Immersion

Immersion language courses excite me.
I remember back to high school and college;
"traditional" Spanish and French classes,
and my sorry attempts to learn another language.

This week, my current instructor cut through the crap
of what could be a boring first class.

Reminding us:
Many visitors attempt to memorize 400 "new" nouns in the language-of-choice;
to "speak fluently" in a foreign country,
but are forced to use (a whole lot of) sign language to communicate.

But properly armed with correct verbs, (maybe 50-100),
correct use of verbs,
and not only one verb per sentence - but many;
strung into beautiful, specific, jewel-like necklaces of structure and form
joined with only 50-100 nouns...
Opens the clearest path to be understood, to understand others,
and work with the correct tools and material,
toward the proper respect of people and languages in the countries we visit.

I am on a journey in Santa Fe
- for more beautiful Spanish.
My best friend begins her journey this weekend in the Midwest
- for the passion of Italian.

Dive in and do your best.
The shiniest rocks are in the deepest pools;
and are worth the most work.

Haggis-Hype

Welcome: The haggis.




David and Eliza; our gracious hosts for the merry-making evening.



The haggis reading.



Scottish accents: Always a crowd-pleaser!




Poems to food.





Dorthy's amazing salad; like a wonderful still-life.





Reading and singing Burns' works with Scotch Broth and Rumbledethumps.





Scotch Broth with veggies and lamb, and the magical golden sauce for the bread pudding.





Hmm... A bit out of focus at this point in the evening.

Happy Birthday Robert Burns.

Snow Day

Snow day today
Approximately 6" of wet stuff greeted us this morning
it had blown in toward the northwest
(as evident from my antennae topper...)





Chivalry was alive and well.



Two more storms due before the weekend.




No blue sky until later this afternoon.



And somewhere under those clouds ahead - are the mountains.

Winter Sustinance

Roasted poblano soup with cotijo cheese
Green chile-chicken enchiladas
Margaritas
Laughter and conversation
Dinner with old friends and re-newed friends
And the start of a new Ryder Studio School session.

Welcome back.
M

Guts and Trials

New Year's Guts

A few ideas for Challenge 2010:
"Something New" once a month;
A class-never-before-tried
A book-never-before-EVER-considered
Cooking AND eating something non-habitual
Lessons in a musical instrument to the point of playing an entire song
Some-sort-of-aerobic-activity-once-a-week...

Upcoming winter challenges that have been reserved and paid-for:

January/February: Spanish Immersion classes - 2x/week for 5 weeks
February: Aikido - 1x/week for 6 weeks
March: ?
( A Hint? Let's just say I received a book
that I would NEVER had purchased for myself...
- I should read it and give a truthful book report, eh?)

Upcoming spring challenges:

April: Cooking class
May: Music lessons?

Ongoing challenges:
Did I mention that I have a fitness center membership?
And I tend to only use it to work as a therapist
in their therapy pool
with 2-3 patients
once a week.
Perhaps the rowing machine
once or twice a week?
I know how to
row,
row,
row.




Get your guts right here.
M

Guts

We spend January 1
walking through our lives,
room by room,
drawing up a list of work to be done,
cracks to be patched.
Maybe this year,
to balance the list,
we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives...
not looking for flaws,
but for potential.
~Ellen Goodman




New Year's Day:
Now is the accepted time
to make your regular
annual good resolutions.
Next week
you can begin
paving hell with them as usual.
~Mark Twain

I checked my thesaurus
for "resolution"
and found the term "guts".

Shorter
simpler
more to-the-point.

My plan for my
New Year's Guts?

Find a challenge:
Hourly?
Daily?
Weekly?
Or a little less regular?

Decide
on a specific number
of challenges
to be completed
before the end of 2010,
and write like the wind
to describe them.

Gotta find some guts.
M

Waiting...

Miles To Go

I love this poem...

Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening


Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Robert Frost
New Hampshire
1923

Igor and Snowflakes

I work in a hospital;

and a friend sent me a poem

after hearing me discuss

the ugly and beautiful

side of familes

in hospitals

during the holidays.

Her Long Illness

Daybreak until nightfall

he sat by his wife at the hospital

while chemotherapy dripped

through the catheter into her heart.

He drank coffee and read

the Globe.

He paced, he worked

on poems, he rubbed her back

and read aloud.

Overcome with dread

they wept and affirmed

their love for each other, witlessly,

over and over again.

When it snowed one morning Jane gazed

at the darkness blurred

with flakes.

They pushed the IV pump

which she called Igor

slowly past the nurses' pods,

as far

as the outside door

so that she could smell the snowy air.

(By Donald Hall

From a collection compiled by Garrison Keillor)

Anyone?

Wanted:

Christmas Memories
The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Anyone?

Anyone?

Spirit of Christmas

Does an 8 year-old boy have the Spirit of Christmas?

My brother Pat, was 8.
I was 5.

He and I were always fascinated by my father's basement workroom;
his place of quiet
and wood dust
and exotic-colored paints and pungent varnishes
of fine and grand pieces and parts
of model airplanes
built of light-as-a-feather tissue-thin papers
and fine balsa wood
layers of paint and varnish
and hours and hours of tender ministrations.

A workshop also crowded by large-and- heavy tools-of-the-trade
sheet metal cutters
wrenches and sledge hammers
table-top vises
for the fire-filled furnaces
and boxy air conditioning units
that were the work behind the man.

And dust and cobwebs
and nails and screws and bolts
CB radios
old broken television sets
two to three ashtrays filled with gray powder
pipes and boards
and "projects" to be fixed for my mom;
toaster-not-toasting
radio-with-no-music
lamp-of-no-light-and frayed-cord
broken bird house

And in early December
as Pat and I crept into
the dark and dusy cave
of my father's workroom;
there on the workbench

a wooden structure;
3' tall, 4' wide (!)
house-shaped,
and yet
huge
green exterior walls
a red roof
(looks like our house!)
and the front of this house
hinged and open
to expose internal
tiny
separate
rooms
with blue walls
pink walls
yellow walls
red (!) walls
and soft-warm-and-sweet chocolate walls.

It was lovely
and I gasped with the beauty.
While my brother's eyes grew wide
(and frightened ?!)

"What IS it?", I asked.

He paused.

And thought.

And pondered.

(Remember the scene from "How the Grinch Stole Christmas",
when Grinch is questioned by Little Suzi-Who
about why he is taking the tree from their home?
And the look on the face of the Grinch as he
comes up with the whopping lie?)

My brother had the same look on his face...
Smiling
(evil - or good?)
charming
sweet
innocent...

"Why, it is a BIRD HOUSE,
with separate rooms for each
little bird
to live and sleep in",
he proclaimed proudly;
and swore me to ultimate secrecy
not to tell Dad that we knew.
NOT to tell mom and ruin the wonderful surprise.

And I promised
and forgot about the
large bird house,
happy to be "old enough"
to be entrusted by my
older and wiser
brother
with such a good secret.

Christmas morning:
We woke
crept downstairs from our bedrooms
to the tree and
all the wonderful sights.

(No birdhouse in sight?)

And as we completed unwrapping.
My father brought out the surprise
not to my mom -
but to ME!

Yes,
a wonderful dollhouse.
A wonderful secret.

And an 8-year old's
Spirit of Christmas.

M

Time #2

Three Challenges to everyone:

Favorite Christmas Memory




Worst Christmas Memory




Spirit of Christmas




300 words or less per entry/per topic.

I will have mine (and hopefully yours, too) posted before the 25th.

Time

Treezup!

We Should Change The Name

The people of the United States
should consider the history behind
the Thanksgiving holiday,
and petition the courts for a name change.

Perhaps change the name to:
"Thank a Native American for Helping Strangers Survive-Day"

I don't see Hallmark picking up on that opportunity.

Maybe change the name to:
"Sharing Food With Friends-Day"




Yes; much less politically charged.

I'll call Hallmark and the courts,
right after you pass more turkey and dressing left-overs.

Lost in Iowa and Now?

I have had to post an advertisement on Craig's List:

Following a Yard Sale advertisement in an Iowa newspaper a few weeks ago:
A family member in Iowa had an estate sale in early November,
and accidently sold two items that were NOT to be in the sale.
This yard/estate sale was held on Brown Street in Davenport,
and at the nearby park pavillion behind the house.

I am hoping the two people who purchased these items will contact me;
so their money can be returned, and the items returned to me.

----A 1920-1930's style lamp with cloth cord.
The lamp is approximately 20-24" tall.
I have been advised that this lamp was re-sold
by the dealer who purchased it at a recent antique sale in Des Moines, Iowa.

----An Eastlake style small dresser with mirror.
The dresser and mirror was refinished 20 years ago,
has brass teardrop dresser pulls,
three obvious drawers and 1 "hidden" drawer at the bottom.
It is believed the dresser was purchased by a gentleman
who may live in a nearby Davenport neighborhood.

Both items belonged to my late grandmother;
the dresser was refinished by my late father,
and both were stored at my family member's home
until I could find safe transport to my new home.




They were both sold by mistake.
If you recognize either of these items,
please call me.

Celebration #2

A cosy spot to curl up and read a good book.
Just in time for the holidays.
M