Peony Moss: August 2006 Archives

I finally tried Julie D.'s recipe for Thick and Chewy Chocolate Cookie Bars. The verdict? They really are all that. This is going to be a go-to recipe for me.

Where does the time go? Hambet, who was not even two when this blog started, is headed off to kindergarten next Monday!

We've been getting ready slowly but steadily over the summer: new clothes, new shoes, picking up a few supplies here and there....

We started serious preparation this week by practicing the morning routine: laying out clothes the night before; getting up, dressed, fed, and out the door on time; and then actually making the drive to school. It's going well -- we've made it "on time" four out of four days this week. This morning Hambet was even up early and made his bed without complaining.

The one who's really dragging is Mommy! I'm so embarrassed, because I've been a lark all my life. Even in college, when I needed to cram I would go to bed early and then get up at four to study. When Posco and I were courting, he teased me mercilessly about how my eyelids started to droop at nine-fifteen, but what could I do? I was getting up at five-fifteen so I could start my shift at seven. And even after I quit bedside nursing, I still left the house by six so I could make daily Mass and still be at work by eight.

Things slowly changed when Hambet came along and the only thing I had to do by six-thirty was get the coffee started and make sure Posco had a shirt ready to go. Still in my robe at six-forty-five? No problem. I still got up reasonably early, but I had plenty of give in the morning.

But those days are over now, and I'm having a hard time getting back to my larkish ways. I've been trying to get up at six sharp and it just hasn't been happening.

Here's why. I like to read before I go to bed. Over the last week, I've been working on The Conservative Mind -- and wondering in despair exactly how much Burke I would have to read to even hope to comprehend even the first chapter.

So on Monday, when I received my very own copy of dear Mr Luse's The Last Good Woman, I tossed dear Mr Kirk's book on the ironing board for later. I figured I could read a chapter or two of the novel every night and probably finish it in a week.

It didn't quite work out that way. I opened the book and half an hour later, I was still reading. My husband finally asked me to turn out the light so he could sleep; I took the book and moved down to the kitchen, just to finish the chapter. Half an hour later I looked at the clock and thought, oh, I'd better get to bed. It was another hour before I finally made it.

Hambet dragged his sleepy Mommy out the door on time the next morning. That night, as I saw the book on the nightstand, I thought, no. No, I must wait and read tomorrow. And then I thought, well, maybe just five more minutes....

I made it to bed ninety minutes later, after I finished the book. (Disclaimer: I do read very quickly, especially when I realize I'm going to be reading something again.)

So the moral of the story: if you need to be up early the next day and need your sleep, and you know your will is weak, you may not want to make The Last Good Woman your designated bedtime book.

Make time during the day instead. You might want to block out a couple of hours.

I knew this was going to be a good read, but I wasn't prepared for its being such a good read in this way. The narrative is compelling, not in that plot-driven oh-no-what-happens-next! way, but in an I'm in the moment and following this thought and totally under the writer's spell way. In his book meme post, Bill mentioned Faulkner as an author he'd read more than once; as I read Bill's book, I wondered if I was hearing an echo of Faulkner in there, in the tapestry of thought and memory and association. (Of course, I could be totally wrong since I'm thinking of what I've been told about Faulkner. I've read only one book by Faulkner myself, and it wasn't one of the good ones.)

I heard a lot of Apologia in there as well: fatherhood and faith, daughters and wives, and the acute observation of how even the most trivial acts and encounters can be manifestations of the potential for goodness or even heroism -- or great depravity -- that lies within the hearts of even the most ordinary-seeming people. And beer. There's lots about beer.

So poor Dr Kirk's going to have to wait a while longer. I want to skim Bill's book again. And ever since I've finished the book, I've had the line Why do men not reck his rod? stuck in my head, and I don't think it's a coincidence, so I need to follow up on that. Then I might try some Faulkner. I should have some good reading time as I wait in the pick-up line at the end of the school day.

(And note to self: I need to get an old T-shirt, a box of gallon-sized zipper bags, and a towel ready for Monday.)

Nerd ABC cards: T is for transverse wave

We were making transverse waves with a Slinky and he was having a blast.

...blogroll Jen when we update our templates.

A nice post by Father Oakes on the First Things blog:

...within her own chosen sphere she has become, by almost universal consent, one of mankind’s greatest moral teachers. That we have so readily forgotten her lessons must surely have something to do with why the world is now in the state it is in.

He recommends this biography by Park Honan.* Dear Santa, I have been very good this year....

*and yes, the Mommies have finally succumbed and signed up with the Amazon affiliate program. Kids, shoes, food, bandwidth, etc.

If your five-year-old comes upstairs and says, "Mommy, there's smoke coming out of the computer," do not waste a minute trying to decide if he's crying wolf.

Yay! Bob the Ape has posted his book list, and it's a good one. I'm commenting over here 'cause his blog doesn't have comments and it's easier than coming up with a real post of my own.

6. One book that you wish had been written: What Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin were doing between 1804 (H.M.S. Surprise, #3 in the saga) and 1810 (The Mauritius Command, #4). A mysterious gap, and, I think, the primary reason (despite O'Brian's lame attempt to blame the Peace of Amiens) that 1813 lasted for 5 or 6 years later in the series.

True -- the Aubreyad is timeless in more than one sense. Maybe this volume could also have an appendix explaining how the children age at very different rates. George seems to stop aging completely (perhaps so Brigid could catch up, which is very gallant of him.)

7. One book that you wish had never been written: For a combination of solo global impact coupled with deliberate malice, I can't offhand think of anything worse than The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

BEST. ANSWER. EVER.

10. One book you should read: (Not quite clear if this means a book I should read, or a book one should read, that I recommend)....

Ooops! I took that question as "a book one should read." So, to clarify my own answers,

10. One book you should read: I think that if you haven't read The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis, you really need to quit reading this blog and go read that book instead.

I should read Fire Within, by Fr. Dubay.

And a bonus answer: I asked my husband what book he thought I should read, and his answer is The Conservative Mind.

From today's WaPo (registration)

When I [Gene Weingargen] heard that the new poet laureate of the United States was to be Donald Hall, the New Hampshire literary eminence, I was elated. The media accounts rightfully praised the beauty and sophistication of Hall's verse. But that's not why I was happy. I was happy because I knew something most in the media didn't.

The respectable Donald Hall at times has been a joyful practitioner of some of the lowest, least dignified, raunchiest forms of poetry. In short, he's my kind of guy! He's done limericks, and he is a fan of the infinitely silly but challenging "Higgledy piggledies," also known as double dactyls.

So Weingarten faxes him his own double-dactyl tribute:

Higgledy piggledy Donald Hall, Laureate! News of it rains in an Imperfect storm, Tragicomedically Failing to mention his Seminal work in this Sorry-ass form.

... by dear Mr Luse.

1. One book that changed your life: An old paperback I picked up for seventy-five cents at a used bookstore in Baltimore: The Man Who Was Chesterton, an old Image anthology. And before that, Poetic Meter and Poetic Form, by Paul Fussell.

2. One book that you've read more than once: Look Inside Cross-Sections: Trains, by Michael Johnstone. I've read this one way more than once.

3. One book you'd want on a desert island: Dear Mr Luse asks, Who would want just one book on an island? You'd want a library, wouldn't you? I would. And I think Mark Windsor has the right idea: I'd want the Aubreyad, in 21 volumes.

4. One book that made you laugh: Most recently? H.W. Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage (that "elegant variation" entry really brings the funny).

5. One book that made you cry: The Clown of God by Tomie DePaola. Gets me every time.

6. One book that you wish had been written: How to Work All Those Colors in the Needlepoint Christmas Stocking Kit You Bought Last Year and Never Finished.

7. One book that you wish had never been written: Confessions, by Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

8. One book you're currently reading: The Temperament God Gave You, by Art and Laraine Bennett.

9. One book you've been meaning to read: The Conservative Mind, by Russell Kirk.

10. [Not on the original list, but added by dear Mr Luse] One book you should read: The Abolition of Man, by C.S. Lewis.

Tag: Pansy, Bob the Ape, and Miss Rosey-Posey Moss (who can post her answers in a comment box).