Little April Showers

It was snowing when I got up this morning, but it ultimately didn't amount to much. It never stuck to anything, nor was there enough to block anyone's view. When I was finally getting dressed and having breakfast, it was lightly showering again. By the time I was on my way to the Oaklyn Library, it was barely doing that.

I mostly organized books at the Oaklyn Library. The DVDs weren't too bad. For some reason, the kids' fiction picture books had a lot of non-fiction mixed in. I don't know how that happened. And someone messed around with the young adult series shelves. They were all out of order! Now I'll have to redo them again next week.

The rain was gone when I walked home, but the skies remained dark. I had leftover Tuna Casserole from last night while watching another Duke/Sach Bowery Boys movie, Looking For Danger. That's my favorite of the last seven movies, thanks to some nice action sequences and very funny gags that almost makes it seem like The Road to the Bowery.

I rode to work a little bit early to get my schedule. My hours for this week coming up are not bad at all. Not only do I have more of them, but the majority of them are earlier. I retain Tuesday and Thursday off as well.

Work was busy, not a surprise for the beginning of the month. I had a few mild problems with WIC Checks. Other than that and a mix-up with my relief that caused me to be almost late finishing, work went fine.

I had shopping to do when I finally did get off. The primary item this week was chicken. There's a big 40% off sale on chicken this week. I bought cutlets, skinless breasts, and legs. I also needed to restock apples (Granny Smiths are 99 cents a pound), grapefruit (3 for $1.99), powdered sugar, and oatmeal. Used a coupon and a sale and got more of those fancy Lipton teas that come in the pyramid-shaped bags. Got Wild Berry this time.

I bought a hoagie roll, too. I ate out enough this week and decided I preferred eating at home. I didn't get to my turkey hoagie and carrot stick dinner until 8:30, but at least I ate it in my own living room.

Balance and the Spring Showers

Started out a wet, gloomy morning with yoga. Pattie was there for the first time in weeks; she'd been away in California. She made me feel much better as we did shoulder stands and joint-openers with the rest of the class. Thanks to her bad back, she couldn't get on her shoulders, either.

Went to the Collingswood Library next. Probably thanks to the cloudy weather, there were piles of DVDs to return - and there were piles more after the Storybook Hour let out! I was busy shelving, organizing, and filing DVDs for well over and hour and a half.

I considered going out to lunch after leaving the Library, but I decided I'd rather get to the bike shop in Haddonfield first while the weather was cooperating. It was still cloudy, but the "rain" was the barest sprinkles. Even that vanished as I headed up Westmont Avenue and past the Bus/Train Station to King's Highway.

The guys at the Freestyle Bike Shop said they were working on another bike and it would take about an hour to finish mine. Oh, that was perfect! I could go out to lunch. It's not like there aren't plenty of places to eat at in Haddonfield.

I strolled down King's Highway, checking out the prices at various restaurants. I finally decided I'd try something that was new to me - the British Chip Shop. Yes, they serve the basic British pub food - fish and chips, bangers and mash, various meat pies, Ploughman's Lunch, Scotch eggs, that sort of thing.

I eventually had the Chip Shop Sandwich. It's Irish cheddar, chicken, Granny Smith apple slices, greens, and Dijon mustard on a huge roll. It comes with a gigantic pile of spring greens drizzled with malt vinegar and oil. It was very, very tasty! I washed it all down with a pot of tea in a tea pot with the Union Jack painted on it.

The atmosphere was pretty cool, too. The walls were faux-brick. There was a fire roaring merrily in a fireplace. Pictures of British icons, from the Beatles to fox hunts to London landmarks, hung on the walls. A widescreen TV in the front of the room was tuned to a rugby match. British Invasion bands played in the background. It felt nice and cozy, especially on an afternoon that was still pretty dark.

I timed things perfectly. The two boys were just about done with my bike when I returned to the shop. And they did take a trade-in on the tire I bought months ago but couldn't use. They took half-off the chain, which brought it and the installation to a little over $20. Sweet.

Treated myself to a slice of pumpkin bread at the deli across the street. When I came out to enjoy my snack, I realized that the rain had picked up slightly. Not anywhere near monsoon levels, but it was a tiny bit heavier than before, more of a mist than a sprinkle.

Even so, I just made one more quick stop on my way home at Walgreens. I didn't find what I was looking for there, but I did pick up dollar boxes of dried fruit. They'll be great for granola bars.

Spent the rest of the afternoon and evening at home. I vacuumed. I baked a Peppermint-Chocolate Chip Chiffon Cake. I watched two Duke-era Bowery Boys movies, Spook Busters and Hold That Hypnotist. I made the bed. I made a revised version of Thumper's Tuna Noodle Casserole from the Mickey Mouse Cook Book for dinner. I used defrosted frozen peas instead of canned, low-fat, low sodium cream of mushroom soup, tuna in water instead of tuna in oil, and whole-wheat noodles. I also added celery for more fiber and carrots for some color.

When Enchantment Meets the Real World

Kicked off my Easter season this morning with The First Easter Rabbit. This 1979 Rankin-Bass special tells the origins of the Easter Bunny. Originally a stuffed rabbit (hense his name, "Stuffy"), a fairy turns him into a real animal and anoints him the symbol of spring and head of Easter Valley. Can he keep the valley's Golden Lilly blooming in time for the holiday...or will a chilly character called Zero put his celebration on ice?

I left for work shortly after the DVD ended. Work was pretty much dead all day. The day had started out sunny, but the sun disappeared about half-way through my shift. When I got out at 4, the day was gray, blah, and windy, though not quite as chilly as earlier in the week.

As soon as I got home, I changed into a sweater, pulled my coat back on, and went back out. I wanted a walk and I needed milk at WaWa. It was very busy there when I arrived; I had to wait a little while to get my milk.

Spring is in full bloom in the neighborhood, despite the temperatures. Canary-yellow daffodils and soft lavender hyacinths bloom in every garden. Some of the trees have their first creamy white magnolia blossoms. Others have buds that'll be leaves in the next few weeks.

Not trusting the weather, I spent the remaining afternoon inside, cleaning the kitchen, listening to music, and watching Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue.

The third movie in the Disney "Fairies" series introduces something new to Tinker Bell's world...humans. Fairies and humans aren't supposed to go near one another, but Tinker Bell is very curious about the human world. She can't resist following a Model T when she sees one for the first time, but the grouchy night fairy Vidia follows her and reminds her to restrain her curiosity. If humans find them, they might hurt them...or worse!

Fortunately, the human who does find Tink and takes her home is Lizzie, a little girl who likes fairies. Vidia gets upset when Tink is captured and tells the others, which spurs a mission to rescue her during a huge rainstorm. Lizzie's having problems of her own. Her very "modern" naturalist father will have none of her nonsense talk of fairies. To him, the only things that exist are the ones that are visible to the naked eye. Tink, however, has a few lessons in ingenuity, faith, and magic to teach everyone, fairies and humans alike...

I'm glad Disney didn't shut this series down when they disbanded their made-for-DVD/video animated movie division a few years ago. I've enjoyed the tales of Tink and her magical buddies. Here, for once, we get to know her friends slightly better, and everyone gets a chance to shine.

More New Bowery Boys Stories and a Page Overhaul

We have so many Bowery Boys role play stories at the site now (and at least three more coming in the next few weeks), I completely reorganized the stories on the front page into their own indexes. Look for "Slip and the Mystery at the Window" and "Changes" in the "Multi-Part Stories, 1946-1955" section!

("Changes" in particular is important to read in light of the upcoming stories...)

Multi-Part Stories, 1946-1955 (Go to the very bottom of the page!)

Adventures In Bike Riding

Started off the morning by finishing Robin Hood. Not bad. The second half was more interesting than the first half, but it was still too long and too dour. On the other hand, this was a lot more realistic than most versions of the famous British tale, and Russell Crowe and especially Cate Blanchett were fine as Robin and Marion. Really, it depends on what you're looking for. I'd recommend it over the ridiculous Kevin Costner version without hesitation, but if you want a more colorful Robin Hood, check out Errol Flynn or Disney.

Headed for the Haddon Township Library as soon as the movie ended. It was a lovely day. Probably still a bit chilly for the time of year, in the mid-upper 40s, but otherwise sunny and breezy. I passed many people walking dogs and children, as well as a flock of Canadian geese, in Newton River Park.

The library hadn't been open for too long when I arrived around quarter of 11, but they already had at least one other volunteer there. I concentrated on returning the few DVDs that were there and organizing the kids' DVDs.

They had the third and final new American Girl mystery, the Rebecca story A Bundle of Trouble, on the shelf with the other AG books. I grabbed that one. In the spirit of trying something new, I decided to try a disk for the current PBS version of Curious George. I have fond memories of the version of George that ran on Nickelodeon when I was very little. I also found the newest Tinkerbell movie Tinkerbell and the Great Fairy Rescue and more Max and Ruby. Since the live-action movies I took out last week were gritty action dramas, I went with two comedies this time. I chose the 1988 hit A Fish Called Wanda and last year's Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World (love that title).

After a short stop at Super Fresh, I rode over to Audubon for lunch at one of my favorite local restaurants, Simply Soups. It was 1 by the time I made it over there, and the small, dark room was packed with families, executives, and local shop-keepers enjoying their lunches. I was lucky I was able to grab a table! Good thing, too. I had two breadsticks and a delicious cup of spinach tortellini soup. The soup was one of the best I'd ever tasted, with tons of spinach, huge tortellinis, and enormous halves of stewed tomatoes. It made for a very satisfying and tasty lunch.

It was such a nice day, I just went for a ride down to Haddon River Park after I finished my meal. Haddon River Park passes through Audubon and Haddon Heights and is much longer and larger than Newton River Park. It's so long, I only took in the part that runs between King's Highway and Mt. Ephram.

Most of the Mt. Ephram side of the park was on the edge of a hill that mostly bordered houses...but I saw fields up there, too. I thought I'd check it out. The hill was long and steep, but I managed to get my bike to the top. Turns out there was a school and a field on the summit of the hill. I didn't want to disrupt any remaining kids, so I headed back down.

That was a little scary. The hill was very steep, and the bike kept wanting to go without me! I should have left it on the bottom of the hill. There were a couple of times I almost ended up sliding down the hill on the dry leaves.

After that incident, I did no more roaming around the hillside. (And ironically, I saw a ramp just a minute away that lead to another part of the school and the park's playground.) I just rode straight home.

I was a block away from my apartment when the gears on my bike just stopped turning. Yes, the chain had come off. Again. I walked it the rest of the way home and tried to get it back on myself, but nothing I did seemed to work. I ended up hiking it down the block to Doria's Deli and requesting help from Mr. Doria (and a half-pound of turkey from Mrs. Doria - I could use it for lunch tomorrow).

When I got home, I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning the bathroom. I've been putting it off, but I really couldn't do it anymore. The sink in particular was gross, and the tub didn't look much better.

I ran Max and Ruby while baking Chocolate-Dried Cranberry Granola Bars and Curious George during dinner. Much to my disappointment, both DVDs were badly scratched, so much that I couldn't really watch the second half of the George disc at all. And I think the Max and Ruby disc is relatively new!

Birthdays are the theme of the Max and Ruby disc. For once, Ruby tended to come off better than Max in most of the stories. I especially liked "Bunny Money," where Max learns a lesson the hard way about saving for a rainy day and Ruby about doing price research before you buy when they go shopping for their grandma. The three-part-story about Ruby's birthday party is also very sweet...especially Max's present in the last episode!

The importance of caring for the enviorment is the theme of the Curious George set. George and his buddy The Man With the Yellow Hat go back and forth between city and country living as George learns how to grow carrots, recycle, and that you don't throw a box with your buddy's favorite hat in it in the trash! I found the series to be charming and funny. The little balloons representing George's imagination are a nice touch; the animation in the balloons is in the style of the original books.

Into the Park

I slept until 9, but didn't get out to doing the laundry until quarter of 12! Good thing I only had a very small load today. It was so small, I put it in for less time than I usually do in the dryer and it was fine. I was also helped by the laundromat being surprisingly quiet for a Monday late morning-early afternoon. There was a couple of women doing their laundry and the owner, but everything wasn't full to capacity.

After I took my laundry home and put it away, I had a nice lunch of leftover Lemon Thyme Chicken, stir-fried vegetables, and spinach salad with strawberries and peanuts. Ran Robin Hood while eating lunch. Honestly, I found it a bit dull. While it made more sense (and had more sense of the time period) than the weird 1991 version, they may have gone a little TOO dark.

I spent my time at the laundromat reading A Weekend To Change Your Life, by Joan Anderson. It discusses a woman who had retreated to Cape Cod for a year to "find" herself after being all things to all people. Now, I'm not married and have no children, so I have a much easier time retreating than most people do. I spent a lot of my childhood just taking random walks by the ocean, picking up sea glass or "Cape May Diamonds" (wave-buffered quartz), watching boats on the horizon or admiring paintings artists would make of the landscape. I repeated these long walks when I moved to Wildwood. I would hike all the way down to North Wildwood in the summer and stroll among the tide pools there.

The woman now holds weekend retreats in Cape Cod for women who want to "retreat" and find themselves as well. As I thought about it, I realized I didn't need to run off to the sea to lose myself in nature. I lived right next door to nature! One of my neighbors is a park! I pulled on my coat and went for a walk.

Actually, it was more like a climb. I decided to explore the wild, rugged cliff-side in the backyard and that lead to the park. You can climb right up the hill and be in the park without actually going through the entrance.

It was cloudy this morning, but the sun came out when I was in the laundromat, though it remains chilly. It warmed my back and made the greenish waters of the river sparkle. I hiked down to the cliff, then around the ubiquitous green sticker bushes and spindly small trees. Most of the trees here have buds, but it'll probably be a few weeks before we see actual leaves.

I kept seeing those green sticker bushes everywhere as I hiked up the hill. When I carefully took hold of one to inspect it, I realized it wasn't a bush. It was a vine - a clinging vine, like the ones Miss Ellie taught me to pull away from the holly trees last fall. Only, unlike the vines we removed from the holly, these vines had thorns that were sharp and able to catch onto anything.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized how much of a metaphor those vines were. I'd been clinging to so many things, so many outdated notions and old ideas. I may not have had anyone clinging to me, like the women who went on that retreat, but I was doing a fair bit of clinging myself. I wanted to be free of things that clinged...including those with thorns that held on.

I kept seeing those vines EVERYWHERE as I kept hiking around the perimeter of the park. The seemed to grow around every tree and bush, choking them and blocking out the light. I'd never noticed them before, but with the leaves and the snow gone, there was nothing hiding them. I rarely walk around the edges of the park, fearing falling in or getting hurt. I wanted to see everything.

I noticed with disgust how much trash was in the park, too. Doesn't anyone in Oaklyn know how to use a trash can? There were beer cans, bottles, and packs, WaWa iced tea bottles, plastic grocery bags, and flattened milk and water jugs. I wonder if there's a way to suggest a trash clean-up in the park for the local schools. Someone has to teach the kids to respect nature.

I hugged that big tree on the southern edge that has been spray-painted, though. I feel as disrespected by my customers as that tree is by half the teenagers in Camden County. Why do people treat people - and trees - this way? How hard is it to learn to be kind to one another and the world around us?

I finally found one tree on the other side of the park that wasn't covered in sticker vines. It was a wide behemoth that already had huge pale green buds on it. The taller, skinnier trees behind it were smothered by vines, but they barely touched the big tree.

I found myself wanting to be more like that tree. I wanted to be strong and flourishing, with nothing clinging to me. That tree showed me that skinny and tall don't always mean you avoid the clinging vines.

I thought about the vines and the trees for the rest of the afternoon, even when I was at work. It was more interesting than work. Work was steady for the night, fairly busy but not quite as bad as this weekend. There were no major problems, and I was able to go straight home.

On my way back to my apartment, I saw flashing lights on West Clinton Avenue. Curious, I rode down there to check them out. All I saw were fire trucks gathered on various streets and lots. Nothing seemed to be on fire, though, and there was no smoke or puddles of streaming water from hoses. I couldn't figure it out.

(I finally discovered online at the Weather Channel that there was a fire weather watch and a red flag warning, though it has since expired. Although I don't know why they were on West Clinton. Maybe practicing?)

You Can Always Count On Me

Slept in pretty late this morning. It was 10:30 before I got going. I made Strawberry Pancakes while listening to Brunch With the Beatles. The animated film Yellow Submarine was in the spotlight today. The eclectic soundtrack includes "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," "Eleanor Rigby," "Hey Bulldog," "All Together Now," and the bouncy sing-along title number.

I worked on editing our recent Bowery Boys role-play stories for a little while after the Beatles ended. They include "Bowery"-fied versions of Rear Window and The Prisoner of Zenda, the story of how Louie and Slip left the Bowery and Duke became the group leader, and one that has all of the boys becoming superheroes after Blinky and Sach's invention accidentally douses them with radiation. Look for these stories next week!

Work was, once again, busy for most of the night. This wasn't helped by a call-out. Thankfully, Sundays are usually pretty easy. There were no major problems, and I did manage to get out and get home on-time.

I called Mom while making leftovers for dinner. Mom was on her way to making dinner for her, Dad, and Keefe, but she did chat for a few minutes. I tried calling her in the morning. but she was busy. Very busy, as it turned out. Not only was she babysitting my sister Anny's son Skylar, but she had to get all-weather tires put on her new car, instead of the summer ones they came with...and apparently, it knocked the car's tire-control system (or something like that) out of alignment.

My sister Rose called about a half-hour later, right after I finished dinner. She was also making dinner and dealing with her dog Kelsey and her almost-year-old son Khai. Khai's able to pull himself up onto things and crawl around like crazy now...and he's driving his mother nuts. She's been working at Anthony's in Haddon Heights with her boyfriend Craig again, and she sounded as hectic as she was probably feeling.

She asked me if I could get the 25th off to go down to Cape May County for Khai's first birthday (and probably hers, mine, and Easter, too). I'm going to see if I can switch my birthday off for the 25th. My birthday off would be nice...but I'd really rather spend time with people.

Hit the shower next. Got out just in time for "The Dress Circle." Tonight's theme was one of the fun broad ones they do from time to time - "You, You, You," i.e, songs with the word "You" in the title. Among the ones that made it on the show were "You Are Beautiful," You Are Love," You and the Night and the Music," "You and I Love," "You Can Have Him," "You Mustn't Be Discouraged," and a favorite of mine from City of Angels, "You Can Always Count On Me."

Springtime Chills

I ended up sleeping in again this morning. Maybe it was just as well. It was rather chilly today, though the fact that it was also sunny helped. It took me a while to get going; I felt too nice in my blankets. I read for a while before having breakfast.

When I did get going, I made a quick run to the bank, then the Oaklyn Library for this week's volunteering session there. I organized the DVDs and did a run-through on the picture books. I felt a little awkward there. The older man who was the librarian today kept staring at me weird, like I was going to steal something. I will not be going back there on a Saturday morning.

I just spent what remained of the morning and early afternoon watching Bowery Boys movies and crocheting. I made a nice lunch of Teryiaki Vegetables and Lemon Thyme Chicken. I just got out to work on time.

Work was, once again, busy for most of the night, just slowing down right before I left. There were no really major problems, including after work when I picked up yogurt and light bulbs.

Fickle March Weather

Yeah, it was much colder today than it has been, in the lower 40s. That's really pretty normal for this time of year, though. You never know what it'll be from week to week. I slept in and didn't have the time for much of anything this morning. I watched The Princess and the Frog, read books, and did some things online.

Work was on-and-off busy, with no major problems. It went faster than it had in ages, even with the extra hour. Not that the extra hour ended up mattering much. It was much quieter by the time I finished at 7:30, and we had plenty of help.

Went shopping right after that. I didn't need quite as much as previous weeks. Mostly restocked fruit - bananas, grapefruit (they're 3 for $1.99 for the smaller ones), oranges, strawberries, and the tiny clementines. Stocked up on honey, chocolate chips, and olive oil.

My schedule for next week isn't too bad, other than fewer hours. There's two days until 8 and one somewhat-early day on Wednesday, but I do have Tuesday and Thursday off again.

Sweet Balance

It was wet and chilly when I started for yoga class this morning. It wasn't doing anything at first. I'd just ridden past the 7-11 on the White Horse Pike when I realized there were small, glittering flakes falling softly all around me. The cold morning had turned our snow into a spring flurry! It was very pretty as I made my way across Oaklyn and into Collingswood.

Despite the weather, the class was fully and busy today. We worked on hip-openers, deep bends, twists, and balance poses. It was frustrating. I couldn't lift myself into a shoulder stand like the rest of the class could, and I couldn't balance as well, either. When everyone else did shoulder stand, I found myself doing legs-up-the-wall.

It made me think. I had an image while we were meditating of a solitary child, in a field of flowers, running and laughing. She was carefree and happy...but she was alone. I'm still very much that solitary child. I'm free in many ways, and my freedom is precious to me. In other ways, though, I'm still that hurt little girl. The one who felt she needed to compete with her sisters and the other kids in school for attention and affection. The one who believed that nothing she did was ever perfect enough. The one who was told that she shouldn't cry when she's hurt, and that it's babyish to show pain. The one who thought she would be sent away to somewhere scary and bad if she did something wrong.

I'm proud of how I live now. I don't like my job and intend to find a better one, but I do have my own money. I rarely borrow money from anyone. I live the way I want to live, and I no longer care what others think of me. I'm not them. I'm tired of competing with other people for everything. I have my own opinions, and being quiet about expressing them doesn't mean they're not there. I'm not going to change just because one or two people are spoilsports. They live their lives, and I live mine.

There's still a lot of that hurt little girl inside of me, though. I've been working on healing her, on showing her that her emotions are ok. That growing up is supposed to hurt. That she doesn't have to go anywhere she doesn't want to. That it's ok to be different. The negative energy has just been there for so long, though, that it's been hard for me to work through these feelings. I'm doing my best. Writing in my offline journal and this blog has been a huge help; so have my walks.

My mind was still on these issues as I walked my bike down to the Collingswood Library for this week's volunteer session there. (I usually walk my bike in downtown Collingswood. The streets and sidewalks are too busy and narrow to ride.) There was a nice pile of DVDs for me to file and shelve when I arrived.

I just organized the "Television" section when the Library's Storybook Hour finished. I was flooded with requests for Strawberry Shortcake and Thomas the Tank Engine. I helped the kids and their parents as best I could, then went out myself.

Made a couple of brief stops on the way home, including WaWa for a Ciabatta Melt for lunch. I also checked out a new cupcake bakery across the street from Collingswood's City Hall. Their Medium Red Velvet Cupcake was tasty, and the college student who sold it to me was friendly...but at $2 for a medium cupcake, this place will be a once-in-a-while treat only. That's steep for something I could make myself.

I went out for a long walk when my hoagie was done. The clouds had started breaking up, and though it was still damp and cold, it was much brighter. The snow was long-gone. My mind was still on that morning, though. Though I really feel better about myself than I did at this time last year, a part of me still wants to be like everyone else and do what everyone else can...even though I know everyone's different and my body can only do so much. I really need to practice more, or maybe do some strength exercises at the apartment.

I spent the rest of the afternoon doing things around the apartment. I ran Two Mules For Sister Sara while working on Spiced Meringue Cookies. Two Mules is a gritty late 60s "spaghetti western" that made a star out of Clint Eastwood and proved Shirley MacLaine could handle action roles. Eastwood is a mercenary in Mexico during the Mexican Revolution, at a time when France had invaded that country. MacLaine is a nun traveling to help war-torn Mexicans. Eastwood is going to aid Mexican rebels invading a French garrison. He saves her from drunk cowboys, and the two find themselves riding together with the afore-mentioned mules of the title as they work on ideas to take the French out of Mexico.

You can guess the rest...or most of it. MacLaine turns out to be far from what she claims to be. I've never been a huge fan of the Italian oaters of the 60s and 70s, but this one is quite enjoyable. MacLaine and Eastwood work better together than you might expect. Actually, it reminds me somewhat of The African Queen moved to Mexico with a grittier feel, the French replacing the Nazis, horses instead of boats, and Mexicans instead of African natives.

I worked on Wishcraft exercises while the cookies were in the oven. Today, I made a flow chart of how I intend to start an at-home business and made a list of everyone I know who could possibly help me start said business and/or find a job.

Made vegetable-beef stir-fry for dinner while watching the end of Two Mules For Sister Sara and a somewhat related Get Smart episode. In "Viva Smart," the second episode of the third season, Max and 99 find themselves in a South American country that was just taken over by a very nasty dictator. They disguise themselves as flamenco dancers in an attempt to rescue the real president of the country...but they get in real trouble when the dictator sees through their ruse and has them jailed. Can they get the real president out of the country before they all find themselves in front of a firing squad?

Oh, thankfully, my meringue cookies came out beautifully this time. I let them cook for a little too long, but it doesn't seem to have impacted the taste that much. They're exactly like the meringue cookies that come in tubs at the Acme...and a lot cheaper!

If At First You Don't Succeed...

First of all...YAY! TCM is finally adding two of my oft-requested MacDonald/Eddy vehicles, Naughty Marietta and Sweethearts, to their Vault Collection line-up. Marietta was their first movie together and remains a favorite of mine. Sweethearts was their first of two Technicolor films and MGM's first full three-strip Technicolor film. Now, could we have the remaining six as soon as possible, please? And while you're at it, how about some of their solo vehicles that MGM owns? Her The Firefly or The Merry Widow, or his Let Freedom Ring or Balalkia? (They already have one he did with Eleanor Powell, Rosalie, in the Vault Collection.)

I was going to sleep in this morning...but a phone call at quarter after 8 ended that idea. Yes, it was the Acme. No, they didn't want me to come in right away. They were asking me if I wanted to stay an extra hour on Friday. Sure. I'll be grocery shopping that night anyway.

I tried to go back to sleep, but I just couldn't do it. Even with the gray weather, I couldn't sleep. I wrote in my journal and read the new Samantha mystery instead. It wasn't raining by the time I got out of bed around 9-ish, but it was still gray and gloomy.

I cheered up a bit with Barbie: A Fairy Secret while I had Scrambled Eggs with Spinach and Mushrooms for breakfast. Fairy Secret picks up almost directly from where last fall's Fashion Fairy Tale left off. Once again, we begin in the real world as Barbie, Ken, and Barbie's fashion stylists confront her snotty rival Raquelle about her behavior at a recent movie premiere. Fantasy quickly intrudes when a group of fairies, lead by the love-besotted Queen Gabriella, kidnap Ken and take off with him to the fairy world, Gloss Angeles! The stylists reveal that they're fairies, too, and lead Barbie and Raquelle into Gloss Angeles to rescue Ken...before he's trapped there forever!

The goofy name of the fairy city aside, I really enjoyed this one. Fairy Secret reminds me a lot of the stories my sisters and I used to concoct as kids that would have all of our Barbies working with She-Ra and riding My Little Ponies to rescue Ken and Luke Skywalker from some nasty queen or witch or warrioress. Though the moral about the power of friendship and forgiveness is still laid on a little thick, it's not quite as bad as the heavy-handed script in Fashion Fairy Tale. The plot's a lot more original, too. And Ken is still wonderful comic relief. He has a hilarious magic duel with a male fairy (with a decidedly non-PC Italian accent) who is in love with Queen Gabriella.

I went for a walk after Fairy Secret ended. It was sprinkling lightly as I left, but otherwise, it wasn't really doing anything major. The clouds remained dun-colored and dull, though, and everything was damp and chilly (though surprisingly not as cold as I figured it would be, probably in the mid-to-upper 40s).

The very light rain continued throughout the afternoon. When I finished my quick lunch of yogurt topped with fruit and Oatmeal Squares, it was barely spitting. I rode to work with only my coat getting mildly damp.

Work was on-and-off busy. There were no major problems, other than the reliefs for me and another college-student cashier were late. Mine came in after a manager had already come in for me. Hers never showed up at all. I spent the down time doing candy.

It was lightly showering when I briefly ran a bag out for a customer. The showers were gone by quarter after 4. I was able to ride home with a few things I needed and stay fairly dry.

Spent the rest of the evening inside, listening to music and experimenting with egg white baking. I was going to make Meringue Cookies again, but some egg yolks got in my batter. No matter. I made some wonderful Chocolate Chip Chiffon Cupcakes instead. I had a fabulous Tilapia In Lemon-White Wine Sauce for dinner with steamed broccoli and cauliflower.

Incidentally, the rain didn't pick up again until about 9:30. There was a small thunderstorm, too. I hope it doesn't continue until morning. I'd like to go to yoga tomorrow.