Month: April 2013

I is for I Got Smoked

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Blogging from A-Z

001This post could have easily been called I’m a Loser.  Oh, Ohio State and every other team I had picked to make the Final Four (I’m looking at you Michigan State, Indiana and Kansas).  You guys let me down!  I have now lost this March Madness bet with my husband 3 years in a row!  A record in its 16 year run.

So, because of my Big 10 love gone awry I am now subjected to our next 5 movie dates being dictated by Jason.  sigh.  I’m really looking forward to crashes, violence and juvenile humor.  No, I’m not.

I’m okay with Louisville winning.  I’m just not okay with me losing.  Again.

H is for the H Quiz – guessing closed

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Blogging from A-Z

It’s a cover quiz 🙂  Just tell me the title (8 points) and author (2 points) of these books that all start with the letter H (the title).

I love when new people play.  It makes you eligible for a special prize and it gives more $ to the winner (details here).  Submit your answers in the comment section by noon Sunday.  I come by and hide answers occasionally so don’t be worried if your guesses disappear 🙂

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1. The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien

2. The Help by Kathryn Stockett

3. The House of Velvet & Glass by Katherine Howe

4. Half Broke Horses by Jeanette Walls

5. The Homecoming of Samuel Lake by Jenny Wingfield

6. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genuis by Dave Eggers

7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows by JK Rowling

8. Here on Earth by Alice Hoffman

9. Husband and Wife by Leah Stewart

10. House and Home by Kathleen McCleary

I’m giving you all til Sunday to guess on last week’s quiz for a chance to win a book from my stacks and bragging rights 🙂

G is for Gage Going Gluten-free

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Gage has always had tummy problems.  We know he’s allergic to milk and we know he outgrew his peanut allergy (he still will not eat peanuts or peanut butter!), but he does still have tummy issues.  So for the last two months he has been gluten-free.  I was worried that we might not find enough that he was willing to eat.  Seriously, when you take away dairy and wheat, your options are limited.  Add in a 2 year-old pickiness and it is a recipe for disaster.  We have found things he will eat, but he has a fairly limited menu.  He eats soy cheese, soy yogurt, and soy milk, gluten-free bread, fries, vegetable soup, corn pasta, mama’s homemade pizzas, chicken apple sausage and most fruits.  Oh, and cookies and raisins.  There are even two gluten/milk free cereals he will eat.

His stomach issues have maybe gotten a little better, but his language has improved so much.  He is still too young to tell us if his stomach feels better so we have to go on his behavior and that has improved.  So, much to my disappointment we have decided to keep him on it for a while longer and see.  It can take up to a year for your body to heal itself from a gluten intolerance.  Why am I disappointed?  It is a pain to go gluten and dairy free.  It is expensive and very difficult to eat out (with a 2-year-old who only wants fries and chicken).  I make a few things myself, but the more complicated the recipe, the less likely he is to eat it.

Do you have any gluten-free tips, recipes or restaurants for me?  I’m open to suggestions since we are in this for a while longer.  And since I like any excuse to post a photo of  Gage, here he is with his grandparents.  This weekend he was doted on while Jason and I snuck away for the night.  It was Jason’s birthday and we went to a mystery dinner at a haunted manor so I’ll also include a photo of that.

018  007

F is for Five word movie reviews, March edition – with money for charity

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You know the drill, add your 5 words to mine and earn $1 for charity.  Once we get to $100 the person with the most reviews will choose the charity.  Click here to see the past winners, the charities they chose and to see the other reviews you can add to.  You guys are off to a good start with $44 so far.

Stingredfordnewman.jpgThe Sting, 1973 (Cast-Robert Redford, Paul Newman, Robert Shaw)                         Grade A-

Sexiest con men ever unite.

Redford and Newman; that’s all.  (Kathy)

Handsome men, don’t remember story!  (Debbie)

Argo, 2012 (Cast-Ben Affleck,Alan Arkin, John Goodman, Bryan Cranston)  Grade A-

Thrilling. Unbelievable but true (mostly).

Edge of your seat movie.  (Kathy)

Crazy CIA scheme rescues Americans. (Leslie)

Heart in mouth nail chewer.  (Teddyree)

Well-done and full of tension.  (Heather)

Pseudoness is conducive to cheering.  (Jill)

Alan Arkin steals the show.  (Tony)

Shrek 2, 2004 (Mike Meyers, Cameron Diaz, Eddie Murphy, Antonio Banderas)     Grade B

Gage’s Shrek love affair continues.

Donkey steals the show. (Caspette)

In-Laws…always with the meddling. (Michelle)

Obnoxiously fun for all ages!   (Debbie)

Favorite! Funny and really touching.  (Heather)

Fiona is an ogre, okay?  (Tony)

We Bought a Zoo, 2011 (Cast-Matt Damon, Scarlett Johansson, Thomas Haden Church)       Grade B-

Lion, tigers… Sweet family movie

Movie is better than book.  (Kathy)

Cute feel good movie. (Caspette)

Can I buy a zoo? (Michelle)

Teary feel-good happy ever after  (Teddyree)

Ice Age (2002 film) poster.jpgIce Age, 2002 (Cast-Ray Romano, Denis Leary, John Leguizamo)   Grade C+

Eh, but Gage loves baby.

Older, less I enjoy it. (Caspette)

 Ice Age fun getting old.  (Teddyree)

Please let the squirrel eat!  (Heather)

Caution: will spawn endless sequels.  (Tony)

E is for Extras (that means free stuff)

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Blogging from A-Z

Every year when I collect all of my unread books in one spot I find a few doubles.  I know I want the book, buy it and then discover it’s already it in the house!!  So, I need your help to find new homes for these books, 2 of them are favorites of mine and 3 I still need to read.  Leave a comment telling me which ones you want and Gage will randomly draw winners on Friday, April 26th (that happens to be the day for W).

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1. Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel. My first book of magical realism and I loved it.  The book is new.

2. Beloved by Toni Morrison. One of my favorite reads from last year.

3. The Devil’s Teardrop by Jeffery Deaver. A favorite author but I haven’t read this one yet.

4. Chocolat by Joanne Harris.  Loved the movie and I can’t wait to read this one.

5. The Almost Moon by Alice Sebold.  Loved her first book and I hope I love this one too.

Happy reading!  List all the ones that you want, you can win more than one.

D is for Darin Strauss, Half A Life

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Half a LifeFinished 3-30-13, rating 3/5, memoir, 207 pages, pub. 2010

Half my life ago, I killed a girl.

(first line)

When Darin was 18 years old he was driving his friends around and he hit a girl who was riding a bike.  The girl went to his high school.  How does Darin go on and live his life?  What about the family of the victim?  What is the price to be paid for taking a life, intended or not?  I can’t even imagine the horror and the aftermath.  How do you pick up the pieces and move on?  That’s why I wanted to read this memoir.

I’m of two minds on this one.  I wanted to like it more than I did.  I wanted feel more for Darin than I did. But, to quote Darin, “I’m not sure I can get across just how much I want to be extra generous to Celine here.  Extra-generous and, you’ve probably noticed, extra-writerly.  It’s a coward’s tactic.  I’m trying to write all the difficulty away.” (p. 58)  For me, there was too much writing and not enough depth.  The accident was not his fault, but this memoir needs to convince the reader of this fact.   It felt more like catharsis for Darin.  He mentioned more than once in the book that he was putting on a show for people, doing what he thought they expected to see and that’s how I felt about the book.  It felt less like a serious evaluation of what happened and what it did to his life than a book to absolve him of guilt.

On the other hand, there were insightful passages like this one, “Through all this, there was the courthouse threat of financial devastation-a thief taking up onious position outside every job, every apartment, rubbing his hands together.  Everything could at any moment be taken away because of the Zilkes, snatched from under me, desks pulled from my fingers.  Her parents had found a very real way, I realized, to keep Celine with me forever. (p.103) Extra-writerly or not I would have welcomed more passages like this.

Having never gone through anything remotely close to this I feel bad for my complaints.  Ignore everything I just said.

This was from my own library.

C is for Cary Grant

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I love Cary Grant.  No, really love him.  I’m sure that when you looked at my stack of unread books yesterday that you noticed this one. (yes, that’s it, bottom stacks, row 10, 2nd from the bottom ;))

Complete Films of Cary Grant

A few fun facts about the suave Archibald Leach…He was born in Bristol, England in 1904.  When we was 12 his mother suffered a severe nervous breakdown and went to live in a nursing home. He ran away at 13 and joined Bob Pender’s Troupe, but his father found him and brought him home.  A year and half later he rejoined the troupe (with his father’s blessing) and travelled around England before the troupe headed to New York City in 1920. He worked as a stilt walker at Coney Island and as an audience plant with a mind-reading act before working on Broadway.  He appeared in a 10 minute short film as one of four sailors and the rest is history.  He headed to Hollywood, changed his name (thank you, Archie!), and completed seven films that first year.  He became a US citizen in 1942.  Married five times, divorced four and the father of one child.  He died in 1986 at the age of 82 of a stroke.

This is a great book for fans.  Lots of pictures and behind the scenes stories.  Here’s one from his very first short film

002And one of the many pages of photos from film shoots and his personal life 004

This book is about his life and his films.  All 72 of them.  I’ve watched 17  and have decided to go on a Cary Grant Binge and see how long it takes me to see them all.  I’m thinking of a monthly post and I welcome anyone who wants to join in.  I can make it official with  Mr. Linky and everything if you want to join me.  And no, I don’t mean you have to watch all of his movies, but you want to watch his movies and post about them, let me know.  I may try to work my way through them in order but it will really depend on what I can get my hands on first.  His first movie was This is the Night (1932).  Here’s the list of his movies if you want to see how many you’ve watched.

I know a few of you read Stories I Only Tell My Friends by Rob Lowe and I loved the Cary Grant story!  I wouldn’t have complained about watching movies in bed with Cary 🙂

My favorite Cary Grant film is The Philadelphia Story (1940) but I pretty much love him in anything.  Do you have a favorite Cary movie?

B is for Book Problem, Year 6 QUIZ

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Before I started blogging I had spent 5 years working for Barnes & Noble so I was no stranger to books (and book discounts!).  I had a sizeable library and was happy with my reading to book ratio.  Then I started blogging and all tomes broke loose!  Every year in May I would stack up my unread books in one place and take and inventory of sorts.  Here’s my picture from that first year in 2008…

At the time I didn’t even do a count.

New motherhood being what it was I skipped last year’s wall building.  But then I felt like my books have slowly been taking over every room in the house so I decided it was time to rebuild the wall.  I always rebuild the same way every year so I can find all of the books. (yes, this is silly, but I sometimes get a little OCD about my books).  Two years ago my stacks looked like this

A little bigger at 604.  So, in a marathon of book balancing done while my little one was sleeping I rebuilt the wall minus the 20 some books I read and the 20 odd books I gave away…

Janet 088

And then added in the books I’ve acquired in the last two years.  Needless to say, I got a great workout hauling all these books around the house, but worry about next year’s wall of books if I don’t start reading more!

Janet 090

Okay, now for the QUIZ -Open to anyone- Guess the number of unread books I have in my house by looking at this last picture.  The person who comes closest by Sunday will help me out by choosing one book from the picture as a gift.  (I did at least give you a few numbers from two years ago :))

For all my regulars – I will be awarding points based on how close you get to the real number.

Leaderboard here.  Last weeks’s Florida Quiz here.

A is for Animated Movies

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Blogging from A-Z Challenge. I’m participating in the A-Z Challenge this month. I just decided to do it today so I hope I can organize myself enough to get through the alphabet.  There’s no telling what each new letter will bring around here so stay tuned 🙂

Gage will be 2 1/2 this month and his attention span is short, however, there is one thing that will keep him mostly engaged for a while.  It’s that big, green ogre we all know and love, Shrek.  I am not sure how many times we have seen the first and second movies and yet he never tires of them.  Shrek, Donkey and Cat (Puss) are his friends.  He doesn’t seem to care one way or the other about Fiona at this point.  As far as movies that can satisfy a toddler and parents at the same time this series is a good one, but I’m ready to branch out.  He saw and liked Ice Age, but Jason doesn’t care for it and I think a few viewings was enough for me.

I love the old Disney movies, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King and I am looking forward to sharing them with him.  But aside from Wall-E, Finding Nemo, and Ratatouille I am woefully behind in the animated movie department.  What are some of the new ones that Gage, Jason, and I might all love?  And when you see an animated movie do you ever see it because of who is narrating the characters?

Oh, and please don’t recommend Bambi.  That movie made me so upset as a kid that I’m not sure I ever even saw the whole thing.  I won’t do that to Gage.  At least until he’s a teenager 🙂