CASTAWAY

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Late night Friday, we watched Cast Away with Tom Hanks. Now, I am not normally a Tom Hanks fan. I know he is a creditable actor. His work has won awards, etc. Still, I remember the sitcom, Bosom Buddies, that he participated in early in his career. I realize that the material was fluff, but it did nothing good for my perception of the man.

My problems aside, Hanks carries the main acting burden for Cast Away. His character is sympathetically, if somewhat optimistically drawn. How many of us would have survived one night on a deserted island without so much as a pocket knife. Hanks did give a good performance, both in the physical emulation of setting up housekeeping on his island and the emotional in giving up the relationships that had kept him going throughout his exile. If that's a spoiler, I'm sorry. Y'all had plenty of time to see the movie before I did.

The word of the day for March 1, 2009 is "castaway" Pronunciation: \'kast-ə-,wā\
Function: adjective
Date: 1542
1: thrown away : rejected. 2 a: cast adrift or ashore as a survivor of a shipwreck. b: thrown out or left without friends or resources.



Our quote for the day is from Anne Sexton (1928–1974), U.S. poet. “Doors, Doors, Doors.”:

Castaway, your time is a flat sea that doesn’t stop,
with no new land to make for and no new stories to swap.

;^)

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PANCAKE

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Happy Fat Tuesday, y'all. Or ShroveTuesday or Mardi Gras if you're French or Carnivale if you're just about anything else.

As those of you who have read my prior calendrical musings probably know, Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Vernal Equinox. Tomorrow is the start of Lent, a period of 4o days of fasting, interrupted by Sundays, leading up to Easter. So today you have your last chance to eat up all the meat and fats in the house so you don't accidentally backslide and get found with bacon rind or a quarter-pound of butter in your maw.

Some of us just give up for Lent. Some of us try to figure out if we qualify to pass (pregnant women, folks with diabetes, etc.) on the fasting. Some of us are just glad we belong to denominations that don't insist on fasting. Maybe the Muslims have it right: their fasting at Ramadan only lasts from sunup to sundown. Makes it a lot easier physically for the long haul.

Anyway, there was a race this morning: the annual international competition between the ladies of Olney, England and Liberal, Kansas, USA. The Kansas winner and Overall Champion was Ms. Tasha Gallegos of Liberal.

(See KANSAN WINS 60th PANCAKE RACE)

The race involves running down the street with a skillet in one hand. During the course of the race, the runner has to flip a pancake and catch it in the skillet three times. I don't know if there are Olympic style tryouts, but on the other hand, no one has (so far) been accused of doping-unless you count extra syrup.

The word of the day for February 24, 2009 is "pancake" — Pronunciation: \'pan-,kāk\
Function: noun
Date: 14th century
: a flat cake made of thin batter and cooked (as on a griddle) on both sides.

Our quote for the day is from Antonin Scalia, recalled on his appointment to US Supreme Court, Newsweek 30 Jun 86:

[In a big family] the first child is kind of like the first pancake. If it’s not perfect, that’s okay, there are a lot more coming along.

;^)

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IMPETUS

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Sorting through the last year's paperwork for supporting tax evidence, I ran across last year's Valentine's cards, a ten-year-old check register that had escaped the search and destroy mission I did a couple of years ago and a letter responding to my Christmas letter about Lloyd's circumstances. I did find all the W-2 and 1099 forms and the 1098 forms, although I will have to call the company that holds our second mortgage again. They won't send out a 1098 unless I insist. I have a handful of thank you's from charity and the personal property statements. I'm all set to get started with my taxes, right?

Wrong. Along about October, TurboTax sent out my 2008 disc(s), which I laid aside unopened until needed. Now the TTax package lies somewhere in the flotsom that lines the floor of my computer room. Now I have to sort through the detritus: sort, shred, file and re-pile—at least until I find the discs.

Logically, the room is finite. There cannot be infinite material inside. Yet, I don't seem to be able to clear more than enough space to walk into to room for more than two days at a time. If I had more space elsewhere in the house, I would move everything out (putting it all in logical, logistical piles) install file cabinets and bookshelfs, and then herd everything back in in logical order. Oh to have Mr. Spock as my organizer.
The word of the day for February 21, 2009 is "impetus" — Pronunciation: \'im-pə-təs\
Function: noun
Etymology: Latin, assault, impetus, from impetere to attack, from in- + petere to go to, seek — more at feather
Date: 1641
1 a (1): a driving force : impulse. (2): incentive , stimulus. b: stimulation or encouragement resulting in increased activity. 2: the property possessed by a moving body in virtue of its mass and its motion —used of bodies moving suddenly or violently to indicate the origin and intensity of the motion.

Our quotation is from Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825–1911), U.S. suffragist and rights advocate. From her 1893 speech at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago: “Woman’s Political Future,” as quoted in Black Women in Nineteenth-Century American Life, part 3, by Bert James Loewenberg and Ruth Bogin (1976):

So close is the bond between man and woman that you can not raise one without lifting the other. The world can not move ahead without woman’s sharing in the movement, and to help give a right impetus to that movement is woman’s highest privilege.

;^)

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