A Challenge For 2011

                                

            Fifty Two Weeks~Fifty Two Letters

I've touched on this subject before- My love of snail mail. There was a time when it was not unusual for friends and family to open their mail box and have a card, letter or even a package from me delivered by U.S. Mail. Surely, that made their day! How nice to get something besides bills and junk mail. Of course, this was before zombie-like devotion to Facebook and text messaging made me Postal Phobic.

I have a challenge for you. Join me in sending a piece of mail once a week in 2011. Need someone to send mail to? How about me? Vickie Jane at:

        
                                              Papers From The Past
                                              PO Box 52
                                              Westover, AL 35185



My favorite stamp of all time!

 

                                                                                  

Check in on the fan page and let me know how you're doing. I'll do the same.

I'm gathering stamps, paper and postcard making supplies.

Happy New Year!!

                                                                                                     

                                                                                                                               

Papers From The Not So Distant Past

Today, it’s about paper from the not so distant past.  It seems wherever I go, I can’t leave without a postcard, a box of note cards, even gift tags.  They make great souvenirs and I can’t resist them.  Many of them come from museums, an inexpensive way to own art. My favorites might be the handmade cards I bought from a lady at our local high school craft fair.  Sometimes I have a recipient in mind and these mementos are sent out right away.  Usually, I admire them for a few days before adding them to my previously found treasure.  They’re filed in a box, in no particular order until the day I need a thank you card or the mad urge to communicate via snail mail comes upon me.  I admit this happens less often than it did before I could communicate with anyone at the drop of a hat  by email, cell,  and more recently, Facebook.                                     

                                          

The mad urge has struck! I know it’s old fashioned but this week, if I have a mailing address for you, you’re getting a handwritten hello.  Write back soon. 

                                                           

When In The World Are We?

                                        
                                        

                  
                                

                    

I’m a time traveler.  I don’t have a DeLorean (Back To The Future), a disease (The Time Traveler’s Wife) , or a T.A.R.D.I.S. (Dr. Who),  to aid me in my journeys.  My means of transportation are books, movies, museums, and old stuff.

My favorite book with time travel at its core is H.G. Wells, The Time Machine.  In its pages I met the peaceful Eloi, the brutal Morlocks and glimpsed the fate of our planet.

I love A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, by Mark Twain.  While visiting a castle in England, the protagonist suffers a blow to the head.  When he wakes up he’s-you guessed it-in King Arthur’s Court.  If you’ve seen the many bad movies based on this book, please forget them and treat yourself to a great read. 

When my kids were small, we belonged to a book club featuring “The Magic Treehouse” series by Mary Pope Osborne. I think I was more excited than they were when a new title was delivered.

                                                     illustration courtesy of  crosbiesclass.com 

There are so many:   A wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L ‘Engle.  This was a banned book which automatically makes it a must read.  Lightning by Dean Koontz.  I haven’t read this one but my DH says it’s good.   Also on my “To Read” list- Time and Again by Jack Finney.  This comes highly recommended by my favorite book reviewer, Kathleen Wylie-Willis.

I’ll leave the movies, museums, and old stuff for another day.  I’m off to the kitchen to make Apple Cheddar  Scones.

The Cookbook Collector

Let me start by saying that, although I deal in old books, I am no reviewer.  I will tell you if I liked a book or hated it (although hate is rare, I'm a very kind reader).  But the deconstruction of books is not in my nature. Keeping that in mind, I just finished a good book-The Cookbook Collector~ by Allegra Goodman. It's the story of  two dramatically different sisters, one a CEO of a rising Tech Company, the other a dreamy philosophy student who works to save the redwoods. Jess, the philosophy student, works in a  store that sells rare books.  And while I enjoyed the story of their lives and loves, what put me over the moon was the bookstore and it's acquisition of a large collection of rare cookbooks from the 1500's forward.  A few samples of the text that has me in such a dither:

To make a tarte of strawbereyes, wrote Margaret Parker in 1551, take and strayne theym with the yolkes of four egges, and a little whyte bread grated, then season it up with suger and sweete butter and so bake it.

                                                  


Truss them..., lard them, boil them quick and white.  This, Jess read, was how to prepare rabbits.

                                                                         

Cut your woodcocks in four quarters and put them in a sauce-pan; but remember to save the entrails.

                                                                                                                       


Now, I am on a quest for cookbooks; thinking of food in the most sensual way.  It's quite wonderful.  I don't know that I will find cooking guides from Renaissance Europe but there will be some treasures, I'm sure.  I'll be passing some of them along to you. Bring your appetite.