This has to have been the longest summer of my life. In fact I think this has been the longest year of my life (and it's not even August!) Everything has happened: life, death, weddings, funerals, work, play, happiness, sorrow; you name it, I'm sure it must have happened here.
But now it's all behind us. All the events laid out for this season have ended, all the major ones at least. Stretched out before me is a blank slate, a story not yet written.
College turned out to be less enjoyable (and useful) than I had anticipated. (Although I did get an A in the class.) So I'm taking this next semester off from school, at least class room school. I'll keep up with my homeschooling, reading, writing, and music. I may even try to get a job this fall.
And now that I'm out of school, the Harold B. Pricklepants society will begin meeting again. I have requested we read Gone With the Wind (one of my all-time favorite books) even if I have read all 700+ pages of it two or three times before!
Life will continue. Even if sometimes I wish it would slow down and give me a chance to catch my breath!
Showing posts with label HBPS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label HBPS. Show all posts
Friday, July 25, 2014
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Acrobatic Chicken
A couple of our young chickens fancy themselves acrobats.
I do not know what made these birds want to walk on the fence railing around our pool, but it was hilarious!
These pictures were taken by Rachel several days ago, "For your blog," she said to me. Since then we have had rain, cold, and the first fire of the season. The smells are wonderfully cozy, and the crackling sounds are music to my ears. One of the worst things about all this coziness is trying to drag myself upstairs late at night, away from the fire and into the cold upstairs to get ready for bed. At least the cold combined with the warmth and comfort of my bed makes it easy to fall asleep at night. Sometimes I wish I could hibernate.
Today the sun is shining and the members of the Pricklepants Society will soon be heading off to Starbucks for warm lunch and cozy book/life discussions. I think I feel like a hot pumpkin-spice latte today.
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
Back to Book Club
Ah, January. That industrious month of maintaining resolutions and going back to a normal daily life after the parties and feasts of the holiday season.
Today Mom, Elizabeth, and I resumed our weekly visits to the local Starbucks for our literary class/reading and writing club. Over coffee, tea, and warm sandwiches, we discussed Dickens, George Eliot, Downton Abbey, that British drama we've heard so much about and have finally dived into (and are loving), as well as branching off onto other topics that have very little to do with our initial subject at all. (Often followed by, "How did we get on this topic anyway?" Life is so canonical!)
In today's chapter of Harold Bloom's Western Canon, Bloom chose to focus on only one of Charles Dickens novels, Bleak House. (Thank goodness we only went over one or we may have been reading that chapter for weeks!) I have never read Bleak House but have read other novels by Dickens and seen a very good BBC adaptation. It is much easier to watch a television production of Dickens than to read one of his novels because the man does tend to ramble. I remember one case in David Copperfield where he spent two very long paragraphs talking about something that had literally nothing to do with the story! And Dickens has so many characters to keep track of. As Elizabeth accurately stated, "If Dickens spends two lines describing someone, that person will change your life!" 'Tis true.
Well Charles Dickens is not one of my favorite authors, I would much rather read Jane Austen or Norah Lofts, but he does belong in the canon of Western literature. He did after all give us The Christmas Carol, and A Tale of Two Cities is on my list of books to re-read in the near future.
Of George Eliot I know almost nothing and have never really read any of her works. I did learn some interesting things about her from today's chapter and our discussion, but I prefer chapters where I at least know something about the writer we're discussing and/or have read their work. It makes it easier to pick out why they belong in the Canon, and then I don't have to go completely off of Bloom's opinions which, I confess, I tend not to trust. (We don't see eye to eye on everything.) I'm always grateful that my Mom is so well educated and understands just about everything Bloom is talking about, because I sure don't!
Next week we read about and discuss Tolstoy, who I know nothing about except that I believe he is Russian (Russian literature=depressing) and he's one of the authors Quorra has read in Tron: Legacy.
Today Mom, Elizabeth, and I resumed our weekly visits to the local Starbucks for our literary class/reading and writing club. Over coffee, tea, and warm sandwiches, we discussed Dickens, George Eliot, Downton Abbey, that British drama we've heard so much about and have finally dived into (and are loving), as well as branching off onto other topics that have very little to do with our initial subject at all. (Often followed by, "How did we get on this topic anyway?" Life is so canonical!)
In today's chapter of Harold Bloom's Western Canon, Bloom chose to focus on only one of Charles Dickens novels, Bleak House. (Thank goodness we only went over one or we may have been reading that chapter for weeks!) I have never read Bleak House but have read other novels by Dickens and seen a very good BBC adaptation. It is much easier to watch a television production of Dickens than to read one of his novels because the man does tend to ramble. I remember one case in David Copperfield where he spent two very long paragraphs talking about something that had literally nothing to do with the story! And Dickens has so many characters to keep track of. As Elizabeth accurately stated, "If Dickens spends two lines describing someone, that person will change your life!" 'Tis true.
Well Charles Dickens is not one of my favorite authors, I would much rather read Jane Austen or Norah Lofts, but he does belong in the canon of Western literature. He did after all give us The Christmas Carol, and A Tale of Two Cities is on my list of books to re-read in the near future.
Of George Eliot I know almost nothing and have never really read any of her works. I did learn some interesting things about her from today's chapter and our discussion, but I prefer chapters where I at least know something about the writer we're discussing and/or have read their work. It makes it easier to pick out why they belong in the Canon, and then I don't have to go completely off of Bloom's opinions which, I confess, I tend not to trust. (We don't see eye to eye on everything.) I'm always grateful that my Mom is so well educated and understands just about everything Bloom is talking about, because I sure don't!
Next week we read about and discuss Tolstoy, who I know nothing about except that I believe he is Russian (Russian literature=depressing) and he's one of the authors Quorra has read in Tron: Legacy.
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