Toast

I read Rye and Peace in the early 1960's around 14 I think. They were required reading in an advanced English class. My parents had to sign a waiver before I could read them though. Is it the age most of us read them that enbeds them so in our minds.

I questioned at an early age also. Religion doesn't like questions. Or answers.

Well I did read Great Expectations by Dickens in the 7th grade. I didn't know how wonderful books were until then. Comic books in the 50's were quite different back then and so was pulp sci-fi. I don't think the same book can do all for everyone. But sometimes it can sure trip you up. Make you change directions.

I really liked the banned book post. So this is a spin off. Name the book or books that changed your life. Me? Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein around 1966. Oh Interview with a Vampire also threw me around 1976, I think. Oh and Brideshead Revisited, oh my.

I've read over thirty. But wasn't Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein banned? That book hit me hard in the sixties.

Really. So it's a good deal. No rip offs. Like a scratched CD or DVD? Oh I like your avatar.

Recently, I went to the rental store thinking to rent True Blood. There are five discs in the first season, so roughly it would cost me $30. to rent them all. But at big 'A' you can buy the complete first season for much less. So I did. And now I have this feeling of consumer triumph. Has this happened to you?

I remember the first PE class in high school, eighth grade back in the old days. No one took a shower but one guy. He got called a queer. He didn't shower again.

What do you know about Chinese chestnuts. I just got supper free from my Korean restauranteur because I gave him a bag of nuts from the trees in my garden. What's in your bag?

La Fea Mas Belle in spanish. I have been watching it in reruns for years. I love it. The American show Ugly Betty is pitsville. Watch the old Spanish version.

A whole branch of my family moved to OK during the first oil strike. They did well for themselves.

I like football, but I hate to sit and watch others do it.

Now, who's just a cartoon?

I will find a way.

There are deer that come into the park also. Not just snakes. Is that cute enough. Bambi. This summer I have counted twelve at once in the front park eating my roses. And blue birds and rabbits. I used to walk booger in the mornings and see where the deer had slept the night away under the chestnut trees. Booger was bit once by a copperhead. He survived it though and lived to be 19. That is pretty old for a labrador. A long time ago wild pigs would chew up the ground under the pecan trees at night. It has been awhile since a black bear was spotted. Strangely someone claimed to have seen a cougar the other day. It was in the paper. Front page.

I guess I can't post a picture. I can't figure out how. But do cottonmouths get that big. Like five feet long.

I think I will post a snake picture then. I like to see my friends jump and scream.

Sorry, this is the real reason I am posting. I just forgot. I just ordered by copy of An Echo in the Bone by Diana Gabaldon. Any other bone lovers out there?

How do you tell if it's deadly. It didn't look like all the king snakes I have seen over the years in the garden, they are always pretty. Usually all black with a little yellow/green markings. Even the big ones are harmless. They just lie there or crawl off. But this snake acted like it was freaky friday or something or like I had a hoe in hand and death in the eye. It was long and fat and mostly a dusty black with some brown gray marking in the middle. It definitely had that arrow shaped head. I wouldn't call it offensive aggressive, but it was all defensive aggressive. It's head was raised at least a foot in the air and was waving around and it was working it's mouth funny like. And it was moving it's whole body in a sideways motion. Cottonmouth? I have seen some huge king snakes on the farm but this was the first truly scarie snake I have ever seen, including the copperheads. This was mean snake. I let it go, but man I'm nervous about the garden.