Favorite Things

School shuns tech, teaches fountain pen.

How cool is that?

Okay... I have several fountain pens so of course I think it's cool. They sit upright in a old Waterford cream pitcher next to my computer at home.

"The pens improve the quality of work because they force the children to take care, and better work improves self-esteem," principal Bryan Lewis said. "Proper handwriting is as relevant today as it ever has been."

"I don't see fountain pens as old-fashioned or outmoded. Modern fountain pens are beautiful to use; it's not like in the old days of broken nibs and smudging," Lewis said. "We have a particular writing style and we have developed it very carefully and found a way that allows left- and right-handed people to write without smudging."

I'll preen a tad and admit I've always been complimented on my handwriting ~ it's even better when I use one of my fountain pens. I have one Montblanc (my parents picked it up for me in Europe a couple of years ago) and the rest are Waterman's. The pens I've bought for myself I have found at eBay.

Man I feel sorry for whomever has to clean up after me when I'm dead. I've got the oddest assortment of stuff in my life: fountain pens, mis-matched Waterford crystal, colored glass collection, gemstones, Christmas ornaments, Spode, Lladro, Wedgewood, Royal Doulton (no hand-painted periwinkles however), tons of needlepoint and cross stich, quilts, hand-made pillows, lace work, and several lambs worth of yarn... and this is after two tag sales and giving stuff to family!

Do you collect anything? Do you have too much stuff in your life?

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Forgot to add that I won US$24 in poker on Saturday night.

Oh, and no one died from eating the cookies.

It's not that I'm not paying attention to Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel and Lebanon, or the lunacy of the US administration - I just need a break from it all. I keep reading about the horrors human beings are inflicting on each other, at home and abroad, but I don't feel much like discussing it.

Maybe next week.

In the meantime I'll share some of my favorite things (cue Julie Andrews):

Astronomy

Cassini finds evidence of hydrocarbon lakes on Titan

How cool!

Researchers counted about a dozen lakes six to 62 miles wide. Some, which appeared as dark patches in radar images, were connected by channels, while others had tributaries flowing into them. Several were dried up, but the ones that contained liquid were most likely a mix of methane and ethane.

See Titan at The Nine Planets as well as Universe Today.

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Art



The image above is of Claude Monet's oil painting Springtime, another of my favorites. According to the Fitzwilliam Museum website:

It shows Suzanne Hoschedé, the eighteen-year old daughter of Monet’s then mistress, and later wife, Alice, and his own son, Jean Monet, in the orchard of his garden at Giverny in 1886. The tonality perfectly examplifies the ‘violettomania’ or ‘seeing blue’ for which the Impressionists were repeatedly criticised: one commentator described the third Impressionist exhibition in 1877 as having the overall effect of a worm-eaten Roquefort cheese!

It might seem strange, but, another favorite artist of mine is Piet Mondrian.




I love the clean geometric lines and bold colors of his work.


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Glass




I love beach glass and blown glass, cut glass and stained glass. Glass has fascinated me... forever. And, being 41 years old, that a long freakin' time. The chandelier above is from FunctionArt.com. As much as I love glass, I probably wouldn't hang that in my home, but it's an amazing piece of art containing 101 individual hand-blown glass pieces.

See also:

It's all about perspective ~ Hm. Next glass art piece for my collection? I think I'll email the artist and find out what it costs. It would look really nice on the dining room table.

Blue Bamboo

Rattled

And my favorite of all cut crystal, Waterford:



This is the 8 inch Cecily Rose Bowl.

sigh

I need to marry a billionaire or hit the lottery.

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Gemstones



My birthstone, (as is this, but I don't like it) courtesy of Gemstone.org, the website of the International Colored Gemstone Association.