Snow White Ramble

This Playmobil Special representation of the wicked queen in Grimms' Snow White fairy tale is currently not in production. On eBay, the "buy it now" price is $25.00 USD. I don't need the dolly, but I sure do wish I had clothes like hers. If Playmobil made a line of goth figures, I would be tempted. Very tempted.

Speaking of Snow White, I hate the Disney version.* Snow White needs the following items in order to work for me:

1)The wicked queen demands the huntsman to bring back the lung and liver, not the heart of Snow White. The lung and liver represent the life-essence and spirit of Snow White. The heart is smoochy-sentimental.

2)When Snow White finds the dwarfs' house in the woods, it's quite meticulous and clean. Snow White gets to live with the dwarfs as long as she makes sure it stays clean. Dwarves are industrious beings, not slobs living in basements.

3)The wicked queen in disguise visits Snow White three times in three different guises. This is important. Most of us make mistakes in judging the character of other people without it making headline news. However, Snow White making that mistake three times brings to light some uncomfortable recognition of ourselves. (Maybe you're wiser than I am, but know I've believed the words of liars.)

4)After biting the poisoned apple, Snow White wakes from her coma after the prince's huntsmen stumble upon a rock, thus dislodging the bit of apple in Snow White's throat. There is no wake-up kiss. That's another fairy tale.

5)In the end, the wicked queen has to put on red-hot iron slippers and dance until she falls down dead. She does not get chased over a cliff by disgruntled forest animals. Where's the satisfaction in the Disney ending? Violence in fairy tales is not gratuitous, but it is just. As Anne Sexton writes,

"Beauty is a simple passion,
but, oh my friends, in the end
you will dance the fire dance in iron shoes."

You can read Anne Sexton's poem about Snow White in its entirety here. For those of you who say that you don't read poetry ("sissy stuff that rhymes" as Nigel Molesworth would say), Sexton refers to Snow White as a "dumb bunny." Are you yet convinced?

*Disney's Sleeping Beauty, which veers way off from all the other known variants, remains one of my guilty pleasures. I'm not sure why I make allowances for "Sleeping Beauty" that I don't for "Snow White," but I suspect Tchaikovsky's music has something to do with it.

Warrior Librarian

Librarians love it when librarian characters show up in popular culture. I used to have a thick handout bundle that cited librarians in key and minor movie roles. Until I started watching Buffy: the Vampire Slayer a month ago, my favorite librarian in film was Rachel Weitz's role in The Mummy. When Evelyn Carnahan says, "I may not be an explorer, or an adventurer, or a treasure-seeker, or a gunfighter, Mr. O'Connell, but I am proud of what I am."

("And what is that?" asks the Brendan Frasier character.)

"I am... a librarian!" Evie replies with fervor. The music soars. The audience cheers. What a rush.

Still, Evelyn Carnahan is no match for school librarian, demon-expert and mentor to the Vampire Slayer, Rupert Giles. As a new watcher (no pun intended), I cannot do justice to honoring the character of Giles. However, librarian extraordinaire GraceAnne DeCandido can, and she does. Ms. DeCandido gave her assent for me to link her article on the Hero Librarian.

Here it is:

Rupert Giles and Search Tools for Wisdom in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, by GraceAnne A. DeCandido

P.S. Why does my library system not yet have Librarian: Quest for the Spear?

P.P.S. I've just ordered a used copy of "Librarian: Quest for the Spear." I am willing to send it around. Just let me know, and we'll get a list going.

The Lost Planet

Headline: Pluto loses status as planet

I should've realized this IAU resolution was coming. A couple of weeks ago, when Lucia and I went to see Nancy Stewart at Pottery Barn Kids, I noticed a planet-mobile on display. "Hurrah!" I said. "Here's a fine addition for Lucia's room. Never mind that it costs $39.00 USD. We can skimp on the caviar bill, after all. But wait a minute..."




I counted eight planets plus the Sun.

"Where's Pluto?" I ranted. "And why is there no attempt to represent the planets to scale? Jupiter is 3/4 the size of the Sun, and the gas giants are all the size of Jupiter." In a rage, I ripped the planet-mobile from the ceiling. The security guards had to drag me away to a quiet room where I could sip weak tea and gather my senses together. No one pressed charges, but in an ironic twist of circumstances, Brad the Gorilla was the one who had to come and make sure I had a safe ride home. Meanwhile, Lucia was still enjoying the Nancy Stewart concert, oblivious to my planet-induced meltdown.

Thus, when I read the headlines this morning, I had already worked through my freak-out phase and arrived at a quiet acceptance of eight planets in the Solar System. My song will be shorter. So much for "Planet Hoppers: The Opera."

Just between you and me, I'm relieved.

Green Sleeves: All My Joy

I'm lucky. Among my three chief pleasures (writing, playing guitar, sewing), I can actually work on sewing projects with Lucia in the room. When I'm writing or playing guitar, she tries to stop me by climbing on my lap and holding down the keys or strings. As long as she is allowed to roll the bobbins, lay her dollies on my sewing basket, walk across the fabric on the floor, make the buttons drive around in little cars, Lucia is content to let me sew. That is why I now have a new dress:



I did not sew this dress by myself. Seattle-Jane, my transplanted friend from New York, helped me sew it. She was instrumental in its actual creation and completion. Thank you, thank you, Seattle-Jane. As a tie-in to the storytelling and song theme of this blog, here is a list of "green" songs:

Green Grass Grew All Around
Green Grow the Rushes O
Greensleeves

It's a small list. Now, I've got to make lunch for Lucia.

I Gave Junk Mail a Chance

After discovering the Spamusement link on Galetea's blog, I decided to give my junk mail folder a chance to prove its creative potential before unceremoniously deleting it. Lo and behold, I found two useful pieces of junk mail:



A Victorian dollhouse with pirates: how could I resist? It's only money, after all, and it would indeed be a great surprise for Lucia.



You know what an astronomy buff I am. The thing is, this star is supposed to date back to 14 billion years ago, but there are wildly fluctuating theories as to how old the universe really is. Some people say it's only 10 billion years old, but in that cast, how can we see objects that are 30 billion light years away? Other people say that the universe is 15-20 billion years old. [And still others say the universe is only 10 thousand years old and multi-million year old dinosaur fossils were put in the ground to confound humans, but that train of thought just makes me grouchy.]

What Was I Thinking?

Inside my juvenalia folder, I found this drawing of a mermaid sitting on top of a sphere with accompanying snake:



It's dated 1988, and I am guessing I drew the picture around the time I had read Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Firebrand. As books went, it was pretty bad, but this retelling of the Trojan war through the viewpoints of The Women impressed me almost as much as Mists of Avalon. As E.A. Solinas wrote in her Amazon.com review, "With its use of sketchy characterization, blatant hyperfeminism, and constant fast-and-loose playing with both history and myth, [Firebrand] flops like a heavily decayed fish." (I have to laugh. She's right-- but I had fun reading it anyway.)

I am guessing that I drew the picture for a story in my head. I don't remember the story, but it probably had something to do with "mermaid vampires." What is it about certain girls' fascination with vampires? Were lot of those girls drawn to unicorns when they were younger? Maybe I have a thesis in the works somewhere...

Song of the Planet-Hoppers

From the New York Times: Pluto Dodges a Bullet




If the new definition of the word "planet" extends to objects beyond Pluto that are larger in size than this wee solar satellite, I may have to make my planet song longer. I've made provisions for such an event, but I'm attached to the idea of nine planets. I wonder why Pluto can't follow similar rules to the Y in vowels ("A E I O U and sometimes Y"): when Pluto's orbit is closer to the sun than Neptune's, it's a planet. When Pluto is further out, it's a Trans-Neptunian object.

For those of you who care about such things:
I wrote my ode to the planets in the People's Key of A minor, but I like to place the capo on the first fret so that I can play it in B flat minor. When I figure out how to make a recording, I'll post a link to a rough version of the song.

Song of the Planet-Hoppers
Irregular 4/4 time


Mercury and Venus,
Earth and Mars
Inner rocky planets
that seem close and yet so far.

Chorus:
Round and round the sun we go,
round and round we roam,
Of all the planets in my life
I’m glad Earth is my home.

Jupiter and Saturn,
Uranus, Neptune,
Each a giant globe of gas
with rings and many moons.

Chorus

Pluto is the 9th one
and if more should come along,
Let's give them all resplendent names
and add them to our song.

Chorus

[This final verse to the tune of the chorus]

Earth, so blue and brown and green,
with seas of sparkling foam
Of all the planets in my life,
I’m proud to call you home.

Lyrics Copyright 2006 by Alkelda the Gleeful

From the comments section: Limpy99 says,

Bad news kids, under the new rules the scientists are saying there could be "hundreds" of new planets in the solar system. How do you feel about "Planet-Hoppers: The Opera?"

I'm not with the band (unless it's virtual)

When I was 15, I bought an electric bass guitar and an amplifier to go with it. My parents let me use the money people had given me when I was a baby. The next day, I set off for Scranton, Pennsylvania to get together with Doreen, my pen-pal with whom I had formed a band. Thus far, there was just the two of us, but we had plans for more people. The name of the band was Priestess. Our collective influences were Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, Heart, the Go-Go’s, Motley Crue, the Doors, Judas Priest, Duran Duran, the Beatles, and Pete Seeger.

Yes. Well.

We wrote a few songs, got tee-shirts made up, and talked about the band during the two weeks I visited Doreen. There was one major difference between us, though: she was a serious musician, and I just wanted to be a rock and roller. I knew I didn’t have what it took to work on the development of a band, go on the road, attempt to get recording contracts, and finally open for Joan Jett. [Years later, one of my other pen-pals ended up doing all that and marrying the drummer, but that’s another story.] When the time came to make decisions about what we were going to do with the next parts of our lives, Doreen headed off to a prestigious music school and I studied English Literature at a small liberal arts college in the Midwest.

I really did not know how to teach myself to play the bass guitar. I chose bass because I had read that it was “easy.” It’s not. You actually need skill. However, I have always liked dressing up as different characters, planning carnivals and puppet-shows, dreaming up possible scenarios… in short, Playing Pretend. Now, I really do think it would be fun to be part of a local band, incorporate more music into my storytelling, but I’m not a professional musician in the making. While I wish I had done more music in college, where there was an abundance of coffee-houses in which to perform, at least I attended those coffee-houses. I’ve always been a good fan. Just ask Heather Kropf.

In the meantime, I’ve changed the name of my conceptual band from Maisie Drives the Bus to Mitzi Drives the Bus. I want to wear bright, cheery stripes without getting sued by the people who represent Lucy Cousins. “Mitzi Drives the Bus” is a combination of several stories: Tell Me a Mitzi, by Lore Segal, Maisy Drives the Bus, by Lucy Cousins, and Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus, by Mo Willems. My motto is "Folk rock for rebel tots."

Bring Back My o.p. Books

I appreciate it when celebrities use their powers for literary good. Emma Thompson made the film "Nanny McPhee" (I've not seen it) and thus, Christianna Brand's Nurse Matilda has returned to us. J.K. Rowling said she loved Elizabeth Goudge's The Little White Horse and now a film is in the making. While The Little White Horse has been one of the few Elizabeth Goudge titles to remain in print over the years, perhaps it is not too much to hope for a reprinting of others that haven't been as lucky. The New York Review of Books has my everlasting gratitude for bringing back Esther Averill's Jenny Linsky series and Eleanor Farjeon's The Little Bookroom.

Well done.

Now, I would like whomever else has clout, money and wisdom* in the ways of children's literature to bring some of my favorite books back into print. Here is a small list:

I Can't Said the Ant--Polly Cameron

The Green Hero: Early Adventures of Finn MacCool-- Bernard Evslin, illustrated by Barbara Bascove

Henrietta's House (UK)/ Blue Hills (USA)--Elizabeth Goudge**

Cat's Pajamas--Thacher Hurd

Daughter of the Moon--Gregory Maguire

Changeover--Margaret Mahy

The Pumpkin Man and the Crafty Creeper--Margaret Mahy, illustrated by Helen Craig

Dinner at Alberta's--Russell Hoban, illustrated by James Marshall

Zigger Beans--Diane Redfield Massie

Elephant Buttons-- Noriko Ueno

Rich Cat, Poor Cat--Bernard Waber

The Compleet Molesworth (including Down With Skool! A Guide to School Life for Tiny Pupils and their Parents )--Geoffrey Willians, illustrated by Ronald Searle


Question of the Day: If you were to show up on an ALA celebrity READ poster, what book would you hold? My book would be The Hounds of the Morrigan, by Pat O'Shea.


*Not you, Madonna, unless you heed my list.

**Technically, at this very moment, there are some hardcover copies available. I suspect that it won't be long before it's totally o.p. again. Last year, I paid $25 USD for a paperback copy of The Compleet Molesworth. I wanted to be able to lend it out while I kept my hardcover copy on the shelf. As of this morning, those paperback copies are going for $249.99. Preposterous! I'll lend you my copy. Just send it back when you're done, please. August 15, 2006

Shadows

Along with planets, Lucia has discovered shadows. I often come across these configurations of action figures placed in the sun. Note that Beethoven is sitting on a piano bench in the traditional storytelling stance.

Juvenalia Intacta

My mom sent me two packages of various items she'd kept for me over the years. In one of the packages was my complete juvenalia... not just the poems, but the short stories. I had photocopies of some of the poems, but I thought the juvenalia was probably lost in a basement flood (or basement fire, or something of that ilk).

Until I went to college, I would type in my age next to my name because I thought it was important. I thought that I was probably going to become so famous that my juvenalia would be in big, big demand. While it's fair to say there are some items that are thoughtful and well-developed for my various ages, the collection will probably be more of interest to my daughter when she's a bit older and writing stories of her own. Do I assume too much? I don't think so.

Addendum for Nonny:

I'm looking through the juvenalia for a story or poem to post. Can't. Do. It. I feel protective of my younger self. There are many cliches, exclamation points, urgent appeals to vampires (i.e. "night angels")... you know, the usual stuff. I was trying so hard to be serious and profound. I'm not saying that in a disparaging tone of voice: I really wanted to be serious and profound. Sometimes I tried to be funny, but it was forced humor. If I am going to be honest with myself (and by extension, everyone else), one of my overarching reasons for wanting to write was so that I could become famous and successful, and thereby show everybody that I was extraordinary after all.

Okay. One poem. I was twelve years old, heading for my thirteenth birthday. The year: 1984. The setting: Seventh grade English class. I've forgotten the specific creative writing journal assignment. It was one of the few times in which I was oblivious to any agenda:

River Rapids

River rapids
Flowing, crashing, thundering, breaking.
The little boat tosses and rocks with the waves.
Over and over again,
Flowing, crashing, thundering, breaking.
The river is harsh and loud,
but its continuing music is a lullaby.
Slowly, slowly, I drift off to sleep.
Drifting slowly and smoothly, the little boat comes to a stop.
The movements in the waves put me to sleep.
Now silence wakes me up.
My little boat is floating in a stream.
Sunlight breaks on the water, causing it to glisten with gold.
Green mossy banks and giant oaks surround me right and left.
The rapids are gone, I've finally stopped.
I'm safe now, able to stand up.
Yet, I felt safer when my life was in danger.

Bart day

My brother Bartholomew: May 11,1979--August 8, 2003


Big Bart


Baby Bart

Songs for Bart:

Drive--Joe 90
Dust in the Wind--Kansas
Changes--Phil Ochs
Cosmic Dancer--T. Rex
Sweet Old World--Lucinda Williams


Really, though, Bart's tastes ran more to Digital Underground and 2 in a Room. He would have listened politely to me play sad folkie and acoustic rock songs on the guitar and then said (with lots of cackling), "How about some 2 Live Crew now?" Of course, I'd have to clobber him.

Pirate Concert in the Library

I attended my first rock concert when I was 13. Ratt headlined, and a new band on the scene called Bon Jovi opened for them. Ulric, my brother, saw his first rock concert when he was 8 years old, when we went to see Ozzy Osbourne and Metallica of the Cliff Burton era. Most of the concerts we attended were in a sports arena. The concerts weren’t much out of the ordinary: there was the usual screaming, flicking of cigarette lighters and waving of fists in the air. People dressed-up in spandex and leather, or dressed-down in artfully shredded jeans and strategically ripped tee-shirts.

A few weeks ago, at the age of 3, Lucia went to her first rock concert. It was at a library, not a sports arena, and there were no cigarette lighters raised high in tribute to the band… but people did dress up. They had skulls and cross-bones on their tee-shirts, hooks in place of hands, and a proliferation of eye-patches. After all, Captain Bogg & Salty were in town.



Captain Bogg & Salty is a pirate rock and roll band from Portland, Oregon making its rounds through the library systems in my part of the country. Initially, Lucia was skeptical. As Captain Angus Bogg and his merry crew of the Pollywogg burst into “We are Singing Pirates,” Lucia wrapped her arms around my shoulders and said she wanted to go home. “Give them a chance,” I told her, and she did. She perked up when Buckle (acoustic guitarist and gunner for the good ship Pollywogg) sang “Scallywag” in his impressive bass voice. By the end of the concert, Lucia was waving her hooked finger in the air along with the rest of the brigands in the audience.

All week, Lucia clamored, “We go to the pirate concert today!” and demanded to hear “Scallywag" one more time. This morning, we attended another Captain Bogg & Salty concert. Bede joined us, as well as some good friends. The 3 ½ year old son of our good friend was a big fan of pirates in general, but the general boisterousness of the show was too much for him,* and he fell asleep in his mother’s arms. [Memo to the band: if this is a trend, there is untold treasure to be had in showing up at the doorsteps of parents with children who refuse to sleep.] Lucia, however, was attentive throughout the entire show, and bravely raised her hand when Captain Bogg asked, “Who’s ever been to a pirate rock and roll concert before?” The most enthusiastic person in our part of the audience, however, was a girl dressed to the hilt in traditional romantic pirate gear who spent much of the concert with her two plastic swords raised in an X.

The band took turns with the lead-vocals, and played a mix of songs off of their two albums, “Bedtime Stories for Pirates,” and “Pegleg Tango.” While the band is filed under “Children’s Music,” they really are an all-ages band. Among all of the songs about avoiding scurvy and sea-monsters, there is nary a tune about brushing teeth or tying shoes. Tonight, Captain Bogg and Salty are playing at an over-21 club. Now are you convinced that they are gruff enough to appear on your music mixes?

Yar!

*I blame the Blue Angels, who are in town this weekend and have been practicing their decibel-defying maneuvers over our heads these past few days. Confound those Blue Angels! Because of them, one of the bridges is closed and traffic is even more congested than usual. Why can’t Seattle host the Chartreuse Seraphim (premiere hot-air balloon group) or the Vermillion Thrones (hang-gliders extraordinaire) for Sea-Fair? I like my noise to have a beat you can dance to...

Good Omens

I just finished reading Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. In short, it is a comedy about the Apocalypse in which an angel (Aziraphale) and a demon (Crowley) attempt to circumvent the prophecies of the End Times because they actually like humanity. Meanwhile, War, Pollution, Famine, and Death, the four bikers of the Apocalypse are coming, followed by the self-styled four other bikers of the Apocalypse:

(1) Grievous Bodily Harm
(2) Cruelty to Animals
(3) Things Not Working Properly Even After You've Given Them a Good Thumping But Secretly No Alcohol Lager
4) Really Cool People


For the most part, I found this story enjoyable to read, with enough thought-provoking material to remind me of humanity's responsibilities toward Earth and all living things. Some people may think that the treatment of the subject matter is too flippant, but remember, after all, that The Devil Hates to Be Mocked.

I shall resist the temptation to fill the rest of this post with quotes from Good Omens (along with a similar penchance for inserting quotes into conversations from Eddie Izzard's comedy routines.) However, I found Aziraphale's and Crowley's New Year's resolutions for 2006. How can I not pass it along?

My favorite Crowley resolution:

Resolution #3: Try to come up with something as good as cell phone ringtones, following one last stab at convincing Downstairs that cell phone ringtones are right up there in the whole Human Misery stakes. And iPods. Has anybody Down There even said thank you for iPods? Or "Googling yourself?" Frankly, I deserve some kind of award for "Googling yourself."

My favorite Aziraphale resolution:

Resolution #10: On the orders of Head Office I will encourage the belief in Intelligent Design – despite the fact that the human airway crosses the digestive tract. Who thought that was intelligent?

If "Good Omens" is ever made into a movie, Eddie Izzard could play either Crowley or Aziraphale. Izzard is versatile.

The Planet Song (Hurrah, hurrah)

Lucia keeps asking me for a song about planets.* I have been working on a composition of my own, but due to my overwhelming affection for the key of A minor, everything sounds like an alternate version of "House of the Rising Sun" or "Greensleeves." I like both of those songs quite a bit, but perhaps music composition is not in my near future...

A quick internet search revealed a fair-sized collection of planet songs, but nothing really appealed to me: either I didn't like the tune** or I hated the rhymes.

Thanks to Lone Star Ma, I now have a planet song I can deal with... and even play on the guitar. The song is one her Lone Star Girl learned in school, and it's to the tune that I know best as "The Ants Go Marching."


The planets revolve around the sun, hurrah, hurrah
The planets revolve around the sun, hurrah, hurrah
The planets revolve around the sun,
And spin on their axis, every one.
And they all go spinning
Around and around they go!

Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars, hurrah, hurrah.
Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars, hurrah, hurrah
Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars,
All whirling and twirling among the stars.
And they all go spinning
Around and around they go!

Jupiter and Saturn are next in line, hurrah, hurrah
Jupiter and Saturn are next in line, hurrah, hurrah
Jupiter and Saturn are next in line,
Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto make nine.
And they all go spinning
Around and around they go!



*The Basic Nine planets of our solar system. Planet X needs its own song, I think.

**There is a handful of songs I refuse to sing: "Old MacDonald" and "Farmer in the Dell" are two of them. When it comes to songs about farmers or animals, I prefer "I Had a Rooster" or "Fiddle-I-Fee." Even "B-I-N-G-O" is fine with me as a flannel-board story or used with the book by Rosemary Wells.

For the sake of conversation [i.e. lots and lots and lots of comments], which sing-along songs do you like most? Which ones do you like least? Which ones make you prefer the experience of dental work to the torture of listening to the songs?

Interlude

[my journal of alien contact] continues...

It is said that if you could randomly teleport to any part of the universe, then 99 % of the time you would find yourself in empty space, devoid of stars. If you were lucky, you’d see smudges in the distance indicating galaxies.

It’s just as well that teleportation is impossible.

Technically, that’s not true. Over the past two hundred years, scientists have discovered different ways to change lab cockroaches into energy, beam their energy particles across an eight foot room, and then change them back into physical lab cockroaches at the other end. The basic problem was an age-old one, though: when the energy turned back into matter, all the cockroaches were dead. Scientists were determined to get it right, but the experiments provoked outcries from the Cockroach Preservation League, and the project eventually was shelved.

Still, some people never gave up. As it turned out, the missing escape pod from Kookaburra IV was the biggest teleportation experiment ever. The results were mixed: the colestronauts returned alive to the Kookaburra, but the escape pod was nowhere to be found. The celestronauts’ protective suits were gone, too. Before they returned to hibernation, they had a brief press conference on the TIC, consisting of one question and answer:

Reporter: What does teleportation feel like?
Celestronaut: It doesn’t matter.

At least the TIC was fully-functioning again.

“I think the teleportation incident was a publicity stunt,” I said to Zeke.

“Something to give the people hope that they can someday get around all this business of slow space-travel?” Zeke asked.

“Exactly,” I said. “What I don’t understand is why we would risk the lives, the project, everything, for this stunt.”

“Maybe it really never happened at all,” Zeke said. “Maybe they made it all up.”

Science-fiction in these modern times? Now, there’s a thought.


The bird after which the spaceship was named