Ramblings-n-Writings

Archive for June, 2008

Are you familiar with Bartleby.com? The website tagline is “Great Books Online.”

The complete text, not excerpts, of the books is available with no registration or fee required.

A quick scan of the titles reveals classic writers to more recent writers, such as Agatha Christie and Edith Wharton, to non-fiction and reference titles.

The reference section looks handy for research and writing purposes – encyclopedias, thesaurus, Strunk’s Elements of Style, Civil War History, dictionaries, and more.

On Saturday we went to an estate auction. I love the treasures at estate auctions!!!

Around here there’s a lot of glassware – mainly Fenton and carnival glass. There’s also a lot of farm equipment at most auctions we attend too.

At another estate auction about a month ago, we got great stone bird bath and a book of Shakespeare prints from 1906.

For months we’ve been wanting a dog house but really didn’t want to pay the outrageous prices – $60+. A few weeks ago we saw one on sale for $40 and failed to buy it at the time. We also talked about building one too. At Saturday’s auction, we bought one for $8! Yep, a whopping eight dollars. We got a few other things too, but the dog house was definitely the best deal for us!

Christianbook.com Home has a really nifty chart posted on its website. If you have a favorite author, you can look up the author on a chart and find other authors that are similar (genre and writing style). See the author chart.

I checked some of my favorite authors and a few recommendations puzzled me. For example, I love books by Dee Henderson and one of the recommended authors is Jamie Langston Turner. Over the years I’ve tried reading Turner’s books, but her books just don’t sit well with me. I usually manage to read a few pages and am not drawn into the story at all. For me, that’s a reason to put the book down. I try to skip ahead (bad no-no, I know!) and the storyline still doesn’t catch me. Usually I return the books to the library without reading them. On the other hand, Henderson’s books are books I can’t put down until I’m done. Once I start, I have to finish, even if it is 2 a.m. by the time I’m done!

In the realm of Christian fiction, my favorite authors are Dee Henderson, Judith Pella, Tracie Peterson, Mindy Stearns Clark, Lorena McCourtney, Brock & Bodie Thoene, and Michael Phillips (some of his books). I also enjoy reading Colleen Coble, Mel Odom, Deeanne Gist, Kristen Heitzmann, Gilbert Morris (when will the Wakefield series end?!?!), and a few others.

I spotted a couple of authors on the list that I’d like to try reading, but I don’t think our local library has books by these – Kim Vogel Sawyer, Judith Miller, Camy Tang and Tamera Alexander. I think I’ve read and enjoyed excerpts from their books as part of Chapter-a-Week.

Jan Karon shows up on the CBD chart too, but I don’t think she is considered a Christian author. Anyone know if she is? I love her Mitford series (read a brief review of her newest book here). Jennifer Chiaverini, author of the Elm Creek Quilts series, is my newest favorite author outside of the Christian realm.

Who are your favorite authors? What new author would you like to try reading?

If you’ve ever been off the interstate (the good road) in West Virginia, you’ll notice that we have two things – lots of creeks and lots of country roads (with potholes). And most of the country roads follow next to the creek beds. Presumably the roads are the old horse trails, and in a mountainous area, the easiest, flattest area is next to the river.

I’ve lived here for almost four years now, and every year we get rain that sends the creeks out of their banks. An average rain can wreak havoc in some people’s lives especially if they live near a low water crossing. For you non-West Virginians, a low water crossing is a cement bridge across a creek and under normal circumstances it will be above water.

Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, we didn’t have average rain. We had torrential rain that came down by the buckets. Then the sun would almost come out. Then we’d have round two…round three…round four of the rain.

We took a drive “around the block” about 8 p.m. Wednesday night, four hours before the rivers typically crest. Here’s a glimpse at what 3 inches of rain in a little over 24 hours can do around here (you won’t see our area covered on national television – I think the media likes to pretend W.Va. doesn’t exist although I’ve known plenty of people who have lost their homes or belongings to flooding like this every year). The picture quality is so-so since it was getting close to dusk and I was in a moving vehicle. =)

This is our neighbor’s hay field. (Thankfully he cut his hay last week.) The creek is normally about 10-15 feet wide in this area. His home is just to left of the garden. I’m not sure if he lost his garden or not since the water rose quite a bit after this picture was taken.

This duck normally swims in a creek. Now he has a pond.

The creek usually goes from the green bushes to about a foot to the left of the telephone pole. About 8-10 feet of the road is under water. This is an easy spot to get around thanks to gravel area on the right.

Local country store sitting on stone pillars for a reason. This store has actually been here since the Civil War time period. The original builders were wise to use the pillars because the creek runs directly behind the store. The brown water is covering grass that’s about a foot below road level – notice the water is about even with the road.
Local horse show ring. Honest! You can see the bleachers and some of the fence – look at the red building. The poles with the lights will give you an approximate location for the ring. The actual creek is in the trees in the distance.

A low water crossing. This is the road we take to church. This low water is usually one of the last to flood. In fact, a few years ago, I was at work when flooding started. I managed to make it to within 5 miles of the house before I had to turn around because the roads were flooded. Many hours and miles later I came across this low water crossing to make it home.

So that’s what happens when it rains a lot around here.