Life Lately

I've had a post in my drafts for weeks (!) about what I've been reading, as well as a few reviews, but haven't hit publish.  Moving to a new city and starting graduate school are not for wimps, and they're taking the blogging stuffing out of me!

Forgive me for not giving this space the time it deserves over the last few weeks - if you stop by and take the time to read, thank you.

I'll be back to posting regularly mid-August, and for now you can catch me and some small reviews on Instagram and Twitter.

Happy summer reading!

Summer Reading

Hi!

I fell off the blogging roll pretty hard there.  Like...falling off a log. Life's been very generous with me the past month (!) of radio silence here.  Below are some lovely peeks into a busy few weeks, but non-photographed highlights include: lots of good food, my first visit to California, seeing the Pacific Ocean, meals with friends, my birthday, learning to cook, hikes, sitting out on the deck, summer rain, farmers'  markets, my first ever root beer float, and the weather here finally cooling to something other than 90+ humidity.  Here's hoping the rest of the summer is full of goodness too.

But - getting back to business! Usually the only things I bring with me to read on a (shorter) flight are my Kindle and a magazine, unless there is a very compelling book I'm reading at the time.  I love a real book in my hands, but I like to travel as light as I possibly can.  This usually means I end up reading some good ole Harry P. on the plane, but I'm branching out here for the sake of blogging and my imaginary jet setting twin.  Without further ado...pretend this isn't the 70000th "Books to Read This Summer" post you've seen this week, and forgive my gentle foray back into the land of the blogging:

What about you? How have your first few weeks of summer been? Anything good on your list?

Anything you'd rip off my list and replace with something else?  Happy Friday and Happy Reading!

Happy Friday!

Reading: Right now I'm really enjoying the audiobooks I'm listening to, which I never thought I would say.  So far I'm rotating between The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat by Edward Kelsey Moore and Peaches for Father Frances by Joanne Harris.  They're good to listen to before bed, while cooking, on the way to work, and so on.  Hopefully I'll have some reviews ready soon.

Watching: Old episodes of Bones - when it was good, it was so good! Oh, stop, you do too.

Enjoying: Sheba's daily gorilla climb up the scratching post so that she can get onto the table.

Eating: Chocolate-y tea biscuits, with just the right amount of sweetness, perfect for dunking into rooibus tea.

Wearing: Black ankle boots - good for fall, good for spring, all-around perfect for in-between freak rain/snow storms.

What have you been up to lately? 

life lessons from sheba

Hello fellow blog-readers.  What's doin'? Happy, happy Tuesday-nearly-Wednesday.  These past few months have been doozies (moving, living with family, moving again, unpacking, meeting new people).  Having Sheba around again has slid certain things in place which earlier seemed totally hard, confusing, and not at all in place.  Has anybody else had that experience before?  Sheba is mostly a zen master when it comes to life and life changes, with the exception of evenings (when she gets a big burst of IT'SBEDTIMEEEEEELET'SDOTHIS) and...when her toys get stuck.  Mornings are mostly napping time.

I've realized I have a lot to learn from the fluffster, namely:

1. Most days, what you need in order to feel better is 1) a nap and 2) some perspective.  Ohhh how often I wish I would take this advice.  Is there really more that needs to be said?
2. Play more. Since Sheba's been back, there have been moments when I'm either working, or cooking, or cleaning, or just-getting-back-to-that-one-last-person, when I hear a plaintive mew and feel a kitten body rub against my leg (or, ok, kitten claws that need to be trimmed piercing my skin).  When I look down, I almost always see this little pink ball that she wants me to throw around with her.  It only takes a few minutes, but watching her race after that little ball, or (my personal favorite) watching her little butt wiggle as she concentrates before pouncing, brightens my mood.
3. Sometimes a vacuum is just a vacuum.  There are a lot of disturbing and dangerous things in this world (toxic people included), and they make a lot of noise and take up a lot of space.  In my experience, there are days when it can be very hard to keep that noise out of your face.  It takes a lot of effort every day (day after day) to keep focused on the things that are important.  Sometimes, (most times), there isn't a lot of substance behind all that noise.  It's just a vacuum.  A vacuum makes a lot of noise - but it won't kill you.  And probably won't suck your tail into its vortex...at least not forever.

 What about you? Any life lessons learned from your small(er) fur friends?

around these parts

Hello!

Long time no see! Well, yes.  Here we are, one week post-craziness, and I for one am ready for the blessed weekend.  The past week has had me in four cities and at multiple events, leaving the house at 6:30am and not getting back until close to 10pm.  Exhausting.  Ruh-diculous.  But also wonderful. 

How the heck have you been? What have you been up to lately? 

I haven't had the chance to sit down to write a book review in ages, but here's hoping you're just as happy to see some pictures from some of my escapades.  Here we go.

^^I volunteered at the Young Women of Achievement Awards hosted by the Women's Information Network at the Carnegie Institute of Science on Thursday.  This was the only shot I got out of the night, but it was absolutely one of the best things I've done lately.  I grabbed some awesome cookies, mingled with the nicest ladies, and was incredibly impressed and inspired by the work that all of these women are doing.  Go check out their profiles! Added bonus? All of them are in their 20's and 30's.  Incredible.^^

^^New York City, best city in the world, hands-down, was where I went for a graduate student open-house weekend, and again, this was the only picture I took (what?!).  This was the hilarious gum they gave out our first day, and it actually tasted pretty yummy.  I saw some wonderful family friends who are more like family, got to visit with friends from Israel that I haven't seen in months, and managed to nearly talk my face off about philosophy, theology, and pedagogy.  I also came back with five extra books, but what I lost in packing space I gained in upper-body strength. ;) ^^

^^I visited my alma mater for the first time since graduating nearly three years ago, which was very weird.  The same, and yet not.  I went for a meeting and wished I could have stayed a bit longer, but - who am I kidding - the best of all worlds would have been to have had the old gang gallivanting around campus catching up and laughing.  Another few years till then! ^^

^^I moved! I am still in the "I don't know where anything is,"/"I think there's an axe-murderer in my closet" phase, but things look much better today than they did two days ago.  We managed to semi-reconstruct my Ikea furniture, and let me tell you...nothing brings out the cray in people more than trying to figure out how to put together anything bought a year ago from Ikea.  This does mean, however, that the countdown till Sheba returns to the premises is whittling away.  We're talking single digits here, people.^^

I'm off to buy some shower curtain rings (I know I packed them, I saw them in their bag before we got here, and yet...gone.  Totally, completely disappeared.) and get things straightened up before Shabbat.  Enjoy your weekend!

Yours in sweltering apartment heat,
Cornelia

sue monk kidd at sixth & i

 

Last week I found myself on a Monday night with a few different choices for the evening (always a good place to find yourself).  After a quick game of "eeny-meeny-minee-mo," I decided to trek out to a book reading event for Sue Monk Kidd's new book, The Invention of Wings, held at a historic synagogue I'd been meaning to check out, hosted by a bookstore I've been meaning to go to. I'd read The Secret Life of Bees in college and loved it, and thought, "What a lucky coincidence that all three things I like have come together in a single event!" and so off I went.

I love going to book readings with author Q&A's because I love hearing about the process - coming up with an idea, how the research went, what obstacles they had to confront, what the final result looks like from an author's perspective - and this event fit the bill.  After a quick introduction, Ms. Kidd got up and spoke about how her interest was sparked at the Brooklyn Museum, by a list of names.  She came across two that she had never seen before: two sisters who had come from Charleston, South Carolina and worked towards the emancipation of slaves in the United States during the 19th century.

The synagogue itself is a really lovely building, founded in the early 20th century as a place for the community to come and worship.  I decided to buy a copy of the book at the door, without having so much as read a blurb about it, and then plopped myself down on a pew between two women I didn't know, cracked open the spine and started to read before the event began.

Here's the skinny:

Basic plot:
Two women find their way in life on the opposite sides of slavery - Sarah, a free white girl, is presented with a slave girl, Hetty "Handful," at her eleventh birthday.  Both have dreams and aspirations; the story straddles the two as they struggle and grow up.

On a scale from 1 to Cripplingly Depressing:
1.  Slavery is a major topic in this book, but the primary focus is on the main characters and the scope of their lives.  Violence is not described in gruesome detail.

Memories from reading:
This was a weekend and at-breakfast kind of book for me.  I spent most of Saturday with it, and then, when I could, read bits in the morning while I ate.  It was a book I wanted to finish. 

Teeth-gnashing:
Sarah's mother.  I think there were so many missed opportunities to talk about why she was the way she was, instead of leaving her as an impenetrable wall of obnoxiousness.

Favorite relationships:
Handful and her mother, Charlotte.  Those were the passages I could imagine most vividly in my mind.

Weapon of Choice:
Hardcover, physical book.  Not one I would carry around in my bag on the subway.

Other titles by this author:
The Secret Life of Bees
The Mermaid Chair
Traveling with Pomegranates
The Dance of the Dissident Daughter
Firstlight
When the Heart Waits

Have you read The Invention of Wings? What did you think?

Hello again!

Hi!  How the heck are you? How were your holidays? Did you survive the weather-pocalypses? Did you watch the Golden Globes?

This is just a quick post to say hi, hello, hey, howdy.  I'll be back to posting regularly next week and look forward to getting back into the swing of things.  Thanks for sticking around, and see you soon!

Kisses,
Cornelia and the Sheebster

good morning

 

view on my way to the bus station.

good morning!

This week sure has flown by, hasn't it? I feel like it's already Thursday.  Sheba's chomping away at her breakfast of kibble champions and I am waiting for my tea to steep, and here we are!

You look like you could use some pictures. 

It's been a mish-mosh of life experiences this weekend/beginning of the week, filled with Sheba snuggles, chats with family, improv games involving clapping while moving around (FINALLY the skills I learned in elementary school coming in handy) and making new friends.  For those of you who fasted this weekend, I hope you had a meaningful one.  For those of you not interested in fasting, here are some super things that have been floating around the internets:

This article on bugs - SO COOL.  Even if you don't like bugs, read it.

A Tegan and Sara video I stumbled upon which reminds me of, oh, all of my experiences traveling abroad (why doesn't traveling have two l's?)

This guy who tried to cross the Atlantic with helium balloons - what?! Dream big.

An article by one of my old advisers fitting for this (Jewish) holiday season.

I am loving this show from Denmark.  It's definitely giving me my travel fix, sort of.

For those of you who say Philosophy is dull and passionless, I present to you this.

Aaand, since you asked nicely, here's another one of Sheba:

 

Have a great Tuesday :)