Happy Banned Books Week (brought to you by the American Library Association).

It's fun to look at the list of 100 most challenged books and wonder why some people find them offensive (Number 51 is A Light in the Attic. And number 88 is the highly controversial Where's Waldo!)

They have a beautiful Ray Bradbury quote on the website, "You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them."
Read more at Mental MultiVitamin

The FDA isconsidering a proposal that would change the definition of chocolate. The change would allow products made with vegetable oil or other non-cocoa butter fats to be called chocolate, in spite of the fact that it the properties of cocoa butter are what make chocolate so special in the first place.
Read more at Baking Bites

I got a denim twirly skirt this summer.
It's long and flairs out when I spin around
Twirling around is a good way to start the day
If we really wanted world happiness, we'd buy everyone a twirly skirt
And encourage them to spin around in the morning
It's gonna be a good day!

Inspiration usually comes during work, rather than before it.” (from Summer of Great Grandmother p. 143)

We do live, all of us, on many different levels, and for most artists the world of imagination is more real than the world of the kitchen sink. (Circle of Quiet p. 89)

Every century the Church makes a fresh attempt to make Christianity acceptable. But an acceptable Christianity is not Christian; a comprehensible God is no more than an idol.
I don't want that kind of God. What kind of God then? (From The Irrational Season p. 19)

I don't want to go to work today.
I want to stay at home, drink tea, and read.
Maybe take a nap.
Or stare out the window

Alas, I have a meeting this afternoon and HAVE to go to work
And, even though it's Friday, I have to dress up and look professional
(Why oh why did I schedule a meeting for a Friday afternoon?)

In other "what was I thinking?" news . . .
I was asked (and agreed) to be involved in another community organization
They do some exciting work, and it is nice to be recruited.
Yesterday (when I was awake and happy) it sounded like fun -
Today I'm thinking that I was insane to take on another project

Maybe I just need a vacation.

Inspiration usually comes during work, rather than before it.(from Summer of Great Grandmother p. 143)

A great painting, or symphony or play, doesn't diminish us, but enlarges us, and we, too, want to make our own cry of affirmation to the power of creation behind the universe. This surge of creativity has nothing to do with competition, or degree of talent. When I hear a superb pianist, I can't wait to get to my own piano, and I play about as well now as I did when I was ten. A great novel, rather than discouraging me, simply makes me want to write. This response on the part of any artist is the need to make incarnate the new awareness we have been granted through the genius of someone else. (from Circle of Quiet p. 147)

One evening he came in as I was, as usual, banging away on the typewriter. "Madeleine, are you afraid of death?"
I turned around. "Of course, Red>"
"Thank God. Nobody's ever admitted it to me before>"
I've had people tell me they aren't afraid of death. I don't think I believe them. . . . My agnostic faith does not, at its worst, include pie in the sky. If if runs along the same lines as does William James's, it cannot evade acceptance of responsibility, judgement, and change. Whatever death involves, it will be different, a venture into the unknown, and we are all afraid of the dark. (Circle Of Quiet p 175)

There is a gap in understand between me and our friends and acquaintances. I can’t quite understand a life without books and study and music and pictures and a driving passion. And they, on the other hand, can’t understand why I have to write, why I am a writer. When, for instance, I say to someone that I have to get home to work, the assumption is that I mean housecleaning or ironing, not writing a book. I’m very kindly permitted to be a writer but not to take time in pursuing my trade. nor can they understand the importance of music, or why an hour with a Mozart sonata at the piano is not wasted time but time spent on a real value. Or really listening, without talking, to music. Or going for a walk simply to see the beauty around one, or the real importance of a view from a window.
from Two Part Invention p. 156

A winter ago I had an after-school seminar for high-school students and in one of the early sessions Una, a brilliant fifteen-year-old, a born writer who came to Harlem from Panama five years ago, and only then discovered the conflict between races, asked me out of the blue: "Do you really and truly believe in God with not doubts at all?"
"Oh, Una, I really and truly believe in God with all kinds of doubts."
But I base my life on this belief. (Circle of Quiet p, 63)

NPR did a story this week on how the reading habits of women vs. the reading habits of men. In and of it self this wasn't terribly interesting, but one sentence jumped out at me.

Among avid readers surveyed by the AP, the typical woman read nine books in a year, compared with only five for men. Women read more than men in all categories except for history and biography.

"Avid readers" only get through nine books in a year?
(Can you really be considered "avid" if you read less than a book a month?)
What does that make those of us who are easily reading more than 40 books a year?
Where did they get this sample (it certainly wasn't at my library, where adults are checking out 3-4 books at a time).

Madeleine L'Engle Camp Franklin, 88, of Goshen, CT and New York City, died Thursday, September 6th. Born November 29, 1918, in New York City, to Charles Camp and Madeleine Barnett Camp, she was educated in Switzerland and South Carolina, before graduating from Smith College. She was the author of over 60 books, including the award-winning A Wrinkle in Time.

A huge section of my personal library is devoted to Madeleine L'Enlgle books. I just told someone the other day about the profound influence Mshe had on the way I see things. The Crosswick Journals came into my life at just the right time - and every chapter is marked with quotes and sticky notes. If you aren't familiar with her work - I'd encourage you to go check it out!

I know that you know.
You don't know that I know that you know
But I know.

Except now I've told you that I know you know
So you know that I know that you know
Unless you don't realize that I'm writing to you
(But I am!)

And now everyone who reads this is going to be paranoid
Wondering what I know and if I'm writing to them.
(But I'm not writing to them - I'm writing to you!)

It's a four day work week
There's a special surprise tomorrow
I'm going to bring treats to work on Thursday
AND Golden Grahams are on sale!
I think it's gonna be a good week!

For every 100 girls who join Girl Scouts . . .

Only rarely will one be brought before a juvenile court.
Four will earn their Gold Awards.
Twelve will have their first contact with a church.
Five will earn their religious awards.
One will enter the clergy.
Eighteen will develop hobbies used through their adult life.
Eight will enter a vocation that was learned through a badge.
Seventeen will be future Girl Scout Volunteers.
One will use her Girl Scout skills to save a life.

Brother Phi posted a list of things about Germany
It's way more interesting than anything I'm going to post today, so head on over to his site to learn about German windows, toilets, cigarettes, locks, and money.

If you buy a pack of cigarettes her instead of having the label on the side that says "caution smoking may possibly be linked to lung cancer and might affect pregnancyes and may promote premature death" in tiny print. half of the front of the box says "SMOKING CAN MAKE YOU DEAD" its funn to read some of the labels while waiting at the super markt yet almost every one in germany still smokes. the first time i saw an advertisement for cigarets at the trainstation i thought it was anti-smoking propoganda but then i saw the packs at the supermarket and relized it was an advertiment and the second largest words on the poster were "smoking can make you dead" (in german of course).