I wish we were private again. I have a mini rant on that topic, having been recently subjected to a facebook article on essential oils and cancer that raised my blood pressure. It had nothing to do with dad, but he's not doing well. So, it made me more irritated than I might have been. I finished The Vintage Caper and the third book of Middlemarch. I need to read Strong Poison by Dorothy Sayers for my next book club meeting. I've also started the Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits. Mysteries are wonderfully distracting.

Speaking of kitties! I don't know if anyone remembers the kitten we rescued last August. Here he is napping on me while I read. This is a daily ritual. He is between nine and ten months old now. This new format lets me upload pictures from my ipad!

I've been reading fluffy escapist mysteries. I finished The Weekend Was Murder by Joan Lowry Nixon and am now reading the Vintage Caper by Peter Mayle. I hope to finish book three of Middlemarch today.

I haven't finished this part yet. I stopped reading around the time the board shut down. I was about halfway through. One reason was Fred's predicament and his poor choices were making me feel anxious. At the time I was worried about leaving my kids for a week. I guess I can get back to it now.

I'm not sure how to answer the question. As good as he can be, I guess. He is not depressed. He had the first chemo round the week before last. Delayed chemo effects began while we were there last week. He lost his appetite and that irritated him more than anything else. The brother who does not live with my dad and I have done a lot of communicating what we hear. We both get slightly different stories from dad and my other brother. He has also been communicating with the cancer research nurse assigned to dad's case. The cancer is more extensive than we had been originally told by my dad. We've accomplished a lot of business stuff and mapping out schedules for the next couple of months. Dad was very helpful and willng to get stuff done. The chemo's first effect was to make his breathing easier, which helped.

I read A Meddler and her Murder by Joyce Porter and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark. The first was found in the thrift store. It is a British mystery featuring a very non-feminine woman called the Hon Con (Honorable Constance) and her "dear friend" who keeps house for her. The Hon Con fancies herself a detective and tries to out detect the local police in a murder on the next street over. The second book I found at the Polk County, NC, library book sale, while I was visiting my dad last week. I remembered that Jane (I think ?) had recently read it. I made my husband take me to the library when we had some time to ourselves. When we walked in the door, I gasped. It is a gorgeous modern library. You enter the reception area from the parking lot, only to find out it is a loft above the main library which goes down behind a hill. The back wall is full of long windows that look out onto the woods and there is an outdoor reading deck. I asked the librarian how old it was. She proudly said it was eleven years old. Then she added, "We are so fortunate. Isn't it awesome." I agreed. I'm not quite sure what I think of the book.

Hi, everyone.

My clubs are back wth no content.

Clubs I do not belong to: Divorce Support Group International Homeschoolers and a club that appears to be represented by a period. (.) Club I want back in: Literary Hub Club I started: I can't remember the name, lol, but I think it is called Nonbelievers or Atheist Support Group. It was private.

I'm glad to see you made it back.

Through dna testing, and with my help, my mother recently found out who her biological father was. He had passed away in 1983. Mom's mother had three husbands and my mother was told she was concieved from a young service man man whose name she was never told. We have managed to piece together the general story. The man himself may not have known my mother existed. The nice part is mom found out she has a half sister and half brother, they were born much later. They have been very kind. At first they were skeptical, but they shared the amount of dna of half siblings and no other relationship was possible. Plus all the locations and dates added up. We have been getting to know the woman on facebook and there are so many coincidental similarities in our families that it's eerie.

I made cabbage rolls last night, the Betty Crocker version with a tomato sauce. Your version sounds amazing. A question: Is your rice cooked first, or raw, when mixed with the meat. Also, what spices are usually in the 7 spice mixture? Thanks.

Wow! Rose, I had no idea what you were going through till I popped on here. I wish safety for you and yours. A friend of mine who recently moved to California posted on facebook this morning that her husband was in the hospital with burned feet from running outside in his flip flops to put out a flash fire. Fire trucks came through thier neighborhood to wet everything down soon afterwards.

My spooky reading has commenced! This week I read two short anthologies of spooky stories from famous writers: Great Ghost Stories and Great Tales of Suspense. I'm currently reading A Discovery of Wtiches by Deborah Harkness. Last week, I buzzed through Crosstalk by Connie Willis (not a spooky). It wasn't one of my favorites by her but it held my attention. She captured the harrassed feeling of a life of constant connection very well. I'm also working my way slowly through the collected works of Robert Ingersoll.

Kazuo Ishiguro has won the Nobel Prize! How many of his books have you read? Any Favorites? I've read Remains of the Day, Never Let Me Go, and When We Were Orphans. Has anyone read the one that has an Arthurian setting?