A Quote to Start Things Off

""I'd love to go to Santa Fe at some point, Emmett said, but for the time being, I need to go to New York. The panhandler stopped laughing and adopted a more serious expression. Well. that's life in a nutshell, aint it. Lovin' to go to one place and havin' to go to another. Amor Towles in the Lincoln Highway.

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Pictures of Memories I

Pictures of Memories I
Snow kidding! These "kids" now range from 17 to 23

Monday, March 18, 2024

12 New Movies 2024: #2 Sing

 In many of the Special Ed classes I sub in they have what is called Fun Friday, an enjoyable activity in the last couple of periods of the day.  Often this is a kids movie.  In February the class I was subbing for watched Sing, an animated film from 2016.  Because of my previous job at a local movie theatre, I had seen quite a bit of it's 2023 sequel Sing II.   But since I didn't work there until 2019 and did not end up taking my own children to it, I had never seen the original.


Sing 10 (29771920775).jpg


Matthew McConaughey at the premiere of Sing. 2016 Toronto Film Festival , 

CC BY-SA 2.0, Link


STAGECOACH West - Flickr - secret coach park (6).jpg
, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link

A Stagecoach West bus leaving Gloucester bus station on route 30 to Coleford. It is a Scania N230UD with Alexander Enviro400 body, registration mark MX08 GHY, fleet number 15451.

I would give Sing a rating somewhere between 2.75 and 3.25 stars.  Matthew McConaughey lends his voice to theatrical producer Buster Moon who is in fact a koala bear, (All of the characters are animals) in this film which is part Zootopia and part High School Musical.  Moon's theatre is about to be repossessed by the bank, and he needs to put  a successful show to avoid losing the theatre.  He decides to put on a singing contest, and the rest of the film centers on the contestants and Moon reevaluating and achieving their dreams.  Taron Egerton, Reese Witherspoon, and Scarlett Johansson all voice contestants.  I really liked the musical numbers in the film.  The animation and the music blend together beautifully. If  the film overachieves in it's musical numbers, it certainly underachieves when it comes to plot and overall direction of the film.  Sing II is a good film that could have been a great one, if the plot would travelled on a more interesting trajectory.  If you like musicals about musicals and movies with animated animals, Sing could well be your jam.

Friday, March 15, 2024

Attention All Poets: April A to Z Challenge is Coming.

AtoZChallenge theme reveal 2024 #atozchallenge #AtoZChallenge 2024


As today is Poetry Friday and also the penultimate day for  the A to Z 2024 Theme Reveal, I thought I'd feed 2 birds with one feeder (I'm a feeder not a killer) in today's post.  

Not everyone participating in Poetry Friday may be familiar with the A to Z challenge.  It's an annual challenge where for 26 days in the month of April you write about something with another letter in the Alphabet.  In addition to that you can coordinate all your posts in a theme.  For example, a few years ago, my theme was the songs of the Sherman Brothers who wrote songs for movies like Charlotte's Web and Mary Poppins.  More recently in 2022 my posts featured a limerick from every letter of the alphabet.  Many people over the years have used the theme of forms of poetry.  One of the best things about the A to Z challenge is the community of bloggers who will read the entries and comment on them.  In that way it's very similar to the Poetry Friday community.  Poetry Friday makes Friday the best day of my blogging week and the A to Z challenge makes April the best month of my blogging year.  I thought today I would encourage you Poetry Friday folks to consider the challenge this year.

This year my theme is Holiday's to see my theme reveal click here. To see my poem inspired by the Holiday, Take A Poet to Lunch Day, click here. For more about the A to Z challenge and theme reveal click here.

Poetry Friday is hosted this week by Tanita S. Davis at Fiction, Instead of Lies . Check it out!



Tuesday, March 12, 2024

72 Reasons to celebrate Randy Stonehill's 72nd birthday.

Last year at this time I commemorated Sir Randy Stonehill's 71st birthday by sharing 71 of my favorite songs of his on this blog. As he is adding a candle on his birthday cake this year, I am upping my 71 song salute to a half gross.  I was able to see Randy at 2 concerts since he turned 71.  One with Phil Keaggy last Fall, and a few weeks ago I crossed the border into Missouri to catch an epic solo concert.

In tribute to that performance I am including every song I can find on the internet that he performed at that concert. All of the songs he perfformed on March 2nd in St. Louis are listed in Bold Letters (Just in case you don't know what Bold Letters look like, they look like this.)Many of his songs can be found on Spotify.  Songs I could not find on Spotify, I found on BandCamp.  Songs I could not find in either place I pulled from you-tube or Patreon.

1. Irresistable Future - Mystery Highway

 2. Faithful - Until We Have Wings 


   

 3. Get Me Out of Hollywood- Get me Out of Hollywood 

4. The Last Day - Not on Album Yet.  Video from Randy's Patreon Page 

 5. Christmas Song For All Year 'Round - Welcome To Paradise  

 6. I Love You - Born Twice  
 7. Norman's Kitchen - Born Twice 

8. Bad Fruit -The Sky Is Falling
   

 9. Still Small Voice - Celebrate This Heartbeat  
 10. Christine - Between The Glory And The Flame

 

 11. Can Hell Burn Hot Enough - Until We Have Wings

   

 12. Light Of The World - Equator
   
13. First Prayer - Welcome To Paradise



14. Keep Me Runnin' - Welcome To Paradise

  

15. Stop The World - Celebrate This Heartbeat  
  16. Sunday's Child - Mystery Highway


 17. Love Beyond Reason - Love Beyond Reason  18. Ramada Inn (Live) - Until We Have Wings  19. Everything But Love - Stonehill  20. Didn't It Rain - Until We Have Wings  21. One True Love - The Sky Is Falling  22. Until Your Love Broke Through- Love Beyond Reason  23. Celebrate This Heartbeat - Celebrate This Heartbeat  24. The Hope of Glory - The Wild Frontier  25. Modern Myth - Celebrate This Heartbeat  26. Can't Buy A Miracle - Can't Buy A Miracle  27. Leonard Has A Toaster - Lost Art Of Listening  28. Glory And The Flame - Between The Glory And The Flame  

 29. Stand Like Steel - Return To Paradise  30. Hand of God - Thirst
   

 31. Barbie Nation - Wonderama

 32. Old Clothes - Until We Have Wings

 33. Charlie The Weatherman - Stories 

 34. Try Havin' Some Faith - Spirit Walk

 35. Turning Thirty - Equator






36. Lazarus Heart - Lazarus Heart 



37. This Old Face - Lost Art Of Listening 

38. Baby Hates Clowns - Thirst 

39. Strong Hand Of Love - Welcome To Paradise 

40. Stormy Winds- Uncle Stonehill's Hat  

41. Die Young - Between The Glory And The Flame 

42. Who Will Save The Children - Celebrate This Heartbeat  

43. Arriving to Depart: Not yet on album 
(Pulled from You Tube video from Jan 24 concert, song begins at approximately 19:00)  


44. King Of Hearts: Welcome To Paradise 

45. That's The Way It Goes (Live) - Edge Of The World 


46. Shut De Do (Live) - Equator

  


47. Jesus - Breath Of God   


48. Big Ideas (In The Shrinking World) 49. Beginning Of The Living End - Lost Art of Listening





50. Broken Places - Spirit Walk  51. Hymn - Love Beyond Reason 


52. Billy Frank - The Lost Art Of Listening
 



53. Venezuela - The Sky Is Falling 





54. What Do You Want From Life? - The Wild Frontier 




55.Brighter Day - Can't Buy A Miracle  56. Get Together - The Wild Frontier 




57. Ready To Go - Welcome To Paradise 


58.Rachel Delevoryas - Wonderama  




59.In Jesus Name - Lazarus Heart  60.Last Time I Saw Eden - Spirit Walk  61. Everything You Know (Is Incorrect) - Thirst 


62.I've Got News For You (Paradise Sky Version) Welcome To Paradise - 


63. When I'm Afraid Lazarus Heart  




64.When I Look To The Mountains - Celebrate This Heartbeat 


65.Mercy In The Shadow Land - Lost Art Of Listening 


66. Backwards On Her Bike - Mystery Highway  67.Cosmetic Fixation - Equator 


68.A Promise Made Is A Promise Kept - Lazarus Heart 


69. The Keeper Of The Bear - Thirst

  



70. I Don't Ever Want To Live Without You - Return To Paradise 




71. One Last Song Before I Say Goodbye - Not yet recorded on an album





72. Life is Tough, God Is Good - Spirit Walk




 Happy Birthday Randy! I encourage anyone who spends time listening to these songs to buy some or all of them on Band  Camp.  Also you can sponsor Rand's ministry on his Patreon page.  

Monday, March 11, 2024

📚 Kids Read Aloud | INTERRUPTING CHICKEN by David Ezra Stein

Today at school was the readathon day. Instead of having core classes (Math, Social Sciences, ELA, & Science) are middle school students were able to read in those classes and have teachers and other staff read to them as well.  

As a building sub I don't usually know who I'm going to be that day.  Today I subbed for a paraprofessional in one of our SPED classes.  This particular class is rather low functioning so the books read to the students were geared for much younger children. There was one book the teacher read called Interrupting Chicken by David Ezra Stein. The title reminded me of the old knock knock joke:

A: Knock Knock
B: Who's There
A: Interrupting Cow
B: Interrup
A: Moo

I was able to find a read aloud version of the book on you tube.  This is not that difficult of a thing to do.  I have considered in the past having an A  to Z challenge of children's books being read aloud on you tube videos.  

Here is one of the versions I found on You Tube,


Friday, March 8, 2024

A to Z Challenge 2024 Theme Reveal

AtoZChallenge theme reveal 2024 #atozchallenge

 March 10th is the official theme reveal for the 2024 iteration of the A to Z challenge.  Last year I actually announced my theme for 2024 here a year early while announcing my theme for 2023. In that post I stated, 

"The 2024 theme will be Narnian characters and creatures from A to Z. My working title is Narnia: From Aslan to Zardeenah."

Well it turns out, I lied.  Lied is a strong word.  I miscalculated.  Almost every year for the last 35 years I have reread each book in the Chronicles of Narnia.  Last year when I made the announcement, I had not yet started on my literary pilgrimage to Narnia and thought the idea of reading the books would help in making the alphabetical list of entries.  

I ended up reading a sum total of zero Narnia books in 2023.  While it's true that  I could easily journey from Archenland to Zalindreh, my heart was not in it.  I chose to abandon  delay my Narnian sojourn for another time (Although I would prefer to do all my blogging in Narnia, as no time would pass while I was writing).  

I then toyed with the idea of having no theme and simply blogging about something new from A to Z each day.  I liked that idea quite a bit, but then it occurred to me, I would have nothing to say at the theme reveal.  I then thought of having an overarching theme but leaving it wide enough to choose the individual topics the day they were due.  That also seemed a little problematic as I often suffer more from topic block than it's cousin writer's block.


Holidays by Nick Youngson CC BY-SA 3.0 Pix4free 


 Finally I thought of a topic that would give me both flexibility and stability.  I decided to blog about Holidays.  However instead of A is for Arbor day, C is for Casmir Pulaski Day (It's A Chicago Thing), I will be focusing on lesser holidays, the kind you would find at sites like the National Day Calendar or What is Today Holiday's like National Take A Poet to Lunch day which takes place on January 6th each year, the holiday that inspired this poem.


My process this year is each day of the challenge to post about a holiday that is taking place that day.  Some holidays like April Fools day on the 1st would match very well for the letter of the day.  Others will take a little pushing to make it fit the letter of the day.  April 2nd for example is Children's Book day. If I choose that holiday, I would have a title like B is for Books for Children. 

In addition to actual holidays, I am going to also create 5 new holidays as part of my list, including ways to celebrate these new festive occasions.   

Recent A to Z Challenges

2023 A Month At The Movies

2022 Limericks, Homeruns, & Wordles (Oh My!)

2021 A to Z People who were alive in 1921

2020 State (& Other) Capitals


Each year on Spotify I make an A to Z playlist for the year.  At the end of each post I will have a link to the song for  that day .


I am very excited about this Holiday edition of the A to Z challenge.  To learn more about The 2024 A to Z Theme Reveals click here, if you are ready to participate in said reveals click here, and finally if you are looking for a spreadsheet of who is already participating this year click here.


A to Z 2023 Road Trip

#AtoZChallenge 2023 RoadTrip