Saturday, February 21, 2009

This blog entry could very well be titled "stupid stuff that I care about...but nobody else does," but since it's my blog, I'm ok with that.

This month's book club pick is MINE!! and it's Gone With the Wind. My all-time-super-duper-absolutely-most-favoritist-book-ever-written pick. It was the first real book I read (I was 10). By the time I graduated high school I'd read it eleven times. My obsession started with the movie. I still love the movie, but the book! The book is so much more. To see the movie and not read the book is like eating cheesecake without caramel sauce. It's like visiting Paris without seeing the Louvre.

My devotion to GWTW has been profound. When I was leaving home for school, I took my GWTW movie poster with me. Seeing this my dad said, "I bet cha by the time your first child is born, Gone With the Wind won't be as important to you." I took the bet, but made it for only five bucks because, although I denied it at the time, in my heart I knew he was right.

Authoress Margaret Mitchell at the Reminton portable typewriter she used to write her book

Who Knew? Who Cares? ME!

Margaret Mitchell...

...took 10 years to write Gone With the Wind. She started in 1926, it was published in 1936

...was a journalist, which was considered a "man's profession" in the early part of the last century

... knowledge of the Civil War was based on the oral history she received from her mother, grandmother and Civil War veterans who were frequently invited to her Grandmother's home for Sunday dinner

... was 10 years old before she found out the South lost the Civil War

...kept her manuscript a secret, covering it with towels when friends stopped by. Sometimes friends sat on the novel (unknowingly) because the apartment she shared with her husband was so small

...named her heroine Pansy O'Hara originally

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Familyfest 2009
We have successfully survived another family reunion. Due to budget restraints, which we will blame on our new President, we all headed to a family cabin and lots of snow. Some of the highlights included: spinning out and getting good and stuck in said snow, internal bleeding, five BLUE stitches and plenty of shared viruses. There was gaming galore, excellent food and good conversation. We sledded, skied and parked our fanny’s in front of the theater screen to relax. Special thanks to Matt and Moo for fulfilling my life long dream of becoming Jon Bon Jovi, ala Rock Band (an experience which previously would have required a transgender operation, massive amounts of plastic surgery…and hair extensions). My rendition of Living on a Prayer caused alarm in my children and prompted my sister-in-law to ask, “Who is strangling a chicken??”
Family Birthday Party

Kissin' Cousins

Snow Time!

Oh what fun it is to ride...

Monday, February 9, 2009



Me and Dad 1969

How do I blog this?

My Dad has been gone for six years now and I have to say that I am profoundly grateful for the brain’s ability to store memory. For the past few years it’s acted like a rolodex of the very best moments with him. I can rifle through, pull out a choice experience, close my eyes and relive it again. So even though my goofy, cynical, wise, and at times irreverent Father is no longer with me physically he’s never really that far away. My Mom says she likes to think of him as with her, just in another room. So, he’s around. Out of sight but never out of mind. Love you Dad. Always.