Robot Unicorn Attack

Grading...dishes...tired...hm. Must fulfill duties to blog. Here, play this game!

Play it here

Pumpkins

I want to paint Angry Bird pumpkins this year--I'm much better at painting than carving, and I've got a lot of extra acrylic paint from my murals and other projects! Here is a picture from be different act normal:

I love the shape of the yellow one in particular, and I think the use of the stems is clever! If only I can light something on top of the bomb one (it is the best).

SMA is the worst.

SMA, or Spinal Muscular Atrophy, is one of my least favorite things in this world. I love my niece Taleah and my niece Tabitha, and both of them have to suffer because of a genetic condition they can't control. SMA is the number one genetic killer of children under the age of two. I had never heard of SMA until I met my future-husband and his family, and now I wish it really didn't exist. It does, though. I wish it didn't, but it does.

I once went to a doctor to get the genetic test and see if I am a carrier for SMA. He'd never heard of the disease (he signed the forms anyway, side note, and I'm not a carrier). Anyway, if doctors don't always know about SMA, I figure that lots of other people don't, either. And if more people learn about it--and maybe, just maybe, if enough people care they can donate and help little children to walk and run and live a normal life.

Little Tabitha is in the hospital. I pray she will get better soon.

E-book Reader

After my son got sick, and then took amoxicillin to get better, and then reacted to the medication with a leopard-spot swelling of hives, I have started to consider buying an e-reader. I need books, especially when I am in front of the TV all day watching Elmo, who is a fine furry monster in his own way but doesn't interest me like, say, Tiffany Aching. And maybe (this is justifying the purchase) I could use it to respond to student scholarship essays. Oh! And also critique partners (I have critique partners with books that are very hard for me to leave on the computer screen because I want to read them all the way through really really fast now!). I could help them!

Okay. See, now that you know all the reasons I need one, do you have any suggestions? Kindle Fire? Nook to support Barnes and Noble? A tablet like the Nexus? I would love to hear anything about any one of them--especially from a reader/writer's point of view!

(Now Cookie Monster is a Muppet who is interesting. I have to admit that I look up from even a Terry Pratchett book (usually) when that big blue glutton comes on screen!)

Favorite Parts of Today

Lava ash bread for lunch (okay, it was monkey bread, but we changed it).

Two-year-old dumping peanuts on the floor while a visitor talks about how fun it is to have kids. Then he goes and dumps out the goldfish crackers.

To the zoo! With cousins!

Dinner at Chiles. I had never been there before. No sons or nieces escaped. Hooray!

This is a baby snow leopard who is pouncing on a seal. According to my four-year-old, who is always right about what creature/superhero/thing he currently is.

Cutest nieces! Our two-year-old was running with Dad, but he was there, too. And Aunt Allison, who took better pictures. And Uncle Richard, too!

Favorites

I have a hard time picking favorites. At the beginning of the year, I tell my students they can ask me anything, and I always get questions like What's your favorite book? Your favorite song? Your favorite mythological creature? There's other questions as well, but those ones make me think. And what I've decided is: it depends.

On some days, when I'm feeling reflective and quiet, Gilead by Marilynne Robinson is my favorite book. On some days (like today) when I'm trying to distract a four-year-old with a broken candy bar (gasp!), my new favorite might be Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which is an entirely different kind of story. On different occasions, I might feel like listening to Florence and the Machine, or the Lord of the Rings soundtrack, or (occasionally) the first CD I ever discovered on my own (Jagged Little Pill, during middle school, in case you wanted the complete record). Favorites are hard to pick! Even favorite colors depend on context, it seems (for the four-year-old? flaming red. for my writing room? green is supposed to be soothing...).

Yeah. If it's a favorite, I answer based off of mood.

And my favorite mythological creature? Dragon.

For now.

* If you watch this, you will get an old song stuck in your head. Plus thunder! You have been warned.

Phew!

Today my two-year-old ate food. He didn't have to sit on my lap every hour he was awake, and he didn't melt into a puddle of "moooooommmmyyyy" sobs every time I had to stand up and, say, get him a Popsicle. And he didn't feel hot, and he even smiled and laughed some! Turns out he had a double ear infection, and since we got him on antibiotics on Thursday he's finally, on Monday, returning to his normal happy-learning-to-talk two-year-old self. Phew! If there's one thing that gets in the way of writing (and grading, and eating, and sleeping...), it's a very sick child.

I'm so glad he's feeling better!

He's giggling upstairs with big brother right now. Occasionally I hear my husband yell "Hey!," which is ominous, but it's worth several rolls of toilet paper (or whatever they're getting into) to hear him happy again!

Poor, sick toddler

I want to call him a baby, but he's not anymore. Regardless, the boy is sick. His nose is so stuffy that whenever he tries to say "Hi, Mommy!" it comes out as "I, Mubby," and he's constantly wiping his upper lip with his hand. He won't drink medicine unless it's mixed with water on a spoon (for some reason), and I just wish I could give him a hug that would destroy all the germs inside his two-year-old body.

At least he's got "Melmo" and Sesame Street, or he'd be a constant puddle of misery. Poor little guy!

Goodreads

I like Goodreads. I've meant to keep a journal of books I read for the longest time, but I usually don't get beyond a page or so before I misplace the notebook, or start using it for to-do lists, or find four-year-old watercolor renditions of volcano lava chasing wolves on top of my notes. So Goodreads lets me keep track of what I've read, and roughly how well I like it. This is good. As a reader, I give three stars to books that I finished but don't want to reread, four stars to books I really liked, and five stars to books that I loved to the point of needing to own them forever.

There are two star and one star books. Hopefully I put them down before I finished them. If I didn't, I would feel annoyed with myself.

Anyway, all of this is my confused way of saying: as a reader, I like Goodreads.

But as a writer, it's sort of scary.

You get to see who loved what you wrote and who didn't, and no matter how awesome your book is, some people won't like it. Many of the negative reviews will have valid points. Some won't. Its all part of being brave and publishing, though, and I'm so, so grateful for the authors who publish. Because reading is my favorite! And I've only read super-good books recently, so I am happy with the reading world.

I'm glad I blogged today. I almost forgot to renew my library books! I shall go and do that now...