Lit blog

[Eluard]

*laughing really loud*

yup. thanks for the edit.




oh sure. and the first time the boys forget to put it together for me I'll blow up the kitchen.

We actually have a small espresso maker. Dick is not allowed to interact with it.

eta: Dick is entirely too amused and fascinated with the espresso maker's "Perfect Froth Attachment."

Maybe Dick needs to have his/her own alt and post here — or maybe *drammatic music* DICK ALREADY DOES.





Aaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!




(Edited to protect the guilty.)

 

[unpredictablebijou]

Maybe Dick needs to have his/her own alt and post here — or maybe *drammatic music* DICK ALREADY DOES.


(okay I'll edit too


Aaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bite your tongue, young man.

Besides, I'd hardly be so proud of the phrase "amoral squalor" if I'd generated it myself.

My alts, sadly, are all just for submitting work that is too scandalous for my family and friends to see. I'd be busted in a heartbeat if I ever tried to post as one. I just can't manage to not sound like me.

I've always wanted a sock puppet, though. I envy people who can shift their voices enough to get away with that shit. Oh what I'd do with a sock puppet...

a grrrl can dream.

bj

 

[Tzara]

The wyf and I were up in the Skagit this last weekend. Lovely place. You get long vistas of flat river delta/farmland backed up by mountains, usually seen through an artistic (i.e., lightly smoggy) haze. There is a lot of wildlife, especially birds, especially raptors, to be seen. You're close to Seattle, so they know how to make coffee. Not that I drink it. I prefer tea, myself, but it's the principle, you know.

Oh, and there are flowers this time of year.

Yeah. Flowers.

 

[WickedEve]

and madness came to us all when we discovered the pit hair...

Scream.
Stares from the roofer across the street -- the one in the camouflage hat and pink tank top.
Scream!
"My sister has pit hair! It's not fair! She's only eight and I'm ten and I don't have pit hair!"

There are three hairs under her arm. Two light-colored ones and one long, black one. It's like a snake hanging from her Medusa pit. She applies deodorant to it.
"Can you still see it?" Frantic.
"Yeah, it's still there," I tell her.

The ten-year-old calls the grandma. My mom asks me the dreaded question. "Is there hair anywhere else?"

I ask the child.
No.
It's just a pit thing.

"Oh, god! I'm a werewolf!"
I assure her that she's not.

 

[Angeline]

The wyf and I were up in the Skagit this last weekend. Lovely place. You get long vistas of flat river delta/farmland backed up by mountains, usually seen through an artistic (i.e., lightly smoggy) haze. There is a lot of wildlife, especially birds, especially raptors, to be seen. You're close to Seattle, so they know how to make coffee. Not that I drink it. I prefer tea, myself, but it's the principle, you know.

Oh, and there are flowers this time of year.

Yeah. Flowers.

Beautiful!

and madness came to us all when we discovered the pit hair...

Scream.
Stares from the roofer across the street -- the one in the camouflage hat and pink tank top.
Scream!
"My sister has pit hair! It's not fair! She's only eight and I'm ten and I don't have pit hair!"

There are three hairs under her arm. Two light-colored ones and one long, black one. It's like a snake hanging from her Medusa pit. She applies deodorant to it.
"Can you still see it?" Frantic.
"Yeah, it's still there," I tell her.

The ten-year-old calls the grandma. My mom asks me the dreaded question. "Is there hair anywhere else?"

I ask the child.
No.
It's just a pit thing.

"Oh, god! I'm a werewolf!"
I assure her that she's not.

My 16-year old called me a few minutes ago and said "Mom, tell my friend's mom about your labor with me," and then put a complete stranger on the phone. And this woman--who I have never met--said "Did you throw up?" Oh pit hairs are just the beginning.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

For Anschul, and anyone else who would like a lovely dose of Kansas in the Spring, here's what's going on at the moment.


Redbud trees

Spirea

Forsythia

Lilac

Golden Hosts...

and of course

the sky

the sky

The Sky

the SKY.

 

[champagne1982]

EnvironMental Impact

Ok, last week a flock of about 500 ducks landed on an uncontained tailing pond up in the Athabasca tar sands by Fort McMurray, about 600 kilometers from Edmonton. It's tragic and almost all of the ducks died in the pond but some escaped and a very few have been rescued.

It's ridiculous that yesterday 3 ducks were discovered in Wood Buffalo National Park and were airlifted to the wildlife care centre in our provincial capital. Where is the sense in this? They are going to try to save the ducks but at what cost? They've increased these 3 little water fowls' carbon footprint from -1 foot to something like 19 acres each.

To say I'm aghast at human susceptibility to popular pressure is inadequate. Why didn't common sense dictate that the officials make the birds comfortable and allow them to die within their natural environment? If they needed to complete an necropsy and toxicity screen thereafter, they could have sealed their pathetic bodies in heavy plastic and sent them off with the mail once they expired.

Don't pollute to discover more about pollution...

 

[Angeline]

For Anschul, and anyone else who would like a lovely dose of Kansas in the Spring, here's what's going on at the moment.


Redbud trees

Spirea

Forsythia

Lilac

Golden Hosts...

and of course

the sky

the sky

The Sky

the SKY.

Oh these are beautiful, and I am muy jealous of your blossoming spring. We're still in the throes of mud season, and though the temps have been in the 60s (F) here and there, we're mostly still having highs in the 40s during the day and colder at night. We won't really warm up here until mid-June or so. But Maine is gorgous in every season, yes even mud season. It's a wild beauty and the quality of the light often makes the sky look unreal to me, like a tromp l'oeile (sp?) painting.

My world:

Maine 1

Maine 2

Maine 3

Maine 4

That last one is right across the road from my house. It's pretty much the view from my living room windows. I'll try to remember that next time I feel like bitching about where I live.

Great idea Bijou. Maybe others can post some pics of their world.

 

[normal jean]

..................

 

[normal jean]

...............

 

[Angeline]

Your pics are beautiful, Sis. Just like I remember Maine when I was there--rather desolate yet beautiful. I have a million pics of rivers from around here and when we travel for work. I use them as Avatars on occasion. If and when you move to NC, you will be just as happy there though maybe not as cold, because NC is fantastically beautiful. ( and so is it's bastard sister-state, SC)



ps, my current avatar is the beach at Huntington Beach State Park near Myrtle Beach and Pawley's Island, SC. It is a nature preserve and has some awesome camping facilities. I will have to show you someday.)

I can't wait to see it!

I've been through the Carolinas many times, but only once spent a week on the Outer Banks in NC. I imagine Myrtle Beach (where my mom lived for a while as a kid) and Pawley's Island are pretty similar--just lovely with those huge sand dunes and the wild witch grass everywhere. Very, very different from Maine and my other reference point, the Jersey shore.

I know western NC will be a big change for us, but I think we'll love it there. Just the other night I heard someone describe Asheville as being a "southern San Francisco." I like the idea of that a lot and, of course, ee is over the moon at the idea having grown up in SF. Don't think we're gonna make the move this summer though, not with the economy in such a slump and everything so expensive, but we'll get there and then we'll meet you and my other Carolina buddy.

 

[champagne1982]

Alrighty. The images are from the net but are in no way exceptional views. I see these things everyday.

Cold Lake One
Cold Lake Two
Cold Lake Three
Cold Lake Four
Cold Lake Five

I don't have any good pics of the ski resort here, suffice it to say, it consists of a chair and a tbar on a drumlin. Still, there's a competitive snow board park and sufficient runs to include Kinosoo Ridge in Ski Canada's list of destinations.

 

[unpredictablebijou]

It's beautiful being able to see a bit of the landscape that surrounds the individuals in here. I'm liking this picture-sharing trend.

All these east coast landscapes make me long for the Atlantic - I did spend a fair amount of time in Boston growing up, and a summer there after my freshman year in college. I was on boats a great deal, and of course had to make various pilgrimages to Salem. Bwa haha. The best thing about Salem is Captain Putnam's Ice Cream Smorgasbord. It's been, I dunno, fifteen years since I was there, so I don't know if Captain Putnam's is even still open, but man, that was the finest ice cream orgy I ever ran across.

More pics of your worlds, please!

bj

 

[normal jean]

...................

 

[Anschul]

Miami Beach, Florida

I'm going to post a few pictures from my place. These are not my pix (that will be obvious), but images from the Internet. My camera broke, and I don't have anything current that I love. However I do kind of like this place, my adopted home. I must admit, however, these pix are not the amazing beauty of the north country, but as some wise man once said, "it is what it is." These would play much better, I must say, if we were doing this in February.

My Place:

Miami Beach

Virginia Key

My beach

Architecture

South Beach

The city at sunset

Anschul lives at the arrow

It's just a place to live, after all, and there are benefits.

A benefit

* That guy can be such a pig sometimes. *

 

[Angeline]

I'm going to post a few pictures from my place. These are not my pix (that will be obvious), but images from the Internet. My camera broke, and I don't have anything current that I love. However I do kind of like this place, my adopted home. I must admit, however, these pix are not the amazing beauty of the north country, but as some wise man once said, "it is what it is." These would play much better, I must say, if we were doing this in February.

My Place:

Miami Beach

Virginia Key

My beach

Architecture

South Beach

The city at sunset

Anschul lives at the arrow

It's just a place to live, after all, and there are benefits.

A benefit

* That guy can be such a pig sometimes. *

So gorgeous! I just love seeing everyone's photos of our respective worlds. Mine were just internet pics, too, but I knew if I googled certain things, I'd find photos of places very near where I lived. And I don't know why I pictured you still in CA, probably our previous convo.

I lived in Hollywood, near Ft Lauderdale for a few years as a child so your pics look somewhat familiar. Sort of. I mainly remember (I was very young) being yelled at to put my shoes on before I went out so the red ants wouldn't get my toesies. That and walking to the beach with my grandfather every morning.

And I can't believe I forgot to post a photo of my famous neighbor's house! He lives about ten minutes from us, here:

He's the only guy in town with bats and spiders on his front gate.

 

[Tzara]

So gorgeous! I just love seeing everyone's photos of our respective worlds.

I see I fucked up and put mine on a different thread. I had kinda idly wondered what had happened to it and assumed I'd just left without clicking Submit. (Note to those few who would give a shit: It is not often that I identify with "Submit," which may have something to do with why this didn't work out well. ) Considering it took some time to put the post together, and that I had to write a poem for Taskmaster Eluard and His Five Days of Doom! besides, I just skated.

Now I see I was just being stupid, like the case study for Do not drive more than two computers at a time. Especially if you've been drinking. Anything.

Oh, well. The photos are still nice.




There is nothing quite like the experience of being stupid in public. It's kind of a refreshing, actually. Like taking your clothes off and realizing that nobody cares.

 

[champagne1982]

I'll just take my clothes off and leave 'em over here with yours, shall I?

 

[Tzara]

I'll just take my clothes off and leave 'em over here with yours, shall I?

That dilemma is discussed here.

 

[LeBroz]

Irena Sendler

.
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From the online version of the Telegraph, here's an obituary that should truly move you. Just think — Al Gore beat her out for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Irena Sendler, who died [Monday, 12 May] aged 98, is credited with having saved the lives of some 2,500 Jewish children in the Warsaw ghetto during the Second World War.

By 1942 the Germans had herded some 500,000 Polish Jews into the ghetto – an area of about one square kilometre – to await transportation to the extermination camps. Starvation and disease, especially typhoid, were endemic.

Irena Sendler was a Polish Roman Catholic social worker in the city who already had links with Zegota, the code name for the Council for Aid to Jews, and in December 1942 Zegota put her in charge of its children's department.

Wearing nurses' uniforms, she and a colleague, Irena Schultz, were sent into the ghetto with food, clothes and medicine, including a vaccine against typhoid. It soon became clear, however, that the ultimate destination of many of the Jews was to be the Treblinka death camp, and Zegota decided to try to save as many children as possible.

Using the codename "Jolanta", and wearing a Star of David armband to identify herself with the Jewish population, Irena Sendler became part of this escape network. One baby was spirited away in a mechanic's toolbox.

Some children were transported in coffins, suitcases and sacks; others escaped through the sewer system beneath the city. An ambulance driver who smuggled infants beneath the stretchers in the back of his van kept his dog beside him in the front seat, having trained the animal to bark to mask any cries from his hidden passengers.

In later life Irena Sendler recalled the heartbreak of Jewish mothers having to part from their children: "We witnessed terrible scenes. Father agreed, but mother didn't. We sometimes had to leave those unfortunate families without taking their children from them. I'd go back there the next day and often found that everyone had been taken to the Umschlagsplatz railway siding for transport to the death camps."

The children who were taken by Irena Sendler were given new identities and placed with convents, sympathetic families, orphanages and hospitals. Those who were old enough to talk were taught Christian prayers and how to make the sign of the Cross, so that their Jewish heritage would not be suspected.

Like the more celebrated Oskar Schindler, Irena Sendler kept a list of the names of all the children she saved, in the hope that she could one day reunite them with their families.

On the night of October 20 1943 Irena Sendler's house was raided by the Gestapo, and her immediate thought was to get rid of the list: "I wanted to throw it out of the window but couldn't, the whole house was surrounded by Germans. So I threw it to my colleague and went to open the door.

"There were 11 soldiers. In two hours they almost tore the whole house apart. The roll of names was saved due to the great courage and intelligence of my colleague, who hid it in her underwear."

The Nazis took Irena Sendler to the Pawiak prison, where she was tortured; although her legs and feet were broken, and her body left permanently scarred, she refused to betray her network of helpers or the children whom she had saved. Finally, she was sentenced to death.

She escaped thanks to Zegota, one of whose members bribed a guard to set her free. She immediately returned to her work using a new identity. Having retrieved her list of names, she buried it in a jar beneath an apple tree in a friend's garden.

In the end it provided a record of some 2,500 names, and after the war she attempted to keep her promise to reunite the children with their families. Most of the parents, however, had been gassed at Treblinka.

Irena Sendler was born Irena Krzyzanowska in Warsaw on February 15 1910 into a Polish Roman Catholic family. Her father was a physician who ran a hospital at the suburb of Otwock, and a number of his patients were impoverished Jews.

Although he died of typhus in 1917, his example was of profound importance to Irena, who later said: "I was taught that if you see a person drowning, you must jump into the water to save them, whether you can swim or not."

After the war Irena Sendler continued in her profession as a social worker and also became a director of vocational schools. In 1965 she became one of the first Righteous Gentiles to be honoured by Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority in Jerusalem. At that time Poland's Communist leaders would not allow her to travel to Israel, and she was unable to collect the award until 1983.

In 2003 she was awarded Poland's highest honour, the Order of the White Eagle; and last year she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, eventually won by Al Gore.

A play about her wartime experiences, called Life in a Jar, was written in 2000 by a group of American schoolgirls. It was performed on more than 200 occasions in the United States, Poland and Canada.

She was also the subject of a biography by Anna Mieszkowska, Mother of the Children of the Holocaust: The Story of Irena Sendler. Last year it was reported that Irena Sendler's exploits in Warsaw were to be the subject of a film, with Angelina Jolie in the starring role.

In her latter years Irena Sendler was cared for in a Warsaw nursing home by Elzbieta Ficowska, who – in July 1942, at six months old – had been smuggled out of the ghetto by Irena in a carpenter's workbox.

In 2005 Irena Sendler reflected: "We who were rescuing children are not some kind of heroes. That term irritates me greatly. The opposite is true – I continue to have qualms of conscience that I did so little. I could have done more. This regret will follow me to my death."

Irena Sendler's first husband was Mieczyslaw Sendler. The marriage was dissolved, and she later married Stefan Zgrzembski, with whom she had two sons and a daughter. One of the boys died in infancy, and her second son in 1999. Her daughter survives her.

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[Homburg]

.
.

From the online version of the Telegraph, here's an obituary that should truly move you. Just think — Al Gore beat her out for the Nobel Peace Prize.



.
.

Thank you for posting this. Sometimes I need reminding that there is the capacity for good in us.

 

[normal jean]

...................

 

[Anschul]

I'm going to post a few pictures from my place. These are not my pix (that will be obvious), but images from the Internet. My camera broke, and I don't have anything current that I love. However I do kind of like this place, my adopted home. I must admit, however, these pix are not the amazing beauty of the north country, but as some wise man once said, "it is what it is." These would play much better, I must say, if we were doing this in February.

My Place:

Miami Beach

Virginia Key

My beach

Architecture

South Beach

The city at sunset

Anschul lives at the arrow

It's just a place to live, after all, and there are benefits.

A benefit

* That guy can be such a pig sometimes. *

SIGH...

 

[normal jean]

.................

 

[unpredictablebijou]

Le Broz, that was astounding. Thank you.

bj