Summer Plans…

Posted on May 26, 2021 by lizipaulk

I’ve now properly started my Summer of Liz which means oodles of free time for me (I’m very lucky), and I’ve been thinking of how I’d like to spend my time. (Doing loads of very worthy and world-changing activities, I’m sure… HA.)

Actually, I’m not sure what I’m going to do but I do know it’s going to involve going to the gym and the pool (for the lazy river, naturally!); it’s going to consist of lots of reading; and I’m determined to continue with this slightly out-of-character interest in cooking new recipes.

(I think this is what happens if you binge-watch a couple of seasons of the Great British Baking Show. I’m not that interested in baking sweet stuff so I tend to focus more on savory recipes. If I’m going to cook, I may as well make it something ready for supper… Two-birds-with-one-stone idea. If I’m honest, I am also not the greatest with fiddly baking stuff either.)

Recipes so far have included spinach and feta cheese wrapped up in individual puff pastry packets (yum); lemon chicken; roasted turkey tenderloins with herb sauce and pork tenderloin with figs — all new recipes to me and all worthy of repeating. 🙂

Reading-wise, I think I’d like to focus on my own TBR pile for a while and see what progress I can make there. I do love the library and I’m sure I’m going to continue my visits there — I’d just like to continue my ongoing focus on my own books as well. (I also need to turn off that One-Click option on Amazon… 😉 )

I’d also bet that there will be a jigsaw puzzle or two to keep me busy.

To contribute to communal life, I volunteered some time with the local Friends of the Library group which was fun and worthwhile. I’ll probably repeat that again sometime soon. Messing around with books? Going to the library? No pressure to be sociable? Yes please.

And then I’d really like to get some culture so I’m planning on seeing what exhibits our museums and art centers have going on. Haven’t been to them for some time so interested in catching what’s new (to me, at least). And linked with this, I’d like to pick up my camera and doing some photog stuff again as well.

So, we’ll see how this progresses. None of this stuff is “have-to-do” and if it happens, that’s great. If not, no pressure there either. Win-win.

I do like summer (especially since our region hasn’t hit the highest temperatures yet so it’s not too brutal to spend time outside right now). I hope your summer is going smoothly as well.

New Orleans, Louisiana – December 2019.

Posted on January 10, 2020 by lizipaulk

Well, hello there. I hope you and your lives are all back in balance after the rather discombobulating holidays at the end of last year, and I hope you’re all getting some good reading done.

The Superhero and I decided to take a quick break just prior to Christmas and jetted down to New Orleans (or the Big Easy, as it’s sometimes called) for a few days. It was gorgeous and we stayed at a fantastic renovated B&B (called The Monrose Row Bed and Breakfast) which was managed by a very friendly and excellent person called Cindy. If you ever need a cool place to stay in NOLA, we highly recommend this B&B. It’s close to everything (walkable for most), Cindy is a font of information about the city and where to go, and she is a great cook as well as being very friendly.

It’s an old B&B located in one of New Orleans’ many historical quarters and Cindy has made this place so welcoming. Truly. It’s also located very close to most of the places a visitor may want to see on his/her trip, and if not, there’s also Uber available throughout the city. (Assume that most trips will average out about $20+ – or at least that is what we found out.)

The last time we’d been to New Orleans was ages ago and not that long since Katrina had hit and devastated parts of the city. Now, years later, it’s hard to see any long-lasting damage on the buildings although there are now new-and-improved neighborhoods and the city itself feels a little better managed. (It might not be, but on this trip, I definitely felt it was a lot less anarchic than the last trip.)

So, tons of lovely architecture to look at and admire, much of which was specially decorated for Christmas and was just gorgeous to see…

And then, because it’s New Orleans, there’s lots of history so naturally we hit up some museums. There was one that featured an exhibit on Mardi Gras and its history (along with some actual costumes – which are amazing!) and then, we wanted to visit some plantations but only see it from the slavery perspective – not from the colonial white-man view.

After a quick chat with Cindy, the B&B proprietor, she recommended an all-day tour of two different plantations which met this requirement: one plantation from a (white – of course) woman-owned perspective (which is pretty rare) and another plantation from the perspective of African slaves who were imprisoned and forced to work there. Both of these historical experiences were so informative and really emotionally moving, especially when you learned more about the actual people who were enslaved in each place. It’s horrifying that it was real and actually happened, but perhaps people have learned from this… (One can only hope.)

That was a sobering experience for us, and after researching these plantation trips, I recognized a picture of one of the most famous white-man plantations except the pic of the place was used as an example of “glorious southern hospitality” on a Visit Mississippi ad on TV. (People – research the pics before you use them in your campaign!)

Yassum, I kin tell you things about slavery times dat would make yo’ blood bile, but dey’s too terrible. I jus’ tries to forgit. (Amy Chapman, former slave.)

The plantation that was wholly (white) woman-owned and run…

All in all, a fantastic trip for us, especially in the winter months when the humidity is way down and the temperatures aren’t way up (as they are in the summer months). Totally enjoyed the trip and will be back at some point in the future. Highly recommended.

So many plantations with slaves up and down the Mississippi River… 😦

And finally, this guy (above) was a “Poet for Hire” and for a donation, he would write you a short poem on his old typewriter!!

Some more gorgeous architecture to gaze at…

September 2018 Reading Review…

Posted on October 2, 2018 by lizipaulk

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So another month has passed, and let’s check in with how my reading is doing (just out of interest).

The reads for September included:

Warriors don’t Cry: The Searing Memoir of the Battle to Integrate Little Rock’s Center High –– Melba Patillo Beals (NF) (blog post to come)
The Great American Read – PBS tie-in (NF)
The Phantom Tollbooth – Norten Juster (F)
Troublemaker – Leah Remini (NF)
The Power – Naomi Alderman (F)
Unforgettable Behavior – Rosemary Kidman Cox (NF)

Ongoing project: Reading the AP Style Book.

So to the numbers:

Total number of books read in September: 6

Total number of pages read: 1,639 pages (av. 273).

Fiction/Non-Fiction: 2 fiction / 4 non-fiction.

Diversity: 1 POC. 5 books by women.

Library books vs. books I owned (and thus removed from the home abode): 3 library books, 2 owned books and 1 e-book.

Future plans include instituting a book-buying ban until December, finish up the AP Style Book, and read more off TBR. 🙂

Unforgettable Behavior – Rosemary Kidman Cox (2017)

Posted on October 1, 2018 by lizipaulk

monkey-book

When I saw this photo (above) of a monkey creature holding a cell phone in a hot pool of water on the cover of this large-format book, I just had to pick it up to look at what was inside the pages. And there, I found a great collection of fantastic award-winning photographs of wildlife from around the world, from tiny spiders in South Africa to giraffes and turtles.

These photos had been recent entries in England’s Natural History Museum’s Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition, and the book’s author/compiler happens to be the editor of BBC Wildlife Magazine for the past 20 years or so, and the long-time judge of Wildlife Photographer of the Year since 1981.

Each two-page spread has an example of astonishing wildlife photography combined with well written and informative text, both explaining what the action in the image represents for the species in question but also delving a little deeper into the background about the animals and insects represented.

It was a feast for the eyes – really. I enjoyed looking at each of the coffee-table sized pages, and even learned a lot about creatures that I’d never heard of: honey pot ants, anyone? 😉

Interestingly, last year a different set of award-winning images were making the rounds of various museums across the U.S., so you may have seen a few of these before if you made it to that exhibition. If not, no worry. The photos here are just as good.

One thing was curious though – there was no image credit for photographer who took that photo of a monkey playing with a phone in the hot tub on front of cover. I searched every page and combed through the index for any mention, but nada. Poor photographer person. Front cover photo and no credit. 😦

Don’t let that deter you though. This was a really fun book to read and look at, and I’ll bet you’ll learn a thing or two about some creatures you don’t know right now. Plus – the photography was delightful!

This is What a Librarian Looks Like – Kyle Cassidy (2017)

Posted on November 1, 2017 by lizipaulk

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When I found this title on the New Releases shelf at our local library, I immediately picked it up as a great fit for me to peruse. It’s a smallish coffee table book with color photographic portraits of librarians from all over the country, taken when the photographer visited a couple of the ALA annual conferences, and although it seems a little lightweight in scope, this was a fun read. A book about people who love books and information – what’s not to like?

What’s not to like is that this book was full of spelling errors and typos which, considering that the topic is literacy and how to access information, was quite ironic when you think about it. (In fact, one of the misspelled words was actually “literacy”…Sigh.)

I can understand one or two errors. That can happen, but page after page of poor writing started to wear on my writer’s soul after a while. All of the mistakes could (and should) have been caught in a careful pre-printing proof, and this was a shame as I loved the book’s concept. Who wouldn’t want to learn more about librarians? 🙂 In the end, the errors ended up being rather distracting for me.

The author is primarily a professional photographer, so the actual photos were pretty good for the most part, although (and I promise I’m not being too picky here) if you are a prof photographer, there’s really very little excuse for some of the actual portraits that were included being out of focus (wrt depth of field). (Or – even more perplexing: why choose them to be in the book in the first place?)

Come on, buddy. You’re not trying to take photos of a herd of cheetahs running at top speed across the savannah in the middle of the night. These photo subjects are folks who probably agreed to have the photo taken between conference sessions in a hotel lobby with a set of lights and a background, and most of the portrait subjects are either sitting down or standing still. It’s not rocket science, my friend. Why would you include photos that are not quite in focus in a book that revolves around your photographs? (And the depth of field issues are not for an arty creative reason. Or not that I could see.)

Additionally, the book concept was lovely, but was again weakened by the fact that underneath each photo of the various librarians was a short sentence about why libraries are important to the subject, and tbh, after the 23^rd person underlining how important libraries are to the community in similar fashion, it was a little tedious.

What kept me going through the pages, though, was looking at the photos of the librarians from across the country, most of whom, both men and women, have a very creative individual fashion sense (which was just lovely). There were very few of the matching cardigan twin set type with pearls, and going by the photos, librarians seem to be a great group with a fun attitude to life.

(And, since it was a book about wonderful librarians, there was naturally a portrait of Nancy Pearl. 🙂 )

So, in the end, although I loved the book’s concept, I am pretty grateful that I used the library for this read. (Thank you, library!)

Movie: Chicken People (2016)

Posted on October 18, 2017 by lizipaulk

chickenpeople_movie Every now and then, the Superhero and I like to catch a movie at home, and last weekend was time for me to choose the title, and full kudos to Superhero for going along with this, as he’s never sure what exactly I’m going to select and he’s going to watch.

At first, I was veering towards a rather stern documentary on North Korea (a country with which I am fascinated at the moment), but seeing his expression when I mentioned that title, I thought that a different title might sit better. Scrolling through my movie list, I stumbled upon another documentary that was described as “charming and uplifting”, so that’s the one we watched. It was actually really good.

Called “Chicken People” and directed by Nicole Lucas Haimes, IMDb describes it thus:

Chicken People is a funny and uplifting look at the world of show chickens and the people who love them. Starting at the largest national poultry competition, likened to the Westminster Dog Show for chickens, Chicken People follows three top competitors over the course of a year as they grapple with life’s challenges while vying to win the next year’s crown. Both humorous and heartfelt, Chicken People is an unforgettable celebration of the human spirit.

And it was such a good film. It’s always fascinating, I think, to learn about other people who are very serious about their hobbies (regardless of what that hobby is), and as we watched these three people try their very best to get the “perfect” chicken to show at this big event, we really became wrapped up in the whole thing.

It would have been easy for another director to turn this into a mockumentary (a la Best in Show et al.), but the documentary was done with respect to these people – no one was mocked or made fun of, and you ended up feeling just so happy that you’d been allowed to follow them on their individual journeys to end up at the hugely important event in the U.S

I would never have learned about the characters or the world of the show chicken if not for this film, and I have no idea where I found the title, but if you’re interested in seeing people who adore doing their hobbies (and are pretty serious about it), then you’ll like this. Slightly off the beaten path, but well worth seeking out.

If you’re interested in any chicken-related reads:

Extra Extraordinary Chickens – Stephen Green-Armytage (2005)
The Hen who Dreamed She Could Fly – Sun-Mi Hwang (2014)

Mini Reading Reviews

Posted on August 9, 2017 by lizipaulk

eyechart

I’ve been reading, as per usual, but not with the usual abandon, I’m afraid. My injured eye is *still* bothering me, and I’ve been ending the day resting it more than usual. It’s really been rather a bane to my existence, but in the big scheme of things, it’s manageable in the end. Plus – my doc and I are making progress, so I’m hopeful that this is temporary.

Anyway, so life has been moving a bit slowly, but the vision issue combined with the lassitude of late summer makes for not many blog entries about books read. For the two that I have recently finished up, they were good reads, but not astonishingly fascinating enough to write book reviews. To wit, here are two mini reading reviews. As always, these tiny review-lettes don’t necessarily mean that the titles were bad. Sometimes, you can have a good read and still end up with not much to say, so they fall into that category.

Mrs. Miniver – Jan Struthers (1939)

This was a reread to get another title into the ongoing Century of Books and was quite fun. It’s a collection of newspaper columns written by Struthers and describing life for her and her family during the outbreak of World War II in England. Fairly lightweight covering topics such as buying a diary and going to dinner parties, this was more a palate cleanser than anything. If you have a Monkey Mind and need something to read that you can pick up and put down with ease, this would fit the bill. This was a good read, despite the gamble of rereading, and did remind me of how hard life would have been at that time and how easy life is nowadays. Plus – epistolary. Swoon.

Here’s a paragraph from Mrs. Miniver which mirrors my own attitude towards learning:

The structure of our life — based as it is on the ever-present contingency of war — is lamentably wrong: but its texture, oddly enough, is pleasant. There is a freshness about, a kind of rejuvenation: and this is largely because almost everybody you meet is busy learning something. Whereas in ordinary times the majority of grown-up people never try to acquire any new skill at all, either mental or physical: which is why they are apt to seem, and feel, so old.

Moving on…

Still Life with Bread Crumbs – Anna Quindlen

A domestic novel that’s fairly straightforward in its narrative arc, this was a fun non-challenging read. (Plus – off the TBR.) It’s about a female fine art photographer who leaves NYC to live in a rural village, rents a slightly tumble-down shack, meets village residents, and a bloke, and it all runs smoothly from there. Nothing too strenuous, but just a nice fairly easy (I might say even cosy in a way) read.

I’m also in the middle of some pretty funny essays collected together in a book called “I See You Made an Effort” by comedian Annabelle Gurwitch. Gathered around the theme of aging and reaching the milestone birthday of 50, it’s an entertaining E-Z read that has some sly wit in it every now and again.

Another reread gamble, but this one paid off, for the most part. Good if you like your humor sly and quick-witted, and you’ll be able to relate to her essays if you’re now a woman of a certain age. 🙂 (I do recommend that you read this in bits and pieces, as opposed to solid front-to-back. It can get a little same-y after a while if you do it solidly. Still fun, but just not as good a reading experience.)

So nothing too mind-blowing. More of just pottering around, really. Life is good… I hope yours is as well.

New Mexico photos cont’d

Posted on July 13, 2017 by lizipaulk

I know. More vacation/holiday photos. (Dear God – make it stop. 🙂 ) However, I wanted to share these so here you go… Enjoy!

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Catch-Up Time…

Posted on June 13, 2016 by lizipaulk

catch_up

So, thought I’d give you a looksee into the inner circle of the life of Just One More Page. It’s fascinating, let me tell you. 🙂

book372 Finished up a quick (and must admit rather forgettable) read of “A Walk in the Woods” by Bill Bryson. I remember it being hilarious when I read the first time, but this time, meh. (And that’s the risk you run with rereads, I think.)

So – ok read but no need to put it up on the TBR pile any more. Out the door with you, Bill.

Peaky_Blinders

We’ve been sucked into the fantastic BBC/Netflicks series called “Peaky Blinders”, a series that follows some Birmingham (UK) travelers who form an organized crime network that grows and grows and grows… The actors are great, but let me give a warning about the accents: Americans may well need subtitles until you get the hang of it. Truly – this is riveting stuff and it would be very very easy to binge-watch this series. Highly recommended if you’re looking for a summer TV series.

vivian_meier When my sis visited me, we ended up watching the documentary “Searching for Vivian Maier” which is truly an intriguing story about a young man who buys a box of negatives and photos in an auction. Opening the box, he finds some high-quality photographs so, curious to know more, he follows the clues to who the photography was. The journey leads to a nanny who took more than 100,000 street photos, but kept them all private. Who was this person and why did she keep the photos secret?

(Along with this detective trail, the question is also raised that since the nanny/photographer is now dead, do we actually have the right to show her photos without her permission? Interesting…) My sis and I are contemplating going to Arlington to see an exhibition there of her work…

Anyway, a fascinating look into a very private person…

And then I’ve been doing some cross-stitch. I had put it down for a while and then picked it up again. Sucked in as usual (which is rather fun)…What’s up in your world?

crossstitch1

So – my trip to Vermont…

Posted on October 14, 2015 by lizipaulk

…Was a lot of fun, so thought I’d put some photos up to show some of the sites that we passed.

As none of us had been to Vermont before and as we were all arriving from different far-flung places across the globe, we started the trip landing at Burlington Airport in one of the state’s larger cities. Didn’t see a great deal of Burlington, but I had a rather late arrival so after chatting a bit (and finding our first set of rocking chairs*, we went to the hotel and bed. (I had no idea that Vermont was so close to Canada! Hmm. Learn something new everyday, right?)

We tootled around Burlington the next morning, with a must-see (for me in particular) being the huge Lake Champlain. In Texas, it’s rare for me to see any large bodies of water, freshwater or sea, and so it’s always very high on my to-do list when I travel to places that do have one of those. So we took a ferry tourist ride around the lake, which was interesting and refreshing and a really fun way to spend the day (especially as all three of us had traveled across multiple east/west time zones to get there).

The next day, we went to the Shelburne Museum which is a huge ranging historical place with authentic buildings that have been moved (in some cases) from elsewhere and then filled with artifacts anywhere on the spectrum from modern fiber art (e.g. art quilts) to sixteenth century kitchen tools and a covered bridge. (The covered bridge was outside, of course, and was interesting in and of its own right. We’d never seen one before, so found it to be an interesting experience. Are the bridges covered due to the frequency of severe cold weather events in Vermont?

One of the buildings at the Shelburne Museum…

Inside one of the old covered bridges that are scattered through Vermont (and other states?)

Credit of artist: ?

My (rather small) mum sitting in a (rather big) chair at the Shelburne Museum.

Anyway, highly recommend a visit to this great museum if you’re in the neighborhood. It was really a fantastic place and we ended up spending most of the day there. (Of course, we found some rocking chairs to sit in for some of the day. 🙂 )

We also visited the really well curated Robert Frost Interpretive Trail run by the National Forest Service and set in the middle of the Green Mountain Forest. There was a beautiful winding drive to and from the trail, and then, during the walking trail at spectacular scenic overviews, there were signs with relevant Frost poems written on them, and this was a really interesting touch. Frost had spent some time living as a forest ranger in this particular forest, so it was interesting to see similar views to the ones he had seen. I also had no idea that Frost is quite a recent poet. (I had thought that he was very Olden Times, but he’s not really.) (The views were really great in and of itself, but with the addition of poems, the trail breaks became a cultural tour as well. Well played, National Forest Service, Well played.)

More booky photos next time. Suffice to say, that this was one of our family’s favorite trips. Thank you, Vermont!

* One of the ongoing themes of the trip was searching for three or more Adirondack rocking chairs. I don’t know what came over us, except that it was really fun to spot them and go and commandeer them for a while. 🙂

Just One More Page…

A (mostly) reading blog.

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