Book Report August 2015

Mercy: Shake the World (1993) by J.M. Dematteis, Paul Johnson (illust)

This is the first graphic novel I’ve ever read, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The story was strong and the illustrations top-notch. Joshua Rose is a middle aged man who had a stroke and is on life support in a coma. His mind is still very active though. He is visited by an entity he calls “Mercy” and travels through time and space with her and witnesses Mercy/mercy in action.

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The Plums Hang High (1955) by Gertrude E. Finney

Good read!! The Howard family comes to the US in 1868 from England to start a farm. Young Mariah Howard is woefully unprepared for the hard life of a pioneer, coming from a background of wealth. She is strong of body and faith, however, and learns along with her husband how to make another country their home.

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It’s a Woman’s World (1944) by Mary Louise Aswell (ed.)

This is a collection of stories written by woman, taken from Harper’s Bazaar. Some were fiction, some were not. All very well written and interesting, and very much from a woman’s point of view.

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The Detective and Mr. Dickens (1990) by William J. Palmer

Very interesting point of view in this book. It’s a fictionalized account of Wilkie Collins and his friendship with Charles Dickens. They team up with Detective William Field and see the sordid side of London and the people who live there. I think there are 3 more books in this series.

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If Walls Could Talk (2014) by Emily Thomas

A Blue Hill Library story. Anne discovers that heavy rains have caused some crumbling at the base of one of the basement walls. When workers go to repair the wall, they discover a skeleton and another room beyond the basement. Anne sets out to discover the identity of the skeleton so he/she can be laid to rest properly.

What’s My Locker Combination?!?!?

It’s that time of year again. Back to school. Where did the summer go???

It’s been 43 years since I graduated high school. WHY do I start getting those old feelings when I see the displays of markers, binders, notebooks etc in the stores, gearing up for another school year to begin?

Then the dreams start…

WHERE is my locker? WHAT is my combination? WHERE are my classes? WHAT are my classes? What do you mean, school started 2 weeks ago and I’ve missed 2 weeks worth of classes, don’t know what the homework was, didn’t even know about it?????

Why does this happen? I never forgot where my locker was or what the combination was. None of the terrible things in the dreams ever really happened to me. Yes, 7^th through 12^th grade was hell itself for me most of the time, but nothing like the dreams.

One of my favorite Val Kilmer movies was “Top Secret!” which was a spoof of spy movies. At one point Val Kilmer has been captured and is being tortured. He drifts off into a dream about high school and being late for class and all the other horrors of those kinds of dreams. When he returns to consciousness and realizes he isn’t in school but is being whipped, he smiles and says in relief “Thank God!”

That’s how I feel when I wake up from one of those school dreams. Thank you, Lord, for seeing me through those awful years.

Crumbs in the Cleavage (and other ponderables)

I was watching TV and munching on a Walmart brand Sno-ball.* Since it’s summer, I was wearing a tank top. Quite low-cut BTW. I try to eat as neatly as possible, but I still found myself dropping crumbs of cake and coconut into my cleavage. It got me to thinking. Do women who regularly wear low-cut garments find “stowaways” at the end of the day? Munching popcorn in a dark theater…bread sticks in an Italian restaurant…that kind of thing. I remember once watching a movie and the lead actor was doing a line of coke between a stripper’s breasts, but I suspect it was put there on purpose…

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I was looking at the directions on my deodorant the other day. Under ‘directions for use’ it said to apply ONLY to underarms. I hesitate to wonder where else you would apply it. OK, I lied. I can come up with a LOT of different places, but I am a lady** so I will leave that one unspecified…

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I HATE shoe shopping with a passion. Mainly because I have huge feet and can’t find anything cute that actually fits. I’ve written before about how if I find a decent pair of shoes and wear them awhile and they still feel good, I will go back to that store and but another pair exactly like the first ones. I once bought a pair of high heels. I NEVER wear high heels. My feet don’t like them. But these shoes called my NAME!! What was I to do?? I tried them on. After regaining my balance***, I walked a few paces. They felt good! So I bought them. The first time I actually wore them for more than a couple minutes I was ready to cut my feet off! The shoes betrayed me! They hurt! Never again!!

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*Walmart Sno-balls are MUCH better than the ones reintroduced by Hostess. I found the Walmart ones bigger, softer and better tasting. Be warned.

**NO LAUGHTER

***Because I’m so short, the sudden gain in elevation threw me for a moment.