Biretta.

Oprah for pope.

Aaaaa! Didn't mean to cause worry. Just meant that this seems to be a very open-hearted thread/ social group: tolerant in the best sense. Btw, note the correction to my post - Scola not Sodano.

Howdy! Come hang out. There's room here for every kind of Catholic, and non-Catholics too. Is it too soon for the horse-racing? My money is on Angelo Scola. Edited for hideous typo

Opus Dei is not a Traditionalist organization. The SSPX (a/k/a "Lefebvrites") DO believe that the current pope, and his predecessors, have been valid popes. They should not be confused with the various sedevacantist ("the See is empty") groups.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.... ;)

And cats.

Toward the end of John Paul's reign, it was pretty solid gossip (pardon the oxymoron) that Cdl. Ratzinger strongly felt that the "pope as witness to suffering" approach of his predecessor was misguided. His resignation statement of this morning is actually pretty blunt about that. And there had been Vatican chatter this last week about resignation. So I'm not shocked. The spurious "prophecy of Malachy" proved useless when the "man of Olives" turned out to be Cdl. Ratzinger I mean, if it was real, it would have had to be Cdl. Martini, right? I bet Fellay is waking up to some regrets.

On Book X right now. I'd forgotten the introductory chapter essays; they almost form a book-within-a-book, don't they? Love the wall art.

Probably if I were truly virtuous I would have posted something to the local homeschoolers list during that three days. But I didn't.

I used to think that if I had three girls I would give them warrior names: Boadicea, Camilla, and Maeve. Turned out I had three daughters, but only used one of those.

I am so weak. One of the local library branches was recently told by the fire marshal that they had too many books. And this week, as I feared, the library discard store was full of beautiful red- and blue-cloth-covered Everyman editions of classic literature, many hardly read, $20-$40 new, for two dollars each. I waited three days to give others a chance. And this afternoon I went back to the store - not a one of the books, as far as I could tell, had been bought - and came home with a box full of books. Most I didn't have, some are books I love but had only as ragged paperbacks, a few are books I had but which have been claimed by Great Girl according to some private theory of primogeniture. So, so glad I didn't sign up for that silly challenge that involved not buying more books.

Good classical homeschoolers would know from their Aristotle that the mother provides the matter of the child, and the father, the form. This is how Dh would explain to people why Great Girl looked just like me but had his mathy brain. Now if the ancients could only explain why Middle Girl looks just like my sister-in-law.

Shhhhhh.

I love Hughes. If you can find In Hazard, it's very good, too. And he wrote a collection of children's stories called The Spider's Palace which I heartily recommend; it's full of odd little stories that adults find strange and disturbing and children find delightful. It's been one of my girls' favorite books.

Praying here.

Dh has now read everything Collins wrote. Likes it all. Tom Jones definitely counts as a chunkster.

One likes to see Catholics on fire for the Lord.

This week I'm enjoying the evergreen Tom Jones. Free on the Kindle, which was nice since my old hardcover Everyman edition is big and heavy. Lots of hanging around in doctors' and dentists' offices this week, alas, with more to come in upcoming weeks, so the Kindle is my friend and escapist fiction, with occasional dips into Kempis' Imitation, is my sustenance. I so love Fielding.

Sexagesima Not half so exciting as its name might suggest, today gets its name by being the sixtieth - by which we mean, fifty-sixth - day before Easter. Now eclipsed ecclesiastically by the Vatican II elimination of Pre-Lent; nationally, by the First-Class Feast of Super Bowl Sunday; and locally by the Octave of Mardi Gras; Sexagesima Sunday is now just a half-forgotten reminder of the approaching Lent. Did anyone get their throats blessed today?

I think it's important to distinguish between 'abridged' and 'adapted.'

Dh is a great Wilkie Collins fan, and keeps moving them over to my bedside table. Tell me if you think The Moonstone is a good choice. And get well soon!

Friends, I appreciate all these recipes, and the sympathy. Of course on top of this, she has several damaged molars that can't be crowned until the jaw is repaired (the surgeon just pulled the molar that was beyond repair). So she's super-sensitive to heat and cold; tepid liquids it will be. (When the oral surgeon told her he was couldn't save the one molar and was going to have to extract the pieces of it immediately, she burst into tears. The doctor, who is Italian, stared at her in bewilderment and said in his strong accent, "But I am very good at this!" She told me later that that assertion of competence was the most comforting thing he could possibly have said.)

So Great Girl continues to have the world's most crisis-laden freshman year ever. She has now broken her jaw and it will have to be wired shut. Liquid diet only. She hates liquid foods, especially soup, so her Lenten penance is all good to go. Does anyone have teen-pleasing recipes, especially slow cooker recipes, for no-chunk soups or smoothies for an active teenager who is stuck with liquid nutrition only? She is a nominal vegetarian but doesn't mind a little surreptitious beef or chicken stock.

I can barely type this post, my fingers are that sore from scrubbing nasty old grease off the kitchen hood. Those pics scared me straight.