2017 CHALLENGE: The European Reading Challenge

A challenge for the new year! Thanks to Gilion Dumas at Rose City Reader for this idea. I will post the books I am choosing soon...
Click the link below for Gilion's full post, and respond here if you are up for the challenge!


2017 CHALLENGE: The European Reading Challenge

Are people still doing this?

Aside from a few technical changes, Blogger looks the same. My page needs updating, but the links still work. Other people are currently updating their blogs. But mine sat dormant for three years.

Three years.

Where have I been? You probably aren't interested, but I will tell you anyway. I have been working in the real world. I am a TV News Producer by trade and took a job producing morning newscasts.

But that is over and the world is new again. So maybe something old can be new again here, too. Maybe a return to blogging and online interaction is just what I need. Maybe...

So hello again! In a way, I have missed you. What shall we talk about? Do I want to get literary again? Do I want to change the subject? The title?

We shall see.

Hello, again.

Back?

Am I back? Other options didn't go as planned...bur could I ever really write?

Just Write

It doesn't matter what you write.  Just write.

There's an audience for every idea.

The Rain Mix

Rainstorms are like a complex song.  The sounds are stacked on top of each other until all you hear is the mixed version.  But listen closely and you can separate the layers.
In the middle is the strongest of the sounds--the constant tiny raindrops that fall so quickly and so close to each other that they greet your ears with the steadiness of a waterfall.  Not a Niagara-type waterfall, but a smaller one that doesn't crash but instead constantly gushes.
The layer closest to you is, usually, the sound of heavier drops as they fall inconsistently from gutters or window panes.  These drops or still being fed by the rainfall, but they are hampered by human creations.  They are given time to join together and fall as they may--harder and less often.  Their noise is louder and joins the waterfall effect as a staccato layer.
And in the distance is the patter of the rain through the trees.  It's a two-fold layer.  The water hits the foliage with a gentle slap--a patter, if you will.  Then the water falls again; this time it is inn larger drops and makes many different sounds as they hit the different ground coverings.  Puddles, play sets, logs, grass, flowers, leaves--each with their unique surface.

Together, it is a cacophony of nature.  And, to be cliche, music to my ears.

Book Art

I love books.  I cherish them.  I love the way they look on my shelves and the way the paper feels under my fingertips.

But this artist has found a new way to love them.  German creator Dorisse can turn ordinary paper products into beautiful jewelry and, my favorite, book sculptures!

I will never give up reading the real thing, but I also love the idea of immortalizing my favorites as works of art--more than they already are, that is.

What do you think?  Reverent to the work or destroying it?

The power of books

From the site Common Dreams comes this "weapon" of mass destruction: the "way cool book tank created by Argentinean artist, Raul Lemesoff, with a 1979 Ford Falcon from the former military junta. Lemesoff tours from the streets of Buenos Aires to the countryside, offering his 900, donated, frequently-replenished books free as a "contribution to peace through literature."

I want to go to Buenos Aires!