Plum from SW Michigan, USA

It's not a far ride.

Thanks (S)P Great Party!

Would love to see his art someday Plum! Thanks for the comment.

Hey Jerry, next time leave during the day, it may be a bit warmer!

Well, Broni, sometimes the party gets more interesting after the sun goes down...

Hi Plum! Did Jerry and his biker babe finally leave?
He seems to REALLY enjoy an party!
I've stopped by to wish you and yours a

Oops! That's 'a' party!

Wishing you & yours

Hi there Plum,
Wishing you and your loved ones a wonderful Christmas this year full of God's good gifts

I guess that while we swelter in Darwin you may celebrate a much colder Christmas. Whatever and where ever, may it be a lovely celebration for you.

Here’s the traditional
LEMON CORDIAL
Ingredients:
Juice of 7 large lemons
Grated rind of 5 large lemons
1 kg sugar
1.25 litres of water
25g citric acid
Method:
1.In a large pan, boil up sugar, water, grated peel and citric acid.
2.Take off and add juice, If preferred, this may be strained.
3.Bottle whilst still hot into clean, sterilised (in oven) bottles
Mix it with gin and soda if you want an alcoholic drink. I prefer mine with straight soda.

May 2009 be a healthy, peaceful, joyful, hopeful, satisfying year for you

Sugar Plum: MERRY CHRISTMAS to you and your family!

Great video on "What if Jesus had never been born?" I was born again in my 20's, but there are many things I am still learning about my Lord and Savior! Thanks for sharing!

Merry Christmas Sugar Plum!
Just stopping in to bring you warm Christmas greetings and blessings throughout the coming year!

Plum (Sugar Plum for Christmas) and all your family!

Thank you for your note. I did enjoy your resposes especially the thought of some one looking at a broken egg and thinking ....that needs a whisk... et voila 2 inventions at once... omelette and whisk. Happy New Year to you and yours.

Plum - What a wonderful idea - a Jane Austen club.
I have to say though that 'S & S' is now my least favourite Austen book, mainly because I should never have seen the movie - the casting of Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman was way off beam for me. Sorry if I have offended anyone's sense and sensibilities.
I will be more positive about the others, I promise.

CynB, I'm so glad you're joining the JaneS. Speak up. All opinions welcome and considered. I intend to be very chatty and opinionated, myself. Take a look at the JA bio video series I found. Watched them all this morning and it was very interesting! Great insight into how her life affected her books. I'll be copying this post on my page to start our Jane dialogue. Keep checking in! We'll see who else wants to join.

Thank you, Plum! Love the Jane Austen video! Leave it there for a bit... I haven't had a chance to see it all!

Plum - thanks for the JA video - how interesting. I will be trying to find the others. It is also interesting that Anna Chancellor, the actress who narrated it is related. I'm looking forward to this and I hope others join us.
About the song 'Botany Bay' by Mirusia - Australia was founded as a convict settlement. The British would regularly ship their criminals - poor people who stole a loaf of bread to feed their families, over here to Botany Bay (Sydney) originally for the rest of their lives. They were eventually freed here but never allowed back to England so they were our first settlers, along with their jailers. It's a folk song and is very poignant - 'Farewell to old England forever.... for we are bound for Botany Bay'.

Shiela - (repost from your page for CynB's sake)
I'll leave up the JA video until I can find a S&S clip we'd like to put up. The whole of the Real Jane Austen video runs 60 minutes (eight 7:30 you tube segments). Suggestions welcome as to the S&S to put up next week. Have (either of) you seen the 2008 S&S production?

Thanks, Plum! Enjoyed the rest of the Jane Austen biography. Really shows insights into the characters in her books. Will probably watch 'Persuasion' this afternoon while hubby is at a basketball game.

Or maybe I should probably watch 'Sense & Sensibility' since that is the first topic. Maybe I'll watch both!

Shiela and CynB - guess it's us to start the Jane Austen talk. We've been distracted by the snow and an internet service slowdown that seems to be over, so now I can talk (and solve puzzles). So, how are we starting off? Have both of you read Sense & Sensibility at least once? How about the videos?

Oh, wow. Just read the easy page. Congrats, Shiela et al.

Thanks, Plum! Might be a little busy to read this week with the new grandson to spoil!

Shiela -- first things do come first! However, if you have read it (?) - and I know you've seen the ET movie - perhaps we can post a few comments as to themes or fav or least fav scenes or how horrible or wonderful or unbelievable characters are? Or not, I could just talk to myself since S&S isn't CynB's fav Austen, either. But last time I reread it, I reread it critically and I did find some nice things to discuss there ... Oh, well, I'll collect some thoughts together this week regardless, as I've always wanted to put together a small study on all six Austen novels.

Hello Plum - I have two messages from you waiting replies, apologies for taking so long. Firstly Botany Bay is a sea-shanty/folk sing probably been around since the convicts were transported here. I suppose we all learn it at some time but it's not necessarily as traditional or as popular as Advance Australia Fair (our Nat. anthem) or Waltzing Matilda or even Peter Allen's 'I still call Australia Home'. I just liked it and Mirusia's version of it.

About 'Sense and Sensibility' as I've said before, it is a long long time since I read it but recently saw the film again. There is something about it that I just don't like compared to most others of JA's books, but I can't quite put my finger on it. Her books are indicitive of the times they were written, full of class distinctions and the lack of rights that women had in those days.
Much as I love her books, I feel that Charles Dickens, whose books cover more than polite middle/upper class society gives a better picture of life as it was in those days.

You know, I think a lot of people have that "can't put the finger on it" reaction to S&S. I think it would be interesting to try to track down what the detractor is. I used to not like it either, but now I like it a lot.

A lot of people condemn S&S as being too based on old fashioned attitudes, but I think the basic human-nature attitudes have strong modern parallels. Look sideways at the economic particulars and the idea of who's an acceptable match, and find we have similar though not identical issues today.

Lots of people condemn Marianne (the one who sickens herself with indulged emotion), but I think she's the archtype of many teenagers. JA felt herself more a Marianne than an Elanor.

If I were a film maker, I'd do a modern version of S&S. All the high school "types" and their parents are represented. I'd make a few changes, of course, because I wouldn't pair up a 16 year old with a 40 year old man (yuck), but it would be very easy to update. (Hmm. Maybe I'll try my hand at another screen play ...)

Certainly, if I were to cover any Jane Austen with a group of modern teens in order to "treat them" to their first delicious taste of JA, I'd do S&S. I think it conveys a lot of wisdom about choices and choosing, certainly about growing and maturing socially.

I like that "even Elanor" is shown to be "unbalanced" and certainly selfish in the novel. Oftentimes, the heroine of the novel is without flaw, which is very unrealistic.

Gosh, the novel overflows into a very in-depth study on selfishness vs. social interaction.

Hi, Plum. I was not impressed by Twilight, but given its popularity wondered what others might have thought about it. Would love to join in on the JS group, but can't this week for sure--perhaps I'll jump in later on.

Hello Plum - thanks for your response. As I wrote my comment yesterday, we were sweltering in 42C heat (about 107F). Today it's a mild 23C. Thank goodness for the cool change! In the tropical north, such as in Cairns, the temperatures don't reach these heights, but they never drop below about 25 all year round. They have 2 major seasons - the wet and the dry. We're at about 37 deg south. The approximate US equivalent in the north would be San Francisco - although the climate would be different because it's on the coast.
Re your question about my favourite fall foliage: most Australian natives are evergreen. I think only Tasmania (even further south) has a native deciduous tree. Of course, we have plenty of imported deciduous trees, as our European forebears wanted to experience the change of colour and the falling of leaves in the season we call autumn. They do well in the southern part of the country because of the seasonal variations, but they don't grow at all well in the warmer areas. One of my favourites is the ash, particularly the claret ash.

Plum, remember this too shall pass. Around the bend life can surprise you with happiness as well. Here have some chocolates

Plum, thank you for thinking of me during this recent sad time. Sorry it has taken so long to get back with my gratitude, I have been quite overwhelmed by the heartfelt response.
Mum will live on in our hearts forever.

Shiela, CynB, Glinda - Anyone have a comment to launch discussion on Pride & Prejudice? It's the most popular and thus is often the doorway into the whole body of JA's work. However, when people read JA it often ceases to be their favorite. So, what's up with P&P? Can you remember the first time you read it or saw it on video? Has the story "grown on you" in any way?

This copy and pasted from Shiela:
I have always liked the Colin Firth rendition of "Pride & Prejudice" because I like Colin Firth.
You are right [Plum], P & P is best known and indeed the gateway to the Austen books. I think that is partially due to the many renditions of movies brought out over the years. It was probably chosen for movies due to the basic story having the timeless quality of "girl in trouble" effecting the whole family. The other Austen books seem to be a bit more dependent on the social times in which they were written. I think also P & P has a more multi-dimensional storyline appeal that the others are more subtle at showing, so I think it has the widest appeal and people start there. I think the gateway happens because everyone who enjoyed P & P wants to see what her other books are like. I think many people go on to have others as their JA favorites instead because they get past the quaintness and see the charm of her other stories. ...Although I have never liked "Emma". (But maybe I am too caught up on not liking the main character!)
"Pride & Prejudice" has been strange for me. I really liked it originally, then I didn't and now I like it again in a different way. The story was interesting the first time I read it. Then after seeing several movie renditions of the book I got so caught up in all of the characters I didn't like, that I didn't like the whole book. Now I've begun to focus on the characters I DO like. So it may be that you go through stages in liking P & P (or not, whichever is the case at the time).

Another posting from Shiela:
Parental characters are quite interesting in Jane Austen books. As probably planned by Austen, I disliked the characters of Elizabeth's overpowering, pushy mother and ineffectual father (P & P) and Anne's vain & impractical father (Persuasion) In Sense & Sensibility the father and later the mother were powerless to protect their family because of societal circumstances and a neighbor took over getting the girls husbands. In P & P an aunt & uncle seems to be the sensible ones. I'll have to brush up on her other books to determine if there is a complete pattern of parental inadequacies. (Makes me wonder what Jane thought of her OWN parents.)

Jane Austen Society posts, go ahead and post here and when I see something new, I'll alert the others. If you're "new" to our Society, Welcome! Leave a message and I'll include you, too.

Hi, Plum. Thanks for keeping me posted on JA. Right now I don't have the time to join in/read, but I'll pop in as I can.

Shiela, I think you nailed P&P when you pointed to the parents. There's a perfectly understandable birth order thing happening here that is consistant with the character of the parents:
Oldest is "best behaved" and reserved. I can imagine her always being told to act like a young lady and be a help with her younger sisters. She was expected to learn to act as a submitted adult and so she does.
2nd is quick witted and rebellious. With big sister helping mom and little sisters requiring the care, #2 wraps dad around her finger and learns she has more freedom of thought and behavior than her older sister as long as she behaves so she doesn't get lumped back with the babies.

Middle is rather neglected and has to try to accomplish much on her own. She is constantly admonished to be "good" (so she'll be less of a bother as her younger sisters require more attention), so she tries to excel at being good to get the attention she craves.
The "Babies" are undisciplined and allowed adult privileges and expectations before they're mature. This because mother and father focus attention from the top down and let the younger catch up as catch can without giving them the stricter instruction in social and intellectual development that the older girls possess.
The family flaws are so perfect, you have to believe JA was inspired by a real situation.

As for the movies and various stage and television productions of P&P. I think the pearl in the oyster of every production is Mr. Collins. He's always "Mr. Collins" according to the book, but his is evidently the one character with enough latitude that he can be a freshly drawn character in each production.
You don't realize what a central character Mr. Collins is until you see how much he is like a glue that binds almost all the other characters and events together in the story. As a "matrix character," therefore, who Mr. Collins is greatly affects how we learn about and feel about the main characters.
Think about it. I think you'll find it's true!

Hmmmm... looks like I'll have to check into Mr. Collins. I have generally ignored him because I detested the character in the Colin Firth movie rendition. (He was such a squirrel!)
I have never paid attention to the fact that Mr. Collins was there in a lot of the crucial scenes. Funny, I always wished Austen had left him out!