Mermaids in the Basement

Apparently, in looking at my blog history I have forgotten to post some of my reading. Last month our book club read was Mermaids in the Basement by Michael Lee West. It was pretty amusing. It was a stereotypical type of chick lit - the story of a writer who is discovers her hot filmmaker boyfriend (He's Irish!) is cheating on her with the latest Hollywood Hottie. She is reeling for her loss and heads off to her grandmother's place on the Alabama Coast. Hilarity ensues as she goes through a sort of regression therapy - learning about all of the things she missed/forgot from her childhood. One of my favorite characters had to be grandma's best friend who would drop drugs of some sort in the food at a party! Be careful there could be laxatives in the sweet potatoes or viagra in the chocolate covered strawberries.

A Model Summer

This weekend I ready A MOdel Summer by Paulina Prokzkova. First off, this was the book of the month for my Book Club. We'll be discussing it Tuesday night. I am curious to see how the discussion goes. The author was a model, formerly the face of Estee Lauder. In this book she gives us a fictional account of breaking into modeling in the 1980's, which cannot be much different than it is now. If anything, it is probably worse now than it was then as society continues to become more accepting of this lifesyle rather than less. This is the story of Jirina, a 15 year old gil from Sweden. She spent 15 years in Sweden being made fun of as the "ugly imigrant cow" as her parents were Czech. Apparnelty the little Swedes didn't like her much. She is found and travels to Paris for the summer to become a model. The story details her exploits. She starts off with the best of intentions, reading Kafka and exploring the culture of Paris. It does not take long for her to join the true underbelly of Model Society- getting introduced to sex, drugs, and rock and roll. If analyzed the story has lots of moral undertones and leaves the reader wiht many good questions and introspection. However, I felt it was a bit trashy, and too full of sex and drugs. It saddened me to see the changes in Jirina and the encouragement she recieved from the modeling industry.

Hot times in Downtown Vicksburg

We had a busy little Saturday. This weekend we are watching my friend Amanda's Dog. Amanda and her family are currently in Orlando Florida on their family vacation. The girls are having a blast in sensory overload at the Magic Kingdom. Allie Dog is a 7 year old Greyhound. I was a little nervous to see how things would go, but she has been able to play the old lady card with the my pups. She is a couch potato, so while they mud wrestle and body slam one another she calmly lies and rolls her eyes at them.

Our morning had a little delayed start. We relaxed and watched some TV. There wasn't anything of real interest on TV, so we watched our 12th Night gift: the He-Man She-Ra Christmas Movie. It was about as cheesy as I remember it being. I did a little housework while the dogs enjoyed the beautiful weather. It was so nice that Daisy Dogg didn't want to come inside. I totally don't blame her!

I headed over to Lorelei Books to catch a book igning. I was really excited by this. Lorelei is a new bookstore in town. It is the first independent bookseller in Vicksburg in Decades. They took an old building on the main drag and rennovated the bottom floor into this cute little bookstore. It is ideally located next door to our coffee shop too! this was my first trip into Lorelei. A little girl was doing a book signing for a book she wrote, her mom illustrated, and they got published. It is a really cute book, Holly's Halo, about how she dealt with her dog dying. A portion of the proceeds from each sale went to Paws Rescue, the organization I adopted Madison from. It was really nifty! The signing was taped and they will cut a video from it to show on our local access network. I even got interviewed to discuss adopting a dog from a rescue organization! So, if you are watching Channel 23 don't be surprised if you see me. Of course, I dont' get Channel 23 since I have directv, so you can tell me I sounded good, even if I didn't.

I really enjoyed being able to go to a book store in town, even if it wasn't huge. The owners are really nice - we chatted for a long while. It turns out that there are a few book clubs forming in Vicksburg. I've always wanted to be in a book club, so I filled out the paperwork, and I belive I will be joining one. A chapter of a nationwide book club, The Pulpwood Queens, has just started up here in town. They will be reading The Pirate's Daughter by Margaret Cezair- THompson for next month. I'm looking forward to it already!! Plus, I got a list of other new and noteworthy books that I can't wait to tear through. This could get in the way of my disseration!!!

After the book store I went to the new(ish) coffee shop for the first time. It is pretty cute. I need to go spend some tiem there on Saturdays. I am all about supporting our local businesses. the day concluded wtih a quick stop at the least local business in town, Walley-World, were I stocked up on some new dog toys. The girls had killed most of their toys. They have this one favorite toy - they have gone through 3 of the so far. They adore it, so I keep replacing it! I'm such a sucker.