Shiny Things

I would like to have these to wear with my fantasy dress. They remind me of the first time I went to London, in the 90s. Everyone was wearing shoes in ice cream colors Very long day at work, but a large chunk of it was at a meeting room in the library. I picked up a book about the origins of The Odyssey (which I will be teaching in the fall), because it was enticingly arrayed with the James Joyce books out for Bloomsday (fun looking article about which here ). At the library I saw a woman wearing white capri pants with a large widely spaced floral pattern in clear toned pastels. I'm not much of a pastel person, but this print was unusual, the quality of the color was like someone had taken crystalline animation cells and transferred them to cotton. I would like to own these pants. Better yet, I would like to have a summer dress with this fabric. Something self-consciously demure, sleeveless with gathered shoulders, a round neck, and slightly cinched, softly pleated waist, knee leng...

I neglected to document my greens, so please accept this photo as an approximation. These lovely greens are from what looks like a lovely blog called Real Food Kosher . Her recipe is essentially like mine, except I also used vidalia onion, and of course, vinegar. I like those moments I don't know that I am going to have and then find myself in the midst of -- well, I like the moments like this when good things happen. This morning, sleeping over at the in-laws in Lakewood, I woke up a little before 5 and my lower back was stiff and I couldn't get back to sleep and I knew I had reading to do, so I got up and snuck downstairs to make coffee (of course, I roused my mother-in-law anyway, but she said some kind things about toast and went back to bed). My intention had been to sit in one of the wingbacks in the living room or upstairs in the recliner in the big room where we sleep, but then I realized there was a screened in back porch and it was a cool morning in June. I took my co...

Everyone loves a parade, especially one with dancing teeth! ( From today's Parade the Circle, in University Circle, Cleveland. ) Kids finished school for the year, summer is upon us, and it was a good week for light.  On Monday morning I had a phone call to make first thing, but there was no reason I had to make it from a desk. I decided to stop and use my cell from the Shaker Lakes. As I approached the turn in at the west end of the lakes along North Park, I could see glimpses of the water through the trees. Then for one moment, I could see the lights on the footbridge over the dam at the end of the lake still glowing orange in the brightening dawn, big and soft in the humid morning air. On the surface of the water the reflection showed as bright twin smudges stretching all the way across the lake. (When I got out of my car, I saw two sleeping mallards balled up on the dam and out on the water what I think was a female horned grebe diving for breakfast.) On Thursday late afternoon...

Questions: How much TV do you watch, and how do you manage that? I don't want to come off as self-righteously anti-TV. I like TV. I don't doubt that we are in a much-vaunted (provide your own links here) new Golden Age of Television. Great, great writing and acting is happening on TV regularly. I do not doubt this. And how cool that our electrified in-home storyteller has gotten so good at its craft. Humans are story animals; this is good news for us in that sense. I understand something really epic happened on Game of Thrones last night, and I admit that I wish I were following GoT so I could participate in the afterglow. But I don't know how to make room for it. I already don't have time to do so many other things. I perceive that most people both watch more TV than I do and have cleaner houses. This feels like a paradox. David and I manage to watch one, maybe two shows at a time. Last week, discovering that the British hospital comedy Green Wing was available on Net...