Alice Is Stalking Me

I'm a big Alice in Wonderland fan and I have a small collection of Alice's with different illustrations. So I was looking forward to reading Alice I Have Been. And did so yesterday. It is a fictional biography of Alice Liddell, the little girl to whom (along with her sisters) Charles Dodgson told the first Alice story. (More about the book later.)

I finished the book last night and picked up Margot Livesey's The House on Fortune Street. It's anovel set in contemporary England...well, actually a collection of four inter-related stories. And who shows up? Charles Dodgson and Alice Liddell.

And then this evening we walk into Barnes and Nobel, saunter past the "New Arrivals" table and...come upon a table covered with copies of various editions of Alice in Wonderland and Alice dolls and tie-ins with the new movie.

Weird synchronicity.

I finished the February Red Scarf this afternoon and am buckling down and knitting away on Rachel's infinite sleeves. And my brother came by this afternoon and chose the colors for the hat he would like me to knit. So I can get started on that, too.

Yesterday afternoon we got home from work about 4:00 p.m. and, after leafing through the mail and such, I walked into the kitchen and looked out our back window. The back yard was a mass of black birds...the ground was covered. I shouted for Mr. Pointy Sticks to look out the window and when he opened the blind in the computer room the birds spooked and, as one, flew up and filled the nearby trees. Then, a few seconds later, they swooped back down, carpeting the lawn again. We thought at first that they were grackles and starlings but when we looked closer we saw some juncos and lots and lots of red-winged blackbirds. They did the "OMG! Into the trees!
"Whew, all clear!" trick a few times while I watched and then, a few minutes later, when I looked out, they had all disappeared.

Gizmo is sitting here beside me, clutching my left wrist with his right paw and resting his head on the back of my left hand. Makes typing iffy. Guess I'll close here and give him some attention.

Oh, and Alice I Have Been? I was really disappointed with it. I just didn't believe the character of Alice as young girl. Oh well, the cover is gorgeous.