Christmas is over and a new year is about to begin. About this time (December 31) I usually start gathering up the Christmas decorations. I try to put them all in one place as much as possible in preparation for returning them to storage. As I look at our Christmas tree and other decorations, I see a collection of memories more than anything else. Christmas Past I look in holiday magazines and see perfectly trimmed, color-coordinated, Christmas trees. Growing up, we never had that type of tree. We always had a real, needle dropping, dry but green tree decorated with various ornaments collected by…
Year: 2019
Song and Memory – “We’ll Sing in the Sunshine”
A 1964 chart topping hit song written and performed by Gale Garnett. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1w9gb9ZEvMs) I don’t remember if I ever heard this song on the radio. Like on the classic station, or oldies, or 60s station on Sirius XM radio. Maybe the 60s station plays it, but I rarely listen to that one. The time I remember hearing it the most is when I was in 6th grade (1973-74). I played the 45 record on a little cream and red-colored record player that I had in the basement of our home on Belford Ave in Grand Junction, Colorado. Grand Junction We had lived in the same…
Guest Review – Fiction Recommendation
We have a guest review of the book this month. I read the book in October 2018, but the reviewer read it more recently. Enjoy! Book Title: Where’d You Go, Bernadette Author: Maria Semple Publication Date: 2012 Publisher: Little, Brown and Company My interest in this book: The book was not on my radar until I received a copy in the mail a few years ago. It sat on my shelf for awhile. Guest review: My friend and former colleague, Katie Stueart, wrote the following book review. She agreed to let me include the review as part of this blog post. Thank you, Katie!!…
Best-Laid Plans of Mice and Men Often Go Awry
The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry. Meaning, “No matter how carefully a project is planned, something may still go wrong with it. The saying is adapted from a line in ‘To a Mouse,’ by Robert Burns: ‘The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men / Gang aft a-gley’” **(www.dictionary.com) I know it is cliche, but hey, once in awhile it works. State of Mind I received some news August 20th and 27th that weighed heavy on my heart, but I knew I had to put it aside for awhile. Preparations needed to be made for our upcoming vacation and dealing with…
Fiction Recommendation – August
I am a fan of both fiction and nonfiction. Maybe I was a little ambitious last month, however, in thinking I could completely read and post about two books (one fiction and one nonfiction) each month. Part of my problem is that I tend to read more than one book at a time (why do I do that? I’ll save that for another post) and then not get any one of them finished within a good time frame. As you can see in the sidebar under my “Goodreads” feed, I have two good ones going right now (and finished Beartown just before leaving for vacation…