Happy New Year

Happy New Year 2016 dear blog world

Peace and good cheer for the year. I wish you health and happiness

Joanne

Christmas Day

Gift by Joanne Faries

take time to say thanks

thanks to all loved ones

remember your past

shed tears of joy, not sorrow

breathe deep and look around

no phone, no electronics, no gadgets

breathe deep and look around

let your mind take the snapshot

    of the moments  

                                                         

of love

  repost from blog 12/8/12




Be back at New Year's. Until then - Peace and Love

Christmas Eve

Bountiful Season 

Christmas cheer and goodwill

from mountains to prairie to sea

rooms glow festive with candles

bells chime to bless you and me

pray for soldiers' safe return

full stomachs and treats

peace in all hearts

delightful friends shall meet

family hugs all around

laughs and stories galore

let this spirit prevail

holiday season and more

Wednesday Christmas Wacky

Gotta have some wacky Christmas going on.  Ray has a membership of some sort with Maker's Mark whiskey. It has proven amusing. As you can see, his Maker Mark bottle received a sweater one year.  This year - ear muffs (and Ray got a ski type headband)

Tis the season

Tuesday Christmas Penguin

There's always a fun new ornament for the tree.  Ray bought this for a school fund raiser.
Yes, we supported education and have amusement to boot

Monday Christmas Clothes

What to wear as Christmas approaches?

Thanks Linda T for my sweater.  We find it amusing.........she's from New York and I'm from PA
(She got them on super duper sale at an after season sale last year)

Tis the season

Sunday Christmas Reading

It's that time of year for some Christmas classics.  Truman Capote's A Christmas Memory is wonderful.  Then How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss is fun. "Twas the Night Before Christmas" must be read on Christmas eve. Don't forget A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.

Or sit and tell your own Christmas tales - the magic is there

Saturday Sweet

Two batches of Christmas cookies are already gone - my guys at work gobbled them as if they never had sweets in their lives. And Ray said goodies disappeared quickly at his company luncheon on Thursday.

Just me and a Betty Crocker pouch of peanut butter cookie mix - add egg, oil, and water. So easy to bring joy.

Tis the season

Movie Review Madness - Spotlight

Spotlight is fast paced and tells quite a tale based on true events. I’ve always liked a “hold the presses” movie and this is old fashioned news beat story telling. Back in 2001, the Boston Globe’s special news team – Spotlight- started researching information on priest abuse. The numbers grew and they realized they had more than a few priests involved – this was a whole system of lies. Interviews, knocking on doors, confirmation of names, and more research yielded an amazing sad expose of lives forever affected due to the trust given to the Catholic church.

Tight film making and great acting gives Spotlight a classy edge.  Michael Keaton is the editor raised in Boston and entrenched in the parish affected. Liev Schreiber is the new comer to the area who questions the fiber of the system. Mark Ruffalo and Rachel McAdams are the boots on the ground researchers, digging ever deeper and getting the necessary interviews to confirm the pain and suffering of former altar boys. Stanley Tucci plays the lawyer who’s been fighting the church for a long time. The cast interaction heightens the drama and sense of urgency to the story.

Oscar buzz surrounds this film and it’s a worthy contender. If you want a well done, smart film experience, then train your eyes on Spotlight.

Leaving you Wordless Wednesday

Star Wars - never watched 'em







(But at work, all my guys have discussed the movies and the new trailers so thoroughly, that I am immersed in all things Lucas mania and more.  We hope J.J.Abrams has NOT screwed it up)

Book Review - Art of Memoir

Mary Karr’s The Liar’s Club was a sensational memoir. She followed it up with Cherry and Lit. Now she’s using her skills as a writer and years as a professor and combining the two for The Art of Memoir. It is not a step by step how-to book, but rather a general discussion of the elements needed to put a personal story down on paper. From the cover blurb – she breaks open our concepts of memory and identity, and illuminates the cathartic  power of reflecting on the past: anybody with an inner life or complicated history, whether writer or reader, will relate.

She uses other writers as examples and also delves into her own process. She admits to fear. She describes the concern of baring her soul, facing demons, and dealing with her own family and their perspective on their roles in her life. Mary Karr says, “ In some ways, writing a memoir is knocking yourself out with your own fist, if it’s done right.”

Everyone has a story, but how do you make  yours interesting to others?  She discusses all the senses and how to throw your reader into the life you are depicting. She says, “ Everyone has a past, and every past spawns fierce and fiery emotions about what it means.” If you are writing a memoir, you are taking a side and trying to be fair in the exposition of the tale. Will the reader stay on your side? Or will they drift and wonder what you are hiding? It’s a dance of sorts, and words are the musical pacing.

I enjoyed The Art of Memoir and marked off many pages for the wisdom, wit, and advice Ms. Karr shares. She’s been a favorite writer of mine and does not disappoint. P. 215 Writing, regardless of the end result – whether good or bad, published or not, well reviewed or slammed – means celebrating beauty in an often ugly world. And you do that by fighting for elegance and beauty, redoing or cutting the flabby, disordered parts.  Whether you are a writer or a reader, The Art of Memoir will strike a chord in your heart and have you digging into your own life story.

Santa Boot Sunday

Ssshhh - someone (my Dad) will be surprised with a treat by Tuesday...........

Wish I could deliver this in person

Tis the season

Movie Review Madness: Creed

The original Rocky was a sleeper movie – low budget, heartwarming story, and a lovable lunk mumbling “Yo, Adrian.” It won the Oscar for Best Picture back in 1977. Then the sequels arrived, each more outlandish than the next and the series became an excessive joke. Now, after a long time, Creed arrives on screen and it harks back to the original – a heartwarming story, a lovable lunk mumbles “Yo Adrian”, and there’s a kid with a chip on his shoulder who manages to prove to himself that he’s worthy of his name and he’s a fighter.

Michael B. Jordan is Adonis “Donny” Johnson, illegitimate son of Apollo Creed – the champion boxer back in the day. Donny fights his way through foster care until Apollo’s second wife takes him in and provides a home long after Apollo died. Donny never knew his father. Fast forward to today when Donny is winning fights in Mexico, quits his respectable financial job, moves to Philadelphia, and seeks out the Italian Stallion himself – Rocky Balboa. Rocky (Sylvester Stallone) keeps a low profile these days running a restaurant. He has no intention of taking on a boxer to train. But something about this kid, the history, and the chance for redemption for Apollo.

Now the focus of the movie is on training – running through the streets of Philly (which looks awesome in this film), the physical and mental strain, the slow build-up to a huge match against Ricky “Pretty Boy” Conlan – a tough boy from Liverpool with a grand reach, fast feet, and a faster lip. Who has the staying power?  Adonis Creed who must acknowledge his name and the demons that come with it?  Or Rocky, old guy, who gets a medical diagnosis that ain’t pretty? They have to fight together.

Creed is a boxing movie and yes it culminates in the Big Fight. But it’s way more than that. It’s about esteem, family, history, guts, determination , roots, plus heart and soul. Michael B. Jordan is excellent – he’s physically ripped, but he’s more than that. His face reflects his feelings and you want to root for him. Sly Stallone is great too – he’s always been underrated, and he shows a deft touch as a mentor. Philly shines, and yes, you want to run up those Art Museum steps with the Rocky theme wafting over the city. Step into the ring and soar.

Book Review - Career of Evil

JK Rowling, writing as Robert Galbraith, is so darn good. I’ve featured her first two novels – The Cuckoo’s Calling and The Silkworm – and now she’s back with Career in Evil.  I think this is the best Cormoran Strike book yet.

From the cover blurb – When a mysterious package is delivered to Robin Ellacott, she is horrified to discover that it contains a woman’s severed leg. Her boss, detective Cormoran Strike, is less surprised but no less alarmed. There are four people from his past who he thinks could be responsible – and Strike knows that any one of them is capable of sustained and unspeakable brutality.

Yowza – now that will make you turn pages.

Indeed, the book progresses with some grisly murders. It’s obvious a serial murderer is on the loose. Cormoran and Robin are under police surveillance. They, in turn, are doing their own investigative work. Meanwhile, chapters offer up the killer’s viewpoint and as the reader, we have no idea who this is.  We are as stumped as Robin and Strike.  Meanwhile, Robin is maybe getting married, maybe not. Trying to maintain a relationship is very tough in this business. And at one point, Robin and Strike are at odds – now that makes it tough for the reader. We root for both of them – they are our constant.

Cover blurb – A fiendishly clever mystery with unexpected twists around every corner, Career of Evil is also a gripping story of a man and a woman at a crossroads in their personal and professional lives.

I love JK Rowling. She truly is a superb writer with a clever imagination and a gift for rich descriptions and characters. This is her best mystery yet and kept me guessing until the very end. Turn on all the lights, snuggle under an afghan and treat yourself to a great read.

Doorknobs Issue 80 - I have two stories

http://www.iceflow.com/doorknobs/DB.html

Not bragging too much, but I'm always pleased to have stories in this journal. 
Enjoy my wacky darkness

Doorknobs

Robin Dunn—Leaving the Globe—Winner

Joanne Faries—Fall from Grace

Ryan Pillarsy—From Arbendale Before Rainfall

Anna Bálint—Saint Anne

Bev Vines-Haines—Saints Marching In

Roger Leatherwood—No Saint

 Hayward Fault Line

Bev Vines-Haines—Achieving Sainthood—Winner

James Shaffer—Saint Januarius

Joanne Faries—No Man, Just Me

Kristen Caven—Vino Vidi Vesuvia

 Dorsals

Steve Rodriguez—Fictitious Memories—Winner

Anna Bálint—Boy on a Bicycle

Sandy Vrooman—Googling Down Memory Lane

Tapas

Frank Stewart Symons—Saint Cecilia—Winner

James Shaffer—Saint Anthony

Abha Iyengar—Living in Hope

Roger Leatherwood—Joanna Lost at Seaside

Trudy Cusella—Recollection 

Cairo Room

Lester L. Weil—Cigarettes, Whiskey, and Wild Wild Women

KJ Hannah Greenberg—Her Bulbous Eyes

John A. Ward—The Saints We Know—John A. Ward

Andrew Ramer—Lament:  in several fonts, sizes, colors

Movie Review Madness - Brooklyn

The new film Brooklyn is an immigrant tale written by Nick Hornby.  1950s small town Ireland does not offer a lot of room for growth. It’s a land of predictability – you live, marry, and die. But more is meant for Eilis Lacey. Her sister Rose arranges via the priest for Eilis to travel to Brooklyn, live in a respectable boarding house, and work at a department store.  Rose will stay in Ireland, continue working as a bookkeeper, and care for their mother. So Eilis ventures into an unknown world. After a bout of homesickness, she soon meets a young man. It’s shocking but he’s Italian.  But it’s not Ireland. It’s America, and it’s okay. Eilis grows into her job – learning to laugh and interact with customers. The local priest (Jim Broadbent) sponsors her night school so she can achieve her dream to someday become an accountant. She’s blossoming before our eyes into an independent young woman – an American.

Circumstance bring her back to Ireland and she has to face her past to decide on her future. The auld sod is in her heart, but she’s torn. She has a new life in Brooklyn.  This tender movie is sweet, poignant, and well-acted. Saoirse Ronan’s clear blue eyes captivate the screen. She’s excellent and you root for her. Jim Broadbent is perfect as the local priest looking out for her. Julie Walters is a welcome presence as the boarding house marm. Emory Cohen, Tony the Italian suitor, is a charmer. And Domhnall Gleeson is the Irish lad in the old home town.

Brooklyn presents choices, growth, humor, love, and tells a tale about home and what the word embodies. It’s rich and presents the energy of America. It’s a good movie to see in this holiday season and to give thanks.

Thoughtful Thursday

Can't have a humbug attitude with a lighted penguin on the kitchen counter

Have a good Thursday - almost the weekend!

Almost Wordless Wednesday

Ray was off on Monday. I came home to a backyard winter wonderland.  The reflection on the pool is dang awesome

Now I have to catch up and do some indoor magic................maybe this weekend.

Feeling the spirit....are you??