Catbird Seat
Last week, I wrote a post on Cat’s Paw from A Word a Day, and today they sent me this one. The theme this week is words and phrases which refer to birds, and I have always wondered about the catbird seat. You hear it used in political journals more than anywhere else.
If you subscribe to A Word a Day they send you a fresh word every day, with a definition, they show how it is used in a sentence, and you can click on a link to hear it pronounced. I’ve been a member for over ten years now, and they are still surprising me with new words.
catbird seat (KAT-burd seet) noun
A position of power and advantage.
[A catbird (named after its catlike call) is known to build a pile
of rocks to attract a mate and sit on the highest point around. This
expression was often used by Brooklyn Dodgers baseball commentator
Red Barber and further popularized by the author James Thurber in his
story “The Catbird Seat” where a character often utters trite phrases,
including the expression “sitting in the catbird seat”.]
-Anu Garg (words at wordsmith.org)
“So, Stillking Films seems perched in the catbird seat. ‘Things
are going very well for us at the moment,’ David Minkowski says.”
Steffen Silvis; Stillking is Still King; The Prague Post
(Czech Republic); Apr 5, 2007.
Tornado Before and After
Imagery provided in Ogle Earth of the recent tornado damage in Greensburg, Kansas on May 4th.
If you go to Ogle Earth, you can see the before and after shots. The destruction is unbelievable. The immediacy with which the damage could be assessed with the help of these shots helps emergency workers and insurance assessors do their job more quickly.
Word Press and Stats
On a quiet Thursday morning, I have some time to get an overview of what kind of articles my viewers like the best. It’s always a surprise to me. I put the most effort into my travel and book reviews. What, you, the viewer, likes best are recipes and photos.
In the last 30 days, the all time favorite has been – I hope you’re sitting down – Scalloped Potatoes. I mean like whoda thunk?? Second is Kuwaiti Customs, which I am guessing is of interest mostly to my non-Kuwaiti readers who are fascinated by the differences in our way of life, as well as the similarities, and third is one of my all time favorites Porn For Women. Fourth for the 30 day period is “Make This Case Go Away” where a Minister makes the police drop what appears to be an air tight case against two young men who abduct and rape a maid, and fifth, one of those anomalies, Tudo’s Vietnamese Restaurant in Pensacola.
What I like about WordPress is that there are options for all levels of users. I’m just a writer. My page is pretty vanilla, not a lot of bells and whistles, but the bells and whistles are out there if I go to the trouble of learning how to use them. I can include music, videos, and all kinds of other tools.
But it’s things like being able to look at the stats and track a post from birth to present, see what has had the biggest following in the last 30 days, and then in the last seven days, see how many people have me on feeds on a daily basis – all those things matter to me, and WordPress has them.
Best of all, it is just so easy. I don’t want to make a clock, I just want to know the time! WordPress is a great tool.
Scenes from Villa Moda
The sale continues at Villa Moda
“For you, Madame, this special Manolo . . .”
“Or this sweet gown?”
Twitchy Water
Here is what the Gulf looks like this afternoon:
It is one of those amazing afternoons, where the water is nearly as flat and reflective as glass.
With one anomaly:
In the midst of the glass like waters of the Gulf, there are patches of twitchy water. I can’t help it. I lost two hours of my life today watching the twitchy water. It was the wierdest thing I have seen; it looked like waves with fleas, except that the fleas would sparkle silver now and then. While all the regular waves would be going one way, this “wave” would flutter and go in one direction, then flutter, and turn in another direction.
It has to be fish. From time to time a bird would pass over and the twitchy water would disappear. Sometimes, it didn’t disappear fast enough, and the bird would dive down and grab a snack and fly away. The fish must be tiny – maybe like anchovies or herring or minnows – and their activity gives the water an entirely different character.
I never thought of fish swarming before, but it looked like hive behavior. I wonder if it is because the weather is so suddenly and consistently warm (between 100 – 110F for my non-Kuwaiti readers) or if they are always there and the surf is too active for me to see them?
Twitchy water.
Big Girl Pants
I got an email this morning from a friend who learned I have taken on a leadership challenge.
“I could never do that. . .” she said.
She gave me a good laugh. We organized a group together, starting from scratch, in a previous life, and she was one of the very first to step up to the plate, to volunteer for a job I considered burdensome, but she has done it well for over three years now.
I grew up around the military. There were always these older women around, really together women, women who organized things, women who managed, women who were leaders. They were also totally intimidating women, and behind their backs we called them the “tough old birds,” not without admiration.
The turning point came for me in my early thirties, when I saw a job that needed doing, and I knew I could do it at least as well as it was being done, and probably better. I knew I had a lot of resources available to help me do the job, just needed some organizing. I took the project, did the job, and it all worked out great. I was not yet a tough old bird, but I knew I was now playing with the big girls.
The phrase I keep coming across now is “put on your big girl panties,” some add “and deal with it.” I’ve seen it in a couple ads, and in more than a couple blogs . . . it seems to be a phrase of the day. (Google it – you’ll see what I mean.) It means dealing with an situation that needs to be handled, even if unpleasant, even if you don’t want to. It means taking responsibility. It can mean you’ve taken a hit and have to keep going. Most of all, it means you’re at a higher level of performance than before, and you need to meet a new standard. I think it’s a hoot.
(It originates in toilet training, when a toddler goes from diapers to cloth pants, called “big-boy pants/ big-girl panties” and it means literally, you are now expected not to have any accidents, but to use the facilities just as big boys and big girls do.)
The elastic on my big girl panties is giving out. I’ve been wearing them for a while now. I have probably now reached the age when women are calling me tough old bird behind my back. When did that happen?
To all my faithful friends out there, friends who have been my friends for years and tens of years (you know who you are) I am proud of you, and more thankful for you that I can express. Aren’t there days when we wish we weren’t big girls? Aren’t there days when we just want to run and hide, and not take those responsibilities? Aren’t there times when you want to say “no! I can’t do that!”? You’ve helped me through all those days.
Thanks to your love and support, putting on big-girl panties hasn’t been so bad. And we’ve had a lot of laughs along the way. Thanks for being along for the ride.
Best Mother’s Day Story
In honor of the upcoming American Mother’s Day (I don’t know why we have it on a different day from the rest of the world) a friend sent this hysterical story, which I am sharing with you.
So, we had this great 10 year old cat named Jack who just recently
died. Jack was a great cat and the kids would carry him around and sit on
him and nothing ever bothered him. He used to hang out and nap all day long
on this mat in our bathroom.
Well we have 3 kids and at the time of this story they were 4 years
old, 3 years old and 1 year old. The middle one is Eli. Eli really loves
chapstick. LOVES it. He kept asking to use my chapstick and then losing
it. So finally one day I showed him where in the bathroom I keep my
chapstick and how he could use it whenever he wanted to but he needed to put
it right back in the drawer when he was done.
Last year on Mother’s Day, we were having the typical rush around
and try to get ready for Church with everyone crying and carrying on. My
two boys are fighting over the toy in the cereal box. I am trying to nurse
my little one at the same time I am putting on my make-up. Everything is a
mess and everyone has long forgotten that this is a wonderful day to honor
me and the amazing job that is motherhood.
We finally have the older one and and the baby loaded in the car and
I am looking for Eli. I have searched everywhere and I finally round the
corner to go into the bathroom. And there was Eli. He was applying my
chapstick very carefully to Jack’s . . . rear end. Eli looked right into my
eyes and said “chapped.” Now if you have a cat, you know that he is
right–their little butts do look pretty chapped. And, frankly, Jack didn’t
seem to mind.
And the only question to really ask at that point was whether it
was the FIRST time Eli had done that to the cat’s behind or the hundredth.
And THAT is my favorite Mother’s Day moment ever because it reminds
us that no matter how hard we try to civilize these glorious little
creatures, there will always be that day when you realize they’ve been using
your chapstick on the cat’s butt.
Stormy Petrel
The following is from WordaDay, to which I subscribe, and which often delights me with words and meanings I have never known. Today’s is so particularly good, I will share this website again. You can see it on my blogroll to the right, and you can subscribe also by copying and pasting the address from the e-mail below.
Starts here:
Birds get little respect. We tend to look down at non-human animals in
general, but we are particularly unfair when it comes to birds (although
we have to look up at them).
We call a stupid fellow a “bird brain”. Australians call him a galah
(a type of cockatoo). Something useless is said to be “for the birds”. We
name someone vain and self-conscious a peacock. One who is talkative or a
hoarder is labeled a magpie. A cowardly or fearful fellow is a chicken…
the list is endless.
We even kill two birds with one stone. I’d rather the idiom be to feed two
birds with one grain.
This week we feature five terms coined after birds. Catch as many of these
bird words as you can. After all, a word in the head is worth two in the book.
stormy petrel (STOR-mee PE-truhl) noun
1. Any of various small sea birds of the family Hydrobatidae
having dark feathers and lighter underparts, also known as
Mother Carey’s Chicken.
2. One who brings trouble or whose appearance is a sign of coming trouble.
[The birds got the name storm petrel or stormy petrel because old-time
sailors believed their appearance foreshadowed a storm.
It’s not certain why the bird is named petrel. One unsubstantiated theory
is that it is named after St Peter who walked on water in the Gospel of
Matthew. The petrel’s habit of flying low over water with legs extended
gives the appearance that it’s walking on the water.]
Today’s word in Visual Thesaurus: http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=stormy+petrel
-Anu Garg (words at wordsmith.org)
“A colourful stormy petrel of the Conservative Party, Anthony
Beaumont-Dark frequently found himself at odds with the party
line in the Commons, and was well known for expressing his dissent
in memorably quotable form.”
Obituary: Sir Anthony Beaumont-Dark; The Times (London, UK); Apr 4, 2006.
………………………………………………………………….
In some circumstances, the refusal to be defeated is a refusal to be
educated. -Margaret Halsey, novelist (1910-1997)
Discuss this week’s words on our bulletin board: http://wordsmith.org/board
Remove, change address, gift subs: http://wordsmith.org/awad/subscriber.html
Pronunciation:
http://wordsmith.org/words/stormy_petrel.ram
Labyrinth by Kate Mosse
When I saw this book at the Barnes and Noble, I thought “isn’t Kate Moss a fashion model?” but that is a different Kate Moss, a Moss without the ‘e’ at the end.
This book was a New York Times bestseller, but then so was the Da Vinci Code, which I thought badly written and sometimes incoherent. The premise was interesting, but it was done years ago by French authors Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh and Henry Lincoln. Holy Blood, Holy Grail hypothesizes (and pulls together a load of hypothetical evidence to support) that the mystical grail is really a symbolic representation of the blood of Christ, that Jesus was not crucified but instead left Jerusalem with his wife Mary Magdeleine and went to France, and started a family there which eventually became the early French royal line.
I remember telling my son this story, as we travelled through the southern areas of France, and him saying in his smart-mouth-teenager way “only the French would be so arrogant as to believe the blood of God was flowing in their veins!”
We spent a lot of time travelling in France. We love France. So when I discovered that Labyrinth was about the beginning of the French crusade against the Cathars, I was delighted. We know this history. We know this area – it is one of the most beautiful areas of France. We know Carcassone, which in its renovation by Viollet-le-Duc is like Disney-does-fortified-city. It’s formidable, but it’s not entirely authentic.
Who are the Cathars? The Cathars were a break-away sect who were called by others ‘bons hommes’ or ‘bons Chretiens’ (good-Christians), but, pre-Luther, they saw many flaws in the way the Catholic church has become more political than spiritual.
They valued inner faith above outward display. They needed no consecrated buildings, no superstitious rituals, no humiliating obeisance designed to keep ordinary men apart from God. They did not worship images, nor prostrate themselves before idols or instruments of torture. For the ‘Bons Chretiens’ the power of God lay in the word. They needed only books and prayers, words spoken and read aloud. Salvations was nothing to do with alms or relics or Sabbath prayers spoken in a language only the priests understood. . . In their eyes, all were equal in the Grace of the Holy Father – Jew or Saracen, man and woman, the beasts of the fields and the birds of the air. There would be no hell, no final day of judgement, because through God’s grace all would be saved, although many would be destined to live life many times over before they regained God’s kingdom.
They believed the earth was created as a trap, by Satan, and that our lives here keep us apart from the glory of God. They believed we keep coming back, until we purify ourselves spiritually, and that in the end, if we get it right, we end up back where we came from, with God. And they believed we all have the right to read the bible, and to talk directly with God, without the necessity of a priest to interpret or to direct.
But this Crusade, the Fourth Crusade, is little known. This Crusade, declared by the Pope to wipe out the Cathar heresy (sometimes known as Bogomilism or Albigencian heresy) was really the tool of the nobility that was then France, less than half of the France of today, to grab the rich, lush southern lands of the Pays d’Oc. The Fourth Crusade was an opportunity for knights to increase their holdings. And it doubled the size of France.
The Labyrinth takes you inside the walls. The main character is not Cathar, but it didn’t matter – this war wasn’t really about wiping out the Cathars as much as subjugating an independant land and making it part of France. You may have heard one famous quote from this Crusade – as the Crusaders were attacking Besiers, the Abbot of Citeaux was asked how the soldiers could tell the good Catholics from the heritics. “Tuez-les tous. Dieu reconnaitra les sien,” he replied – Kill them all. God will know his own.
The book is lightweight, an easy read. The heroine, Alice, seems to have lived before, as Alais, and has memories she has never lived. You jump back and forth between today, and the time of the Crusade, in the early 1200s. Some of the plot mechanisms don’t make a lot of sense, but you do get a real sense of life in a fortified town during the 1200’s, and of the injustice done to this beautiful area in France. For a book I am lukewarm about in retrospect, I read it avidly, and enjoyed the read.
What I like about this book is that it brings to life a time in history that few pay any attention to. Somewhere in the book, it says that “history is written by the victors.” We see France today, and we know little about the struggle that united these diverse areas into one nation. This book illuminates a slice of time, a grave injustice, and a sense that religion is too often a tool for political ends.
Like the heroine, the big church in Carcassone, where the trials and tortures of the ‘heretics’ took place sends a cold chill up my spine, I can hear the screams of the tortured. I love churches, and I can’t go into this one. It feels unholy. Did you know that the origination of the Inquisition was not in Spain, as most people believe, but in this area of France? And it was aimed, first, at the Cathars.
All in all, not a bad book. Though light in plot, it is heavy in content, a book you will remember and think about in terms of issues, if not the main characters.
“Who Am I?”
As DNA testing becomes more and more common, surprises are popping up everywhere. This article from BBC is about two Englishwomen who discover they have Native American blood when they send their DNA in for testing.
It’s fascinating to think that migration and trade has left it’s traces generations later. I love the work that is being done with bloodlines these days.
Native American DNA found in UK
DNA testing has uncovered British descendents of Native Americans brought to the UK centuries ago as slaves, translators or tribal representatives.
Genetic analysis turned up two white British women with a DNA signature characteristic of American Indians.
An Oxford scientist said it was extremely unusual to find these DNA lineages in Britons with no previous knowledge of Native American ancestry.
Indigenous Americans were brought over to the UK as early as the 1500s.
It rocked me completely. It made think: who am I?
Doreen Isherwood
Many were brought over as curiosities; but others travelled here in delegations during the 18th Century to petition the British imperial government over trade or protection from other tribes.
Experts say it is probable that some stayed in Britain and married into local communities.
Doreen Isherwood, 64, from Putney, and Anne Hall, 53, of Huddersfield, only found out about their New World heritage after paying for commercial DNA ancestry tests.
Mrs Isherwood told BBC News: “I was expecting the results to say I belonged to one of the common European tribes, but when I got them back, my first thought was that they were a mistake.
“It rocked me completely. It made think: who am I?”
You can read the rest of the article at BBC Science/Nature News, here.
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