Turning Tables

According to a reliable source, one of the trendy names for kids is Nevaeh, which is inevitably followed up with, "It's heaven spelled backwards."

I may start introducing my granddaughter to people as "Harpo. It's Oprah spelled backwards, ya know."

New and Useful

As Sheri's hired help said, "It's hot, but it's not Africa hot."

Lately I've been saying, "He's crazy, but not Tom Cruise crazy."

Touched, in a Good Way

While stationed in North Dakota with the Air Force, I spent a long, cold winter reading massive amounts of poetry by Byron, Keats and Shelley. I'd never been exposed to poetry to any extent and decided that it was high time that I correct the situation. I made it through to the end, but discovered that I'm not much of a poetry person.

That's not to say that I don't occasionally get into some, but it's not a steady diet.

Recently I've been reading Sappho, One Hundred Lyrics. A couple of nearly complete pieces and a handful of fragments are all that are left of her work, and yet, for two and a half millenia she has been considered one of the greatest (if not the greatest) poets of all time.

"Sappho who broke off a fragment of her soul
for us to guess at." -- E.E. Browning

The book contains all that remains of her impossibly perfect words, along with a welcome bit of context and history. There were probably nine volumes of her work all told, along with various other types of works.

"Love's priestess, mad with pain and joy of song,
Song's priestess, mad with joy and pain of love." -- H.T. Wharton

I am smitten.

Heart of mine, if all the altars
Of the ages stood before me,
Not one pure enough nor sacred
Could I find to lay this white, white
Rose of love upon.

I would build a fragrant temple
To thee, in the dark green forest,
Of red cedar and fine sandal,
And there love thee with sweet service
All my whole life long. -- Sappho

We used to play a silly game, imagining a time machine and what ifs. Were it to become reality, I know exactly what I would do.

Silent Library

I think most game shows are weird, but Japanese games shows take weird to a whole new level.

Silent Library is one of my favorites. The game is simple. Six guys sit in a 'library' and a game is announced. They then draw from a stack of cards. They each turn their card over and the one with the uh-oh card has a stunt pulled on them. They're supposed to stay quiet through the whole thing but as you'll see, it's pretty damn hilarious.

The video at the link is long, but try to at least watch beginning at 5:50.

Euell Gibbons

We share a birthday and a love of the outdoors, but that's about it. In popular culture, he's most famous for his television ad quote, "Ever eat a pine tree? Many parts are edible." Followed soon after with "Grape Nuts cereal reminds me of wild hickory nuts."

Remind me never to eat a wild hickory nut, because I tried Grape Nuts for the first time this morning and they are nasty. Yuck.

Sooper Dooper Valoo Deal! Boy Howdy!!!

In the $5.00 bin at WalMart they had a copy of Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus!!!

Yep, past tense. It's mine, Mine, MINE now! Bwahahahahahahahaha

Wayell Hayell

To everyone who's comments *just* got posted here, my apologies. I haven't been real good about checking the bucket o' spam for gold nuggets, and blogspot is rather, er, enthusiastic about marking things as questionable.

Which you all are. Have no doubt, that's one of the things about each and every one of you that endears you to me.