorder in readers, and I really think Prairie Fiction does that for me. I am not being completely dramatic. Books do tend to make their impressions upon me (ie when I read Fight Club and became psychotic?) I loved The Diviners, but it stirred something up in me that needs to be left alone in order me to be functional. I become overwrought. Sarah Harmer wrote “I’m a Mountain’; I’d love to hear “I’m a Prairie” and find out what it has to say, and then maybe I could get to the root of the problem.
I am now reading Laurie Colwin’s Goodbye Without Leaving which should calm me down a bit.
Two fabulous acquisitions in our house: Atwood’s The Penelopiad (which I read last winter and loved) and a pastry marble!
October 2, 2006
At the Vic Book Sale
I went mad at Half-Price Monday and acquired the following:
Human Croquet by Kate Atkinson, because I love the other books by her I’ve read; Survival by Margaret Atwood just because; Atwood’s The Journals of Susannah Moodie for my ghost course; Babel Tower by AS Byatt because sometimes I really like her; FINDS OF THE DAY Goodbye Without Leaving, Shine On, Bright and Dangerous Object, Another Marvelous Thing and A Big Storm Knocked it Over ie almost everything by Laurie Colwin; Crocodile Soup by Julia Darling, because I liked her Guardian Poetry workshop way back when; An American Childhood by Annie Dillard, because I used to own it and left it in Japan; Mavis Gallant’s Paris Notebooks, because I read it years ago and loved it; The Remains of the Day because I’ve never read it and Kim Dean said I should; Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri because Kim Dean picked it up and said “Read this” just as Amy Tan said she would on the book’s back cover; Heat Wave and Spiderweb by Penelope Lively because I LOVE her; Martin Sloane because it was a dollar; Moo because I’m in the mood for campus fiction; Park and Ride by Miranda Sawyer because I’ve read it and liked it, and I’m up for “adventures in suburbia”; and The Queen and I by Sue Townsend, which also used to belong to me but I had to leave it behind in England. All this for $27. Oh yes, it had been a fine fine day. It’s nice that I like authors that are so unfashionable I can pick them up in droves for pennies.
