Scout Moves

I popped in for a visit with Ms Mac this morning and discovered a delightful recording of her voice and a discussion of accents. So, here is a recording of my voice demonstrating my own accent. As I was speaking, answering the three questions posed by Ms Mac, I was sure I do not have an accent, but as I listen, I apparently do. I just don't know how to describe it. (I used studio.odeo.com to create this). powered by ODEO

I shouldn't have cheated and used the second book on the shelf. If I had chosen my grandmother's school book, which is entitled Modern English Book One copyright 1906 (not mathematics as I had thought), my stolen post would have read as follows: "II. A Window Garden.—Have you seen the tiny window gardens that city boys and girls, who love to see "green things growing," make for themselves? Have you such a garden in your schoolroom? Describe a window garden you have seen. Tell—Where you saw it; what it was made of; what grew in it; how it made the room seem indoors; how it looked out of doors; who took care of it, if you know." My grandmother grew up in rural Alabama, so her school book has a Southern Literature supplement in the back with poetry to memorize and various exercises. One hundred years later, the English literature book my 16-year-old daughter studies from includes one of the same poems--The Song of the Chattahoochee by Sidney Lanier.

I was just visiting Somewhat Refined , a site I enjoy, and I will now steal her post, which she stole from someone else, who probably stole it from someone before that. You know how that kind of pilfering goes on. Anyway, here are the rules: 1. grab the nearest book. no cheating! the nearest book. 2. open the book to page 123. 3. find the fifth sentence 4. post the text of the next four sentences on your blog, along with these instructions. 5. don't you dare dig for a cool or intellectual book on your shelf. pick out whatever is closest! I'll confess here that I skipped my grandmother's fourth-grade mathematics book. The reading I will post, then, is the second nearest book--The Portable Oscar Wilde, a 1946 Viking Press edition (Dive, you would be appalled. The binding has come loose, and I'm not doing a thing about it.) This excerpt is from The Critic as Artist. "I am very fond of the work of many of the Impressionist painters of Paris and London. Subtlety and di...

After a couple of years, we moved out of the cute nursing home apartment and bought a house in Wanaque, NJ, an unpleasant little town not too far from the New York state line, a part of New York that is a bit like a scene from Deliverance. This house was never home--it was merely a tool to build equity and move on to something less...let's say...rocky. I use the word "rocky" because it was built on solid rock, which meant you couldn't plant a tree or a bush or even a petunia, the ground was so hard. The rock face of a small mountain was just across the street, which acted as a sounding board for the neighbors' vicious fights. The sound of screaming and smashing furniture bounced off of the rock face and right into my living room. More than once I had my hand on the phone to call the police just as a patrol car would pull up to diffuse the situation. It was also "rocky" because we bought the house with a friend who lived in the basement--like a mother-dau...

Last night, my family discussed the meaning of "home." Is it where ever your family is? Is it defined by your greater sense of connection to your community? Is it the house where you live that provides a sense of emotional shelter beyond the actual roof and walls? It's probably a combination of all of these. Some of us develop ties to a town and envision spending the rest of our lives in one spot--the "home is where the heart is" types. And some of us keep those strings loosely tied so we can come and go more easily (the "home is where you hang your hat" types). When you're with your family, you can blend the two types, I suppose. When my husband and I first married, we moved from our parents' homes in the Midwest to our own place in New Jersey. We rented the upstairs half of an old house in Ridgewood. It was owned by a nursing home that rented the first floor to an older woman who needed assistance but wasn't quite ready for the home. It w...

You Are A Fig Tree You are very independent and strong minded.A hard worker when you want to be, you play hard too.You are honest and loyal. You hate contradiction or arguments.You love life, and you live for your friends, children, and animals.A great sense of humor, artistic talent, and intelligence are all gifts you possess. What's" Your Celtic Horoscope?

Your Language Arts Grade: 100% Way to go! You know not to trust the MS Grammar Check and you know "no" from "know." Now, go forth and spread the good word (or at least, the proper use of apostrophes). Are You Gooder at Grammar? Make a Quiz

In honor of Mark Twain's birthday, which is today, here are a few of his quotes with editorials. "All generalizations are false, including this one." So, then...some generalizations are true? Which ones? Yesterday, Rich wrote about how women talk more than men, and studies have shown this to be true, if you believe in generalizations. I know a man who just won't shut up. You greet him in the morning with a simple hello, and somewhere around 2:30 in the afternoon, he finally stops with his continuous string of blabber. Oddly, much of what he says is mindless generalization. He's always nice enough to nudge your shoulder to wake you up because you have once again fallen asleep to the lullaby of his chatter. "Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society." I don't remember why, but during our Thanksgiving dinner, someone mentioned Lady Godiva--it may have been after someone mentioned how much they like Godiva chocolate. No on...

Read in my local paper this morning: Don Keating of the Eastern Ohio Bigfoot Investigation Center is asking deer hunters to be on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary. Specifically, anything 6- to 9-feet tall, bipedal and covered with dark hair. More specifically – Sasquatch, better known as Bigfoot. Keating is hoping that deer hunters somewhere in Ohio spot the elusive Bigfoot and report it to him but urges them to not shoot if they spot it.

What Kind of Reader Are You? Your Result: Literate Good Citizen You read to inform or entertain yourself, but you're not nerdy about it. You've read most major classics (in school) and you have a favorite genre or two. Dedicated Reader Book Snob Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm Fad Reader Non-Reader What Kind of Reader Are You? Create Your Own Quiz

My daughters used to play a game they devised called This. To play This, one person writes the names of locations around the house on scraps of paper and then places them--a scrap that reads Back of Toilet is placed behind the couch, for example, and then on the back of the toilet, the person places another scrap that might read Piano Bench. On the piano bench goes another scrap, and so on and so on. The other player is handed the first scrap that begins the hunt--the player follows the trail around and around, and at the end is a prize of some kind. They would sometimes play This at our business on Saturday when the place was empty. The scraps would read with the names of the employees and would lead from office to office to office. And the prize would be candy from the vending machine downstairs. When you want to the play the game, you say, "hey, you wanna play This?" Sometimes, real life seems like a rambling goose-chasing game of This, and you run from scrap to scrap foll...

This is a short story written by my daughter just this year. As a word of explanation, she is an adult but was able to take the voice of a child, thus the lack of capitalization and punctuation. I offer this explanation only because you don't know her or me really (this is NOT autobiographical). it was raining outside and since you were downstairs watching your soap opera i went into your room. i lay on your unmade bed and ran my hand across the sheets, which must have been clean once. i stared at the carpet for a long time. i looked at your old dresser, the mirror was cracked. and on the dresser there was a hairbrush full of your blonde hair, a picture of me and a picture of daddy, and a glass angel that your mama gave you and she said you were her angel. you were going to the grocery store and i wanted to come with you. i wanted to watch you pick up apples and put them back if they were bruised because you knew i wouldn't eat them. i wanted to hear the tone of your voice when...

Say it! Say it! Say "I lost the nest-egg." Go on, say it! Albert Brooks wrote, directed, and starred in Lost In America, an often overlooked comedy that also stars Julie Haggerty. It's the story of an advertising executive who does not get the promotion he believes he has been groomed for and is sure he deserves. He is so disillusioned that he quits his job completely and convinces his wife to quit her job as well. They sell their home and all of their possessions, buy a Winnebago, and set out to explore America--free spirits, no ties, no worries. They have a nest egg. Their first stop is Las Vegas where they plan to renew their vows, but during their first night, Julie Haggerty's character discovers the intoxicating lure of gambling. While under its spell, she loses the nest egg, all but a few hundred dollars anyway. So, there they are--no home, no jobs, no free spirit. Brooks delivers his best ad-agency sales pitch for the casino owner to convince him to return the ...

This was a film created by my niece and her husband (Michelle and Erik). I just thought I'd post it here because it's brilliant, and they're brilliant, and I enjoyed their company at Thanksgiving.

2 cups flour 1/2 cup brown sugar 3/4 cup butter 6 Tablespoons cocoa 2 Tablespoons vegetable oil 2 Tablespoons butter 2 cups powdered sugar Water Mix flour, brown sugar, and 3/4 cup butter until crumbly. Spread evenly on a baking sheet to form the crust, and bake at 325 F for 20 minutes. Mix remaining ingredients until smooth and spread over hot crust. Cool and cut into squares.

I have run out of postable paintings and old stories, which came in handy while I was away for Thanksgiving. But now that I am easing back into a weekday routine, I'm left with having to write about something new. The problem is, I don't want to write about something new. I want to write about something old, something with tradition and roots and with strings attached. My husband, daughters, and I spend Thanksgiving with my in-laws in Illinois every year. It's a tradition. College students travel hundreds of miles for this event even if their parents can't make it (the large family is scattered all over the country and even into Brazil). This year we had twenty-four people for dinner and another day of just being together. One of the few old family traditions is Short Bread Squares, simple layers of shortbread topped with melted chocolate. Beyond that, there aren't many dishes or activities the family continues through the generations. This is not a sentimental bunc...

My Grandfather's Shed-- the tree is juvenile, but the one below is slightly better. Pretty Tree (I'm being facetious)

As with yesterday's post: A very slight story I wrote a year or two ago, but I thought it would be appropriate for Thanksgiving. Tomorrow, look for another installment in The Gallery. In 1952, the South was officially segregated, baby boomers were being born, and Elvis was a junior in high school. No one had heard of the British Invasion, touch-tone phones, VCRs, CD players, or space shuttles. In 1952, the Canton Summer Band was performing in parks during the summer, and a group of young men, men who were school children during World War II, joined to play their clarinets and trumpets. Fifty years later, when the current Canton Summer Band was assembled on a basketball court in Price Park, the concert announcer said between numbers, “I’d like to know how many of you have been in this band for more than ten years. Please stand up.” A large number of people stood, and the audience applauded. “Remain standing if you’ve been in longer than twenty years. . .Thirty years. . .Forty years...

A very slight story I wrote a year or two ago, but I thought it would be appropriate for Thanksgiving. Payday was the first and the fifteenth of each month when I worked the counter at Burger Chef—ruled the counter, reigned as queen of the counter—in my brown double-knit tunic with orange stripes down the sides. I saved most of my income for college, but I set $10 or $15 aside every other week to buy old books at the Train Depot, a quaint store in town that occupied the old train station. At the back of the store was a small book room with dusty copies of Shakespeare and Hardy and boy scout manuals. I was a regular. One week, the day after payday, I was considering the books I had spotted the payday before, but I changed course with a new idea. Instead of books, this time I would buy a wooden soprano recorder. I’m not sure where I got the idea for such a purchase, but I knew I wanted it more than a 1946 copy of Jane Eyre . My mother and I had to drive all the way to Michigan City to fi...

Lighthouse Even while traveling...I...will...not...miss...a day. For those who missed the initiation of The Gallery, these are little painting exercises that are a result of my attempt to learn water color.