Help, please

I have just finished my books and am looking for more to read. I loved The Thirteenth Tale (for the second time). It is a book for people who love to read. I read Buckingham Palace Gardens (by Anne Perry) about a murder in Buckingham Palace, solved by Thomas Pitt and his spunky housekeeper, Gracy. I love Anne Perry's period novels. They are quite good. I also finished Pillars of the Earth, and while it is really good, it is really graphic. I think that everybody in middle ages was just awful. Too much pillaging and raping of peasants, too much consensual sex in most graphic and vulgar terms. All this about building a cathedral. Still, it was compelling.

So here I am trying to figure out what to read next. I would love suggestions from anyone about what I should check out. I am always a little leery of contempory fiction because it is so often salacious, simply for shock value. I was going to read Memory Keeper's Daughter until I saw that it was made into a Lifetime Movie of the Week. That is when I was sure I wouldn't like it. Other than that, I'm not real picky. It just has to be good. I've read the new Richard Patterson (7th Heaven -- good) and the new Patricia Cornwell (Book of the Dead -- not good).

Please, help me out. Make suggestions.

Good Morning, NYC

I’m not sure what it is about my memory, but I can’t seem to remember that the red eye to JFK is not the best way to start out a trip. The last time I flew overnight to New York it was for a whirlwind 24 hour visit to the Big Apple. I flew with Sarah and Emily for just a day. We went to the Manhattan Temple at 6:00 am (because it is the only thing open that early). Afterwards, we found a small deli/café and changed out of our dresses in the bathroom. I left my skirt in the trash, because I didn’t really like it and didn’t want to carry it all day. We then went to Canal street and bought purses, saw Ground Zero, wandered through the shops on 5th Avenue and finally dragged ourselves to Rockefeller Center where we decided that we would rather sit in the airport for 4 hours than try to make ourselves do anything else. At that point, I swore I would never do such a crazy thing again. Well, I haven’t, but I did take another red eye to JFK.

On Thursday April 17th (OK, just barely Thursday; it was 12:30 am) Sarah, Stacy, Kathleen and I flew to JFK. I was sure that I would be able to sleep since the plane wasn’t crowded and I had the window seat. That wasn’t going to happen. Kathleen managed to curl up with her head in my lap and sleep most of the way. I was left with trying to read in the dark and watch the map and flight info switch back and forth from English to Espanol. When you are watching, it seems that 5 hours is a really long time. I now know how to read about altitude, ground speed, tale wind, and air temperature in Spanish. El fin – we are at the end of the flight.

Since we are basically cheapskates, we took the train/subway into the city. While I thought I was booking us into the Time Square Courtyard by Marriot, which is a pretty swanky hotel, I was actually getting us into the 5th Avenue Courtyard, which was OK. We got off the subway too soon and dragged our suitcases 13 blocks down 5th Avenue to 40th Street. We later discovered that Grand Central Station was only a couple of blocks away. Anyway, we checked into the hotel, but could not get into a room until 2 pm. So being the righteous young women (and old) that we are, we went to the Temple and did baptisms for the dead. The Manhattan Temple is a marvel. It must be the cleanest, most serene, blessed place in the entire city. You leave all the hustle and bustle and noise and troubles at the door. It was great to be there.

Afterwards, we still had time to kill so we went to the Natural History Museum and went to a star show. I don’t remember what it was about because we all fell asleep. Back to the hotel, take a nap, get a shower and head out for Mary Poppins. Great stuff.

This was a fast trip – in the remaining 3 days we did the Empire State Building, the Guggenheim, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Moma, Chinatown, Ground Zero, 5th Avenue shopping, stake conference, and a fabulous Harbor Tour at night. We walked 100 miles and got caught up in the circus that was the visit of El Grande Papa (the Holy Father Benedict XVI not la grande papa - the big potato). We discovered Century 21, a department store that is like Big Lots for designer goods. Lots of fun. Kathleen had to see designer stores so she could figure out how to make the clothes at a lower cost. Really, a $6,000 dress with matching shoes for $1,950!!

Finally, Sunday arrived and we flew home on the longest flight I seem to remember. It is probably because we started out so tired and just never stopped.

I love NY!! But, there’s no place like home, there’s no place like home, there’s no place like home. Oh, and like before, I left some personal items behind in the trash -- my black dress shoes. They have holes in them. Maybe I should have bought those $1,900 ones.

P.S. This is strumpet Hello Kitty most appropriately found in Times Square (at the Sanrio shop)

Watch This Movie!!

My picture disappeared, but it is for the movie -- On clear day!!

This movie is so great. It is very funny, like only the Brits can be, but also very tender and poignant. I wonder if all Brits are as funny as these guys. Actually, they are supposed to be Scots. The main guy gets "made redundant" as loses his job at the shipyard in Glasgow. To over come his depression, he decides to swim the English Channel. It also helps him get over the loss of his son in a drowning accident many years before and reconcile with the son he still has. I laughed myself silly, and then cried and then went back and watched it all again. If you watch any BBC or PBS dramas, you'll recognize some of these actors and there is the Hobbit, Pippin.

Our New Neighbor

This past weekend, we were up in HV for just overnight and a day so we could listen to General Conference without any distractions. I always look forward to this time. When I am in SLC, there is always yard work, laundry, stuff like that to keep me away from the wonderful messages. I always tell myself I'll get back to them on the dvr, but I never do. Anyway, great conference, wonderful spirit, President Monson has stepped up so beautifully. He even sounds different, more prophetly.

Anyway, the really exciting thing is that we finally found the culprit for the bird doodoo on the garbage can and all the pellets full of mouse bones. And here he is (actually, this is from Google images, because the picture Bob took is too dark to see and his camera is in his office and he has clients in there). He is a great horned owl, growing to the huge size of 18" tall with a

wing span of 4 feet. His name is Stanton

Now the owl pellets are even more interesting. Owls don't seem to digest the bones of their prey (mice, small rodents, cats, skunks, and an occaisional bat). They just seem to collect them in their gut and then urp them up in a nice little ball of feathers and bones and stuff that I don't know what it is and am not going to ask. (for a picture of them, go to www.owlpellets.com/uploads/images/lb.jpg) You know, there are sites where you can buy them for $5.00+. Maybe I should collect them and make a small fortune. We seem to have an unending supply.

I wish he would move so my garbage can is not such a mess. I guess I'll have to move the can.

Welcome to the neighborhood, Stanton.