Monkeys on computers

 At Creek Valley School, the blue monkeys had overtaken the library. They climbed the shelves and typed Shakespeare essays on the computers. Miss Selina had tried to ban computers from the library after they were handing in book reviews on behalf of the students as the previous librarian hadn't taken the monkeys with her. She was suspicious whenever a perfectly typed book review was handed in and preferred handwritten ones complete with spelling mistakes, for she knew that that likely hadn't been a cut and paste Chat GPT copy job. 

Mrs Hardback, the Headmistress however was all for technology for she had bought the computers for the school years ago and wanted everyone to use them, eventually rendering all pens and pencils and paperbacks obsolete. She didn't forsee the time when the library would become a video game parlour. 

Miss Selina voiced her concerns but Mrs Hardback had lots of money invested in this new technology, and nothing left for books, so when it came time for budget cuts to be made she took her scissors and cut Miss Selina's name out of the school newsletter.

We already have a Mrs Chan so, we don't need two of them, it will only confuse everyone, declared Mrs Hardback, who ruled the school without question. Then she readvertised Miss Selina's job, but there were no takers, so she poached a librarian from the other school who was under the impression that the Creek Valley school library had more books than the one she was already in, where in reality it was just a dark, windowless room full of sleeping computers. And monkeys. 

Traffic on Lincoln Road

 Pablo and Mr Muggs met up at La Porchetta. Mr Muggs really wanted to cross the road, but he was a bit chicken. He wanted to get to the other side to the Bird Barn. Whaea Selina used to go to Pomaria School, I know because I saw her school photo in the 'Find Whaea Selina' book. And that's just down the road from the Bird Barn. 

Mr Muggs was thinking of the tasty birds. Pablo's mouth was full of cheese. He was wary though and warned Mr Muggs about crossing the road there were way too many cars and a cat pancake was a real possibility. There was a long line of late model SUVs snaking along to Waipareira Avenue, and trucks hearing toward the supermarkets, and buses, and Toyotas, Suzukis, Hondas, Subarus, Daihatsus, Mitsubishis, queuing toward the five petrol stations and drive through takeaways. 

If only we had wings and could fly. 

I thought it was the 21st century and we would have flying cars by now. 

Lincoln Road stretched toward the horizon of the Waitakere Ranges. It could be cleared of all traffic, and turned into a runway, and all the airplanes could land and park near the Hangar Bar, or Sunderland School,  and we could send out a search helicopter to locate Whaea Selina again. 

The birds at the Bird Barn might agree to this plan, if they had not thought of this first. They knew something the cat and the mouse didn't. 

Goodhome

 Pablo paused in his tracks. This was most unusual. For the past four years, Whaea Selina had been turning up at Hells Pizza every Thursday at Lunchtime to deliver pizza to Ranui children, and it was only by their reading efforts that Whaea Selina had been able to survive because Lord knows that she couldn't subsist on the cold chicken and carrots school lunches. By extension Pablo had been eating whatever had been left over if it hadn't been snatched up by scabbers.

He thought she might have continued on, but the Creek Valley children were too well fed to need Hells Pizza, or maybe, they preferred the fancier Sal's Pizza? It had special sauce flown in especially from New York. But there was no sign of a reading deal on their door. 

Pablo turned to go and crossed to the Goodhome Gastropub. He smelled a faint whiff of cheese, and there was a sign outside their door. It read Quiz Nite Wednesdays. And inside, he noticed there were...books! They lined the shelves above the tables and near the pokie machines too. This was a definitely a pub Whaea Selina would patronise. 

Pablo was in luck, it was Wednesday. He just had to wait around past Happy Hour and see if Whaea Selina was at the Quiz Nite. Surely she would be there, they always needed her to answer random quiz questions. He recalled the last Kahoot quiz she held there was a question that most smart children got right and only the non-readers could fail.

Why must we be quiet in the library?

a) There's a baby in there and it's sleeping

b) If its noisy Whaea Selina gets a headache

c) So we can read our books in peace

d) So we don't have to call noise control and pay a huge fine

On the trail

 Mr Muggs tuned left and Pablo turned right. They had decided to split up and then meet up in the middle at La Porchetta if neither had not found Miss Selina by then. La Porchetta had cheese, and it also had fancy feast Italian food. 

Mr Muggs was a bit reluctant to leave Creek Valley School though, because it was rumoured to have good butter chicken at the school cafe. But he knew that even if it had, Whaea Tilot would likely not approve as only she made authentic butter chicken. She got the children to grind the spices especially in the mornings, she never took shortcuts. However Mr Muggs knew even butter chicken would not keep Miss Selina at a school. Something had happened that had made her leave. Perhaps she was offered better food at Mr Lobster. And the closest school there was West Auckland Middle School. 

Mr Muggs made his way down Central Park Drive. He passed the Chipmunks Playground and cafe (but no library). No S. He passed the Kings Plant Barn, which looked like an MLE. No S either, but maybe it was just not a planting day. Learning Network hadn't seen her recently either, though one lady said yes she was here once enquiring about books. Mr Muggs noticed that 'Teaching to the North East' was on sale. He thought TT should have bought the teachers 'Teach like a Pirate' instead.  It had a better looking cover.  There was a long stretch of shops and businesses before he got to Mr Lobster. The only thing, when he looked in all the female customers sort of looked like S with black hair and pale skin and he couldn't tell which one was her. 

Meanwhile Pablo was making enquiries at Hell's Pizza. No sorry we haven't had any orders all year from any schools. Not even Ranui. The children must have given up on reading books! Pablo was aghast. Had they lost their appetites?  Now what was he going to do? 

Better Work Stories - Fashion designer

 One of my fellow  teachers was looking at my job situation. Of course nobody now has money to pay a librarian, and so she looked at my hands like she was a gypsy fortuneteller and told me that I was to be a fashion designer. 

I nearly fell out of my chair. 

There is no way I could be a fashion designer. I don't even have a sewing machine. And I didn't feel like I could really draw what clothes people could wear only to have them made in a sweat shop in Bangladesh, Vietnam or China where all clothes are manufactured these days, as they sure are not made here. 

I have lived long enough into the 21st century to know that every decade in the past has reached the nadir of fashion and now anyone can now just wear anything they like. It's only in certain places, like schools and working in retail that you have to wear ugly uniforms. 

So if you wanted to wear a meat dress or all your soft toys like Lady Gaga, you now can, and nobody would bat an eye, and even wearing your underwear on the outside is acceptable. Girls can wear pants and boys can wear skirts and everyone can wear a pink t-shirt. I remember years ago we had this 'Trash to Fashion' parade at the Trust Stadium, where everyone literally wore rubbish. What creative things you can do with black plastic bin bags knows no bounds. 

On mufti day at school everyone was wearing either track pants and sweat shirts, or, if they were children, their onesies and unicorn horns/Disney princess dresses, or superhero costumes. It was like Armageddon Comic Con Cosplay meets Book Week. If it was not mufti day, everyone would be wearing blazers and ties and looking like they went to Hogwart's School of Withcraft and Wizardry, or if doing sports, like the All Blacks team with advertising branding prominently displayed, and in mourning because black is the new black. Or something.

My preference is actually bathrobe and/or toga/wrap/pareu/sarong/lavalava, because you can just tie that around your body without having to sew anything. Security blankets are the new hoodie. 

But who am I to dictate what anyone else wears? I think it's only because I am harbouring a secret desire to have everyone dress in stripes for the largest Where's Wally Day ever, and get into the Guinness Book of World Records, but of course that's just crazy talk again and not going to happen as long as we have people that take their day jobs seriously. Everyday cannot be a party. We are in an election year as well, so all the political parties are parading around in the respective colours/gang patches and people are wary of showing their affiliations. So if I became a fashion designer, I might only add to the confusion. 

Last few years have become a bit of a masquerade though but I've just stuck with the surgical blue masks and scrubs look because its the fashion to look like a zombie who just got out of a hospital bed, with bed hair and bandages. It's fun to dress up I suppose, but to make a living out of it I am not sure. It just might be creating more work for the people that have to do the laundry (me). 

Well, it was either that or work at SpecSavers like another teacher suggested. 

Mr Muggs investigates

 Mr Muggs the library cat was at Creek Valley School after having crossed the bridge of troubled waters, to find S was no longer there either. Well she WAS here, said his sidekick Pablo, and there was evidence that she HAD been there...Mr Muggs glanced around and saw all the fiction chapter books had been genrified, the non fiction had been sorted into Dewey Decimal, and the lounge chairs had been feng shuied. There were also tell-tale spider plants. They could only come from one plant the mother of all plants, and Mr Muggs remembered S had told him she originally got the first baby from Henderson Intermediate. 

But he must have missed the memo because none of the teachers ever remembered seeing her. She was like this invisible ghost librarian that only the children ever saw and you could never rely on what children told you. 

Well look at this, said Pablo. There was a note on the noticeboard in the office that read 'You're cool'. Who would that be? We all know teachers in this school aren't that cool. None of them wore dark glasses yet could still read a book like S did. 

There were two graduate bears wearing their caps and gowns sitting on the top shelf. Which was labelled 'Top Shelf'.One had an engineering degree and the other had studied business. Wouldn't they know? 

Ah Miss Selina or rather 'Mistress Selina' yes said the bears she had been here they confirmed as they had presided over her piece of paper that was her MLIS degree. But it had mysteriously disappeared and was now replaced by a picture of a bookworm eating a book. 

Where did she go? Back to Ranui School? Not likely. The green gorilla was still there and hungry. Mr Muggs consulted his Wises Map and looked at all the schools in the area. Pablo would know where she had gone. He had a good nose for anyone who had the cheese touch...and it seemed Miss Selina inadvertently had the cheese touch. 

Pablo said she was definitely here as I scoured the staffroom and she left her china soup spoon, a rice bowl and some chopsticks. That could only belong to her as all the other staff subsisted on coffee and cereal. Pablo suggested they ask Hell's Pizza as he was really hoping she did take up the job delivering pizza to those who've read 7 books on a full-time basis, now that she had the cheese touch. It was just down the road. 

Mr Muggs investigated the returns trolley. He saw there was a book that had just been returned. It was called 'The Man who Ate Lincoln Road'. I reckon she would have gone one better than Hell's Pizza. Besides this book is a little out of date don't you think? It still has Valentines in it! 

Pablo agreed. Mr Lobster Yum Cha restaurant it is then. 

Better Work Stories - Vet Nurse

 This might have been the perfect job for me. I looked after cats in the cattery and prepared pets and their anxious owners for repair. Of course I didn't mind cleaning up cat poo and bird poo and doing all those things only a crazy cat lady could do. Play with yarn, roll around in catnip, talk in cat language etc. After all, Catwoman was my supposed alter ego. I had nine lives, and spent most of them on the catwalk, treading the fine balance of navigating the pitfalls, barking dogs, and humans who just didn't understand cats. 

You had horse whisperers and baby whisperers, I was the cat meower. I had about five cats in my charge and one cat that had 17 kittens (it was the neighbours, they took no responsibility for any of her pregnancies) but we loved her so much that we were willing to rescue her from the SPCA and give her a good, even better life chez the Chan family. We had chinese food of course, what cat doesn't like mum's cooking. 

My vet nurse description wasn't much it was basically caring for animals. However at the Swanson Vet it wasn't just cats, though they operated a cattery, but all other pets, including dogs and mice. Unfortunately for me, dogs and cats generally do not like each other. And in the operating theatre, I had to witness dogs getting their balls chopped off and mice being euthanised. I was stoic though and this of course came with the job. I would hold their paws while the deed was being done. 

The price people paid for their pets was pretty steep, though I suspect children cost a whole lot more. The only thing that undid me was the medical smell, of dried blood and disinfectant and iodine, that in an enclosed space made me feel very dizzy and faint, so I didn't last very long in that job and had to quit. 

I do wonder sometimes what turn my life would have taken had I had a stronger constitution and stuck with what was the animal division of Shortland Street. When Socks was nearing the end of his life mum made an appointment with the Vet, but he knew what was coming and snuck away. So we never did find Socks though sometimes his ghost comes to visit me at odd times (usually at night) waking me up but I just open the window and say go to the flowers where he's supposed to be sleeping. 

Every hospital needs a cat though and Waitakere has one called Daisy. Though we didn't see her there last time mum got drained of blood. I now avoid hospitals whenever I can because of all the traumatic memories, long buried,  of nearly losing my life in one. Though I sometimes think they could do with better books instead of Women's Weekly magazines in their waiting rooms, circa 2002, though it is entertaining to read the latest gossip out loud to patients who really really want to know just what the Royal Family are up to.  

Mum was very disappointed I did not become a nurse like the heroines on Shortland Street that she watches every night at 7pm. I remind her she already has one son who is a surgeon, she doesn't really need me in the medical profession. Don't I have enough drama in my life already? If the DHB had proper libraries for patients in hospitals and I could just go round reading bedtime stories and singing lullabies to distressed patients I could possibly do that, but whoever heard of such a thing in New Zealand?

The MLE

 Princess Anne was keen to show off Avonlea Private School to her visitors who were an international congress from CCTV. This included the formidable Mrs Trunchbull, former Headmistress of Crunchem Hall who was utilising the barn as a MLE - modern learning environment for her brand of special callisthenics. Whaea Caryn had the feeling that she actually was training her pupils for the circus but she didn't want to say in case she was wrong to a two-time Olympic Gold medal winner of the hammer throw.

They entered the barn where indeed there were bales of hay piled up from the summer harvest. Mrs Trunchbull had just been transferred from Crunchem Hall now that it had been bought out and rebranded 'The Cool School'. Miss Honey  had taken over management. 

Miss Honey! Spat Mrs Trunchbull. The children adored Miss Honey who was originally a  lowly librarian until child prodigy Matilda appeared on the scene. It was only because Matilda was a genius and actually read the books that nobody else in school read that she was able to put the fear of God into Mrs Trunchbull, who had to admit defeat when she was outsmarted in the school spelling bee for being unable to spell Missisissipi. Matilda then appointed Miss Honey to the top job after proving that Mrs Trunchbull had cheated her out of her inheritance. It was all very messy but it was all in writing in the annals of Roald Dahl. 

Princess Anne had kindly taken Mrs Trunchbull in as PE teacher where she was now in her element, and now her bullying had an outlet when she wielded her ice hockey sticks in the cold Canadian winters. Her team was now the main feeder to the Toronto Maple Leafs.

TT was impressed with the school and wondered if she could apply for a transfer. Whaea Caryn was holding out though, her husband back in the Land of the Long White Cloud had been calling her saying he was unable to cope with her being so far away and that he needed her back as she was the only one who knew how to change the lightbulbs in their new housing compound on Teacher's Row. 

Whaea Caryn was only slightly annoyed. I thought I left plenty of soy wax candles in the cupboard! Surely hubby knows how to light a candle. She now had to spend some time writing step-by-step instructions in an email and a flow chart diagram and several graphs.  TT was glad to help with this. He just needs to be taught Whaea Caryn. I understand, we are so busy teaching tamariki that we neglect our husbands. But that requires another school...

Princess Anne of Green Gables

 Whaea Caryn and TT finally arrived on Prince Edward Island after their successful CCTV conference. They were meeting Princess Anne of Green Gables, who was Headmistress of Avonlea Private School and was giving the teachers of the Land of the Long White Cloud a tour of the campus, of where she had been based for 16 years.

Yes I grew up here, said Princess Anne. She insisted on being called Princess and not 'Principal'. Her red hair was piled up into a bun on the top of her head, and she wore a long dress with puffy sleeves. In her hand she wielded a long rod, which had measurements on it, and said it was her 'pointing stick' and that all veteran teachers had to have them. We have authority to rule, thus, we must never be seen without our rulers, advised Princess Anne. She smiled, and tapped her pointing stick to the ground. 

When I was a girl I was the naughtiest, most rebellious child in class and could never stop talking. I also broke a slate over poor Gilberts head as he pulled my braids. He is now the caretaker of the school. Actually he is over there right now. Princess Anne pointed her stick to a burly man over in the far field who was raking autumn leaves into a large pile.

TT looked around the old schoolhouse. It had not changed since 1911. There was a bell at the top and the traditional blackboard and rows of hinged desks. Do you teach here?

This is where I do my history lessons, said Princess Anne. But I have also installed CCTV behind the blackboards so we can do zoom online learning for the 777 other students who've enrolled. My face to face class is restricted to 66 lucky pupils. 

Do you have a library? Asked Whaea Caryn. She glanced at the Canadian flag held aloft outside. It was fluttering in the cool breeze. It swelled her heart with pride to see the red maple leaf, to her it looked like a red leaf shaped love heart, and was really her ace in her pack of teaching cards. She always played the Canada Card whenever teachers questioned her methods. 

Princess Anne snorted. A library? Don't be absurd. The only books we have is my hagiography series written by Lucy Maud Montgomery. That's the only books we need to read at this school. 

But where do you go to relax and read books? asked TT. She was thinking the extra space could be another classroom. 

Princess Anne said there was no need for a library. We don't have bean bags at this school. If children want to read books and roll in the hay, they can do it in the barn. She pointed her stick in a north easterly direction, and sure enough, there was a big red barn that looked like a giant MLE. 

Better work stories - Usher

 One of my friends now works as security for all the big concerts and sporting events around Auckland. I wouldn't do that as I'd probably be beaten up and flattened, but I did have a similar job once in my 20s at the University when showed people to their seats at the theatre, where I wasn't paid but got to see a free show. It was usually a play put on by the Auckland Theatre Company. 

I had no real aspirations to be an actress and being in the limelight but dressing all in black and being invisible was something I could do. My boss at the time thought I was terrible as I was supposed to sell programmes for $8 a pop and I never sold any, as I thought people should get their money's worth of tickets that were already expensive as it is and didn't need to shell out for the program to go with it. Most people who I asked if they would like a program declined. We were all poor students!

I don't recall many of the plays, except for No 2. in which Madeleine Sami did an Robin Williams/Aladdin virtuoso performance of as many different Indian accents as she could, and one play (was it The Graduate? or A Streetcar Named Desire) where Elizabeth Hawthorne streaked naked across the stage. It was theatre, anything goes. 

After the play was over and everyone ushered out, my boss who had his eye on me said he was watching me all the time and I was a bit unnerved by this. He was probably bored watching the same play over and over every night and thought I was much better entertainment. I was doing my English papers at the time and studying drama so I thought I should at least see one play. 

The only time I got up the courage to act was when we acted out a scene from Top Girls by Caryl Churchill in the drama studio. I played the waitress so and didn't actually have to say any lines. Which was alright but I ruined the scene because I made believed I was a clumsy waitress who dropped all the food. 

After my stint as an usher was over I had two big black bin bags full of black clothing enough for several funerals so ended up donating them to the Salvation Army. I preferred the big broadway musical type shows to the serious political and fringe ones anyway but that kind of theatre never got a look-in at the University. My boss was dismayed that I would sometimes fall asleep on the back row though actually I slept anywhere and sometimes in lectures if they were too boring as well. 

Unlike in Shakespearean times, the patrons of this theatre were not riff-raff groundlings who snacked and drank mugs of mead while watching the show. They did not have rotten tomatoes tucked up their sleeves or a hook to drag anyone off the stage. This crowd was very polite and clapped at the end, because it was usually the sons and daughters of the wealthy scions of Auckland (doctors, lawyers, engineers)  having a night out at the theatre and acting for fun if they couldn't be full-time on Shortland Street. 

Book Week

 Next week is Book Week.

On Monday we will read all books about the moon.

On Tuesday we are all going to 'tues' our own books.

On Wednesday the books will be buddied up and there will be a mass wedding where the books get married to each other.

On Thursday, Thor will make a guest appearance in the library and there will be a culling of bad books

On Friday, it will be cookbook day where everyone brings their favourite recipe to make a cookbook and food and drink WILL be allowed in the library

On Saturday, the books will have a nap, and everyone will relax in reading hammocks and beanbags and tripillows and bibliotherapists will be on hand with cucumbers for sore eyes.

On Sunday, we will read aloud from the Holy Bible

Wait, said the children. Our school isn't open on Saturday or Sunday, we can't get into the library on those days! Whaea Selina just laughed and said that's why you need to find the book with the golden ticket inside. 

Better Work Stories - Born again

 I found out I couldn't be a born again Christian and a librarian at the same time, at least, not in the public library. Nativity displays had been disapproved of if not banned, and Bible reading was not to be done in work time, but I could do it on my days off. And at lunchtime, we had a Wednesday group at a Bible ministry called Bibles in Action where others met for prayer and read from the Word for Today.

Jesus saved and delivered me from being a weirdo. I no longer did yoga or reiki or any of those new age things. I didn't need to read Rainbow magazine and be pyschic or clairvoyant or whatever magic they were trying to tout. The books about Jesus in the library were alright, but some didn't seem to know who He was and claimed he was made up. I thought right, God, show me who you are. 

I needed a Bible so walked into the Bibles in Action shop. I can't afford a new Bible can you give me a spare old copy, like those King James Bibles. The only thing about the Bible was I could understand the stories in the shorter New Testament about Jesus as being superhuman but God? He was a mystery to me. The Alpha course seemed to say He is spirit, but I didn't really understand how that worked. 

I had to read the big Old Testament to find out. I don't know what happened, but what was before just words on a page become illuminated. It was the story of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. And there it was, Eve, desiring to be wise, was tricked by the serpent. She was like me. I had done a foolish thing wanting what was forbidden. My prayer was answered.

Forgive me God, I was like Eve. Then as I read on, Genesis became quite the story, and I read on and on and on until Mum became concerned I was reading the Bible too much. I read the whole Bible in a few months. 

I asked my boss if we could have Bible reading in the library. Just people taking turns to read the Bible out loud. That would be the way to share it. I thought it was a great story and it was all true. He said I could only do it outside work time. Thankfully I had Fridays off and so I gathered friends and those interested and we read the Bible on Fridays out loud until we were told off by people studying that we were too noisy, so we went tried to book a meeting room instead. 

And after that I had been working in the library for seven years God convinced me that it was time to have a break. Mum was not happy but there wasn't much she could do. They weren't giving out any paid sabbaticals but God was going to lead me somewhere else. 

Babysitters Club #100

 If there's one thing a librarian appreciates, is a long running series that hooks readers for the rest of their free reading time. 

.Which brings me to the Baby-Sitters Club. If you were a girl like I was in the 80/90s this was the series your big sister read and ordered from the Scholastic Lucky Book Club. It was about a bunch of American girls who start a baby-sitting club not because they need the money but because Kristy's solo mum needs a babysitter and was ringing around for a sitter. So Kristy calls three of  her 12 and 13 year old seventh grade girlfriends together to form a club at her neighbour Claudias house (because she has her own phone line!) and the Baby Sitters club is born. The first book was called Kristy's Great Idea and every book thereafter featured a different club member narrating their own book and experiences baby-sitting, friendships, and sometimes fall-outs.  

Never mind that these girls are actually underage and might have needed to be babysat themselves - this is fiction remember! They did not actually babysit babies either. All this is candy to a young reader perhaps wanting to be part of a cool club themselves but probably not able to find the time - they met three times a week and were extremely professional and committed, they had a President, a Vice President, a Treasurer and a Secretary and ran all things like clubs do with membership dues and a minutes book, and planned sleepovers and pizza parties with the proceeds from their babysitting jobs. Kristy ran it as a business, she was bossy, but as far as I know, every club member respected each others different personalities and roles and nobody tried to steal each others jobs or embezzle money. 

My sister bought the series and she must have collected up to book #45 until she grew out of them. I was reading the junior series Baby-sitters Little Sister about Kristy's 7 year old step-sister Karen. Except Karen was the star of each and every title that also ran on forever although I think I only had the first 10 or so books. 

Every character was always described in great detail at the beginning of the books, their looks, personality and family background. Girls were extremely self-aware, so there was Kristy the boss, tomboy who's dad abandoned the family, Mary-Anne the shy sensitive listener only child who's mother died when she was a baby, Claudia the Japanese-American funky creative artist with the genius sister and Stacy the permed blonde New York sophisticate diabetic who's parents got divorced. 

More sitters joined later on and the series became extremely popular. I thought I had left the series behind in my childhood after I got into the classics and wasn't reading about tweens anymore. I skipped Sweet Valley High and went right into Gone with the Wind, War and Peace and Jane Austen.

The Baby sitters Club never died though as it came back as Graphic Novels and became the most popular books in the school library (amongst girls) with new full colour editions. The first seven books flew off the shelves and totally outpaced the original chapter books. Even when they came out with fresh covers and Netflix series tie-in. 

I've now gotten into the e-books editions of the original chapter books on the public library's Libby platform as the paperbacks we had to ditch. My sister had stored them under the house I have no idea why - and they'd gotten mouldy. Was she hoping to save them to give to our younger cousins or what because that moment had totally passed them by and they were into Harry Potter and the Divergent series. 

It's interesting reading the rest of the series as an adult and finding out that new club members had been added, some of the girls start dating and that, shock horror for the hundredth book Kristy decides to disband the Baby-sitters Club. Then there's all the spin off books, the mysteries, the super specials in which the Baby sitters travel far and wide (how can they afford??) and the diary series, and even after their 8th grade graduation, a Forever Friends series in which their friendships are explored after they stop baby sitting. The entire Baby-Sitters Club series is more than 200 books which possibly beats Danielle Steel's output but maybe just a bit below Nora Roberts and James Patterson. 

If there's one series to binge read and like me you  don't really get the whole manga thing, want to avoid any cringy sex scenes because secretly, you never really grew up anyway -  the Baby-Sitters Club may be just your gateway drug into the delights of reading. 

Sometimes boys are shamed into reading Baby-sitters Club by their teachers but actually I know quite a few liked them, even though it was mostly a girls club (Mary Annes boyfriend was an associate member)   but honestly I think there could worse things adolescent tweens could be reading, and nobody practised witchcraft or fell in love with a vampire or zombie in this series. Thank you Ann M Martin - who knew you would create so many happy readers. 

Library wishlist (17)

 The garden outside was flourishing. The children had decided after finding out where sugar came from, and whether they could grow it themselves. This was why half the school field was now sown in sugar cane, a quarter had maple tree saplings, and the far corner had wildflowers and was  dedicated to beehives. 

Where are we going to play rugby? Asked Mr Kell. He was a bit annoyed and would have to revise his sports curricula. 

The children invented a new game, or rather, they convinced Mr Kell that hide and seek was actually a better game to spend time playing than rugby. 

But how will we compete against other schools? This isn't right. 

The children wrote letters to the other schools saying they could come over and learn how to play hide and seek too. And they would also make up a new haka. This time, they would dig kumara pits in the field so that they could literally act out the haka. Everyone thought this was a wonderful idea.

Even the lunch ladies got into growing kumara which spread over the rest of the field. 

Whaea Selina rubbed out Pyjama Day, that was over, and it was now Matariki. They were going to have a Library Lockdown where those who remembered to wear their pyjamas, bring their cuddly toys and books were now treated to what Kahu 4 and 5 always wanted - A knock down, drag out Pillow Fight.

The children got all excited and said it was going to be even better than Ranui's Got Talent. 

The prizes were assigned - 3rd Prize - Bunny slippers, 2nd Prize - Fluffy Comforter and 1st Prize Reading Tent.

The 'no food and drinks' in the library rule was broken, and now steaming mugs of hot chocolate and marshmallows would be served along with the enormous hangi that had been cooking for two whole days. 

Whaea Sheree and Deputy Principal Alissa kept the parents at bay by holding a Quiz Nite in the hall, at the same time. 

Let's do a maths round and a spelling round, suggested Whaea Sheree. I want to see if the children are teaching their parents anything. Mr Kell asked if there was going to be a sports round. No said Whaea Sheree, you'll be too busy refereeing the Pillow Fight. 😀

Better Work Stories - Come to Jesus

 My come to Jesus moment was then. I had a vision when I thought Jesus had forgotten all about me. I had worked on Sundays because I never had any church commitments and the library was a seven day operation. I knew Jesus lived in churches as I had gone to one once and everyone talked about Him there, but, since my family only went to churches when there were weddings I thought that was the extent of it. I wasn't going to marry anybody anyhow, so really,  what use was church for me?

Then I remembered that Jesus laid hands on people and healed them. At least, that's what the Bible had said although I had given up on the Bible long ago when I couldn't make sense of it. Christians were constantly going on about the Bible that they were known as Bible Bashers at school and people to avoid as do-gooders and ones who got married as soon as they left school, because it was such a big deal to be married in church, in a big white gown, and have lots of children, even though having children was expensive. This was not going to be my fate. My mother made it quite clear that Christians were deluded religious people who were only after money and they were just as bad as other people but just had a get-out-of-hell back up plan. 

God doesn't look after you, I do, she said. And when you die, you are not going into Jesus loving arms, you'll just be dead. 

Thanks mum, I thought. Real comforting. Except those Christians seemed so certain in their beliefs. They weren't burning paper money so that their hungry ghosts would be appeased with cash in the afterlife of hell. Their souls would just sleeping in peace and waiting to be resurrected in heaven. 

I decided to rebel and find out more about Jesus anyway, in case he was real and not just a figment of my imagination, or as Richard Dawkins put it, having a  God Delusion.  So in my time spend shelf-checking the non-fiction I went to the 200s and secretly borrowed as many books about Jesus as I could. In the name of research. 

And lo and behold my workplace was even having what they called an Alpha Course for anyone curious about what this whole Christianity thing was. They were even giving out free breakfast at the staff cafeteria. If Jesus wasn't real at least I would be having scrambled eggs and baked beans on toast and I wouldn't have to spend too much of my pay on buying lunch. This time I would pay attention instead of reading my own books and being told off by the Bible teacher at primary school. 

Library Wishlist (16)

 Whaea Caryn reckoned she knew her way around the library. She also knew where Anne of Green Gables was located.

She looked amused as TT headed towards the Rainbow Section of the library where all the ROYGBIV books were and tried to find it under the Green category. 

Ha! She doesn't know Anne of Green Gables is under M. 

Sometimes Whaea Caryn could be sneaky when she knew something nobody else did. It was a way of giving herself a Gold Star for being super smarter than everyone else. Whaea Caryn casually walked over to the M section, in the fiction, certain the book would be there. She forgot that the Childrens and Teens books were separated from the Adults books though and soon found herself looking at a shelf of murder mysteries. 

Murder Mysteries were books where somebody dies and nobody knows who murders them. Everyone says 'it wasn't me' until a super clued up Detective saves the day by revealing it on the last page. The moral of these stories seemed to be - if you murder someone, you just don't tell anyone and keep them guessing, instead of being honest about it. Only Adults could read these stories, children didn't have the patience. Also, they weren't that interested in death and dying. Children were more interested in reading ghost and zombie stories where the deceased came back to haunt everyone. 

One book stood out from the rest because it didn't have a black cover or spine like the rest of the murder mysteries did. Her teacher's intuition told her that this book was in the wrong place. 

She read the title. Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty.

Liane Moriarty? Was this what L M Montgomery's real name was? Truthfully she had forgotten. She picked up the book anyway. She read the back cover, hoping to find the answers. It seemed to be about a Primary School Quiz Night, and something about bullies. This might come in useful for Quiz nite, she thought. 

Meanwhile TT was under the impression Princess Anne had written Anne of Green Gables, but the graphic novel version would be illustrated by someone else,  which was why she headed to the Rainbow Section first. She found that all the Green books were about gardening. 

Library books were arranged rather differently in Canada. 

Library wishlist (15)

 There were rows and rows of books at the Saskatchewan Public Library. TT didn't want to admit she was a bit intimidated by them all and would have absolutely no idea where Anne of Green Gables was located. She could ask a librarian but that would mean admitting she didn't know something. Teachers were always supposed to know everything. 

Sensing TT's fear, Whaea Caryn said don't be afraid, it's only a book.

Isn't there a tv show on Netflix I could watch instead? 

Whaea Caryn sighed. CCTV wouldn't allow it. It was required reading for their conference talk didn't TT know?  Now she knew why she'd been assigned to accompany TT. TT wanted to copy Whaea Caryn's notes and have her do all her homework for her. She had bribed Whaea Caryn with some duty free Tim Tams before they got off the plane. 

Hey I read Teaching to the North-East and that was enough for me. TT was going to be the keynote speaker on this very topic. She had her graphs and maps all loaded on her Powerpoint. 

Well that's not going to help us on Quiz Nite. I just know there is going to be a whole round on Anne of Green Gables. At least read the first chapter.

Ok...

I'll test you. Who wrote Anne of Green Gables?

a) Anne Frank

b) Anne Green

c) Anne Perry

d) Princess Anne

Library wishlist (14)

 It was Pyjama Day at the library.

TT and Whaea Caryn hadn't returned and so there were really no head teachers to tell anyone what to do. This was a strange situation and soon word got round that Whaea Selina was now putting up instructions on the glass door of the library on what to do at school now and only if you could read them you'd have any idea.

She put them in her best handwriting in florescent orange chalk marker, to make it clear. 

1. Tomorrow is Pyjama Day. Come to the library in your pyjamas. 

2. If you are not wearing your pyjamas, your teachers will take you to McDonalds for work experience emptying rubbish bins.

3. Prizes for the best pyjama and cuddly toy/book combo.

Most of the teachers had agreed that this was the best solution for lazy readers. Some of them thought it was madness but they soon learned Whaea Selina had a method in her madness. 

After she'd introduced Lego after much resistance (why did we have Lego books but no actual Lego? she asked the teachers) the boys got busy building weathertight houses. She'd warned them what would happen if they didn't put a proper roof on their houses, by filling up her watering can and watering their creations. If they had no roof it would all collapse and the girls paper dolls inside would get wet. 

Then she put on her glasses and went back to reading the rest of Dork Diaries. 

Well, she's a librarian the teachers all said, not a teacher, we can't expect her to make kites and paper lanterns , wear correct uniform and yell at everyone like the rest of us. 

Some disgruntled teachers murmured that they thought librarians were an odd bunch and did not belong at school. The library monitors were always cutting class and saying they had to work in the library, but who knows what they were really doing in there? Playing hide and seek? 

Library Wishlist (13)

 TT and Whaea Caryn never made it back to school for Term 3. Their plane had emergency crash landed over Saskatchewan and TT had saved the day by commandeering the plane. Who knew that her teaching skills also ran into hijacking? She knew how to do everyone else's jobs too and was great at telling people what to do. And so instead of the lake of thin ice that it was headed for TT had expertly guided the plane to an abandoned wheat field and everyone got off safely. 

This is really teaching to the North East, said TT. Leading by example. 

Whaea Caryn said, you ought to receive a medal, or at least a gold star. Wait, I have a roll of them in my handbag. She opened her handbag and peeled one off for TT. Next stop, Prince Edward Island.

?

It's even further North East. I've always wanted to go there.

Why? TT shivered in her puffy vest. She couldn't wait to get to the CCTV* hotel where a hot bath would be waiting for her. 

That's where Anne of Green Gables lives.

Anne of Green Gables? 

What you've never read Anne of Green Gables? Whaea Caryn was incredulous. 

Um no...

Whaea Caryn was dismayed, and proposed to march TT straight to the Saskatchewan public library where there would be sure to be a copy. 

*Canadian Council of Teaching Veterans.

Better Work Stories - The Reiki Master

 One time I had a student job cleaning for a rich lady in Remuera. She had a giant villa with a mosaic floor in the kitchen and operated a Hawaiian massage room in the parlour. She was from Manhattan divorced with four children and I remember that her Kiwi husband had left her after she'd had the big house and the big car and maybe it was all too much for him to handle so he ran away to live by himself on Great Barrier Island. 

She would leave me home made muesli bars to munch on while I mopped and vacuumed her floors and a cheque for $50 for doing that for 5 hours. It was a big house so it did take that long. I thought it was the best job ever because nobody was on my case telling me what to do. As long as I got the job done. 

I soon was fascinated with her trippy massage room though and later when I had to leave the job after my studies ended I asked if I could have a massage, and it was there that she read my colours. She had these bottles of liquid colours I could choose that were meant to represent the state of my soul or some kind of new age thing, and weirdly, I also had some kind of trauma that was present in my body when she touched it. Was it true, that I had been mishandled as was carrying all this trauma in my 19 year old body? Possibly? 

Anyway such was that I became an adept at alternative therapies to treat what was then known as my spells of manic depression which nobody could ever find any cure for. I was deathly afraid that I would end up in some kind of group home and never be able to hold down a job like a handicapped mentally deficient person that needed to be locked up. I'd read about such people in Abnormal Pyschology textbooks where it was known that Princess Leia also suffered from Bipolar Disorder, amongst other celebs that mostly killed themselves if they hadn't self-destructed before that. 

I wanted to get well I really did, and so tried them all - polarity therapy, shamanism, acupuncture, bowen technique, chiropracters, osteopaths, psychotherapy, yoga, pranic healing, tai chi and my favourite - reiki. Reiki involved lying down on a couch/horizontal massage surface while a Reiki master laid hands on you and moved your energies around. It was all about balancing your aura. 

I thought thats it, I will become a Reiki Master. I will then be able to heal myself and others too. It will be fine. So I went to all the workshops and found a healer somewhere in Coatesville and got all the attunements and everything and was well on my way to becoming a master. I did distance healing and even had a session with my ex-boyfriend healing him of childhood trauma and his alcohol problem. I attracted all kinds of broken people who really, just needed a good cry but as I was unable to prescribe crying as a way of releasing trauma the next best thing was to have them lie down while I let the reiki flow out of my hands over their bodies. I could never charge for these sessions, but I knew Reiki Masters taught others how to do it and they would charge for their workshops. The phrase 'love and light' and 'Just for today' was often on their lips and it felt very Zen. 

One day while I was having a session of my own after doing some volunteer work gardening for a free clinic in Te Atatu and the healer started having visions. It was not uncommon in some new age circles to encounter these, avatars, angels, and guiding spirits.  I'm seeing...Tara she said. Tara was one of the Hindu goddesses. Huh. She was seeing Tara but I was not. We had our eyes closed and were meditating while all this was happening. We were in the spiritual zone. I wasn't seeing Tara. I was seeing Jesus Christ. He was wearing his crown of thorns and he was on the cross and he was being crucified. This vision stayed with me until the end of the session but I didn't want to tell anyone cos I was a bit spooked. Why was I seeing Jesus? 

to be continued...

Bookathon Bonus Blind Books

 It's my last day and my eyes haven't fallen out yet. My goal was 30 books as I started a day late so I've really got two books here to make up for it that I've been reading. 

Remember the Yellow Pages? Let your fingers do the talking. I am a free range book worm and will read anything, including dictionaries and sometimes even the newspaper ads if there is NOTHING else. But thankfully I discovered actual books and in my years as a librarian the ones I prefer are the real life stories, especially memoirs of people spilling the beans on their lives, warts and all. I especially like memoirs of people who have a different perspective of life, and everyone has a tale to tell. (Whether true or not, is something you'll have to be the judge of) 

Thank you to those who recommended I read Haben. How a deaf-blind woman conquered Harvard Law. Haben Girma (Haben means 'pride' in Eritrean) was born in Eritrea, grew up in Ethiopia and the US and is deaf-blind. She has partial hearing and partial sight (today we call it 'impaired') in that she can hear within a very small range while everything else is muffled and can see blurry outlines of things. So smell, taste and touch are very important to her, and her memoir is mostly about these things. She can read braille and has a machine that converts speech to braille so she can communicate, she also has guide dog and writes about her experiences with her puppy peeing everywhere, and can use a cane.

 When she went to college she asked the cafeteria if they would print their menus in braille or simply email her a copy to convert so she wouldn't have to have a jackpot surprise every time she had a meal. She thought this might be a reasonable request but it turns out more difficult than she imagined! This in turn led to consider a career in law to become an advocate for those with disabilities. So she went to Harvard, changed legislation and met the President of the USA. 

I so admire that - you can read about what happened in her book in which she does all sorts of things it was not considered possible for a person with disabilities to do. (If it were me I might consider a career in blind taste testing gourmet meals). 

Book number two was Do you dream in color? Insights from a girl without sight. Lauren Rubin shares her experiences being born blind (but not deaf) in which she becomes an opera singer and jewellery maker on the side. She does dream in colour but being blind also means she's sensitive. It also meant when it came to a partner, it didn't matter who they looked like (or what race, which seems to be a big issue in the USA) or whether they were a boy or a girl. Her parents were very supportive and it seems she never had to want for anything, if she wanted to go skiing she learned, and if she wanted to learn opera she got in the best schools, and if she wanted to go to a museum she was allowed to touch all the paintings and objects. However she didn't always have a great time at mainstream school with people who didn't want to be her friend because she was 'different' or felt they might be obligated to look after her. She also applied for a guide dog like Haben but didn't have problems toilet training with her puppy. 

I found reading these books about blind people to be eye opening (and everyone who is blind will have unique experiences) no two would be the same. What comes across is they'd like to be self-determined and have their rights to independence just as other Americans do (it's enshrined in their constitution) so good on them. I've got another one to read called 'Planet of the Blind' this time about a blind man.

If you are reading this and haven't donated to Great Kiwi Bookathon to support blind and low vision with readers, assistance, guide dogs, audio books and braille then please consider it before my eyes fall out. I am securing my future you see so if my eyes fail me I know who I can turn to. Happy reading!

Bookathon Bonus - The Miracle Worker

I'm reading biographies of blind people for the rest of Bookathon of which American Helen Keller (1880-1968) was one of the most famous. I recommend this one to find out more.

Helen Keller - A life by Dorothy Herman

 I didn't know much about deaf-blind Helen Keller other than her portrayal in the movie The Miracle Worker where she was played by young Patty Duke. I didn't know what she was like as an adult, so this biography satisfied my curiousity, it was very well researched. It explored her family background, her devotion to Annie Sullivan who was also partially blind and lived with Helen for the rest of her life and whom Helen called 'Teacher', and her other relationships too after Annie died.

Helen lived into her 80s. I learned that Annie was the driving force behind her intellectual pursuits, Helen got into college and graduated, and had a mind of her own, she wrote books, she learned to speak although this was not perfect, she starred in a Hollywood movie called Deliverance of her own life, the duo were stars of Vaudeville, lecture tours and the chautaqua circuit as an advocate and activist. Helen met all the famous people of her day including Mark Twain and Alexander Graham Bell. She was patronised but also dependent on philanthropists, but many were unaware of her radical political views, which some of the Blind Foundation tried to suppress.

Helen also wrote many books about her life and experience as a deaf-blind person. To many she seemed a saint. In the book it was emphasised what a great beauty she was, in that she was attractive and photogenic, so that helped. She was honored and feted in her lifetime. However it seems her dependency did come with a great cost, Annie's life -- and this book explores that symbiotic relationship, that few deaf-blind people have today because they aren't usually dependent on just one person. I think that bond she had with Annie from when she was a child meant the world to her. Her own flesh and blood family, on the other hand, remained distant.

I found this bio really interesting. Ironically later in life Annie's eyes failed her and she did go blind. 

 Annie Sullivan to me was a true heroine and friend to Helen Keller and few people won't be touched by how Helen Keller learned to read words for the first time by her experience with the water pump and Annie writing the word for water in the palm of Helen's hands. As with Louis Braille, get your hands on these books and read. 🙌

Bookathon Bonus - Louis Braille

 Hooray I finished the alphabet! That doesn't mean I've finished reading though. I promised four bonus books to end the month. Since we are raising money for Blind and Low Vision Children I would definitely recommend this book.

Louis Braille - The boy Who Invented Books for the Blind by Margaret Davidson

Louis Braille was only 12 years old when he invented the raised dot alphabet that was named after him.

He had full vision originally but was blinded as a toddler when he accidently got poked in the eye with an awl. (Parents with toddlers - keep an eye on them and all sharp objects away from curious hands!)

His parents took him from his French village to a school for the blind in Paris. There he invented his alphabet and his classmates loved it because they could now read books without anyone having to read out loud for them. But the alphabet was hard to catch on with those who already could see, and they didn't want to lose their jobs if the blind could read for themselves!

It took many years but eventually braille became popular in all schools for the blind and known worldwide.

I enjoyed reading this book, it is geared for children so, maybe doesn't have the full story but enough for us to know that Louis was a very special boy who changed the world for the better. He stayed a school teacher all his life and people didn't know much about him (or care) but his invention was far reaching.

The back cover is embossed with the Braille alphabet so see if you can get your hands on this book 👐

Bookathon - Z

 Zack Zombie. Plants vs Zombies. Mark Zuckerberg.

Z is a hard letter, and I'm tempted to read books about zombies (or zombosses), or fake books that are not really books, like Facebook, or The Book Thief by Mark Zusack, but that would be cheating as I saw the movie and haven't read that book. I did come across a copy in the book fridge library that was stamped Waitakere College, but it had been withdrawn so it actually ended up at Paremoremo Prison. I took a lot of withdrawn books there as I was weeding the collection, a lot of them for children, as children of prisoners needed something to read to stop them going crazy (and their dads too). 

My sister once gave me a copy of the Librarian of Auschwitz as a gift which was a real life story of a librarian who smuggled books into the concentration camps. She figured I might enjoy it but I'm like I already work in schools that can be like concentration camps and I don't really need to be reminded. 

This is because many schools tend to  have some kind of Gestapo/Nazi regime thing going on that represses any freedom of speech so you can't really say what you truly think. And woe betide you if you are in the minority and don't fit in with everyone else. I am not sure why this is, but 30 children in a classroom of mandatory attendance can sometimes feel like a bootcamp. When children didn't come to school the Principals would worry and call the parents but I always got the children who came to school but hated going to class so they would come to the library instead. If school was more fun and engaging maybe they'd want to come instead of playing truant. And if there were no bullies. But getting rid of school bullies was always a problem especially when teachers sometimes exhibited bullying behaviour themselves. That was when school became this scary place you'd want to stay away from. Work doesn't make you free after all. 

I tried carving out a safe space for readers in the library. It was here that we could tell our own stories. If nobody could find a Z book I would tell them find a NZ story. These were often lost in a sea of American, Australian and British books that spoke of slavery, convicts and Empire.  The series I spent most of my time reading that was often overlooked was the My New Zealand Story series of books. Written from the perspective of a tween about a period of NZ history in diary format, one could experience what it was like to win the vote for women, be a gumdigger, live in Auckland's Chinatown, take a stand at Bastion Point, watch the Auckland Harbour Bridge being built, win the America's Cup, take a ferry ride on the Wahine, undergo a Dawn Raid, rescue someone at Tangiwai, hear about relatives dying at Mt Erebus, or live like a hippie in an Ohu. You could be there when the French blew up the Rainbow Warrior, or check for aftershocks at the Canterbury Earthquakes, survive the pandemic (both small pox and Spanish Flu) or be a Mission girl in the Hellhole of the Pacific, or a camp cook in Kauri logging operation or what happened when the nation divided over the 1981 Springbok Rugby tour and not know what side you were supposed to be on.

I've lived vicariously through all those stories so now I know what it's like. I've been with Anne Frank in The Secret Annexe and read about her hopes and dreams for her future from her diary and every story I ever read I feel like I've become a wiser and more understanding person to have read it. Z is when you reach the end of the alphabet and realise now it's time to rearrange the letters into stories of your own. 

Four more days of Great Kiwi Bookathon. Please stay on for more books about what it's like to experience blind and low vision and to value the precious freedom to be able to read. 

Bookathon - Y

 Y is for Young Adult

Imagine you are girl and told you can't go to school because you are a girl. You have to stay home and cook and clean instead - for the boys. Boys get to go but you can't. 

When you ask why it's because, as discussed,  you are a girl. Being a girl is not anything you can change. 

So what happens when you DO go to school? Well, when the government decides schools are only for boys, any girl who goes is liable to get shot by the Taliban. Were they just thinking of your safety? 

Malala Yousefzai did a dangerous thing. She wrote a blog journalling her experience. She learned how to read and write at school as her dad was the Principal and operated a private non-government school that accepted girls before all the rules changed to Sharia Law. She was targeted and she was 12 years old when she was shot on the bus on her way to school. The amazing thing about it is she was not killed. She woke up in Birmingham, England as after she was shot she was airlifted straight there from Pakistan. 

The story is in her memoir I am Malala and now she advocates for education and the right for girls to have it worldwide. This book is banned in Pakistan, but even if it was available, most of the women there and even the men have such low literacy rates, they wouldn't have been able to read it. 

It's wonderful to have an education, I certainly value mine. But sadly, for a lot of females, being smart means you'll be targeted and boys resent you. So maybe we need to have a conversation about that. I can think of perhaps a typical male response. Instead of girls having an education, maybe girls should all learn self-defence. Or maybe they should just all stay home, it's safer. Lest you think 'this is just an extreme Islamic thing' I have encountered sexism within Christian communities where girls have no say in anything either and are prevented from having the most basic education or told they cannot do this because they are female. Are we just pretty faces and empty vessels?

What do you think? Malala Yousafazi also wrote a children's picture book called 'Malala's Magic Pencil'. Imagine not being able to communicate, or speak or write and being treated like a dumb animal or pet simply because you are a girl. Or a maid of all work. When I read this to them, children, both boys and girls are horrified. Typically children are now encouraged to speak up and be noisy in class as that is their natural response. It's often always the loudest and biggest that becomes the bully and in most environments that tends to be the boys.  But those who are quiet readers prefer to master this secret thing called writing that you can communicate without even saying anything. I give them chalk malkers and say go for it, write, express yourselves, practise and they write all over the windows. Magic Pencils also require sharpening and the bright ones make little comic books because they all want to write and be authors too. 

The Battle of the Sexes seems to rage on and none of us can really escape from it. I'm all for boys learning nurturing skills too, and it's great to see boys also getting into cooking and becoming chefs at culinary schools and designing smart robot vacuum cleaners, dishwashers and washing machines  at engineering school so us girls no longer need to slave away fetching water. Robots can now do our jobs! In some countries though the shooting happens in schools amongst the children themselves and it doesn't matter what gender you are though it's generally males doing the shooting, schools being taken over, libraries being removed and used as breeding grounds for terrorists. Some people are just haters.  I have been at some schools where they actively encouraged children to fight and be in competition with each other like a real life Hunger Games except they call it House Wars. I don't know the answer to that but I am dismayed to witness that enshrined in their pedagogy. 

Malala completed her high school education in England and went on to study at Oxford University where she graduated with honors. She won the Nobel Peace Prize at age 17 and now advocates for the right for girls to have an education everywhere. She calls on world leaders to invest in 'books, not bullets'

Why not do the same and support the  Great Kiwi Bookathon?

Bookathon - X

 X marks the spot. Exams. Exposé

 I am reading a book at the moment recommended by my counsellor called Taming Toxic People. The science of identifying & dealing with psychopaths at work & at home. 

No I haven't been divorced or dropped by a callous ex. Although the experience of working in a toxic workplace with a boss who shows pyschopathic traits is sadly all too common. The advice given, psychopaths cannot change so look for another job while you are there is what it amounts to. On the cover is a silhouette of a man brandishing a naughty chair and a whip. 

 Don't get the wrong idea, I am not reading x-rated books! When children couldn't find an X book I told them try finding one with X in the title. Or it could be about X-men or My cat likes to hide in boXes or My Mum has X-ray Vision. 

So Taming ToXic People. It turns out I have read this author before. David Gillespie writes books about sugar being Sweet Poison, and being a dad to seven children and advocating for Free Schools. He also wrote a book called Big Fat Lies, and I'm wondering if it's similar to Liane Moriarity's Big Little Lies, which put me off divorced soccer mums and primary schools big time. It also made me question what the parents were REALLY up to that made their children so violent, at least, in Australia. 

The Learning Network only gave this answer to everything - trauma. Basically even having children is traumatic and when you delve into the science of brain injury and stress response and the amount of drugs given to pregnant mums to ease the pain I'm thinking no wonder it's a miracle most us are actually coming out alive. My hunch is psychopaths had too much exposure to anaesthetic at birth and hence cannot empathise with others or feel pain. 

There's another author I recommend who DOES start with X and she has only ever one name, Xinran. I have read all her books from What the Chinese Don't Eat, The Good women of China to China Witness, to Sky Burial and Miss Chopsticks, and her most heartbreaking, Messages from an Unknown Chinese Mother to her most recent Buy Me the Sky: The Remarkable truth of China's one-child generations. 

Having not ever lived in China but possessing an entire DNA of Chinese blood I can only say I am extraordinary lucky to be alive here to tell the tale. Which I may do at some point. It's often the case that the truth is stranger than fiction. How I miss my yum cha book restaurant. Xinran's books would be prominently displayed on the trolley along with Por Por's cookbook. You can no longer silence a Chinese woman or bind her feet like they did in the olden days. She'll do a dangerous thing - she'll write a book. 

Happy reading! xxx

Stick around for dessert after we've finished the alphabet at the Great Kiwi Bookathon

Bookathon - W

 Where's Wally?

Actually Wally is staying in the library as he's been banned from the classroom. Teachers were saying that I wasn't to let their pupils borrow Where's Wally books because they weren't READING any words.  Because when it came time for SSR (sustained silent reading) they would say they were reading Where's Wally when they were really just looking at the pictures. 

I can't argue with that because I find Where's Wally books frustrating. I can never find Wally either. So I marked the Where's Wally books Not For Loan and they stayed in the puzzle books section of the library. Where he was easy to find. 

Then I worked in another school library where Where's Wally books were allowed to be borrowed. There was a swift circulation of these books along with Minecraft, as digital literacy seemed the order of the day there and the teachers got all the children on to I -pads and tablets as soon as they could see. Even though they mashed up the ipad I had in the library and the replacement went missing. I -pads etc have their place but I am not a fan of them, I prefer turning pages of REAL books.

The books that everyone genuinely wants to READ (i.e the words)  are Elephant and Piggie books by Mo Willems. I think he found the winning formula for the beginning reader and I swear that Dr Seuss never got a look in once the children found this series under W. Elephant and Piggie are a cartoon duo that are like the odd couple. Elephants name is Gerald and he wears glasses, is a bit myopic, and anxious, while Piggie doesn't seem to have a Christian name and she is carefree and happy-go-lucky. They are best friends and have mini dramas that involve dilemmas like Should I share my ice cream? ask each other Are you ready to play outside? and think of adventures like Let's Go For a Drive! (even though they are not yet old enough to drive, and even though they are animals and not humans). The most popular title would have been There is a Bird on Your Head!, while the most loved would definitely be The Thank You Book.

Waiting is Not Easy! is an exercise in patience and your dramatic reading skills. You can pretend to throw a tantrum too in I will take a nap! Though my favourite might have been I really like Slop! great for picky eaters (or readers) especially those who were doing the Pizza challenge and had to read 7 books for rewards. There are 28 books in this series and you wouldn't want to miss reading each 64 page one, so you'd possibly get 4 pizzas out of Mo Willems which is very good value! 

Mo Willem's other books haven't been as popular although children still read The Pigeon has to Go to School. The pigeon is like a 2 year old toddler who thinks he's the centre of the universe. He also wants to drive the bus. I'm sorry pigeon, you have to wait and you have to sit your drivers licence exam before you do that. And take a bath as he's grubby.  Mo Willems books have been translated into all languages and I am waiting on the Te Reo versions of Elephant and Piggie. Happy Pig Day! was definitely a hit in Chinese. They are perfect for reading out loud and I'm sure blind and low vision children will get a kick out of them in a way they can't do with Where's Wally. 

Don't forget to donate to the Great Kiwi Bookathon where these children will gain access to these wonderful books.

Bookathon - V

 Sorry Vasanti while your name does start with V, I already had you under U and it wouldn't be fair to the other V authors. Of which I could only find one but still. V is for Jules Verne, also known as the 'Father of Science Fiction'.

It seems I actually don't read a lot of Science Fiction but the Science Fiction I prefer read is one from more than a hundred  years ago and so most of it has actually come to pass. They have now renamed it Speculative Fiction about books set in the future, and they can be utopian or dystopian. Dystopias are books about the end of the world. So like the Left Behind Series or 88 reasons why the Rapture will be in 1988. Or 1984, The Handmaid's Tale, The Hunger Games, Tomorrow when the War Began, and the Last Kids on Earth. All fun stuff. The Book of Revelation might come under this category as well. But it's only natural that writers of certain era will be worried about the advent of World War Three. Comic conventions in this post-modern era simply call the whole thing Armageddon. 

Utopias on the other hand, aren't so popular. It's now not profitable or compelling enough to write about the wonders of the age and how everything will be wonderful and isn't it a Brave New World - the future is bright and promising. But my author today was a Utopian author even though all the things he wrote about came to pass reading it now takes you back to that bygone age where all these things were potential possibilities on the horizon. 

Now you CAN circumnavigate the globe in 24 hours by jumbo jet or concorde but back when Jules Verne wrote Around the World in 80 days in 1872  the wager was that it couldn't be done in 1920 hours. Reading the novel is entertaining and insightful and a fun adventure through time and space. It's also was hugely popular in his day like how chef/writer  Anthony Bourdain reached cult status eating his way around the world and presenting it in TV (as well as numerous others..Michael Palin, Monty Don, Michael Portillo, Joanna Lumley, Billy Connelley etc)   The best part of 80s days was when Phileas Fogg and Passepourtout met his Indian princess Auoda and took her on a to North America where she marvelled at snow for the first time. 

Armchair travellers like me enjoy it because travel from New Zealand is so expensive. Plus nobody has ever challenged me to a journey by betting a million pounds. The other tale by Jules Verne that I delved into was 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I once chose this book for a book club read and everyone turned up to the discussion night with different versions/editions of the classic book. You can read the real life version about life on the Calypso on a Jacques Cousteau expedition, possibly inspired by the Jules Verne tale itself. 

The third of his adventures, Journey to the Centre of the Earth, hasn't actually been accomplished yet. But I live in hope that one day, we could go inside and there is actually an entire metropolis and prehistoric creatures in there that we'd never heard about. As of writing fourth adventure, From the Earth to the Moon, has been accomplished, though I was a bit disappointed in that one, for when Americans landed on the moon they didn't really do much except plant a flag, pick up some moon rocks and gaze back at planet Earth. 

Jules Verne is the second most translated author in the world (the first is Agatha Christie, the third is Shakespeare) but he comes top for me. I love the adventure and excitement and risk taking, possibly why Sir Edmund Hilary is on our $5 note. You can become a foolhardy dreamer too and go places in books...by embarking on a the Great Kiwi Bookathon. Save up your $5 notes and help blind and low vision children experience Utopia as well. 😍

Bookathon - U

 Utopia. Urban Myth. Ubiquitous.

I am stuck on U. But thankfully I found The Boring Book by Vasanti Unka. The Boring Book defies description. It's the kind of book that might put you to sleep, though it has pages and a library card pocket and a date due slip at the back and words, and things in it that don't really make sense. I think it's the kind of book that you might  say you have read to your teacher and they can ask you what it was about and you can be honest and say it was boring!

I've booked Vasanti Unka for Book Week as she knows a bit about books and how they are made, having both written and illustrated a few. Her mystery book 'Who Stole the Rainbow?' has everyone guessing who the culprit was. 

Was it ...the sun?

Was it...the rain?

Was it..the clouds?

You'll have to read it to find out...as I always tell my children. Keep them guessing until the last page. Although I am terrible with mystery books. I always want to skip to the back where all the answers are. 

I am the Universe is a big picture book about the vastness of space...in a large format too. It has a billion star rating. 

I promised Vasanti butter chicken if she would come to the school for Book Week...since she has complied a book called a Suitcase of Saris: From India to Aotearoa : Stories of Pioneer Women. But I don't know if she'd be impressed with the school's butter chicken. I found there would always be too much rice and never enough sauce. So I'll have to find some other way of luring her in..

Then she can teach us how to make things out of socks and gloves and felts because she writes craft books too. I am looking forward to it. Even though I've already nearly done an entire Book Month this June I have thought about extending it and having another Book Week and after that 2024 can be Book Year. 

Currently there's only one more week of the Great Kiwi Bookathon left so help our blind and low vision children access books and get your donations in.

Bookathon - T

 Today's Titles for T authors

The Joy Luck Club. Sisters. The Hobbit.

I'm talking Amy Tan, Raina Telgemeier and J R R Tolkien.

Amy Tan's first novel The Joy Luck Club really did become that touchstone story of immigration and relations between mothers and daughters for a great many Asian Americans - a group and culture as distinctive as African Americans, or even European Americans, not that anyone ever calls them that! While it's been many years since I've read it, it still resonates even now, and when I talk with Asian children of the diaspora it's like we have this thing where we just KNOW...yes this is what Asian parents are like. (Even with fathers and sons) it's like this thousand generation ancestor filial piety thing that you can never really explain to an outsider. We (especially the Chinese) are caught between two worlds and A LOT is expected of us. 

The Joy Luck Club itself can be confusing as it's narrated by four daughters and three mothers, the fourth mother has died so its more a collection of interlocking stories than one narrative.  Like many family sagas has its share of tragedy and triumph. One of the stories in it I remember is the one of the proud mother of a chess champion, and what happens when her prodigy daughter fails a competition. Or, taking from Amy Tan's actual life, how she feels when she fails her piano recital. And then..what about all the other things in life we fail to do? 

I know mum's can't live through our daughters though physically us daughters did live inside our mums for approximately 9 months. But we have to pay them back somehow. And so it is. Amy Tan has written more on Chinese mothers (my favourite was The Kitchen God's Wife) but  for more detail on this phenomenon try reading Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua. 

Sisters is about the bond between sisters this time in a  European American (?) family which is pretty much based on Raina Telegemier's own life. The mum and dad are actually on the verge of breaking up as is quite a common occurrance these days particularly at a vulnerable time for young children and the mum is taking them on a road trip to meet up with the dad, Raina's younger sister sharing the back seat with her and being, as younger sisters can be - completely annoying. 

This is a graphic novel in full colour so it's like reading a storyboard for a potential movie anyway. (Are you listening Disney/Pixar? )  Otherwise, it's just a regular family story but the sisters relationship is front and centre. Raina wants to love her sister, but how can she when she's so different and just doesn't understand? 

This graphic novel/memoir, along with Smile (about Raina getting braces) and Guts (about Raina having IBS) are THE top reads amongst tweens. Raina Telgemeier also illustrated the first few books of the Baby-sitters Club series by Ann M Martin, which had spawned over 250 volumes and sold millions of copies, and are most beloved among the readers who grew up in the late 80s and 90s. Even over Francine Pascale's Sweet Valley High book series which was a precursor to tv shows like Beverly Hills 90210. 

As we now know for girls the most important things in life are relationships. Ok forget about boys, (far too complicated)  let's concentrate on the familial relationships that are more intimate and long lasting than it will ever be between a husband and wife - those between mothers, daughters and sisters. Read  these authors books for understanding and empathy. 

This is not something you will glean from The Hobbit, which really has no girls in it whatsoever...or Americans. As it's set in Middle Earth which is somewhere near New Zealand I believe.  I just wanted to put it out there because J R R Tolkien starts with T and if you looking for escape its probably just the ticket, none of the hobbits actually have relationships or parents they all just seem to live happily barefoot in their hobbit holes and defeat a taniwha/dragon once in a while. And also, ok, there has been several movies but READ the book because the book was original while the movie took liberties which for me ruined it! 

Keep going with the Great Kiwi Bookathon I promise more good books to come..thank you if you've already made a donation. 

Bookathon - S

 William Shakespeare. Danielle Steel. Craig Smith.

All my S authors today are bestselling rockstars in the literary universe. Amongst English Majors, nobody can get away from Shakespeare. I thought I would leave him far far behind once I graduated but no he just has a way of popping up all the time in those annoying Pop Up-Globes like someone who doesn't know the show's over and the series has jumped the shark. Yes so like everyone in high school I read Shakespeare and I can't say I loved him, after all, 500 odd years from now what plays or screenplays will we still be performing in endless remakes - do we even know? Will The Simpsons scripts seasons 2-8 or maybe Friends be lauded as the golden age of wit and social commentary and entertainment as Shakespeare's royal soap operas were in his day? 

I call them royal soap operas because many were generally about someone in power, i.e royalty, a King who had something fatally wrong with him. Fratricide being a common occurance in those feudalistic times. Macbeth, King Lear, Othello, Henry V, Hamlet, Antony and Cleopatra were like this. Or they were sitcoms set in exotic places that often had mistaken identities and twins or star crossed lovers like Much Ado About Nothing, Twelfth Night, Romeo and Juliet, As you Like it, Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer night's dream, The Tempest, All's well that ends well, The Taming of the Shrew et al. 

I want to say Shakespeare may have changed my life, or had some profound influence, but I could never warm to the characters like I could to say, Joey of Friends or empathise with them like Lisa of the Simpsons. Their Elizabethan concerns seemed alien to me and I was never au fait with exactly why everyone was acting so foolishly and stupidly on stage. Women were either strumpets or naive maidens, and men were either arrogant or lovesick. If you love needless drama, read Shakespeare. 

If Shakespeare was living and performed today you would probably end up with something like Diana, the Musical which was quite entertaining on Netflix if you saw it, and he would win a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Screenplay. So I am sorry Shakespeare lovers, I can never be in raptures over the beloved Bard and have feelings for him like the Darling Buds of May.  Or he would be like Danielle Steel,  endlessly recycling plots about rich people who turn to rags and then become rich again. You have to admire Danielle Steel, she knows how to tell a yarn, but the thing about Danielle Steel is...her books always ends the same with her on the back cover with her coiffure, designer clothes and expensive jewellery looking at you and smiling as if saying 'you have made me even richer'.  (190 books and counting) 

The last author who cottoned onto a good thing and is milking it for all it's worth, and like The Simpsons, shows no sign of stopping, is one who turned a well known joke into a huge fandom for preschoolers and primary children. Of course I am talking about The Wonky Donkey. Thank you Craig Smith, for all the honky tonky, winky, wonky, dinkey donkey making fan girls and boys of us all. 

If you scan the S's at the bookshop or library today you are sure to find these taking up a lot of room on the shelves, their popularity knows no bounds and if they do get assigned reading in schools, watch out. They will drive you nuts for years to come. 

Keep going with the Great Kiwi Bookathon, where I am reading nonstop A-Z in June supporting blind and low vision children access to books.

Bookathon - R

 

Reading, writing and arithmetic? 

Today's author has 3 R's. Rachel Renee Russell, aka writer of the wildly popular series for girls Dork Diaries. For those who don't know, it's like Diary of a Wimpy Kid but told from a 14 year old girl's point of view. Nikki Maxwell and written in the style of Wimpy Kid, i.e hand written with cartoons. 

Girls absolutely love these books. As a former girl, I like them too. I guess you can say I never really grew up. Nikki lives with her mum dad, and little sister Brianna and goes to Westchester County Day School, which is actually a real-life well-to-do district in the state of New York. The problem is at this new school she is not popular, because she is a self-confessed dork and has a locker right next to a very mean snobby girl called Mackenzie Hollister who hates Nikki and makes fun of her clothes and in general acts like snakes-on-legs super villain, always bullying Nikki and giving her micro aggressions. Mackenzie is part of a group Nikki calls the CCPs -- Cute Cool and Popular. They wear the latest fashions just because they can and never have to want for anything. Nikki's dad works as a pest exterminator which is decidedly NOT cool and she is forever trying to hide the fact that that's what he does for a living.

Before I go off and tell you the entire plot of Dork Diaries I just want to establish that, at 14 years of age, these things are the most important thing in a girls life - to be able to make friends, be a friend, and fit in at school. Unlike the movie Mean Girls, Nikki did not come from living in Africa, or Grease, where Sandy came from Australia actually it's never mentioned in the books that Nikki is African American and her tormentor is what people in America call WASP. White Anglo-Saxon Protestant. In the books, that doesn't figure into it. It's just full on class war. It all comes to a head in probably the best book IMHO is Frenemies Forever. This is the one where both Nikki and Mackenzie get transferred to a fancy private school. 

Luckily Nikki makes some new BFFs called Chloe and Zoe (I know right?) and they look out for each other, though the one friend Nikki makes that is most important is her diary which, you dear reader have the absolute privelege of reading. It's hilariously funny, smart and easy to read which is why girls from age 7 up love these books. Dork Diaries has gone on to about 12 books so far with her many adventures and they get better each time. At school, she gets involved with amongst other things, being a clumsy ice skater, organising a school dance, coming top in an art competition, helping out in the library, adopting a puppy, becoming a pop star, writing an anonymous advice column for the school newspaper and I think the latest one she gets to go on a school trip to Paris. That one's coming out in October. 

If you never got to do these things at school, relive your best (or worst) years in Dork Diaries. I read the near entire series in lockdown and so it was like I was back at school anyway. I also listened to them in audio, but you don't get the benefit of the illustrations when you just listen. Now some teachers might think these are just fluff, eye candy books that have no literary merit at all. Well I just say to these teachers you are no fun. Nikki is our heroine facing real life situations, and who hasn't been the new girl at school and tried to fit in? Who hasn't been a dork? Who hasn't confessed in their secret diary, all the awful things they have done? And who hasn't had an annoying sister and dreamed of being an only child? (Unless you are already an only child, lucky you). Who hasn't had an awkward crush?

One day you will look back on your school years (If you have survived them) and see, that it's all part of growing up and the most things you will learn are not actually what teachers teach in the classroom. And less boys miss out, Rachel Renee Russell has also written a series for boys about one of the characters Max Crumbly. 

If you'd like to win a brand new box set of Dork Diaries, email me and let me know.  Answer this question...what dance does Nikki do when she's happy? 

Otherwise donate to the Great Kiwi Bookathon so that our Blind and Low Vision girls can enjoy these books too.