I keep waiting to hear the prancing and pawing of painter's boots on the balcony like I did Tuesday morning, but no such luck. They are painting the trim on the condos and early Tuesday a.m. I knew it wasn't Santa's reindeer I heard on the roof. By the time I got out into the livingroom they had already taken down the lights Steve put up. They reassured me they would put them back up when the paint dried. No such luck. So I guess I will be restringing lights when I get back from campus today.

We had our Dept. Holiday Luncheon yesterday and what fun. We gave our secret pals the books we had chosen for them to donate to the Homeless Shelter here in Greenville. I had Barbara's name and she loves her Golden Retriever so I found a really cool book, The Right Dog for the Job: Ira's Path from Service Dog to Guide Dog by Dorothy Hinshaw Patent. Beautiful color photographs of Ira as a puppy to him as a trained guide dog. The text and the illustrations also showed his trainer brought him to her classroom so he could acclimate to noise and children. A gotta have Nonfiction title for elementary school libraries. I received a copy of Silverstein's Where the Sidewalk Ends and we shared memories of particular poems from this book. Along with the secret pal donations, we collected two Zerox paper boxes full of books, from board books to adult novels, for the Homeless Shelter. This is part of our ALA Student Chapter activities so two of our students came to collection and deliver the books. Such a feel good event!

Lots of talk about the new Charlotte's Web movie. Jami and I had made plans to go on Friday, since that is opening day, but it is also our College of Education graduation ceremony day. So a bunch of us from the Dept. are getting together for lunch and then headed to the movies afterward. I have heard both good and bad reviews of the movie, but if it will bring kids to the library asking for E.B. White's wonderful book, which was one of our donations, then I am all for it.

As far as reading goes I finished Fannie Flagg's Redbird Christmas. What a delightful Christmas story of how a small Alabama town can bring an ailing man back to health. Oswald T. Campbell, an orphan with no family and doctor's order to spend what is supposed to be his last year of life in a warmer climate, ends up as a boarder in a private home intiny Lost River, Alabama. The women in town are delighted to have their second available male to pamper and before he knows it Oswald is feeling a lot better and has become fast friends with Patsy, a little abandoned girl, and Jack the Redbird who has free reign of the town's only store. I found myself smiling and sighing at the slow lifestyle of this little town. It is as much Patsy and Jack's story as it is Oswald's as the community adopts Patsy as she finds her voice while playing with Jack. The ending will bring tears to even the most grinchy reader's eyes. No bah humbugs here! :-)

I am also working my way through Zusak's The Book Thief. Although an absolutely stunning book, it is not exactly one to make you feel good. A little girl in Nazi Germany who steals books and finds herself reading them to the Jew they have hidden in the basement as well as in the neighbor's basement (designated the bomb shelter) during raids. Add the narrator, Death, to this scenario and you see why I have to put other "feel good" books into my reading schedule.

All for today.