I misplaced my passport a couple of years ago. Searches in the file drawer, the garage, and moving boxes proved fruitless.

We put in new closet hardware in our bedroom this week, and Mr. Cuccu found that it had fallen behind the dresser. I am relieved not to have to get a new one. This one has plenty of blank pages waiting for future travel.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Thursday, April 6, 2006 at 9:35 AM
Unfiled • (0) Add your comment

In addition to All Consuming, I’ve created a couple of lists at Lists of Bests, also part of the 43 Things family of sites.

The first is The Essential Sing Cuccu Book List, which will ultimately list my favorite books.

The Essential Sing Cuccu Film List will serve the same purpose for my favorite films.

Feeds are available for both lists, as well as for my All Consuming and del.icio.us lists. Try to keep up.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Wednesday, April 5, 2006 at 9:29 AM
Life management • (0) Add your comment

The Beiderbecke Affair got me to thinking about writers and readers and me.

I once attended a writer’s conference solely to hear David James Duncan speak*.

As I recall, there were three sessions in which he either participated or was the subject of discussion. One was called “Is David James Duncan a Christian?”, a question that is beside the point, unless you’re a teacher at a Christian college and need to justify teaching his books.

He spoke at another session, in which he also read from The Brothers K, after which I became an even more devoted fan. In the third session, a professor from the English department interviewed him.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Monday, March 27, 2006 at 10:20 AM
Writing • (7) Add your comment

Until recently, I hadn’t seen many movies (LOTR, Star Wars) since the spring of 2000. Back then, I was seeing a couple of movies a week, often on my own, with friends if they were available. Then I started dating Mr. Cuccu, work got busy, we got married, and I got depressed. I didn’t read a book for two years. Movies took too much energy.

Since late December, I’ve been making up for lost time. I see at least one movie a week in the theater and another at home on DVD. This week has been a marathon of movies. On Sunday, I watched Bowling for Columbine at home and The White Countess in the theater. On Monday night I saw Good Night and Good Luck (first Three Kings, then Syriana, and now this…I heart George Clooney). On Tuesday night I saw The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, and last night I attended a screening of a locally shot and produced film.

Even better, I learned about a local filmmakers group that meets once a month. I can talk about my projects and allow my work to be critiqued, a prospect that simultaneously excites me and makes me want to vomit.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Thursday, March 23, 2006 at 10:12 AM
Movies •Writing • (0) Add your comment

My grandmother is on a waiting list to move into a retirement facility. I asked if she would be able to take her dog with her. “Yes,” she said. “I only wanted two things—my dog and 3ABN, and I’m getting them both.”

Her world was a little larger once.

Aside: She asked me what I knew about the Linda and Danny Shelton breakup. I told her what little I knew (all of it second hand, and therefore gossip). She said, “I think it was the change.”

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Sunday, March 19, 2006 at 9:58 AM
Family life • (0) Add your comment

Today I officially entered my 40th year. To celebrate, I took the day off work and went to a museum exhibition in Detroit. Highlights include the following:

• I thought all of the Tim Hortons were in Canada, but they’ve crossed to our side of the border. Should we be concerned about encroaching cultural imperialism?
• The Bridge to Canada sign had me going for a few minutes. I would have taken it if it were Toronto on the other end.
• Many thanks to the grad student who let me in to the exhibit, even though it was spring break. Thanks also to Julian (who was assigned to baby sit me) for letting me take a look at the items that didn’t make it into the exhibit.
• After seeing an exhibit about fake relics of a fake civilization, I stopped at an Asian arts and antiques store. There were real Chinese antiques in the store, but also plenty of replicas and quasi-Asian items. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference.
• I made it home in time for dinner, where this year my family remembered it was my birthday.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Thursday, March 16, 2006 at 10:05 AM
Memoir • (0) Add your comment

Salon’s Sarah Elizabeth Richards, on a “report out of England that shows the sexes differ in what kind of science they prefer to study”:

One can’t help wondering whether the answers really reflect students’ interests or whether they felt social pressure to answer a certain way. I can just imagine a bunch of 15-year-old boys guffawing Beavis-and-Butt-Head style (albeit with a British accent) about how cool it would be to learn about blowing stuff up. And any girl who admitted she was really curious about what lightning does to the human body might be labeled as freaky.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Wednesday, March 15, 2006 at 4:34 AM
Unfiled • (0) Add your comment

As long as I’ve had a web site (blog or otherwise), I’ve looked for a way to easily share what I’m reading, as well as to track what I’ve read.

The now-defunct Library section of Sing Cuccu clumsily served that function. I’ve experimented with lib.rario.us, Listal, and LibraryThing, but they’re more about what one owns than what one’s read. MediaMan already fills that bill for me.

I thought I’d find something in Ning that I’d like, but I didn’t.

I finally settled on All Consuming. All Consuming is part of the 43 network: 43 Things, 43 Places, 43 People, and Lists of Bests. If you’re a member of one, you’re a member of all.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Tuesday, March 14, 2006 at 10:08 AM
Life management • (2) Add your comment

I had a minor meltdown at the dentist’s office today when I showed up and found out that I had been assigned to a different hygienist. I’ve had the same hygienist for seven years, and she’s part of my strategy for surviving the dentist office. Make sure nothing changes, and I’m all right. Change the hygienist, and I’m not.

Worse than a new hygienist, however, is rescheduling, so I submitted to her capable ministrations. But upon checkout, I made sure the receptionist put a note in my file that I prefer Jennifer.

“Does this make me Rain Man?” I asked Maverick.

“No, not that, something more like Sprinkle Man,” she said. “And for more than one reason.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Monday, March 13, 2006 at 9:02 AM
Memoir • (0) Add your comment

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Sunday, March 12, 2006 at 6:49 AM
Family life • (0) Add your comment

Writing of nearly every sort came to a standstill this week, the result of my late-night Oscar-watching: I was too tired.

Otherwise, I’ve managed to do preliminary work on my screenplay on at least four days out of every week.

Not only have I managed to work on the one project, I’ve come up with two more original ideas. I find myself rejecting more ideas before they attain some form, because I’m not certain what to do with them all. As it stands, I have six possible projects sitting in front of me. Two of them are adaptations (one book and one short story), three are original, and the sixth has a historical basis but will probably be an original story. One especially interests me, and I’m taking a field trip next week to do some research.

In the meantime, I’ll just have to collect ideas. I am such a consummate rabbit chaser that I may need some sort of ceremony to release each idea onto a list, knowing that it will be there someday when I need it.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Friday, March 10, 2006 at 5:15 AM
Writing • (0) Add your comment

I dithered around all day yesterday, wondering if I should give up sleep in order to watch the Oscars.

In the end, I even watched most of the pre-show, because my computer kept locking up while watching Benny and Joon. Tip to red-carpet interviwers: Let the celebrity talk. Interrupting and talking-over is not only rude, it annoys the hell out of your viewers.

A combination of housework, cuddling with my husband, and a game of Civ II kept me going through the broadcast and an hour past. Jon Stewart was nice, but his opening monologue went on a bit long. Had they cut out the interminable and wholly unnecessary montages, they could have cut an already shorter-than-usual program to just over three hours.

I liked Walk the Line, and I liked Reese Witherspoon in it. Kudos to her for learning to sing and play an instrument for the role. But I was disappointed that the best actress Oscar didn’t go to Felicity Huffman for her performance in Transamerica. She was amazing, and so was the film.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Monday, March 6, 2006 at 5:04 AM
Movies • (0) Add your comment

Maverick tells me stories about the work of her other half. Since I usually don’t have a lot to go on, I remain skeptical.

Today she mentioned that HOH is working on a Las Vegas casino deal in which George Clooney is an investor, and that there’s a good chance that she’ll get to meet him. “Yeah, right,” I thought, and moved on to the next tab in Firefox, where I read:

Then there’s his role in organizing star-studded tsunami fund-raisers, campaigning with U2 singer Bono for African debt relief, opening a Las Vegas casino and somehow getting the rap for breaking up every faltering celebrity marriage. MSNBC

I’m still skeptical, but I’m giving him this point.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Thursday, March 2, 2006 at 3:44 PM
Unfiled • (0) Add your comment

I really shouldn’t be surprised by this kind of thing:

Trible has also found layers in the Book of Ruth’s tale of the widowed Ruth’s fealty to mother-in-law Naomi (“Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay”), which has been used as a model in some Korean churches for how a young bride marries both a husband and a mother-in-law.

Via Salon.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Wednesday, March 1, 2006 at 10:34 AM
Unfiled • (0) Add your comment

It’s not a novel, but it is new David James Duncan, which is better than no David James Duncan.

Yesterday it ranked 350,797 on Amazon. Today it’s 66,033. Word must be getting out.

Posted by (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Tuesday, February 28, 2006 at 5:31 PM
Books • (0) Add your comment