Pick-n-Mix

I'd wish you a happy weekend, but I think it's a little late for that. So instead, a wish for a good rest-of-weekend, and a potluck of other stuff:

• I took Miss B, whose scooter is still down for the count, for more groceries on Friday, and while much more sugar was bought, I did discover two more things thanks to some extremely subtle questioning, firstly that she has Meals on Wheels delivered to her, and secondly that she does occasionally eat vegetables and savory foods.



• This weekend I'm wistfully remembering a favorite book from my childhood, a discarded library book donated to our cause by our librarian grandmother. This grandmother introduced us to books that we still think and talk about fondly decades later; she's responsible for the indelible impressions that Frances the Badger and Amelia Bedelia and the Funny Little Woman and Sara Crewe made on me, among many others. But today's trip down memory lane was about Santa: specifically Father Christmas, a Cockney Father Christmas, a Cockney Father Christmas who is so exhausted by his labors that he runs away from the North Pole for a beach holiday, told in comic-book form. I so wish I could remember the name or the author of this one, but I can't. Does anyone besides me remember it?



• Are you one of those people who'd go camping if only electricity and, like, artful candle arrangements were included with the tent, and if only the campsite rates were as expensive as a big-city luxury hotel room? Well, if you are, then you may be interested in the Tent City at The Encampment at Bull Creek at the Resort at Paws Up. I myself cannot decide whether I'm down with this or not, but those candle arrangements are artful, are they not?



• Mmmm, watermelon owl.



• Sadly, this article in the onion might just as well be serious journalism. In fact, I remember reading stories like this all the goddamned time when I lived in Louisiana. (In a related story, I remember a time when a drunk LSU frat boy -- the fucker -- attempted to drag one of the university's ostriches over a fence by the neck and killed it.) Therefore, this story really only pissed me off, or at least made me glad that the alligators can defend their turf pretty well. Better than ostriches.



• My mother boycotted Mother's Day this year; she hasn't quite recovered from my grandmother's death last summer, and she and my father disappeared into the NC mountains for the weekend. And so I spent today eyeing her present of frivolous gardening implements, if you can call them implements, and wondering if I'm going to be allowed to give them to her, or if I should send them back. I am holding on and waiting a few days before making my final decision.



• There are better days ahead, though, I think, because in a sort of circle-of-life literary moment, my brother and his wife will be providing my parents with a grandchild come Christmas. This is the first in our little, late-blooming family, and we are all very excited.

eta: One of the great secrets of my life is that I am always absurdly touched by e-cards sent me. Thanks for yours, Veni--love it! :D:D:D:D:D:D