Welcome to Canada

I spend a good bit of the summer in British Columbia.  The Canadian people are terrific.  

It appears that the Canadian animals are just as, er, personable:

I brake for beavers.

A Connecticut Yankee

I spent the Fourth of July weekend in Connecticut.  Salisbury, to be exact; the charming town that Meryl Streep calls home.

Being from the Northwest, it was not the lush greenery nor the rain that fell on and off over the weekend.  We “webfeeters” have those things and are used to seeing them.

What DID impress me were the acres and acres of immaculately trimmed lawns.  The county looks like a cross between a giant cemetery and a golf course, with a few clubhouse/mortuaries and some forests thrown in for good measure.  Even the pastures are mowed. 

I’m not saying it’s not beautiful.  It is one of the loveliest places I’ve seen.  But it struck me as odd, all this lawn maintenance, in a portion of the country known for its liberal persuasion and “Save the planet” mentality.  Lawns are not eco-friendly in any way, shape or form.

Seattle-ites are eco-minded across the board, even those more conservative (I happen to not think that conservatives love the planet less, by the way.  Most of them tend to see the glass half full as opposed to the half empty view of “Oh my God, what will happen?”).  I lean to that direction.  I believe that if one piled up all the dire things that happen in a year on our planet, and weighed them against all the good, the scale would be heavy to the positive, indeed.  Not my politics, simply my belief.

I love lawns.  I water my lawn; I cut my lawn.  I enjoy my lawn just as much as I’m sure the North-easterners do theirs.  But, as is said about many things, size counts.  And, sometimes, smaller IS better.

The Dog Song

There’s a wonderful artist in my neighborhood…a dog artist.  Nancy Shutt is truly gifted when it comes to capturing the essence of a dogs personality on canvas.

I have personally met many of the canines she’s immortalized.  Their characters, various as they are, always shine through the paint.

Here’s a “snapshot” of her work, set to the music of another local talent, Emily Westman:

If you have a special dog (and what dog isn’t), consider having him sit for a portrait…Ok, maybe an oxymoron.

Top Twenty-Five

Every year, English teachers from across the country can submit their collections of actual analogies and metaphors found in high school essays.

 

These excerpts are published each year to the amusement of teachers across the country.  

 

Here are last year’s winners…..  

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.  
  
2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.  

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking  at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.  

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.  

5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.  

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.  

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.  

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.  

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.  

10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.  

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.  

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.  

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.  
  
14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across  the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19  p.m. at a speed of 35 m ph.  

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.  
  
16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.  
  
17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.  

 

18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.  
  
19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.  

20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.  

21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.  

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.  

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.  
  
24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.  
  
25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as  if she were a garbage truck backing up.

 

Icons, Adieu

Two icons of my childhood moved on yesterday.  Farrah Fawcett, whose hair I always wanted (well, maybe her body, too), and Michael Jackson, both made news yesterday.

I listened to the radio in the afternoon, and many of the “Drive at Five” shows were talking about the lives of both people.  It struck me though, that more than half the opinion voiced about each was negative.

Both Fawcett and Jackson had their scandals.  Both contributed enormously, as well.  Their accomplishments far outweighed their pitfalls.  Just as the good things happening in the world far outweigh the bad.  And yet, it seems to be human nature to dwell on the negative, no?

Merely observing the criticism makes me think more about compassion.  We could all use more, directed toward others and directed toward ourselves.

Perhaps that’s the real good news in every passing.  Self-examination is often where we find the truth about the world.

The Rules of Storytelling

There are many rules for writing.  Some are followed; some are ignored.  And, somehow, it seems in much of today’s published fiction many have never been heard of.

Mark Twain divides his rules for story-telling into large rules and little rules:

Large rules:

1. A tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere.

2. The episodes of a tale shall be necessary parts of the tale, and shall help develop it.

3. The personages in a tale shall be alive, except in the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the corpses from the others.

4. The personages in a tale, both dead and alive, shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there.

5. When the personages of a tale deal in conversation, the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject in hand, and be interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the people cannot think of anything more to say.

6. The personages of a tale shall confine themselves to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and reasonable.

Little rules:

7. An author should say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it.

8. Use the right word, not its second cousin.

9. Eschew surplusage.

10. Not omit necessary details.

How Would You Vote?

It’s becoming a hot-button issue—again.

Here’s a little back-round:

Some say that by taxing it, we could pay the national debt of in no time.  Since the per person amount of debt hovers at $37,000 at the moment, the thought of legalizing marijuana might give fewer voters pause than it used to.

What do you think?

Awful Library Books

Love books?

For a twist on GoodReads, try Awful Library Books.  It’s the antithesis of the former and often a trip down memory lane.

Next time a vote comes up on a bond issue supporting local public libraries, you might want to make the “yes” box….

Retribution

Do you know someone who pulled a practical joke on you? 

Would you like to get back at them?

Try this:

But, stand back.  You’ll be the next on THEIR list.

Nocticulant Clouds

Spaceweather:

“The first NOCTICULANT CLOUDS(NLCs) of 2009 have been sighted over northern Europe.

May 29th, photographers recorded wispy electric-blue tendrils spreading across the twilight skies of Denmark, Northern Ireland and Scotland. This follows a similar display over Russia on May 27th.  These sightings signal the beginning of the 2009 NLC season, which is expected to last until late July. Early-season NLCs are usually feeble, but these were fairly bright and vibrant, suggesting that even better displays are in the offing. 

Noctilucent clouds are an unsolved puzzle.  They float 83 km above Earth’s surface at the edge of space itself.  People first noticed NLCs in the late 19th century. In those days you had to travel to high northern latitudes to see them.  In recent years, however, the clouds have been sighted in the United States as far south as Oregon, Washington and even Colorado. Climate change, space dust, and rocket launches have all been cited as possible explanations for the phenomenon. Interestingly, low solar activity seems to promote the clouds, so the ongoing deep solar minimum could set the stage for a good season in 2009.

The best time to look for NLCs is just after sunset or just before sunrise when the sun is between 6 and 16 degrees below the horizon.  That’s when the geometry is just right for sunlight to illuminate the tiny ice crystals that make up the clouds.”

A reason to rise early!