Fernando took these pics as I was packing up the Christmas tree, also known as Minion's Favorite Cat Toy.
"Betrayal!"
"J'accuse!"
She decides to stage a sit-in.
"Shh hush. I love you Christmas tree."
nom nom nom
"I love you so."
At this point she appeared to have handcuffed herself to the tree.
________
THEME: Who Says There's No Sleep For the Wickeds?
(all you need is a comfy nap spot)
________
Trying to sneak up on Haley
Loo loo just sleeping here...
...raaaaw just streeetchiiiing...
...loo loo just -- F*CK OFF! --
_____
THEME: There's No Schnoogle Like a Daddy Schnoogle
__________
Saturday afternoon...
...even winter sunshine brings out latent dreams of the Serengeti.
I thought Minion's most intense Cake Face was reserved for when she sees Haley. But having only got her last August, I'd never seen her "the return of the first birds after winter" face. Woah là. It's going to be a struggle to keep the baby birds that like to practice flying to our balcony safe this spring.
Until I again have a regular income we have gone into Supa Careful Monies Mode. It's not too difficult. When I was in school I worked part-time, and Fernando's position was a little less than full-time, so we've always tried to live at a lower standard of living. We don't own a home or a car and schooling in Quebec for residents is unbelievable inexpensive, and I had a bit of monies from my grandfather, and my parents sometimes sent nice gifties--so we've never gone into "good debt." And we pay off the credit card every month, so we have no other type of debt either. But I want to keep it that way!
In January I finally knuckled down and hauled out the half-finished budget I'd worked on earlier in the year, and with Gail Vaz-Oxlade's tools I finished it up. Fernando wanted to go on her jar system, and he chose out spice jars for it. Aren't they cute? Don't bother robbing us, you'll be very very disappointed at our weekly spending monies. And half the jars have fake money because I mostly spend online. So I made up little "Mabel dollars." Whenever I buy something online I withdraw Mabel dollars from my jar so that I'm conscious of SPENDING. It's worked so well that I've become a cheapskate. I like seeing my little fake dollars accumulate.
I also made little I.O.U. dollars cause I know the little Fernando sometimes likes to ahem borrow ahead of himself. And me too sometimes, for gift items.
Anyway. One way Fernando has helped cut money is to let me make lunches for him, and to come home for supper instead of eating at work. (He has a very physical job, so he was often so tired he preferred to stay there and relax and eat.) Which means I get to use all my bento boxes and rume bags! Weeee!
Fernando likes 1 jelly bean.
I purposely didn't tidy my bento drawer for you. Here it is in its messy glory. monotone lunch slow and healthy time.
lunch bags
Shakespeare bottle
The other thing I did this year was Family Calendar on the Cheap! I like calendars that come with stickers and stuff, but I used to work somewhere with a staff discount. No more! So this year I bought a dollar store calendar...
attached it to the pocket from last year's calendar, where I can keep handy notes and stuff...
gathered up all the unused stickers from my last three calendars...
In other news... Minion just fell off the heater in her sleep... again... . Luckily I have really long, very thick curtains. Too long, cause I was too lazy to trim the ends, so they drag on the ground. Instead hitting the hardwood floor, she sort of rolls through the curtains and gets deposited in a startling but gentle thump.
I wanted to knock a book off my backburner file, so I returned to this one. Here's the longer review I sent to The Betties Blog About Books. Or, for your viewing pleasure, you can just skip to the end and watch the video of the Nigerian scammers performing the Monty Python skit about the dead parrot. Just because it's funny.
I Do Not Come to You By Chance - by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani
It's hard to find English language fiction about sub-Saharan Africa, by authors who were born and still live there, so this book is a good find for this reason alone. The book takes place in Nwaubani's home town and the areas where she's lived.
I Do Not Come to You by Chance (I love the title) is about Kingsley, a young man from educated but poor parents, who can't find a job even with his university degree. As the family falls deeper into poverty, he finally ends up working "419" scams--those famous Nigerian emails we've all received--and naturally the book's tension hinges on both his moral dilemma of being a scammer, and the inherent danger of the activity.
While the author isn't very good at descriptive writing--I didn't get that "Ooh I want to see Nigeria!" feeling--she's great at everyday detail. I learned a lot about daily life (public transportation, placing a long distance call, education, dating, village vs city life, names, money, etc.) I think if you were Nigerian you wouldn't be bored/feel like she was writing for foreigners, but as a foreigner I was able to learn a ton about life in Nigeria. Super super interesting. And of course I learned about 419s. Nwaubani's done her research, and I never found the topic tiresome. The variety of scams being run is simultaneously fascinating, sad, creative, and funny. And I had to love the gangsters with their names like Cash Daddy and Protocol Officer and World Bank.
In the beginning I put this book aside for several weeks, because the start is slow. She's carefully trying to establish Kingsley's character, and why and how he would end up in 419s, but I think she could have shortened the front end of the book, and elaborated a bit in some other areas. For example, we don't witness his actual transition into scamming at all--it's a fait accompli when we hit Part II of the book. And towards the end, when we reach the inevitable point of having to choose between his new criminal lifestyle, or returning to the poor and honest path chosen for him by his parents, the choice would have felt more difficult if (a) the author had better maintained his connection with his mother, and (b) if the romance in the latter part of the book had been introduced earlier, and handled differently. The book's first romance is really heartbreaking, and this later romance could have had that potential.
On the plus side, Nwaubani's writing is really entertaining. The last book I read was also by a first time author, and he too was attempting to write a humor book about his nation (Canada); and though he was obsessed with proper English (he admits to this obsession) I found his similes and descriptions unoriginal and long-winded. Nwaubani, on the other hand, uses words in odd ways, and her writing is a bit sloppy; yet her similes and metaphors were creative, and her descriptions were funny. I don't have any quotes 'cause I can't underline on my ereader, but here's a good one someone posted:
"Then came my father’s diagnosis. For a poorly paid civil servant to get caught up in an affliction like diabetes was the very height of ambitious misfortune."
Also, I loved Kings. His character arc was realistic, he was a good kid, and I was rooting for him. I was curious to see how Nwaubani would choose to end the book, and I'm giving the book four stars solely on the basis on the last chapter (epilogue). It was perfect. It is so so SO rare to find that perfect of a last chapter. It was tight, it was funny, it answered all my questions, and it was satisfying.
The huge book tote I bought on my last day at my last job (I worked at a large format bookstore, where we sold a lot of gift items.) I'd had my eye on it for awhile cause of the pretty lettering.
