Lotus white, tea, braids and ice

This post is linked with: Booking Through, Thursday 13 

"And, the reverse–which actors have been particularly badly cast in roles of characters you first met in the pages of a book? Do you blame the actors or the writers and other film-people for the failure? Who would you have cast instead?"

Ewan McGregor as Carlo Ventresca in Angels and Demons. I thought he was too thin and small as a carmerlengo. They could have cast someone with more body volume and a deep bass voice, but it's just me.

Katharine Schlesinger as Catherine Morland in Northanger Abbey. Too pretty for her character as one who is into horror Gothic stories. Again, it's just me.

I don't care about blaming anyone for the failure. It's not worth the wrinkles. I just go get myself a cup of tea and find other books and movies to enjoy.

Thursday 13: Random quotes that mention white things in photos I took recently

1. The white lotus opens wide to those who know her secrets. ~ Fung and Iroh.

2. I failed to make the chess team because of my height. ~ Woody Allen

3. A picture is a poem without words. - Horace

4. There is not so variable a thing as a lady's headdress. ~ Joseph Addison

5. As lovely as the white orchid, I'll never own this bloom outright. Yet as I dream in my small chamber, faith blooms in ever spreading light. ~ Liilia Talts Morrison

6. Genius is more often found in a cracked pot than in a whole one. ~ E.B. White

7. Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning. ~ William Arthur Ward 

8. From time to time I'm vilified as the person who cares about the look of a teapot. ~ Stephen Bayley

9. Real nutrition comes from soybeans, almonds, rice and other healthy vegetable sources, not from a cow's udder. ~ Ingrid Newkirk

10. Women eat ice cream. Men toast marshmallows. ~ Diana Hardy

11. Consumers are eating about six ounces of Pangasius per year. Hardly more than a mouthful ~ shared by a member of The Caravan Club

12. A girl without braids is like a city without bridges. ~ Roman Payne

13. I dread no more the first white in my hair, or even age itself the easy shoe. Time doing this to me may alter too my sorrow into something I can bear. ~ Edna St Vincent Millay

Dream Cast

This post is linked with: Booking Through, Thursday 13 

"And while we’re thinking about books converted to tv/movies. Do you ever sit and wonder who could be cast as your favorite characters? (Please feel free to give examples!)
What actors do you think have done particularly excellent jobs with some of your favorite characters?"

Cleopatra VII of Dan Brown's latest thriller; if they're converting Inferno to film soon- I wonder how would a younger version of Maggie Smith do. A complicated fancy but it's free to wish.

Richard Harris (HP1 & 2) and Michael Gambon (HP3-6) were perfect for their role as Hogwarts headmaster Albus Dumbledore.

They couldn't have chosen a better actor than Leonardio di Caprio as Jay Gatsby in the recent The Great Gatsby.

Jacob Black of the Twilight series was played quite well by Taylor Lautner. I don't mind that he is not as tall as his book character. Taylor is the best shape shifter ever and he played Jacob very well I was in love with him for months.

Thursday 13: Random bookish photos in my files

1. the latest Dan Brown thriller

2. I piled these last Christmas to make a tree out of them

3. got to watch the film first; went straight to the bookstore for the reading experience

4. at my fave second-hand bookshop: deciding which ones to check out

5. writing a research-reflective note on a page of a Jane Austen book

6. I heard my mother mutter quietly while watching me bid goodbye to these books I bought after a week-long vacation at home, "Anastasia and her latest loot.'

7. Advertising Management books, Business Management Faculty office (my playground)

 

8. this boardroom at work teems with e-books

 

9. Kinokuniya search machine; looks like the one that replaced the note cards

10. a book filled with color drawing of fairies by Mary Cicely Barker

11. some of those books I bought from Logos Hope

12. normal state of the bed

13. playing with free photo background online

Flea market supper

Three cousins wrestle a mountain of clothes in the flea market. An hour or two in they proceed to the food section. It's been awhile since the girls had somtam, or green papaya salad. So it is high on their list of dishes to have for supper. Joy is finding a vendor whose somtam combo is exactly one's taste.

 

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This is the state of the coffee table the day after- a mainly fruit breakfast to offset the effects of coke drunk during the somtam supper which cost just $4.50.

And this is how fruits in the tropics are enjoyed: ten mangoes for $1.61, a kilo of rambutan for $0.60, two kilos of mangosteen for $1.30, durian for $3.25, a dozen pieces of jackfruit for $0.65. Joy is spending less for healthy food.

Somtam is everywhere in Thailand and popular among locals and foreign visitors alike. The Thai variation is no. 46 on CNN Go's World's 50 Most Delicious Foods. Here's a recipe by Maangchi Kim.

Visit these sites: Creative Homeacre * Inspire Me * Create it Thursday * Share the Joy * Favorite Things * Time Travel * Thrifty Things * Food Friday

Unbirthday tea

As Lewis Carroll's neologism in his Through the Looking Glass, an unbirthday is "an event that can be celebrated on any day that is not the person's birthday." People who love celebrations may be into unbirthdays regularly. I am. It keeps me counting blessings and looking at life positively.

"Statistics prove that you have one birthday, just one birthday every year. But there are three hundred and sixty-four unbirthdays. And this is a reason to gather and cheer." 

An unbirthday is also

"when you acknowledge that it is, indeed, the date of your birth, but refuse to acknowledge that you have aged."

and to you!

 

~ Sally's Blues and Maiylah's Food: sticky rice sweet coconut balls ~

It is also suggested that an unbirthday is "the day of a sibling's birthday where you also receive presents/money in order to keep the peace." 

I didn't know about this before but I have been buying gifts for my fur kid when the biological one has a birthday, and vice versa. When CJ turned nine I decided to join in the fun with my boys by having an unbirthday; albeit a working mom style one, spread and ongoing.

The local delicacy is the saving grace of the plastic water glass and paper coffee cup - served as snack during a 15-minute research conference break (intense and seemingly endless; not to mention quality control meetings here and there). When things go this way, as they usually do, the answer is an unbirthday.

~ My World: Business Faculty meeting, TRU-STech 18, Bangkok Campus ~

Never mind that it's punctuated with research thingamabobs: Epistemology. ANOVA. Enthnography. Multiple regression. Theoretical framework. Gimme the darn findings already! A long shot but it's nice to wish sometimes.

Plowing on - content validity, strategic communications, deception analysis. Crack! I need tea!

~ Mellow Yellows: it's strawberry milk tea time in my nook ~

And another unbirthday. So I made a little detour to Asia Books from bank errands the other night and got myself the latest Dan Brown thriller. Don't you just love the feeling of holding a 'just out' book in your hands?

~ ABC Wednesday: unbirthday treat ~

I read the prologue aloud to myself, heart skipping at the mention of Uffizi, huddling in the shadows...; then halted unexpectedly on chthonic, laboring beneath the earth.... How is 'chthonic' pronounced anyway? Anyone?

~ Ruby 2: Inferno ~

They are behind me unyielding, closing in. 

They do not understand what is coming.... 

Ungrateful land! 

The pressure to publish is floating around my nostrils. "'Seek and find,' the woman repeats" (Brown, 2013). Back to research mode. The load does get lighter when fueled by unbirthday tea.

Visit these sites: Time Travel * Favorite Things * ABC Wednesday * Our World * Sally's Blues * Mellow Yellows * Ruby 2 * Share the Joy * Food Friday *

Childhood vs adult

This post is linked with: Booking Through, Thursday 13 

"Have your reading habits changed since you were a child? (I mean, I’m assuming you have less time to read now, but …) Did you devour and absorb books when you were 10 and only just lightly read them now? Did you re-read frequently as a child but now only read new books? How about types of books? Do you find yourself still attracted to the kinds of books you read when you were a kid?"

It's less crazy now and I have more freedom to read the way I want, what I want. As a child my books were parent-sanctioned. During my teens I relished that secret excitement over books they didn't know of or didn't approve. I don't remember re-reading. But I was told that before I learned to read I used to ask my mother to read those Bible stories to me again and again. 

Then I learned to read. I devoured fairy tales and mostly mystery. I had a go at trash and struggled to understand The Aeneid to please and impress my father. Since becoming an adult I haven't taken a second look at the ancient work. I fancy revisiting it but electronically this time. Old meets new.

My juvenile reading curiosity was eclectic. At one point it got me engrossed in Lapland and at another my eyebrows met stupidly in the middle at discovering myself innocently plowing over raw tuition in gun silencer installation. As far as attraction goes, mine is on the postmodern version or reincarnation or call it metamorphosis of the books I read when I was a kid.

Thursday 13: Books I want to add to my collection. I mean I already promised myself to slow down on collecting as this tiny city apartment is going to explode. But well... and oh, this is only part 1. There are several of them mentioned in Books that changed the world. It's for the reason they made it to the list that I want them in my collection.

1. Hitler's Mein Kampf
2. Darwin's Origin of the Species
3. Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin
4. Sigmund Freud's Interpretation of Dreams
5. William Harvey's De Motu Cordis
6. Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince
7. Sir Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica
8. Henry David Thoreau's Civil Disobedience
9. Mary Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Woman
10. Thomas Paine's Common Sense
11. Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations
12. Alfred Mahan's The Influence of Sea Power Upon History
13. Edward Jenner's An Inquiry into the Causes and Effects of the VariolaeVaccinae

Second choices, anyone?

When I got divorced I had to make changes to a life of ease which came with luxuries that I sometimes took for granted. The process taught me a few, important things. Single life so far has been very good and I am grateful for enough blessings and challenges that kept the balance.

My son attends school in the home country. I continue to be a mom to him from a distance, and although it is not exactly what I would rather have, I am learning to work my way around such living arrangement.  Second Choice: embracing life as it is "challenges some assumptions in Western culture and gives a different slant on the idea of success." I pick what's culturally relevant to me.

Viv Thomas, the author "insists that to live our lives well it is vital that we are able to live in a world of second choice or no choice at all." I would recommend the book to anyone who is curious about second choices and how they can become "places of grace, community, imagination and maturity if we learn to embrace life as it is." (excerpt)  The photo above is the cover of my copy. Lovely, isn't it?

The kiddo turns 9. Nine roller coaster years! For his gift I made a financial decision that will impact his life long term. Here's to life, my Baby Pooh you Sweet child of mine! What's a celebration without music? Do you like Gregorian? I do. This is my favorite remake of the power ballad.

So while loved ones at home are busy celebrating with glorious food, I'm having brunch of beef steak, salad and black tea from Fuji, my favorite Japanese restaurant.

Visit these sites: Mellow Yellows * Creative HomeAcre * Inspire Me 

Share the Joy * Food Friday * Favorite Things

Returns

This post is linked with: Booking Through, Thursday 13 

What book(s) do you find yourself going back to? Beloved children’s classics? Favorites from college? Something that touched you and just makes you long to visit?

(Because, doesn’t everybody have at least one book they would like to curl up with, even if they don’t make a habit of rereading books? Even if they maybe don’t even have the time to visit and just think back longingly?)

Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code. JK Rowling's Harry Potter 5 and 7. Stephenie Meyer's Twilight 2 and 4 - re-read all twice.

Mary Cicely Barker's The Everyday Handbook for Magical Mothers. I LOVE FAIRIES. The illustrations on my copy take me to a world I love visiting again and again.

Lately I've been scouring second-hand bookshops for Clue in the Crumbling Wall of the Nancy Drew series. I've been wishing to find an old copy, not interested in its e-form, no thanks. I want the book preferably yellowed with age, with the paper gone brittle through the years. Since I could not find it I bought Carolyn Keene's The Hidden Staircase which I reckon would do for now.

Thursday 13: Books I fancy reading again

1. You Don't Say by Barry Phelps
2. The Complete Neurotic by Charles A. Monagan
3. Interpersonal Communication by Julia Wood
4. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
5. Secrets of the Code by Dan Burstein
6. Anne Shirley of Green Gables by LM Montgomery
7. Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
8. Taste Berry Tales by Bertie Youngs
9. Jesus, CEO by Laurie Beth Jones
10. Second Choice by Viv Thomas
11. The Pelican Brief by John Grisham
12. Nights in Rodanthe by Nicholas Sparks
13. Angels and Demons by Dan Brown

Do you re-read books? Care to share?

Mother's day high tea

This whole tea idea was unplanned. Things were hectic at work. Besides, the son is with Grandma in the home country. But a friend was greeting her Mom friends on FB, I was tagged on cards a couple times and it looked like people were bent on making the day something you wouldn't forget easily.  Well, they show me. I love celebrations so it didn't take long for me to decide that I was having tea after all.

I picked Coffee Beans by Dao, a posh cafe in a posh mall to celebrate Mother's Day with a girl friend. She's not a Mom but her niece just had a baby and that according to her makes her a Grandma. Sweet. I believe in treating the self from time to time, and of course it is such joy to have a friend to celebrate special occasions with.

The Moroccan mint tea (on collage) was a welcome taste as it was my first since 2010. Blueberry cheese cake is the specialty of the house and that's what I had. Yum!

Why does food look so inviting right after work? Yeah... work hard, party hard.

Or maybe it's just me. I'm a fan of food and I love to eat. I even like saying that ;)

Visit these sites:  Mellow Yellows * Creative HomeAcre * Inspire Me 

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Fifty

This post is linked with: Booking Through, Thursday 13 

"My brother-in-law turns 50 this weekend. So, in his honor, please pick up your nearest book or whatever book you’re currently reading, and turn to page 50 and then share the first 50 words with the rest of us."

From Timeline by Michael Crichton:

Only the Professor's personal intervention prevented him from being expelled from Yale. Chris's response to this sudden jeopardy was to bury himself in his studies; his grades swiftly improved; he eventually graduated fifth in his class. But in the process he became conservative. Now, at twenty-four he tended toward fussiness and stomach trouble. He was only reckless with women.

Thursday 13: Books that readers did not finish reading. Book Riot on FB asked fans what books they broke up with and these are 13 out of more than 200 responses.

1. Fifty Shades of Grey (reported 29 times)
2. Twilight (reported 7 times)
3. Eat, Pray, Love (reported 3 times)
4. Game of Thrones (reported 3 times)
5. The Great Gatsby (reported twice)
6. Anna Karenina (reported twice)
7. Duma by Stephen King (reported twice)
8. War and Peace (reported twice)
9. The Casual Vacancy by JK Rowling (reported twice)
10. Jane Error (spelling intended)
11. Wuthering Heights (reported 3 times)
12. Catch 22 (reported twice)
13. Emma by Jane Austen (reported twice)

Other answers were Little Women, The Devil Wears Prada, Water for Elephants, Hunger Games, The Book Thief, Poisonwood Bible, and even Pride and Prejudice. But clearly people's preferences differ of course. What book did you not finish reading?

Tea time in Castelgard

Constantly a fan of old, it took me 2013 to start reading Michael Crichton's Timeline. Published by Frederick in 1999, the book talks of going back hundreds of years; of knights and castles, an ancient language, lords and ladies, sword battles - there's my appetite for medieval history.

The story deals with modern machinery to get a glimpse of the old world. That's my cue not to lose touch with reality. High-cost technology is woven into the plot. There's a tournament in Castelgard. A rogue knight threatens to marry Lady Claire by force to save himself from bankruptcy. I need to make sure my own finances are in order after that spontaneous island vacation I did two weeks ago. Things seem manageable. I bought the paperback for just 68 cents. Contrasts keep life interesting, don't they?

So tea time into a tour back in time.

And joy is accompanying the read with a white chocolate macadamia moist cake paired with a cup of earl grey. I love chocolate drinks, hot or cold, but I take care not to have the same flavor in both pastry and drink. What kind of drink do you usually have with cake or while reading?

Visit these sites: Sally's Blues * Thrifty Things * Food Friday * Share the Joy * Favorite Things