Grounded in the Truth

As the daughter of a career newspaper writer, I feel compelled to maintain my subscription to the daily print paper.  I enjoy perusing it in a leisurely manner over breakfast, confident that a squirting grapefruit will not cause any electrical device to short circuit.  This past Saturday, however, I nearly experienced a short circuit of a different type.  I could not believe what I had just read.  Audio of the formidable "Miss O" (Miss O'Sullivan) at St. Mary's Episcopal School for Girls began playing in my head; she was a veritable Grammar Czarina, and the governing document of her domain was Walsh's Plain English Handbook.  My copy is dutifully shelved in the "language" section of my nonfiction bookcase, and I consulted it for confirmation of my observation.

The following sentence appeared an article about a suspect's surrender after a hostage situation:

"Officers quickly surrounded XXX as he lied on the ground."  

My mental image was of the suspect's telling falsehoods in the dirt.  But why would he talk to the dirt?  Perhaps he was fabricating some story while on the ground?  Then I realized that the Associated Press writer most certainly meant that the suspect was prone or supine as he was surrounded.  In plain English, he LAY on the ground.  I hope that perhaps some overzealous copy editor made the "correction" and that an AP writer did not commit this grammar infraction.  One of the disadvantages of print is that the error lives in perpetuity unless the story is corrected and reprinted.  In the electronic world such sins can be wiped clean without a trace.  Instant grammar absolution!  "Miss O" would have liked that.

And that's no lie.

Confessions of a Middle-Aged Nerd

Books, dogs, music . . . okay, lots of people have these hobbies.  Some truly cool people have these hobbies.  I am here to confess that I am not one of the truly cool.  I'm not even marginally chilly.  I am, and always have been, a nerd.  Oh, I tried to deny it through my teens, and I could belt out "Louie Louie" with the best of them at college fraternity/sorority pledge swaps, but deep down in my heart of hearts, I KNEW that I was a nerd.  By some stroke of lucky fate, I found another nerd to marry.  He watched me eat green jello in the dining hall for almost a year before introducing himself, but that is fodder for another post.

A couple of years ago I discovered what must be one of the Quintessential Nerd Pastimes:  jigsaw puzzles.  I confess to shopping for them the way many women shop for shoes, and I have the boxes stacked in a closet to prove it.  Perhaps working on a puzzle triggers some region of the brain that releases Happy Nerd Serotonin, but I find these puzzles rather addictive.  It is amazing that this type of concentration can actually be extremely relaxing; maybe it is because the visual and spatial reasoning required is outside the realm of my workaday world.

Only a certain type of puzzle provides a respite from the daily grind; a fine balance exists between challenge and frustration.  My balance point seems to fall in the 300- to 500- piece range, especially if the pieces are categorized as "Easy Grasp" or "Oversized" (often touted as perfect for those "older or less agile" puzzlers).  Detailed artwork and multiple colors are the most enjoyable.  The fisherman and mountains with reflection in a lake was abandoned after a few hours.  There was nothing relaxing about sorting all blue-green pieces.  In duplicate.

Here is one of my favorites from last summer; this photo does not do it justice, but the details inside the diner were just plain fun.  So, if you are stressed and looking for an inexpensive, non-fattening path to relaxation, clear off the dining room table, turn on a good light, and feel a tiny triumph with each interlocking peace piece.

FX Schmid makes fabulous puzzles.

Book Clubs of Yesteryear

How excited I always was when my teacher distributed the new book club fliers each month!  They were printed on the cheapest of newsprint, which made them almost impossible to mark with pencil, but oh, the wonders those leaflets contained.  The listing of books seemed positively endless at the time, but looking back through adult eyes, I am sure the titles only numbered in the twenties.  Most books were priced either 50 or 75 cents.  I would make my initial selections and take the form home for money and most likely a parent's signature.  Our teacher must have dreaded sorting out the returned slips and their attendant coins, but she dutifully submitted our orders.

In a couple of weeks the box would arrive, and our treasures would be distributed.   Two books from book club days stand out in my mind: the red and gray book about Abraham Lincoln, and the book of Baba Yaga stories.  I remember reading and rereading both of those titles many times.  The Abraham Lincoln book was certainly interesting, but I must admit that much of its appeal lay in its being printed with red ink.  I have no idea why it was manufactured in such a way, but the novelty drew me to it time and time again.   

The Baba Yaga stories captured my imagination in a way few other folktales ever did.  I was mesmerized by her house's being built on chicken legs, and I thrilled to her traveling in a mortar and pestle.  Why were the chicken legs so memorable?  Was it because I loved drumsticks as a child?  Nowadays we educators would try to prompt the child reader to "make connections", and this would be termed a "text-to-self connection".  BAH! I enjoyed the image and the stories, plain and simple.  They fired my imagination and made me eager to read even more.  Reveling in a tale well told is reading's own reward.

The Bibliohound

Welcome to my blog. I have absolutely no illusions about its ever being read by more than a handful of people, if that many. This is more of a personal project, a place to set forth my ramblings and reflect on things literary and canine: hence the "Bibliohound". I am by no means an expert on either subject, but they both bring great joy to my life.

So, who is the Bibliohound? I am a school librarian by profession, an avid reader (when I don't fall asleep after a busy day), and the human leader of a pack of sighthounds, currently three greyhounds and one whippet. I adopted my first greyhound in 1995 and have been involved in greyhound adoption ever since. That same year I discovered lure coursing with my first greyhound, and I still help out with trials for a couple of local clubs. Four of my five greyhounds completed basic obedience courses, and three of those earned their CGC (Canine Good Citizen) certification. Max, my red boy, is my most recent obedience student. He is surprisingly motivated for such a laid-back fellow, and he is a lot of fun to work. If I can scrounge up the time, I would love to pursue beginning agility or perhaps rally obedience with him. It's amazing how the human-hound bond grows when training.

On this blog (in this blog??) there will be musings on books, dogs, and music, with no pretense of authority and no desire to enter into academic debate. Oh, and current education buzzwords are strongly discouraged (collaboration, Professional Learning Community, assessment, differentiation, chunking, scaffolding, rubric, portfolio, and the one that makes my every nerve jangle . . . best practices).