Book of the Week:Read it and Eat By: Sarah Gardner

This book combines my two favorite pastimes. This is a quick read.

The author is the founder and publisher of The Literary Gathering a bimonthly newsletter that integrates cooking with reading. She wrote this book as a way to get people to socialize and discuss literature. She discovered that by mingling book club discussions with a meal made for a richer experience.

She dedicated each chapter of the book by month and in each chapter she recommends four books to read. With each book she has created a brief review and a list of discussion questions for you to use. She creatively pairs food to coincide with the book's theme or title. She even threw in four bonus chapters in case the monthly selections were not quite your cuppa tea.

This is a great book for people that want to begin their own book club (reading group) or just have a reason to celebrate a book. The recipes are great, very easy to follow and has reasonable portions to serve a group of eight. So grab a book pull out the pots and pans and have some fun.

Clinics in your local supermarket

I read that there are these new nurse practioner clinics setting up in groceries and discount stores all over to help reduce the need to head to your doctor. The cost is low and wait minimal. Could be an option. But how ofen would it be abused?

Finally get those kids some fruit

If more insurers would invest in programs like KidPower there would be an incredible reduction in the amount of health problems facing Americans. With the new and easily accessible junk food snacks it's hardly a wonder how children haven't gotten any worse. I suppose it took an increase in childhood obesity to finally knock some sense into the world. It's a shame to see the changes in youth. I can remember as a child that I preferred to be outside playing rather than watching tv or playing Atari. Now it's the reverse. Where have we gone wrong as a society?

Book of the Week:Ballet Shoes By: Noel Streatfield

This story of three orphan sisters adopted by a loving a man to be raised by an old fashioned female guardian was a lovely read. The three adopted sisters, all unique in their personality and background are bound together by sisterly love and their determination to put their name in the history books. It is certainly a page turner. The eldest, Pauline wants to become a Shakespearean actress. Petrova, the bright automobile/airplane-obsessed tomboy has very little interest in dancing and performing. The youngest, Posy exudes tremendous skill and absolute self confidence in her destiny to be a dancer.

Enjoyable as it is, it has an obsession with class. It focused on a nursery world of wholesomeness: manners, good clothing, tasteful story books and proper upbringing. The children are constantly being warned about modesty. Being shamed for showing off instead of encouraging the girls to take pride in their skills. Perhaps that aspect is the hardest to overcome in this book.

Stupid Copier

The staff copier is acting up again and I want to scream. When I returned from vacation it was misbehaving and the repairs were supposedly done. So that only compounds my desire to scream.

My co-workers are going bonkers because it has been so unreliable that if it does work we are absolutely shocked. The scanning mechanism is not connecting to our staff drive so there is a minor amount of panic floating about. There are some major orientation publications that need to be completed and so far the copier has managed to eat, literally, a fair amount of the handouts.

Ugh. I'll call the tech again. So far he has been here quickly, usually same day, but I'm sure our luck will run dry. I may need to give him his own cubicle at this rate.

Newspaper joke

Four surgeons are discussing who makes the best kind of patient to operate on. The first says, "I like to see accountant on my operating table because when you open them up, everything inside them is numbered." The second surgeon responds, "Yeah, but you should try electricians! Everything inside them is color coded." The third surgeons says, "No, I really think librarians are the best. Everything inside them is in alphabetical order." But the fourth surgeon shut them all up by saying "You're all wrong. Politicians are the easiest to operate on. There are no guts, no heart, no balls, no brains and no spine; and the head and ass are interchangeable."