Yesterday I gave a talk called Once Upon a Time: A History of Children’s Literature to a group of about forty seniors at Greenfield Community College. http://www.gcc.mass.edu/community_education/senior_symposia.html
It was sort of my semester course shrunk down to about an hour and a half. We began with fairy tales



And horn books



And Mother Goose



We took swift looks at Alice in Wonderland, Beatrix Potter, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Winnie-the-Pooh, The Hobbit, then scrambled through Little Golden Books, Dick and Jane, and The Cat and the Hat.

Of course we looked at picture books, most lucky children’s introduction to literature, though I resisted the temptation to just pull a few out and read. People seemed happy to see images of old friends – Wanda Gag’s cats and McCloskey’s ducks --and meet new ones: Brian Selznick's The Invention of Hugo Cabret got a lot of oohs and ahs. And yay, my fifty plus powerpoint images went off without a hitch. Afterward, a couple introduced themselves as Dick and Jane. I also saw two old friends and Nancy Frazier, who’d been my husband’s boss when I met him, overseeing black and white illustrations for the local newspaper. She said, “We had a lot of fun.”

I spoke on the invitation of Margo Culley, who currently oversees the senior symposia program, and years ago was my professor for a class called Lost New England Women Writers, a course which ignited my passion for research. I was so lucky to have her as a professor, and am so lucky to be friends with her all these years later.

Notes augmented

We've enhanced and de-bugged Notes. If you haven't tried it yet, now's the time! You can create a private note when you ban multiple users. You can also delete multiple notes at once. Lastly, paid users have the option to add a note (visible only to you) whenever you add or remove a friend (guaranteed to avoid embarrassing social mishaps). If you don't currently have a paid account, you can upgrade now! It only takes a few minutes and costs less than a bad shopping mall haircut (plus, it's way more fashionable)!

Product tweaks and bug kill

1. In another effort to zap spam, comments containing links from domains LiveJournal deems untrustworthy are now automatically screened
2. If you sign up to get notifications of the Writer's Block question of the day, you'll now see the daily question in the email notification, so you'll have a little extra time to ponder before you post. You can subscribe to Writers Block notifications here
3. The issue causing random comments to vanish has been fixed!
4. If you visit a LiveJournal page and get prompted to log in, you'll be returned to the same page after you sign in (Thanks, Dreamwidth)!
5. If you don't edit the timestamp for an entry at all, the entry timestamp will indicate the time the entry was posted instead of the time the Update Journal page was loaded
6. Comments with paddings/backgrounds render correctly within the comment box (and will no longer wrap outside the box and break frames/margins)

New FCK fixes rich text editor!

1. We've updated our RTE (Rich Text Editor) to FCKeditor version 2.6.5
2. When switching from the RTE to HTML editor, links for syndicated feeds are no longer broken
3. RTE now functions properly in Safari 4.0
4. An extra line/space will not be auto-inserted whenever you switch from RTE to HTML editor
5. The insert image link now works correctly in all browsers

LiveJournal Cares

We’re pleased to introduce you to lj_cares, a new LiveJournal community dedicated to raising awareness and funds for U.S. charitable organizations that improve the health and well-being of people around the world. Each month, we’ll spotlight a nonprofit that is making a significant global impact through medical research, public outreach, and/or humanitarian social programs. Charities will be selected in accordance with the U.S. calendar of national health observances based on a high rating (of over 60%) on Charity Navigator and global scope of impact.

In this, our inaugural month of November, we will celebrate national adoption month by offering a charitable virtual gift (priced at $2.99) to support Love Without Boundaries, an organization that saves the lives of orphans with life-threatening diseases and places them in loving homes around the world. LiveJournal will donate 100% of the proceeds from the sale of charitable vgifts (we'll cover the cost of credit card transaction fees). To learn more about Love Without Boundaries, please visit lj_cares and read about how they helped save Baby Kang and the Rainbow Twins from fatal illnesses, who are now thriving in nurturing families. You can purchase your Love Without Boundaries gifts in the Virtual Gift shop.

Papered in postcards

A couple of weeks ago, we asked you to send in postcards to surround us with LiveJournal community. Thanks for coming through! We've received postcards all the way from Germany, Finland, and Canada and from all over the US, including Texas, Florida, Alaska, Montana, Wyoming, Indiana, Hawaii, and Oklahoma just to name just a handful. We're thrilled with our improved decor.

Please keep the love coming for one more week by writing to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be drawing the names of ten random contributors next Thursday to win paid account credits!

Photos of the week

We have more dazzling images posted by talented LiveJournal photographers from around the world. We're hoping to span the entire globe, so please continue posting and tagging. Of course, you can also sit back and enjoy the view at lj_photophile.

You can see a sample of this week's gorgeous photos and check out spotlight communities and awesome user content after the jump!

( Read more... )

Curtains

We thank you, once again, for joining us. See you next week!

Last night I went to the Odyssey Bookshop http://www.odysseybks.com/ to hear Harriet Reisen talk about her new biography for adults: Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women. Like many of us, Harriet Reisen’s passion began as a girl reading her way through Louisa’s novels, and grew during the past twenty years of writing this biography and co-producing a film biography which will be aired Dec. 28 as part of American Masters on PBS. She talked about conversations with costume designers about making the linen outfits the family wore on the utopian farm, Fruitlands. There were visitors, many of whom wrote journals, but while Henry David Thoreau, for example, might lavish pages on a tree, there’s no written description of the tunics and bloomers. The costumers did their best with this period when the Louisa was ten and her family avoided cotton, because it was based on slave labor, and wool, since it relied upon unconsenting sheep, and leather: though practical Mrs. Alcott surely insisted on shoes once the weather got cold. As authors we can do our best with words, but costumers and illustrators have to get more specific. Here’s what illustrator Jean-Paul Tibbles did with the cover of my book (Putnam 2001).



Like Harriet Reisen, the topic of the Alcotts is one I could go on and on about. I liked that the quote from the diary Louisa wrote when she was ten – how she and her older sister Anna were called to a meeting to see if the family should stay together -- which inspired my novel also kind of broke her heart. I loved hearing a few research stories: the unanswered phone calls, the plodding, the serendipity of a letter that fell out from a volume at a used book store with a phone number at the end. Harriet Reisen read two excerpts, and it’s clear she worked hard not only to elegantly and truthfully show Louisa, but put her vividly into the context of her time and place. Harriet Reisen loves a material world both for its clues and color. And she shows Louisa as a runner. Often twenty miles a day.

She cited authors who have been influenced by Louisa Alcott including Simone de Beauvoir, Cynthia Ozick, and J.K. Rowling. I might add more than half the the writers I know. I look forward to reading the biography and seeing the television documentary, with a script that is all quotes, many from Louisa’s diaries and letters, with some commentary by scholars.

EDIT@08:16 UTC/GMT. Wow. That was ugly. I expected it to go for 30 minutes and have maybe 1 minute of broken connectivity. Instead it lasted over 4 hours and we had 10 minutes of downtime directly related to the load balancer upgrades and then another 5-10 minutes of downtime when our primary Pingback database server crashed and the secondary couldn't take over; which could have been indirectly caused by the network upgrade missing a self-VIP.

Anyways, we're up, we're working, the load balancers are barely breaking a sweat right now and I need some food and a shot of whiskey. I don't even *like* whiskey!!

Thanks mhwest and dnewhall for helping out!

---

On Saturday the 14th at 4AM UTC/GMT we will be upgrading the operating system of our network load balancers to a newer version, one that will allow us to use both CPUs! Nifty, because multiprocessing is nice.

Since we have 2 load balancers, the plan is to upgrade 1 at a time, and there really should be very little impact to our website. Hopefully you won't notice a thing and I'll get to go back to the hotel and watch some wonderful late night infomercials.

We've got a lot of exciting projects coming up for 2010 and we're hoping that we'll be able to deliver them all to you, that you will find it useful/cool/lovely and then you will use the site even more. Behind-the-scenes work like this will give us the capacity to handle the anticipated traffic, so expect a few more maintenance windows especially in the beginning of next year as we've got some neat ideas to improve performance around here! We had the recent 30-45 minute outage yesterday due to one of our logging databases filling up disk space -- not so great design coupled with my human error in handling the initial problem -- and it looks like we're going to finally have some resources to eliminate stuff like that. I can't wait!

As usual, I will be updating status.livejournal.org before and after, just in case you are not able to reach our main website during the work.

Shop Indie Bookstores


Dulemba, Elizabeth O. Soap, soap, soap = Jabón, jabón, jabón. McHenry, IL: Raven Tree Press, 2009.

 

Soap, Soap, Soap, tells the story of Hugo and his trip to fetch soap for his mother from the market. The only problem is that Hugo keeps forgetting what he is supposed to purchase. Soap, Soap, Soap (Jabon, Jabon, Jabon) is Elizabeth’s first picture book as both the author and the illustrator. Raven Tree Press publishes the book in an English only and a Bilingual English/Spanish edition.

 

I enjoyed the bilingual addition very much and was pleased with how seamlessly the Spanish vocabulary (printed in red) was included in the text. I was actually hoping for more Spanish, perhaps a side by side translation and wonder what the editorial decisions were surrounding this issue.

 

I had a great time following the main character as he tried to accomplish his mother’s task through Elizabeth's wavy, whimsical town, but I had a hard time believing that the main character would loose his train of thought so quickly. How could someone be so forgetful? However, this past week I have misplaced my keys, and my cell phone, forgotten an oil delivery, and left my wash to mildew for three days. I also had to have my own kiddo repeat, “Get dressed, collect my laundry,” three times this morning. And he still needed to be sent back upstairs to get pants. Hugo’s journey seems more believable now.

 

Elizabeth Dulemba’s digital illustrations have appeared in trade and educational titles and the SCBWI national bulletin. In Soap, Soap, Soap, Elizabeth creates a wonderful array of diverse and true-to-life characters. Hugo and his friend, Jellybean Jones, are especially animated. I love their expressions as they navigate the mud puddle (charco de barro.) Elizabeth uses her character’s body positions (angle, arm position, and visual balance) to convey their inquisitive attitude wonderfully. Perhaps my favorite image is of Hugo on the back cover hanging on the clothesline after his bath. His body is delightfully relaxed and shows so much movement. Kudos to the designer, I love the details in this book: the text design, the endpapers, the soap bars on the pagination.

 

Elizabeth is well well known on the blog circuit. She has designed cyber-school "Virtual Visits" so that schools with smaller travel budgets can access guest speakers. Parents and teachers can take advantage of her extensive activities and coloring pages also available on her website and the Raven Tree site.

 

Whatever you do, make sure that Soap, Soap, Soap is on your holiday shopping list. Don’t forget!

The stress of the last few weeks have taken their toll. I'm finally gonna take that advice from my Chautauqua mentors to JOURNAL. I had wanted to take it immediately, but you know for me this blog is a personal thing... perhaps if I came to it better published, it would be different. But part of my problem is articulating what is important to me, and being as honest as possible. In my life, when I've taken chances it's been 50/50-- great odds if you have a strong resilient soul and some kind of back up. But I'd had the rug pulled out from under  my feet at a time when it would take MIGHTY MOUSE or a whole lot of groveling, backtracking and the-eating-of-the-feet-with-shoes. And others that my chances have paid off brilliantly. The most difficult thing, I can't tell when and which is which without walking through that door. Kinda sucks that way.

I was so hoping the Equality of some of our citizens would be upheld. Gay rights is a civil issue to me, and I'm all about that. It would establish the LEGALITY of  same sex partners. Not the sanctity, churches would choose whether they would countenance and perform it within their bounds (that render onto Caesar, thing in my book). But people forget Marriage was a LEGAL contract first, amongst the landed and elite five, six hundred years ago. Among all others, and that would be the majority, was hand fasting. People would promise to TRY marriage for a year. If it didn't work out, well then no harm, no foul. Even in America, from Joseph Smith's interpretation of marriage according to the Old Testament, to Oneida's experiment of every man being married to every woman (and Shakers were an experiment in anti-marriage), to say marriage has been set and dried for centuries would be inaccurate.

I'm sad and disappointed that fear won out and we repealed a right for some, that would bring us up to equality.

Then yesterday in my fever addled brain I watched the Ellen and Portia interview with Oprah, and somethings clicked for me. Some of it darkly personal. I will share what I know and what I believe I know.

I had a poison in my family from an early age. There were other poisons, but they were far enough away that I could pretty much ignore until I had to confront them. But this poison was in the heart of my family from the time I was a little girl. She came when I was five and stayed a year. Came back when I was ten and never went away. She crossed and betrayed family boundaries. She came from rough beginnings and the only aspiration to leave those behind was to TAKE whatever she could from everyone else. She had an incredible work ethic, but was replaced at regular intervals for her bad attitudes, at greater expense, which says to the adult me, the cost of replacing her was more valuable than keeping the work horse around. And she married my father, her aunt's husband and then disenfranchised my siblings and I.

I hadn't realized the depth of her disregard for me until one day she had shown up at my supper table (I was sharing it with my best friend, an asthmatic, her husband and children, all non-smokers, and myself, a nonsmoker and pregnant), lit up a cigarrette and then proceeded to try to berate me out of a rocking chair. A gift from a friend many years prior, my father had stored it in his shed for me. She felt I should just give it to her for storing it.  When I said  "No, I want to use it with the baby," she flew out of the house swearing a blue streak. I remember saying "Wow, she doesn't like me." My friend replied, matter-of-factly, "She never did." And it was an epiphany. Until that moment I really had denied her feelings toward me and my siblings, more than likely because I shared a room with her. I still have nightmares, and they usually involve being trapped in that bedroom with all that hate roiling from her.

One of the things she had done was do the Christmas Accounting. Right now, I'm so looking forward to having Christmas with my sister and our families. But to say I dread/don't like Christmas is an understatement. True some of it is wrapped up in Father's illness and subsequent death, usually exacerbated by Christmas-past. But much of it, too has to do with the Christmas Accounting. Who gave what to whom and whether it means so and so loved, respected, cared, whatever. It's another reason I don't do gifts that well (though oddly enough I LOVED getting little gifts from my students, probably because there was no accounting involved, just admiration and respect). One had money and chose to gave handmade gifts-- must be cheap. Funny thing I LOVED those handmade gifts and took some of those things from my Gram's estate, for memorabilia. Even when they found out she felt that way, they bought her a beautiful coat, and there were things she found fault with.

During the Christmas Accounting, we didn't only do gifts. Of course not. That was the time to assess the relatives. One of the people she was toughest on, was one of my favorite aunts. She simply was not to be trusted. No one could be that good, and besides, she thought her S**T didn't stink, and you just wait it was all a front. An act. A bitter joke.

Problem was, I harbored deep secrets I really needed to talk with someone about.  My aunt would have been the perfect person to have had those conversations with as a young woman. Aunt A, is a resource, a go getter a doer in my family. She's the perfect combination of heart, responsibility, pragmatist, diplomat, maven. As it was,  I did share with her, twenty years after the facts. I also shared why I hadn't said anything, and I'm sure that hurt her and distanced her from me. I changed her perceptions of HER family.  Self-fulfilling prophecy.

You may ask what this has to do with Gay Rights.  Everything. It's that insidious indoctrination of the young. ALL of the opposition was based on fear.  Your children would be taught about not only gay marriage, but gay sex-- not true. Perhaps in SEX ED, but then wouldn't that be appropriate? Especially if you have kids in class who are gay or have gay parents. It's true there are gay-friendly books in many libraries, but parents can control the content of what their children have access.

Being and artist, I've had many gay, lesbian and bisexual friends. NONE of them CHOSE to be who they are. They are who they are. Perhaps some people's religions tell them those people are less than everyone else, But in my world G*d doesn't make anyone that's unnecessary or "less than". Though I may believe in the Great Divine, I also KNOW I don't know jack about it. I think I'm just as close to the GD as anyone, and those that would hold themselves as being closer, are usually seeking grandeur for themselves. The words written from on high, went through (quite)a few fallible human filters to get to me, the great unwashed mass.

I do believe reason will win out. Perhaps asking the correct questions will help people get over their fear? Worst case scenario, they teach gay marriage in school-- what is the fear? The child will be  more tolerant of gays? (perhaps, but wouldn't that be a good thing, to not disseminate hatred toward a group?) The child will BECOME gay? (that's not how it works-- when did YOU decide you liked the opposite sex?) The sanctity of marriage will be ruined and the institution as we know it will fall apart! (Show me how one impacts the other, I'm open to you showing me how having people with the LEGAL contract of marriage will lead to the other) Perhaps what the churches-- and this one was church led, make no mistake--are more concerned about is losing FEDERAL funds. If they accept federal funds, they cannot discriminate based upon race, creed, religion or sexual orientation. To me that's a DIFFERENT argument, and if it's one worth making, then make it. But at least be intellectually honest about it.

Enough of a rant. My fever has been three days, and my eyeballs hurt. But I'm done with being silent about things that are important to me. If someone is beating someone in front of you, DO something. But if someone is a consenting adult in the comfort of their own home, it's a noneyer. Anyone who wants to make a family, take care of their loved ones, be respected, and be truthful to themselves and others, this is supposedly the free-est country on this planet. You either are free or not. So far we are not.
 

sixwordstories
Whether you're in the mood for a creative challenge or you're short on time or attention span, this semi-addictive community is perfect for those who find flash fiction way long. Once you get the hang of it, you won't be able to stop. The prince turned into a frog. The girl ran home to mother. Tough to write. Easy to read. It's a double threesome of fun.

dailyfoodie
Delicious, ambitious, and occasionally nutritious dishes make for an eclectic, all-you-can-eat feast. Whether you're searching for recipes for your next dinner party or you're jonesing for a late-night brownie fix, your cravings are sure to be well sated. A warm and inclusive community that welcomes all orientations, from carnivores to vegans, from gourmands to junk-food junkies. Guaranteed bias-free, food-positive, and pan-epicurian.

I know it’s been a banner year for pine cones, since I’ve been stumbling over them in the woods, and I know there’s some scientific explanation about the cycles in which they grow, but I can’t tell you what that is. Yesterday Tamra Wight tamra_wight mentioned on Facebook that scientists say it’s impossible to be sad while looking at the sky.

Add a tree, and you can be ecstatic. Here’s what I saw looking up through a pine and an oak. Thanks, Tami! And there look like more blue skies today.




And a little later in the afternoon.

I probably should have known that giving a talk on Halloween was asking for trouble. But I didn't expect the lights and power to go off halfway through my talk at the Keene State Children’s lit conference. That was a new experience. Standing in front of 550 people, everything was going terrifically for the first 20 minutes, then BLACK! It turned out a squirrel had gotten into a transformer and blew all the electricity throughout the campus. Jane Yolen stepped up like a seasoned conference trooper and suggested we break up into small groups in different areas of the auditorium, so that the attendees could speak personally with each of the presenters (Lois Lowry, Katherine Paterson, me, and this year’s Caldecott winner, New Hampshire artist Beth Krommes.) That turned nightmare into a fun experience for all. Eventually a battery powered mic was located and Jane started her talk since I relied on power point to show visuals. After Jane, the power came back. Ah. I finished my hour-long talk. Surprisingly, it all came together seamlessly!

Time has flown by and I'm sorry to be behind on my blog entries. I'm half way through final art of my next book, which is always consuming. And the weather up here in New England has been exceptional this fall, so when not up to my ears in drawings and paintings, I crave to be outside, soaking up the last of the fall sun. This year we had a special treat, savoring autumn's beauty with my editor Namrata and her husband Quinn. They came up from the city and we reveled in everything fitting for the season -- hikes in fall color, hot apple cider and books by the fire, guitar and banjo music with friends, toasted S'mores, and even pumpkin carving! What fun we had with them. We even fit a little time for work over a book.

Nami and me by the river -- my favorite spot to think about books and ideas.

Quinn is a talented musician, but somewhat unschooled at traditional New England pumpkin carving. He chose to create with a jigsaw.

It's starting to feel more like winter these days. And as the days get colder, the wildlife comes in closer to select goodies from the yard.

I just saw the just slightly edited copy of an article about Margarita Engle’s verse novels and histories I wrote for Book Links magazine, to appear in their January issue. It’s called Green Paths and Open Views: The Poet Slave of Cuba, The Surrender Tree, and Tropical Secrets. The editor was so sweet, as was Margarita, who I interviewed by email. Book Links will print that interview with the article, and I’m happy others will get to be inspired by Margarita’s wonderful vision and imagination. I can't say the article was fast to write, still, compared to a book, not so much, and it's satisfying to see something complete.

And I got some possibly fun news about my book, Girls Who Looked Under Rocks. A big movie company wants to feature the book on the set and asked for rights to do so. I would be a proud mom in the audience if this happens. And hope the movie is a good one! Hey, the love interest is a woman naturalist.

Yesterday morning I enjoyed a walk seeing yellow leaves, red sumac, milkweed fluff, winterberry, West Brook, and an intrepid bit of blue someone planted on a bent tree intent on survival.



This morning I’m working hard on revisions, and in the afternoon tackling a presentation, so please join me if you can. Lorraine, I’m happy to hear you pushed past your stuck point yesterday, hanging out with Amy! And I’m ready to roll, after having the pleasure of witnessing Jo – in person! -- finish a draft in Esselon café yesterday. It’s not a myth after all. Even if one draft rolls into another, coming to an end is possible.

Also yesterday I came home with a bag of local apples, as did my husband. So apple crisp might have to be made. Cinnamon, nutmeg, a bit of maple syrup: maybe the smell will coax the muse.

I've been thinking about death a lot this week. It's not as dour as one would think, though, and there is a crash of reasons why. First, the changing of things to white-- first snow squall today. It was lovely seeing my niece from Florida, never having seen snow, prance and squeal at the newness of it. To me though, it's the death of summer and spring, the muting of fall, the deep slumber of outside.

I've been thinking of my parents and grandparents quite a bit, with the arrival of my sister and her family. It's been wonderful to see my daughters and her daughters pick up where they left off, even a little bit further down the line. The familiar comfort of family. It's been a joy to have my sister here, and it's given our husbands the opportunity to become friends, perhaps, and forge their own bond. But it also brings up all those old connections and communications. One of the things my father would do whenever I spoke to him (and apparently his mother, my grandmother would do for him), would inform me of who had "passed".  "You know, Arthur caught pee-neumonia and didn't make it." Or, "Chickie got the big "C" and left Delores the house. She's going on a cruise and redoing the front rooms."

There were people close to those I love who died this week. My nieces' and nephews Aunt died this week after a valiant fight with breast cancer. Though not unexpected, it still was a heavy load. I was so saddened, and empathetic to their loss, I hadn't noticed till cutting out the obituary a friend of mine had died. Both were far too young.

Last night my brute of a Sharpei got loose in the dead of night, and I was sure he was a goner. He was for a short while, just not in the way I thought. He eventually came to the kids (the only way they would have caught him) to the tune of squealing tires and a rattling food dish. I had made my peace at his loss, so was at a REAL loss, happily when the thought of his demise was far to premature.

But I'd had a sense of loss and foreboding the entire week, and it hadn't left me. Tonight is what took the wind out of my sails.

Too tired, sick child, I spent much of the evening in bed, trying to rest for my all-night shift at Beans.

I really enjoy working there for oh-so many reasons, and I know that often times, at that time of the night, some people are simply calling to hear my voice, so I try to make it as pleasant and caring as I can. Whether they are buying those wonderful flannel lined, Double L, Relaxed Fit Jeans or asking if I'd ever been to New York or a Broadway show, or has it snowed there, or are we REALLY open twenty four hours a day, seven days a week with a 100% guarantee of satisfaction. Many old, some sick, some simply harried, I don't only offer Bean's outstanding products, but HUMAN CONTACT, and THAT is the reason for their success, in this cold, cold world.

Just as, not even three minutes away from my departure time, my son-in-law came in to inform me one of our cats was in the road, dead. Anyone that knows us, knows that all of our pets (passels of pets) are part of our family. I've told myself over the years, it's good for the children to know how to care for others, and also it's a dry run for losing people in our lives. Those are good reasons and partially true. It's also because I love them so. Their energy, shenanigans, personality.

Holly and Gabi and Dave went to see which one it was, and it was my dear Cuddles. The kittie with the counterintuitive name. I had to leave immediately and the kids took over. Me, I cried and screamed all the way to work. You see me writing this now, you know I'm not there, but here venting and remembering WHY and HOW and just REMEMBERING.

I'd been thinking earlier about the baby kidnapped (thank goodness the baby is alive and safe and sound). And how some pains seem insurmountable. I thought about whether death gives meaning to life, or is it simply the gaping absence of it? I'd thought how some can hang on to life by their bloodied fingernails, and others can throw it aside, and still others can simply avoid it till the unknowable inevitable. I thought about how some of my friends I admire and think about and don't often tell (Kathy Rollins, are you out there?) have helped me deepen my thoughts and understandings, through their pains.

But tonight, I simply wanted to BLAME SOMEONE, or how about everyone. The kid who let him outside (the intention he was SUPPOSED to be an INDOOR KITTEN-- over a year old and I still think of him as a kitten). I wanted to blame ALL the creatures in my house, pushing him out. I wanted to blame HIM, for that desire to go out and BE a cat. I really want to blame the person who so callously hit him and left him in the middle of a less-traveled-by road.  I realize that is only because for a cat, I have this wound that's gouting a bit.

Thinking on it further, and this is reflection, not the shocked feelings of seeing his limp form or missing him so or worrying how to tell a sick little girl tomorrow, we've lost one of our own to a different place, I realize the way he's touched our lives. The first time he came here I spent almost six hours with him going through convulsions and seizures, and thought he would die that night. to only have him recover and become the loveliest cat I'd seen in a while. I loved the way he LOVED our dogs, and they became kinder to the cats as the result of his doting upon them.

Even recently, he'd got out and climbed a forty foot tree. He had been stuck there all night, and it was too far out in the field to call a fire engine or use a ladder. He brought out the knight-in-shining-armor of my husband, all the things I had fallen in love with. Tom bravely (or psychotically if you stood at the base of the tree looking up) climbed the tree and ever so patiently LIFTED Cuddles down from branch to  branch, til they both reached the bottom safely. Cuddles accommodating Tom to the best of his ability, Tom with his bulging muscle, sure, strong hands and heart wide open.

In the end, either our words and thoughts have meaning and are accurate or they do not. Either our ideals stand for something, or they are lies. I have always said this is but a way-station. This week it has been brought home to me. Wherever we go, upon the end of this journey, I will have to say, I've been wonderfully blessed with all the people and creatures I've met here. And I sincerely hope I see most of them again, if we've parted ways. RIP Cuddles.

The empire strikes back

In recent weeks, we've taken huge steps towards blocking spam accounts on LiveJournal. In fact, we've suspended as many as 30,000 accounts in a single day! We've implemented several pre-emptive measures to prevent the creation of spam accounts, and we've honed our detection of suspicious content. Spam bots are a crafty lot, so we'll continue to refine our tactics and keep up the good fight to keep you safe from spam attacks on LiveJournal.

RSS feeds again

If you're addicted to xkcd_rss, icanhaschzbrgr, or other syndicated feeds, we're pleased to report that we've resolved the update error that was mucking up your RSS feeds. While content was being pulled correctly, it wasn't being posted to the feeds themselves. Late last week, we finally nailed down what we hope was the root problem, so content should post properly. We thank you for your patience.

Wii have killer CSI Deadly Intent contests!

c_s_i

If you're a gamer who loves CSI, have Wii got news for you! c_s_i is sponsoring killer contests. Simply post a question to a member of the CSI crew. The winner will get a free copy of CSI: Deadly Intent for Nintendo Wii (with a retail value of $39.99) and get their question answered by a member of the CSI writing team! There's also a fantastic monthly contest. To enter, join c_s_i, play the online version of CSI: Deadly Intent, and respond to a two-part query for a chance to win a Wii! Entries will be judged on composition and originality. Sorry, but you must be a U.S. resident and over 18 years old to participate. Check out the rules here.

Enveloped in postcards

Last week, we asked you to send in postcards to help us decorate our drab concrete walls. Here's a photo of the results so far! Thank you so much and please keep them coming! You can mail them to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be giving ten random users paid account credits.

Photos of the week

If you haven't visited our new LiveJournal photo community, you're in for an amazing visual trip. LiveJournal users from around the world will take you on a scenic journey to everywhere. Post your own pictures or kick back and enjoy at lj_photophile. You can view some of this week's awesome photos after the jump. Please start tagging with geographic location, since we'd like to track all the places around the world represented in this community. Keep on commenting too!
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