Well, I have failed miserably in my mission to make Mississippi read. This article and video from The Washington Post features the Como Elementary School. I live at the end of Main Street in Como, and the school is exactly one block north of my house. I was the Town's Librarian for nine years before moving to my current position at the college. I wanna cry, but it ain't gonna help.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Friday, October 26, 2007
Tongue & Cheek Meme
Lynne from Lynne's Little Corner of the World tagged me for a purely innocent meme. No, hubby wasn't maddened by my character lust. ;D
“Ten Literary Characters I Would Totally Make Out With If I Were Single and They Were Real.”
1.) Inman of Cold Mountain (but I'll wait for him to take a shower)
2.) Captain Gus McCrae of Lonesome Dove (but I'll have to get in line)3.) Captain Woodrow F. Call of Lonesome Dove (strong, silent type)
4.) Mr. Darcy of Pride & Prejudice (oh, but he makes me so mad!)
5.) Rooster Cogburn of True Grit (a real man's man)
6.) Jacob Jankowski of Water for Elephants (He doesn't mind my past!)
7.) Mark Darcy of Bridget Jone's Diary (oh, but he makes me even madder!)
8.) Rhett Butler of Gone with the Wind (I'll help you forget her...)
9.) Ranger or Morelli from the Stephanie Plum Series (Eeny Meeny Miny Joe!)
10.) Ebenezer Scrooge of A Christmas Carol (old, rich, and ready to kick the bucket) Bah!
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
High Cotton (copy)
In the morning, I hear it while ironing clothes. It is in the background while I take a shower. It gets louder when I take out the trash. It is still droning while I brush my teeth for bed at night. And with windows open, it lulls me to sleep as I try to read. At this time of the year, our little town is filled with a busy hum or ever-present mechanical sound, the cotton gin.
I will forever associate the sound with the autumnal season. It is my background music while raking leaves, picking pecans, and planting pansies. It comforts me as much as the cotton sweatshirt and blue jeans I wear as I perform these duties. It is chapter eight, “The Gin,” in Gerard Helferich’s new book High Cotton: Four Seasons in the Mississippi Delta.
For most of today’s Americans the word cotton evokes comfort. The latest cotton advertisement flaunts runway models leaving the high-fashion stage for the front door, implying cotton is quality couture and everyday wear. Even before this ad, we strutted around proudly in, “The Fabric of Our Lives.”
How odd to discover this fluffy fiber needs a promotional campaign. Of course it is to fight against softer and cheaper manmade fabrics; regrettably, the plant had an image problem prior to synthetics. The association with back-breaking labor in ungodly heat and humidity for meager wages or bare-existence trade is how field workers from 1840s to 1970s felt. Three decades ago, cotton may have been king, but only for those already in the upper echelon of its business.
Through Helferich’s reporting, readers follow a modern day cotton farmer for a full year. His subject, Zack Killebrew, farms 1,700 acres outside the small town of Tchula, in the rich Mississippi Delta soil. One-thousand acres are for cotton the rest set aside for soybeans and corn. Some of Killebrew’s cotton acreage is prime two-inch-deep Delta soil known locally as ice-cream.
Helferich leads us through the first days of breaking the soil to the last hours on the loom. As if on a cotton tour, we step into Killebrew’s pick-up for the long day, where Helferich relates the history of each process we happen to arrive at. For instance, during the weeks of picking cotton Hurricane Katrina rolls through and Helferich sidesteps to tell us about the Great Flood of 1927. On this tour readers can expect side excursions to encompass slavery, sharecropping, pesticides, and the Civil Rights Movement as it pertains to Mississippi cotton.
It is a fascinating year filled with bright blue cotton seeds and white, arm-resting pick-up trucks. Lucky for me, I also have the pleasure of living in Mississippi during a time when cotton is more a democracy than a tyrant king.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Get'em Jimi!
I wish they'd had electric guitars in cotton fields back in the good old days. A whole lot of things would've been straightened out.
~ Jimi Hendrix
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Death Makes a Holiday (copy)
Did you know Ehrich Weiss, better known as Harry Houdini, died Halloween night in 1926? It wasn’t a stunt gone awry, but a dare acted out a week earlier which led to his demise. The story, told through David J. Skal’s book Death Makes a Holiday: A Cultural History of Halloween, clarifies a university student followed him to his dressing room where he dared Houdini to take a stomach punch. Skal continues, “He may already have been suffering from undiagnosed appendicitis; the result was peritonitis and a swift but excruciating death.”
During Houdini’s time, Spiritualism was a growing movement. Some Victorians believed spirits of the newly departed could be communicated with through the use of Mediums. World War I also gave rise to the movement because of the enormous death toll.
Mr. Houdini thought Mediums were con artist and enjoyed debunking their methods. His wife Bess, on the other hand, was a devote Spiritualist who lived to prove him wrong. Before Houdini’s death, he gave a secret code to his wife and other believers such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. If Mediums were the real deal surely one could relay the message back.
Every year for ten years, Bess attended different séances on Halloween night, with noted Spiritualists. She left unenthusiastic. Finally, a New York seer named Arthur Ford claimed he had been contacted by Houdini’s spirit. Bess acknowledged his claim and signed a statement proving its validity, but she later recanted claiming the code wasn’t all that secret.
What was the secret message? I know you are dying to know! The bunch of garbled-goop goes, “ROSABELLE ANSWER TELL PRAY ANSWER LOOK TELL ANSWER ANSWER TELL.”
Author Skal has written an engaging history of Halloween. Through the use of the Oxford English Dictionary and period postcards, he follows the migration of the celebration from Europe to America. What started as a way to relax after the harvest has now turned to big business with Disney costumes and Hershey candies.
Within the pages one will read all about haunted houses, witches, Jack-o’-Lanterns, and skeletons. He includes a fascinating chapter on Hollywood title, “Halloween on Screen” and concludes with the scariest of scenarios, September 11.
This was a purely fun, nostalgic look at Halloween when the monsters were in front of the door and not behind it.
Note: Number 3 RIP II Reading Challenge
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Playing for Pizza (copy)
Alright readers, get your pom-poms ready, because I’m about to lead a cheer for John 
Grisham’s new book Playing for Pizza. “Give me an ‘F’!” “Give me a ‘U’!” “Give me an ‘N’!” “What do ya got?” FUN! “I can’t hear you!” FUN!
That’s right, Grisham’s new book is nothing but fun. Matter of fact, it is the perfect little read during the week while one waits for Grisham’s Alma Mata, Ole Miss, to kick-off a Saturday football game. What am I thinking? One only has two weekdays to read if he is a real football fanatic, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
Our story opens with 28-year-old Rick Dockery lying in a hospital bed not really sure just how he got there. This confusion makes his agent, Arnie, a bit nervous. Over Rick’s lackluster football career this makes his third concussion—and one is usually one too many—in the NFL.
Arnie retells the story as Rick notices his head throbbing more and more with each sentence. Apparently, third-stringer Rick was called on the field to replace the second Browns’ quarterback to sustain injuries in the Cleveland Browns versus Denver Broncos match-up. This play-off game is all but won as Browns fans begin to head towards the parking lot.
As Rick accepts the snap, the Browns are up by 17 points with only 11 minutes left in the game. Have you ever played the game, “7 Minutes in Heaven?” Well, for Rick this is 11 minutes in the opposite direction as the ball is intercepted three separate times for unbelievable Bronco touchdowns.
Arnie has more bad news. First, Browns manager, Whacker, called while Rick was in his coma to fire him. Second, no one, not even his parents have sent flowers or get well cards. Last, an angry group of drunken fans have staged yell-ins directed at the quarterback’s hospital window for a week.
Hiding in the hospital, Rick is left with only two options; essentially, quit football altogether or play for the Parma Panthers in Parma, Italy. Who? Where?
Arnie’s worked the phones daily while Rick recovered for another NFL contract, but things have been brutal. Even the Denver Broncos-heading to the Super Bowl thanks to Rick-laugh at his offer. The Parma Panthers are the only agreeable team. Their offer, a whopping $20,000 plus room, car, and all the pasta one ex-NFLer can eat.
So, before the next tailgate party, what will you do? “Read! Read! READ!”
Note: Number 3 Armchair Travelers Reading Challenge
Monday, October 08, 2007
Non-Fiction Five Completed!
Sorry, this took so long, Joy! I finished the Non-Fiction Five Challenge before the end of 
September, but am just now getting around to posting my participation. I loved the challenge and am thankful Joy hosted such an immensely thought-provoking genre.
Out of the five original books, I read none! Bah! It is just impossible to stay to a list of books. When I sit down to type my article for the newspapers, usually on a Wednesday morning, I have a hard time getting started if the book doesn't already match a seasonal, topical theme. Why? Well, I'm no writer; I'm a librarian.
This limits my challenge participation as earlier mentioned. Thankfully, Joy approved my 
modification of the rules, and I got to read some damn good books. My favorite, Rats by Robert Sullivan, gave the hubby and I an added adventure during our trip to New York City. Here is a picture of me under the sign to Eden Alley. We have pictures of dead rats in the alley, too. Not sure y'all would appreciate them though?!?
Oh, Hubby thought I should tell you about our encounter before finding the alley. We, dressed as wrinkled tourist, kept looking around corners and walking blocks looking for the alley. Finally, an older white haired gentleman wearing the latest in brooks brothers, asked if we needed directions. Our temporary tour guide must have thought we wanted to see something in the financial district and he was eager to please. Well, that is, until we said Eden's Alley. He abruptly frowned and said he never heard of it and literally scurried away! Bah!
My final list:
The Big Bam by Leigh Montville
Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
Flower Confidential by Amy Stewart
Rats by Robert Sullivan
Teach like your Hair is on Fire by Rafe Esquith
The Big Bam by Leigh Montville
Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
Flower Confidential by Amy Stewart
Rats by Robert Sullivan
Teach like your Hair is on Fire by Rafe Esquith
Saturday, October 06, 2007
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
A Long Way Gone (copy)
He is a refugee, a soldier, and a reformer; but most of all, he is a survivor. This is the true story of Ishmael Beah, as written in the horrific A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier.
Eleven-year-old Ishmael is living in the small village of Mogbwemo, Sierra Leone, as the story begins. His idyllic African life is filled with school (learning Shakespeare), friends (playing soccer, rapping to Run-DMC, and swimming in the river), and warm nights of storytelling by his grandmother. That is before the rebels attack his remote village, causing all to flee for their lives.
In the chaos, Ishmael and his older brother Junior, run in the opposite direction from their family. With every step their distance grows farther, as the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) drives them deep into the jungle.
Later the next day, the boys return to a home filled with lounging rebels. Blood is splattered on the huts and pooled on the dirt; otherwise, there is no sign of family and friends. Relief feels their hearts as the lack of bodies provides the possibility of life. The brothers decide to travel on to the next village in search of their mother, grandmother, and baby brother.
For almost a year, they search and narrowly escape the rebels who seem to be walking in their shadows. They face isolation and starvation during this time, plus Junior becomes a victim of the war. By pure luck Ishmael finds and joins a group of six boys he knows from school.
Although Ishmael and his friends are only trying to survive, the villagers they encounter fear them. They have heard of ruthless gangs of boy soldiers and attack the seven boys as if they are rebels. How will these misfortunate children stay alive with rebels and civilians attacking them?
Involuntary conscription is the answer to their daily pain. By placing the National Provisional Ruling Council (NPRC) uniform on, they can take regular showers, sleep under a roof, and eat two daily meals. Unfortunately, they will and do kill others with their army issued AK-47s and G3s.
What can be more frightening than a 13-year-old boy aiming an AK-47 at your person? This one thought haunted me throughout the reading of Ishmael’s brutal account of war. I found it remarkable how he became so dehumanized by the killing, yet rehabilitated to become a gentle adult.
Note: Number 2 Armchair Traveler's Reading Challenge
Number 2 RIP II Reading Challenge
Christina of Ardently Pink Reader had a totally different take.
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
Stereotype Preceeds Me!
I gave a program October 1st in a town 25 miles south of the campus called Batesville. The delightful Friends of the Library group were seven strong when normally they have a crowd of sixteen. I joked it must be the speaker, but they assured me many were on vacation. Even the librarian was out of state.
Not remembering my contact - last minute deal and said vacationing librarian suggested me - I walked into a room full of strangers. I was greeted by a nice woman who blurted out, "You're pretty!"
Not something I get to hear everyday, I basked in the slightly uncomfortable compliment as she continued, "I mean, you look different from the librarian I pictured on the phone."
She obviously hasn't been exposed to my most-recent (beige) publicity photo. Bah!
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