Quote From Your Current Reading

[ms_n]

I have a quote to share from a book that I just read. It is a children's novel (9-12) my daughter recommended to me, Esperanza Rising, by Pam Munoz Ryan. This comes at a point in the story where Esperanza is longing for the life she once had and a younger girl is trying to comfort her. In the hustle and bustle of this season, so simple a thing to remember and hope for - the gift of contentment:

"...She turned to the wall, , yearning for the holidays of her past, and repeated what was becoming a nightly ritual of silent tears...
Esperanza stared into the dark. Isabel had nothing, but she also had everything. Esperanza wanted what she had. She wanted so few worries that something as simple as a yarn doll would make her happy."

Happy Holidays!

[Grouch]

Great thread!

Most of the best parts of what I'm currently reading--Strip City by Lily Burana, a memoir of the stripping industry--is unprintable here. However, I did find this passage:

*Stripping takes out of me things that I didn't even realize I had. The near-nudity isn't the problem, or the physical vulnerability, or working well outside the margins of acceptable female behavior. It's the damn neediness: Angry men scowling at me like they can buy me for a dollar, lonely men professing love after a ten-minute chat with the specter of femininity that wafts before them, and confused and desperate men convinced that if only they could get a girl to do what they ask, however outlandish, things will be better somehow. These men don't just hunger for a glimpse of skin, because they could stay home and look at Miss August were that the case. They want some kind of connection, to tap the life in a live, nude girl. And no amount of professional distance on my part can keep that leeching feeling at bay.*

[realtraveller]

"Hank walked to the church window. Each of his steps started at the hip and rolled down his leg to the foot, one muscle at a time."


Simple, straightforward, no over writing. But very effective description.

[kurt_messick]

I've recently re-read one of my favourite snapshot books on monastic life and practice, A View from the Monastery, by Brother Benet Tvedten, of the Blue Cloud Abbey in South Dakota. I read it first when it had just come out two years ago. The last page always makes me think (because I haven't given up the idea of entering a monastery):

The English monk asked the world's Benedictine abbots, 'Is there some way in which monks can escape from the museums in which the secular world prefers to confine them, without betraying what is essential to monastic culture?'

Regardless of what kind of monaster a person enters today--one like our or one like ours used to be--there are matters that need clarification from the beginning. He should be told: If you don't like people, you'll become even more annoyed by them in the monastery. You will not only have to work with people you may find disagreeable, you will have to live with them, too. You cannot walk away from them at the end of the workday.

If you've heard that monks are saints, you'be been told a lie. Like everyone else, we're sinners. You may even be scandalised by some of the things that happen in the monastery.

If you are running away from yourself, you won't escape here.

[murasaki]

I just love the word image in this line:

"...what briars the roses of her affections grew." from The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia by Sir Philip Sidney

The same line might also be in the Old Arcadia by I haven't cross-referenced it.

--naomi

[erik_kosberg]

I finished Norwood by Charles Portis a few hours ago so I guess that I’m not reading it currently any more but here’s a quote from it anyway:

“There were dark pouches under her eyes which an indoor existence and an uncommon amount of sleep did not help much. Things had not worked out well for her. The young planter she thought she was marrying turned out to be a farmer. Her mother got on her nerves. Instead of the gentle Lew Ayres doctor son she had counted on, the Lord had given her a poolroom clown. She claimed descent from the usurper Cromwell and she read a long paper once on her connections at a gathering of Confederate Daughters, all but emptying the ballroom of the Albert Pike Hotel in Little Rock. This was no small feat considering the tolerance level of a group who had sat unprotesting through two days of odes and diaries and recipes for the favorite dishes of General Pat Cleburne. She often managed to leave the impression that she was in Arkansas through some mistake and it was her belief, perhaps true, that only common people had piles.”

[tipu]

An office secretary offers the narrator a pen...

I had already half pulled out my shirt-pocket pen, but not wanting to refuse her offer, I hesitated; at the same time, she saw that I already had a pen, and with an "Oh" began to retract hers from the proferring position; meanwhile I had decided to accept hers and had let go of the one in my pocket, not registering until it was too late that she had withdrawn her offer; she, seeing that I was now beginning to reach for her pen, canceled her retraction, but meanwhile I, processing her earlier corrective movement, had gone back to reaching for my own pen—so we went through a little foilwork that was like the mutual bobbings you exchange with an oncoming pedestrian, as both of you lurch to indicate whether you are going to pass to the right or the left.

— Nicholson Baker, The Mezzanine

[ms_n]

I like this thread if I do say so myself!
I love finding what others are experiencing with and through their reading. Please, keep quoting!

From Teaching Children to Read (a text book by Reutzel and Cooter)

Teachers need to lead their students through four levels of vocabulary knowledge if new content or specialized vocabulary words are to become part of their permanent memory: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Listening vocabulary, the largest of the four vocabularies, is made up of all words people can hear and understand. This includes not only the words we use in our everyday speech but also those words we can understand only when used in context. For instance, while listening to an evening news report, a child in sixth grade may hear about the latest breakthrough in cancer research. Although the youngster may be able to hear and understand the news report, she probably would not be able to reproduce the specialized medical terms used (e.g., carcinomas, metastasis, chemotherapy). Some have speculated that entering first-grade students may have a listening vocabulary of around 20 thousand words! The second level of vocabulary knowledge is called the speaking vocabulary. This consists of words we not only can hear and understand but also can use in our everyday speech. A third level of vocabulary knowledge is called reading vocabulary. These are words we can hear and understand, use as part of our speech communications, and recognize in print. The final level, writing vocabulary, is made up of words we can understand on all these levels, listening, speaking, and reading, and likewise use in our written communications. In teaching new technical vocabulary like that found in typical content readings, a primary goal is to bring students through each of these levels of vocabulary knowledge.

Yes, text books are boring, but I do get excited over it all! Strategies, definitions, and theories - Oh, my!

[tipu]

Just another day at school…

February 1

Well, they stabbed the substitute today. In the back, with a pencil. The paramedics said it was only a flesh wound. She didn’t press any charges, she just went home.

“Who did it!” Mr. Turner howled at them. They were silent. Who in their right mind would say anything? He stomped out. . ..

“Would anyone tell me… why?” I asked, genuinely curious.

“It your fault,” Vanessa grinned.

“My fault!” I laughed incredulously.

“Yes,” explained Selena. “You’re the one who is always telling us, ‘Treat people the way you would like to be treated.’ Well, she told Donna she was fat, and she told Vanessa she was stupid. She ain’t treated us like we like to be treated. So. . .” Her so trailed off by meaning of explanation.

— Esmé Raji Codell, Educating Esmé: Diary of a Teacher's First Year

[ms_n]

[juliette]

From Hardy's The Woodlanders :

The house was rather large for a cottage, and the door, which opened immediately into the living- room, stood ajar, so that a ribbon of light fell through the opening into the dark atmosphere without. Every now and then a moth, decrepit from the late season, would flit for a moment across the out-coming rays and disappear again into the night.


sigh

[kurt_messick]

History is the autobiography of a madman.
- Herzen, Doctor Krupov

as quoted in Reasons for our Rhymes: An Inquiry into the Philosophy of History, by R.A. Herrera

On Windows 2000 member servers and Windows Professional computers, only members of the Administrators and Backup operators group can access the drive_letter$ share. On Windows 2000 domain controllers, members of the Administrators, Backup Operators, and Server Operators group can access this share.
Chapter Seven - Accessing Files and Folders
Sybex MCSE Windows 2000 Server Study Guide

Who knew that such romatic, soft-core porn could sneak its way into seemingly drol and dull technical jargon? Bodice-ripper meets cable-puller, I figure.

[MrsNormanMaine[$]]

"Edema is more easily prevented than treated. Careful exercise, even if it is not more than a short, assisted walk, can be an uncomplicated way to promote the clearance of accumulated fluid. Physical therapy may also be of benefit in this regard. The patient should avoid prolonged sitting. Long autmobile trips or airplane trips should be interrupted to permist brief walks. Care should be taken to avoid restrictive garments, garters, corsets and tight stockings. Even well intensioned support hose can become restrictive tourniquets if not carefully fitted and frequently adjusted. When some edema is unavoidable, take special care to prevent breaks in the patient's skin, which could permit inrection or promote ulceration. The skin overlying areas of edema is unusually fragile and easily subject to breakdown."

From - "Edema of the Legs (Dropsy) in Instructions for Geriatric Patients and Caregivers (2nd edition) by William A. Sodeman Jr.

MNM :p
(Who just can't seem to put this one down...
and who never knew support hose had motivations. )

[conradd]

[list=1][*]Sift the sugar, flour, baking soda, and salt together in a large mixing bowl.[*]In a separate bowl, blend the hot coffee, sour cream, and vegetable oil together with a whisk.[*]With the mixer on low speed, add the coffee mixture in a stream to the dry ingredients and mix until blended, about 35 seconds. Stop the mixer to scrape the bowl several times with a rubber spatula.[*]Add the eggs one at a time and mix on medium-low speed after each addition until smooth, about 15 seconds. Scrape the bowl each time. Add the chocolate and mix until the batter is uniform in color, about 10 seconds more.[/list=1]

From "Rosies Famous Chocolate Sour-Cream Cake Layers" from Rosie's All-Butter Fresh Cream Sugar-Packed No Holds Barred Baking Book by Judy Rosenburg

Deb
thinking that Shane will be one happy kid when he gets home from school and sees this cake

[Dani257]

Ooh, I LOVE Esme!!

He was walking along confidently, stepping down off the curb as any sensible dog would, when she had a fit of some kind. Yank went the leash, half choking him.

From Stars Come Out Within, the autobiograhy of Jean Little

[ms_n]

Diversity is fun!

[tipu]

But man's instinctive desire for moral perfection is too well ingrained in his genetic structure to be crushed by the gaucheries of myth and "religion." There will always be a morality implicit in human behavior, independent of the doctrines that pretend to explain it. Organized society would be impossible without a preponderance of citizens who are moral. With nonbelievers as well as with believers, it is always quite obvious that to torture, to degrade, and to exploit fellow human beings is immoral, and men of good will are forever fighting to see that such immorality does not ber fruit. Lying, cheating, slandering, etc., are generally deplored. The presence or absence of a God or the religions that postulate gods does not change what should and what should not be considered morality. Human kindness will always be a good thing, God or no God. Attributing morality to the propensities of some kind of Deity is nothing more than quibbling. Here we have an "it is so because it is so," kind of pseudoreasoning.

— Chester Dolan, Blind Faith
*

[tipu]

Can frail, clumsy words describe what that library meant to me? It was at once an Arabian palace, a rocket ship, a time machine—a window on Creation! What I knew of life on Earth—of all life outside the confines of our Zoo—I learned from two sources: my mother’s starry sagas of peace and love on Ocean Parkway; and those blessed things called books.

For weeks at a time I’d become a fetus in the library’s dusty womb, wandering the aisles, pondering the choices, reading, reading, READING until my aching eyes cried: “Stop!” But how could I stop? There was still so much to experience!

High Adventure! Tragic Love Affairs! Unsullied Ideals! I was dizzy with the joy of discovery; page and print, creator and creation, all dancing together in my mind’s eye. And, O!—what dancers they were: Homer, Cervantes, Bradbury and Baum; Shelley, Keats, Byron and Blake; the Brontes, the Brownings, the Three Musketeers; Peter Pan and Wendy, Siddartha and Govinda; Prince Myshkin, King Richard, and Captain Blood!

— J. De Matteis, writer | Jon Muth, illustrator, Moonshadow #1 (Epic Comics, March 1985)

[Grouch]

The book you are holding in your two hands right now--assuming that you are, in fact, holding this book, and that you have only two hands--is one of two books in the world that will show you the difference between the word "nervous" and the word "anxious." The other book, of course, is the dictionary, and if I were you I would read that book instead.

Like this book, the dictionary shows you that the word "nervous" means "worried about something"--you might feel nervous, for instance, if you were served prune ice cream for dessert, because you would be worried that it would taste awful--whereas the word "anxious" means "troubled by disturbing suspense," which you might feel if you were served a live alligator for dessert, because you would be troubled by the disturbing suspense about whether you would eat your dessert or it would eat you. But unlike this book, the dictionary also discusses words that are far more pleasant to contemplate. The word "bubble" is in the dictionary, for instance, as is the word "peacock," the word "vacation," and the words "the" "author's" "execution" "has" "been" "cancelled," which make up a sentence that is always pleasant to hear.

--The Ersatz Elevator by Lemony Snicket (the opening two paragraphs)

[tipu]

Some advice i can't seem to follow very well...

"When people do nice things, Sexton, you should always say thank you. It makes life an awful lot easier."
*
— Gaiman | Bachalo | Buckingham | McKean | Klein, Death, The High Cost of Living
*

[tipu]

"We have so many requests for other items," Orddu said. "Seven-league boots, cloaks of invisibility, and such great nonsense. For wisdom, practically none. Yet whoever owns this book shall have all that and more, if he likes. For the odd thing about wisdom is the more you use it the more it grows; and the more you share, the more you gain. You'd be amazed how few understand that. If they did, I suppose, they wouldn't need the book in the first place."

"Do you give this to me?" Dallben asked. "A treasure greater than all treasures?"

Orddu hesitated. "Give? Only in a manner of speaking. If you know us as well as you say you do, then you also know that we don't exactly give anything. Put it this way: We shall let you take that heavy, dusty old book if that's what you truly want. Again, be warned: The greater the treasure, the greater the cost. Nothing is given for nothing; not in the Marshes of Morva—or anyplace else, for the matter of that."

"Even so," Dallben replied, "this book is my choice."

— Lloyd Alexander, The Foundling and Other Tales of Prydain