I Wanna Play Too!

Katrina over at Callapidder Days has announced the spring challenge from March 21 to June 21, with the snappy and highly appropriate name of Spring Reading Thing 2007! But in my own little world, I like to think of it as "Tackle the Mountain 2007." Working for a publisher has ensured my neverending supply of books that threaten to topple my bookshelves.

So here's my target list which is bound to grow, since I'm going to another booksale on April 14.
(in no particular order)

1. The Birth House by Ami McKay
2. The Keep by Jennifer Egan
3. The Good Guy by Dean Koontz
4. The World Below by Sue Miller
5. The Wreckage by Michael Crummey
6. The End of the Alphabet by CS Richardson

Is anyone else creeped out by the fact that every book on my list starts with "The?"

*shudder*

On with the reading!

What Books May Come

Critical Mass asks, "What Are You Looking Forward to Reading This Spring?"

Well, I'll tell ya.

1. The Good Guy by Dean Koontz (Bantam, May) I've been a big fan of Dean Koontz since high school. My collection of dog-eared mass markets and hardcovers spill off the shelves in my basement. In my humble opinion, I went through a rough spell starting with From the Corner of His Eye through By the Light of the Moon. But with Life Expectancy, he had snagged me again, and whenever a new one comes out, I simply devour it. This new one promises a thrilling ride, as Timothy Carrier attempts to save a woman's life, but in doing so, implicates himself as the one who's hiring her killer.

2. On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan (Knopf Canada, April) Atonement was an amazing read. Someone swiped my copy of Saturday, but it's also been on my wish list for a while. But read the exerpt of this new one (pdf), and tell me you don't want more.

3. Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult (Atria, March) This is the book that people have been saying has the Columbine-type plot with school violence. I've read 1.5 books by Picoult (The Pact, and I'm almost done with Salem Falls), and both have captured the young and tortured souls of teenaged angst extremely well. She's good at the love story, and great with the courtroom scenes that don't get the snooze award like some others. Check out this excerpt.

4. Everything I needed to Know About Being a Girl I Learned from Judy Blume by 24 notable female authors (Pocket, June) Seriously, I don't know a girl out there who hasn't read a Judy Blume novel and learned a thing or two. I remember passing around a copy of Wifey with my junior high girlfriends and giggling about all the smutty parts. God love ya, Judy Blume.

Long Time Gone

So I feel the need to explain my blogginess. Er, my blogessence. Um. Whatever.

I started a blog way back in 2002. I called it The Old Curiosity Shop, and this was my very first post:

7.17.2002
Curiosity is not just for cats. I read to learn. I read to feel. I read because I'm curious about the world and about people. I love to share my favorite books and poems with people. That's just what this is. The Old Curiosity Shop of Literature.

Somewhere along the way, I lost track of that mission. I went strong for a good solid year, I think, and then the posts started coming few and far between. I think I figured out a reason for it.

I'm a perfectionist (like so many others who say they're a perfectionist when asked what their negative qualities are) and I can't seem to continually produce what I intend to be high-quality posts on a regular basis.

How can I get over that? Well...I can start writing rambly posts like this one until I figure out what the heck I'm trying to say.

I've always believed that good writing is an art that is well practiced.

And boy, have I been out of practice.

But now I feel that urge again...to write...to discover...to share the things I know. It's a pretty profound feeling. I hope it sticks around.

Eggs Benny on a Sunday: Books & Brunch

This morning I hopped into my little silver Civic and tootled on downtown to the King Eddie hotel for Books & Brunch. A little eggs benedict, some adorable conversation with the senior citizens at my table, and some great talks from the following authors:

The Honourable James Bartleman started the program off with an inspiring talk about his new book,
Raisin Wine, which naturally led to his literacy efforts for Aboriginal children in Canada. He has established some amazing initiatives, including an annual book drive which has sent over a million books to reserves in an effort to build libraries and ensure that every aboriginal child has a book to call their own. This is a program that gets right to the core of my heart because books had a profound effect on me as a child (as they did for His Honour -- they changed his life completely, going from a poor kid in Port Carling to the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario. I'd say they had an effect!). I encourage you to read more about the wonderful literacy initiatives, and get involved however you can! And, I also encourage you to read the author Q&A about his book. And then go buy the book at your favourite local bookstore. It's a delightfully devourable read.

Next up was the lovely Kyo Maclear, whose book The Letter Opener is about a woman who works in the Undeliverable Mail Office, and one day discovers that her co-worker has gone missing. Maclear began her talk by reminding us that there actually is a LOT of lost mail out there...some of it with your very own name on it likely sitting in a lost mail bin somewhere out there. Do you ever wonder what's been lost of yours? Letter from an old friend? Bills that never showed up (hoorah!)? How many birthday gifts have gone missing? What a wondrous treasure trove that Undeliverable Mail Office must be!

Guy Gavriel Kay spoke about the way each of our individual pasts have an effect on our reaction to and interaction with a book can have. That's part of the conversation between the author and the reader. If you've just had a terrible argument with a friend, then your interpretation of a book you're reading will be different than when you are having a brilliantly good day. And Kay wants to be the kind of author that keeps you up until three in the morning, even if you have a meeting at 8:00, or have to get the kids off to school, or whatever. He wants you to not be able to put that book down...to not end that conversation between author and reader because you just can't wait to see how it all ends. Will his latest book Ysabel do that for you?

Last but by no means least, Sally Armstrong described her excitement for researching her book, The Nine Lives of Charlotte Taylor, about her great-great-great-grandmother. It sounds like a fascinating story. And because I don't feel like paraphrasing, here's the book description:

In 1775, twenty-year-old Charlotte Taylor fled her English country house with her lover, the family’s black butler. To escape the fury of her father, they boarded a ship for the West Indies, but ten days after reaching shore, Charlotte’s lover died of yellow fever, leaving her alone and pregnant in Jamaica.

Undaunted, Charlotte swiftly made an alliance with a British naval commodore, who plied a trading route between the islands and British North America, and travelled north with him. She landed at the Baie de Chaleur, in what is present-day New Brunswick, where she found refuge with the Mi’kmaq and birthed her baby. In the sixty-six years that followed, she would have three husbands, nine more children and a lifelong relationship with an aboriginal man.

Charlotte Taylor lived in the front row of history, walking the same paths as the expelled Acadians, the privateers of the British-American War and the newly arriving Loyalists. In a rough and beautiful landscape, she struggled to clear and claim land, and battled the devastating epidemics that stalked her growing family. Using a seamless blend of fact and fiction, Charlotte Taylor’s great-great-great-granddaughter, Sally Armstrong, reclaims the life of a dauntless and unusual woman and delivers living history with all the drama and sweep of a novel.

No, it's not the Bass-O-Matic 76, it's the HydraCoach!

For those of us who are mathematically challenged in keeping track of our water intake, it's the new HydraCoach Intelligent Water Bottle! Gotta love their catch line too: "It Thinks While You Drink." Ha!

So apparently this handy little contraption will set a Personal Hydration Goal for you, and will monitor your daily intake. It even calculates your average consumption, the time left you have in the day to meet your goal, and yes, even the "Sip Tracker" tells you the "amount and percentage of fluid consumed relative to your Personal Hydration Goal."

Whew!

All this for a mere $30 purchase. Who knew drinking water could be so complex?

How do you solve a problem like ice on the CN Tower?

Ice Closes Gardiner

This week in Toronto, a major section of the Gardiner Expressway was closed due to the threat of falling sheets of ice the size of dinner tables from the side of the CN Tower.

The size of DINNER TABLES. Yikes.

Well, this little conundrum made my commuting hours hellish. As any Torontonian knows, whenever something happens on the Gardiner/QEW, you get gridlocked traffic trying to get out of the city which makes for lots and lots of cranky motorists.

Me included. CRANKY-pants! My commute home on Monday afternoon took over 2 hours, when it shouldhave taken 1. Grumble grumble.

But the good news is, the highway has reopened -- for now. The sheet of ice is still clinging for dear life on the tower, and officials have no idea how to get it down safely.

Enter the brilliant Canadian public:
"Ask the Maple Leafs to play on it. Maybe they'll actually win a game."
- Wilson Chung, Mississauga

(ouch...hey, they DID win last night!)

"Put a bunch of politicians in the 360 Restaurant. All the hot air generated is sure to melt the ice."
- Trevor Dzoutzidis, Toronto

"Where is Spiderman when we really need him?"
- R. Swift, Point Edward

"Have them re-route the cast of Amazing Race All-Stars to the base of the CN Tower. Give each team a soup spoon and tell them the last one to remove their section of ice is eliminated. Those guys will do anything."
- Bryant St., Toronto

"Lower a large speaker from above and acoustically blast it off. I'm thinking Celine Dion. She can hit the high notes and that way she could use her voice for good instead of evil."
- Tom MacMillan, Brockville

Sheer silliness! :)

Why don't they do my idea? Get a helicopter up there with a really big broom hanging from it, and smack that tower around a little bit? That'll teach it!

Deconstructing the Twinkie: Or, Thou Shalt Not Eat the Pudding.

There's a brand-spankin' new book coming out on Thursday called Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated Into What America Eats by Steve Ettinger.

Here is an interesting review in Newsweek, which describes one ingredient in the Twinkie as "food-grade plaster of Paris."

Eek. I grew up on those things!

No wonder it's easy for us to be unhealthy and overweight. Food companies are coming up with these wonderfully tasty treats that have absolutely NO nutritional value whatsoever. And we've learned (over time) that these "foods" are making our lives easier because they're fast to prepare, and easy to carry around with us.

Fast forward to my desk at lunchtime today...

I happily chomped down my fat free chicken sandwich (complete with honey mustard, sans mayo) and then considered my next option. I had a lovely clementine rolling around in my lunch sack...right next to...a little plastic cup of heaven: a Jell-o Fat Free Chocolate Pudding Cup!

Ohhhh boy. Well I wasn't terribly hungry, having just gobbled my sandwich, so I decided to choose one or the other to finish off my lunch.

Clementine?

Pudding?

Guess which won. Yah. You got it. The tiny cup of goodness...100 calories of God knows what that gave me nothing valuable in return other than a 1 minute full of chocolatey bliss.

I should have picked the clementine.

But tell me, what would you have done?? Honestly! I felt like I'd broken a commandment afterwards.