My Friend Caroline

Are you familiar with Caroline's Crayons? If not, follow this link. You're in for a treat. She has absolutely outdone herself today! She has taken her pencil and crayons to the Milwaukee Art Museum.

Apparently her comment section isn't working today, and I just had to tell her how much I enjoyed this, so I hope she reads my blog today.
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Happy Birthday, Kitty

This morning I called my daughter in California, since it is her birthday. She tells me they had birthday cake at breakfast! Partly because Isaac was begging for it. Mostly because she and Mike are busy, busy, and there are other things to do when he gets home tonight. They haven't even had time to celebrate their anniversary yet. That was earlier this month. They have decided to have anniversary month instead, and manage to celebrate later. If not before, they have reservations for a couple of nights in a lighthouse hostel, the last week of the month.


We were bemoaning the fact that stores have grown so BIG. Way too big, so far as I'm concerned. I have to plan which items I'm going to buy in a supermarket - those at this end of the store, or those at the other end. I just can't walk all the way to the back. It's too far for me any more, even though I use the shopping cart sort of like a walker. That helps. Department stores are too big too. Some have motorized scooters for old fogies like me, but I don't like them. There are always things piled in aisles that obstruct them, or crowds get in the way. And sometimes people don't plug in the scooters when they're finished with them, and the power will run out when you're halfway through the store.

Then there are super big stores that swoop into a neighborhood and drive out all the nice little shops that I love. This also applies to craft shops and book stores. I wanted to cry when our small bookstore went out of business. Also, a huge craft chain moved in nearby, and all those little guys left too. I can't shop in the big new one. That is just waaay too big, and the sales people don't know the stock well enough to direct you to anything. I had hoped they would carry the Artful Blogging Magazine that has an article about Caroline's Crayons in the new issue, but no such luck. I know that Border's carries it, but that isn't within my driving range. One of my daughters will find it for me.

Anyway, it's Kitty's theory that sooner or later, all of this will turn itself around, and we will start to move back to the smaller businesses again. It seems to be happening in California, where just about every small town now has a market night, when you can stroll through the town's main street, buying fresh produce, and just about anything else you can imagine. Of course, in California the produce is fresh all year 'round. We don't have that advantage here.

Kitty writes a column for her County paper about whatever cultural events are going on each week. This week there was much about the Steinbeck Museum in Salinas. She was unhappy with it because it concerns a big Mexican Festival - free (with admission to the musem). We wonder just who this is aimed at. Certainly not the poor Mexican families with whom Steinbeck himself was so concerned. There are so many of them in Salinas who work the farms. But they will not be able to afford the admission to bring their children to the festival.

Also big doings down on Cannery Row, where they opened Doc Rickett's lab for a day. He was a famed marine biologist and Steinbeck's friend. (co-author Sea of Cortez) My daughter is educating me in these matters.


So anyway -
HAPPY BIRTHDAY KITTY.
I love you.

TAGGED AGAIN

Yes, it's happened again. Tagged for a meme. As I've said before, I really am not into these things. I do think this one is kind of interesting, and I will do it - at least the first four rules. I won't do the fifth rule, because it involves other people, and I don't know many who would be willing to comply.


This is the one involving books, which is why I like it. The rules are:
1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you.


Let me do the last first. I was tagged by Nonizamboni, of Peacock Blue, God bless her. And that's as much of #5 that I will do. Because I love to encourage people to read, I also do encourage anyone interested to try this one, but I won't tag them.



I love to read. Unfortunately, in recent days my eyes won't allow me to do much reading. I'm struggling with newspapers, and a very few books. My dear blogger friend, Caroline, of Caroline's Crayons, did a wonderful post a while back, suggesting that her readers get hold of a book called Moyers on America. I'm happy to say that I did find the book, and have been reading it, a little at a time, as my old eyes will let me. Haven't made it to page 123 yet, but I turned to it today. It is a chapter written in 2003, titled The Fight of Our Lives, in which Mr. Moyers is discussing media reform.

He is speaking of Ted Gup, a journalism teacher, who is, in turn, speaking of Jerry Springer:

"He does not speak for me. Yet 'the media' speaks for us all."

The third sentence returns to Mr. Moyers' own words:

"That's how I felt when I saw Oliver North reporting on Fox from Iraq, pressing our embattled troops to respond to his repetitious and belittling question, 'Does Fox rock? Does Fox rock?'"

He continues, saying that he and Oliver North are part of the same media, but "are not part of the same message."

(I'm sorry - Blogger will not let me change from Italics.)
I have not yet read the entire chapter in depth. I will manage that eventually, little by little, as I will continue to read the entire book. It is well worth reading. But I did skim it, and found what has to be a key phrase: "Democracy can't exist without an informed public." Surely most of us are by now aware that our television cable networks do not give us the real deal, and that our government controls much of the media in the name of "national security" because some things just must be labeled "Top Secret". Thank God for PBS.


Enough. I will get off my soap box. Please, read the book.

OK, Nonizamboni! I did it! And I must say, I kind of enjoyed it.