Yearly Archives: 2006

Happy Bloomsday!

Ted reminded me that today is Bloomsday:

Bloomsday is a holiday observed annually on 16 June to celebrate the life of Irish writer James Joyce and commemorate the events in his novel Ulysses, all of which took place on the same day in Dublin in 1904. The day is also a secular holiday in Ireland. The name derives from Leopold Bloom, the protagonist in Ulysses, and June 16 was the date of Joyce’s first outing with his wife-to-be, Nora Barnacle, when they walked to the Dublin village of Ringsend.

Hawking to write children’s book

I so thoroughly want this:

Physicist Stephen Hawking and his daughter are to write a science book for children which will be “a bit like Harry Potter”, but without the magic. “It is a story for children, which explains the wonders of the universe,” she [his daughter] said.

I hope it’s something in the vein of Heinlein’s juvenile fiction, basically a scientifically-accurate adventure story.  It would be great to give Ben a copy along with the Heinlein, Asimov, Rowling, Pullman, Pratchett, and Nix he’ll have on his “Daddy Recommends” shelf.

(I have to post this before that list gets any bigger.  I keep adding authors.  Who would you recommend to a young reader?)

Seaweed

So, the decisions have been made and Deana and Glen’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Covers quilt has been begun in earnest. It’s all been cut up into eensy weensy bits and I’m beginning to put them back together. See?

Slicing and sewing

Fabric was, in fact, harmed in the making of this photo. I admit it.

Don’t you like the way the strips curl up on themselves as they feed through? Like seaweed, curled and waving in the water as your submarine slowly drifts down past it. DIVE! DIVE!