Thanks once again to our host Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy, who kept me entertained for many happy minutes on my flight to Texas, with a snippet of his NaNoWriMo work. It’s gonna be good, when he has the whole thing ready for public consumption.

***

1.  I forgot to tell you last week, I think: Part 1 of my reversion story is up at NewEvangelizers.com.  Part 2 coming next month.

2. Also I think I forgot to tell you: Last week at AmazingCatechists.com, I told everyone that they really need to know about Ela Milewska.  If you don’t already know, maybe you should go look.  But probably only if you care about evangelizing young people.

3. I’m live-blogging the conference over at CWG.  You do want to know where I ate lunch, don’t you?  Isn’t that what the internet’s for? So you can know these things?

3.5 LIGUORI!  I told you I’d shout.  Contract is signed, manuscript submitted, even got the SuperHusband to borrow some flashes from work and make me an official Author Photo.  (He doesn’t do soft-focus — hazard of marrying a guy whose job is to make the machinery look all crisp and bright – no one puts soft-focus fiber-optic cable in their brochures.  So, yeah. I’m not sixteen, and we’re not using Adobe to change that.)

I’m pretty stoked about going with Liguori, because everything I’ve seen from them is a lot of value for the reader’s dollar.  Which appeals to my inner accountant, parish-finance-version.  And my local Catholic bookstore speaks well of their relationship, and that was a must-have on my list.  So yeah.  Exciting.

Double exciting part: Did I mention my manuscript is no longer in my hands, and now my editor gets to work on it for a change? Because after a year or so of living with this thing, I’m really ready for someone else’s brain to hurt, and not mine for a few weeks.

***

It’s link day.  Surely people don’t come here on a Tuesday to read about me.  Post your links in the combox.  And have a great week!

At CatholicMom.com: How to quick get a homeschool up and running in ten minutes twenty minutes pretty fast.  And not regret it too much.

I suspected my desk was under those papers — and yes!  It is.  Still immersed here, but look I wrote something over at Amazing Catechists last week, and it’s proving helpful to people.  Score one for useful little engine. 

Please pray for two special intentions this week, and I’ll try to come up for air here in the next week or so.

Thanks to our host Jen Fulwiler at Conversion Diary.  I never was much of a joiner, but having two days a week to anchor my blogging helps me keep writing.

Pray for Allie Hathaway then go take a look at the other takes.

1.

Going on vacation will crush your inbox.  I’m working through my backlog.  If I owe you something and you don’t hear from me by Monday, send me another e-mail?

2.

We went to Mob Museum.  It is silly expensive, but once inside you quickly see where the money went.  A bit over the top, but loaded with info and good exhibits.  Focused 98% on your basic model 20th century American Mafia, with a strong orientation for what happened in Vegas that sent kickbacks all over the country.  No monkeying around with glamorizing crime.  Not suitable for young children, but well worth a visit if you have teens.  Serious dose of reality.

A note on the location: I minded the $5 parking fee, until I came to my senses.  Because that guy under the umbrella collecting your money?  He’s watching your car the whole time.  And not leaving you to walk across an empty parking lot all alone.  Because it’s not the loveliest part of town.

3.

My new favorite Las Vegas site is the Spring Mountain Ranch State Park.  Fabulously awesome.   Well worth the admission fee.

4.

I read most of Sarah R.’s new book on the plane.  Wow, what a tearjerker.  Very moving.  Not a regular pregnancy book.  Highly recommended.

5.

When I’m out in the desert I’m in love with the desert.  But how refreshing to be back in the land where the trees grow like weeds.

6.

Patriotic thoughts:

6A: I’m thinking of taking my niece to the Torchlight Tattoo.

6B: Julie at Happy Catholic has been writing about religious freedom every day of the fortnight.

7.

Hey, we should have a quick novena for Sandra of this combox and Larry L., who are getting married a week from tomorrow.  In observance of the Week of Pre-Wedding Misery, which can only be made more fun by hosting a slew of Yankee relatives in this heat.  Hey, St. Laurence would be perfect, huh?  And let’s see . . . any thoughts on a good second saint for the daily litany? St. Katharine Drexel comes to mind — she was a northerner who did good things in the South. Any other votes?

7.5

I love these.  Can’t help myself.  Solar powered:

Everybody needs at least one Asian relative. I’m convinced.

Photos:

Spring Ranch courtesy of Nevada State Parks [Public Domain]

Good luck cat courtesy of Amazon.com.

Thanks to our host Jen Fulwiler at Conversion Diary, where you can see as many quick takes as a person could stand.  Of course you’ll pray for Allie Hathaway before you click the link.

***

Aside from the fact that Las Vegas, Nevada is the pit of depravity —  when Stephen King wrote The Stand he got it right about that — it’s a great place to visit.  I prefer to go in the spring or fall, or in the winter when you can play in the snow on Mt. Charleston, but my friends and relatives always seem to be coming up with reasons I should go during the Months of Death.

And it turns out you can have fun in the desert in the summer, even if you are like me and not only despise gambling but you hate it too.  Here’s my list of the 7 Best Things to in Las Vegas in the Summer:

1.

Hike around Red Rocks National Park.  See all that shade?  As you enter the park, on the right side at the beginning of the scenic loop are these lovely red cliffs that provide morning shade until about 10 AM ish.  So that in the middle of the summer, you can hike in metro Las Vegas and not bake.  It is a magical thing.

Summerlin, by the way, is the community at the foot of Red Rocks.  Upscale, has places like an REI store, Starbucks, everything you need to refresh your inner 1% after too many minutes observing the masses in front of the slot machines.  One of my very favorite Las Vegas activities, though it isn’t summer-friendly so much, is walking the neighborhoods looking at the xeriscaping.  The yards are very small, and so in the wealthier areas people go all out to make interesting gardens.

2.

Visit the Adventure Dome.  I usually hate amusement parks because you have to stand outside in the heat, and you can’t come and go freely.  The Adventure Dome avoids both these problems.  Get an all day pass, come and go as you like, and on a weekday evening the place empties out after a certain time and you can ride the roller coasters without waiting in the line.  The whole time you can see the sky through the rose-colored dome, but bask in the refreshing breeze of the air-conditioner all the same.

I guess you also lose all your stature as an environmentalist, but you had already lost most of it by showing up in Las Vegas anyway.

3.

Hike around Mt. Charleston.  Or just drive up and picnic.  Cool, pleasant, think 70-80 degrees.  If you are hiking any distance at all, pack gear for inclement weather.  I’ve been pushed off the mountain by afternoon rain (cold!)  and hail in August.  If you are a lowlander, be mindful of the altitude so you don’t explode your brain or bust a lung or something.

4.

Hang out at the Mandalay Bay.  Actually I have never done this.  (But soon?  Yes!) But I tell you about it because this is where my sister’s family used to go for weekends “away” when they lived in town — book a room for the weekend, and then you can hang out at the beach in between running the kids to soccer practice and stuff.  One of the nice things about Las Vegas is that the sprawl really is not that bad for a city its size.  You can get back and forth between the strip and the suburbs pretty quickly.

(Now my sister is sensible and spends her summers in metro Portland.  I’m not allowed to tell you about that.  We’ll just pretend the Pacific Northwest is cold and rainy all year long, and that there is no reason you should consider a summer vacation to that corner of the world.  Nope.  You didn’t hear it from me.)

5.

Quit Las Vegas altogether and go to Zion National Park, the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, or Great Basin National Park.  If you have a week in Las Vegas, it is worth considering whether you really want to spend a week in Las Vegas.

All three of those parks are summer destinations.  Save Death Valley for your winter trip.  Don’t let the name fool you.

6.

Hoover Dam.

7.

Whatever it was you came for.  You have to do that at least one day, right? 

Unless you really did fly all the way to Las Vegas just to hang out in some dank casino wasting your money and losing your hearing.  In which case, maybe um, take in a movie, or go to masstimes.org and work out a tour of the daily masses, or go shopping . . . ?  Something, anything.  I heard there’s  a good quilting store in Henderson. Oh, and the Children’s Museum isn’t half bad.  And the Springs Preserve is delightful, if you can withstand the weird combination of eco-worship and eco-confusion in the propganda buildings.

Maybe it would be better if you just stayed home this year.

The boy finishes his homework yesterday morning afternoon after a certain amount of, shall we say, boyishness?  Calls his grandmother to say he’s free, please come pick him up to go play with the cousin.

A few minutes later: “Grandma says to pack a change of clothes in case I sleep over.”

Homeschool Mom alarms go off.  Wait a minute — I’m finally being diligent, you are taking all day to do your work — and you think you’re going on a sleep over?  And this is going to keep you on track for getting your work done the next day . . . how?

Ha.  But I have a secret plan.  “Okay, son.  No problem.  Do you know what a ‘security deposit’ is?”

— Conversation ensues.  Assurances that you get your money back if the agreed-upon conditions are met.—

He’s skeptical, but relents.  It’s either that or no cousin time. Still, the feet drag . . . hard to quite remember to go dig out the wallet and hand over $10 to She Who Cannot Be Trusted to Remember to Give it Back.  (She who is somewhat untested on this point.)

I remember I still owe him for mowing the front lawn on Saturday.  (Hence, trust issues — the HR dept. at this castle is notorious for late paychecks.)  I fish out his $10 from my wallet, let him know that this is his pay, it’s going under Dad’s sword, and if his Thursday homework is completed by end of day Thursday, he’ll get it back.  If not, it’s ours.

Before Grandma even arrives, there are already two grammar assignments in my inbox.  Victory.

I feel like I’m living in one of those experimental labs at the economics department.

 Dear Friend of Family Honor:

You are receiving this e-mail as a friend of our organization. We need your help. We have hit a cash flow crunch that is having a significant effect on our staff. They are loyally working away at half pay and even that will be interrupted.

We have assembled a real “A Team” of staff and consultants over the last year to help implement our vision of putting Family Honor in every diocese in the country. Great strides have been made thus far: we have significant, new alliances with Catholic bishops and lay leadership around the country; we have added an affiliate in Ohio; our executive director and other guests are being interviewed regularly via Catholic media (our executive director will be a guest of Father Mitch Pacwa on EWTN Live this month); our parent-child programs are in the process of being updated and streamlined; and staff has been planning new ways of reaching even more parents. We also have many fund development efforts underway. Ironically, however, much of those fund development efforts will not bear fruit until at least the first of the year.

Excluding project driven efforts, which are covered by specific grants or donations, it takes about $25,000 a month to operate Family Honor’s home office. Our parent-child programs are essentially revenue neutral.

Can you help? In the short term, we need $15,000 by the 15th of September. We would also appreciate pledge commitments over the next few months. Please feel free to forward this e-mail to those who you think may be able to provide a donation to Family Honor. You can donate via the secure Family Honor web site at www.familyhonor.org or you can drop a check to our office:

Family Honor

Attn: Brenda Cerkez

2927 Devine Street, Suite 130

Columbia, SC 29205

Whatever you can do will help. Thank you very much.

Sincerely,

J Cabot Seth

Family Honor Chairman of the Board

803.773.8676

Just what I needed as I took a quick lunch break before tackling the house:

As for renunciation and detachment, the Christian understanding is not a rejection of material things because they are bad, or even because we want to ascend to the more spiritual realm, or even because attachment to the material things causes suffering. This is Buddhist. Instead Christian detachment is ‘attachment’ to all things in the rightful priority. We love all things. We love all created things. Its just that we must love them according to their intrinsic worth. This is where Thomas Traherne’s thought is so beautiful: “Can a man be just unless he loves all things according to their value.” We renounce not the things or the people, but our inordinate or distorted love of them. By putting God first the rest of our world falls in line with everything in its proper value and place. “Seek first the kingdom of God and everything else will be added to you.”

And now, the desk.  Always the desk.  Girls’ room after that.

. . . the more the Easter.

Good luck, and Happy Ash Wednesday.