I am not fond of alphabet books although there are several that I admire and even enjoy reading out loud.  I am not fond enough of cats to go out of my way to own one, although I have owned them in my time and certainly see the advantage. However….dum, dada, dum…(that’s supposed to be a drum roll) there is a series of picture books that combines these elements into an absolutely delightful 32 pages of giggles for all involved.  Meet Bad Kitty, the crankiest, hungriest, lovingest, badest cat to ever be wedged between the pages of a picture book.  The study hall kids and I have taken to reading these books aloud just to be able to make Bad Kitty sounds.  Bruel has transitioned Bad Kitty into the world of emergent readers with Bad Kitty Gets a Bath. With or without reading the picture books, the first chapter book is a wonderful transition into the world of independent reading but the adults involved might want to buy their own copy because the kids aren’t giving this one up.

Speaking of independent readers….Gerald and Piggie are at it again in Mo Willems I Am Going!  Piggie is going and Gerald, in typical fashion, jumps to the conclusion that disaster is imminent.  Even though this is not my favorite Gerald and Piggie book, it’s still funny and fun to read – especially out loud.  And for the Nervous Nellies (or Nelsons) in your house, this one is perfect.

And as long as we’re talking about books in a series, guess what?  The Magic School Bus is back and taking on the Climate Challenge!  I love these books.  There was time when I was younger and sillier – the latter is difficult to imagine, but there it is – that I dressed up as Miss Frizzle and did the outer space book on a bus with a bunch of school-aged children.  I was looking at the photographs of that event the other day and those little devils were enthralled!  The books work as an adventure in their own right and as an introduction to various scientific concepts and ideas.  P.S. The bus gets a make-over.  Don’t miss this one! 

And so it goes.

Yesterday was lovely!  Miss Sarah, child the second, is my thrift/antique/second hand shop partner in crime.  We had a lovely morning of grocery store and then putzing about to find other people’s treasures.  Both of us pine for the start of garage/yard/estate sale season but until then we are content with our usual haunts.  We added a new one – a newly formed co-op where items are priced to sell. When I moved I discovered that I am thoroughly enamored with depression glass and have been collecting pieces of various colors.  The red and pink are along the ledge in the living room; the amber lines the ledge in the kitchen and now I have begun the search for blue for the bathroom.  At the new shop I found three amber pieces – two in the sunflower pattern and one in some other pattern.  Those three pieces and a shelf for Miss Sarah were under $10 total.  We were thrilled.  We also stopped at Home Depot and I purchased the required garbage can for compost.  While at Home Depot, I purchased seeds and a rosemary plant.  I was quite vocal in the joy I was experiencing, so vocal in fact that Miss Sarah assured onlookers that whe was returning me to the hospital right after we left the store.  Everyone laughed, some a bit more tentatively than others.  Spreading joy and laughter = a good thing.  When we got home, Master Thomas, child the fourth, poked the holes in the sides and bottom of the trash, filled it with “rank vegetation” and moved it three times for a mother who couldn’t make up her mind.
This morning I cut back the aloe that was taking over the kitchen windowsill.  I will give the trimmings to a co-worker who makes a lovely salve with it.  I also planted the basil seeds for the windowsill herbs   Aloe, basil, rosemary and sunflower amber glass on the kitchen window that looks out onto a plot of earth waiting to be tilled and planted.  Ah!
And so it goes.

When I moved, I found my little home beind that of a dear friend.  She is in her 80s, funny and irreverent and one of the strongest women I know.  I built my little garden against the back of her garage and she was happy that it was more than a pile of dirt.  The handfuls of tomatoes I took to her throughout last summer were blessings in her dimming eyes.  We had tea and toast and laughed and laughed.  There were days that I put my head in her lap and sobbed and she is wise enough to be silent and let me cry.  But that is by way of introduction.  On Christmas Eve she got a notice from the Village Zoning Officials that the garage needed to be painted and that windows and shutters needed care as well.  It was cause for alarm and much laughter.  “Have those fools looked outside?  I might be old but I’m not senile.  Who the hell paints in this weather and on Christmas Eve?  I am calling them up and giving them a piece of my mind!”  And she did.  I was not there for that conversation but I am quite certain the Village Phone was too hot to touch by the time she firmly put the Village people in their place.  But now spring has come and the snows have melted and the notice returns.  “Take care of this by the end of April.”  So of course we will help – the kids and I but the puzzlement in it all is the note that there is “rank vegetation” around the garage.  What the hell are they talking about?  It couldn’t possibly be the tomato plants and sunflowers.  Even the Village People should know what those are.  Oh my God!  It’s the compost pile!  Of course those fools don’t know what compost is!  “Rank vegetation.”  Cripes!  So I am off today to get the makings for a homemade compost container.  It was all going to be under another load of top soil in a month but the container will have to be there for another batch of “rank vegetation” this winter.  Good grief!  Stupid Village People.
And so it goes.

I tried to read more slowly.  I did.  I didn’t want to finish it in one night because I knew there wouldn’t be any more of them.  I played on the web some – read his obituary and a handful of old articles that are reappearing now that he is in author heaven, sitting carelessy on a barstool, no tie, but a buttong down shirt open at the color.  He looks like Spenser and Spenser looks like him with a little of Robert Urich thrown in.  I couldn’t read slowly enough and finished it in one night because I couldn’t stop.  I just couldn’t stop.

Split Image is vintage Robert B. Parker.  Perfect pacing and enough unknowns to keeps the pages turning.  It’s a Jesse Stone novel with a Sunny Randall guest appearance.  It’s a perfect ending really, so perfect in fact, that I wonder if it would have been the final book if Parker had lived. 

Looking into what is out there that will published posthumously, it appears that there is another of his westerns arriving on shelves in May.  I’ve not read those.  The best news is that there are two Spenser novels locked in a vault that no one has made a decision about.  Hmmmm.  Who is writing fiction that can do for Robert B. Parker what Parker did for Raymond Chandler?  Harlan Coban maybe.  Or Dennis Lehane.  Hmmmmm.

I am listening to Bach.  Birds are singing.  The sun shines.  And I have a new Robert B. Parker novel swimming around my head.  Life is good.

And so it goes

Time moves
one day after the other.
Dawn comes
unbidden
but welcome.
I wish for
jacketless mornings
and longer walks.
Today
the birdsong
almost masks the sound
of the furnace
and crocuses bloom.
I’ll move the grasses
and plant flowers
and tomatoes.
Some day soon
I will smile and mean it.

Thing the First
The usual morning ritual and a double take at the thermometer.  Almost 60.  Yes, the pavement is wet but there was no rain as I walked outside.  Our morning walks have been getting longer.  Yesterday I saw the crocuses (croci?) peeking through the soil.  Jonquils and daffodils too.  We are all itching for the real thing, raking leaves off beds, shoveling the last of the snow piles flat so they melt quicker. Dinner brought the taste of fresh asparagus – a spring taste, an Easter taste, a rebirth taste.  And this morning brought the scent of skunk.  It might not be the same sense memory as the flavor of asparagus lightly steamed, but it is nonetheless, a scent of spring arriving.  Interestingly, with a wry smile, I am grateful for both.
Thing the Second
The film Precious arrived in the library yesterday.  Run, do not walk, to your local library and beg them to order it.  Tell them it is worth the budget dollars.  It is.  This is one of the most moving, important ensemble pieces I have seen in a very long time. Based on Sapphire’s novel Push, it is a story that deserves more than a 50 word synopsis.  Precious is a 16 year old girl, the mother of one child and pregnant with her second, both the children of her father.  Raped by her father, abused violently by her mother, Precious manages to hang on to hope and self, to dig deep and hang on.  Many of us work with the precious of the world.  All of us see them every day.  Sometimes we make quick judgements of how they got where they are – young, pregnant, seemingly unmotivated and lazy.  This film asks us to look deeper, see differently.  It has changed me as only brilliant work can. See it 
And so it goes.

I have always, ALWAYS, had a dog.  Usually I have had more than one.  Living on a farm there were a lot of strays.  People dropped them off or they appeared, lost, hungry, hurt, confused, and much to my mother’s chagrin, I took them in, fed them, loved them, kept them or found them homes.  As the children grew we had all manner of beasties – guinea pigs, hamsters, rats, lizards, cats, birds.  They have come and gone.  But always there has been a dog.  I am a an animal person.  Fins, fur, feathers – it all works for me. I understand the appeal of cats.  Believe me, on these winter mornings there would be something so appealing about a critter that had the common sense to use a litter box and not require a walk or twelve.  But in my heart of hearts, I am a dog person.  Dogs are so….so….present.  When I hurt my back several weeks ago, the concern and understanding Bonnie exhibited was heart-filling and tender.  She kept her distance, understood the pain, and frequently acted as a gently moving handrail that I used to get up and down.
I have become fascinated, my children would say obsessed, with The Dog Whisperer. I took the dvds home because I needed something to laugh at and wound up becoming one of his ardent fans. I love his gentle, quiet way, his humor.  Were I a teenager I would plaster poster of Cesar Millan all over my bedroom walls and ceiling.  It isn’t about, “Oh my goodness, he’s so HOT.”  He isn’t.  It’s the understanding he exhibits.  While I believe I have the perfect dog in Miss Bonnie, who has grown from a little ball of fluff to a sensitive, mature bitch, there are always some areas that can be more balanced.  I know the chasing bikes and things with wheels is my problem,, not hers.  I become tense when a bike wheels by, anticipating her herding/prey reaction.  She responds accordingly, barking and chasing and trying to put them in their place.  We will deal with that this spring and summer, whne the bikes and skateboards are out in force.  I have always wanted a dog to go biking with and I think, thanks to Millan, I have the skills to teach her now.  She no longer lunges at the vacuum, a source of serious aggravation in the past, but rather turns away, shrugs her shoulders, and goes back to sleep.  I managed to accomplish this without raising my voice or becoming frustrated.  Pretty cool, actually.  And I owe it all to the Dog Whisperer.  So does Bonnie.
And so it goes.