Citizen Vince Meeting

Thanks, Faye, for the fun meeting and donuts. I really enjoyed the first half of the book which is all I've read so far. I hope to finish it soon. Maybe before the election?

I love the cd and the quotes for each song. Here's the playlist if you haven't picked up your cd yet:

1. Inland Empire

2.This is Hell - Elvis Costello

3. Boy from NYC - The Ad Libs

4. Blackbird - The Beatles

5. Legal Tender - The B-52s

6. Everyday People - Sly & the Family Stone

7. Perfect Skin - Lloyd Cole

8. You Can Leave Your Hat On - Randy Newman

9. Mack the Knife - Bing Crosby

10. You Sexy Thing - Hot Chocolate

11. NY State of Mind - Billy Joel

12. He's Got the Power - The Exciters

13. Bad LeRoy -Jim Croce

14. I Feel Free - Cream

15. Wouldn't It Be Nice - Beach Boys

16. Best Place I've Ever Been - World Party

17. I Feel Good - Al Green

18. What a Wonderful World - Joey Ramone

I didn't think a cd was necessary for 'The Road' but I just had an idea for one so if you'll humor me there'll be a musical companion to the book.

The next meeting will be at my house on Wednesday, November 12. We'll be having the meeting outside under a tarp with canned peaches, mystery meat and muddy water for snacks. You may want to dress appropriatly. Shopping carts are optional.

The VGT Omnivore's Hundred

I found this list on a website the other night, during The Night Of Much Puking (don't ask). It intrigued me and, since my own blog is still not public, I thought I'd post it here. It would be interesting to see what everyone else comes up with. Go to the site and follow the instructions and re-post for us so we can see your epicurean limits. You can click on the highlighted items to look them up in Wikipedia. I'm betting Kristine has tried most of these things (anyone who can bungee jump off of a bridge would have the balls to try crocodile.) I couldn't figure out how to strike through so I used an asterisk for step number 3. I am italicizing things I want to try. Have fun!

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.
4) Optional extra: Post a comment here at www.verygoodtaste.co.uk linking to your results.

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding *(I think this is like blood pudding - no way.)
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese*
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar (anyone want to do this with me?)
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O (If this is the British version of Jell-O shooters, then YES!)
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk (does cheese count?)
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu* (I'd be in the 4% who gets the poison part and dies instantly. No thanks.)
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel*
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin*
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer*
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini (I've had a classic, never a dirty one.)
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine (OMG, I want to try this!)
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads*
63. Kaolin*
64. Currywurst
65. Durian*
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis*
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette*(even deep frying couldn't make me eat pig's ass)
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini (had them seperately, but not together. Does that count?)
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill *(are you kidding me?)
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie (Nope, never had one.)
78. Snail*
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse* (Not only does the thought repulse me, my daughter would never speak to me again!)
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam (unfortunately.)
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake*

Basically, if it's cheese, alcoholic or involves curry I'm all over it. Japanese/raw/smelly? Not so much.

Bottle Cap Puzzles

I couldn't believe it when Vince Camden from 'Citizen Vince' cracked open a beer and solved the puzzle from the bottle cap. That opened a memory from my childhood I completely forgot about. My parents, when they were feeling flush, would buy the beer with the puzzles on the caps and my brother and I loved to solve them.

It was escpecially entertaining on camping trips as the picnic table was usually covered with them by night's end and it would provide the rest of us kids some entertainment while our parents became more inebriated. Good times.

Here's a link for more bottle cap puzzles: http://jokelibrary.net/yyDrawings/bottle_caps.html

I also found it funny that he was reading some sort of Dante's Hell book and was learning about the fourth level of hell.

Molly's Review of 'The Road' by Cormac McCarthy

I cheated and read this book before 'Citizen Vince'. Don't worry I won't give away any spoilers. Here's my review:

I thought it was okay.
Okay?
Okay.
Really? Okay?
Yes, okay.
Why?
It underwhelmed me.
What?
It was so simple.
I think that's the point. They were so tired. They didn't want to expell much energy by talking.
Okay.
You really just thought it was okay?
It was okay.
Okay?
Yes.
Okay?
Okay.
Okay?!?
Can we stop saying "okay" now?
Okay.

Interesting Covers

Is it me............


.............or are these covers just wrong?

Worst Book Ever

The following is an e-mail that Jackie sent out a few weeks ago. It made for some entertaining reading and whenever I feel bad about my writing/ storytelling skills I just have to read this and know that I'm okay.

"Okay, I may have found a new "worst book ever written". I haven't actually read more than an exerpt, but it looks pretty darn bad. The woman who wrote and self-published the novel was actually banned from all Amazon.com discussions because she was spamming all the discussion boards promoting her own book. It's like a train wreck and here's an excerpt." ~ Jackie

Antigua: The Land of Fairies, Wizards and Heroes (Part 1) is the first of a trilogy. This story is a fantasy with magical characters such as a Sorceress, a Dragon, Fairies, Wizards, Knights, Kings, Queens, Pixies, and Gnomes. Here is a sample from the book: Suddenly, there were black clouds in the sky. Everyone heard a loud noise coming from the sky and they all knew that Voltar the Dragon was coming. King Artor yelled out, "Daughters, Voltar comes! Get ready your weapons! The time has come for you to fulfill the prophecy!" Princess Sasha, Princess Trina, Princess Alexandra and Rebecca walked up ahead of the army and lined up together in a row. They looked like warriors! Rebecca was not afraid! She took a deep breath and got her weapon ready for the task that lay ahead. She understood the prophecy now and had faith in herself and the Princesses. They each pulled out their bows and prepared to kill the dragon. Fire came out of his nostrils and his mouth. Princess Alexandra handed each of the other girls one of the special arrows that they had gotten from the Queen of the Unicorns. All four of the girls pointed their bows up into the air and waited for Voltar to come nearer. Voltar let out such a loud noise that the ground shook! Then fire came right out of his nostrils. The Wizard Thandor held his mighty wand up toward the sky and yelled, "Mighty clouds of the sky, I call upon you to bring forth lightening to destroy the Dragon Voltar!" Large lightening bolts came out of the clouds toward Voltar. One lightening bolt struck Voltar and wounded him, but it didn't kill him!

YPU Recap

First, I'd like to welcome Kim Windsor to the GAB.

Our meeting for YPU was a lot of fun. Those that finished the book said it was a bit dense which was good to hear from those of us that didn't finish it. Overall it was a well liked book. Wish I could give you more insight but I was one of those that made it to page 80 and then stalled.

Our November pick is 'The Road' by Cormac McCarthy
http://www.readinggroupguides.com/guides3/road1.asp
I will order the book from Book People today.

Next month's meeting is 'Citizen Vince' hosted by Faye. The date is Wednesday, October 8.

The Skeptoid Skeptic - The Forward

I am completely fascinated with this book possibly because we're in the throws of watching the X-Files, a show that is the complete opposite of this book. Like Agent Fox Mulder on the series 'I Want to Believe' all of this "woo-woo" matter.

According to the book, I am not a rational thinker and probably never will be and you know what that's just fine by me. If I'm living in a bubble of fantasy than so be it. I'm happy here.

Websites:
http://skeptoid.com/

Molly's Latest iPod Misadventure

WARNING #1: Thinking about Apple , iTunes and iPods can send me into a rage of profanity....

It's been two years of a love/hate relationship with iPods - you may vaguely remember my experience with the little white portable music device right when we got it. Well, our computer decided to take a big greasy dump on Tuesday so I have been burning the midnight oil, not to mention my rods and cones, to get our computer back up and running to full capacity. The last thing on my list to do is figure out the least painful way of getting our music back onto the computer.

WARNING #2: For those of you who are/ were naive like me and thought that music is on the iPod, it should just transfer somehow back on to the computer after it crashes just fine, we are wrong. If you haven't backed up your music files recently I suggest you do so....now!......seriously...stop reading this blog...back up your music.....but hurry up so I can finish my story

OK you're back....what a pain in the ass that was, which is why we never backed up our music, until now.

So I've spent the entire morning reading the troubleshooting guides and message boards to try and find solutions to recover our music and podcasts - I have close to 800 songs on my iPod and Nate has about 300 - can you imagine us sitting and manually plugging in cds, not to mention all of the songs we've purchased from iTunes.

I finally came across some downloads and hoped they worked. I settled on Media Widget to try out their free trial to see if the program even worked. I install everything only to find out it will get you 10 songs off the iPod anything else I want I'm going to have to purchase the program. Is this a scam or wha? 10 songs??? Does anyone have just 10 songs on their iPod? That may get me around the block but not a road trip to Montana.

Three hours and $35.78 later we have iTunes restoration. The program worked! I can't believe Apple doesn't offer some sort of free program that does this for you. It just fries my ass! The crappy thing is we are completely helpless and let these corporate bastards give it to us in the ass without lube while they smoke their Cubans and laugh like the devil. Well, I hope they get banished to the 9th level of hell and I can have the last laugh high above them on my perch with my three headed monster friend and living the good life in the 3rd level of hell.

Molly's turn.....

Top reasons for Molly not posting on this blog:

• Taking little dinos on trips so I can post on Chocolate Mike's Blog
• Trying to craft so I can post more on my crafting blog The Scraplifter's Dream
• Living life so I can post on our family's blog Spain Family Adventures

I cracked open the Dante Club and it is a tough one for me to figure out. I need to write down names and descriptions of characters as there are so many. It's like watching a war or gangster movie and everyone looks the same and has the same (or variation of) last name.

Can't wait to read the posts!

Where are all the GAB bloggers?

Our book club is at its peak. We have a record number of amazing women with many great ideas and opinions. So, why don't we post on the blog? I'd love to hear random thoughts about the books, or life in general, throughout the month. So, I'm going to try to get this started again.

Is anyone finished with The Dante Club? Sadly, not me, but Todd read it last weekend (he was in Chicago) and really liked it. I can't wait to read it!

If you read it, post your thoughts; if you haven't read it, post your top ten reasons for being such a slacker (ha ha)

Mine:

10. Too busy waiting for building inspectors to not show up
9. Too busy going to scheduled appointments to find the person I'm supposed to meet is not there
8. Too busy in the yard, "pulling weeds" (which is code for talking to the neighbor)
7. Too busy goofing off on the internet
6. Too busy reading bad fiction and disturbing non-fiction, so I will have June choices at our next meeting.
5. Too busy getting kids to all the billion end-of-the-year events (related to school or other activities)
4. Too busy anticipating which David will be the next American Idol, and celebrating when the right one wins (David Cook)
3. Too busy spilling 2 cups of vegetable oil all over the kitchen (it was a BAD day)
2. Too busy trying to get Eric to put on his shoes
AND, the number one top reason I haven't read the book yet:
1. I don't know- we still have two weeks and I don't want to break character by not procrastinating.

Fiction does not equal Erotica

I went looking for eBooks to load onto my PocketPC. Not that I really read on it much, but it is nice to have. I have some free ones from the Univ of Virginia e-Text library, but I’m looking for some more contemporary books. So I went to amazon.com – nothing. I went to Barnes & Noble – nothing. Feeling desperate I went to Microsoft.com and selected the MS Reader link (since that's the software I use to read the eBooks.) That had links to various e-texts and a list of categories on the right nav bar. I chose “Fiction” and got all sorts of stuff I would put under “Erotica” (which was also a category.) Now I’m getting the impression that because I read e-texts I’m going to be labeled in an unflattering way. Finally finding a book that looks mostly tame, I look to see where I might buy such an eBook. And there, right in front of my eyes, is a link to Powells.com. Yea!! My beloved Powell’s Bookstore from my hometown is a wonderful vendor of eBooks! Click MS Reader format and click Literature and the first item on page 1 is “A Thousand Splendid Suns,” our April book selection. Woo Hoo!!

Meeting Summary for Six of One

Thanks to all who attended last night at San Miguels – the food, margaritas and discussion were great. We missed the rest of you! Thanks to everyone for their patience in trying to get this meeting to happen. I just feel slightly cursed by the weather gods.Summary of our state of the union for GAB:

• Keep time and date same, except for March 2008 that conflicts with spring break. Because 3 of us already knew we were out of town, Kristine changed the date to Wednesday, March 5th.
  
• Up our Book People order to 12 and review in April to see if we have an accurate count.
  Reviewed 2007 book choices with lots of positive feedback. Some members looking for more nonfiction options so keep those in mind.
  
• Desire for more structure within the discussion. Ideas suggested included advance study questions or web research, giving hosts questions or comments in advance, and/or question basket during meeting.
  
• Molly will work on updating the web site.
  
• Anita received a couple of corrections to the Member List last night so those that didn’t attend be sure and get yours to her so she can get the corrected version back out to us.

Last night our choice was Six of One by Rita Mae Brown. I provided way too much background information on the author and her interesting evolution as a writer. The antics bickering, boot legging, poor driving, colorful Southern characters provided a lot of laughs to many. As we have found with other books, plots that jump around through time and many characters (with multiple nicknames) can be challenging. This book was written early in the author’s career and if you want to check out her later writing style, she has two mainstream mystery series, The “Sister” Jane Fox Hunting Mysteries and the Mrs. Murphy Books.Our choice for February is Every Secret Thing by Ann Tatlock.

Our March choice is The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer: Close Encounters with Strangers by Eric Hansen.Thanks again for a great meeting.Mary

“If the world were a logical place, men would ride side-saddle.” Rita Mae Brown

“The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four Americans is suffering from some form of mental illness. Think of your three best friends. If they're okay, then it's you.” Rita Mae Brown