Springtime and a Newfoundlander's fancy turns to...the possibility of seeing some sweet green shoots, come on little crocuses, come on, don't be shy...

(Image: naturaltapestries.com)

Poetry in the Fog

Walking home from the Winterset awards yesterday evening (Randall Maggs won for his superb poetry collection Nightwork: The Sawchuk Poems), so foggy on Bond Street, a young photographer was taking digital shots of a cat poised against a small, bare tree, could that be true?, everything was snow and mist and the sound of the foghorn, the maritime city something alomost imaginery, almost a dream.

(Image: bytanya.blogspot.com.)

Perils of Academic Writing

Here's a cartoon a fellow grad student put up in our study room:

(Image: Calvin and Hobbes, by Bill Watterson.)

We're doing our final proofing and are gearing up for the printers, which is very good and very much on time - still, the mean-spirited weather has us a bit low. In the interest of mood-elevation, here is a cartoon; and not just any cartoon but one about

penguins, because just the thought of penguins always makes people feel better. Scientific fact.

(Image: toonpool.com.)

Atlantic Blue

Events of of past week have kept this song in my mind - by none other than our own fabulous Ron Hynes :

Atlantic Blue

What colour is a heartache from a love lost at sea?
What kind of memory never fades but lingers to eternity?
How dark is the light of day the sleepless eyes of mine survey?
Is that you, Atlantic Blue? My heart is as cold as you.

How is one heart chosen to never lie at peace?
What kind of moment remains? Is there not one sweet release?
And who's the stranger at my door,
To haunt my dreams forever more?
Is that you, Atlantic Blue? My heart is as cold as you.

I lie awake in the morning, as the waves wash on the sand,
I hold my hurt at bay, I hold the lives of his children in my hands.

And who's plea will receive no answer?
Who's cry is lost upon the wind?
Who's the voice so familiar,
Whispers my name as the night comes in?
And who's wish never fails to find my broken heart on Valentine's?
Is that you Atlantic Blue? My heart is as cold,
My heart is as cold, my heart is as cold as you.

####.... Ron Hynes (Cryer's Paradise, 1993) ©1990, 1995, Blue Murder/ Sold For A Song: TMP SOCAN ....####

(Image: therockandahardplace.typepad.com.)

Silver Thaw

The follow-up to the Brush; what a sound the trees made on Saturday, metallic little chatterings.

(Image: farm4. static.flickr.com.)

Sheilagh's Brush

Seems we're in for a touch of this

traditional storm; I thought this story of Sheilagh, St. Paddy's wife, sweeping up after his party, was an adaptation of an Irish tale - but apparently it's unique to Newfoundland.

(Image: SpringSnowStorm94.)

In the Memorial Service held last night at the Bascilica for the lost of Cougar 491, Archbishop Martin Currie quoted from a poem of Robert Frost (1874-1963). Here is another:

Nature's first green is gold
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

(Image: farm1.static.flickr.com.)

We're moving into the proofreading stage...

(Image: macsparky.com)

Cinema Safety Tips

Couple of safety tips picked up from weekend film viewing of Taken and The Watchmen:
1. If you are involved in a car chase in Paris, and need compels you to drive the wrong way up one-way ramps, it will be OK, if fact no one will notice, because, hey! it's Paris;
2. If you are 17 years old, and pretty much an idiot, do not travel anywhere without your parents;
3. If you involved in any kind of experimental work with radiation and you leave the lab with your fellow scientists and then realize you have left your watch behind, do not return alone for your watch no matter how special it is;
4. It's all still Nixon's fault! Imagine!

(Image: zzeiss.com.)

Wendy and Lucy

Feeling a bit haunted by this film I saw last night. Simple and straightforward - the story mostly projected across lead actress Michelle Williams' face - it yet delivers an emotional wallop.

(Image: fataculture.files.wordpress.com.)

Hope in the Prison of Despair (by Evelyn de Morgan)

Vicky Christina Barcelona

Don't know if you've seen this film yet, but it's worth a look, and Woody Allen's

production notes are definitely worth a read.
Sample:

2 April

Offered role to Scarlett Johansson. Said before she could accept, script must be approved by her agent, then by her mother, with whom she's close. Following that, it must be approved by her agent's mother. In middle of negotiation she changed agents - then changed mothers. She's gifted but can be a handful.

(Image: www.wildsound-filmmaking.)

I wonder who originally composed the start-up sounds for computers and cell phones? I guess the aim was a kind of fresh-scrubbed futurism, an enfolding lemon-scented tinkly clean sequence. Which some find irritating, and all find ubiquitous. But here's a secret: you can turn 'em off.

(Image: homelinux.org.)

Sproing!

Ahead or back? How come my computer tells a different time than my cell phone? I really think today should be a holiday, we need to adjust.

(Image: newsline.daylightSavings.jpeg.)

Saw a great film last night at the MUN Cinema Series: The Class, which follows a teacher and his students through a school year. I mistakenly thought it was a documentary; rather, it was inspired by a book, Entre Les Murs (Between The Walls) written by teacher Francois Begaudeau (who plays the teacher in the film). Director Laurent Cantet worked with school staff and students to develop characters and improvise scenes. The resulting hybrid of script and reality is both absorbing and provocative.

(Image: www.minnpost.com.)

Needing a Shot of Parental Zen

Have had a couple of conversations lately about dealing with teenagers; more specifically, how we parents often overreact in terms of problems our kids are having. But it's hard not to overreact, because the parameters of behaviour change so quickly. One day, they maybe leave their mittens at school. The next you're like, "What? You're making and trafficking crystal meth to nuns?"* And you're trying to discuss an issue with someone who, if telling the truth takes 0.0004 more seconds than telling a lie, will tell the lie. "Yes - no - blue - whatever." And who keeps telling you you're crazy - quite the most maddening thing you can say to someone. Learning how to give and maintain space is a big issue for everyone at this stage I guess.

(*Not that my child would ever blah blah blah...)

(Image: www.bbc.co.uk.)

Scattered in bookstores, greyed by dust and time,

Unseen, unsought, unopened, and unsold,

My poems will be savoured as are rarest wines -

When they are old.

- Marina Tsvetaeva (1892 - 1914)

This poet was unknown to me before a seminar yesterday.

(Image: www.poetryloverspage.com.)

Tubular Bells

Walking home from the supermarket Saturday, my husband and I met the daughter of a friend. She was carrying something under her arm - it looked like a two-dimensional harp, one that had slipped from the real world into a cartoon perspective. "What's that you're carrying?' I asked. "A

glockenspiel," she answered. Having never before received the reply "A glockenspiel" in answer to "What's that you're carrying?", I was delighted.

Here is perhaps the most famous modern musical interpretation of that esteemed instrument.

(Image: traditionalmusic.co.uk.)

Extreme Pedestrianism

Well, that was an interesting spot of perambulation early this morning. Ice, freezing rain and big huge mucky puddles for cars to drive through and splash you. I have never seen such bad conditions for walking. People were moving slowly along the sidewalks, carrying bags of salt that they sprinkled before them as they slowly negotiated the slick, catchless sidewalks. (Is there a patron saint for pedestrians?)

(Image: www.ac.gl.ca.)