Berry

Berry comes from an Indo-European root meaning "to shine," perhaps for the bright colors of many small fruits.

~ Harold McGee from On Food and Cooking:
The Science and Lore of the Kitchen ~

Image by robynejay.

R.I.P. Leo Dillon

When we first met, we thought that there would be vast differences between us since we were different races and from different cultures. It wasn’t long before we began to understand that there really is no difference between people. There might be ideas that you’ve grown up with and believe are true. But you realize early on that those are really surface things; that underneath it all, we’re the same.

~ Leo Dillon ~

It's the Smart Thing To Do!

It is no disgrace to move out of the way of the elephant.


~ Vietnamese proverb ~



Photo by easegill.

Memorial Day

summer grasses
all that remains
     of soldiers' dreams

~ Basho ~

Photo courtesy the U.S. Army.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

from his hole
the snake pokes his head...
the cat slaps it


~ Issa translated by David G. Lanoue ~

Fiction

It think maybe that's why people write fiction, and why people read it, is because you don't know who you are unless you can imagine being otherwise.

~ Marilynne Robinson ~

Poetry Friday

Haiku shows us what we knew all the time, but didn't know that we knew.

~ R.H. Blyth ~










Image courtesy Library of Congress.

People ≠ Gods

I turn people into human beings by not making them into gods.

~ Imogen Cunningham ~





Photo © Imogen Cunningham Trust, courtesy National Galleries of Scotland.

The Internet

The Internet is so big, so powerful and pointless that for some people it is a complete substitute for life.

~ Andrew Brown ~

Photo by Steve Rhode.

Dreamy Shoes

Let your dreams outgrow the shoes of your expectations.

~ Ryunosuke Satoro ~

Photo courtesy the Virtual Shoe Museum.

Number 3 Was Unexpected!

Great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts--the book of their deeds, the book of their words and the book of their art.

~ John Ruskin ~





Mary Cassatt, "The Boating Party," courtesy National Gallery of Art.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

She rubs my chin
and purrs away,
as if I am
a game to play!

~ Aileen Fisher from "My Cat and I" ~


Photo © Diane Mayr, all rights reserved.

Feminist Makeover

Feminism represents all women, young and old, pretty and plain, boisterous and shy, married and single, straight and gay. That's the whole point. Instead of lumping all of us in with some generalized definition of womanhood, feminism seeks to allow each individual the freedom to define herself.

~ Digby ~

Poetry Friday

Words are more powerful than perhaps anyone suspects, and once deeply engraved in a child's mind, they are not easily eradicated.

~ May Sarton ~

Win-Win

People worldwide are rediscovering the benefits of buying local food. It is fresher than anything in the supermarket and that means it is tastier and more nutritious. It is also good for your local economy--buying directly from family farmers helps them stay in business.

~ LocalHarvest.org website ~




Image courtesy NH Dept. of Agriculture.

So Sad

I'm in awe of people out there who deal with Alzheimer's, because they have to deal with death 10 times over, year after year.

~ Marcia Wallace ~

Something We Never Seem to Understand

All wars are civil wars, because all men are brothers.

~ François Fénelon ~

The Purpose of Junk Mail

Cartoon courtesy Dilbert.com.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

1. Find sunbeam.
2. Lie down.
3. Sunbeam moves just as you fall asleep.
4. Wake up cold.
5. Repeat until you are a nihilist.

~ Henri, le Chat Noir ~





Courtesy Henri, le Chat Noir

Good Job!

Once you start to see praise for what it is--and what it does--these constant little evaluative eruptions from adults start to produce the same effect as fingernails being dragged down a blackboard. You begin to root for a child to give his teachers or parents a taste of their own treacle by turning around to them and saying (in the same saccharine tone of voice), "Good praising!"

~ Alfie Kohn ~

Poetry Friday

Spider, you and I are kin;
Our deepest selves we both disburse.
Your entrails into silk you spin,
      And I mine into verse.

~ Paul Scott Mowrer ~

Photo by cybershotking.

Science or Politics or Both?

Anyone who doesn't take truth seriously in small matters cannot be trusted in large ones either.

~ Albert Einstein ~

The Original Wild Thing

I often went to bed without supper cause I hated my mother's cooking. So, to go to bed without supper was not a torture to me. If she was gonna hurt me, she'd make me eat. That's true, too.

~ Maurice Sendak ~

Children's Book Week

A great nation is a reading nation.

~ Frederic Melcher ~






Poster courtesy Children's Book Week.

Strawberry Bank

"Oh, Mother, see what we have found! The bank was covered with berries, even after we had picked all these!"

"Why, boys, it is just like the home-land! Surely Captain John Smith had described this Place well for Prince Charles to name it New England. Already I feel better, for this land is not so strange since home things grow here."

The boys found that even the sassafras could not have given her more pleasure. They went to bed that night before dark, contented with their search and anxious to return to the strawberry field.

For twenty years the land about the Great House was called Strawberry Bank. Though that was almost three hundred years ago and the name was afterward changed to Portsmouth, there are now many people in New England, and some outside, who know just what spot is meant when they hear of Strawberry Bank.


~ Edith Gilman Brewster from Some Three Hundred Years Ago, The W. B. Ranney Company, Printers, Concord, New Hampshire, © 1922 ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

We had birds, gold-fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a small monkey, and a cat.

This latter was a remarkably large and beautiful animal, entirely black, and sagacious to an astonishing degree. In speaking of his intelligence, my wife, who at heart was not a little tinctured with superstition, made frequent allusion to the ancient popular notion, which regarded all black cats as witches in disguise. Not that she was ever serious upon this point--and I mention the matter at all for no better reason than that it happens, just now, to be remembered.

~ Edgar Allan Poe from "The Black Cat" ~

Photo by spacecookypk.

Free the People!

We'll free the people with music.

~ Bob Marley ~

Poetry Friday

They are milestones to see where you are now, to perpetuate your feelings, to establish them. If you have in any way touched the central heart of mankind's feelings, you'll survive.

~ Richard Eberhart ~





Photo by sleepymyf.

Pretty Creepy If You Take It Literally...

These are not books, lumps of lifeless paper, but minds alive on the shelves.

~ Gilbert Highet ~

Good Advice!

One's prime is elusive. You little girls, when you grow up, must be on the alert to recognize your prime at whatever time of your life it may occur. You must then live it to the full.

~ Muriel Spark ~

Monuments

Monuments and archaeological pieces serve as testimonies of man's greatness and establish a dialogue between civilizations showing the extent to which human beings are linked.

~ Vincente Fox ~

Photo by Darkest Before Dawn.