Chester Golf Tourneys

I need for my creative juices to start flowing but it's hard to do on demand! What to name a tournament where we want to encourage other women players to join the ladies' league who haven't done so in the past. The best I've come up with so far is "Fun Fore All" but what would that actually mean with respect to the tournament?

I'm looking forward to the PR aspects of this "job". Ideas so far:

--Season kick-off newsletter with photo of new Executive, list of all the tourneys, reference to the ladies' division website, only $10 to play, "yes, we play by the rules and yes, we putt out but..." , kudos to people who broke 80, 90, 100 for the first time prior year. Explanation of pin rounds, Maggie Baker cup, ringer and chip-in boards, etc.

--Mid-season newsletter with some "action" photos and photos from lunches.

--End of season newsletter with pictures from Field Day and upcoming Executive.

--E-mails to all ladies in club at end of month with upcoming month's tourneys and explanation of formats.

--Inclusion in Keith Club e-mail of blurb about the ladies' league

This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper

The Book Expo is a great place to be exposed to the type of books that I typically don't read--novels by "real" writers who aren't obsessed with coming up with a new twist on the serial killer theme. (OK, (i) I do read other "action" type books and (ii) I am always going to exempt Lee Child from my derision because Jack Reacher is such a smart and well-written character. But I digress.) So, my modus operandi at the Book Expo has been to follow Wendi's lead and grab as many books as possible that have been written by well-regarded authors, not in hopes of reading them before they hit the library shelf but in order to sell them to others who want to do so.

On occasion, I pick up a book that I sold only to find that it is in fact a truly enjoyable novel. This is Where I Leave You looks to fall into this category. The set-up for this book is the death of a father who, though non-religious, asks his family to sit shiva for him. (As an aside, I learned that there are specially designed shiva chairs that are 12" from the ground. They are low to the ground as a sign of respect.) The prospect of spending seven days together is a bit daunting for this rag tag family and I can't wait to find out where it leads them. Tropper's writing is full of expressions that I want to sit and appreciate. For instance, when talking about the mother who monopolizes phone conversations while the father tries to chime in from the background, he says that "Marrying her was like joining the chorus." What a great analogy!

The hallmark of a powerful writer might be the reader's ability to visualize a scene as it is being described to you. The narrator's description of his thought process when he finds his wife in bed with another man, as comedic as it is in many ways, rings true. It takes some time to process the scene and, once he does, his reaction is like none you've ever heard of before. The act of sitting in the shiva chairs provides the setting for one memorable scene as a well-wisher ogles the D cup breasts of the new widow, causing one of the sons to whisper that "It's like AARP porn."

Postscript:  Get thee to a library and check out this book.  It is laugh out loud funny and poignant, often at the same time.

English Discussion Topics - Idioms

When doing some reading about the Teach for Friendship program, I was directed to the website ESLdiscussions.com. This site has hundreds of ideas on topics to discuss and has a site for questions relating to idioms. For instance, do you think it's a "dog eat dog" world? Do you know anyone who's a bird brain? Having your student use an idiom in a sentence will enhance understanding and creativity--and is bound to generate a pretty lively discussion!

Resilience

Resilience in psychology is the positive ability of people to cope with stress and catastrophe.

My sunflowers exhibited a phenomenal resilience after Hurricane Earl. Battered by the storm, many were left in an almost horizontal state, and were twisted towards the house. After being staked to stand upright, the heads worked themselves back towards the sun, seeking warmth and sustenance. If only we all were able to adjust ourselves towards our own sun in a similar manner.

Every Last One by Anna Quindlen

My Hurricane Earl day was spent reading Anna Quindlen's Every Last One, which I finished by (faux) candelight before the power went back on. I am familiar with Ms. Quindlen as a commentator and knew that she was an author but have never had the pleasure of reading one of her novels before. She is a beautiful writer, and drew me into her book on the very first page, on which she talks about getting up early every day before the rest of the household to have some tme to herself so that she can "rest without sleeping, think without deciding, speak and hear my own voice". These few words so elegantly capture the lives of mothers and wives who don't have time for themselves as they make sure that everyone else in the family is cared for.

Just a few pages later she writes about her daughter's sense of style and how she admires it but is a "little intimidated by it, as thought I had discovered we had incompatible blood types". What a wonderful--and unexpected--analogy.

The author later writes about a woman talking to her husband, an opthamologist, about the colors of people's eyes, commnting that he must see a vast range. "Eye color's not clinically significant," he replies. This exchange encapsulates the difference in the way most women and men look at the world, at least in my experience--the beauty versus the facts.

When tragedy strikes, Quindlen's protagaonist struggles to put her life back together. I don't want to go into the storyline here but it was engrossing and compelling. Jodi Piccoult's themes come to mind, and while I enjoy her writing, I would put Quindlen head and shoulders above her in the beauty of her language.

It is rare to find a writer with such a command of the English language. When I was talking with my voracious reading friend Pat Hackett about Olive Kitteredge, we wondered why it won a Pulitzer Prize for fiction. We both felt that the writing was fine--certainly not that of a hack--but it wasn't compelling. I think the word that Pat used was "proficient", which captures my feeling precisely. Perhaps it was the originality of the approach that Strout took in that book (the short story-like format) which won the judges over. For my dollar, though, I'll take Quindlen any time, and I look forward to reading her other works.

Postscript:  In the NY Times Readers' Greetings section appearing on November 26, 2010, the Times' three book reviewers each chose their top ten favorite reads for 2010.  Janet Maslin named Every Last One as one of a few books that could not be on the list because it was a colleague's work.  Brilliant!

Hurricane Earl

As we prepare for Hurricane Earl to pass through, I've been thinking of the phrases "batten down the hatches" and "hunkering down". Not surprisingly, to batten down the hatches is to prepare for bad weather and it has a nautical derivation. The phrase was first used in 1823 when a sailor wrote about a journey during bad weather when he had to "batten down the hatches" by putting strips of wood on the gaps in the ship and filling them with oakum.

The phrase "hunker down" has several meanings. The first is to sit on one's haunches. OK, not relevant in this situation. The second is to take shelter, either literally or figuratively, for an extended period of time. This is the meaning most typical in my mind, and definitely relevant as I load up on movies and popcorn to wait out the storm. The final meaning, while not relevant to this scenario, does have some appeal and is to hold stubbornly to one's position. Perhaps I should do more of that, but that's a topic for another post. TTFN

Salad Days

With this ongoing heat, the phrase "salad days" seems appropriate (although according to Wikipedia, the term actually refers to someone at the peak of his or her abilities). Hopefully I'm working up to that!

One nice thing about this summer has been trying some new recipes. Three new salad recipes are being added to the repertoire:

--Beet and goat cheese salad. I've actually done this before but was inspired to try again after hearing about Nicola's inclusion of beets in her recent cooking class. Michelle shared some little baby beets from the market with me and I roasted them per Nicola's instruction (cut off tips and tails, salt and pepper, wrap in foil and bake at 425 for 1-1/4 hours--skins then come off easily). I roasted string beans as well (don't know why this has been intimidating--just add a little salt, pepper and olive oil and put them in the oven at 425 for about 25 minutes, turning occasionally--they just need to carmelize a bit--delicious!) I cooked them early in the day and then let them warm to room temperature before serving (which took about five minutes in this incredible heat!) To round it off, I added toasted walnuts and goat cheese. Really tasty and colorful!

--Island Pork Tenderloin. This dish was served at the ladies' golf luncheon at the Club and it was quite delicious. It takes a bit of prep work with the searing and then the brown sugar glaze (which I think is what puts it over the top) but it is easy and fairly light. Will report back after I serve it at my own ladies' luncheon (which is getting bigger by the day--I hope I haven't bitten off more than I can chew, so to speak!)

--Arugula Salad with goat cheese, toasted or candied walnuts and carmelized red onions. I tried this salad after buying a huge thing of arugula so that I'd have a couple of sprigs to put on my strawberry goat cheese bruschetta (another interesting dish--maybe I should have that as the starter at the ladies' luncheon...) I think the trick to this dish is the carmelized red onions--finishing them with a bit of balsamic seems to add to the dish. (I happened to see this on a food show with Ina Gardener but it was also in the recipe.) One note: you can never carmelize too many onions--they shrink down incredibly! I liked the toasted walnuts better than candied, although that might have been my poor job of candying them as they turned out sticky.

That's my take on Julia and Julia for the day!