25 September 2020

Five Things for Friday / #Friday56 / Book Beginnings on Friday

 Hello and welcome to another Friday! It's a good Friday so far here - I got my new desk and got it put together yesterday. We moved the giant corner desk out of my office (and to hubby's new basement office), so I'm reorganizing my space. I also got my hair did this morning. I'm keeping it in a short pixie now, so getting it cut more frequently, and today I had the front dyed navy blue! Sorry I couldn't get a picture I was pleased with...I'm sure I'll have one eventually. For now you'll have to use your imagination.

I'll get to my five things after my bookish updates. Today I'm joining in with Rose City Reader for Book Beginnings and Freda's Voice for #Friday56. 

The book I'm using this week is Tommy Wallach's Strange Fire


The beginning:
from the Prologue: 
Florian Parks was sitting in the Gantry watchtower, whittling a wooden doll for his little sister, when he first spotted the travelers over the pointed tips of the palisade. He was so surprised that he cut the figurine's nose clean off.

#Friday56:

from page 56:

Clive stepped out from behind a tree just a dozen yards or so upstream. And for once, Clover was grateful that his brother was tall and strong, intimidating even at eighteen. Dominic took a step backward, out of the flow of the stream, muddying it up as he went. 


While at least one of the reviews mentioned that the book had a lot of religious overtones, they're the kind I don't mind so far. I'm almost halfway through and enjoying this book. There are sections about different societies that sound post-apocalyptic. I'm sure I'll find how they overlap soon.



My five things for Friday:

  1. I read a series of tweets talking about how the six-month mark in a traumatic situation (yeah, like now) can be very hard. Add in school stuff at the same time, and it's clear why so many people seem to be reaching a breaking point. And of course just as the kids and I settle into remote learning, our school board this week decided that NEXT week we need to decide whether we want in-person learning, or to continue with virtual. For my middle school daughter, this decision lasts until late January, and they are allowed to change formats at semester change. For elementary school, we have to decide if my son will be in-person or virtual for the rest of his third grade year (not counting of course if there's increased cases and they're all forced to do remote again). 
  2. I saw someone on Facebook recommend apple cider with a shot of kissed caramel vodka. This is a solid drink suggestion. I would recommend it as well. Yum.
  3. As much as I love autumn, I hate that fact that it means cold weather is coming. I'm really appreciating the warm weather we suddenly got again this week.
  4. Who else plays Animal Crossing - New Horizons? I play almost every day, but it's actually my son's island. So all I really do is take care of shaking trees, fishing, catching bugs, and redecorating my awesome house. I've already added all the rooms possible, so now I just move stuff around. I love that fact that stuff still works like it's supposed to. And we were super excited that there's custom graphics for the Biden/Harris campaign (you can add them to your Nintendo account from the official campaign website). I've got an adorable sign in my fake lil yard. :D
  5.  My real yard is a work in progress again too. We dumped most of the flower baskets (except the one that's still alive - I think I'll make sure that one isn't poisonous to the cats and bring it in for the winter). It's time to dig out all the bird feeders and start keeping seed to fill them each day so we can watch out birdie friends til living  things are ready to bloom again.
Hope all is going well for you and yours. Make good choices and stay safe!

5 comments:

Liz Parker said...

That's a hard decision, re: the virtual or in-person learning! I feel like re-evaluating at the end of the semester makes more sense ... ie, you could choose in-person and then there could be a spike in cases, who knows? Hard decision for sure. I think I saw that infographic about the 6 months as well. I definitely didn't think I'd be WFH for six months but it's safer than the office IMO, though I'm glad I still have the office as a choice.

fredamans said...

I'm definitely curious for more!! Sounds like a good one! Happy weekend!

Ashley Sapp said...

Great snippets. My interest is definitely piqued. Thanks for sharing! Have a great week! :)

Rachel said...

When I had my hair cut shorter I got it cut a lot more often too. Would like to see the blue in it. Yesterday I had cider with champagne but I’ve been waiting it with the Carmel vodka. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could skip back to Spring after fall!?

Yvonne said...

These are really good teasers and grab your attention.