There needs to be a warning label.  I'm serious.  Government ought to step in, quit fooling around with mosquito spraying and frac'ing regulations and do something useful for us poor citizens.

Warning labels on cliffhangers!

Neither movies nor books should be exempt.  Do they realize how disappointed Ed was at the end of The Desolation of Smaug?   I forgot to warn him--but why should it be my responsibility?

And that brings us to

Cinder
by Marissa Meyer

A very oddball take on the Cinderella story, complete with charming prince and wicked stepmother (but her evil seemed to have logic in it's madness.)   And androids.  And cyborgs.  And Lunars...like the comedy series that started with Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, this ought to be called Cinderella and Robots.

I loved this book.  Oh, it had the usual teenage angst in endless self-reflection.  Oh, the world-building a little peculiar in a not bad at all way.  But the plot was delightfully twisty and turny and the main character was a hoot.  I liked her a lot.

But how long do I have to wait to see if she gets her you-know-what?

Doing penance in Boise

 I thought Canada Geese nested in Canada!  These guys got no farther north than Boise, Idaho.

Giving me the eye.

I'm not much on baby animals, but this guy was just too cute to ignore.

Snoozin'

 Isn't that the cutest thing?






Cats playing king of the hill.  Except I don't think Yuki knew they were playing.


I'm heading out for a week business trip tomorrow, so there may be nothing new for a while.

No foodie stuff for me

 I've been too discouraged to try vegan cooking this week, so instead I'm trying vegan eating. 

Subway's veggie sub with guacamole was skimpy and the guac tasted fake.  Chipotle's salad was excellent, as always.  Mooyah black bean burger with sauteed onions and mushrooms, plus sweet potato fries, was so good it was worth the hefty price tag.  I can't pretend it was good for me--my nose would grow.  Masala Wok's vegetable balls with spicy sauce and rice nearly made me cry...but what in the world was in those balls to make them taste so good?  Whatever resemblance to vegetables they might have had was pureed away to oblivion.

Oriental Express veggie deluxe with tofu and brown rice was excellent as always.


So far it's a tie between Chipotle and Oriental Express.  Next up, Sprouts deli, Tom Thumb deli, or Central Market.  Stay tuned.

Got to love this lady!

Home

by Julie Andrews
 is subtitled A Memoir of My Early Years.  I want the rest of her years!  So far, anyway.  It was a lovely memoir.  I wish it had gone a little deeper, but you know?  If I were in her position, that's about as deep as I would have gone.  It's none of my business to want to know all of the intimate details.

It ends in 1963, after Camelot and right at the start of Mary Poppins.  Since I recently re-watched Saving Mr. Banks, reading her brief conversation with Miss Travers made me start singing all of the Mary Poppins songs over again, in my head.  Endlessly.  I love 'em to death, but enough!

By the way, it's beautifully written.  I've never read any of her kids' books, but I suspect she's one of the few "celebrity" authors who deserves to be called authors.

trying to catch up on the reading challenge....

 

Slave: My True Story
    by Mende Nazer and Damien Lewis



At age twelve, Mende Nazer was stolen by Arab raiders from her family and sold as a slave to a family in Khartoum.  When did this happen, in the nineteenth century?  Last century?  In the dark ages?

1993.  And this was a girl who could read and write, who was attending school and hoped to become a doctor some day.  It seems nearly impossible, yet it happened.  She was isolated and afraid; had no place to go for help and no confidence that help would come even if she tried.

I am convinced that the only way to stop this sort of atrocity is to cut off the demand.  In any European country and--I think--and country in the western hemisphere, the idea of anyone owning a slave was repugnant.  Hiring a Hispanic housekeeper and not paying social security--well, that's still socially acceptable.
Other than the bare outlines of the story, the book is not that exciting.  Like many of these "shocking" memoirs I have read, it has a sweet, idyllic beginning--a perfect childhood in a rural environment, loved, protected and adored by a close knit family.  Then violent collision with the evil outside world.  Then a rather long, boring day-to-day description of life as a domestic slave.

I was really hoping for something deeper. Especially at the end.  Didn't get it.  It's too bad that non-fiction writers are restricted to reality and can't invent a smashing ending.  But even without taking license to exaggerate, he could have tried harder to show us the internal revolution that must have happened as Mende began to realize her freedom.

salad fresh

Really fresh.  There's something different about a salad when you wade out through the mud to the garden and rip the lettuce and spinach leaves right off the plant.  Jerk radishes out of the ground and shake dirt all over the kitchen.  Add just a couple of leaves of arugula, then top with baby bella mushrooms and zucchini.

That's some salad with serious flavor.