Is it possible to delurk from your own site? If so, hi! This is me, delurking to wish you and yours a belated happy whatevermas. I come bearing pictures! Specifically, pictures of what's turned me into a skulking, shadowy, and (dare I dream?) somewhat menacing presence at 50 Books HQ:
Wee Will is not quite so wee, having recently passed the nine-month mark and long passed the 20-lb mark. He's added standing and raspberry-blowing to his list of accomplishments. Frankly, I'm impressed that he's found time to master these skills, what with all the energy he's been devoting to practicing for the Olympic Speed-Teething Team.
And Sam is officially in big brother mode. Also: Big Brother mode. I finally get where Orwell got that particular turn of phrase. Is it wrong that we've nicknamed our own child Sammy the Rat? For whatever it's worth, we don't say it to his face.
They're sweet and funny and ever-so-cute, but they're also CRAZY. As I said to a friend who is contemplating having another baby: "If you find yourself with a bit of free time on your hands from time to time, I highly recommend a second child."
But enough about me. What about you?
Three things not to ask yourself when looking at the Library Bathtub...
- How do you get in and out of it?
- How do you keep the books from getting wet and mildewy?
- Why does it look like something from a medieval dungeon?
And one thing you maybe should ask...- What kinds of books would a library bathtub absolutely need to keep in stock in order to be credible as, you know, a GOOD library bathtub? Moby Dick? The Old Man and the Sea? Mutiny on the Bounty? Jaws? Voyage of the Dawn Treader? The Log from the Sea of Cortez? 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea? Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog)? You couldn't just check any old book under there, could you?
[Thanks, Stephie, for the link!]
[From People's "Cakes from Every State" photo essay. Thanks for the link, Jody!]
So how's this for a set of unrelated circumstances perfectly designed to minimize my sleep:- Last night, an old friend, whom we rarely see because he lives on the other side of the country, drops by unexpectedly. We get so caught up in our conversation that it's almost 2:00 am before we realize how late it is. But no worries. Sam's been sleeping in till 8:00 most mornings, so we can still count on a half dozen hours of solid Zs, right?
- No! That final set of molars decides to rear its ugly head and wake Sam up, irritable and in pain, at 5:55. And we're up! But he naps in the afternoon, so we can catch some shuteye then, wouldn't you think?
- You would be wrong, mon frere! There's a street festival happening in our 'hood, and of course a twelve-person experimental jazz troupe sets up stage less than a hundred feet from our house. Were they good? Well, let's just say that what they lacked in skill they more than made up for in volume and stick-to-it-iveness.
It's kind of a miracle, isn't it. But, like, a shitty miracle.I'm so friggin' tired right now. I'm experiencing first-six-weeks-of-parenthood déjà vu. Old school. The thing about me and fatigue is that it makes me uncharacteristically clumsy. You wouldn't believe how long it's taken me just to write these few words, because I keep hitting the wrong keys. Also, earlier today I stubbed my toe quite badly, and I must confess that I dropped the F-bomb in front of an impressionable toddler. More than once. Loudly.The other thing about me and fatigue is that it makes me stupid. But I'm not one to let mere stupidity keep me from posting. I'm the George W. Bush of the blogosphere.But I don't want to assault some poor helpless book with my subnormal dribble. It seems to me that images can do a better job of standing up for themselves, so for today I'm going to let pictures do my work for me. (I've heard they can tell a story worth a thousand words. Can you IMAGINE?)I've become a total Etsy addict in the past couple of months. I've ordered some cute handmade toys and tees for Sam, and lately my attention has turned to the many fine pieces of visual art for sale on the site. I've been bookmarking like a fiend, because that's what I do, and along the way I seem to have collected a little slideshow of prints designed especially to appeal to book lovers and assorted other word nerds. And voilà:
I've always liked the idea of using pages from old books in collages and whatnot. From Etsy seller myfolklover's description of this piece:This little girl is rather forgetful and has befriended a bird who has taken up home in her hair... to remind her of all the little things that she has forgotten! This is a print of an original ink and watercolor drawing on the page of an old Enid Blyton book. It is part of a series of original artwork titled "Remembering to Think of Things".
Everything about that description is just right.
I feel like this sometimes. Such as right now.(In addition to artwork, this seller, curster, also has a bunch of crazy stuffed toys for sale. If this print speaks to you in a very special and ever-so-slightly creepy way, you should check them out.)
It's Story Time! But in a way, isn't it always story time?
Hey, everybody! Remember TYPEWRITERS? Me neither! But I like Typewriter Girl's mary-janes-and-striped-kneesocks combo so much, I can forgive her for having a dress made out of an obsolete technology. Also, it makes me feel better about the fact that I'm the last woman in the Western world still clinging to bootcut jeans.
Nobody ever thinks to feel bad for animals because they're illiterate, but how would you feel if that were you? Hang this little guy on your wall to serve as a daily reminder of just how lucky you are.
I'm back. So tired. Book stuff to come. Later.In the meantime, let me introduce you to my favourite photo of the week -- apropos of very little, save my documented love of cupcakes -- courtesy of Scott Beale at Laughing Squid:
(See the original here.)
...they might look something like this:
(Ups to Yomama, whose 12-year-old has this poster on his wall, for the pic. If Sam is that cool when he gets older, I'll be one proud mom.)
Most people, when confronted with a killer head cold, have the good sense to hunker down with a steaming mug of something-or-other and wait for Death's icy hand to pass them by.
Me? I like to mix things up. So when I woke up this morning feeling as if some nefarious member of the Barbapapa clan had crawled into my sinus cavities, blown itself up like a pufferfish, and then transmogrified into solid cement...Wait. That last sentence got away from me. Do over. So I went to my previously scheduled dentist appointment. I don't know if I'd forgotten that I was getting three old fillings replaced, as well as a new one installed. I don't know if I'd forgotten what getting fillings feels like. I just know that if I'd had any idea of what was in store for me, I would have planned my day differently. I wouldn't, say, have planned that I'd just duck out from work for an hour, then tra-la-la! skip back to work for the rest of the afternoon. I actually LOST COUNT of how many injections my dentist gave me to freeze my face. I can tell you this: I didn't fully recover sensation for more than FIVE HOURS. Can someone do the dentist math on that? Between my impacted sinuses, my wretched headache, my hacking cough, my badly aching jaw, and my horribly disfigured, swollen visage, it took me several hours just to differentiate the various sources of pain and discomfort located above my neck. I spent these hours at home, where I had lurched straight from my dentist's office, frightening small children and causing birds to fall dead as stones from the trees.I was too uncomfortable to sleep. My head ached too much to read. Daytime television... it is best not to speak of that. So I whiled away the afternoon looking at pretty pictures on the internet.
This amazing shot is of the Elmer Holmes Bobst Library, also known as the Bobst (or so Wikipedia tells me). It's the main library at New York University. I find it cool and slightly creepy, in a Borg ship kind of way. (Shout out to meera for busting me on my Star Trek reference earlier this week.)
[See the original photo here.] 
I've heard of these people who organize their books by colour, but I'd never seen an example before. Pretty. (That was my last thought before my head exploded.)
This is a bookstore called El Ateneo in Buenos Aires. I don't believe in an afterlife, but if I did, it would look a lot like this. Plus unicorns.
Oh, sure. Some manga has a reputation for being violent and exploitive. But look at how well organized it is!
Yikes! How did that picture of my basement get in here? (Cue wah-wah-wah-wah horn of jokery.) But seriously. This is a photo of the Detroit Public School Book Depository. I don't believe in an afterlife, but if I did, this is where naughty book-lovers, if there can be said to be such people, would end up. Nary a unicorn in sight, either.
Wee Will is not quite so wee, having recently passed the nine-month mark and long passed the 20-lb mark. He's added standing and raspberry-blowing to his list of accomplishments. Frankly, I'm impressed that he's found time to master these skills, what with all the energy he's been devoting to practicing for the Olympic Speed-Teething Team. 
