The Periodic Table of the Muppets

Dig this crazy scarf. Christmas is coming soon, and you can order it for me here.

Mike Baboon, who designed the table, describes it: A comprehensive depiction of many memorable Muppet characters from throughout the years (and some not-so-memorable ones as well).

Each square represents a different character and indicates the primary Muppeteer(s) for that character, as well as the year and production in which the character made its debut. Borders align with hair/hat colour, background aligns with skin/fur colour, and colour of the abbreviated name represents nose colour (for characters with noses that is).

The separate sections are based on the show the characters were either created for or most often associated with. The icons within each section are then organized by year of creation.

A closer look.     Thanks for the link, Sal!

I know you're not going to believe it, but this is our garden! Remember when our front
yard looked like the vacant lot behind K-Mart? Deanna designed it for us. The plants are all
drought tolerant, which is a very good thing.

Tantrum

A visit to Tantrum, my favorite toy store.

The First Images of Pluto Arrive

The first images of Pluto won't really arrive until tomorrow morning.

These images are from this evening's walk on the Coastal Trail.

From today's New York Times, I loved this!

... Because Pluto is the Roman god of the underworld, the scientists drew on underworld entities from myths and literature in beginning to assign informal names to the regions.

A large splotch that resembles a whale was named Cthulu, a deity from a H. P. Lovecraft story. Other splotch names included Meng-Po, the goddess of forgetfulness in Chinese mythology; Balrog, a creature in J. R. R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” books; and Vucub Came and Hun Came, death gods of Mayan mythology.

It is the evening of the day, I sit and watch the children play.

Keith Richards and Mick Jagger were all of 22 when they wrote the song.

On My Screen Today

Elena Lokshina. What a discovery! At San Francisco Women Artists

Back on the Beach

Sand Flowers

 

Fourth of July

Fireworks for a foggy Fourth

It's so nice walking and seeing and shooting pictures.

My ALA Adventure

Friday night dinner with Beach Lane buds at the sweetest place: Local Kitchen. We missed Allyn. 

I tried to get everybody to cry for the group shot so we could send Allyn a picture letting her know

how much we missed her, but people seem to resist crying for photos.

The book-signing was fantastic. The line never let up. When my time slot was 

over, all the books were gone! I was stunned and ecstatic until Kristin 

informed me that the books are free to the conference attendees as long as they 

stand in line for a signature. Then I was super-stunned. You mean I lost all that
sleep for naught? Still, what a blast.

Kristin had promised to buy two of my books if I could sneak her in to hear Sarah Vowell.
There was no need for me to sneak her in at all now, having discovered the books were free.
But she was adamant. Sarah Vowell is phenomenal! Her book-signing line was miles long,
and Sarah would sign a book and shoo her reader away, sign a book and shoo her reader away.
When Kristin stepped up, Sarah stopped to chat. I finally slunk up and laid my book on the table
as Kristin walked away but Sarah yelled after Kristin, continuing their conversation as she signed
my book and shooed me away.

The same-sex marriage ruling passed Friday and there
was a slight traffic jam on the way to the Simon & Schuster party
Saturday night honoring Ashley Brown.

Ashley led us in shouting, singing, and hugging. He brought his pal Nikki Giovanni along, too.

You aren't going to believe this. Somebody flaked out on the Newbery Caldecott Wilder
Awards banquet on Sunday night. When I was asked if I'd be interested in attending in her place,
I said yes immediately. And I then read the details. The banquet is a formal occasion. Again
my anxiety level shot through the ceiling but I dug my most formal baseball-style dress
out of the closet and zoomed over. Here I am with Sylvie. The people at my Simon & Schuster
table were the best, the food pretty good, the waiters surly, the speeches inspiring for the most part
––though Kwame's was beyond exhilarating.

Passing by the Caldwell Snyder Gallery on my way to meet Rubin for breakfast Monday morning.
Pancakes and eggs. We had such a fun meeting, planning and drawing on the white paper
tablecloth at Cafe de la Presse.

How many man-agents do you know who will stop into a shoe store with you on their way
to the airport? It looks like Rubin's trying to convince me to wear something other than
sneakers, but actually we're thinking of Allyn and wondering which Fluevog she'd prefer.
(The one on the right for sure.)

Say Hello to Me!

I’m so excited to be signing books at ALA this Saturday. If you’re coming to the convention I’d love it if you could come by my table. I’ll be at Simon & Schuster booth #1103/1104 between 10:30 and 11:00 a.m. My time slot falls right between Gloria Steinem's talk and Sarah Vowell’s talk (!) with plenty of time to spare.

On My Screen

My Dad

Aggles' dad too.

I made my dad help me earn my photography badge during my short stint with the Girl Scouts. Here he is modeling for me. We had to title our photos, and on the back of this one I wrote Dad Sitting.

He loved taking pictures so much that he built a darkroom right in the middle of his and my mom's bedroom.

This photo was taken one year before he died.