A Reading Challenge

So, lately I’ve been reading lists of books to read. I find that a great many list books I have read, and I think it’s time to mention some that may not be so well known.  Not all of these books are long, although many of them of are, they are not all adult fiction, many of them are young adult, some of them are even on other lists, but they are in no particular order: So here are my favorites . Read them, love or hate them, just read them (if you want) I don’t think you will regret it.

Clara’s Favorites Reading Challenge:

1. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

2. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien

3. The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

4. It by Stephen King

5. Percy Jackson and The Olympians Saga by Rick RIordan

6. The Enchanted Forest Series by Patricia C. Wrede

7. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

8. The Castings Trilogy by Pamela Freeman

9. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

10. A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin

11. The Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins

12. Memnoch the Devil by Anne Rice

13. Under the Done by Stephen King

14. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

15.  On Writing by Stephen King

16. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes

17.  The Legends of King Arthur and His Knights by Sir James Knowles

18. The Other Boleyn Girl by Phillipa Gregory

19. The Help by Katherine Stockett

20. The Lottery by Shirley Jackson

21. Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift

22. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

23. The Shack by William P. Young

24. Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell

25. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll

26. The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry

27. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

28. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

29.  The Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini

30. The Road by Cormac McCarthy

31. The Postman by David Brin

32. Inferno by Dante Alighieri

33. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

34. The Illiad by Homer

35. Atonement by Ian McEwan

36. Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut

37. Slughter-house-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

38. The Giver by Lois Lowery

39. The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde

40. The Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

41. His Dark Materials Trilogy by Phillip Pullman

42. Essays and Poems by Ralph Waldo Emerson

43. Where the Sidewalk Ends by Sheil Silverstien

44. Howls Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

45.  Watership Down by Richard Adams

46. The Harry Potter Series by J. K. Rowling

47. Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter by Seth Graham-Smith

48. Gangs of New York by Herbert Asbury

49. The Stand by Stephen King

50. Lord of the Flies by William Golding

51.  The Fall of Atlantis by Marion Zimmer-Bradley

52.  The Lorax by Dr, Seuss

53.  Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

54. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

55.  The Bielski Brothers: The True Story of Three Men Who Defied the Nazis, Built a Village in the Forest, and Saved 1,200 Jews by Peter Duffy

56.  The Fall of the Athenian Empire by Donald Kagan

57.  The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

58. The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen

59. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey

60. The Circle of Magic Quartet by Tamora Pierce

61. The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood

62.  Fool by Christopher Moore

63. The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare

64. Chocolat by Joanne Harris

65. The Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett

66. Watchmen by Alan Moore & David Gibbons

67. The Godfather by Mario Puzo

68. The Once and Future King by T.H. White

69.  The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux

70.  The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

71.  I, Robot by Isaac Asimov

72.  Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day byWinifred Watson

73. Dracula by  Bram Stoker

74. The Diaries of the Family Dracul by Jeanne Kalogridis

75. The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

76. The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan

77. The Client by John Grisham

78. A Time to Kill by John Grisham

79. The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

80. 300 by Frank Miller

81.  V for Vendetta by Alan Moore

82. Jurassic Park by Micheal Creighton

83. The Last Ride by Thomas Edison

84. The Vampire LeStat by Anne Rice

85. The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

86. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

87.  The Call of the Wild and White Fang by Jack London

88.  About a Boy by Nick Hornby

89.  The Republic by Plato

90.  Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

91.  The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo

92.  Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray

93.  Carrie by Stephen King

94.  The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells

95. The Pern Novels by Anne McCaffrey

96. The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan

97.  Freakonomics by Steven Litt and Stephen J Dubner

98. The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer-Bradley

99. The Complete Fairy Tales by The Brothers Grimm (not the Hans Christian Anderson rewrites)

100. Nothing Lasts Forever by Roderick Thorpe (This book became Die Hard)

Rant-ish thing

Ok people, I get it, everybody has an opinion, and everybody has an opinion about the opinion that everybody has. Yippee.

I have got to say that I am so incredibly sick and tired of all the propaganda that goes with expressing your opinion. I may not agree with the owners of Chik-fil-A, but they have a right to their opinion. Same as the Dixie Chicks had a right to theirs.

Maybe this makes me a person of low moral backbone. But the fact that I disagree with the owner doesn’t mean that I will not patronize the chain. I still listened to Dixie Chicks music too. It is just as bad to put people out of work as it is to discriminate against people who believe differently than you do.

If you really don’t want to support them, then don’t go to their place of business. Don’t buy their product. And by all means, express your opinion about it when asked, or when conversation allows, but please, for the love of all things, enough with the public attacks.

All of the public backlash and abuse, is no different than the abuse they are dishing out. Rise above. And please STFU about it.

ALSO

Not all Christians act like bigots. The ones who don’t just never make the press. Leave it to a few to give a bad name to many, and leave it to the many to complacently accept it.

End. Rant.

Home

I’ve been doing some thinking lately about what home is. It’s been a really long time since I have felt like the place where I live, is my home. When I was growing up, I was never afraid to go home, no matter what I had done, or where I had been or what was going on, home was safe.

What do I mean by safe?

The door was never locked, my friends were always welcome, the phone nothing to be afraid of, we could always call. If I needed help of any kind, my parents were always available, no questions asked, no judgement.

That’s not to say that when I did something wrong there were no consequences. Because there were. Usually serious ones, the degree of which depended on the offense.

 

Lately, I have seen a lot of parenting paraphernalia, and most of it just makes me sad. So much of what I see is from what I consider a selfish parents point of view. “You did this or you missed that and it messed up my day so….” to me, this way of dealing with a child is utterly wrong.  Now, I’m not a perfect parent, I’m scared to death of when she gets older and how we are going to teach her. I have analyzed  the things my parents did, and all the things they did wrong, and all the things I hated about them at the time, and I realized that I don’t have a clue how to do what they did.

I just know that no matter what, no matter what she does or what choices she makes, I want my Little Lady to always feel welcome in my house. I want her to feel safe when she comes home, to know that there are always arms here to hold her when she needs them. I want her to never be afraid to call and get a ride home, or just talk and ask for advice. I want her to know that the place she lives is more than just a house, it’s her home, her anchor, her safe haven, and even when she does wrong, that her home is where she belongs.

Getting Routined…

In my opinion, getting settled into a routine is by far the HARDEST part of parenting, at least so far. Trying again to get one established with My Little Lady, and it sucks to listen to her cry at bedtime. I really hate it :(, I know that I have to let her go to sleep and stay firm, but it really blows the hairy bird.

 

Of course, since the school year is rapidly approaching, it is time to get myself settled into a routine at well, which mean a firm bedtime of no later than midnight. Getting up at 6am and doing a quick workout, cleaning up, making breakfast, waking up the Little Lady and getting ready for/ going to work. Yep Yep. Starting that one this week

This year, was my first year doing the Summer Reading Program at the local library as both an adult and a parent, it has been a blast and sadly, this week is the last week. Looking forward to the closing celebration on Thursday, and I’m SO proud of my Little Lady, 100 books for her first summer. Next years goal is 125. It’s a lot easier than it sounds since it’s picture books, but still, how awesome is that!?

Anyway, I’m doing my adult time relaxing and catching up on my this-show-or-movie-so-not-appropriate-for-my-kid-to-see stuff:) Goodnight!

Indecision…

I can’t decide what to do today,The Little Lady woke me from a corpse-like sleep, screaming bloody murder because she had a minor nosebleed, so took care of that crisis and headed out to the living room which I had left a mess last night due to extensive playing of video games. At some point last night daddy came up for a midnight snack and left his milk glass on the table, it took the little lady all of about thirty seconds to discover and destroy it, leaving the living room carpet a veritable mine field of books and glass shards.

So I rushed her to daddy, and cleaned up the glass, tripping over books all the while, and then retrieve her. She was not happy to have been unceremoniously deposited in the basement with daddy in the dark. Spend a few minutes comforting her, then have lunch. Decided to go swimming at some point, since we have a free pass, but can’t find anyone to go with us, so not sure which place to go. Need to clean up the house, and go to the store and do the laundry today. I didn’t get a work out in yesterday so I need to make sure I do that today too. Just not sure in which order to do things….. 😦

Taking a moment to indulge….

So, I’m gonna rant a little here and take a moment to do the pity me thing. If you don’t want to read it, skip down and read the stuff under the ——- line.

I feel second rate. I feel like I get no help, and I get no notice and it doesn’t matter how many other people I “like” things for or post comments on, when it’s me that makes some progress or declares a goal. No one gives a shit. I hate that.  Maybe this is being passive aggressive, but I need to get it out, and I don’t feel like my usual sounding boards are available anymore, although, happily, one of them may be back. I started a competitive weight loss blog with my sister. I’m down 4 pounds, and I’ve laid out a goal to do the color run next year. I have gotten no “likes” and no comments, no encouragement, not even a shut the hell up. From anyone. Not even from my sister who I know reads the blog. I make an effort to send encouragement to her and to my other family, if I don’t have time to comment I always “like” but no one does that for me. No one.  I don’t get any credit for the blog idea either, even though it was me that pointed out we could motivate each other from afar, whatever.

——————————————————–

I’M DOWN 4 POUNDS!!!!! Maybe that doesn’t seem like a lot, but it’s a start and it feels good. I’m so proud of my sister who is down 11 pounds!!! And my other sister, brother and relative are also competitively blogging to see who gets to 200 first, good luck to them and I’m so proud!!! Everybody is getting in shape 🙂 Huzzah!

Also, one of my best friends is out of wedding planning hibernation and home from vacations so I get her back! HUZZAH!

If you would like to keep track of our progress you can at sistersfightfat.blogspot.com

🙂

Declaration of stuff

It’s time to get my routine whipped into shape, so here goes:

Starting Monday

6a.m.- Get up and make a small snack

6:10a.m.- Write until Alice wakes up

9:00a.m.- Wake up Alice if she is not already up, have breakfast with her

10:00a.m.-1:00p.m.- run errands, clean, play with Alice, whatever

1:00p.m.- Lunch

2:00p.m.-4:00p.m.- whatever

2:30p.m.- Alice goes down for a nap

4:00p.m.- Work out (half an hour with zumba, one hour with other)

5:00p.m.- If Alice is not awake, wake her up

6:00p.m.- Dinner

7:00p.m.-9:30p.m.- whatever time

9:30p.m.- Bath for Alice

10:00p.m.- Put on Sprout Channel Good Night Show

11:00p.m.- Alice goes to bed

12:00a.m. I go to bed.

 

We’ll see how this works out, it may be edited as we go for something that works better, but for now we’re gonna go with it, that is the official plan. Wish me luck!

 

The Inside of the Circle

Friday was the last day of school, which also means it was my last day of work for the school year, it was also the last of day of work for two wonderful teachers. At my school we have a tradition for event like this, the concert choir encircles the event and sings a four part-not quite a round version of- The Lord Bless You and Keep You.
It is in fact an incredibly thing. I have sang it myself in the circle close to a hundred times it seems and have always shed a tear. It is a rare privilege to be able to send someone off with that kind of blessing, or to reach out in sympathy, and when you are the one on the inside, let me tell you, it is impossible not to cry.

I have been on the inside twice. The first time was when my dad passed away in 2003. I was away on the show choir retreat that weekend, doing what I knew my dad would have wanted, which was to keep singing, to keep going, to keep living. I got lost in it that weekend. I was incredibly sad, but also relieved that the cancer that had slowly ate away at my father was not longer consuming him. As I prepared to leave the retreat a few hours early (an unprecedented event) I was pulled up from my belongings by a friend and our rather obnoxious director. I was encircled for the first time in my life by people who wanted nothing more than to support me and give me strength, no matter what our relationship was, every person sang to me and they all meant it. They all wanted to help and I bowed beneath the weight of it as the power of the voices, the words and the music ripped the tears from me, I was held up by the arms of one person and then crushed by the weight of fifty as the song ended and every voice became a solid entity and then I was swept from the hall, my belonging already loaded for me, my new brown suit pulled back into place by innumerable hands and I went to say my final earthly tribute to my beloved father. A man who is still greatly missed.

For my second experience, the song was not for me, but for two wonderful and dedicated teachers who had inspired more students than they would ever know about. All of the staff sat at the final luncheon to say farewell, and the music washed over me, and it still held all the power of the first time, I caught the eye of another teacher there who had graduated the year before me and had also sung this piece with me and we shared a quiet tear across the room before turning away from each other, and even though the song wasn’t for me, it touched me deeply, I was still swept away in the moment. Writing about it now, I am indeed haunted by its emotional grip:

The Lord Bless You and Keep You
The Lord life His countenance upon you
And give you peace
The Lord make His face to shine upon you
And be gracious unto you
And be gracious
The Lord by gracious unto you
Amen.

I don’t want to play an MMO…

My list of long time friends has dwindled down to five that aren’t relatives. Of these five I only see two of them on a regular basis and one of them just moved away for the summer. Not good odds for me. I keep being surprises by these things when they happen. I never considered myself a heinous person, but I just can’t bring myself to think that ALL of these people that I used to trust are collectively that mean. So maybe I was. I honestly don’t know. All I can say about it now is that even if I was heinous, I’m not that person anymore.

I want to make new friends. Hang out with people who share common interests. But, I have to be picky about it. I don’t think I could survive another mass purge of the trusted and loved. I need to meet people in the flesh and blood, hear their voices while seeing their faces and watching how they react to mine. In other words, I don’t want to make a bunch of online friends. It’s nothing personal, but I need contact, not IMs.

The trouble is, I don’t know where to start. The things I used to enjoy are all wrapped up in these lost people. I don’t know if I could honestly continue in these pursuits and really love/enjoy them the way I used to. So that means trying things, and meeting new people, and figuring out what I like to do now. With other people that is.

I spend so much time at home, alone with my little lovely daughter. I love it, I love her, and don’t want to loose that. I just feel like maybe, I need a night to just be me sometimes, to rediscover the things that I am passionate about. To move forward and find new friends to add to the shining few. To evolve in life, and it would be great if that could happen soon, because to be honest. I feel alone most of time, and I am tired of it.

 

The Following is a true account of a fictional posibility

It was easy to see the pride in their eyes, standing there, facing their peers, preparing to join them in triumph. There were twenty of them waiting to welcome the three, all lined up in khaki uniforms, patches in neat rows, and above them, the newer addition, two brass bars. It was the bars that indicated the coveted rank, the once less macabre distinction: Eagle Scout. What once meant responsibility, dependability and intelligence, now also indicated a deadly ability, to kill the dead. To survive and maintain the borders, to manage the threat until winter, when the road crews would take over, plowing the frozen corpses into deep pits that would later succumb to the flamethrowers of the military. The government claimed that the “reanimation threat” was lessened every year, even though more and more young men and women were needed to keep it at bay. The surviving neighborhoods kept getting smaller, rather than expanding to reestablish the cities. Whispers filled the air like spring breezes, snippets of doubting conversations, conspiracy theories and despairing fatalistic remarks. Personally, I thought that the government has simply underestimated the threat and it would take more work and a longer period of time than three years to put it to rest, but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t afraid of how things would go until then. Military control, communism, terrorists, cannibals, all the horror stories that I had ever heard constantly nagged at the back of my brain, tormenting me in my sleep. But I was optimistic, like my three friends waiting to receive their stripes, the mark of their 100th erasure, 100 of the reanimated dead, re-slain. The final accomplishment of all rest. Eagle Scouts. Now and forever.