Last week LB and I went to see Kung Fu Panda at the theater.  It was cute.  The hero is a panda raised by a goose.  The villain is a snow leopard raised by a brown panda (LB had to explain what he was; I'd never seen one before).  The story is very similar to the Monkey King, at least in the travel companions and the scroll.  I won't say more-don't want to give it away.

I rented Vantage Point but wasn't that thrilled with it even though it's supposed to be a political action thriller.  The story is okay, but the rewinding that the film does, repeatedly, was a little distracting.

Then I came down with a cold on the eve of the fourth-started with super sneezes (G said I was going to blow my head off if I didn't stop) and by the morning of the holiday I was running a fever and it hurt to swallow.  No parade for me.  But I should know better than to watch anything sad when I'm sick.  First I watched Steel Magnolias on tv (even though I have it) and cried, and then I watched Hilary and Jackie, a film about sisters who were a talented flutist and world-renowned cellist.  Jackie died of MS at 42, so I cried again.  That's just about my quota for the year.

 

I am reading Toddler Adoption: The Weaver's Craft and, when it arrives, will also read Attaching in Adoption:  Practical Tools for Today's Parents.  Both are about adopting older children and how to recognize attachment problems, signs of grieving and loss, and parenting the hurt child.

G is reading my copy of An Imperfect God, the story of George Washington.  It is a highly acclaimed book in history circles because of its insight into Washington's feelings on slavery and our new nationl

 

The only recent reading has been on my part, and that was in Kentucky reading AP US history essays.  This year there were 1250 of us for US, 1100 for English Literature, plus foreign language and calculus teachers (I might have missed some).  Lunch time is like cattle call.  I had an awesome roommate from Mobile, AL and a great table made up of readers from CA (two), CO, NE, TX (there's always one from Texas) and FL.

 

G bought a book for me about the Adams dynasty last Christmas or the one before.  He is now reading it himself and every morning he watches an episode of the HBO John Adams show.  I've been watching it with him as I get ready for work.  This week is school vacation, it is going to rain almost every day, so I'm going to try to tape some episodes for use in history class next year.  I could never use it all, it's too long, but parts of it could be really helpful.

 

G is currently reading a book on Daniel Boone which he says is overdone.  When he is through with this one, he wants to look for a gangster book-Machine Gun Kelly or Bugsy Moran.  He always scoffs my history book club flyers from the mailbox and reads through all the listings before letting me know that they came in the mail.  Some books that he really enjoyed in his western collection recently (he is always up for western history) are Kansas Charley, Doc Holliday, and Billy the Kid.

As for me, I'm always reading something fluffy when I don't have to read for work.  So right now I'm reading a vampire romance by Amanda Ashley (who is really Madeline Baker), plus I'm still reading The Undercover Economist (which I use to teach AP microeconomics with-great supplementary book) and  I've got to finish The Last Days of Europe (about the changing demographics in France and Great Britain and the changes in world power) and The River of Lost Footsteps (story of Burma).

I actually have to start reading Gilgamesh and Beowulf for a class that starts mid-April; the class is called The Other Side of History and is about myths, legends, etc.  We also have a summer reading list for students now, and I have to read (again) Home Before Morning in order to write the questions to go with it.  I read it during the summer as a teenager, so it's perfect for my students-very moving true story about a nurse in the US army during the Vietnamese war.

    G & Me

    G loves to read history of the American West and loves to watch movies that are western, action, intrigue, comedy.  He doesn't have favorites.  He does not like anything that is musical (though he loves music), romantic, or related to aviation.  His favorite time period is from the Civil War to the turn of the 20th century.

    I am eclectic in my reading but do not like science fiction or police stories.  In movies I like drama best, but also like some of the same things that G does, and I like both romantic movies and those that relate to aviation.  My favorite time periods are probably the 1830s and 1840s, the post-Reconstruction era to the eve of WWI, WWII, and the late 1950s-forward.  My favorite books are Gone With the Wind, My Antonia, All Quiet on the Western Front, A Lantern in Her Hand, and Nigger by Dick Gregory.  My favorite movies are The Memphis Belle, Return to Me, Since You Went Away, Steel Magnolias, Nicholas &  Alexandra, Sometimes in April, and  The Winds of War (there are just so many that this is incomplete) .

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