Nice Picture, Oppy!

Just this minute noticed your new photo on your blog listing!

What a good-lookin' guy we've been corresponding with! A real Coloraden.

I hope the next step will be a blog where you can choose the subjects and we can post the comments.

(Did I embarass you?)

Coreopsis, sundrops, veronica...all freebies

The veronica and the sundrops are mingled, the former just showing its flowers like white drops of sap. Soon they become long droopy white spikes (Is that the right word? racemes? I'll have to look it up.)

Mr. Summer's Story

Today I recommend a short novel, translated from the German, hauntingly beautiful. Your library could get it for you.

Here are 3 reviews that describe it better than I can. The illustrations by Sempe are wonderful.

From Publishers Weekly:

German novelist and playwright Suskind, whose sophisticated novel Perfume drew international attention, now offers a deceptively simple, rather slight fable of childhood and lost innocence. Mr. Summer, a tall, gaunt eccentric whose first name none of the townsfolk knows, roves through the unnamed European countryside every day from dawn until late evening. The goal of his endless nature walks remains a mystery. The nameless narrator, a middle-aged man recollecting his boyhood, tells how he resolved to commit suicide after receiving a verbal thrashing from his hunchbacked piano teacher, only to be inadvertently thwarted by Mr. Summer. When their paths cross again on a black October night six years later, the youth, now in high school, witnesses the mysterious man's final plunge into darkness. Is Mr. Summer a redemptive figure? Is he emblematic of our ruptured unity with nature? Suskind leaves the answers open-ended in a beautifully translated tale. Illustrations not seen by PW. Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal:

Suskind, whose novel Perfume ( LJ 10/15/86) was an international best seller, has a lightness of touch rarely associated with German literature. The narrator of this slender volume, a middle-aged man looking back on his childhood, reveals on the very first page a delightful personality: innocent, whimsical, eager, and filled with wonder. Mr. Summer, the ostensible main character, is an enigmatic, ultimately tragic figure whose capacity to walk endlessly through the countryside gives the narrative a fairy tale-like quality. A plot summary would give away too much without ever elucidating this magical work's essence. Highly recommended for general readers.- Michael T. O'Pecko, Towson State Univ., Md.Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews:

From Sskind, author of Perfume (1986) and The Pigeon (1988), comes this tiny little pleasure, hardly more than a longish and quietly garrulous short story, about a handful of years in a post- WW II German boyhood. Symbols fall like quiet raindrops here as a nameless narrator recalls his boyhood life in the village of Lower Lake--learning to ride a bicycle, falling out of a tree, being disappointed in first love, suffering absurdly and terribly (to the point of considering suicide) through the hilarious agony of piano lessons. As daily life unfolds itself to this boy, he quietly observes the odd Mr. Summer, the mysterious and solitary village eccentric who endlessly and incessantly walks alone, tramping for mile after mile along road and trail and pathway and in every kind of weather throughout the surrounding countryside. At story's end, the lives of Mr. Summer and of the nameless boy will come together in a way that's unexpected, terrible, pathetic, and exquisite. Sometimes verging on the saccharine or the slight, but never calamitously, Sskind's story offers the pleasures of a modest, private, unassuming glimpse into cosmic grief--the way a first-rate Garrison Keillor monologue can do, say, or a Dylan Thomas memory of long-ago childhood in Wales. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

I'm bringing these comments to the top...

...so we can slop around on memory lane some more. Thanks, Herb!

Here we go with the memory tests again... Our house (1078 Mountain ave, Summit-6-1958) was built in 1940 by Andy Hay, a local builder. He built all the houses from our house down to the Romond's house. Peppy do you remember what kind of a car the Jefferies had? What Color? What style? I even remember your dad's first name.... "Edmund". Something has often bothered me though and that is every time I look at the Liptons Tea man with his mustach he brings back memorys of your father. Is there a resemblance or is my memory incorrect???
June 23, 2008 10:02 AM

Herb said...
One other thing.... Do you remember "Vito Mondelli" He would drive his old rattle trap truck up our driveway 2 times a week and sell my mother veggys and eggs and you name it. I can remember my mother and him haggling over a few pennys in price on things. It was a game for both of them and it seemed they both looked forward to it. We did most of our shopping at O'Conners Market on Plainfield Ave just up from Columbia School. The butcher there was Andy Danyo. He and Dad were good friends and did a lot of Ice Fishing together up on Swartswood Lake where we had our summer place. I have many fond memorys of "The Lake" from long ago.... Perhaps we can go there as well.....

Well, where to begin? Jeffries' car...I'm not sure, maybe a Henry J. It must have gone past the bus stop many times as we were waiting there. I remember he was always late for the train and went around that corner (Mt. Ave./Park Ave.) at high speed. There was someone on Dogwood Lane who had an early Volkswagen with the flaps that went up for directional signals. Or was that the Jeffries?

Yes, my father's name was Edmund. A closer resemblance, I think, would be to Arthur Fiedler, the longtime director of the Boston Pops Orchestra.http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pops/background/bios/fiedler.html I'll have to check out the Lipton Tea man. (I just did. Couldn't find him on the internet)

O'Connor's Market... lots could be written about that place! I worked there one summer (1961); wasn't old enough to sell beer so every time someone came through the checkout line with beer I had to go into the back where the butchers were chopping up carcases and get one to come out and punch the numbers in the register with their bloody fingers so I would technically not be selling beer. Their aprons were bloody too. Ah, memories. Charlie Fisher used to buy whole carcases and have them custom butchered (Biddie, chime in here).

I always envied you people who had places at Swartswood Lake. Kihlgrens had a little cabin there, too, and we were their guests a few times. Didn't you and Biddie live there for a while? I think I visited her there once when your older daughter was an infant. How long did your family keep that place?

Vito Mondelli and vegetables are associated in my mind, but we got our eggs from Mr. Lang who had a chicken farm in Gillette. There was a Dugans Bread truck going around but we weren't customers. I think my mother with 3 active kids on her hands welcomed the trips to the grocery store and civilization. I remember that your mother didn't drive...was that correct? Stanley was the nice man who delivered heating oil, putting it into a hole in the ground beside the house...I could never figure that out. How is your sister DeeDee?

Well, this is long enough for now...

Poison next time

Enough is Enough!

All gone. Guns put away. (June 30)


Sweep, Sweep

(Gittin' rid o' the bodies)

BAM!
(Monday's prey)

Git them varmints

outta mah eyeballs,

OR ELSE!!!!!

BAM!! One down (Sunday sport)

Not one book but an AUTHOR

Today is Friday, Book Recommendation Day. This time I want to mention not a single book but my favorite living author, Alexander McCall Smith, who keeps on churning out delightful stories in at least 3 series. (I think he must be triplets.)

His first series about the lady detective, Precious Ramotswe in Botswana, intrigued me. There are at least 9 titles in that series. Then he started writing a second series about some characters in an Edinburgh boarding house, 44 Scotland Street, which was so good (I listened to them on CDs from the library) that I began to think and talk with a Scottish accent. There are 3 titles now. The third series, about sharp-witted and thoughtful Isabel Dalhousie, also located in Scotland, is perhaps my favorite series. There are 4 titles in this series so far. Last but not least, there are 3 short novels about an incredible Professor Von Igelfeld,

One warning, however...If you read, or listen to, just one title by this author, you will be hooked!

Here's his web page. Watch for the red fox.
http://www.randomhouse.com/features/mccallsmith/main.php

I eagerly await the ..... of a certain.......

You have my email address, I think.
Just send it as an attachment.
(hee, hee)

They're Here!!

The 17-year cicadas have been reported in East Setauket, just a couple of miles from here. Last seen in 1991, these beasties are swarming in certain neighborhoods, buzzing to beat the band, terrifying soccer moms, and shedding their skins by the millions.
I remember finding cicada shells clinging to our willow tree when I was a kid and wondering what the heck they were. Those bug eyes could scare anyone.
This afternoon I'm going over to East Setauket and try to get some shots of afflicted properties. Isn't that what a digital camera is for, getting the dreadful stuff?

Friday...Book Day. Well, I don't have one to recommend right now, but I've just started reading Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin's Three Cups of Tea; One man's mission to fight terrorism and build nations...one school at a time. It's about an American who builds schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. I'll let you know how it is. Aamir has read it and says it's great.

The Sunbeam

The reason for this picture?

I have accepted a challenge from Cheryl to post old verses if she will do the same.

This is from The Bad Child's Book of Automobiles, circa 1966.

The Sunbeam

The Sunbeam has a rumble seat

In which to put your parcels.

Don't ever try to ride in it

If you value your metatarsals.

I know....I did....I limp....I rue.

I toss on this advice to you:

A car is not what it may seem.

Beware the magnified, bright Sunbeam!

Hey Oppy!

Are you back from Wisconsin yet?

Hope you weren't in the Dells area with all the flooding.

Three little ivies

Above is Ivalace, a variety of hedera I've grown and propagated indoors for years. I experimented this year and left one plant outside all winter. It survived beautifully in a protected location near the house and put out lots of new foliage. As we only had one snowstorm this may not be the norm. The needlepoint ivy also overwintered, as did the variegated, "glacier" I think it's called. I have all three growing in several places (my little ivy farm). I got the stones from the beach.

My attempt at cropping using PhotoShop Elements

This is the cropped photo

And this is the original as I took it two weeks ago.

What do you think, Cheryl?

Elements is a simplified version of Photo Shop. The instructor the other day seemed to turn up her nose at it, but it worked for me today and it's on the public library terminals, so I'll use it.

More Animals

Friday is Book Recommendation Day, and I want to mention to you a favorite author of mine, Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953). His Bad Child's Book of Beasts and the other one, More Beasts for Worse Children, are delightful. I first discovered them in my 20s and even ventured to imitate him with my own series of poems, "The Bad Child's Book of Automobiles" (unpublished, thank goodness).

Here is a link to more of the droll poems and drawings http://www.michaelspornanimation.com/splog/?cat=8

scroll down about 1/5th of the way to find Belloc.

And some more http://www.mainlesson.com/display.php?author=belloc&book=beasts&story=_contents

Nostradamus indicates, in one of his newly-discovered quatrains...

...that Big Brown will NOT win the Belmont this Saturday, and thus the Triple Crown.

Why?

The horse himself has a rebellious look in his eye.

Mark my words.

Nostradamus knew.