Bess and Georges

Today I'm thankful for Laura Ingalls Wilder and Herge, the two writers who have had the biggest impact on my life. I don't even know who I'd be if I hadn't read and reread and reread again every single Tintin and Little House book. Would I know what head cheese and name cards are? Would I know how to braid straw for a hat, or that the "chinook" is the wind that blows in the first spring weather, or that badgers flatten themselves out when threatened? Where would my sense of moral location be if I didn't have Ma's sure guiding hand on my back? And even more's to the point, where would my sense of humor be if I didn't have the reference for "ten thousand thundering typhoons!"?

So, Bess and Georges, I'm thankful for you both as you continue to be strongly present in my life, into adulthood.

Thankful for Funny: Or, a Remarkably Un-funny Post about Funniness.

Today I'm giving thanks for funny: funny people, funny blogs, funny movies, and funny songs. I love more than anything to laugh, to genuinely laugh, it's what keeps the weeping woohoos at bay and makes life worth living, as much as loving does. Every once in awhile, or maybe all the time, one runs into a person without a sense of humor, a person who looks at you like you're nutty when you laugh maniacally at something you thought was obviously hilarious...my dear departed grandma Eva was one of these souls, although one of the kindest people on earth. Ironically, she was married to Grandpa Max, who had one of the wittiest most brilliant senses of humor I've ever experienced! Pretty much everyone I've met in the blog world has an awesome sense of humor, though, and even if their blog posts are often serious, you can see the spark of wit in their comments. Here are some of my favoritest funny people online, the ones who most often make me laugh right out loud:

Megan, CSI Seattle, Inner Voices, MJ, and a secret favorite, Old Knudsen (who doesn't even know who I am or how often I read him and cackle wildly to myself), and Beast. These folks consistently have the Funny Kevorka.

My sissy is perhaps one of the funniest people alive today. Sometimes when I'm with her I laugh so hard I cry and fall off the couch. And my brother-in-law and Sarge too. And Hedgehog. Ditto my oldest friend AKPW, who often comes out with a sally that will reverberate for days and even weeks. She's let loose with some classics that need no context and will remain genius into eternity. And she's been providing me with these moments of pure joy since we were babies.

I also love low-brow comedy, Sascha Baron Cohen (aka Borat) and and the South Park guys (although just between us, I think a lot of their soapbox rattlings are pretty profound and iconoclastic...). And Woody Allen's "Love and Death."


Also I admit to loving Weird Al Yankovich and The Hanukah Song, which is and will always be a classic of Jewish humor. Also my personal god, Andy Samberg of The Mirror, The Chronicles of Narnia, and Ras Trent.

And now I'll leave you with a gift, for anyone who needs a laugh and hasn't yet experienced the brilliant beacon of hilarity that is...The Onion.

Okay, I may be back later if I remember more funny things and people for you. Right now I have to go to the gym. If you're funny and I forgot to mention you, yell in the comment section.

Thankful for Yarn

Today I'm thankful for yarn. It's so lovely.

Thankful for Yarn

Today I'm thankful for yarn. It's so lovely.

Election Day

Today I'm thankful for my right to vote, in secret ballot. And I offer you some more Whitman:


Election Day, November, 1884
by Walt Whitman


If I should need to name, O Western World, your powerfulest scene and
show,
'Twould not be you, Niagara--nor you, ye limitless prairies--nor
your huge rifts of canyons, Colorado,
Nor you, Yosemite--nor Yellowstone, with all its spasmic
geyser-loops ascending to the skies, appearing and disappearing,
Nor Oregon's white cones--nor Huron's belt of mighty lakes--nor
Mississippi's stream:
--This seething hemisphere's humanity, as now, I'd name--the still
small voice vibrating--America's choosing day,
(The heart of it not in the chosen--the act itself the main, the
quadriennial choosing,)
The stretch of North and South arous'd--sea-board and inland--
Texas to Maine--the Prairie States--Vermont, Virginia, California,
The final ballot-shower from East to West--the paradox and conflict,
The countless snow-flakes falling--(a swordless conflict,
Yet more than all Rome's wars of old, or modern Napoleon's:) the
peaceful choice of all,
Or good or ill humanity--welcoming the darker odds, the dross:
--Foams and ferments the wine? it serves to purify--while the heart
pants, life glows:
These stormy gusts and winds waft precious ships,
Swell'd Washington's, Jefferson's, Lincoln's sails.

"America, I'm Putting My Queer Shoulder to the Wheel"

Today I need to catch up a bit on my thanks, since I missed the first day of November.

On the eve of the election I'm thankful for America in all its rowdy contentious argumentative nonconformist naive and weathered beauty.

And I'm thankful for Allen Ginsberg and Walt Whitman, two of my favorite American poets, who wrote about us and all our ragtag ingredients.



America
by Walt Whitman
(1819-1892)

Centre of equal daughters, equal sons,
All, all alike endear'd, grown, ungrown, young or old,
Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich,
Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love,
A grand, sane, towering, seated Mother,
Chair'd in the adamant of Time.

Thankful in November

(courtesy of Confessions of a Craft Addict)

I found this link over at Miscellany of Me (and I advise you to check out her mouth-watering peach-mango crisp) to Thankful for 30. I'm going to post one thing I'm thankful for every day in November. My personality has always been a weird, irreconcilable combination of gloom, pessimism, anxiety, and playfulness, cheer, and good humor. So to combat the darker tendencies, I'm going to nurture my hopeful side. I hope others will join in!

Thanks #1: Today is Sarge's birthday, and I'm thankful for him. He is loyal, a good man, morally and ethically strong, brilliant and funny, and a beautiful father to my daughter and husband to me.

That was so easy!

Please join in!

xoxo

A Halloween Meme with a Holiday Theme

I decided to do my own meme--feel free to take it if you like!

1. What's your favorite Solstice or Equinox? Summer solstice. Is there anything more magical?

2. What was your best Halloween costume? My aunt, who worked in theater, borrowed an amazing fairy costume for me from a production of Midsummer Night's Dream. It had enormous metal-frame wings dripping with green gauze, and I kept slamming people with them.

3. What's your favorite kind of candy? Penguin bars. English, and hard to find in the states. Runner up, Brazilian Pudding Pocky.

4. What was your scariest Halloween experience? In the early '80s, I, my mom, and my sis had to take shelter at a random house as a gigantic gang of teens armed with pipes and chains ran screaming through the neighborhood. I'm serious as a heart attack.

5. Do you like to be the go-to house for treats, or are you a faithful curmudgeon? I love to give out treats--to a point. When the teens without costumes begin to show up as it gets darker and later, well, that's when I put on the curmudgeon mask.

6. Do you, like my dad, think trick-or-treating is a little like begging? Well, yes, in a way. But sanctioned, socially acceptable begging. Plus, you're giving a choice. Trick or treat!

7. How many fillings do you have in your teeth? Many.

8. Ever dressed up for Halloween as an adult? What was the costume? Not really, but I plan to wear elf ears tonight to keep Hedgie company.

9. What did you hate to get in your candy bucket as a child? Hands down, pennies. Old worn pennies. Please.

10. Do you like to be scared (I mean, not by a robber with a gun to your head, but by horror movies or haunted house rides)? I LOVE to be scared in a fun way. LOVE it. Horror movies, scary books, haunted houses. I think it makes you feel sort of cozy.

11. What's your favorite horror movie? Halloween. Best ever, still. Love that '70s vibe.

12. Do you think bobbing for apples is unsanitary, or all in good fun? I think it's akin to putting your child's face in a virus-filled petri dish. I cannot believe my mom let me do it.

following questions courtesy of Hedgehog, answers mine:

13. What's your favorite spook (ie, ghost, vampire, werewolf, etc.) Ah, vampires. NC-17 version.

14. Have you ever had a trick played on you? What was it? No, but I'm still waiting!

15. What was your favorite neighborhood you've gone trick-or-treating in? My grandma's neighborhood in Long Island. Totally awesome, totally suburban. What a haul. That year we got to go back to Brooklyn and trick or treat AGAIN.

Back to my questions:

16. Did you ever dress up in one of those icky '70s store-bought costumes with the plastic masks that both suffocated you and cut into your delicate child-like skin? Of course. I'm an American child of the '70s, aren't I? But only one year, and I was a princess with a home-made hat to go on top.

17. If you're a parent, home-made or store-bought costumes for your children? Home-made. Hedgehog and I become obsessed. But I never judge the store-bought.

18. Do you dress your pets and/or babies up for Halloween? Never dressed dog or baby, as neither baby Hedgie nor Pippin would ever stand for it. But I always admire the dogs in costume, especially the indignant-looking mutts. And the babies dressed as pea pods.

19. Would you steal your child's candy? No, I can buy my own. Unless I'm desperate.

20. Do you see Halloween as the harbinger of the impending doom-laden holiday season? Yes.

Ill-Advised Blogging Averted

By popular request...well, Megan's request...I'm editing with some photos. First up, my latest meisterwerk, Carrot Man.

Well Sarge, who possesses more equilibrium and dignity than I do, prevented me from posting another rant about this freaking election. He thought that, like drunk-blogging, anger-blogging is never a good idea. So I won't post what I'm really thinking; for once I'm going to keep it to myself.

Instead, I'm going to post about my knitting. As far from politics as anything could ever be.

I have so many projects going now that my head is spinnnnnnnnning. I must prioritize.

First in the queue, I shall finish the socks for Random Chick. They're almost done, and very pretty. So Random, you and your socks will soon be together.

Next up, a fancy cabled sweater vest for my sissy, in lovely teal wool. It's fairly ambitious, but since it doesn't have arms it's less intimidating. When finished, it will have sterling silver frogs for closures; I rescued them from a sweater of Hedgie's that the moths got to.

Then, an afghan in bulky paprika wool that I promised Sarge's cousin, oh, about a gazillion months ago.

And a quick project which I won't detail here, as it's going to be holiday gifts for assorted peeps.

And a Winter Lace Afghan for a gift for mom.

So, what are you all knitting? Or if not knitting, what craft or art projects are you working on?

Galadriel

Thousands of pearls sewn, diadem crocheted with wire and a tiny needle, silver slippers purchased, elf ears affixed with spirit gum...all add up to one elf queen.