This one's for my fellow English majors

"The purpose of a liberal education is to make one's mind a pleasant place to spend one's leisure."

Joseph Joubert

however...

My computer still has a virus which has completely shut it down.

I'm still in the middle of a great deal of major uncertainty (I'll explain, friends, as soon as I can.)

However....

I just stood on our back deck, and the white blossoms from the two big trees in our backyard rained down on me. It is a green and blue and pale yellow spring day, with a bonus gentle breeze.

What else matters?

Random acts of public happiness

I found this video via my friend Joan, who was the voice of kindness and reason on my dorm floor my sophomore year of college.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EYAUazLI9k

This video gets better as it goes. I just love it.

I'm reminded of a wonderful woman I met years ago when I lived in England. (Steve? Are you reading this? She was a friend of yours. I don't recall her name.) She had started a volunteer group which, in twos or threes, boarded trains on London's Underground. They would begin to sing a singable, knowable tune, and invite anyone who wished to join in. They wanted to make a dent in the anonymity of urban life. They wanted to connect. Sometimes they would sing their song and then quietly exit at the next station. But sometimes, she reported, they'd get a whole car singing. I always meant to join them, but I never made it.

There is this video, too, which is good fun, but it doesn't quite have that element of boundless joy, does it?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwMj3PJDxuo

snow + bloom

Perhaps I'm taking the silver lining thing a bit too far, but I find reassurance that sometimes, even Earth herself muddles things up. Today, long after she released the blooms in my neighborhood--oops, she flurried some snow.
















(Can you see it swirling in this photo?)

It's strange. Surreal. Beautiful. And it allows me to take it a little easier on myself when I go to the store expressly for eggs and bread, and I come home with eggs (and tofu and chocolate and strawberries) but no bread. I'm in good company in my absent-mindedness.

new game around the house

My husband was in Germany last week, and he brought back with him loads of German chocolate (thank you, honey), and also an addictive game called Tantrix. Check it out.

Stop action animation is the new black

Oh! This video. It bears many repeat viewings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_HXUhShhmY

recommended eating

I don't know...we are just emerging from our winter hibernation. Maybe you don't want a cookie recommendation?

Just in case you do...

May I suggest Chocolate Toffee Cookies from Louisa over at The Wednesday Chef. I left out the nuts, as that is what my children prefer. These cookies have so much chocolate in them that they satisfy the cookie urge and the chocolate urge simultaneously. Little marvels, they are.

Leslie over at a Friend to Knit with bakes a weekly cookie, usually something new every week. I love that idea. I get into my rut of oatmeal chocolate chip or brownies, occasionally some short bread. And a package of Fig Newmans if I don't get any baking done.

I'm also very inspired by Heather at Beauty that Moves, whose new teaching gig encouraged her to have a Sunday food prep day--baking and cooking in one marathon for the week. Very smart. I'm going to try it.

Spring, seriously

The first day of spring was kind enough to feel like it in my area.



















We have had some warm days, but today no longer felt like a taste of the future.

Real spring: sprung.

This little guy means business.













I hope spring arrived in your neighborhood, too.