Two, two, two for my family

img084, originally uploaded by your neighborhood librarian.

I don't do leftovers. Which is quite unfair of me, because I do a lot of the cooking, and I do things like cook a pork roast in the middle of the week just because I have a day off, and then we have this huge lump of meat in the fridge that I won't do anything with.

Luckily, Mr. Librarian loves to mike up a big leftover dinner for everybody. So it would seem that between the two of us we do ok, right?

Not. Because the leftover dinners that he makes are mostly on the weekend days when I work, or Monday night, when I work, so that means that by, say Thursday, our fridge is choked.

Choked. Because our other problem is our condiment addiction. See all them little bottles and jars? We have sambal. We have easily three kinds of mustard.

We also have:

Homemade mango pickle from Mrs. Pavan at Pavan's Indo-Pak
Homemade habanero hot sauce from Janie
Homemade stewed garlic from me
Homemade horseradish from some damn place
Tamari
Shoyu
Salsa (3 kinds)
Kimchi
Somen soup base
Pickled baby green tomatoes
Pickled okra
Pickled green beans
Picked something I thought was green beans but appears to be stems of some kind, but the writing on the jar is in Russian so I just don't know. They're good though.
Pickled herring
Pickle relish
Vidalia onion relish
Banana pepper rings
Ground red peppers
Roasted sweet peppers
Wasabi in a tube
Tomato paste in a tube
Pesto in a tube
Miso paste
Garlic paste
Thai green curry paste
Anchovies
Capers
Bacon bits
Duck fat
and Miracle Whip

Oddly, no ketchup. Hm. Sounds like a hell of a sandwich though, right? And what goes best with a sandwich? A nice cold beer... but wait! All that crap in the fridge means no room for beer!

It would be a disaster, except my folks got a new refrigerator a few years ago, which of course meant a new hand-me-down fridge for us, so we also have the fridge in the basement to fill up. Just extra juice, milk, beer, SlimFast and water down there right now though, we're judicious.

It's the little things

Little things like the little dead mouse I found behind the art supplies desk in the dining room. Foul. And I think the cats peed on him post mortem. Extra foul.

Things like the gnarled little item offered me by the neighbor boy last night.
"What is that? It looks like coral," I said.
"Eat it," he said.
And now I am totally addicted to Cheetos XXtra Flamin' Hot Cheese Flavored Snacks. Oh my god - is this a snack item developed especially for Asian immigrants? I have a higher-than-usual tolerance for spicy food, due to the hard work I've done dulling my taste buds with alcohol, cigarettes and coffee, but even I couldn't get through the whole bag.



Little things like the last guy Clive Owen kills in this extremely NSFW clip from the forthcoming (and apparently aptly titled) Shoot 'Em Up. You have to click through to see it but it's really really worth it.

A little thing that was almost a big thing: I heard a song on WTMD this morning that I LOVED. Thought the band would save rock and roll loved. Made me think of XTC and Firehose at the same time loved. Stopped in at the record store, bought the album, and the rest of it sounds like Dave Matthews or somethin. Awww.

Although, one more little thing about the pink hair: you walk into the record store and say, "I heard this song? And I'm not sure about the band name? Was it somebody... and The Pharmacists?" and if you have pink hair you still don't look like a doofus (or a 40-year-old mom, whichever comes first).

And a short little book thing: The Plain Janes, by Cecil Castellucci, which I must be the last librarian on earth to have read. I recommend it to all people for its art-positive real-feeling take on high school. Reminded me of Kirsten Miller's Kiki Strike, the second book of which hits the streets October 2. Not that Kiki Strike is at all real-feeling... or has anything to do with art... screw you, I just like girls being sneaky, ok? Read the damn books!

It's no baloney

Well, I've been sleazing around the picture books again looking for good illustration, and it's now time for another edition of Best children's books for hipsters. Yay!

I'm the biggest thing in the ocean by Kevin Sherry. Kevin Sherry is the local hero behind the achingly cool Squidfire t-shirts. And I have to say, great illustrators do not always great kids' books make (I better type fast, I think the Syntax Squad is about to break down my door), but I have read this book out loud to a batch of under-tens, and the one joke, which takes the entire book to set up, lands like a dumptruck full of firecrackers. Rolling on the floor laughing they were. And they loved the achingly clean and clever illustrations, which you've got to expect from Mr. Squid, all the way.

Me! Me! ABC, words by Harriet Ziefert, characters by Ingri von Bergen. Little flat soft stitched-vinyl toys saying "Admire me!" "Buckle me!" "Call me!" A little too modern-daze self-referential / neurotic for your average 4-year-old, but your 34-year-old otaku brother will love it. Can widdle Ethan say, "chokeproof brand extension"? (Love those funny Daddy Types!)



Ryan Heshka's ABC Spookshow. Ho boy, that Ryan Heshka is Mister Sophisticato - he's like Seth on, like, too much Prozac. Prozac mixed with uppers, maybe, for that happy-frantic feeling. I haven't seen this one yet, but I'm expecting that they'll have a copy for me at Atomic Books.



365 Penguins, by Jean-Luc Fromental and Joelle Jolivet. I want the pages of this book, done all in black, orange and blue, printed up as fabric so that I can have a skirt. The illustrations are energetic, dense, blocky, expressive, retro, and somehow strike me as Scandinavian, even though the authors are French (or possibly Belgian). The story is cute too, with arithmetic problems that you can do (or not) and a brief environmental message at the end.

They're giant robots

Big Man just turned 6. We had a great party at an underappreciated museum, a place full of obscure machines and items previously thought to be too quotidian to attract notice. I love that kind of thing - the reconstructed rooms used to be my favorite part of the National Museum of American History, one of the few museums I never had anything to do with professionally. Hence, I haven't been there since I was a kid, and now they're renovating the joint, so those rooms are probably history (ooo, meta!).

At our party we had cake, we encountered a wacky old docent who demonstrated the machines and let the kids hoist cargo, there was a fairly successful engineering activity involving masking tape and marbles.

But I think my favorite part was the ride home. We packed five boys, ages 4 to 7, into the minivan and listened to them tell each other lies and crack each other up all the way home.

Funny guys.

That covers both Jane and Sassy

That's a first grade breakfast!

That's a first grade breakfast!, originally uploaded by your neighborhood librarian.

... and some Grade A hair. He's so thrilled to be in first grade, and I'm so damn proud.

They'll be gaga at the go-go when they see me in my toga

me on the beach, originally uploaded by your neighborhood librarian.

A few things about the pink hair.

On the beach on Whidbey Island (this picture), Bob said that from behind, it all looked like a black and white photo in which only my hair had been colorized.

If you work with strangers, and you dye your hair pink, you better be on your best behavior. Previously, if someone had a complaint about me, it would go like this: "That librarian with the long hair and glasses wouldn't write my paper for me," and they could have been referring to either Your Neighborhood Librarian or Our Resident Pagan, and we were kind of both covered. Now, however, all they gotta say is, "That pink-haired librarian was a bitch to me," and I got nowhere to hide.

If I'm having a stressy day, or merely in a hurry to get somewhere, and someone stops, stares, smiles, and asks, "What made you dye your hair pink?" it doesn't make me slow down and smile back, it makes me want to snap his or her neck.

I could tell any 8-year-old girl to read Aristotle - in Greek - and she'd take it from me reverently and come back the next week with a book report.

It's fading already. Wah. Sniff.

I know what boys like

The other day I helped a lady who was doing a book club for middle-grade boys. She was looking for "boy books". Now, many people turn up their noses at the idea that books can be "boy books" or "girl books" and indeed, I wouldn't tell a boy not to read Black Beauty or Anne of Green Gables.

BUT... I'm not going to spend my valuable (and hard-won: have I mentioned the pink hair?) credibility suggesting Little Women as a historical fiction choice for a boy. And I have given up on recommending The Woman Who Rides Like a Man by Tamora Pierce to my fantasy-loving boy readers - I just couldn't take the rejection anymore!

So eventually you conclude: girl on the cover? that boy is not going to read it. Horse on the cover? iffy. Bird on the cover? probably not. Crazy, huh? What's so girly about birds? But he's not going to read it, and he may think that you're clueless for suggesting it to him.

So here are some books in a variety of genres and age ranges that are go-to choices for boys (and also great for girls too - as with names and clothes, girls get to pick from both sides of the aisle). I have read almost all of these. Anything I have previously reviewed has a link. Anything without a link, read the School Library Journal review on Amazon.


First readers (I Can Read):
Nate the Great series by Sharmat. Detective stories.
Elephant & Piggie series by Mo Willems. Friendship. Super-funny!



First chapter books (Beyond I Can Read):
Time Warp Trio series by Jon Scieszka. Funny adventure stories.
Ricky Ricotta's Mighty Robot series by Dav Pilkey.




Up a level:

Ziggy and the Black Dinosaurs series by Sharon Draper

Melvin Beederman, Superhero series by Greg Trine

Secrets of Dripping Fang series by D Greenburg

Mr Chickee series by Christopher Paul Curtis
Encyclopedia Brown series by Sobol
The Great Brain series by John D. Fitzgerald
Captain Underpants series by Dav Pilkey

Longer books:
Benny and Omar by Eoin Colfer (UK boy moves to northern Africa, gets into trouble and learns about responsibility. Also, fun. Benny's voyage of discovery continues with the forthcoming Benny and the Babe I think it's called)
Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney (heavily illustrated, lots of funny: for the reluctant reader)
Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis (African-American hero, historical fiction)
Brainboy and the Deathmaster by Tor Seidel (great for gamers, science fiction but not futuristic)
Cryptid Hunters by Roland Smith (science fiction, hunting for a mythical creature, brother and sister, super adventure)
Alex Ryder series by Anthony Horowitz (first book is Stormbreaker. Teenage secret agent, very actiony!)



Young Adult:
Airborn and Skybreaker by Kenneth Oppel (adventure books set in an alternate past. SO good, read them before the movie comes out)
The Guild of Specialists series by Joshua Mowll (Operation Red Jericho and its sequel, Operation Typhoon Shore (reluctant reader, adventure, alternate past. Awesome presentation, with fold-out maps and an elastic band, but kind of pedestrian writing)
Red Kayak by Priscilla Cummings (wrenching YA novel about a dead toddler and responsibility. local author)
Hoot and Flush by Carl Hiaasen (super-funny, environmental theme, adventure)
Bucking the Sarge by Christopher Paul Curtis (coming of age, African American hero, funny, terrible mother)
Greg Korman in general (funny, real-life-like)
Walter Dean Myers in general (African American writer, mature themes)
Gary Soto (Latino writer, mature themes)
M.T. Anderson in general
Markus Zusak's two books: The Book Thief and I am the Messenger

Sports:

3-6 grade: Matt Christopher, Dan Gutman, Rick Wallace
YA: John Feinstein, Chris Crutcher, Hoops by Walter Dean Myers




Fantasy (I define fantasy as anything with any nonhuman sentient characters):
City of Ember series by Jeanne DuPrau (very popular young adult fantasy books)
His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman (first book is The Golden Compass. It's a stunning alternate-world fantasy trilogy that works in some very sophisticated ideas. Movie coming out this fall.) Young Adult
Artemis Fowl series by Eoin Colfer (elves, thievery, funny and engaging. Shelved as Young Adult, but I don't know why)
The Supernaturalist by Eoin Colfer (excellent sci-fi novel, spectacularly plotted. Young Adult)
Percy Jackson and the Olympians series by Rick Riordan (first book is Lightning Thief. Teenage demigod, great adventure and funny too)
Gregor series by Suzanne Collins. (first book is Gregor the Overlander. Underground world populated by giant rats, bats, spiders, roaches, etc. Really cool.)
The Dark is rising series by Susan Cooper (first book is The Dark is Rising. Wonderful Arthurian fantasy, good relationships, coming of age - very important to read this before the movie comes out!)
How to Train your Dragon series by Cressida Cowell (Vikings, humor, friendship, for younger readers)
Sisters Grimm series by Michael Buckley (first book is The Fairy Tale Detectives - mysteries starring fairy tale characters, for younger and reluctant readers)
Clan Apis by Jay Hosler (graphic novel about bees, written and drawn by a biologist, funny and real, this is a great book!)

NOTE: Cryptid Hunters and Airborn are very nearly fantasy too.




Historical Fiction:

Gary Paulsen (Tucket's Ride etc)
Montmorency: Thief Liar Gentleman (the first book only) by Eleanor Updale (very clever hero, espionage, crime, Victorian London)
Stowaway by Karen Hesse (historical fiction, Captain Cook's voyage, first-person narrative)
Victory by Susan Cooper (historical fiction, British navy, first-person)
Sally Lockhart trilogy by Philip Pullman (first book The Ruby in the Smoke, Victorian detective novels that you can sell a boy on - tell them the books are rather dark) Young Adult.

Harlem Summer by Walter Dean Myers

47 by Walter Mosley

Nonfiction:

USS Constellation : pride of the American navy by Walter Dean Myers
Secrets of a civil war submarine by Sally M. Walker
Onward: a photobiography of African-American polar explorer Matthew Henson by Dolores Johnson

Whatcha mean what's a zine? by Mark Todd and Esther Pearl Watson
The history of pirates: from privateers to outlaws by Allison Lassieur.
Tracking trash: flotsam, jetsam, and the science of ocean motion Loree Griffin Burns.
Freedom walkers : the story of the Montgomery bus boycott by Russell Freedman.
John Lewis in the lead : a story of the civil rights movement by Jim Haskins and Kathleen Benson

Dougal Dixon

Russell Freeman

Steve Jenkins

Patrick O'Brien

Ann Bausum

They clean up good

paying attention to the vows, originally uploaded by your neighborhood librarian.

We are back from the PNW. My brother's wedding, then a few days marching around Seattle, watchin em throw fish, eating pho, checking out the new library, hanging out with our friends. The Sci Fi Museum was particularly great. I bought a dodo. Sunsets, lots of sunsets.

Bob forgot to pack cufflinks (who remembers cufflinks?) so he used the doodads from the kids' Crocs. Suave! Mr Four passed out during the reception, and the bride was a knockout.

It was a great vacation, it was a beautiful wedding, and it was a nightmare of travel. Fucking airlines. Miserable asshole airline personnel. We are so lucky that these boys didn't LOSE their MINDS - cause god knows I came close. Arrived back at the homestead at close to 5am, after boarding a plane in Seattle at 11:30am. All done now.