I Like It!
How Should Your Death Be Marked?
I can only imagine how glorious it would be if I hadn't taken the Luther Burbank "I Don't Feel Good" option.
Via Alicia who has the same pretty angel.

"We've created a victory over nature"
That’s one way of looking at it.
Another one of those modern ‘miracles’ that is so wrong in so many ways. My heart breaks for any child born of this ‘ill-conceived’ scheme.

Oldest Living Person Dies In Connecticut
Woman Was Oldest For Only Two Weeks
Now that's a job with limited potential. And there is always some snot-nosed 112 year old understudy waiting to take it from you.

Fine Art Friday*



La Vierge Consolatrice - William-Adolphe Bouguereau - 1877

*Made possible by the patient help of the Embot!

Many thanks to the Summa Mamas!

Try it, you'll like it.

Blood and Chocolate
Imagine that, they have made a movie about my laundry problems. Can’t wait for the sequel, “Marinara Sauce and Motor Oil.”

Isn't it Romantic?
Embot's brother-in-law Jerry proposes to his girlfriend while taking a Chicago Symphony tour, thereby raising the bar of romance in the greater Chicago area.

A Catholic Culture Meme (via Video Meliora...)
It’s been a long week-end. We may be plum out of culture at the von Huben boarding house.... but I'll give it a shot.

Name a Catholic book that you want to share so much that you keep giving away copies:
The Strangest Way by Rev. Robert Barron

Name a work of religious art you'd like to live with:
Any religous work by Bouguereau, maybe La Vierge Consolatrice or Pieta.
(In a way, I do live his Pieta, since I ordered a large quanitity of Mass cards at work with this piece, and most people do not share my affection for it. It’s a little too raw for a lot of people.)

Name your favorite Catholic artist:
Caravaggio

Name a work of Catholic fiction which has penetrated your real life:
The Lame Shall Enter First by Flannery O’Connor

Name your favorite Catholic Musicians - male & female:
Springsteen and ?

Name your favorite musical:
Anything Goes.

Name a punch line that always makes you laugh:
“Everyone, just... pretend to be normal”
from Little Miss Sunshine

and I’ll tag Alicia (if she has time between catching babies.)

Not mine...
Just another test!

Another Test...
Fran with the Christmas tree. 12.24.06

Testing, testing - I've learned new skills

I think that I will take it
'Cause it took no time to bake it
And I'll never have that recipe again...
In a juxtaposition of realities, I found myself seeing and hearing MacArthur Park referenced in several places over the past week. So it is little wonder that the song should come to mind as I walked out of the Rummage Shop with a cake that I was anxious to protect from the falling snow.

I didn’t even want to go into the Rummage Shop. I tried to convince Martha to drop off her own charity donations. But she went to work before the shop was open. Rick didn’t want to run in after he picked me up from work. So I had the honor. There was a payoff.

First, there was a pair gilded cherubs the size of hefty toddlers.
Ten dollars a piece. How could I refuse? I ran back to the car to grab my purse to purchase one. The one whose paint was in better shape. Just one is all I needed wanted. And more than we have room for. (Of couse, if the more distressed cherub is still there at a reduced price in a week or so, I could make room.)

While waiting to pay for my new friend, I noticed a nicely decorated birthday cake sitting on the counter. With a price tag. I couldn’t believe it. Plaster. Just like the plaster cake that we would have placed on our desks in first grade - no sugar orgies at my school. So I took that, too. It cost a lot less than a real cake. And with no expiration date.

Maybe next time Rick will want to run into the Rummage Shop. He certainly looked dismayed when I got into the car with a twenty pound gold cherub - is it plaster or metal - who knows? And told him that I had a beautiful, unedible, needs to be dusted occasionally cake in my shopping bag.

Join Rick in the refrain....

Oh, no!
Oh, no
No, no
Oh no!!

The cherub has already given us quite a bit of entertainment. Intended to lend a certain sweet je ne sais quoi to our home, the general response has instead been, “That scared the $#!& out of me. “ Sitting on the bench for storing boots, the little guy does appear to be hiding behind the front door, waiting to pounce as soon as the door is closed. No pouncing yet. And he’s already dolled up with Mardi Gras beads...

Another sign...
that Amazon.com knows me too well. I order this and they suggest that I would also like this. Point well taken. But it will have to wait for next time.

"I show them from the neck up," Guillen said. "I try to keep the eyes closed and their tongue in their mouth. I brush their hair."
That’s more than can be said about our pets in life.
(I used to drive past the cemetery in the article. At night, on my way to La Leche League meetings. That was the worst part of the drive. The place creeped me out in a StephenKingPetSematary sort of way.)
It seems a bit disordered to me. Not that I wrestle with the thought much. At this time I couldn’t afford to bury a human relative, so I don’t spend much time considering what to do with the dogs. Good thing the switch was off when Clyde chewed through the Christmas tree lights! (FYI – Clyde is a husky. Husky Dog. Not husky human.)

What can I do, my dear, to catch your ear
I love you madly, madly Madam Librarian.
...on behalf of the faculty, I hereby declare that these candidates have met all the requirements for the degree, returned all overdue materials, paid all fines in full, and request that such degree be conferred upon them....
Or that’s what I thought I heard on Saturday, as our little Embot received her MLIS degree. (in the 21st century it is Library and Information Science) It was all very exciting. We are so proud.
For the civilized world accepts as unforgivable sin
Any talking out loud with any librarian
Such as Emily.....Madam Librarian.

Let it out
Or maybe...let’s not.
There are certain benefits to keeping it in. Or maybe that's just my Teutonic blood talking.

"Brad and I want to continue to adopt, but keeping a big family uses up a lot of money."
Perhaps we could write to Angelina with some cost cutting suggestions.

Go to Smith? She couldn't even spell it.
Don’t forget - tomorrow is National Smith Day.
Call a Smith and wish him/her well. Please, no calls after 8:00PM CST. (Even if you are a Smith. This Smith needs her sleep.)

One evening in the mid-1980s, Haggard found a handful of congregants praying over a 5-gallon bucket of cooking oil. They said God had told them to anoint the city, and so they did, block by block -- using a garden sprayer.
Now that’s just weird. Having just had chalk blessed for an Epiphany door blessing, I think I can speak with some knowledge about various rituals and blessings. But the oil with a garden sprayer thing sounds slippery and dangerous. Although, in the summer, it might help with mosquito larvae in standing water…

Oooh fuuudge!
One last apropos Christmas movie quote for the time being.
Bridget said I could use her car today. The problem is that she locked the keys - the only set of keys - in the trunk before she could go anywhere last night. She had to find a ride to work this morning, from where she called to ask if we had any ideas about how to get into the trunk. Maternal charity keeps me from restating that she should have had an extra door key made. I understand not wanting to spend the big bucks on the ignition key with the microchip. But a two dollar door key? Hmmmm. So we may not go too far today.

I’m very surprised that I was not aware of this last night. I would suppose that when it happened she wove a tapestry of obscenities that as far as we know is still hanging in space over Lake Michigan.

My own personal epiphany...
Just 5 days until National Smith Day. Can’t hardly wait.

Happy New Year!!!
This morning is when we reap the benefits of my typical abstemious New Year’s Eve.

There is much to be said for a celebration that includes prayer, a Pinky and the Brain ‘film’ festival, followed by a nap before the uncorking of the sparkling grape juice at 11:50. And then off to bed.

Ten hours into 2007 and we’re doing OK with the resolutions:
1 - find more opportunities for prayer and sacrifice
2 - let’s all learn to return CD’s and DVD’s to their cases.

We’re going to make the disc thing work. We may not be especially well off, but we’re blessed with a lot of music, cinema and software and it’s about time to cultivate a little discipline in the care of our stuff. (I came very close to lending a friend an empty “Monster House” case for her weekend viewing entertainment. That was the second to last straw. The last straw was when I couldn’t find the empty case...but the disc turned up and I had to put it in a box with a homemade label.)

Living in an unincorporated part of the county makes us the recipient of quite a few ad hoc fireworks displays around July 4th and January 1st. The chances of being caught by the sheriff’s department are pretty slim and some of the young dudes in the neighborhood take full advantage.
So, the Roman candles and M-80’s were fun for the first couple of minutes and then they just became plain annoying. Unlike other times, when I would just pull the pillow over my head and grind my teeth, I decided to offer up my irritation for the people in the world who go to bed every night to similar sounds. Sounds that sound like those sounds but signal things much more ominous. I also counted my blessings that it was January 1 in the Chicago 'burbs and I was sleeping in front of a slightly open window. This should be the the heart of winter claustrophobic-housatosis-despair.