Thank You

When I opened my blog today, I was greeted by an award from Michele (Ruminations and Uncovering:  Toward a New Me).  Thank you, Michele!  Not only did I discover a new friend with whom I have a lot in common, but now I have a topic for today's post!  Here are the rules for the Versitile Blogger Award:

1.  Thank the person who gave you the award

2.  Share seven things about yourself

3.  Nominate 15 newly discovered blogs

4. Let your nominees know about the award.

Okay, 7 more things you might be interested in knowing about me . . .

1.  I love cookbooks.  I collect them and have since I was a teenager.   Lately though, I've gotten a little more selective about my cookbooks.   I like to have a beautiful color picture of the food for each recipe.  I also want to have the nutritional information at the end of the recipe.  And, of course, there's the food.  I want food that fits my life plan of eating.  I have multiple cookbooks from Cooking Light, Eating Well, Weight Watchers and Williams Sonoma.  Then there's the index--I want a really good index.  The WW cookbooks, which I love, used to have terrible indexes.  They've gotten a little better.  I use the index to circle the recipes I love.  If I want to make roasted red potatoes with rosemary, say, I'll end up flipping to the index of several cookbooks to find the recipe I want.  I've started getting rid of cookbooks that don't meet my needs.  I've probably given 60 of them away over the past year.  I try to copy my favorite go-to recipes to my computer as my friends and family often want the recipes for foods I make.  

2.  I'm the youngest of four kids.  Even though my older brother is 10 years older, my sister is 7 years older,  and my younger older brother is 3 years older,  since I became an adult I've always felt older then all of them.  Older in a good way.  Older as in wiser, more responsible, more in touch with the ways of the world.  

3.  I like to run.  I prefer running alone.  I like to set my own pace and not be slowing someone else down.  I like listening to my playlist (60s classic love songs with some classical mixed in), but if I'm with someone else, I feel like we should chat.  The best thing about running with someone else is the added impetus to get out the door, but, it can also be a bad thing if that other person convinces me to wimp out of going when I sorta really felt like going.  

4.  The only recipe I know absolutely by heart is the recipe for my mom's brownies.  The best brownies in the world.  I used to make them at least once a week.   Actually, it's been about six months since I've made them and maybe I'd better take a peek at that recipe before I make them again.  They're only for very special occasions now and only when there'll be enough folks around to get a sensible brownie/person ratio.  Gone are the bad old days of making a batch, nibbling all day, and then making a replacement batch so no one realized that I ate the whole thing.  (Unless, of course you consulted Mr. Scale--he realized it.)

5.  Our oldest, Laura, is a wunderkind.  She learned to read when she was two.  She was very shy.  She's beautiful.  She chose her college partially based on the caliber of their Ultimate Frisbee program (she went to Stanford).  She and her husband live near Seattle.  She is a children's librarian, but has chosen to homeschool her three children.  This is a picture of Laura with her youngest.

6.  I'm a chronic re-reader.  I read a lot.  I usually have a CD book in my car, an audiobook on my ipod, a paperback in my purse, and at least two books (a novel and a non-fiction book) by my bed.  I love to discover new authors  (M. C. Beaton's Agatha Raison series,  Dana Stabenow's Liam Campbell series, and Adriana Trigiani are among recent finds) and I tear through all their books until I'm waiting impatiently for the next one.  I love historic fiction.    My all time favorite book is Here Be Dragons (Sharon K. Penman).  I have reread this one at least once a year since I discovered it in 1985.  A library patron kept recommending it to me and finally put a copy on my desk.  I was put off by the title (I don't care for fantasy), but I decided to read 50 pages to give it a try. I was totally hooked.  It's not fantasy.  Anyway, I re-read this often and love it.  Other books I re-read are Gabaldon's Outlander series, Jean Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear series, Francine River's A Voice in the Wind series.  All really well written.  BTW, for that book in my purse, it's usually a re-read.  A paperback of one of my favorites so it's easy to get right into it when I have just a bit of "found" time.

7.  It sounds like a cliche, but I knew the very day I met him, that I wanted to marry DH.  We met our senior year in college, at a birthday party for a mutual friend.  We were singing and he was standing near me.  He complimented me on my voice and we started talking.  He called me that night (just as I was telling my roommate about him) and invited me to go dancing in Sausilito the next day.  That was January 27, 1973.  He proposed in April and we were married the day after graduation.  Thirty seven years and counting.

Hmmm, 15 Newly Discovered Blogs--I'm going to fail this one.   If you haven't gotten this award yet, please consider yourself awarded!

Just curious, what's your favorite novel?