Bday lunch, 12th Night, Amphora, Sunday; Banned Books and the Lovecraft A-Team

[skreidle]

Met Christine and her dad (Bob) at Maggiano's in Tysons Corner Galleria around 1400, Erika arrive ~15min later. Had some damn tasty food, including a salmon/bacon/avocado sandwich and tiramisu. Sent the leftovers home with Bob, since we wouldn't be home (or near a fridge) for many hours yet.

From there, we headed west to the World Market at Fair Lakes. Really neat store--vast arrays of imported foods, drinks, housewares, furniture, and more. Oohed and aahed over this and that, particularly in the kitchenwares, they bought a few things, and off we went, westward. Very westward.

Next stop: Round Hill Elementary in Round Hill, VA--3 miles west of Purcellville, 12 miles west of Leesburg, 37 miles NW of Fair Lakes. Christine and I arrived around 1815, and did cartwheels in the grass until Erika arrived, at which point we went inside, and met Vanessa's mother, among other friends of Christine.

RH Elem. was the emergency backup location for the Franklin Park Summer Theater, as the FP Performing and Visual Arts Center isn't quite up and running yet--meaning the intended-to-be-outdoors performance of Twelfth Night was held in the cafetorium instead, with flaky A/C. However, temperature aside, it was a great performance. Set up as theatre-in-the-round, 2-3 rows of chairs on all four sides of a ~20' square stage, good acoustics, equal-palette lighting (to recreate the natural-light feel), great costuming, great actors, great acting. Show ran from about 1900 to about 2200, with a late intermission (with free bottled water! Very welcome.)

On the way back, we decided to stop for food, and picked the Amphora [Deluxe Diner] in Herndon, as the girls were starving and I was kind of hungry. Lots of meat later, Erika headed for Centreville, and I headed into DC with Christine, dropped her off, and headed home myself. Total mileage for the day, about 165 miles!

Sunday afternoon, the three of us are meeting at the Shakespeare Theatre to see Macbeth. I don't think I've ever seen that particular play. Yay! :)

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ALA's Top 100 Banned Books from 1990-2000.

I've read:
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Harry Potter (Series) by J.K. Rowling
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
The Witches by Roald Dahl
Blubber by Judy Blume
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Cujo by Stephen King
James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
The Anarchist Cookbook by William Powell
Fade by Robert Cormier
Carrie by Stephen King
The Dead Zone by Stephen King
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Where’s Waldo? by Martin Hanford
Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Greene
How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell

Award for "Most wtf?": Where's Waldo?
Award for "Most Ironic": Brave New World

Hehe! Via thehunter: H.P. Lovecraft's A-Team

Comments

[my2perfectday.livejournal.com]

Obviously, Where's Waldo? teaches children that people who wear glasses are freaks who should be sought out and pointed at.

Anyway, do you have any idea where I could get a list of reasons the book was challenged? Some of the ones from the list that I've read were hardly memorable at all, and some of them I remember but don't recall anything objectionable about them, and some I read and recall as just not being very good - but it didn't look like any of the objections fell under the "this author sucks" category.

[skreidle.livejournal.com]

I -believe- the ALA site has explanation for some of the book bans--or at least, I know I've read some before, and ALA seems the most likely place. :)