Look Me In The...Eyes

Forehead Tittaes w/ Marion Cotillard from Marion Cotillard

Twittering Again

"Mum, you have to push the cart - I have to go do my business now"

— Dominic at Home Despot. His "business" is to check for spare coins lying about. So far he's found about $35 in loonies and toonies on the floor - in the past 4-6 months. Found money. At big box stores. No wonder I don't give him allowance...

"MUM! Toffee is sitting on the most beautiful instrument in the world!"

— FDPG, in response to the cat sitting on a little string harp we have, that is named exactly that: the most beautiful instrument in the world.

"But I wasn't going to throw it off the deck. I was just thinking about it."

— Max standing on the deck holding the compost bucket over the compost bin. The distance between the two, let me stress, is about 30'. Not a target I was willing for him to contemplate. Yes, I realize I am a total killjoy.

"But you love me because I am such a delightful son. Right? Even if you can't admit it right now."

— Max, in response to me seeing him wear his really super muddy shoes across the kitchen floor out onto the deck so he could toss a spider off said deck because I have a bit of a spider phobia. And guess who had to mop the kitchen floor? Grateful mother? Sigh. The things we do.

Cold

If it isn't enough that our Island honeybee population has apparently been hit badly by bee mites:

Vancouver Island beekeepers are reeling from the worst commercial honeybee die-off in recent memory, with some estimating almost 90 per cent of colonies have been wiped out in the last few months.

Many blame a harmful parasite called varroa mites that has become immune to some pesticides, and fear the shortage of bees could affect spring pollination.

“The amount of bees that have been lost is just phenomenal,” said Sol Nowitz, a veteran commercial beekeeper who breeds bees and produces honey at the Jingle Pot Apiary in Nanaimo. “It’s the biggest catastrophe to kill bees on the Island ever.”

Our Mason bees have started hatching. Here is one here, drying its wings. Why this is so sad is because our weather went from a balmy 18ºC on Saturday to a frigid 2ºC last night. It's COLD. And all those lovely little Mason bees are out in that cold. I am keeping my fingers crossed that they will survive this cold snap.

Here's another shot. You can see the mud at the bottom of this bee house, with a bee on the tile in front. It's basking in the warm sun. And now it's cold and wintry out there.

A Tale of Time City

Finished this last week. I was expecting not to like it, because it was a bit more SF-y than her usual stuff, but her characters were, as always, so individual that I couldn't help but get quite engrossed in it. The kids were all enthusiastic, but then, they like everything of hers. The only DWJ book I probably won't read them is Time of the Ghost. It's a bit on the Creepy Weird side and FDPG is a bit young for that, Weeping Angels not withstanding.

The story is this: young girl being evacuated from war-time London, in 1939, is kidnapped by two boys (from a future place called Time City) who think she is a Time Lady. At this point in the story we aren't sure who this Time Lady is, nor are we sure if she's a good person or not. All we do know is that these two boys hold her responsible for manipulating history so that is is reverberating in very bad ways. They take her back to Time City with good intentions of Bergmanesque proportions. Can I say "chaos ensues" without it sounding too clichéed? Or "the kids save the day after many a mishap"? Because that's pretty much what happens. There's even an android. And a revolt in Canada, of all places (Canadians? revolting? surely she jests). Time ghosts. Butter pie. Pajamas instead of street clothes. It only gets curiouser and curiouser from there.

Academy Awards Recap

Did you watch them last night? I did. I always do. I've watched them for so many years that it's almost a habit. Some years we have a party with friends; some years it's a solo affair, because I'm the only one in my house who really likes watching all 4,000 hours of them. Oh wait, I lie: this year FDPG and Richard hung around, although we had to send FDPG to bed because she was seriously flagging, even with those obnoxiously enforced 45 second speech rules. What was with that? Killjoys, those producers.

Anyhow, I've found a few photos to illustrate what I think is best and worst about a movie awards show. But first let me say that I thought the director of The Hurt Locker, Kathryn Bigelow, had all the right attributes of an Award Winner: she was breathless (I like it when they seemed shocked and amazed), she was humble, she seemed genuinely nice, and she had a pretty decent speech considering. I did, however, get a little irritated with Richard, who, after each category had its winner, would say things like "Who do you think would have given the best acceptance speech?" I used my stock reply: "The Brit." Fortunately there was one in each category.

Let me also express my extreme indignation with those turkeys who thought it would be a good idea to cut the mike off when the second or third winner attempted to give a thank-you speech. Boys, here's the deal: there is a difference between shortening a bloated boring awards show and taking away the possibility of anyone saying anything remotely memorable. What you did was to cut up an already dull event and you didn't even have the wit to replace it with something interesting. Interpretive dance? Blech. Actors introducing the nominated movies? Boooooring. I want unexpected! I want gasp-inducing (but not, let me hasten to add, when it involves Mariah Carey or Miley Cyrus)! I want original and unusual!

Okay, now let me give you a brief synopsis of some dresses.

Someone give this girl some Spanx. Or at least someone who can honestly tell her not to wear clothing that is too small for her (without her later killing them or flattening them). This is not a good look. Mariah, if you were to hire me I would tell you that you do not have a very realistic self-image. And that you shouldn't inhale quite so deeply when you are posing. And that you need some chest deflators.






Miley Cyrus. Sorry, I simply cannot include a photo with this terrible excuse for an entertainer. This girl used this phrase "lots of glitter everywhere" and "it looks SO classy" in the same speech. And her sister, who is about 10, looked like a very trashy 30 year old hooker. Bad. Bad. Bad. I was horrified and highly irritable looking at those two. Where are their parents? Bad parents. Very bad parents. Good parents do not pimp out their children. Do not pass go. Do not collect $50.
Be still my beating heart! Gosh, I like this guy. He's such an amazing actor, even if he does have his troubles with drugs. Let's just all breathe a sigh of relief that he isn't dead yet.









Do I really need to say anything about this gem of a woman? I aspire to have hair as good as hers one day. Among other things.










Here is Richard's girlfriend. Not that he'll admit it, of course. But when she shows up on screen he sits up straight and tidies his hair. So I refer to her as his girlfriend. There is the kind-of-weird issue of her being a brunette and me being a blonde, but if he can deal with my Doctor Who obsession I can deal with the brunette thing. Besides, she is one hot chick. At least he has good taste, right?






What is with this dress? I think someone lost their streamers from Chinatown. These look like the ones I get for the twins on their birthday. I stretch them out over the garden and they look supremely gorgeous, but this is definitely an odd look. Even for me. Highly tactile, but weird.








I know this is a very LOUD and BOLD look but it was my favourite dress. Not my favourite colour, but it was so shiny and multi-hued I loved it nonetheless. I had a hard time dragging my gaze away, it had so many, err, layers to it. I'd put this on a cake or present any day. I'd even take a stab at wearing it. I think this could be a good look for a visit to Home Despot, don't you? To pick up some chicken manure?






Do you know who this is? Then you cannot be a True Doctor Fan. Her name is Carey Mulligan. Now she is An Ingenue With A Bright Hollywood Future. But before she was AIWABHF she was...









...Sally Sparrow. And yes, that is her hair. She was in a Stephen Moffat-penned episode of Doctor Who entitled Blink (don't you love how I can bring everything back to Doctor Who?). It was one of the scariest of the scarier episodes. It was so scary that I might I have to make myself a Weeping Angel one day, for the garden. Just to scare the bejesus out of everyone when it's dark and we're out dashing around in the night. FDPG's Dr Who poster has those Weeping Angels on it, and every night, before they go to bed, the twins say the same thing:



"Is it true that Stephen Moffat is going to bring back the Weeping Angels in the new Doctor Who?"

Sadly, Sally Sparrow will probably be too busy to do a cameo for this hypothetical future episode. But the Doctor knew. He knew this would happen. One day.

Here he is, trying to tell Sally that she should not leave to seek her fortune in Hollywood. "Don't go!" he is saying, "you will only regret how shabbily they treat you. When you win awards they will cut you off in mid-speech. They will serve you cheap champagne. Expect you to laugh at cheesy jokes and act in sub-standard material. You will regret leaving me. Whatever you do - do NOT go to Hollywood."

Garden Thursday

We were at a multicultural lunch today, with some homeschooling friends, and afterwards we all segued to a park to continue watching the boys thug it out with a football against the girls playing, then we dashed home and dashed out again to track, so I didn't do much garden thinking today. I did take a few pictures, just in case.

It continues to be bizarrely mild here, as you can see from the nectarine blossoms. There are no bees around to pollinate it but luckily it doesn't need bees: it's self-fertile (no rude comments now). And speaking of bees, we've redoubled our watch on the Mason bee houses, because some of them look as though they've had some tunneling action going on. They are the first bee out in our yard. If you have a lot of fruit trees and shrubs I would definitely recommend getting yourself some Mason bee houses: they are solitary, mild-mannered and ferocious pollinators. Check out this website if you like persuasive statistics. And making a Mason bee house is the easiest thing in the world if you have some plywood and a table saw. Or a really clever Dremel.

Here is the peach tree, just starting its flowering season. This tree was sheltered by a couple of climbing roses, which seemed fine during the cold winter months but now, with spring starting, it's not so fine. I am pruning all the roses, as per this book, because I didn't last year and when I realized that I should have they were already branching out every which way, and it was too late already. This might sound odd, but pruning really goes against my grain. It just doesn't seem right to take perfectly good branches away from something. Then again, the last couple of years with lots of roses and a couple of old fruit trees (that have been heavily pollarded) have taught me that some things really DO do better with a good pruning. (it seems like there should be a really good joke there, doesn't it?)
The irises are done, the crocuses are just about over, and now the daffodils, hyacinths and tulips are starting. It's all suddenly so YELLOW out there.










Oh, and wonder of wonders, remember me moaning on about my finicky fritillarias? Well, I eat my words, because looky what we have here. (do I sound like Yukon Cornelius yet?) Methinks I saw a fritillaria.









A pasque flower, soft and delicately purple. This is the miracle plant right now, because I yarded it up in the fall, intending to move it elsewhere, and I forgot all about it. So it sat, in a clump, under the rhododendron, until January when I was struck with horror by the sight of it sitting there so woefully. So I moved it over to where I had just planted some apothecary roses. I sat it on the dirt, in preparation for planting, and forgot all about it. Until today, when I noticed that it had suddenly bloomed. Despite my care. Poor pasque flower. Forgive me. I was not saving you for breakfast, I was planning on planting you. You are so sweet and so cold. (ack, stop it with the bad poetry allusions already!)


Some English primroses. Nice to see them undecimated by the slugs.






Finally, some Purple Sprouting Broccoli leaves. Gaze on them in all their unchewed glory. I've stuck them in the food processor with carrots, green onions, and mayo for a coleslaw; eaten them raw; and chopped them up in a stir-fry. All very good. We're not big on brassicas in this house but we all like these a lot.

Wee Free Men, Hat Full of Sky, & Wintersmith

We read these over Christmas and I completely forgot to mention them, but now that I have a spare moment I'm going to mention them, because they are an impressively fun read.

We have a few Terry Pratchett books, after having had them recommended to us (the first two books in the Discworld series and another called Only You Can Save Mankind), but I have to say that while I appreciated the run-on

sentences in the Discworld books (I am a big fan of the run-on, can you tell?), they were so complicated and so mature that I attempted to read them then put both back into the bookcase all in the space of about 30 minutes. And none of the kids complained. I resolved to read them later, on my own, just to see what they're like.

We read Only You Can Save Mankind, which everyone enjoyed well enough, but it certainly didn't get the same response that the Tiffany Aching series got. For one thing, the plot centers around a boy who plays a lot of video games, and reading BLAM BLAM KERPOW over and over again, not to mention the ZINGS and BEEPS, got slightly tedious for me, sad to say. Plus, it featured an old version of the Video Game (black screen anyone?) and even the Teenager had no idea what THAT was all about, so most of the significances were lost on them. It had a plot that drew us in, and lots of humour, but I was relieved when it was over.

The Tiffany Aching series (Wee Free Men, Hat Full of Sky, Wintersmith) though, was so wonderful we were all unabashedly thrilled at the sight of JUST the covers each and every morning. Everyone loved these so much that I bought them one after the other. Once morning we even made a beeline to the bookstore right after finishing Hat Full of Sky, and FDPG gasped out loud when she spied it on the shelf. I even overheard her a few times whispering "The Wintersmith" to herself in the morning before I started reading. We could hardly wait to get to the next one. I pulled a rich Scots accent out, to imitate the Nac Mac Feegle (miniature blue Scots fairies who seem most enthusiastic when drinking and fighting and swearing at each other, characteristics guaranteed to convulse almost any kid), and the kids were enthralled (even the Teenager, who I thought would scorn this book, because the protagonist is a GIRL). It was particularly sweet for FDPG, being as how most of our reading seems to involve an awful lot of boys. Or men. And here we had a girl, nine years old in the first book and thirteen by the time the events in Wintersmith take place, a capable, clever and cool-in-the-face-of-most-dangers, girl. And not just any girl, but a witch-in-training.

So there you go. I won't give you more plot, but I will encourage you to try them out. Best for ages 7-14 when used as a read aloud.