Slightly NGK Today

Emily is staying with us for a little while, having a break from the Tucson heat. So we were really looking forward to some serious saling this morning. Unfortunately, the saling is "bunco" today (as Gail always says), or "NGK" ("no good kind") as my sister, Linda, likes to say.

Here are Emily's treasures:

• a purple bag, large enough to carry her laptop, and it crosses her body for easy carrying while bicycling ($2)



• a book of Yeats, and two volumes of short stories by W. Somerset Maugham, plus an illustrator's book of nude poses (there are ones that are pretty straight-forward such as "arms around knees", and then there are others that are a bit trickier, such as "abandon" or "sultry")



• A card (more about these later) that is too perfect for this English major doctoral candidate, and which she intends to hang in her "cubicle" at school. Just last Wednesday, Emily introduced me to a podcast called Stuff You Missed in History Class, in which two young women related great stories about Byron and Shelley.

Here are my goodies:

• a never-used, hard cover copy of Strunk and White's The Elements of Style. This one is illustrated by Marcia Kalman. The illustration shown here opens Chapter III: "A Few Matters of Form"



• More books...so boring, but when there are no fabulous little treasures, books must suffice. I love three of these authors already: Roald Dahl, Joan Didion, and Harriet Doerr. Tobias Wolff I'm not as familiar with. His book is a novel, the others are short stories or essays.



• cards...but not your ordinary cards! These are made by "Cara Scissoria", and they are each marked $3.00. I bought about 30 for a total of $2.00 (with the Strunk & White thrown in for an additional quarter!) I'm only picturing a couple of them, including some little wine cards, but here are some of the titles: The Christ Child at the Olive Platter, Free Range Pinatas, and Planet of the Aprons. Check out the website. None of these cards came with envelopes, but ... ta da! Last summer we bought a lifetime supply, which happen to be a perfect fit.

Actually, now that I look at this stuff again, I guess it's only slightly NGK.

Finally, here is a little note especially for my friend, Alicia. Stanley went out sailing on his own this morning, too. He found (in his words), "a cute jumping deer picture" for $2, which he thinks would be perfect in the Wrightwood cabin. It is pretty cabinesque,
but I'm not exactly sure that's what we were looking for! It might be bunco...or just NGK.