IMPORTANT JULY EVENTS

• July 4, 1776 Happy Birthday America!!!

1976 Michigan bicentennial license plates!!

• July 24, 1897 Amelia Earhart, American aviator and first woman to fly the Atlantic, born.
• July 25, 1956 Andrea Doria sinks 

• July 25, 195? BABS WAS BORN!!!

Let the Birthday Month Festivities commence!!!

Summer Reading Program

Click on the image below to receive your invitation:

A group of malcontent, radical, militant librarians & educators trying to break addictions to the Interwebs in a summer reading program using the Association of College & Research Libraries Reading List. http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/3348016-acrl?order=a&sort=title.  You may not like this list-- it surely aint' no Danielle Steel nor Clive Cussler.  Shut up and start reading, it's good for you, professionally and personally.

This is a public group.  Anyone can join and invite others to join. rules

1. Complete as many books from this biblio-centric list of recreational & professional books
... before 9/21/11.
2. Write a short review. Please make it good!
3. If you've already read a book on the list, write a review (if you can remember it). 
4.  A Leaderboard will be updated weekly.
5. "Special prizes" for "Special" readers will be awarded at a pagan ritual held on the Autumnal Equinox in the following 3 categories:

• # of reviews written.
• # of books read between 6/23 - 9/23/11. 
• A special Magoo award to the person who reads the greatest #of books on an e-reading device (Kindle or Nook) 

Canada is Cool

To my dear readers in Florida, et orbi:

As I post this blog, we finally breathe a sigh of relief.  No, that infernal Casey Anthony trial isn't over, but the sun has, in real time, set on this-- the longest, but not the hottest frickin' day of the year--The Summer Solstice.  Goddamn it, global warming is costing me major coin.  To wit:  My car battery died due to the heat, likewise my key fob remote battery-- not to mention, my hearing aid, pace maker, and vibrator (Mr. Happy) batteries, respectively.

Today's blog inspiration came to me while indulging in the only daily discipline I practice--reading the stellar St. Pete Times* in print not online (won't you please add me to your blog roll, fellas?).  Being a creature of habit (some say retarded, I prefer "special," or Aspberger's Syndrome) I read my paper the same way daily.  Some people start with the lottery numbers... I...

• Start with the obituaries.  Maybe one day I'll see the names Fang Epstein or Priscilla Krass Epstein, there in tiny print.  I am delusional-- those two are way too cheap to buy an obituary in the newspaper.  Yet, hope springs eternal.   
• Then onto the "hard news...."  the Leo horoscope...roar girls  (Cougars and baby Minx alike).
• Followed by the Florida weather (easy reading even when hungover--sunny and warm).    

Ergo today's blog inspiration: 



Canada is cool!!  Like these shoes-- sexy but kinda sensible.

1.  Summertime Weather.  Back page, the forecast for Florida predicted  temperatures soaring close to 100 F today.  In Canada forecasts looked something like this: (international readers, you will have to use your government-subsidized slide rules to convert to the socialist, oops Celsius, system you insist on using:

• Vancouver 70 F.  Nice.
• Toronto 78 F.      Nicer.
• Montreal 79 F.     Nicest!!

2.  Page 3A: The "Hard-Rockin,' Tight-pant wearin' Canadian Mullets of the 80's Tour,"sponsored by Viagra and Cialis will be performing (maybe in rugs, be prepared for the worse gals and you won't be disappointed, ) at the Florida State Fairgrounds this weekend.  Quarter page ad!



3. Page 4A  "A request for help in growing reefer"  or "Canadians are kind folk"
"Nova Scotia's Community Services Department is wondering what's next. It was ordered by an appeals board to help a needy couple in the Canadian province improve their marijuana garden. The couple, whose names have not been made public, have permission to grow up to 25 plants for medical purposes, according to a Canadian Broadcast Corp. report. But the couple, who get income assistance from the government, can only afford to grow six plants — and sometimes run low on supplies. So the board ruled recently that the department should pay $2,500 to set up the full marijuana growing operation and $400 a year for supplies. A department spokeswoman said Monday that it is pondering the order."  --St. Pete Times, pg. 4A, June 21, 2011

In conclusion, reading the newspaper is good, and Canada does have it's faults-- #1: it's not the U.S. #2: Winter. #3: Metric System (Hello? Canada?  This is a collect call from 1974. Will you accept the charges?).  Okay, just sayin'.  God forbid I had to live anywhere else, (like if I got kicked out of the U.S.) it would probably be Canada as...

• They have a great dole.
•  I "get" hockey and curling (unlike baseball and football).
• They have a "Queen," but not really.
• Dad gum it, I got the accent down "real good," so much so that I could pass for an actual Canadian.
• They don't use that stupid pound Sterling system.
• They drive on the right side of the road, for the love of God. 
• After the hockey riots of last week, Canadians have made Americans feel a little less retarded about themselves on the world stage.

--xoxo,
Babs
*The only newspaper in the U.S. to increase it's circulation

Truly, the "Greatest Generation" ever*!!! Weiner's need not apply.

Happy Father's Day, Dad.  Yea, my cool old man (gone but certainly not forgotten) served in the Army Air Force during WWII.  I just can't see him up there amongst the heavenly hosts today...I see him as he really was--recovering at the Biltmore in Coral Cables, FL...

...drinking rum and Coca Cola, holding court poolside at the Biltmore w/his pals, and some nice gals from the USO.



Happy Father's Day to the best, bravest, funniest, and handsomest Dad, ever... 

*May I suggest for your viewing pleasure today "Saving Private Ryan," "Band of Brothers," "The Pacific."    

Sweetest little bookworm..."Her eyes were portals into another world..."

Edmund Spenser's Amoretti: Sonnet 79 centers on the idea of what true beauty is... Spenser states that true beauty comes from intelligence...outer beauty fades, but inner beauty lasts forever and in the end touches more people.

Inspiration...Zelda Fitzgerald.



Planking craze in Australia

This will never catch on in America.  We're too fat. 

The virtual European vacation experience on the cheap..

Okay, don't have the bread to head over to Europe this summer?  Just declared bankruptcy, graduated from an Ivy League university, got that pink slip, and/or working at Barnes and Noble? 

Readers it took me two years to dig out of the debt quagmire I got myself into after visiting the real London two years ago, and the whole place smacked of Disneyland.  I'm rethinking the charm of those mighty expensive European capitals.  Fret not, Babs has some suggestions that may give you a bit of an old world flavor, sans the unfortunate exchange rate, and the mark up caused by socialist medicine. 

Below please find some Northern Hemisphere options you may want to consider until your ship, if ever, comes in. 

• Montreal instead of Paris
• Quebec City, instead of Provence
• Nova Scotia, instead of Scotland
• Upper Peninsula of Michigan instead of Scandinavia
• Toronto instead of London
• Detroit, MI instead of St. Petersburg, Russia
• Miami instead of any third word hell hole capital city in South America
• Victoria, B.C. instead of London
• London, Ontario instead of London, UK
• Detroit, MI instead of Beirut or Kabul

To add to the verisimilitude of the experience you may want to sport indigenous costumes, i.e. a pith helmet, jodphurs, and an ascot when taking tea in Toronto.  A kilt when touring Nova Scotia.  A jaunty beret in Montreal, and guys, be dripping in gold jewelry, and gals, work that cleavage when in Miami. 

Readers, any further suggestions are welcome...

Flaming Desserts Anyone?

Happy 25th Anniversary Mame and Kip.

Mame, since Kip has been such a twirp as of late, may I suggest the following menu selections for your 25th wedding anniversary dinner?  A starter of straight up German bean sprouts, followed by a dramatic presentation of Bananas Foster, Cherries Jubilee, and/or Baked Alaska.  They key to this scenario is pouring 151 proof Rum straight outta the bottle (no decanting allowed).  Mame, you're an expert at that.  Oh, Mame, wear that darling asbestos little black dress, with asbestos push up black bra for this dinner.  And instead of Fresh Scent Downy, use terpentine, for the final rinse on Kips toughskins for the big night out.  I'm sure it will be a flaming success!!!   
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/13/bananas-foster-explodes-injures-four_n_875820.html

"I do think about sex a lot...'cuz I'm Catholic." --Lisa Landry

Starts out a bit slow, but trust me, stick with it...funny, funny stuff!!

2CELLOS evoke a glandular response...

Welcome to my inaugural weekly post:  "Revenge of the Nerds!!" 

No doubt some stupid jock hassled these guys every day the bus picked them up schlepping their cellos.  Who's getting the chicks now?   

Weiner Sale on Spirit Airlines



Clever guys and gals writing this copy!  Any openings in creative at Spirit?



The Sarah Palin History Channel

Slacker Cooking w/Lisa Landry

Panic at the Disco -Overture

One of the coolest videos ever!!

320 sq. foot home.

"It's not what you don't have, but what you have."  I totally love this concept of simplifying your life.  Lord Polo...it can be done.

xoxo--
--Babs