Tom Clancy’s Polter-Ghost

February 16, 2022February 16, 2022 / Diane Henders / 25 Comments

I’ve never believed in the occult before, but I may have to change my tune. Because I’m pretty sure I’m being haunted by Tom Clancy’s ghost.

Actually, not just haunted. Poltergeisted. (Poltergeised?)

It started simply enough: Hubby is a Tom Clancy fan. And Hubby’s favourite reading spot is on our bed.

About a month ago I was blissfully asleep when a sudden loud noise catapulted me to wild-eyed wakefulness. It sounded as though somebody had smashed in our bedroom door with an axe. This is not a sound one wants to hear at three o’clock in the morning.

Hubby roused, too; although not as dramatically as I did. “It’s just my book.” He retrieved Clancy’s gigantic tome from the floor. “It fell off the night table.”

He promptly went back to sleep. I took about ten minutes to gradually disengage my fingernails from the ceiling before dropping back into bed and lying awake for the next hour, waiting for my heart rate to stabilize.

Several nights later, it happened again. This time it wasn’t quite so traumatic because I was pretty sure what had happened; but nevertheless I had a serious conversation with Hubby about stabilizing the damn book before we went to sleep. A few days later he finished it, so I assumed that would be the end of its nocturnal antics.

Fast-forward to a few nights ago. I was blissfully asleep when… BANG! I bolted upright and switched on the lamp, my heart jackhammering my ribs.

No crazed axe-murderer. Hubby didn’t even wake up, despite my violent thrashing and subsequent flooding of the bedroom with light.

After staring around the silent bedroom for a few minutes, I eased myself back onto the pillow and switched off the light. Hubby slept on. Maybe I’d dreamed the loud noise? Was I losing what little sanity I still retained? Eventually, I managed to ease back into a fitful doze.

In the morning, Hubby woke bright-eyed and bushy-tailed while I dragged my carcass out of bed, groaning. When he asked why I was so tired, I explained about the loud noise.

“I can’t figure out what it was,” I complained. “Sometimes the heating ducts click and bang, but this seemed so much louder.”

Hubby picked up the giant Tom Clancy book from the floor. “I guess this must have fallen again.”

Nobody had touched that damn book for weeks. I know we didn’t have an earthquake, and it’s highly suspicious that the sound woke me, but not Hubby. There’s only one explanation: Tom Clancy has returned from beyond the grave to mess with me.

What did I ever do to him? More to the point, what can I do to make him move on? Should I start reading frothy romances until his shade flees screaming?

Any suggestions?

Book 17 update: I made it Chapter 20 this week! Aydan’s cover has been irreparably blown, and now she has to find out who spilled the beans and how many assassins are coming for her.

When Neurons Misfire

March 13, 2019March 13, 2019 / Diane Henders / 36 Comments

So, the good news is that Book 14: “Friends In Spy Places” is finished and is now available for pre-order at all retailers, hooray! (Click here for retailer links.)

The bad news is that my brain has been sucked dry, wrung out, sent through a vigorous spin-cycle, and finally pinned onto a sagging clothesline in my cranium, where’s flapping uselessly in the breeze that’s whistling through my ears.

And it’s still in better shape than Hubby’s.

Unfortunately, that’s not a joke. He slipped and fell on some ice Sunday afternoon and is now the not-so-proud owner of a concussion, some bruises and sore muscles, and a nasty scalp laceration. Fortunately his CT scan was clear and he’ll be fine, but that little adventure wasn’t kind to his brain or mine.

Spending a tense 23 hours in the emergency room would have been enough excitement for me, but I also volunteer as the webmaster for our local Rhododendron Society. So on top of my usual post-book-release brain drain, ER stress, and sleep deprivation, I had a gruelling 4-hour meeting yesterday afternoon. My poor little neurons aren’t even capable of firing anymore — at this point they’re only twitching feebly.

You’d think that might cause some creative (or at least unusual) thoughts, but the only thing that occurs to me is this:

There must have been a big sale on beans around here, because I’ve never before been subjected to so much of other people’s flatulence. The last four days have been a veritable fartnado. My nose has been assailed at a lecture, at the hospital, in a grocery store lineup, you name it. It’s been so frequent that I’m seriously beginning to wonder if I’m actually the culprit and I’ve just been too distracted to notice that I’m doing the dastardly deed.

Also, I learned a new technical term this week. I had attended a lecture on mosses which included a field trip at the park, and someone asked our expert about the finely-textured bright green stuff growing on the trees from about 18″ on down. When he began, “We call that the ‘DPZ’”, we all leaned in to hear his explanation. “Yes,” he went on sagely. “That’s the Dog Pee Zone, and the green stuff is algae, not moss.”

So apparently toilet humour is the best I can do for this week. Maybe next week will be better…

*strums lips and rocks back and forth, humming quietly*

Crap-Shooting

March 6, 2019March 6, 2019 / Diane Henders / 38 Comments

The other day I got a letter from my life insurance company, and the first sentence was a friendly “We hope you’re enjoying the benefits of your policy.”

I thought, “Oh, that’s nice…”

Then I realized that in order to ‘enjoy the benefits’ of a life insurance policy, I’d have to die. Exactly what were they trying to say there?

I’m ambivalent about insurance anyway. I’ve always considered myself an optimist, but buying insurance means I’m basically betting that something bad is going to happen to me. The insurance companies (the true optimists, apparently) are betting that everything’s going to be fine. This completely messes up my worldview.

I won’t get started about how insurance companies stubbornly pretend everything is still fine even after you submit a claim. That’s a different rant, but I will say this: If you want the most comprehensive list of weasel-words ever compiled, take a look at the wording of an insurance policy.

But I suppose policy wordings aren’t actually that much different than playing poker: The rules are set out before the cards are dealt, and you can ante up if you want. I’d just feel better about the whole thing if it wasn’t my own wellbeing in the pot.

If I’d saved up all the money I’d spent (and will spend in the future) on insurance, I wouldn’t need the insurance. But I don’t dare cancel it, because I haven’t saved up all that money. And with Murphy and his Law breathing down my neck, I just know that if I cancelled, I’d somehow manage to launch my vehicle into the middle of our living room the very next day, destroying the car and house and leaving myself disabled with huge medical bills. And I’d probably run over somebody in the process, so I’d get sued into the bargain.

Hmm. Maybe I’m not as much of an optimist as I thought.

Anyhow, insurance might be a crapshoot, but here’s a sure thing: We have a cover and release date for Book 14!

The big day is Wednesday, March 27, and pre-orders should be available by this weekend. (If you’ve signed up for my New Book Notification list, you’ll get an email with all the purchasing links.)

Here’s the big reveal:

Secret agent Aydan Kelly’s supposedly-dead mother Nora has resurfaced after thirty years, and the chain of command assigns Aydan to investigate her for treason. With only two weeks before Nora leaves the country under diplomatic immunity, Aydan struggles to piece together her mother’s questionable past.

Two days into Aydan’s investigation Nora announces she’s leaving early, and Aydan’s director gives her an ultimatum: Solve the case before Nora escapes, or face imprisonment for dereliction of duty. Meanwhile, an unknown enemy is stalking Aydan’s friends and the threats are escalating.

When time runs out and prison walls loom, claustrophobic Aydan must make an unthinkable choice: Sacrifice her friends, or lose her freedom forever.

Okay, I Admit It…

August 30, 2017August 30, 2017 / Diane Henders / 54 Comments

Hi, my name is Diane and I’m a bookaholic.

My addiction has serious effects on my daily life. I always need to have a book within reach, and I get anxious if my To-Be-Read pile dwindles to fewer than ten books.

Oh, I pretend to be “only a social reader”. I pretend I could put down that book once I’ve started it. Sometimes I even succeed; but then all I can think of is getting back to the book. I lie awake in bed, staring at the ceiling and fighting the book’s siren call. Sometimes I manage to fall asleep. More often I slip out of bed and finish reading in the dark and secret hours of the night.

Whenever I finish a book, I feel a lessening of the need… but only until I glimpse the next book. Then the urge is stronger than ever.

I fight it, to no avail.

“Only one per day,” I promise myself. “That’s normal, right? That’s only social reading… okay, two books. Two per day, that’s still okay. I can do a full day’s work, have an early supper, and if I start reading by six I can be in bed by eleven. Midnight at the latest.”

But then I find a series.

Soon I’m reading three or four books a day, immersed in the guilty pleasure. Meals go uncooked; laundry undone. I forget important appointments and have to find excuses for why I didn’t show up at my accountant’s or dentist’s or doctor’s office.

I feel ashamed. Other people can lay down their books. Some people only read a few pages before bed and then stop. Why can’t I do that?

Because I’m a bookaholic, that’s why. An addict.

And no, I don’t want a 12-step program, thank you very much. Just back away and let me read, and nobody will get hurt.

The other day I finished a book and went to look for Hubby in the workshop, but he was nowhere to be found. I checked the garage, too. Nada.

I’d seen him leave, so I wandered around outside for a while but I still couldn’t find him. When I went back into the house, there he was.

“When did you sneak in?” I demanded. “I was looking for you outside.”

He gave me an ‘are-you-nuts?’ look. “I walked right by you twenty minutes ago. I couldn’t have been more than six feet away. You were reading.”

“Oh.”

He laughed. “We need to rig up a cattle prod connected to a timer, to launch you out of that chair when it’s time to stop reading.”

“No,” I disagreed, with perhaps a hint of menace. “That’d only piss me off.”

“Okay, how about an electric-shock cushion hooked up to one of those alarm clocks that comes on gradually? It would start with a little tingle and then build up until you noticed it.”

“Um, no. I’ve had that TENS electrical treatment for physiotherapy. If you turn it up gradually you get used to it. I’d just end up getting slowly electrocuted.”

“No problem; we’ll use a current-limiter.” Hubby grinned. “This could work.”

But I’m not convinced…

Marvin Goes To The Library

April 26, 2017October 2, 2018 / Diane Henders / 34 Comments

Remember Marvin, the desperately depressed robot from Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy?

Well, I just witnessed an interaction with a real life “Marvin” (or perhaps “Mavis”, since she was female).

I was in the library avoiding the chaos of the house construction to work on Book 12, when an elderly lady came in accompanied by a younger woman. It was unclear whether the younger woman was her daughter or merely a hapless stand-in, but in any case their mission was to get some audiobooks for “Mavis” (the older woman).

Mavis was blessed with one of those voices that is perfectly pitched to carry with maximum efficiency – quite an attractive voice, but very… audible. And she had one of those dry British accents: the kind where you suspect the speaker is making fun of you but you can’t respond in kind because you’re not certain.

So I couldn’t help overhearing.

It started as soon as Mavis came in the door: “My daughter got me a bunch of books but they’re all science fiction and I hate science fiction.”

I missed the first bit of the exchange because I didn’t immediately recognize the comedic value, but here’s a transcript of the conversation after I started paying attention:

Daughter: “…How about Robert Ludlum?”

Mavis: “I don’t like Robert Ludlum – I never understood the Bourne thing.”

Daughter: “How about Danielle Steele or Debbie Macomber?”

Mavis: “I don’t like girly books.”

Daughter: *Reads off a title, something about joy*

Mavis: “I don’t fancy that; I don’t have any of my own.”

Daughter: *reads off another title: Ten Steps To (something)*

Mavis: “Well, I don’t believe in that.”

Daughter: *reads off *A doctor’s guide to (something)*

Mavis: “Pooh. It’s too late for me.”

Daughter: “This one’s about Zimbabwe…”

Mavis: “Oh, no, I don’t want to read that.”

Daughter: “Well, do you have any authors that you’re interested in?”

Mavis: “No, not really.”

Daughter: “Do you like Shakespeare?”

Mavis: “No.”

Daughter: “This one’s about the Persian war…”

Mavis: “I don’t like old stuff like that.”

Daughter: “How about…”

Mavis: “Are those scary? I don’t like scary stuff.”

Daughter: You said you like biographies; here’s one about Oprah…”

Mavis: “I don’t like Oprah.”

Daughter: “Here’s Marley and Me; it’s about a dog…”

Mavis: “I’m not into dogs.”

Daughter: “Would you like this one?”

Mavis: “No, probably not. Well, I’ll take it anyway. I’m getting tired.”

Daughter: “Here’s a book on end of life…”

Mavis: “Oh, good, maybe it’ll tell me how to end it.”

I fully expected her to moan, “Oh, what’s the use?” in Marvin’s gloomy tones.

And then…

Super-Librarian to the rescue! In only a few short minutes, the brilliant middle-aged librarian determined Mavis’s interests and loaded her up with biographies of Katharine Hepburn and Steve Martin, and an account of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. Mavis brightened visibly.

As they moved toward the checkout counter, Mavis’s voice receded: “You know, I enjoy biographies. I liked the Schwarzenegger one.”

Librarian: “You like Schwarzenegger?”

Mavis: “Oh, yes!”

So, just in case there was any doubt… librarians rock. But Mavis’s over-the-top gloom and doom gave me my chuckle for the day!

P.S. If I ever get that negative, please remind me of Mavis – it’s sure to make me laugh.

The Scariest Word: ‘Oops!’

July 29, 2015 / Diane Henders / 41 Comments

A couple of weeks ago I was scooping ice cream out of a one-gallon pail when my hand slipped and a gob of ice cream hurtled across the kitchen to land on the floor. Not surprisingly, I yelped, “Whoa! Shit!”

Hubby looked over at the scene of the crime and said, “You know, ‘shit’ is one of those words you just never want to hear coming from the kitchen.”

That’s very true. But after considering it for a while, I think ‘oops!’ is probably the scariest word on the planet. For instance, here are just a few of the times and places you really, really don’t want to hear anybody say ‘Oops’:

In the hairdresser’s chair
In the operating room
At the accountant’s office
At the lawyer’s office
Any time condoms or birth control pills are involved
In answer to the question, “You remember I’m allergic to (fill in the blank), right?”
When checking in for a flight/hotel/rental car
At the bank
In the dentist’s chair

The list (and the potential for scary situations) is virtually endless, but if you’re lucky ‘oops’ isn’t always disastrous. I emitted a benign ‘oops’ a few days later. It was quickly followed by a facepalm, but it made me laugh because it was such a quintessentially Canadian mistake. Here’s what happened:

It’s been an unseasonably hot summer here in Calgary, and Hubby and I were driving to our garden outside the city. We had a plastic gas-can in the trunk to fuel the rototiller, and the fumes were strong (we discovered later the can was leaking, but that’s another story).

Anyway, I rolled the window down.

After a few miles, I thought to myself, “Why is it getting so warm in here?”

Uh, DUH! *facepalm*

It’s hot outside. You’re letting the air conditioning out and the hot air in, dummy.

You can tell I’m from Canada, where we always expect it to be colder outside than inside.

* * *

But that’s enough about words you don’t want to hear. Here are some words you do want to hear (at least those of you who are waiting for Book 10 to come out):

The beta readers are hard at work and I’m well into my first round of edits. And… We have a cover and blurb! (These aren’t finalized, so if you spot any ‘oopses’, please let me know.)

Bookkeeper-turned-secret-agent Aydan Kelly has barely begun to relax after her last mission when a shotgun-wielding man kicks in the front door of her country home. She doesn’t recognize the would-be assassin, so who hired him and why?

As evidence mounts against her abrasive co-worker, Aydan begins a deadly game of cat and mouse with herself as bait. If her suspicions are correct, the Department’s security has been breached and no one is safe.

With the lives of her dearest friends at risk as well as her own, Aydan must stop her unknown enemy before the next assassin succeeds.

More good news: I can now set up pre-orders, and all retailers will release the book on the same day. Pre-orders for Spy Away Home should be active in another couple of weeks (if you’ve signed up on my New Release mailing list, you’ll get an email when the pre-order pages go live), and it looks as though the final release date will be at the end of August. I’ll keep you posted with more details as I get them confirmed.

If you’d like to have a say in which day Spy Away Home gets released, please vote in the poll below. Thanks for your help!

Scrotums Rule! …Or not.

July 1, 2015 / Diane Henders / 46 Comments

Last week I mentioned that I hadn’t misread anything in a long while. Clearly that statement tempted fate, and fate was quick to retaliate.

To wit: There was a lot of buzz in the news this past week about the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling on marriage equality, and it seems most American journalists are fond of acronyms. It took me a while to figure out that SCOTUS stands for Supreme Court Of The United States; probably because I read the acronym as ‘SCROTUMS’.

You can imagine my reaction when I read ‘SCROTUMS rules in gay marriage!’

‘Scrotums rules’? Did the new marriage ruling specify what constituted acceptable male equipment? That led me to wonder exactly what the specifications were, and who enforced the ruling. Were there inspections? Measurements? Wait, let me get my calipers…

Or, (I speculated) maybe they actually meant ‘scrotums rule!’, implying that the marriage of two men was superior to any other combination. Like some X-rated version of poker: “Ha! A pair of scrotums beats a pair of vaginas! Pay up, loser!”

Fortunately I realized I’d misread SCOTUS before I could go too far down that path, but I must say it was an interesting trip as far as it went.

And apparently fate was determined to teach me a lesson, because that was only the first of many.

I read ‘…the fourth grade class decided to get pissed as a civics lesson’, but at second glance it was actually ‘get a bill passed’. Technicalities…

Next up was an email that offered me a seminar titled ‘Creating Flatulence’. I couldn’t figure out how it constituted a business opportunity, but I was completely sold on the entertainment potential. Unfortunately, it turned out they were only offering to teach me how to create ‘Affluence’, with an ornate drop-cap on the first letter. So I guess I’ll have to stick with beans, beer, and cabbage for all my flatulence needs.

And apparently business development was on the spammers’ minds this week, because they also offered me a ‘Self-Important Training Program’ and a chance to ‘Thrive by Insult’ (which seemed like quite a useful and practical course). Much to my disappointment, though, it was merely ‘Thrive by Intuit’ and a ‘Self-Employment Training Program’.

Next came this nugget of wisdom: ‘Along with great taste, beetles have health benefits and they’re low in calories, too’. I’ve already made my position clear on the consumption of beetles, but I couldn’t deny my morbid curiosity. Were they offering recipes? Dung Beetle Pilaf? Crispy Sriracha Weevils? When I clicked on the link, though, it turned out they were recommending beets, not beetles. I wasn’t sure whether to be disappointed or relieved.

And my week was complete when my favorite automotive website chimed in with the headline ‘Peeing Under The Hood’. Even though my garage is well-stocked, I was pretty sure I lacked the necessary tool to successfully complete that endeavor. But it was okay – it turned out we were only ‘Peeking’ under the hood.

I’ve been waiting with bated breath, but apparently fate has been satisfied by completing the circle from scrotums to inappropriate peeing. No other gems have revealed themselves, but I know better than to get smug about it.

Know any good beetle recipes?

Beware: Killer Raisins

November 5, 2014 / Diane Henders / 33 Comments

By now everybody knows I suffer from what I prefer to call ‘attention-deficit dyslexia’ (because it sounds better than ‘I read too fast and my twisted brain spits out weird stuff’).

That’s been happening frequently of late, probably because I’ve been stoned to the eyeballs on muscle relaxants and my brain function has slowed to the speed of a crippled snail on downers. I thought being stoned would be more fun than this, but at least my misreading has kept me entertained.

You may have come to expect my misreads to be of the off-colour variety, but apparently my sexlexia is (mostly) under control these days. Only a couple of my latest finds fall into that category: I read ‘Last time for a Night Screw’ instead of ‘Last time for a Night Crew’ and ‘Elevate the status of old spanky’ when it actually said ‘Elevate the status of an old standby’. (I’m not even going to speculate as to who or what ‘old spanky’ might be. Sometimes the nobility of my restraint astounds me.)

Then this inspirational title gave me pause: ‘Ambulance doesn’t follow giving until giving becomes its own reward’. I’ve heard of ambulance-chasers, but that seemed to be carrying things a bit too far.

The title actually read ‘Abundance’, not ‘Ambulance’, but even with the correct wording I’m not sure how to interpret that headline. At least I don’t have to look over my shoulder for an ambulance the next time I donate to a cause.

Apparently I have a mental block against the word ‘plan’, because I read it wrong in two separate headlines within a day. First I read ‘you need a pun’, and then ‘7 signs you need a gun’.

Both those articles would have been much more entertaining if they’d explained why I needed puns and guns instead of plans, but I guess that’s too much to hope for in your average business magazine. (Though now in my drug-induced haze I’m imagining trade journals like Clown World and Assassins Weekly. Or better yet, guns and puns together in The Assassin Clown’s Handbook.)

Standing in line at the supermarket, I did a double-take when I glanced at one of the tabloid headlines and saw ‘Killed By Raisins’. At least I thought that’s what it said. When I looked more closely at it, I was disappointed to discover that it actually said ‘Raised By Killers’. I was totally bass ackwards on that one.

And speaking of food, I got a giggle out of one of the invitations from my Meetup group. It announced ‘A waistline is available for Steak Night’. Padding somebody else’s waistline instead of my own seemed like an excellent idea, but it was too good to be true. In fact the only thing available for Steak Night was a waitlist.

After that spate of misinterpretation, I barely blinked at the spam email that mentioned ‘colorectal feathers’. I re-read it, fully expecting to find it said something else. But no; this time it wasn’t my eyes playing tricks on me. It actually said ‘colorectal feathers’.

The mental image cracked me up. No matter how I tried, I couldn’t help picturing a guy with a gaily coloured feather duster stuck up where the sun don’t shine.

My back is much better and I’m looking forward to ditching the drugs soon, but at least I got a laugh from killer raisins and poop-chute plumage.

Any other ‘creative readers’ out there?

Snake And Mayonnaise

January 29, 2014 / Diane Henders / 34 Comments

Yes, that title does actually read ‘Snake And Mayonnaise’. That’s what I thought I saw on a poster not long ago.

You guessed it – I’ve been misreading words as usual.

It turned out the poster was actually advertising the movie ‘Snake and Mongoo$e’, but snake & mayo sounded more appetizing. (I was hungry at the time.) I’ve had rattlesnake fondue and it was tasty, so I was willing to give snake & mayo a try. I thought maybe it would be like a lobster roll. Yum.

Or not.

Speaking of eating, I did a double-take a few weeks ago when Hubby and I were shopping for new cutlery. I didn’t realize Lagostina made flatware called ‘Enema’. It sounded… uncomfortable. Fortunately, the flowing script on the box actually spelled out ‘Enigma’, but we bought a different brand just in case.

And my mind must have been in that… er… area, because a few days later, I saw a Facebook status that read ‘I just pooped in Safeway’. (Safeway is a supermarket chain here in Canada.) I was recoiling in disgust when I realized it really said ‘popped into Safeway’. Whew.

Also on Facebook, I came to a screeching halt when I read the status of one of my guy friends: ‘I can’t believe I’m following a live blog about an erection’.

I couldn’t believe it either. In the first place, who live-blogs about their erection? Wait, no! Don’t answer that! I don’t even want to know…

Anyway, it turned out the word in question was ‘election’, so that was a relief.

In advertising news, I discovered the headline ‘Volkswagen takes big swing with Golf Rodent’. I realize car manufacturers must be struggling to find names for their new models, but ‘Rodent’ was one I never thought I’d see.

And I still haven’t. The headline was ‘Volkswagen takes big swing with Golf R debut’. But you know? I’d totally buy a Volkswagen Rodent. Perfect for scurrying through traffic and squeezing into tight spaces…

Speaking of advertising, I got all excited when I discovered an ad for ‘Vicious Women Magazine International’. Now that sounds like my kinda mag!

But… no, not so much. Turned out it was ‘Virtuous Women Magazine’, a religious publication written “…to encourage young ladies to embrace their calling of becoming virtuous women and daughters polished after the similitude of a palace”. It scared the shit out of me, but I’m sure lots of young ladies (or more likely their parents) find value in it. Different strokes…

Then I thought I’d found an ideal reader for Vicious Women Magazine, if there was such a publication. The young woman in question was wearing a T-shirt that proclaimed, “Kiss me, I’m a monster”. I was chuckling and wondering where I could buy one when I took a second look and realized the T-shirt said ‘modster’, not ‘monster’.

I didn’t know what a modster was, so I googled it. And even then, I wasn’t sure. There’s a Modster site that offers fashion advice; but the Urban Dictionary says a modster is “An asshole hipster. Usually someone who ruins the vibe at a good bar.”

I have no discernible fashion sense and I like to think I’m congenial company at the bar, so I guess I won’t buy that T-shirt after all.

But I’m still willing to try snake & mayo. And if they ever release a car named the Rodent, I’ll be first in line!

* * *

Belly-dancing update: We learned some new moves this week. Or rather, the instructor introduced some new moves, which is not exactly the same thing. One of them was the ¾ shimmy: shaking our hips in ¾ time while walking. Ever heard of St. Vitus’s Dance? Yeah, that’s how I looked. I nearly dislocated my butt.

I tried a memory technique to remember the names of the new moves, and it worked really well. “Umi” refers to a circling movement of the hips that includes a suggestive pelvic tilt. That move became “do-me” in my mind, and I’ll never forget it now. But I don’t think I’ll share that particular mnemonic with the rest of the class…

What My Library Says

October 16, 2013 / Diane Henders / 29 Comments

A little while ago, I ran across a link to the website of artist Nina Katchadourian, and I was instantly captivated by her Sorted Books project.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so I decided to play, too.

But first, a disclaimer: Obviously, she’s an artist and I’m not. Her books are beautifully arranged and photographed, the subjects are carefully chosen, and the whole thing is a meaningful artistic expression.

I’m just a copycat, and a poor one at that. My photography sucks, my arrangements look like they were stacked by an inebriated orangutan, and my subjects are distinctly low-brow.

But I’m a rabid book lover, and I’m endlessly fascinated by the variety of titles we all have stockpiled on our shelves. And besides, this was fun!

Here’s what I came up with from my personal shelves:
In the “Philosophical” category…