A Christmas in July Weekly Link Round-Up

 

With the temperatures here in Phoenix stubbornly staying over the 110°F mark, Denis and I are pretty much staying indoors as much as possible and doing anything that requires going outside (like filling birdbaths and fountains) after the sun goes down. Since my doctor was in San Diego, I didn't have to make the trip to the clinic last Friday, for which I was extremely thankful, but the trips resume today. I'll be interested in what he has to say once he's taken a look at my leg. My leg has healed; it's my blasted toes that are taking their own sweet time to behave themselves. In fact, my toes have been such a problem that I've been working with my home health nurses to devise ways to keep the bandaging on that foot. After some trial and error, we seem to have found a solution which should mean that those five little piggies will finally start to mind their P's and Q's.

Last week, I showed you a photo of the box o' books I received. Well, Christmas in July continued this past week with a box o' yarn. (I may start referring to a box o' books as "bob" and a box o' yarn as "boy"-- what do you think?)

As you can see, I've got some very colorful projects lined up!

Wherever you are, I hope you're able to have some prime R&R this summer. Enjoy the links!

►Books & Other Interesting Tidbits◄

• Author David Housewright: Can your series characters evolve? Yes. Do they have to change over time? No.
• The year of the slim volume.
• Why you should read reviews after you've read the book.
• Why Jaws became more terrifying without the shark.
• "People still do not want women to succeed or be equal. While that is true, you need Virago": 50 years of the warrior publisher.
• How to find weirdly specific books online.
• Why cozy mystery's amateur sleuths are not just busybodies.
• Why all of Steph Auteri's book clubs have imploded.
• The real history behind the Archimedes Dial in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.
  

 

►Book Banning & Censorship◄

• "Racist," "grooming": Why parents are trying to ban so many picture books.
• The most banned picture books of the 2021-2022 school year.
• Moms for Liberty objections lead Leon County (Florida) Schools superintendent to pull five books.
• St. Marys (Kansas) officials again threaten the library because of LGBTQ books. (The library won't do what the officials want, so they want to get rid of the library altogether.) 
• A petition in Sterling, Kansas circulates to save the jobs of the library's director and assistant.
• She's a second-generation Utah school librarian, but after ten years, she needs a break.
• Numbers reveal more about District 6 book complaints in Greeley, Colorado.
• Senator Oliveira fights against a Ludlow (Massachusetts) book ban.
• Yancey County (North Carolina) backs down from a library takeover after a heated debate and community backlash.
• Barack Obama takes to TikTok to support libraries' fight against book bans.
• Ta-Nehisi Coates crashes a school board meeting over removing his book from class.
• Boston (Massachusetts) locals are fundraising for an LGBTQ+ library.

 

 

►Channeling My Inner Indiana Jones◄

• Does this Pompeii painting depict a 2,000-year-old pizza?
• A Roman aqueduct and "luxurious" burials were unearthed during the construction of an underground parking garage in Serbia.
• A Maya canoe surrounded by animal and human bones has been found in a "portal to the underworld" in Mexico.
• 1,200-year-old "Viking graffiti" is the oldest drawing ever discovered in Iceland.
• A man in Kentucky found over 700 Civil War-era coins buried in his cornfield.
• The "Ivory Man"-- a powerful leader buried in a lavish tomb 5,000 years ago-- was actually a woman. 
• Elite Bronze Age tombs laden with gold and precious stones are "among the richest ever found in the Mediterranean."
• How the key to the Bastille ended up in George Washington's possession.

 

►Channeling My Inner Elly May Clampett◄

• Why are squirrels "splooting" on hot days? (A rather common behavior to observe here in the Sonoran Desert in places like the Desert Botanical Garden...)
• Watch a chimpanzee rescued from a biomedical research lab see the sky for the first time in her 28-year life.
• How famous writers mourned the death of their beloved pets.
• The lonely battle to save species on a tiny speck called Tern Island in the Pacific.
• A new extinct species of "ridiculously cute" tiny penguins has been discovered in New Zealand.
• New at the Smithsonian's National Zoo: meerkat pups!
• These are America's 20 best cities for birdwatching.
• Why black bears have stopped hibernating.

 

►The Wanderer◄

• I've found a new place I'd love to stay in Scotland: 57 Nord.
• That extra loop of fabric on your seatbelt is actually an important safety feature.
• Why some people like the smell of gasoline. (I'm one of the weirdos.)
• How to find library bookshelves.
• Eleanor Rigby's grave in Liverpool, England.
• Here's where the highest rates of Alzheimer's are in the United States.
• Climate change is shifting the color of Earth's oceans.
  

 

►Fascinating Folk◄

• Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor's staff prodded colleges and libraries to buy her books.
• Marion Mahony Griffin, Prairie School architect.
• Josephine Cochrane, the forgotten housewife who invented your dishwasher.
• In praise of the crafty Hortense Mancini.
• How Dorothy Liebes, the mother of modern weaving, transformed the world of design.

►I ♥ Lists◄

• Twelve DIY book nook kits that add an extra dose of magic to your shelves.
• All 27 Pixar films ranked by their likelihood to make you cry.
• Emma Thompson's favorite books.
• Five stories featuring bad guys you love to root for.
• Twenty-one historical novels set in France.
• These ten non-fiction books will teach you something new.
• Twenty psychological thrillers to read by the pool.
• Ten cozy reading chairs for your home.

That's all for this week! Don't forget to stop by next Friday when I'll be sharing a freshly selected batch of links for your surfing pleasure.

No matter how busy you may be, don't forget that quality Me Time curled up with a good book!