1
Laughing is good for you. I got my laughs last Friday from Violet at Promptings and this list of verbal exchanges that are said to be taken from actual legal transcripts.
Here’s a sample:

ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated?
WITNESS: By death.
ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated?
WITNESS: Now whose death do you suppose terminated it?

2

Mr. Walker has a Weight Loss Stimulus Plan. It involves eating more in order to ummmm, lose weight? Well, the way he explains it it’ll work just as well as that Other Stimulus Plan.

3
Life at Walmart by Charles Platt at BoingBoing “Of course, I was not well paid, but Wal-Mart is hardly unique in paying a low hourly rate to entry-level retail staff. The answer to this problem seems elusive to Barbara Ehrenreich, yet is obvious to any teenager who enrolls in a vocational institute. In a labor market, employees are valued partly according to their abilities. To earn a higher hourly rate, you need to acquire some relevant skills.”

Why is this concept so difficult for people to grasp? I would even go so far as to say that if you work hard at a low-paying job and gain some experience and prove your dependability, yu will likely, in most well-run companies, become more valuable to your employer and thereby be paid more, even if you don’t go to school or some training institute to get “relevant skills.” I’ve seen it happen again and again. A friend’s son is working at a local grocery store. He started out as a bagger. He is now training, in store, to be a customer service manager. He’s twenty years old and has a very few hours of college credit to his name. However, he is dependable, teachable, and pleasant to be around. These qualities can, with time, get you a decent job at a decent wage.

4
Check out JellyTelly, Phil Vischer’s new project (VeggieTales).

5
From School Library Journal:

Blair Lent, the Caldecott winning illustrator of many books based on East European, Asian, and African folklore, including the popular Tikki, Tikki, Tembo (Holt, 1968), died on January 27 in Medford, MA. He was 79.

Prior to winning the 1973 Caldecott Medal for The Funny Little Woman (Dutton, 1972) by Arlene Mosel, Lent had three Caldecott Honor Books: The Wave (1965) by Margaret Hodges); Why the Sun and the Moon Live in the Sky: An African Folktale (1969, both Houghton) by Elphinstone Dayell; and The Angry Moon (Atlantic, 1971)

Tikki Tikki Tembo is one of my favorite picture books. I call my youngest Tikki tikki tembo no sa rembo chari bari ruchi pip peri pembo when I’m feeling particularly fond of her, just like the Mother in the book.

6
Sarah at Reading the Past writes about some upcoming historical fiction titles, including a new book set during the Great Depression by Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society co-author Annie Barrows. I just finished reading Guernsey . . ., and I must say I liked it very much just like everyone else.

7
The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith is being made into an HBO mini-series. Thanks for the information, Mindy.

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