minor book report rant regarding a young adult book...

A friend recommended a book to me called "Missy The Werecat". 

Premise is that Missy at age 13 was at soccer camp on summer and woke in the middle of a moonlit night to go into the woods.  She changed into a panther. She is an intelligent teenager and stumbled around a bit getting used to her new self.  She tried to her best to change back but that didn't happen for two years. 

So she lived as a cougar in the woods hear Mount Washington.  She fed herself on rabbits, the occasional deer.  She went into heat several times and drove off male cougars successfully. 

Eventually she migrated south along the mountains and found herself changed back into her human form.  She was naked and stole some clothes. She is contemplating how to contact her parents and has no idea how to explain her absence.  She gets involved in a rescue when a car goes off a mountain road and she plunges down a cliff to rescue the passengers.  She ends up getting transported to a hospital. 

The rest of the book involves the authorities, her parents, the reunion.  The delicate handling of this possibly sexually abused teenager.  And things stumble along.  A year goes by before she outs herself to her parents.  So that is mostly the first book.  I really enjoyed it.  She does extremely well in high school in getting caught up and in sports.  She has extra strength because she is a werecat. 

By the end of this book she has endeared herself to friends of the people she rescued and is trying for a position at West Point.  The books dealing with this were pretty good, the pleb rituals and all of that was very interesting. 

However the authors writing style began to wear on me.  Missy giggled....a lot.  I was hoping for the occasional smirk, or smile or guffaw but no it was steady giggling.  Her good friend Tracy giggled a lot as well.  The author used italics way too much for emphasis.  Didn't need it...at all.  Somewhere around the third or fourth book and author began using quotation marks around a single word to indicate emphasis.  Ugh. NO that ain't grammatically correct.

There was a sex scandal a group of 7 upper classmen had hired prostitutes for sex and they pimped these women to other cadets. Missy broke that up but it seems like West Point has actually a better system to handle this type of thing compared to other military academies. 

So the books progress to the point where Missy discovered she can teleport about 500 miles at a time so the FBI has her infiltrating enemy computers with virus. Everybody partners up, marry or have relationships and merrily have sex sex sex sex sex.  Uh gets a little repetitive.  I reached a point where I ignored the boring bits and paged ahead about five pages of panting and thrusting. 

Also the author recapped endlessly the subsequent books had to tell 35% of the previous damn story and that AFTER a good three chapter Prologue.  If the author is THAT short on word count, time to develop the characters. 

The only thing we ever hear about Missy's internal dialog is that she compartmentalizes well, pain, anyone killed in battle, etc.  Oh and she has bonded with her soulmate and they chat telepathically with each other constantly.  Isn't that kind of like texting and driving?  Could be a BAD thing.  SHUT UP MISSY!!!!

I enjoyed reading quite a few of the reviews.  About half complained about the sex and at least one did a full analytical review pointing out grammatical errors and made actual suggestions.  Hope the author reads it and took it to heart.  I will check back to see if there any other Missy books.  Hope she actually finishes West Point and goes on to Ranger and Seal school as those were goals of hers.  Mebbe.

BOOK REPORTx

REDBIRD by Fannie Flagg

I want to move to Redbird, Alabama.  I shudder to think of moving to the South due mostly to mosquitoes and humidity.  Since this place is fictional, chances are it shall remain in my imagination. The writer is as lyrical as Marjorie K. Rawlings who wrote "The Yearling".  I want to attend a luncheon given by the Secret Society.  I want to eat some of the special macaroni and cheese.  Fortunately there are recipes in the back of the book. 

The story starts in cold wintery Chicago.  Our hero has just visited his physician who told him that his emphysema was going to kill him soon and his liver was shot.  It was recommended that he go somewhere warm.  He is given a very old tattered hotel brochure for Lost River Hotel, Alabama.  So our hero took a train and was met by one of the town residents.  He had rented a room in a charming bungalow owned by Mrs. Kitchen.  There is actually a redbird involved, an orphaned little girl, several reunions and redemptions.  This book is a Christmas story and although there are many Hallmark Christmas stories, this one could become a classic it is that good.  Made me want to go meet the Cajuns across the river. 

Retro Blog: Stand up schstick

Retro Blog: Stand up schstick: I have been contemplating a stand up comedy routine, not that I would actually get up on stage...unless it was for a bunch of senior citize...

Stand up schstick

I have been contemplating a stand up comedy routine, not that I would actually get up on stage...unless it was for a bunch of senior citizens. 

I would speak about something I have noted in the aging process that just started in the last couple of years.  Ever since I got my little old lady skin, I have noted an extra sprinkle of dandruff.  Surprisingly I don't have it in my hair....or maybe that comes along in a couple of years. 

It became alarming to me couple of years ago. I was going to physical therapy for arm exercises and when I got up, there was this huge poof of white flakes expressed through my pants...an actual cloud!  Both my therapist and I were surprised.  I then began to apply lotion religiously but to no avail.  I heard about Mae West using Vaseline as part of her beauty regimen and I have tried that.  It works for awhile but if I don't apply it, I get sock dandruff, pant leg dandruff and shirt sleeve dandruff. Oh and face dandruff but I am sort of used to that and apply Vaseline routinely for that. 

I have begun to avoid black clothing.  I only wear it on a one time basis for public appearances.  I have adopted gray.  I have a nice warm gray sweater worn over gray green cotton shirt and gray sweatpants.  That clothing also allows a certain degree of camouflage. 

I would like to blame some of this on Climate Control and secondarily on Trump.  Our El Nino has given us a very dry and SUNNY winter.  Extra dry, dry, dry.  More skin drying up.  A side effect of all that sunshine is driver disorientation  We Oregonians do better in gloomy conditions.  All that sunshine strobing through the trees while driving is causing migraine headaches and driving into completely sunshine/black shadow corners is very dangerous for all oncoming traffic in both directions. So in the meantime we pray for better distribution of the routine moisture and a miracle cure for body dandruff.

G'night Folks! You've been great!!!

MY FIRST CAR

I left home at age 17 after having graduated class of 65 from EHS. I was invited to live with Carl and Robin, my debonair cousin and his wife.  They lived in Petaluma.  I spent the summer a bit disoriented.  Carl got me a babysitting gig over a long weekend and I wound up somewhere in Russian River babysitting a 13 year old while the parents and teenager and friend attended a local dance.  Hell, the kid should have gone and learned some social skills or at least watched her parents dance together.  Carl told me about Fairchild Conductor and he took me there to fill out an application, shortly after I turned 18 and was hired and became a wage earning, tax paying, emancipated minor.  I got a roommate not to long after that and we lived in a fairly nice house in Novato.  Sue had a car so no problems there.  She kept wrecking them though.  One of the ladies we worked with told us that her husband who was in the Air Force at the nearby airbase sold used cars.  Yeah sign me up.  He sold me a brown 57 VW, it was a stick and I learned how to hold a pause on a steep San Francisco hill without burning up the clutch.  However long before that I was stuck somewhere and the car broke.  I tried to start it, Sue kept yelling, "Pop the clutch!" I had NO idea what she was talking about.  I called a local foreign car repair who towed it and repaired it.  Crank shaft had cracked right down the middle.  So how do I get this thing repaired.  I used the pink slip for the repair shop to hold until it paid for the repairs.  Pam's husband felt sorry for me and left me have it for the amount that I had paid so far, about 250 bucks.  She was pissed at his poor business practice.  So I puttered around in that thing for a couple of years.  One summer visit, Dad decided I needed a better car so they traded their 65 Barracuda to me for the VW.  All the girls learned to drive the thing.  Oh I remember now why Dad gave me the car,  That summer I was home I lost the brakes on the VW and he decided to step in.  Also the drive across the desert was boring, no radio.  So I sang my way "Going to Winnemucca, Winnemucca here I come!", topped out at 35 mph going up the foothills of the Sierra's to get to Reno.  Only other mishap I ever had was running the battery down, when I had stopped at Bergies drive in, you summoned the carhop by turning on your lights.  Gotta remember to turn them off.  I learned how to change tires as my bald tires would go flat or shred at inopportune times.  I paid about 100 dollars for a set of four around then.  I am sure I could have shopped around for a better deal. Uncle Carl asked me how much and I think I lied and said I got a bargain. So my adventures with the Barracuda began.  It was just the right size to fit a twin sized mattress in the back and other bits and bobs of a young person moving from place to place.  It was fairly powerful and kept me on time for work.  Only accident it was ever in was when I loaned it to a friend while I flew home  Got home and dummy had poked a hole in the frame near the hood.  I never got it repaired. And I never loaned it out again...ever.  Oh wait the only OTHER accident to the Barracuda was the winter I decided to drive home because IT WOULD SAVE MONEY.  I did okay until I hit a patch of black ice and blew up the engine just outside of Rome, Oregon.  Called the folks, eventually got it towed, had one valve reground that cost 65 bucks at the time and got a loan from Grandma Horn so I could pay for the repairs.  And Dad insisted on taking me home.  Boy was I pissed/relieved.  God bless him.

I think I invented a sport!

To dream that you are watching a sports competition represents two opposing viewpoints or conflicting opinions.

I woke up from a dream and it was very different.  I was talking to a young athlete who was anxious to get back into his game.  The game involved him brandishing a sort of spear club like thing.  The club was made of very thinly sliced bamboo about six feet long.  The bottom bamboo slices were unbound and if tapped against the floor provided bounce.  The middle of the spear had a stylized handle and the top of the bamboo had a sort of shallow curved spoon for either catching, blocking, hitting etc. 

I could see a black box that consisted of one inch square blocks that were automatically stacking up into a square foot black block.  I am not sure what the rules were but I think team members had a certain amount of time to gather up loose blocks and try to destroy the block before it completed building. 

The defending team had to use their sticks to deflect incoming smaller blocks. Each small block is worth one cent.  The whole block is Lord, math fails me how many one inch squares are in one square foot?  That's 12 x 12 x 12.  There is a dollar amount in there somewhere.  The opposing team does not make any points unless the block is smashed apart.  Once a block is smashed, there is a toss up of one block at center court.  The athlete was wearing what looked like some sort of sports leotard, and didn't look bruised, so contact may be against the rules.  Need a name. How's about a pick up game of "Smash?" Needs work.

To carry forward the dream analysis of two ideas I think I can safely say that I was contemplating a BIG idea and a LITTLE idea.  Swell.

ASSIGNING TERMS AND PUNISHMENTS TO SEX CRIMES

I have been thinking about the apparent differences between the various men in the news lately and degree of their crimes.  I think we need to distinguish the varying degrees of involvement.   For instance I think the apparently innocuous crime committed by Al Franken could correctly be termed "pattycake"
Pattycake: Undocumented touching which would include "I don't remember".  Recommended punishments: Fine: Dollar amount determined by judge.  Sexual harassment classes, counseling.
Pattycake 1: He leered into a camera, touched a sleeping co-worker while she slept.  Recommended punishments:  Fine to be determined by judge.  Sexual harassment classes. Work in a Women's Shelter for 30 days. 
Pattycake 2: for instance would be a man miming a sex act behind a woman who may be bending over.  Recommended punishment: Fine to be determined by judge. Sexual harassment classes. Work in a Women's Shelter for 30 days.
Pattycake 3: is same as Pattycake 2 with his act witnessed by male co-workers. Recommended punishment: Fine to be determined by judge.  Sexual harassment classes.  Work in a Women's Shelter for 60 days.

I believe other actions are covered under various statues and do not need to be repeated here. 

CIA GIRL ASSASSIN AND SEX

I have been avoiding sex scenes as I haven't quite decided the circumstances.  She can handle the actual sex, her problem is how to avoid becoming the go to girl amongst the entire bunch of Taliban.  After thinking about her approach she targets the main leader who seems to wield the most power.  She is aware of the cultural bias against hairy bodies and offers to make his body, let's give him a name like Omar.  She thinks of him as Hairy Man as mentioned in the Haka.  So making acceptable or not haram she offers to remove the hair from his body.  This involves sugaring which she can make work.  She is not allowed a knife but she can use thread as scissors to twist off a few hairs at a time when shaping eyebrows, beard, around ears, etc.  She must also make herself hairless as well.  She only has to do her genitalia as she has difficulty reaching other bits adequately.  This proves acceptable with Omar The Hairy and she attends to him only.  There is no romance about any of this, she is only trying to stay alive until she can teach the Haka and be rescued.  She is not allowed anywhere near the fire, knives or pots and pans as far as cooking is concerned.  Sure,she could kill him with the string but it's would be premature and messy and likely to get her instantly executed.

Addendum to book I HAD A GREAT IDEA!!!!

See Facebook regarding my book. You know, the one I haven't written and probably never will.  However, I do work on the plot every once in a while.  I have a fertile imagination, just have problems connecting characters, plots, logical sequences, beginnings, middles and er ahem...ends.  I'm good at titles and general ideas though (cough).

I had the idea that our CIA girl assassin has gotten a little tired of her captivity by the Taliban.  She doesn't get enough sunshine, the food stinks and she is caught up with all the chapters of "Dies The Fire".    So she decides it is high old time that she got rescued.  So she teaches the Taliban a Maori war chant. Since Maori does not translate well into Farsi, she teaches them the English version that she knows.   

Prepare your feet, stamp with fury and gusto

It is death, it is death

It is life, it is life.

Behold the hairy man who reigned in the sun so it shines.

Arise! Arise!

Rise up to the heights to the rising sun

It is death, it is death

It is life, it is life.

Well they practice a lot.

The next time they went out on patrol, they assembled on

a close hill side.  The got into formation and began to chant, wave their guns, slap their thighs, slap their arms, slap their chests and roared the Haka.  A CIA spotter reported the activity.  They called 

back and confirmed, "They have our girl! Call in a Seal team!"

See Facebook the Haka video, it is very impressive.

Nostalgia and mechanical grinders

Every year NPR puts on Mama Stamburgs cranberry recipe.  It is very different.  This year the 8 year old granddaughter helped with the grinding.  They use an old fashioned hand grinder dated sometime prior to 1909.  They grind up a bag of cranberries, a small whole onion and drain off the juice.  This is set aside in a bowl and add two big tbsp. of FRESH horse radish, 8 ounces of sour cream,add a little sugar.  Mix well and store in freezer until needed for topping the turkey or addition to left over turkey, dinner roll and cranberry relish sammies.

My family recipe was a jello version and tasted MUCH different.  The original recipe calls for lemon jello.  That was discarded in favor of black cherry which makes a much richer combination.  Grind the berries, one whole orange, add one cup sugar, macerate one hour, prepare jello, use half the amount of water or juice called for it jells quicker and more solidly.Add chopped walnuts and chopped cerery, set and serve for dinner.  

Now, Virginia's version of the use of the meat grinder was a bit more involved.  We had to use a large bread board to anchor the grinder as the jaws were note wide enough to go around the edges of the counter.  So one lucky kid got elected to sit on the board AND. HOLD. IT. STILL.  God help any one who wiggled.  Also must place chair holding a drip bowl beneath the grinder as it leaked like a sieve.  And the juice got used religiously in the prep for the jello. After all of that proceed with rest of the recipe.

The only other occasion when the grinder appeared was one day I came home from highschool and there was something odd lying on a plate in the middle of the table. 

"Mom, what is that thing?"

" It's a cow's tongue."

Ugh, Dad had purchased a yearling calf at the auction, had it butchered and we were now blessed not only with 400 lbs of ground beef, roasts and steaks but the organ meat.  The meat was kept in a local locker as no one owned large home freezers then.

So Mom boiled up the tongue, peeled the thing and ground it up in the meat grinder.  She mixed in fine chopped onions, some salt and pepper and Mayo.  It made mighty fine sandwich spread.  I don't remember if I tortured my siblings with that item or not.  But I knew that artistically slices of tongue would go unconsumed. Bon appetite.

Woke up this morning completely infuriated.

Factory

To dream that you are at a factory represents repetitious thinking and an old way of doing things. It is symbolic of predictability and unchanging habits. Alternatively, it signifies business, productivity, energy and bustling activity. You are a person that can get things done.

Dreaming of an abandoned or run-down factory means that you have broken from your routine or have escaped from a monotonous aspect of your life. You are leaving a meaningless past behind and are thinking for yourself. 

I woke up this morning.  I was angry in my dream, so angry I was thinking of trashing something. 

For some weird reason, I was working on a project in a rather dingy factory.  My immediate supervisor was from the continent of India.  Things had been moved away from my office and I demanded to know who had moved my stuff.  My supervisor had a long name with lots of D's and I's in it. I asked him sarcastically to spell the other guys name so I could find him.

I looked in my office at one time and it was piled high with boxes of tools, cleaning supplies, linens, appliances.  What is this!? They needed the space. 

Next time I looked all the items had been sorted, the fridge, washer and dryer were along one wall.  The linens and towels and stuff were neatly folded and stacked on the washer/dryer.  The desk was piled high with boxes of tools and the place had no room for me. 

I was furious.  How was I going to get my work done?  I began to think after a minute, why hadn't I been fired?  I was being so rude! Then I asked myself, you never get angry, you get busy.  So I began looking around for places to move this stuff and reclaim my office.  Then I realized that this was a dream and that I didn't have to deal with any of this nonsense.  What a relief!

So I woke up to NPR's Weekend Edition and a review of an all girl's play about soccer.  Bleahhhh.

The dream interpretation pretty closely hit the nail on the head.  I have settled into a predictable life.  While I no longer work, I do some small things around the house.  I no longer go downstairs to the basement.  Darling Man has taken over the laundry completely and does a wonderful job.  All I have to do is fold, hang and put away.  Yay me!!  My main tasks consist of morning exercises, breakfast, other small frequent meals but breakfast is usually the biggest meal of the day.  I can't do any hand sewing until this eye thing is cleared up, so I must resort to clothing that does not need buttons attached unless it is with a safety pin of some sort. I have to keep those covered up because my lap kitty, Charlie, will chew on buttons and anything SHINY.  I wash dishes and sweep and mop the floor. note NONE of this is on a regular basis, y'see.

I recently watched a Facebook post about the Japanese method to avoid laziness.  Basically, if you can do something for one minute, that's right 60 seconds, you cannot call yourself lazy.  AND there was no preaching about incremental minute increase.  Hmmm. well I can say that I have worked my way up to 30 seconds.  Hah! Take THAT!

I do after all have Pilgrim ancestors fresh from 1600's Holland by way of England  looking for the chance to practice conservative religion and encourage the work ethic.  Oy!

The Grinder and holiday prep sort of.

Pick the grinder you remember Mom used.  I believe Grandma Horn owned it one time so that makes it 19th centure for sure.  Every year I listen to Susan Stamberg long time NRP coorespondent recite her Mama Stambergs cranberry relish recipe.  Last year when her granddaughter was eight years old it was delightful to listen to.  The ingredients for her recipe is fresh whole cranberries, one small whole onion, 1 cup sugar, 8 ounces sour cream and two tablespoons of fresh horse radish.  Put in freezer until needed.  Now the Virginia version is as follows.  The recipe was based on a jello salad recipe that originally called for lemon jello. The morphed over the years to black cherry, it went well with the orange and cranberries.  The grinder had to be fastened to the large bread board because it would not fit on any of the counter tops.  Therefore one member of the family had to sit on the breadboard to keep it from moving whilst force was being exerted.  God help anyone who wiggled even the least little bit.  Also a chair had to be placed beneath the grinder to hold a bowl to catch the juice from the orange and cranberrys because the grinder was not water tight.  Grind up the cranberries, quarter and grind the orange skin and all.  This was allowed to drain and then put in a bowl where two cups of sugar were added and the whole thing macerated for at least one hour.  The juice that was captured in the bowel on the chair was measured and brought to boil with the water recommened to cook the Jello.  The celery was sliced and diced small.  The walnuts were chopped once everthing had macerated and jello partially set, everything was combined into one big bowl and cooled in the fridge.  Over the years the BAG of fresh cranberries has shrunk from 16 ounces to the point where you may want to put in another bag for the recipe.  My meat grinder was retired long ago in favor of a very brief whirl in the blender.  Don't over blend, that gets gloppy and disgusting.

And while were are The Grinder, the only other time I remember Mom using it was for sandwich spread.  I came home from school one day and there was something very large and gray lying on a dinner plate. 

What is THAT!?

Tongue. 

Oh, Dad had purchased a yearling calf and had it butchered.  Mom decided to try her hand at organ meat.  Now I remember years ago that Grandma Horn made Head Cheese from the head of a big old pig.  I remember it tasting a little salty and pepper but not much else.  But TONGUE! It looked disgusting.  So it disappeared and turned up made into sandwich spread, mixed with chopped onion, dill pickle and Mayo.  We ate it up like hungry little heathens and the Berglund kids consumed organ meat, largely unknown to them.  I never did mention it to my younger brother or sisters.

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