31 is less of a no big deal event than 22 - because it least then, you're 22.
I took myself for some shopping and a massage. I think I'm going to be a massage therapist.
Dinner with the family was very good; good food, lotsa laffs, fun times.
I'm still here, just ramping down the weekly posts, as note previously.
Have a good one!
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
31
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Friday, July 10, 2009
Books & Boston in The Globe
The Globe highlights 29 books that are set in the various neighborhoods of Greater Boston. A highlight:
WEST ROXBURY
8. “The Blithedale Romance”by Nathaniel Hawthorne (1852)
“And, by-the-by, we were favored with many visits at Blithedale [Brook Farm], especially from people who sympathized with our theories. …In their view, we were as poetical as Arcadians, besides being as practical as the hardest-fisted husbandmen in Massachusetts.”
For the rest of the list (and it's quite a fun little read), go to:
http://www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2009/07/05/literary_boston_neighborhoods/
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Behind the Scenes at Samuel Adams Brewery
Good ol' Tigh, my Stonecoast Spouse, my Grad School BFF, was in Boston before heading up to the summer residency (the first one I'm not going to since 2007...sad...) Since he used to work at the brewery, and now works for their sales department in CA, we hit up the Boston Beer Company brewery down the street from me in neighboring neighborhood Jamaica Plain for a visit. It was fun! Here, a pictoral blog:




Hanging out in the tap room
Me, wearing Tigh's old cover alls, with owner and founder Jim Kock in the background
Tigh and Bridget hitting the taps
Even though I'm not drinking much these days, I popped a bunch of Tums, drank a lot of water and braved the belly's storm. There's no other way, if one is at the brewery, to get around it. For Tigh it's old hat but for me, it's like Grown Up Disney Land!
We went back today so he could say good bye to everyone. I met Dean & Bob from the commercials. As noted on Facebook, I have a crush on both of them - Bob's head is rub-a-licious and Dean's eyes match the color of their Boston Lager.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Cape Cod for the 4th
Ali cia had a huge group of people (20 in total) down the Cape this weekend. It was tons o fun and the best was that the sun came up and stayed up for our vacation weekend. How nice!
Fun things to do:
- bocce - we were doing well the first three tosses then it all fell apart
- grillin' and cookin' - I liek the kitchen there a lot
- making sand castles - esp. since there's a kid nearby and I don't look nearly as silly as if I were alone
- lobsters and steamers - lobster was super sweet and tasty
- ladder ball - a game anyone can play. I love it. I'm obsessed.
- spectatoring for sporting events - Sox finally pulled out a win, Wimbeldon mens was loo-oo-oong (I'm starting to like tennis since Rene is so into it...I think I'd like to try it and be very bad at it) and the hotdog eating contest
- camp fire - there's a fire pit now and we all sat around it at night and had fun playing Would You Rather; I'm also partial to Marry Chuck or F*ck.
- and, of course, my favorite: swimming in the ocean - great waves on Saturday
Of course, none of this would be half as fun if it weren't for the company. I have good friends. And they have cute children. T was down with DTC and she's such a cutie pie. Very expressive face and says "Mumma!" and "Hi!" clear as day. So fun. I srsly can't wait until I'm old enough to have one. Hahahahahaha. Ugh.
To wait out traffic, I hit up the Cape Cod bookstores. I wrote about that over at the poetry blog, so if you feel like seeing my latest acquirements, check it out.
Labels:
- Boston to Maine + other places,
974.4 Boston + surrounding areas,
cape cod
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Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Cilantro - if you don't like it, you're deformed
Summer time brings out the salsa for a lot of folks - lovely, cilantro filled salsa. For instance, Mom and I went to Margarita's yesterday (there's one in Weymouth now but it feels so very different from the one in Orono where I saw Howie Day play on St Patrick's Day in 1999) and their tasty salsa reminded me of this fun little diversionary story about cilantro I once heard on NPR.
Labels:
- WTF + Silly Lady Stories,
398 Stories + Randomness,
cilantro
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Monday, June 29, 2009
This Week in WTF - Mow the Lawn
We had family dinner tonight at Mom's. Greg told us about a commercial that was quite eyebrow raising:
Ah, yeah. Tulips on the mound... Wow.
Labels:
- WTF + Silly Lady Stories,
304 Pop Culture,
commercials,
this week in wtf
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Saturday, June 27, 2009
This Week in WTF - Gainesville Mayor Arrested for Nudity
Hooray for Wonkette for providing this link:
This is the best police report in the history of the world. Former Gainesville Georgia Mayor Mark Musselwhite was arrested for nudity. He was drunk and camping. Oh my giddy gumdrops. As I noted in my comments on the Wonkette, this makes me wanna go camping in Georgia real real bad.
Labels:
- Lets Get Civic al,
- WTF + Silly Lady Stories,
071 Journalism + Current Events,
mark musselwhite nude,
this week in wtf
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Friday, June 26, 2009
Nothing You Can Do But Dance Dance Dance
When the report was still just a hospitalization, I posted a blog entry saying I hoped it wasn't true, but, tragically, it is. Michael Jackson is dead.
This is so strange to think about. I don't really believe it yet. And yes, he was a really wacked out person, but I loved his music. It's funny how music can move you so much, even though it comes from someone who perpetrated some very morally questionable behavior. But my, does it move me.
I remember when I was 5 and 6 years old, how much I worshipped Michael Jackson. That's when I knew
I wanted to be an artist of some kind. He inspired my imagination and my creativity. I had a red jacket and a white glove and I would play my Thriller tape on my purple plastic tape player stereo and dance and sing for hours on end. My Thriller tape actually broke because I wore it out.
Later, in college, my recreation of Beat It, from lying on the couch, to looking over kitchen counters, to breaking up a pretend dance-y knife fight, was quite the party trick. At weddings, I grab a gentleman's coat and pretend to be Michael, with the tiles lighting up under my feet (so I like to think). And when I taught middle school and high school, I kept the end-of-class Friday chaos under control by having Dance Party Friday for the last five minutes of class, if everyone was good for the first 75 minutes, and then showing off my Michael Jackson moves. Nothing endears you to a group of high school kids like the willingness to be a total and utter dork in order to keep them from bouncing off the walls. And they loved it, so they've said.
Last night, to commemorate this artist whose work meant so much to me, I stayed up listening to his songs and other 80 pop dance tunes (thanks to the "Thriller" station on Pandora.com radio) and dancing the night away into the evening. I hadn't had so much fun in ages.
So, yeah. Yeah, he was definitely a freak. But, my oh my, was he a musician, was he a genius, the likes of which we won't being seeing anytime soon, I don't think. and I'm sorry to see such talent and inspiration go. I hope his troubled soul is at rest.
Labels:
- Artsy + Bookish,
780 Music,
michael jackson
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Don't take things for granted

at least for the summer. He and I got together and did some Old School things, like take the train to the Other Side Cafe on Newbury St and walk the street to the Public Garden (which looks SO PRETTY right now) and then Boston Common, through Downtown Crossing to the train, where we parted ways.
Labels:
- Boston to Maine + other places,
398 Stories + Randomness,
974.4 Boston + surrounding areas,
the note project
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Thursday, June 25, 2009
NOOOOOO - I know he's WEIRD but I can't be without my MJ
I know he's a big giant freak, but the world can't be without Michael Jackson yet! He has to be okay! Ahhhh!!! I mean, c'mon, Thriller. What's better than Thriller? Nothing. No album is better than Thriller, as far as being Important to the World-at-Large.
http://cbs5.com/national/michael.jackson.hospitalized.2.1059770.html
I hope this is a publicity stunt to promote the new tour or something........please please please...
Labels:
- Artsy + Bookish,
071 Journalism + Current Events,
304 Pop Culture,
780 Music,
michael jackson
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Going Weekly
I think I'm shifting from a mostly daily to a mostly weekly blog and not holding fast to any rules on posting. I'm going to concentrate on other things. But I'm still posting to all the other blogs in the meantime, so check those out.
http://neophytepoetics.blogspot.com/ (very sporadic entries)
http://dreamingbridgedesigns.blogspot.com/ (just made a whole bunch of new necklaces, too)
http://my-mediterranean-diet.blogspot.com/ (this I'm sticking to posting daily entries)
And if you just miss me, here's the collection of link for my "web presence" as of today...
http://dreamingbridge.blogspot.com/
Enjoy, all five people who read this blog!
Labels:
- Not So Every Day to Day,
808 Writers + Writing,
blogging
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Saturday, June 20, 2009
Cute Little House
Mom and I are always remarking on "cute little houses" that we see while driving around town. She's looking to downsize.
Here's one in Winthrop, ME, which is a nice little town. A cute little white house with black shudders. I'd put a purple door on it, too.
There's a purple house with white and yellow trim on VFW Pkwy that I see on my way to work. It is always so adorable.
Obsessed with cute little houses....
Labels:
- Not So Every Day to Day,
398 Stories + Randomness,
cute little houses
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Linky linky linky - feed your head with these spectacular blogs
- DreamingBridge.com
- Madd-Blog - Greg Madden
- Kara Mom of Three Girls
- Sandy's Year of New Things
- Tools of My Ignorance - Steve Visco
- Rock Blogster - Emily Burnham
- Third Factory - Third Factory
- Nomadics - Pierre Joris
- Collectages - Nicole Peyrafitte
- In Place of Chairs - Chris Rizzo
- Writing On... - Bunny Goodjohn
- Mainuh? Yessuh! - Jen H.
- Moon Pie Press - Alice Persons
- UMaine English Dept
- Stonecoast
- Humanities on Demand - Maine Humanities Council
- Political Junkie - Ken Rudin
- All Song Considered Blog - Bob Boilen (NPR)
- Robert Reich's Blog
- Library Thing
- Thingology Blog
- Library Thing Blog
- See Also...(library weblog) - Steve Lawson
- Portaportal
President Obama's White House Blog
Support VAIW
If You Want More Me - (and who doesn't?)
- Home Page
- Dreaming Bridge Designs - really coming along now...
- Dreaming Bridge Picasa Albums
- LibraryThing page
- Facebook Page
- MySpace Page
- Neophyte - a collection of quotes, thoughts, pontification, etc on poetry, writing, creativity and art
- My Mediterranean Diet
- How to Become a Publishable Poet - notes from a class at Stonecoast
- poetree - some "creative writing" as they say
- Maine Campus articles
Hell hath no fury like my kitten bored
These are the knick knacks my cat, Sir Oliver the Lilshid, has destroyed because he's crazy.
About Me
- Bridget Madden
- West Roxbury, Boston, mASSachusetts, United States
- Bridget Madden loves Maine and her neighborhood in Boston. She likes to pretend to be a real librarian as she sits behind the circulation desk at a small community college. She enjoys choosing one of her 82 pairs of shoes to wear every day, walking the dogs and writing about herself in the third person for autobiographic blurbs.
About This Blog
Thanks for visiting!
Categories and category desriptions:
- "All Madden Athletics " - Red Sox & other Boston teams, sports news, and feminine commentary
- "Artsy & Bookish Things" - Books, Libraries, Poetry, Writing, Art, Museums, TV & Movies, Theatre, Dance & Fashion
- "Boston to Maine & other places" - Area Events, Things of Note and Other Information & Musings about Boston, Maine and other places I've visited
- "Foodie Things" - Recipes, Restaurants, Drinks & Wine, Taverns & Pubs and Food Stuffs
- "Let's Get Civical" - Current Events, Journalism, Politics, "This Week in WTF"
- "Not So Every Day to Day" - Family, Friends, Pets, Dudes, & Comments on School (being a student & an educator)
- "Soft & Hard Sciences - "Health, Environment, Plant Life & Gardening and other science-related posts
- "WTF & Silly Lady Stories - "Facebook & MySpace Surveys, Diary Entries, Googling My Name, This Week in WTF, and other hodge podge
Blog Description in Franglish
What is "In the Pines"? Qu'est-ce que "Dans les Pins" ?
Sup Dudes? Sup Dudes?
I'm Bridget Madden and this is my blog. Je suis Bridget Madden et ceci est mon blog.
If you dig randomness along with pithy ness, you'll like this blog. Si vous creuser l'aléatoire avec lapidaire ness, vous aimerez ce blog.
This blog is: Ce blog est:
- commentary on books, journalism, libraries, poems, general literature and the literary life Commentaire sur les livres, le journalisme, des bibliothèques, des poèmes, de littérature générale et de la vie littéraire
- a regular journal about the events of everyday living: love, loss, family, friends, life, the blah of the days, the pursuit of happiness Un journal sur les événements de la vie quotidienne: l'amour, de perte, de la famille, d'amis, de la vie, le bla des jours, la poursuite du bonheur
- an odyssey as I embark on the perilous world of figuring out what I want to be when I grow up Une odyssée comme je l'ai lancer dans le monde périlleux de déterminer ce que je veux être quand je serai grand
- silly randomness because I need a break from whatever it is I'm doing Silly aléatoire parce que j'ai besoin d'une pause de quoi que ce soit que je fais
- a place for lamentation regarding leaving my beloved state of Maine and the great things I miss from Maine Un lieu de lamentations au sujet de mon bien-aimé quitter État du Maine et les grandes choses me manquent du Maine
- Massachusetts- lovely or annoying? Massachusetts-lovely ou ennuyeux? It will depend on the day, I suppose. Elle dépendra de la journée, je suppose.
- Baseball- because I don't just like baseball, I don't just love, I'm IN LOVE with baseball; and I write about other sports Baseball-parce que je ne suis pas, tout comme le baseball, je ne suis pas seulement l'amour, je suis IN LOVE avec le baseball, et j'écris sur les autres sports
- a blog about dining, libations, food, fashion, nightspots, and other entertainment info Un blog sur dining, libations, de l'alimentation, la mode, les boîtes de nuit, de divertissement et d'autres infos