Winter is here!!! But we are not going to let that keep us inside and away from fun things!
Join us! We’re on Meetup.com as the group Relaxed Readers, and we are open to anyone who wants to come chat about books. And we know a lot of readers are crafters, so we’d love to have you join us in doing some crafting!
This Tuesday, Dec 03 · 6:00 PM, we’ll be at the Great River public library in St Cloud – ready to craft!
Join us for this session where you can bring your crafting work, get some projects underway (or done!), and chat with fellow crafters! Have a couple of uninterrupted hours to work on your crafting projects.
We’re
fine if you bring dinner, or snacks, to enjoy while you work.
(Obviously: please be careful with food and other people’s projects.)
Our
agenda is, as it always is, relaxed. Start a new project, work on a
years-long project (me!), or make some small things you can polish off
in a short time.
If you have holiday crafting work, we would love
to see it – and may pepper you with questions! (This might be a good
time to make a dent in any craft projects you are planning to gift over
the holidays.)
It doesn’t matter if you are a very experienced
crafter, or (like me) a novice stumbling through some potentially
interesting things. This is just an opportunity to get away from
distractions, and spend some craft-focused time. Nobody is being graded –
we are just here to have a nice time together!
We have a room at the Great River Regional Library in St Cloud, from 6:00pm to 8:00. We are in the Array room, Room 105. There will be tables with some space to spread out. (Again, obviously: everyone we be sharing space, so be considerate.)
Join us! Bring a friend! Let’s experience the hygge that’s only possible when you are inside, warm, and having fun, while it’s cold and snowy outside.
Hello! Thank you for joining us on Reading With Libraries! We’re so glad you could be here to enjoy our book group podcast. This week we’re especially glad to have your company, since the genre we are discussing is True Crime!
We are so pleased to welcome back returning Guest Host Kelly, from the St. Cloud Public Library!
Check out our full show notes page here.We have links to all kinds of other resources, to help you to find books for yourself and for your patrons. We also give you links to the books we shared, so you can follow up yourself. And, of course, we have the links to the beverages we enjoyed here! (Beverages are a key part of any book group.)
Become a full book group member on Patreon! Click here to be part of the “inner circle” of this book group, and get access to behind-the-scenes info and photos. Support levels start at $1/month – and you get a postcard from Official Office Dog Lady Grey! More swag is available at higher levels of support; check it all out today.
We love doing this, but podcasts aren’t free to create; so thank you so much to our book group members who have joined us. We love having you as part of the team.
(Prior article is right here! But no prior knowledge is required. I’m just armchair traveling the country in book form, after doing in in cars this year. Join in the travels!)
In this segment of the trip I was in the Deep South, and wow it was HOT! It was only May on this leg, but again: SO HOT! (I took a picture of my car’s dashboard saying it was 91 degrees, which is just absurdly hot for my tastes.) So a lot of my car ideas involved keeping on the air conditioner, finding food I could keep that didn’t melt (no chocolate), and figuring out where to camp to avoid melting myself. (I’m much better at the frozen tundra of Minnesota winters than I am in Southern heat. My southern in-laws are constantly amused at my Yankee inability to function in the heat – and of course, they are not wrong.)
This week’s travel ideas are about finding places to sleep. It is really easy to spend a fortune on nightly lodging if you aren’t on top of this. And of course, there may be times you choose to stay in a fancy place: you deserve a treat, everything else looks terrifyingly filthy, etc. But in general, some careful thought here will give you more money.
For this segment of the trip, and for most of the whole thing actually, I leaned heavily on my KOA membership to find places to sleep. Sure, camping purists would not recognize this as “real” camping – but who cares what fussy people think anyway? It’s your trip! I think a KOA membership is $30/year, then you get 10% off each reservation.
One of my Kabins at night – so pretty!!
The really handy thing is the app. I had an app for KOA, because I had a general plan for the trip; but I didn’t really know where I was going to be each night until later afternoon. (Flexibility is always nice!) I could make reservations for a KOA three or four hours down the road, get there after the office closed, pick up a key to my prepaid Kabin, and be all set. No need to check in, to show ID, or to deal with the drunks and loud baseball teams that always seem to inhabit cheap hotels. KOAs are often cheaper than acceptable cheap hotels in an area, and are QUIET and CLEAN – a much better choice for me in almost every situation.
I also stayed in some of their tent sites, and that is convenient, potentially fun, and super-cheap. (I will say, that in most KOAs, tents are a minor after-thought, so you are not going to have a great experience if it’s crowded.) But when it was so hot it was great to know I was going to have a night of electricity and air conditioning in a Kabin. Almost everyone else in a KOA is in a massive RV, and retired; so they don’t have time for the likes of tenting trash like me – all good! (I’m not a social traveler.)
You do have to bring your own bedding; but I was toting a couple of sleeping bags and pillows anyway, so that was no problem. Roll out your bag on the double bed, throw down a pillow, and you’re basking in luxury! Each Kabin looks the same as the cabins in the MN state parks: a double bed on one side of the room, and a set of bunk beds on the other. For a little extra money, some campgrounds have Kabins with a second room that has two sets of bunk beds. You can also get fancy, and start spending some serious money, to get nicer Kabins with kitchens and bathrooms. But I was only ever in a place for the time it took me to sleep and have a shower before I hit the road again; so small was just fine for me.
For sure, consider tenting on your trips!! It requires a little more equipment to haul, but for saving money – and often getting to see some lovely scenery – it is absolutely the best way to go! Don’t make it complicated. A tent, a sleeping bag, a pillow, a flashlight, and you’ve got the basics. You will be much happier if you get a pad to put under your bag; I started using a twin bed foam topper – aaaaahhhh….it feels so nice! Just enjoy the opportunity to be outside and enjoy the night in a way you rarely get to at home.
Louisiana
My only experience with Louisiana before this trip was visiting New Orleans. On my prior trips, I stuffed myself with raw oysters, steamed crayfish, muffaletta, and king cake, while wandering around dazed with admiration for the beauty of the city. That was fun; but this was different. I zipped across the northern end of the state, and didn’t see tons of cool things (highways do this!) but it was nice to stop at the rest stops down at the other end of the Mississippi river!
“Abdulrahman and Kathy Zeitoun run a house-painting business in New Orleans. In August of 2005, as Hurricane Katrina approaches, Kathy evacuates with their four young children, leaving Zeitoun to watch over the business. In the days following the storm he travels the city by canoe, feeding abandoned animals and helping elderly neighbors. Then, on September 6th, police officers armed with M-16s arrest Zeitoun in his home. Told with eloquence and compassion, Zeitoun is a riveting account of one family’s unthinkable struggle with forces beyond wind and water.”
(Small note: the American Library Assn was the first big conference to be held in New Orleans after Katrina, after lots of the cancelled. Everyone was encouraged to come and bring money and spend lavishly. The library people complied. Libraries are lovely instruments of positive social justice action, even in unusual circumstances!)
Mississippi
I had never been here, though my husband spent a lot of his youth here. He went to the Univ of Southern Mississippi (go, Golden Eagles!) for his undergrad degree – along with fellow future Wisconsin resident: Brett Favre! (Sorry Vikings fans; he’ll always be a Packer to me.) It was SO HOT here!! And this was the one night on the trip that my Kabin AC let me down – I was miserable.
And while I don’t want to sound like, or to be, a terrible Yankee – as assuming everyone Southern is dumb and racist is clearly incorrect. (I’m literally married to the smartest person I’ve ever met, who, as I said, is from here.) But I have read a lot of terrible things about Mississippi, and was kind of nervous here. “Leading the nation in lynchings” is not a great stat, along with a bunch of other social problems here. And Southern poverty is not like Northern poverty. In my rural Midwestern childhood, “poor” was not having a TV, wearing hand-me-down, or Goodwill, clothes, and driving a car everyone hoped would hold together a few more months. Across the South, “poor” is not having shoes, not having windows, not having four standing walls on your house/shack. It’s a much more third-world type of poverty. I have no understand of the sociology here at all, and I’m sure people have looked at all of this; but it’s all shocking to my sheltered experience.
I definitely felt my middle-class-white-lady privilege here, and across the South. While I was worried about what I’d do if my car broke down, I was less worried that many people would be about being shot by the police, or others. (That was a more urgent worry for me in rural Idaho, lost on back-roads, surrounded by houses and cars flying “Don’t Tread On Me” flags – which I interpret as a straightforward “I’m Going To Shoot You Because I’m Crazy” symbol. Steer clear of these people when traveling.)
I’m a big proponent of not being afraid to travel, and not being afraid of being a woman alone – generally all will be just fine. But I’m also a fan of not being careless about safety. And it’s okay to notice that things are not okay. Hopefully that can serve as a spur to push us all to make better changes and choices, in making the world at least a little bit better for everyone.
(Recommended by my husband, as “a very readable Faulkner”) “Light in August, a novel about hopeful perseverance in the face of mortality, features some of Faulkner’s most memorable characters: guileless, dauntless Lena Grove, in search of the father of her unborn child; Reverend Gail Hightower, who is plagued by visions of Confederate horsemen; and Joe Christmas, a desperate, enigmatic drifter consumed by his mixed ancestry. “
Alabama
I had also never been to Alabama. So many firsts here! I spent a lot of time here, driving hours north on the highway here. It was very cool to drive past the US Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, AL!
“Reverend Willie Maxwell was a rural preacher accused of murdering five of his family members for insurance money in the 1970s. With the help of a savvy lawyer, he escaped justice for years until a relative shot him dead at the funeral of his last victim. Despite hundreds of witnesses, Maxwell’s murderer was acquitted—thanks to the same attorney who had previously defended the Reverend.
Sitting in the audience during the vigilante’s trial was Harper Lee, who had traveled from New York City to her native Alabama with the idea of writing her own In Cold Blood, the true-crime classic she had helped her friend Truman Capote research seventeen years earlier. Lee spent a year in town reporting, and many more years working on her own version of the case.
Now Casey Cep brings this story to life, from the shocking murders to the courtroom drama to the racial politics of the Deep South. At the same time, she offers a deeply moving portrait of one of the country’s most beloved writers and her struggle with fame, success, and the mystery of artistic creativity. “
Tennessee
This state is really beautiful, and has a lot of varied terrain! The Great Smokey Mountains! Clingmans Dome! Dollywood! I haven’t been to that last one, but I’ve been to the others; and I’ve driven across the state West to East, and back, many times, going between Chicago and Chapel Hill for school. There is a lot to see here!
“In November 1944, eighteen-year-old June Walker boards an unmarked bus, destined for a city that doesn’t officially exist. Oak Ridge, Tennessee has sprung up in a matter of months—a town of trailers and segregated houses, 24-hour cafeterias, and constant security checks. There, June joins hundreds of other young girls operating massive machines whose purpose is never explained. They know they are helping to win the war, but must ask no questions and reveal nothing to outsiders.
The girls spend their evenings socializing and flirting with
soldiers, scientists, and workmen at dances and movies, bowling alleys
and canteens. June longs to know more about their top-secret assignment
and begins an affair with Sam Cantor, the young Jewish physicist from
New York who oversees the lab where she works and understands the end
goal only too well, while her beautiful roommate Cici is on her own
mission: to find a wealthy husband and escape her sharecropper roots.
Across town, African-American construction worker Joe Brewer knows
nothing of the government’s plans, only that his new job pays enough to
make it worth leaving his family behind, at least for now. But a breach
in security will intertwine his fate with June’s search for answers.
When the bombing of Hiroshima brings the truth about Oak Ridge into devastating focus, June must confront her ideals about loyalty, patriotism, and war itself.”
Whew!!! So far we’ve armchair traveled through twenty states! Wow – we’re on a roll now! Thanks for traveling along with me; and I hope you are inspired to do some traveling with books – and to start thinking about some IRL traveling yourself.
Winter is coming, and we’re ready! We’ve got a big stack of library books, and we’re looking forward to digging into them, talking about them, and sharing them.
We want you to be ready to share some reading with us too!
Join us online on Goodreads for our 2020 reading challenge. We have a bunch of prompts set up, to ensure you will find all kinds of books you love, books new to you, books from all sorts of people in all sorts of places. You can read books, and have a wonderful time.
And we wanted to make it a little extra fun, so we have added an overlay of friendship and advocacy for the kitten foster organization: Kitten Academy! If this isn’t your thing – no need to read a single kitten book all year. But if you want to admire them, you can watch the kittens bounding around their rooms 24/7 (or sleeping; baby kittens do a LOT of sleeping, when not bounding!) on YouTube. Check out their website if you want to donate $1/mo to join their very active Discord community, or if you want to apply to their animal shelter, DAWS, to adopt a kitten or momcat.
AND!
We want to see you in real life too!
We’ve set up a Meetup group, to make it easy to coordinate activities. We will announce events here, of course; but you might want to join the Meetup to be sure you are fully up to date on things we will be trying the next few months. Want to to try something? Let us know; let’s see if we can organize others to go too!
Monthly Book Discussion and Dinner: Join us this month at the Mexican Village Downtown! Bring a book (or five), or just bring yourself. We like to read books in all formats: paper, audio, e-books; any of them are fine to discuss. This is a casual environment, so feel free to drop in as your schedule permits. Wednesday, December 11, 2019 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Book Group Discussion! Join us for chatting about books – any books that you are enjoying! Bring a book, or just bring yourself. We’ll enjoy dinner, sharing books, and getting to know each other! Wednesday, January 8, 2020, 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Join the Meetup group (you won’t get spammed!), and RSVP to let us know you are joining us! (You can email us at admin @ cmle.org – no spaces – and RSVP too; we’d just like to know to expect you.)
Join us! Let’s have a cozy, happy, sociable winter – filled with books and other nice things!
We’re in Minnesota, so we know: Winter really is coming!! It’s dark, it’s going to be cold, snow will be here soon.
All of this is better when we are in warm, cozy place filled with nice people.
So, we’re doing that!
We’ve set up the Relaxed Readers Meetup Group, to give everyone some nice activities this winter. We’re counting these are Member Events, and will be so happy to see you there. And we have also opened them up to anyone – because it’s great to get more people reading and eating together! Bring your friends, neighbors, family – anyone would be fine.
Join us on Wednesday, Dec. 11 at Mexican Village downtown in St. Cloud for a book group session. No need to prep – everyone can come and discuss any books you are reading! We are a low-stress book group.
And because so many of our members (and other nice people!) are readers AND crafters, we are also holding regular crafting nights!
Tuesday, Dec. 2 we will meet at the public library in St. Cloud, to work on some crafting. Bring your holiday projects, bring long-term projects, or get started on something brand new! All the information is right here.
In January we will add to these sessions with regular sessions of a silent book group, where everyone can have some uninterrupted time to read books, and enjoy a little solitude. If you want to read, but have trouble finding the time or the peace for it, we’ve got you covered!
You may want to sign up for our Meetup group: Relaxed Readers Meetup Group to be sure you get all the notices about events, locations, and any other good stuff!
Join us! We always want to hear from you. Let’s get through this winter with a sense of hygge: books, food, good people. It will be a lovely winter for us all!
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