A Writer's Meme

1. Who are your favorite authors?
John Steinbeck, Pat Conroy, Bill Bryson, Michael Connelly

2. Who has had a major influence on your writing?
Steinbeck, without doubt. Perhaps not lately, but I read a lot of Steinbeck back in the late 70s/early 80s and whenever I was reading one of his books I was very aware that my writing became much tighter and more descriptive.

3. Name a book you never finished?
"The Mind's Eye." I absolutely LOVED it for the first three chapters, but in the fourth chapter he got into a subject I was very uncomfortable reading, because it related to me rather than to someone else. I kept reading, but I began to lose interest and ultimately I moved on to something more interesting...which surprises me because that first part of that book was one of the most interesting things I had ever read!

4. What word or words do you always have trouble spelling?
Meredith. I don't have trouble spelling it, but I have the devil of a time typing it. I have been typing it Meridty for literally YEARS (difficult, since one of my bosses had a daughter named Meredith). (I just typed it "Meridity" again!)

5. What three adjectives best describe you?
Fat, funny, compassionate

6. Which of your characters would you want to be and why?
I must have picked this meme up on Tess Gerritsen's web page because the answer I have here is one of her characters (Jane Rizzoli). I think I would prefer to be Kaye Scarpetta, intelligent, self-assured, unbothered by nasty odors, and a great cook!

7. Which authors would you invite to dinner?
Tess Gerritsen, Patricia Cornwell, and Kathy Reichs. Now THAT would be an interesting trio

8. Where do you write?
At my computer, looking at a wall covered with "stuff."

9. When do you write?
All the time.

10. What makes you happy?
Puppies, babies (not necessarily in that order. It depends on the day, the puppy, and the baby!)

11. What do you most fear?
It used to be something happening to my children, but so much for that. Now I think it's becoming incapacitated and dependent on other people for everything. I think about how Concetta lived for most of her life and I just don't know how she did it. Of course...what choice did she have?

12. What is your favorite vice?
Peanut butter

13. What is the quality you most like in yourself?
My love of animals....is that a quality?

14. What are the qualities you most like in your friends?
The ability to share our lives, a sense of humor, the ability to laugh together, and to cry together, or just sit and be quiet together. To always be there for each other.

15. What part of your personality do you detest?
My shyness in social situations. I have a feeling I have missed out on a lot of fun in life because of it.

17. What is your favorite adjective?
Probably "cool."

18. What is your favorite book?
"East of Eden"

19. What book would you read three times?
I have read "East of Eden" at least three times and in my youth, I read "Marjorie Morningstar" many times. Nowadays there are so many books I want to read, I doubt if I would re-read a book.

20. To whom would you award the Nobel Prize for Literature and why?
Steinbeck has already won the Nobel Prize for literature, so I'd have to choose someone else. Pat Conroy is out because he is not consistent, I don't believe, in his writing "Prince of Tides" was amazing, but not all of his books live up to that standard.

Most of the books I read today are lightweight, so I can't really come up with a suggestion, though reading Tess Gerritsen's choice, "Abraham Verghese, for his masterpiece 'Cutting for Stone.' The best novel ever written about the practice of medicine." Made me check that book out and mark it for download for the Kindle some day.

Parenting Puppies

Wow. It's been more than a year since I wrote about bottle feeding puppies, puppy pee, puppy poop or puppy breath! Haven't you missed it?

I've bottle fed a lot of puppies, but I don't remember if I've bottle fed an orphan singleton puppy before. Probably, but I don't remember. After raising many litters of orpans, I realize that Buddy, as an "only child," needs more than I have given the litters.

Puppies need body contact. Put 4 newborns at 4 corners of a box and they will very quickly find each other, even though they are blind and deaf at birth. They crave the warmth of their siblings. As they get older, they learn how to interact. Even before their eyes are opened, they are batting at each other, blindly...but they know a sister or a brother is there.

When I had mothers with puppies, I studied how they were with each other. The puppes are constantly kneading her side while they nurse, they act frantic and move from one teat to another, climbing over siblings in their frenzy to get to the food. Buddy acts the same way with my hand when he's taking the bottle.

The mother is always grooming them. She washes them all over and it is from her tongue licking their genitals that they learn how to relieve themselves.

Well...I do draw the line at licking the genitals, but fortunately Buddy arrived here with opened eyes and working genitals, so that wasn't necessary. But I really feel the need to give him the body contact that he should be getting from his mother and siblings.

With the other puppies, I could put them in a big cage together and, when they got older, add a fence to double their free range. But I can't really do that with Buddy. He sleeps alone, of course, but when he is awake, he hasn't learned how to play with toys and he craves contact.

These days I feel like Konrad Lorenz, who studied imprinting in young animals, and how they learn a lot of their behaviors from their parent. I think about Lorenz whenever I am near Buddy, who immediately lifts his head and runs after me, literally "dogging" my footsteps. When I'm sitting, he comes and rests his head on my foot. When I'm working in my office, he sleeps alongside me. For a "big sleep" he goes into the crate (I don't usually lock him up any more, unless the other dogs are eating and he runs the risk of their wrath if he gets too close) and sleeps on the furry stuffed dog that came with him (this dog isn't being mothered by my white mother teddy bear). He pulls it out of the crate to play with and then sleeps on it when it's nap time.

When he sits in my lap I talk with him and he looks at me so intently it's almost like he understands (of course I just finished reading a book about a dog who lived many lives, so I'm more likely to think that at the moment!)

He has pretty much free run of the house, which means we are back to policing for puddles and what passes for puppy poop at the moment (runny and icky). But I am going to be getting some puppy kibble tomorrow and will start introducing that to him and that should firm things up quickly.

Now, haven't you missed entries like this?

Unfortunately, Polly, the alpha dog around here is starting to exercise her dominance. She sits in Walt's chair and growls at Buddy when he's eating. Tonight Walt found her humping his head (which is all about dominence and nothing about sex) and when I tried to sneak out and see her, she came running toward me, cowering, as if she knew she had done something wrong and was convinced I was going to punish her.

Don't know how long Buddy will be here, but he won't be ready for injections (prerequisite for going up for adoption) for about 3 weeks yet. That's a lot of puppy poop under our feet in the interim. Good thing he's cute.

I think he's ready for solid food!

Not Quite Charing Cross

Charing Cross Rd. is one of my favorite streets in London. Not quite a grand promenade, not quite an alley, it's a book seller's street with one book store next to another as far as the eye can see. It's a book lovers' dream. Something for everyone. Some stores are of general interest, some of special interest (Walt liked the book store that sold only map books and old maps; I liked the show biz store and bought two biographies of James Mason there on one of our trips). Most are little hole in the wall stores, with one room filled to the ceiling with piles of books, and Bob Cratchit himself sitting at a desk watching as you check out his wares. They really are all just like the movie 84 Charing Cross Rd., which I loved so much.

It's quite a contrast from the nearby Foyle's bookstore, once listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's largest bookshop in terms of shelf area (30 miles/50 kilometres) and number of titles on display.

Book stores, new or used, are becoming a dying item. We haven't quite come to Fahrenheit 451, but with kindles and audio books, and a decline in reading in general, how many more decades will used book stores find clientele?

When Borders moved in to Davis, two book stores were pushed out. One remained and has actually outlived Borders, which closed last year. Two lovely used book stores closed during the Borders era and I'm not sure about the third.

Into this fading market has come Logos Books, a used book store run by Susan and Peter Linz.

I met Susan long before she and Peter decided to open their store. She is Charlotte's cousin...or second cousin, or kissing cousin or something like that. Daughter of Charlotte's cousin. On one of her rare trips to Davis, Char and I went to lunch at Susan's house, which may have been the first time I met her. I found her to be a lovely woman with a wonderful sense of humor and entirely too organized house, and a woman who put together a mean ladies' lunch.

Some time later, Char heard that they were opening this book store and shortly before their official opening celebration, we stopped off to see the store. It had very few books at that time, but we had a lovely visit with Peter and learned about the philosophy of the store, which I love. They aren't in it to make money, but only wanted to cover their expenses and any profits they made would be donated to charity. This was a project to help Peter fill his time in his retirement doing something he loved to do, which was to work with and around books and to meet other people who loved books.

After Char's mother died, she gave me several bags of books, which I took to the store to donate. I was happy to see that business seemed to be going well and that the shelves were more fully stocked than on my first visit.

Some time in December, a local on-line Davis magazine did an article about the shop and about Susan and Peter and said they were looking for volunteers to help work the store. I wouldn't have paid attention if I hadn't known Susan, but I read the article and that they were only looking for volunteers for something one day a week, or one day a month--just enough to give them a little break. So I volunteered.

Susan and I communicated when I was in Santa Barbara and she set yesterday as the day for my training. What fun. It helped that she started by saying "there is no way you can break anything." Then she went on to give me a tour of the small store and the shelves, which vary by the books which have been donated (at present there is no shelf for erotica, because they only have two donated books, which are shelved up high enough as to not attract the notice of young people).

Their love of books and encouragement of reading is particularly evident in the children's "room" (really just a closet) where the books are divided by age appropriateness and there is a basket for "kids who are still at the chewing stage."

I went through my orientation and screwed up my first sale, but it only affected me, not anything/body else. But I start volunteering next Tuesday and will be working once a week. I already have my eyes on several books I want to read. I hope nobody comes in to shop. :)

Concetta

Our Pinata Group has lost its first real core member. Concetta Finocchio Jorgenson died last night. It is an amazement to all who knew her that she lived to celebrate her 70th birthday. She was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis before we moved to Davis in 1973. I cannot remember the last time I saw her with movement below her neck. Yet, despite her condition she lived a full life, traveled as much as she could, ran the Newman Hall Alumni Association for perhaps decades. She was an amazing woman.

I met Concetta when we were both attending UC Berkeley. I was the latecomer and missed most of the brouhaha surrounding the National Newman Club convention, which Berkeley hosted in 1961 ("Follow the Sun in 61"). That convention became the glue that bound together a large number of people whose experiences during the planning and execution of it became the stuff of legend. Out of its ashes, over time, arose the phoenix of the Pinata Group, my oldest and dearest friends.

Pinata Group (and others) at Concetta's daughter's wedding
(the priest in the back row was the priest who married Walt and me;
he died several years ago)

Just to briefly recap for those who may not know what the Pinata Group is, we were five couples who met, dated, and married at Newman Hall, Berkeley, in the 1960s. Many of us were attendants at the weddings of the others. Among us, we birthed 22 children, who have all been raised as cousins to each other. Many of us are godparents to many of them. We lived near each other in Oakland for a few years until the 70s when we started spreading out, geographically. Many of our children went to nursery school and early grammar school together. Each New Year's Day we would have a big party (because we didn't want to exclude the kids and have an adults-only party on New Year's Eve), which centered around the kids. From 1966 forward, each party included a pinata, for which there were strict rules, like lining up in birth order, youngest to oldest. The last time we had a pinata for the "second generation" was at the 40th birthday party for the five kids who had been born in 1966. They lined up like they always did. There was a pinata at Jeri & Phil's wedding, which was hit by the children in the 3rd generation, lining up, youngest to oldest.

I met Concetta around the time of the convention. Of all the Pinata People, she was probably the one I knew the least. Her parents owned the famous San Francisco night club, Finocchio's (a popular stop on the Greyline tour for decades) and Charlotte, with whom she attended high school, remembers seeing shows there when she was probably far too young to be night-clubbing.

Her wedding to Eric was a gala affair, with reception at Oakland's famed Claremont Hotel, overlooking the San Francisco Bay Area. They moved into a beautiful home high in the Berkeley hills. I remember the big bear skin rug on which many of our naked Pinata babies had their photos taken.

I remember the Pinata party we had there, where all the kids played downstairs, pretty much unsupervised. I don't know if they EVER got the candy out of the wooden floors, from the pinata which was broken down there. All of us "responsible adults" were pretty embarrassed by the behavior of our children.

It was late 1960s or early 1970s when she began to experience double vision and was eventually diagnosed with MS. She continued to be active and I remember parties she hosted from her wheelchair. Her husband left her not long after her diagnosis, leaving her to raise their four children. She raised their children alone in that house, with the assistance of caregivers, and the kids themselves.

When the fire erupted in the Berkeley Hills, all the houses on her block were destroyed except Concetta's. If you ever saw the movie made about that fire, her story is featured prominently, how she was rescued from the house and taken through the flames to safety. We hoped she would move off of the hill, but she was adamant. She wanted to stay in her house. Concetta was always adamant about most things!

MS never slowed her down. We all, at one time or another, were drivers for her to parties and other events. Char & Mike, and Jeri & Bill put in yeoman's duty, especially Char and Mike who even accompanied her to Australia to visit her daughter, who had married an Australian. Concetta wanted to be there for the birth of their first child. She made several trips to Australia, until her daughter and family finally moved back to California.

with her grandchildren, at son Eric's wedding

The last time I saw her was at her 70th birthday party, where we all marveled that she survived to 70. The time I saw her previously was during one of her hospitalizations, when we wondered if this was "it."

Our friend, Audrey (also a pinata mother) put it beautifully: Having known Concetta as a vibrant young woman continually engaged in a whirlwind of activities, never walking, always running, it has for many years been heartbreaking to see her so confined by the effects of MS. Yet she epitomized a level of faith and courage that was astounding, always smiling while enduring so many hardships, always concerned about the well-being of others in her life. She will be missed, for she has left us with a vision of true endurance and faith, and our faith tells us that she will be happy and with God in heaven forever.

At Concetta's 70th Birthday

Bonding Pains

"STOP DOWNLOADING!" came the anguished cry from Walt, who had just checked our usage on Verizon's web site and discovered that I had completely used up the entire 300 mb of data allotted for the month of January in only two days.

This made absolutely no sense to me, but I checked the chart and there it was--almost zero usage for Walt and 297 mb of data for me. In two days. But the chart that showed usage didn't make any sense. I hadn't done THAT much on line, I hadn't thought. I think of myself as a "light" user, though of course in these early days, I am doing much more, trying to learn the machine and set it up, but most of the work was done off line.

The biggest thing we found out was that all the time I thought the contact was going through our wifi, it actually was using the internet connection. Wifi = free, internet = counting down time! We tried and tried to figure out what happened. I had given Walt the password for our wifi and he got in just fine, but when I tried, it would connect, say it was accepted and then immediately disconnect. I was ready to go to the store and demand that they remove all the time from my phone because obviously there was a defect.

When I gave Walt the password, I mentioned that I couldn't remember if it used a certain punctuation or not...sometimes I use it, sometimes I don't. I thought it did. Well, he got in right away and I didn't. After 24 hours, trying to figure out why it took the password for Walt and not for me, I decided to cancel the connection altogether, install it again and try NOT using the punctuation. Voila! I was in. I was now working off the wifi. Walt said "Oh yeah--I didn't use the punctuation." Sheesh!

Anyway in the intervening hours of frustration, apparently Verizon had logged a billing because instead of using 297 mb of data, it now showed that I had used only 3 mb. Apparently crisis averted. I'm still not convinced that Verizon won't own our house by the end of the month, but we're monitoring it!

In the meantime I have gradually, and very slowly, begun whittling away the "problems" I thought I had. I finally figured out that the little button on the bottom left of the screen, which is supposed to bring up options, brings up DIFFERENT options for each app you are using. Thus, while I was frustrated because I could not get a full Google Calendar to display, it turns out that if I push the options menu gives me that option.

I also somehow managed to sit somewhere where the GPS can find my position. Not sure how that happened.

Again, using that handy little option button, I was finally able to create and send e-mail instead of just reading what was in my in-box.

And after mistakenly sending a photo of Walt to Facebook, that I meant to send to Jeri, I think I finally did send it to Jeri.

Walt decided he wanted to take a picture of me playing with the phone and send it to the kids and while he was trying to figure out how to do that I took HIS picture and did the same thing.

I told him we reminded me of that old couple on the viral video that are trying to figure out how to make a Skype call.

We're very cute too.

I spent the entire afternoon trying to update my Google contact list. I've managed to reduce it from >1600 to >1000, no mean feat. Who are all these people anyway and how did they get on my list?? But I'm only in the Ks at the moment, so there are miles to go before I sleep--and lots of unknown contacts to kill first, as well as eliminate four of the five e-mail addresses that some people have and only keep the current one.

I was able to set quick dial numbers and I learned how to make personalized ring tones work, so I can get those back again, though I can't quite do it yet because somehow I erased the one I installed (which worked) and I haven't had time to go through the steps and recreate it.

At some point this afternoon, I found a book called "Droid x2 for Dummies" and I got the Kindle version of it. It's very good--I knew it was for us when it warned against putting your cell phone in the washer and then talks about the machine dozing "just like Uncle Walt after Thanksgiving dinner."

Unfortunately, I began to share little tidbits like that with Walt, who decided to borrow the Kindle while I was cooking dinner. As I write this, several hours later, he is still reading it. But his cell phone is a Droid 3, which is slightly different from the Droid x2. I checked Amazon and found that there is a "Droid 3 for dummies," so he is (eventually) going to order that and we will each have our own "for dummies" books for our respective smart phones.

I also learned that Ashley also has a droid and at some point we may get together and let me see what wonderful things I can learn from her.

It's Day #3 and I don't love it yet, but I'm liking it a lot more. And it's nice that most of the concerns and questions I had I have been able to answer...eventually.

Sunday Stealing

1. What did you do in 2011 that you’d never done before?
I climbed the Great Wall.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I didn't make any last year and I haven't made any this year...it's easier not to break them that way!

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Of course. Our daughter-in-law presented the family with Lacie Ann in September.

(She seemed a bit surprised about it all!)

4. Did anyone close to you die?
Sadly too many--9. The one that hurt the most was my cousin Kathy, even though we expected her death. Cousins Days won't be the same ever again.

5. What countries did you visit?
China

6. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?
Nothing specific comes to mind.

7. What dates from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
September 20, the day Lacie was born.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
I think it would have to be the deepening relationship with the Compassion kids.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Whatever it was I did that caused Peggy to end our 13 year friendship.

10. What was the best thing you bought?
Hopefully the new cell phones, which we bought three days ago. I expect to eventually fall in love with it. It is right up there with my Kindle, which I fought buying for years, but am so glad I finally lost the battle.

11. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Hands down, Walt and Ned, building the puppet stage for Bri.

12. Whose behavior made you appalled and disgusted?
Anybody involved with the sex scandal at Penn State; and the Catholic Church in Boston which would rather deny assistance to hundreds of orphans than to run the risk of anybody gay fostering or adopting one and giving the child a home.

13. What song will always remind you of 2011?
Well, it's not a new song, but "In the Arms of the Angel" has been so consistently on TV as advertisement for the SPCA. I notice it every time because it's what Marta and Paul's widow sang at his memorial service.

14. What do you wish you’d done more of?
I would like to have seen more movies in the theater

15. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Going to funerals.

16. Did you fall in love in 2011?
Yes. With Lacie.

17. What was your favorite new TV program?
A tossup between Grimm and Once Upon a Time. Try them if you haven't seen them!

18. What was the best book you read?
I don't think I have "a" favorite of the 41 that I read, but I discovered David Baldacci this year and his "Absolute Power," the first I read, was great. In non-fiction, I would have to name "The Mind's Eye" by Oliver Sacks.

19. What one thing would have made your year measurably more satisfying?
NOT losing my friendship with Peggy.

20. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2011?
The same as 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003....etc.

21. What kept you sane?
Blogging

22. Who did you miss?
The same people I always miss -- Paul and David

23. Who was the best new person you met?
Sharon Filmer, a woman from England whom we met on our trip to China. We became Facebook friends after the trip.

(with our waitress, Cherry)

24. Tell us a valuable lesson you learned in 2011?
Absolutely nothing lasts forever.

25. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
I've heard it said
That people come into our lives for a reason
Bringing something we must learn
And we are led
To those who help us most to grow
If we let them
And we help them in return
Well, I don't know if I believe that's true
But I know I'm who I am today
Because I knew you
(from "For Good" from "Wicked")

2011 by the Numbers

At the end of last year, I did a wrap-up of how many "things" I recorded in the year. I decided to do it again for 2011.

Last year's entry was prompted by my reading three books while on our trip to Santa Barbara for Christmas. It brought my total number of books read for 2010 to 40. It was 9 books more than I had read in 2009. I was determined to top that number this year. And I did. Barely. I read 41 books this year, but going by page count, I can't hold a candle to 2010, 15,811 pages last year and a piddling 14,071 this year.

As in 2010, crime dramas topped the list, but I read a greater variety of subjects this year, everything from the fascinating "The Mind's Eye" and "A Loving Approach to Dementia Care" to several first-person stories to dog-themed books, including an old friend ("His Dog" by Albert Payson Terhune) and the ubiquitous Michael Connelly, David Baldacci, and James Patterson fare.

My goal for 2012 is to top both 2010 and 2011 in number of books and pages read, though since I am currently reading a hefty Diane Gabaldon novel, the number of books itself may not rise very fast.

In 2010 we hosted 17 dogs. In 2011 we hosted none until Buddy arrived yesterday. With adopting Polly, I decided to take a break from fostering and I have to admit it has been a nice break. I couldn't pass up the chance to bottle feed another puppy and Buddy is a sweetheart, but I don't see this as opening the door to regular fostering again. Just too complicated with Polly.

We only saw 3 movies in 2010, but 6 in 2011, the latest of which being the newest Sherlock Holmes as our "family movie night" in Santa Barbara (the others were The Kings Speech, The Lincoln Lawyer, Water for Elephants, Midnight in Paris, and The Help). We generally have a family movie night when Jeri comes to town, and we saw two of these movies with Jeri.

In contrast, we saw 43 stage shows, compared with 58 the year before. The lower number reflects the number of shows I had someone else cover for me because we were out of town or because I was busy doing something else (or in at least one occasion, because two shows overlapped and I couldn't get to both). There were also fewer shows at the University this year.

I think we only took two plane trips together this year, the one to China (I'm not including the number (7) of flights we took inside China), and one to So. California to see tapings of Jeopardy and attend the Cal-USC game. We did not see a taping of Says You this year. Walt took a trip to Boston to spend a week with Jeri.

The game was the only sporting event we saw live. It has now been two years since our schedule has allowed us to join the Lamplighters tech crew at Giants games, though Walt saw a baseball game in Boston.

We lost 9 people we cared about this year. Some of them, like Walt's mother and Charlotte's mother, were not really a surprise, since both women were in their 90s, but it was no less painful. But also Walt's mother's cousin, Nora, in Ireland; my dear cousin Kathy; Ned's good friend Brendan; my mother's goodfriend Betty McGlashin (whom she had known since I was a baby); computer friends Laura Morefield and Judy Watt; and a local woman, Kat Fox, who had also been ill for many years. The number nearly reached 10 with the suicide attempt of someone this week, but fortunately death was averted.

And while there was no death involved, the unexplained loss of Peggy was as painful as a death...and more painful than some.

It has also been more than two year since we have seen Steve, which is a big change since we first met in 1999, and saw each other frequently.

The biggest change (other than no foster dogs this year) was in letters written this year. In 2010, I wrote:

There was a time when I wrote lots and lots of letters and was the post office's biggest customer. Now I write lots and lots of e-mails and couldn't even BEGIN to calculate how many I've written, but other than the letters I write to the Compassion kids (121 to the six combined), I wrote only FOUR regular letters this year.

Obviously that has changed significantly this year. I began The Pen Pal Project in March of this year and with few exceptions have written something every day for 247 days, though I haven't a clue how many letters I have written. Suffice to say that when I start a new project, I dive in headfirst and writing letters has been the project de l'annee. I have made such nice friends over the year and look forward to continuing this project in 2012.

I added 5 more children to my list of Compassion children, bringing the total number to 11. Three of these are correspondence children, but I love them just as much as the ones I sponsor financially. I lost 2, Pedro from Brasil and Victor from Bolivia, both of whom left the program.