Snow and Retirement Reception

Snow

From yesterday, December 19th.






Retirement

Public reception for Vicki York.

Parker J. Palmer Attacks En Masse

NonFiction 
In Support of the Upcoming January 22nd Book Discussion Sponsored by the Arts Alliance of Greater Lake Mills

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy one.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy two.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy three.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy four.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy five.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy six.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy seven.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy eight.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy nine.

Healing the Heart of Democracy by Parker J. Palmer.  Copy ten.

Parker attended Carleton College. He is now suspect.  Everyone sing! Gusties will shine tonight, Gusties will shine!

Musical Notes Inlaid onto a Thin Metal Service That Can Be Scratched and Ruined

Babel by Mumford and Sons.  Singers sing songs of folkeyness.

Fiction

Edgewood by Karen McQuestion.  Self published sci-fi.  But, McQuestion is an honest to goodness writer and had titles published by a subset of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt named Mariner.

I once read a book of Norwegian sea stories and liked it. I think this was the book.

One Sound, 18 Video

Music on Flat, Circular Piece of Plastic

The Dreamer by Rhett Miller.  Singer sings songs with his gold tooth mouth.



DVD

Little Rascals: the complete collection starring [kids who never got residuals].  The guy who played Spanky spoke at my college in "90 or '91.  I was only able to attend his talk for about an hour and then had to leave to wash dishes in the cafeteria.  I was telling everyone about hearing Spanky and my classmates and dorm mates did not know what I was talking about.
The Champaign Public Library used to loan out 8mm films and projectors.  My parents would get the Our Gang features for birthday parties.



Detention starring Josh Hutcherson.  High school horror comedy.

ParaNorman starring [animated people and monsters].  Boy who sees dead people has to save his town from a curse.

Expendables 2 starring [guys with muscles].  Guys with veiny muscles - Bruce Willis excluded - shoot things.  I have no idea what the plot is.

Eastbound and Down: complete third season starring [chubby guy with mullet].  Baseball pitcher joins minor league team in Myrtle Beach.  I went to Myrtle Beach in 1999.  I did some go-kart driving and enjoyed it greatly.



Dragons: riders of the Berk starring [voices].  The case says "4 explosive episodes" so I guess this is not a feature film.

Citizen Gangster starring Scott Speedman, Brian Cox.  Canadian war veteran robs banks.  Hoser guy wears a toque and robs a bunch of Loonies from a Toronto bank then goes home to sit on his chesterfield.


Shape: 400 calorie fat-blast with [fit blond ladies].  Three 15-minute workouts.



Shape: make over your butt, hips and thighs with [fit blond lady and background models].  The box photos imply lots of lunges.

DVD Bonanza!

DVD Bonanza (with limited number of embedded trailers)

Bourne Legacy starring Jeremy Renner, David Strthairn, Scott Glenn, Stacy Keach, Joan Allen.  Secret agent's life is threatened by the government and, according to the tv commercials, he jumps from a roof into a narrow alley.

Savages starring Blake LIvely, Salma Hayek, Benicio del Toro.  Great novel.  So-so movie.

Safety Not Guaranteed starring [people you don't know except for] Kristen Bell.  Guy says he knows how to time travel and is looking for people to go with him.



Angry Boys starring [Australian acting different parts].



Breaking Bad: First Season starring Meth.  Cancer stricken high school teacher brews meth to earn money for his family.

Breaking Bad: Second Season starring Meth and Guns.  High school teacher is making much meth money and his drug business causes other trouble.

Men in Black 3 starring Josh Brolin, Will Smith, Tommy Lee Jones.  More franchise.

Ted starring Mila Kunis, Mark Wahlberg.  Teddy bear that came to life with boyhood wish is still around and causing trouble when owner an adult.

World Without End starring Cynthia Nixon, Miranda Richardson.  389 minutes of Ken Follett.


Girls starring Peter Scolari and Lena Dunham.  Single women, just out  of college, and in New York City.

Snow Engagement of Ages with Musical Interlude

DVD

Rock of Ages starring Alec Baldwin, Tom Cruise, Paul Giamatti.  Musical with '80s rock music.  I heard someone this past weekend pan the movie but rave about the stage production.  Judge the flick for yourself.


Five-Year Engagement starring [that schlubby guy] and Emily Blunt.  What's the deal with Emily Blunt?  Was  she in some big name TV show or movie?  I see her name around but have no idea why.  Comedy movie that, I presume, deals with a couple taking forever to get married.


Snow White and the Huntsman starring CGI Software, Charlize Theron, Chris Hemsworth.  Queen wants to CGI Snow White and sends the Huntsman to CGI his way into the CGI woods to CGI Kristen Stewart who was CGI'd into showing CGI emotions.


Musical Interlude

Joan Armatrading.  I listened to a BBC Radio documentary about producer George Martin who praised Armatrading for her skill and talent.

Ruckatham

Fiction

Alpha by Greg Rucka.  Comic writing novelist Rucka pens another action novel.  Delta Force dude sent to fictionalized Disney World in anticipation of 9/11 style terrorist plot.  Disney World?  Action scenes?  Sounds like Victor Gischler's forthcoming Go-go Girls of the Apocalypse sequel.

Say You're Sorry by Michael Robotham.  Robotham writes good thrillers.  Bio says he lives in Sydney, Australia.  Australia is on the other side of the world.  You know the place, right?  They have all the kangaroos and crocodiles and The Lord Humongous?

Whole Lot of Fiction

Fiction

City of the Lost by Stephen Blackmoore.  "Urban fantasy"  Dead guy deals with dead things.  I used to read Blackmoore's blog about crime in Los Angeles.  I stopped reading most blogs because it was taking too much time.  Blackmoore likes Hi-Powers.

Gun Church by Reed Farrel Coleman.  Kip is a former big-time author and now a low rent teacher. He saves his class from bloodshed and is courted by a cult focused on handguns.  A gun cult?  Sounds like some internet websites I regularly read.

Crow's Landing by Brad Smith.  I read Smith's previous novel Red Means Run and it was pretty decent.  Virgil Cain is fishing in the Hudson River when his anchor pulls up a steel cylinder.  A crooked cop seizes the cylinder and Virgil's boat.  Virgil wants his boat back and gets into drug dealing trouble when investigating.

Dangerous Inheritance: a novel of Tudor rivals and the secret of the Tower by Alison Weir.  Weir?  Didn't she write something popular?  Maybe I'm thinking of a different Weir because I don't recognize anything off her title list.

Dirty Streets of Heaven by Tad Williams.  Some angel novel with angel named Bobby worrying about the end of the world when souls start disappearing.  I was just getting this confused with Johnny Angel.  I didn't know Shelley Fabares sang that.

Large Print

Shiver by Karen Robards.  Repo woman finds beaten guy in trunk of BMW.  Guy takes woman hostage.

Poseidon's Arrow by Clive Cussler and Dirk Cussler.  Another Cusssler cover covered in planes and flames.

Large Print? We ain't got no Large Print. We don't need no stinking Large Print!

Large Print With Badges

You Are the Love of My Life by Susan Richards Shreve.  Hola, Senor.

The Last Man by Vince Flynn.  We are the Federales.

Gone by Randy Wayne White.  You know?

The 100-year-old-man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson.  The mounted police.

Ugly Duchess by Eloisa James.  If you're the police where are your badges?

An Outlaw's Christmas by Linda Lael Miller.  Badges?  We ain't got no badges.

An Amish Gift by Cynthia Keller.  We don't need no badges.

Christmas in Cornwall by Marcia Willett.  I don't have to show you any stinking badges!

A Season of Angels by Thomas Kinkade and Katherine Spencer.  Better not come any closer!

Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan.  We didn't try to do you any harm.Why don't you try  to be a little more polite?

Spider-Man's Guide to Parenting

DVD

The Amazing Spider-Man starring GuyPretendingtoBeTeenager and Denis Leary.  Peter meets his missing father's former partner and things happen.


NonFiction

Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids: how to stop yelling and start connecting by Dr. Laura Markham.  "When you and your child ate stuck in negativity" Yep, that happens sometimes.

Another Anthropomorphic Fox

Fiction

 [Book with anthropomorphic fox on cover] by Rita Mae Brown.





The Forgotten by David Baldacci.  Dalbacci took his author photo at 11:26.  I was thinking Baldacci was the guy who spoke at the Fort Atkinson library last year.  It was James Grippando who spoke, I looked it up.  The story I heard is that Grippando showed up because his sister lives in Fort and forced him to speak since he was in town for his niece's graduation.

Notorious Nineteen by Janet Evanovich.  I do not know what time it was when Evanovich took her photo because he watch is turned to the side.  Evanovich and another author dude, Lee Goldberg, have been collaborated on a novel.  Goldberg does good stuff but I've only read one Evanovich novel.

Audiobook on CD

The Black Box by Michael Connelly.  I watched a DVD extra for The Lincoln Lawyer where a cameraman drove around Los Angeles and Connelly pointed out different locations and his own favorite spots.  Connelly lived in the apartment where Philip Marlowe lived in The High Window.

1731 Minutes of Sex, Violence, Horses, CIA Agents, and Laughs

Audiobooks

Notorious Nineteen by Janet Evanovich.  5 CD at 6' 04". Stephanie Plum does something new and my wife is sure to read it.

Last Man by Vince Flynn.  10 CDs at 11'00".  Super good guy Mitch Rapp does derring do.

Running Wild by Linda Howard and Linda Jones.  10 CDs at 11'47".  A cowboy stands around with his hand son his belt buckle, his unbuttoned shirt wide open and falling from his shoulders, and his face hidden beneath his hat brim.

Seven Books with Twelve Total Title Words

Fiction

Cold Days by Jim Butcher.  I got my feet underneath me, seized a computer chair by its back, and lifted it.

Private London by James Patterson Manufacturing Industries and Mark Pearson.  "You turning philosophical on me?"

Black Box by Michael Connelly.  "I told you all to get!" Briscoe called from behind her security gate.

Shiver by Karen Robards.  She glared at him.

Shadow Creek by Joy Fielding.  Shit, Jennifer thought, hearing Brianne and James return to their tent and thinking she should probably go out there and apologize to James again.

Nano by Robin Cook.  "Hey, Eric, they're on the move."

Threat Vector by Tom Clancy with Mark Greaney.  Chavez and Biery left through the garage door without another word.

One Thing

Fiction

Strange Candy by Laurell K. Hamilton. The queen of vampire sex novels publishes this short story collection.    Random paragraph:  Gannon the Sorcerer was tall, as tall as Sidra. His hair was yellow, his eyes the fresh blue of spring skies.  But his face was set in cynical lines, as if he had seen too much of the world, and it all disappointed him.  Today his eyes held anger and sorrow.

EDIT:  Dang!  This books is not new, it is from 2006!  The spine label was replaced and I thought the book was new.

Extra Bonus Content!

Batman!

Driven Generals Pushed Too Far Navigating Driven Hope

Fiction

Pushed Too Far by Ann Voss Peterson.  Police Chief Valerie Ryker solved a vicious murder case with the body burned to ash.  The killer sits in prison.  Now the original victim's body is found frozen in a lake and the killer is about to be freed.
The Colt revolver on the cover is a mirror image.  The cylinder release is shown on the right hand side of the frame.

Large Print

Perfect Hope by Nore Roberts.  "Ryder is the hardest Montgomery brother to figure out."

Audiobooks on CD

Driven by James Sallis.  3 CDs at 3.5 hours.  Driver escaped the mob in Drive and is living peacefully in Phoenix with his wife.  Driver's wife is killed in a street attack and Driver knows the same people are still after him.

The Generals: American military command from World War II to today by Thomas E. Ricks. 14 CDs at 16 hours.  I read a commentary piece this morning that ripped on Petraeus.  Not because Petraeus had an affair but because he was a publicist's success and not a military success.

Super Brain: unleashing the explosive power of your mind to maximize health, happiness, and spiritual well being 9 CDs at 11.5 hours by Deepak Chopra and Rudolph E. Tanzi.  Long Titles: how to expand and exaggerate your claims with an overlong subtitle that never seems to end.

The Time Keeper by Mitch Albom.  4 CDs at 4 hours.  Mitch Albom just bought an island somewhere.

NonFiction

Navigating Autism: the essential how-to by parents for parents by Melissa Martinez Areffi and Andrew Areffi.  What kind of name is "Areffi"?  Seriously, what is the etymology because I have no idea.  I'm thinking something Southeastern Europe.  Or Arabic.  Persian?  Basque?  I'm clueless on this one.

Special Goldberg Edition, courtesy of Bill Crider

Fiction

The Dead Man: Volume One: Face of Evil [Goldberg and Rabkin]: Ring of Knives [James Daniels] : Hell in Heaven [Goldberg and Rabkin] by Lee Goldberg, et al.  Goldberg and William Rabkin started this series of adventures novellas as eBooks.  Amazon is printing the the eBooks with three stories per volume.  A fun series with action, suspense, humor, so forth, so on.

Goldberg and Rabkin have been hiring new writers for each entry in the series. There have been some very fine ones chosen including James Reasoner, Bill Crider, Anthony Neil Smith, and Christa Faust.  A fun series.

Lumberjack Matthew Cahill was buried in an avalanche.  Cahill was dug up in spring, thawed back in the morgue, and came back to life.  Cahill is hunting down a spirit/ghost/demon/something he calls Mr. Dark.  Mr. Dark infects people with evil and only Cahill can see the rotting flesh of the infected.

The Dead Man: Volume 2: The Dead Woman [David McAfee] : The Blood Mesa [James Reasoner] : Kill Them All [Harry Shannon] by Lee Goldberg, et al.  Cahill continues to travel the U.S. searching for Mr. Dark and fighting evil.

The Dead Man: Volume 3: The Beast Within [ James Daniels] : Fire and Ice [Jude Hardin]: Carnival of Death [Bill Crider] by Lee Goldberg, et al.  Cahill kills evil people. Cahill meets chicks.  Crider writes about gators.  I liked Fire and Ice but I have not yet looked for more Hardin books.

NonFiction

Active Senior Living: a fictionalized memoir by Jan Curran [Goldberg's mother].  Humorous tales of living in an assisted living facility.  Curran was a newspaperwoman in Southern California.

That British Show That Was on MTV A Couple Times

DVD

The Comic Strip Presents starring [Limeys].  Several episodes of this funny show played on MTV in later '80s (or so).  For years after I would check TV listings for Comic Strip.  Whenever Comic Strip was listed I'd tune in and, sure enough, it was some stupid show with stand-up comics.

Each episode was a half-hour parody and, hopefully, they hold up after 30 years.  This one is very 1980s.  Lemmy of Motorhead appears at 1:01.





Cabin in the Woods starring [people I never heard of, again].  Summer campout turns deadly.

Large Print Monster Will Crush You To Death

Large Print

Killing Kennedy: the end of Camelot by Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard.  The Large Print Monster teeters above you.

Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver.  The stacks of books seem to reach into space.

A Winter Dream by Richard Paul Evans.  A sudden gust of wind sways the stack sideways.

Last Man by Vince Flynn.  At first, just a few copies at the top curl downward.

Sleep No More by Iris Johansen.  Suddenly the whole stack starts to peel off as in a simile I cannot think of.

The Bridge by Karen Kingsbury.  You fall to your knees, vainly covering your head from the tons of paper cascading down.

Dodger by Terry Pratchett.  "No! No! Why did you let this happen?!" you scream to the Library Director.

Bone Bed by Patricia Cornwell.  "Stop exaggerating," says the Library Director, "I'm weeding the old stuff and we can do a better shift after the renovation."

EDIT:  I just noticed two of the titles listed above are regular print.  Oh, well.  My observation stands.

Select Quotes

Fiction

Merry Christmas, Alex Cross by James Patterson.  Damon stood...beating a hooker...with a partner. ... "Court is now in session!" ..."Nobody better have touched those eggs!"

Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan.  I was naked ... and ... been typing for forty minutes. ...One hundred and thirty-six pages...had...a...talking-ape.

NonFiction

The Chronicle of Downton Abbey by Jessica Fellows, et al.  His uniform...excited...the Electric Hotpoint Toaster.  There were some perks to this role...as a happy-go-lucky...horse.

No More Room in Large Print

Large Print

Finding Casey by Jo-Ann Mapson.

Blackberry Winter by Sarah Jio.

Secret Keeper by Kate Morton.

Hostage by Elie Wiesel.

Mad River by John Sandford.

How I Came to Sparkle Again by Kaya McLaren. What?

Something Old, Something New by Beverly Jenkins.

Into the Kingdom of Men by Kim Barnes.

Last to Die by Tess Gerritsen.

You Don't Want to Know by Lisa Jackson.  Then I won't read it to find out.

NonFiction

My Bad Parent by Troy Osinoff.  Snapshot photographs of kids with humorous commentary. [I think very few comments were funny.]

Looking for Arrow Sacks

Fiction

Looking for Yesterday by Marcia Muller. Caro Warrick was acquitted of murder but still slandered by the trial.  She hires Sharon McCone to investigate and find the real killer.

Poseidon's Arrow by Clive Cussler and Dirk Cussler.  A flying plane.  Explosions.  Lots of flame.  A burning yacht.  Machine guns on the flying plane.

NonFiction

Hallucinations by Oliver Sacks.  Flyleaf says: Hallucinations don't belong wholly wholly to the insane.  Much more commonly, they are linked to sensory deprivation, intoxication, illness, or injury.  People with migraines may see shimmering arcs of light or tiny, Lilliputian figures of animals and people.  People with failing eyesight, paradoxically, may become immersed in a hallucinatory visual world.