Catastrophe

I haven't had a Caturday post in awhile, so here's something about cats to (maybe) make you laugh.  Have you ever experienced a CAT catastrophe, something catastrophic caused by a cat?  Please share it in a comment with the rest of us.

Beginning ~ in the future

Beginning

Here begins a happy day in 2381.  The morning sun is high enough          to touch the uppermost fifty stories of Urban Monad 116.  Soon the building's entire eastern face will glitter like the bosom of the sea at daybreak.  Charles Mattern's window, activated by the dawn's early photons, deopaques.

The World Inside ~ by Robert Silverberg, 1971, science fiction, 184 pages

2381.  Man had attained Utopia.  War, starvation, crime, and birth control had been eliminated.  Life was totally fulfilled and sustained within mammoth skyscrapers hundred of stories high.  It was blessed to have children.  Contemplation of controlling families was heretical.  And there were methods of treatment for heresy, the most radical being death.

I have just started this book, but so far it's been interesting.  Did you notice that word "deopaques"?  It isn't actually a word I can find in the dictionary, so let's figure out what it means:

o·paque / ōˈpāk / adjective = not able to be seen through; not transparent.  Example:  "The windows were opaque with steam."

So that means if the windows somehow "deopaques," we can now see through it.  In the future, apparently, sunlight "deopaques" windows.  I've only read a single chapter, so none of this is explained yet.  Maybe later in the book.  Or maybe it's going to be beyond my understanding.

Also interesting is the fact that "man" had attained Utopia, according to the blurb on the dust jacket.  That's before the women's movement, so I wonder if the women in the book consider it a utopia or not.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts

Book Beginnings on Fridays.

Thanksgiving

Mending, making, and sewing up rips

I read somewhere online:  "I can embroider, cross-stitch, use a sewing machine, and sew by hand to alter clothes.  If my clothes rip in a way I deem unsuitable, I can mend them.  Sewing is an art fewer people learn every year."

Once upon a time, I made my children's clothes and could do all the things that person listed.  One of my daughters wanted my sewing machine, so I haven't been doing much sewing lately.  Now I wonder how many people still know how to mend clothes.  Do you?  And do you make clothes for your children?  Or did you, when your children still lived with you?

Fiction by Margaret Atwood

Surfacing ~ by Margaret Atwood, 1972, literary fiction, 233 pages 

This novel grapples with notions of national and gendered identity, anticipated rising concerns about conservation and preservation and the emergence of Canadian nationalism.  It tells the story of a woman who returns to her home-town in Canada to find her missing father.  Accompanied by her lover, Joe, and a married couple, Anna and David, the unnamed protagonist meets her past in her childhood house, recalling events and feelings, while trying to find clues to her father's mysterious disappearance.  Little by little, the past overtakes her and drives her into the realm of wildness and madness.  What she really discovers is the truth about her past, her inner fears, and the strengths she never knew she had.

Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz.

Beginning ~ at a bookstore event

Beginning

It would be a night of murder, they'd been told.  And there'd be lemon squares, too.  The group, mostly women, gathered in a half circle, some in the old leather chairs that book browsers coveted and others in the folding chairs the bookstore owner, Archie Brandley, had set up for the special event.  At the other end of the cozy loft, narrow aisles seperated wooden bookcases that rose nearly to the ceiling.  One section was crammed with mysteries, the spines straight and proud — a perfect background for the night of crime.

The Wedding Shawl: A Seaside Knitters Mystery ~ by Sally Goldenbaum, 2011, cozy mystery, 307 pages

Izzy Chambers is about to get married, but much remains to be done.  Then the wedding plans get complicated when the wedding party's hair stylist begins missing appointments.  When she's found dead, things really begin to unravel.  Rumors circulate about the stylist's past and her connection to an unsolved murder years ago.  All the Seaside Knitters really know is they must rally to find some answers, so Izzy can don the wedding shawl they're surprising her with — and replace the whispers about town with wedding bells.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts

Book Beginnings on Fridays.

Today is World Philosophy Day 2024

World Philosophy Day is an international day to be celebrated every 3rd Thursday of November.  It was first celebrated on November 21, 2002.  Celebrating World Philosophy Day each year underlines the enduring value of philosophy for the development of human thought, for each culture and for each individual.  Critical questioning enables us to give meaning to life and action.  Philosophy is a discipline that encourages critical and independent thought and is capable of working towards a better understanding of the world and promoting tolerance and peace.

Okay, so you probably aren't surprised that my double major for my bachelor's degree included philosophy, right?

Later in the day, I happened to read this quote from page 54 of The Wisdom of John and Abigail Adams edited by R. B. Bernstein (2002):  "What is philosophy but the study of the world and its cause?  Man is a riddle to himself.  The world is a riddle to him.  He puzzles to find a key, and this puzzle is called philosophy."

Beginning ~ at her mother's feet

Beginning

Little Thérèse sat on the floor at her mother's feet, watching the bright needle as it flew through the cloud of fine lace her mother was making.  It was a winter day in the year 1875.

Saint Thérèse and the Roses ~ by Helen Walker Homan, illustrated by George W. Thompson, 1955, young adult, 149 pages

This story from the Vision Books series for youth 9 -15 years old is a beautiful story about the most popular saint of modern times, St. Thérèse of Lisieux, the "Little Flower."  Growing up in Lisieux, France was occasionally painful but usually delightful for Therese and her four sisters.  For practical Marie, studious Pauline, hot-tempered Leonie, mischievous Celine, and beautiful, lovable Thérèse, growing up meant growing closer to God.  The Little Flower found her pathway to holiness right in her own back yard.

With their disagreements, secrets, visits to the convent, school adventures, and romances, these five girls are an enjoyable handful for their kindly, widowed father.  But Thérèse, because she loves her family, discovers that one of her sisters might unwittingly prevent her dearest wish from coming true.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts

Book Beginnings on Fridays.

Still musing about Coke for a nickel

The coincidences continue (a week later, see HERE, where I wrote about Coca-Cola coincidences).  I was reading Out of Time by Caroline B. Cooney (1996), and the main character had time traveled to 1898 (p. 74). On the opposite page, I read this:

She didn't have to figure out how to buy a ticket; her driver and the porter accomplished this. She did buy a Coke, which cost a nickel. It made her happy to buy a Coke in a glass bottle and pay five cents for it.

What I'm re-reading next

Out of Time ~ by Caroline B. Cooney, 1996, YA fiction, 210 pages

Strat, the wealthy boy with whom Annie fell in love during her first time trip to the 1890s, needs her help when he reveals her real origin and finds himself confined in a mental asylum.  The back cover says:

Annie Lockwood exists; everyone admits it.  Everyone has seen her.  But only Strat insists that Miss Lockwood traveled a hundred years back in time to be with them in 1895.  Now Strat is paying an enormous price; his father has declared him insane and had him locked away in an asylum.  When Time calls Annie back to save Strat, she does not hesitate, even though her family is falling apart and desperately needs her.  Can Annie save the boy she loves, or will her choice keep her a trespasser out of time?

Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz.

The beginning of the latest book by my favorite author

Beginning

        Many years after Melina graduated from Bard College, the course she remembered the most was not a playwriting seminar or a theater intensive but an anthropology class.  One day, the professor had flashed a slide of a bone with twenty-nine tiny incisions on one long side.  "The Lebombo bone was found in a cave in Swaziland in the 1970s and is about forty-three thousand years old," she had said.  "It's made of a baboon fibula.  For years, it's been the first calendar attributed to man.  But I ask you:  what man uses a twenty-nine-day calendar?  The professor seemed to stare directly at Melina.  "History," she said, "is written by those in power."

By Any Other Name ~ by Jodi Picoult, 2024, biographical fiction, 525 pages 

Young playwright Melina Green has just written a new work inspired by the life of her Elizabethan ancestor Emilia Bassano.  But seeing it performed is unlikely, in a theater world where the playing field isn't level for women.  As Melina wonders if she dares risk failure again, her best friend takes the decision out of her hands and submits the play to a festival under a male pseudonym.

In 1581, young Emilia Bassano is a ward of English aristocrats.  Her lessons on languages, history, and writing have endowed her with a sharp wit and a gift for storytelling, but like most women of her day, she is allowed no voice of her own.  Forced to become a mistress to the Lord Chamberlain, who oversees all theater productions in England, Emilia sees firsthand how the words of play-wrights can move an audience.  She begins to form a plan to secretly bring a play of her own to the stage -- by paying an actor named Willam Shakespeare to front her work.

Told in intertwining timelines, this novel is a tale of ambition, courage, and desire, centered on two women who are determined to create something beautiful despite the prejudices they face.  Should a writer do whatever it takes to see her story live on?

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts

Book Beginnings on Fridays.

Thinking about the election ... and a cat ... and other stuff

Thoughts, so many thoughts, are going through my head after election day.  But which ones do I want to share?  That is the problem in such a divided time.  Here's a nice thought, and it's about a cat.  (Hmm, should I save it for Caturday?)

"On November 3, 2024, a lost tabby recognized herself

from her missing cat poster, and you can read her feelings

all over her face."  (This photo was with the article.)

The video shows her walking straight up to the poster and touching it with her nose.  Cats are smarter than lots of folks give them credit for.

What's on your mind today?  Please share it in the comments.

Butterflies

The Girl Who Drew Butterflies: How Maria Merian's Art Changed Science ~ by Joyce Sidman, 2018, children's nonfiction, 160 pages

This biography won the Robert F. Sibert Medal.  The Newbery Honor–winning author introduces readers to one of the first female entomologists and a woman who flouted convention in the pursuit of knowledge and her passion for insects.

One of the first naturalists to observe live insects directly, Maria Sibylla Merian was also one of the first to document the metamorphosis of the butterfly.  Richly illustrated throughout with full-color original paintings by Merian herself, The Girl Who Drew Butterflies will enthrall young scientists.

Bugs, of all kinds, were considered to be “born of mud” and to be "beasts of the devil."  Why would anyone, let alone a girl, want to study and observe them?  The Girl Who Drew Butterflies answers this question.

Two students for TWOsday

Click HERE to read about how two students discovered proof of the 2000-year-old Pythagorean theorem.  I enjoyed my math classes, so reading this fascinated me.  I remember learning about that theorem in school, just as these two did.

In mathematics, the Pythagorean theorem is a fundamental relation in Euclidean geometry between the three sides of a right triangle, which states that the area of the square whose side is the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the areas of the squares on the other two sides.  (I got most of this wording from Wikipedia.)

Here's another way to say it:  The formula for Pythagoras' theorem is a² + b² = c².  In this equation, "C" represents the longest side of a right triangle, called the hypotenuse.  "A" and "B" represent the other two sides of the triangle.

Wow, look at all the twos:  a² and b² and c².  And don't forget the two students.

Coca-Cola coincidence

Back in 1899, Chattanooga became the site of the world's first Coca-Cola Bottling Company.  The Coca-Cola taste had been invented by a pharmacist in Atlanta in 1886 and was originally only sold as a fountain drink.  Then, two businessmen from Chattanooga convinced the owner of Coca-Cola to expand into bottling the beverage.  I chose this illustration because I remember buying Coca-Cola for a nickel, and the bottle was green like that.

My neighbor Larry noticed me sitting alone at a table in our Circle@Crown Café the other day, so he brought his food over to join me.  Our conversation got around to my hometown being Chattanooga, and he asked me something like "wasn't your town connected to Coca-Cola somehow?"  Anyway, it was only a small bit of our conversation, easily forgettable.

That afternoon, I happened to be sitting in the lobby when Larry came back from shopping and started rummaging around in his bags.  He pulled out something small and came over to hand it to me.  It was a Coca-Cola coaster like at the upper right of that second illustration.  I had a puzzled look on my face, so he said, "I was at Goodwill and saw this.  What a coincidence that we were just talking about Coca-Cola!"  He had bought it to show me.  I smiled and reached out to hand it back to him, but he said, "No, it's for you!  You keep it."

So here I am in St. Louis, with my iced tea beside me on a Coca-Cola coaster representing Chattanooga.  (Are you confused yet?)

The coincidences continue (added late in the day):

Larry and I were both sitting around a table with other friends having a Café Conversations meeting, so one of us mentioned the Coca-Cola coincidence.  Someone in the group happened to look up at the large windows to the outside and shouted, "There goes a Coca-Cola truck!"  We were all astounished, to say the least.

The coincidences continue (added a whole week later):

I was reading Out of Time by Caroline B. Cooney (1996), and the main character had time traveled to 1898 (p. 74).  On the opposite page, I read this:

She didn't have to figure out how to buy a ticket; her driver and the porter accomplished this.  She did buy a Coke, which cost a nickel.  It made her happy to buy a Coke in a glass bottle and pay five cents for it.

Reading is my FAVORITE pastime

In the Words of Nelson Mandela ~ edited by Jennifer Crwys-Williams, 2004, collection of quotes, 136 pages, 8/10

My favorite quote in the book includes that very word:  "My favorite pastime:  reading."  It's found on page 36.  This is a short report because it's a very short book, but the most important thing I can tell you is that it's written for people who already admire him for who he is.  It doesn't really explain who he is and why he's famous, so a bunch of quotes would mean nothing to you unless you know those things.

Of Mice and Men ~ by John Steinbeck, 1937, novella, 118 pages

They are an unlikely pair:  George is "small and quick and dark of face," while Lennie, a man of tremendous size, has the mind of a young child.  Yet they have formed a "family," clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation.

Laborers in California's dusty vegetable fields, they hustle work when they can, living a hand-to-mouth existence.  For George and Lennie have a plan: to own an acre of land and a shack they can call their own.  When they land jobs on a ranch in the Salinas Valley, the fulfillment of their dream seems to be within their grasp.  But even George cannot guard Lennie from the provocations of a flirtatious woman, nor predict the consequences of Lennie's unswerving obedience to the things George taught him.

This is also a small book.  I found it among books in one of my boxes and decided to re-read it, since it's been decades now.  Did you also have to read it in school?

Sunday Salon is hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz.

November is Science Fiction Month 2024

November is SciFiMonth 2024 (more information HERE), and my library book (below) came in time for me to read it for this event.

Beginning

Perhaps he'll die this time.  He finds this doesn't worry him.  Maybe because he's so cold he has a drunkard's grip on his mind.  When thoughts come, they're translucent, free-swimming medusae.  As the Arctic wind bites at his hands and feet, his thoughts slop against his skull.  They'll be the last thing to freeze over.

The Ministry of Time ~ by Kaliane Bradley, 2024, science fiction / time travel, 352 pages

In the near future, a civil servant is offered the salary of her dreams and is, shortly afterward, told what project she’ll be working on.  A recently established govern-ment ministry is gathering "expats" from across history to establish whether time travel is feasible — for the body, but also for the fabric of space-time.

She is tasked with working as a "bridge":  living with, assisting, and monitoring the expat known as "1847" or Commander Graham Gore.  As far as history is concerned, Commander Gore died on Sir John Franklin’s doomed 1845 expedition to the Arctic, so he’s a little disoriented to be living with an unmarried woman who regularly shows her calves, surrounded by outlandish concepts such as washing machines, Spotify, and the collapse of the British Empire.  But with an appetite for discovery, a seven-a-day cigarette habit, and the support of a charming and chaotic cast of fellow expats, he soon adjusts.

Over the next year, what the bridge initially thought would be, at best, a horrifically uncomfortable roommate dynamic, evolves into something much deeper.  By the time the true shape of the Ministry’s project comes to light, the bridge has fallen haphazardly, fervently in love, with conse-quences she never could have imagined.  Forced to confront the choices that brought them together, the bridge must finally reckon with how — and whether she believes — what she does next can change the future.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts

Book Beginnings on Fridays.