Barbara Hambly's Blog, page 49

haiku

I presume as a reaction to the mental concentration of the screenplay (which seems to be coming along fine), I've gone back to reading a lot of haiku. I tend to stick with the original masters - Basho, Buson, Issa - and find the snapshot quality of the pieces both fascinating and restful: This was how the world looked to one man, on one morning, in 1810. My current project is collecting my favorites and doing a little graphics project: arranging them in a rough year-cycle and illustrating, mo...

Older than Dirt

Well, it was a lovely birthday. A small dinner with friends Saturday evening - my actual birthday - a variety of salads, chicken from CostCo, Hazel's Hamburger Beans (I understand these are what the gods serve on Mt. Olympus when they have a barbeque), corn on the cob, Laurie's jawdroppingly good chocolate cookies. Mostly, a lot of good talk on the back patio under the tent that gets put up every time I have a patio dinner - good talk with a small group of close friends being my greatest plea...

Cat Lady?

WoW - Well, I went looking for the Cat Lady that's supposed to live just outside the gates of Stormwind and couldn't find her - can I get some advice? There seem to be two farmhouses between the city gates and Goldshire, and neither appears to have cats. Or is there something special that I have to do at one or the other?

To all the NON-WoW folks out there, my apologies... but I really want a virtual cat (like I don't have four real ones).

On the other hand, MANY thanks for the virtual bunny-ra...

Stormwind Tonight!

WoW - Got the connection fixed (though I haven't yet signed on to WoW to test THAT connection, I think the problem - which seems to have been a failed connector-cable - is taken care of). So, barring the unforseen, I'll be in Stormwind tonight, ready to rock 'n' roll.

May all our problems be so easily resolved.

Internet Issues

Alert! I don't know at the moment whether I have a problem with my local server, or with my computer (and of course it's too late in the evening to reach anybody who WOULD know), but I'm out of LJ, e-mail, etc touch for I don't know how long.

WoW - If I'm not there in Stormwind tomorrow night at 6, that's why. (I've tried to sign on and zip). I'll keep everyone posted as best I can, but I can't keep on borrowing my neighbor's office.

Grr.

Torta and brownies

This from my friend Laurie:

The torta recipe came from Cucina Fresca, which was published back in the mid-'80s; the cheesecake brownies came from Maida Heatter's cookie cookbook, published in, oh, the early '90s? Neither of them is in digital form.

But I betcha both could be found for not a whole lot of $$ from abebooks.com. I know she'll be posting recipies on her blog when she gets it underway, but I suspect that at the moment, she's a little too buried to dig them out.

And while I'm in Shamel...

End of summer

Boy, Laurie and Hazel know how to throw a picnic! Chamber-music concert at the Huntington Library last night, picnic on the lawn: rack of lamb, mustard potatoes, garden-grown tomato salad, something which Laurie called a "torta" (fluffy cheese with bits of savory stuff embedded in it). Amazing. More amazing still because it's all packed up into neat compartments and boxes: we sit down, Hazel pulls out the appetizer plates (I didn't mention the salami, cheese, and asparagus with...

Much Ado About Nothing

An evening picnic in Griffith Park with dear friends - how much better can that get? The Independent Shakespeare Company does two open-air, free productions per summer in the park: I missed Othello last month, but Much Ado About Nothing is one of my favorite Shakespeare plays, and this was a lovely and hilarious production. We got there early, set up our portable chairs in the best spot, had grilled chicken and a salad of home-grown, vine-ripened, backyard tomatoes. Laurie also brought one of...

WoW Thursday

WoW - return to Thursdays this Thursday night? Looking forward to getting in a little tanking - something I just didn't feel emotionally up for during the stint of teaching 4 nights a week. (Maybe it was all those wars and conquests...)

I see - from reading the exams - that I will need to fluff up my Joan of Arc lecture. One student informed me that Joanie got an army from the King of France to defeat the Mongols. Another explained that Machievelli was a girl disguised as a boy who got an army...

Three whole weeks!

It's amazing how much better I feel when I've had enough sleep.

Class finished last night. I did a Jeopardy-style review for the final the night before ("And for one point, what WAS the event that triggered the Hundred Years War?") and everyone seemed to enjoy that, though it was exhausting (especially the part about running back and forth to give points to the Guys side or the Girls side). Now I get to grade the exams, which I'm sure are going to have identical language on the i.d. terms. But...