I have been on a tear--Gini loaned me two books and I read them both in a couple days which is highly unsual. And then and then...will add more as I have them to add. I have also been blasting through books on tape. Can't seem to get enough.
In no particular order...
Crashing Through. Robert Kurson. The true story of a guy who gets his eyesight back after over 40 years.
Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen. Charming book about a circus.
The Road, Cormac McCarthy. Grim fascinating depressing quick read, did I mention grim?
On Beauty, Zadie Smith. Good writing, quirky families. Story set on a college campus.
Eat Pray Love, Elizabeth Gilbert. Several people recommended this and it is wonderful. Particularly good for women of a certain age--anything over 30 for instance. Five star recommendation.
Alec Delaware mystery (any), Jonathan Kellerman. He's hunky. (Delaware, that is--don't care much about Kellerman, frankly)
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Jonathan Safran Foer. Wonderfully written story of a kid dealing with a post 9/11 world.
Final Exam, Pauline Chen. My brother David recommended this. It contains insight into end of life through the eyes of a surgeon. Tough but interesting. Not exactly beach reading.
Prep, Curtis Sittenfeld. The novel follows a young woman from Indiana to a prep school in the NE. Charming painful reminder of high school, even if i didn't go to a prep school in the NE.
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
I couldn't resist
Here's the boy, Senor Baru Bear, last month. I swear his head is getting bigger. My neighbor said that happens to a lot of us. He, the dog not the neighbor, has since dismembered the stuffed pal his head is resting on.
Monday, July 2, 2007
How it can take someone 30 hours to go from San Francisco to SWFL by air
Thurs June 28
• Leave Fitch house 8:15 am PT
• Arr SFO 9:15 am PT (did the Fisherman’s Wharf/Union Sq tour on Super Shuttle)
• 10:45 flight delayed to 3:15 pm PT(stood in line for TWO hours at customer service to re-schedule ORD-RSW which was brilliant b/c waiting til ORD, all flights would have been booked)
• Arr ORD (O’Hare) 9:18 pm CT. Stand in line at customer service to waitlist on 6:31am flight to Charlotte (CLT?)
Attempt sleep 11:30-5 (those recordings about leaving your luggage unattended indeed go all flippin night)
Fri June 29
Got on Charlotte flight which miraculously left ON TIME (or I was so tired I didn’t notice)
Got on standby list for CLT – RSW, supposed to leave at 10:15 am ET, left at 2-ish (by this time, who cares)
Arr RSW 3:30 pm ET. Had to wait for all bags to come off to prove to the nice woman they hadn’t made the same flights I did.
Pick up Baru Bear the Big Dog. Arrive home around 5 pm ET. 29.75 hours later. I think
Sat June 30
6:45 am ET: phone rings--the nice man from the courier company is close by with one suitcase from US Airways (I flew United but was re-routed via US Airways ORD-CLT-RSW)
10 am: Woman with heavy accent calls from United in RSW. (I have to spell out the name of my street including "Box.") They have my other bag and it will be delivered between 11:30 and 3.
12:15 pm The nice man from the courier company calls, sounding a bit confused. "I have a bag from United for you--wasn't I just there with one from US Airways?"
Everything works out in the end. Now that wasn't so bad was it? I still wonder if the guy ahead of me in line ever got to Paris. Last I heard, he left SFO on Thursday and he expected to get to Frankfurt on Sunday, with no idea how he'd get to Paris where he started school on Monday. He said, "I feel like I am in the middle of what will some day be a great story."
• Leave Fitch house 8:15 am PT
• Arr SFO 9:15 am PT (did the Fisherman’s Wharf/Union Sq tour on Super Shuttle)
• 10:45 flight delayed to 3:15 pm PT(stood in line for TWO hours at customer service to re-schedule ORD-RSW which was brilliant b/c waiting til ORD, all flights would have been booked)
• Arr ORD (O’Hare) 9:18 pm CT. Stand in line at customer service to waitlist on 6:31am flight to Charlotte (CLT?)
Attempt sleep 11:30-5 (those recordings about leaving your luggage unattended indeed go all flippin night)
Fri June 29
Got on Charlotte flight which miraculously left ON TIME (or I was so tired I didn’t notice)
Got on standby list for CLT – RSW, supposed to leave at 10:15 am ET, left at 2-ish (by this time, who cares)
Arr RSW 3:30 pm ET. Had to wait for all bags to come off to prove to the nice woman they hadn’t made the same flights I did.
Pick up Baru Bear the Big Dog. Arrive home around 5 pm ET. 29.75 hours later. I think
Sat June 30
6:45 am ET: phone rings--the nice man from the courier company is close by with one suitcase from US Airways (I flew United but was re-routed via US Airways ORD-CLT-RSW)
10 am: Woman with heavy accent calls from United in RSW. (I have to spell out the name of my street including "Box.") They have my other bag and it will be delivered between 11:30 and 3.
12:15 pm The nice man from the courier company calls, sounding a bit confused. "I have a bag from United for you--wasn't I just there with one from US Airways?"
Everything works out in the end. Now that wasn't so bad was it? I still wonder if the guy ahead of me in line ever got to Paris. Last I heard, he left SFO on Thursday and he expected to get to Frankfurt on Sunday, with no idea how he'd get to Paris where he started school on Monday. He said, "I feel like I am in the middle of what will some day be a great story."
The Dirty Laundry Tour of Northern CA
Another successful tour of the Bay Area has come to a close. My annual journey to see as many friends as I can over two weeks was good fun. Again, just about everyone seemed to be in pretty good shape. Not bad. And again, I left behind a string of crumpled bed linens and damp towels. You are all good for allowing me to do that. Thanks!
I went from San Francisco to East Bay (Albany) to Santa Cruz to Aptos to Carmel to San Francisco to Marin to oh darn I probably missed a few. It was good to catch up and fun to see how easy it is to slip back in. I had fabulous weather while I was there and everything there remains pretty familiar. (One of the ongoing themes was passport issues. Since it was summer, friends were preparing for departure to exotic lands. Because of the new rules that one needs a passport to fly to Canada and Mexico, the passport offices are hugely backed up. I heard horror stories at several stops. Get your passports early--like six months or more!)
Our annual Angel Island picnic (#26) was once again a resounding success. The next generation is getting older--though the older generation (myself included) remain young and vibrant--and they seem to continue to embrace this tradition. Funny how satisfying that is! We camped two nights with a changing line up of campers. A good time was had by all. I already have it on my recently purchased itty-bitty 2008 calendar: Angel Island #27 will be on June 21, the Summer Solstice.
I went from San Francisco to East Bay (Albany) to Santa Cruz to Aptos to Carmel to San Francisco to Marin to oh darn I probably missed a few. It was good to catch up and fun to see how easy it is to slip back in. I had fabulous weather while I was there and everything there remains pretty familiar. (One of the ongoing themes was passport issues. Since it was summer, friends were preparing for departure to exotic lands. Because of the new rules that one needs a passport to fly to Canada and Mexico, the passport offices are hugely backed up. I heard horror stories at several stops. Get your passports early--like six months or more!)
Our annual Angel Island picnic (#26) was once again a resounding success. The next generation is getting older--though the older generation (myself included) remain young and vibrant--and they seem to continue to embrace this tradition. Funny how satisfying that is! We camped two nights with a changing line up of campers. A good time was had by all. I already have it on my recently purchased itty-bitty 2008 calendar: Angel Island #27 will be on June 21, the Summer Solstice.
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