zirconium

http://upperrubberboot.tumblr.com/post/123904555213

My parents' wedding album:





Lynda Hull's poetry:



Oh phantoms.
Oh the many lives that have fountained through
my own. Soon, soon, I shall stop upon that platform

& you will meet me there, the world rosegray beyond
the scalloped tops of buildings & we shall seek
that thing which shines & doth so much torment us.

-- "The Window"

100 untimed books prompt 50: no idea how I feel

Well, I have mixed feelings about Bobby Flay. I viscerally dislike the whole Throwdown caboodle.

That said, the man likes horses, he seems to support progressive candidates, and I like what I've read about him as a working chef and talent assessor.

For that matter, I have mixed feelings about the Great Chefs--Great Cities book. It was comped to me around 20 years ago, and I've used it more as a flower press than a cooking reference. Most of the recipes are fussier than I'll ever bother with even on a weekend. But I enjoy reading the chef bios, and sometimes looking them up on the net to see where they are now (Jody Adams in particular).



Prompt 52: biting

I was not the only Nashvillian who decided to haul their past weeks' worth of glass to the East collection center this morning:



In my case, it was imperative that I make room in my car for a present waiting for me at Woodland Wine Merchant:



#100untimedbooks prompt 48: shovels



"There is the question of individual mining, by which farmers can mine some minerals by truck and shovel..."

While hunting for some tights I'd stashed somewhere out of the way, I came across a sheet of notes for a paper I was drafting back in 1991 or 1992. At this remove, I don't quite understand all of it, especially as it refers back to even older notes from February 1990 (a Michael Murrin lecture on the Holy Grail), but I am amused to see this quote (of Murrin, I think):

"We're never going to get done, we never do, but then, this is medieval lit."

If my house weren't so firmly 20th century (thank God!), I'd be tempted to nickname it Medieval Lit. There is so much to do and to deal with. But then, it's a house. And sprucing it up is not that high on the list -- not when there are indexes to draft and avocadoes to mash (K&S had a one-day sale yesterday) and housemates to giggle at:



(That is a jack-o-lantern squeaky toy in Miss Dawg's mouth.)

Prompts 45 and 46 in Upper Rubber Boot's photo challenge, 100 Untimed Books, are "miniature" and "coming home."



The mini-book (created by Roger Culbertson and illustrated by Sarah McMenemy, 1997) contains pop-ups, including the wagging tail of a dog on a beach and the turning wheel of a bicycle.

I used to own a copy of Rosamunde Pilcher's Coming Home, and it contains scenes that remain in my memory, such as the night that Jeremy cooks steaks in butter for Judith. Though I'd forgotten that Judith had a cold until I looked up the scene again just now. (And glancing at some of the other pages online has reminded me of why the book irritated me enough to sell it.)

The Shell Seekers remains on my shelves, though. I think I picked it up at a used bookstore in Chicago, and it too has various characters returning to places they consider "home."

I didn't go to church today, what with the still-nasty cough, but I have The Shell Seekers open to a funeral scene, where the congregation is singing "For all the saints"": "It wasn't perhaps the most suitable hymn for a funeral, but ____ had chosen it because it was the only one she knew that ____ really liked." Another congregant thoroughly approves of the choice: "Music, flowers, and now a rousing hymn . . . just what _____ would have enjoyed."

When Miss Dog nosed me off the couch this morning, my head was still aching and my throat still raw from the cold that hit me toward the end of last week, and I staggered back to the cushions thinking that I'd be flat on my back for another day and in no state even to watch videos (a library copy of The Crossing, is waiting for me; it may be of interest to some of you because, according to one YouTube commenter, "Alexander Hamilton [Steven McCarthy] never looked so sexy!" and I admittedly requested it because I'm still working through my Roger Rees fetish; he plays Hugh Mercer).

At any rate, three more hours of sleep + meds + coffee somehow worked wonders, at least to the extent of me feeling up to light gardening. I pruned the mess around the rogue rosebush and rooted three cuttings from it, dipping them first in honey:



"Honey" is also prompt 43 in Upper Rubber Boot's 100 Untimed Books photo challenge, so this passage from an Emily Dickinson letter (28 December 1880) caught my eye:

The Honey reached us yesterday.

Honey not born of Bee -- but Constancy -- which is "far better." I can scarcely tell you the sweetness it woke, nor the sweetness it stilled.

In introducing the letter, the recipient's granddaughter notes that "death was again uppermost in [Emily's] mind" at this time, "two more persons were gone who had meant much to her in different ways" -- the novelist George Eliot and the physician David P. Smith. I am not grieving, exactly, but I did hear of two deaths last week that have me perhaps clinging a touch tighter to the connections that have persisted across time and distance. Both women died of cancer -- one last November, one this past March -- and I am not surprised that I was not in the loop about either passing, as it's been more than fifteen years since I saw either of them and I am no longer close to the people who would have known to let me know. But I am also immensely grateful to the connections deep enough to transmit both news and warmth every few years, which is how I found out about the former colleague, and to the internet's obituary archives for providing me closure on Marilyn, whose paintings hang in my living room and library. My copy of E. E. Cummings's collected poems was already pretty beat-up when I impulsively gave it to her during a workshop we were taking together; I wonder if it survived her own moves since 1995, or if a family member chucked it into a dumpster during the final cleaning-out, or if maybe she handed it on to another penny-pinched artist to enjoy.

I am not really fretting over what happened to the book, of course; it is merely somewhere for the sadness to go until I regain the drive to channel it into poems. In the meantime: honey and dirt. For perhaps the roses really want to grow...

Upper Rubber Boot's 100 Untimed Books prompt 36 is "nails." I brought Donna Karan's new memoir home from the library today (along with a Pilates manual and a collection of Szymborska poems from the sale shelf for the grand total of $1), but this is the book that first came to mind:



I met with one contractor last week and will interview another this week. The sunroom will get built eventually. In the meantime, I hauled inside one pot of rosemary, four of peppers, and two tomato vines ahead of the weekend's second frost warning. Another vine was too far gone to bother with, but I plucked the two tiny tomatoes off its tip before chucking it over the rail:



(Diameter of dish = 3.5 inches)

Prompt 37 is "joyful."



The holiday prayerbook is from West End Synagogue, where I've celebrated Simchat Torah a couple of times. The glossy guide to Tel Aviv was purchased during a stay there, prompted by the wedding of a college friend in Jaffa. That was indeed a joy-filled occasion, as was the wedding celebration I attended in Austin this past weekend (which also featured some Jewish elements, and during which I chatted with the woman next to me about New York and Houston synagogues and community centers). The bride is a librarian, so one of the cakes was decorated with the outline of a book, and the centerpieces were pop-up books with photos of the couple pasted into some niche or tab. Focal points during the gatherings the following day included a restored player piano and hundreds of silvery bats and an Irish band rocking through Elvis and Johnny Cash as well as more traditional-sounding tunes. (I can't hear "Ring of Fire" without remembering the contra dance mashup someone at Christmas School devised for an after hours session, which had a title like "Walking the Line of Fire" ...)

I'm repeating prompt 32, "breathing," because I'd forgotten about this chapbook:



Of the books I've reviewed for Galatea Resurrects over the years, my favorite is Enjoy Hot or Iced by Denise Duhamel and Amy Lemmon, and my favorite poem in it is Duhamel's "Expired," which begins with:

When my mother says, Take something of your father's to remember him by,
I take his black and silver "D" cufflinks and an Albuterol inhaler ...

For prompt 33, I picked up my Gilbert and Sullivan treasury, expecting to find "Full Moon" from HMS Pinafore in it. It's not. Oh. So a glimpse from The Mikado will have to do:



For prompt 34, "declined," an excerpt from Robert Lewis's Slings and Arrows:





[photo challenge: Upper Rubber Boot's 100 Untimed Books]

So much happening in Nashville today. Assorted friends and colleagues were at either the Southern Festival of Books or Frist Center events, especially in relation to the Shinique Smith show. My Twitter timeline seemed to be checking in from either Oktoberfest or the Grace Potter concert. I was tempted to walk to the trunk show hosted by my yoga studio (especially on hearing that hot whiskey cider would be served), and equally tempted to stay home and nap, since I'd stayed up longer than I should've rereading a Lee Bros. cookbook.

But I had reserved a spot in the free 9 a.m. screenprinting workshop at Plaza's Hands On Creativity day, so that's where I went after breakfast. The hands-on part of that session involved applying glow-in-the-dark ink to a t-shirt, which is now on my ironing board upstairs, awaiting the heat-before-wearing/washing step. (Note to locals: there are workshops and demos on various topics through Sunday, too.) To my relief, the group opted for the skull-with-flowers design rather than the four-leaf clover pattern. The rep warned that the blue ink we selected would not glow as intensely as the original practically-invisible-in-daylight formula, but I was willing to make that tradeoff, especially since it sounded like the latter might register as yellow (which, no thanks. I have plenty of dingy-looking shirts already).

While at the store, I also picked up a copy of Huis Clos, a new paper I'd heard some buzz about. The "What's It Like to Bike That Pike (Volume VII: Murfreesboro Pike)" column was both fun and informative enough read for me to see if the earlier installments were online, but I've come across only an abridged version of the feature on Hillsboro.

After a stretch of housework, I went back out to Charlotte Pike, dropping off dry cleaning and picking up twenty pounds of rice at K&S, along with a sack of snow pea leaves. Chinatown and Lucky Bamboo have both been out of those greens the past few times I've attempted to order them, so spotting them was today's winning-the-shopping-lottery moment. On the way home, I stopped at Sweet 16th for kung pao quinoa and an Elvis mini-bundt cake.

After lunch, it was back to Plaza for the Gamblin workshop, which involved 2- and 3-D color wheels as well as extended discussions about layering and opacity/transparency:



The take-home samples included a bottle of Galkyd Lite, a bottle of Gamsol, and a tube of Torrit Grey. A new pair of products of particular interest: solvent-free gel and fluid, which are sufficiently non-flammable that artists can bring them onto planes.

On my way out, I spent a couple of minutes at the Winsor and Newton table, where there were markers and blenders to play with. On my way home, I stopped at Woodland Wine Merchant, where today's tasting was from their barrel of Eagle Rare. Its smell? Glorious.

---

Upper Rubber Boot's prompt 27 for 100 Untimed Books is "dog-eared." That entry is over at Vary the Line.

Prompt 28 is "water":

Upper Rubber Boot's prompt 25 for 100 Untimed Books is "skyline."



The two skylines that have lifted my heart the most often are Chicago's and Nashville's. Riding the bus from Kentucky or the train from Michigan to Chicago. Giggling at Nashville's Bat-building countless times.

I am kind of tempted by this painting party, but Music City Masquerade is also that weekend (not to mention music to rehearse and perform, and letters to letter, etc.). Oh, the choices ...

The day, it was mixed. On the less fun side of the ledger, there was the flat tire on my bike, a family member meltdown, feeling out of shape, and having to return to the supermarket because I'd left the yeast and mayo in the bagging area. On the upside, I was treated to a lovely breakfast, the new temp crown is behaving so far, I have a bowl of bao-dough rising, and I adapted the Lee Bros. recipe for shrimp supreme into cod creole for tonight's supper.

Upper Rubber Boot's prompt 23 for 100 Untimed Books is "instructions."

My go-to cookbook is Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. It's been revised since I received my comp from Borders, which adds to the grungy oh-la-la of my tattered and splattered first edition:



And in spite of this book being older than most of my shoes and nephews, there are plenty of dishes I look forward to attempting someday: