Never Jam Today

Ganseys

2012-01-26T17:52:00.000-06:00

It's lovely when a book is stewing on the back of the stove, so long you almost forget the details and then one morning, something catches your eye, a vital ingredient that would never have been included if you'd eaten the soup the first day. Dutch ganseys, for instance. Traditional knitted fisherman's sweaters. Patterns passed down by oral tradition. Intriguing.

My heroine is the daughter of a Dutch fisherman, in a home where knitting is forbidden, and painful to mention, because of her mother's nightmarish past. The story is my own pattern, flowing from the old fairy tale about the swan brothers, and the sister who must free them; I hope to blend elements of Mrs. Rochester, locked away in her attic; that Meldrum novel, Madapple, which I never read but the cover and premise appealed to me; the can't-put-your-finger-on-it deliciousness of We Have Always Lived in the Castle... this is sounding like quite the gothic novel, but that's not my goal. Anyway, knitting plays a big, big part in the plot, and now to discover this element of ganseys, well. I'm pleased.

(Does this mean I'm writing again? Well, I'm thinking about it... :)

ala travesty

2012-01-23T09:19:00.000-06:00

Okay for Now doesn't even get a nod in this morning's Newbery results.

"Dead End in Norvelt," written by Jack Gantos, is the 2012 Newbery Medal winner. Two Newbery Honor Books also were named: "Inside Out & Back Again," written by Thanhha Lai and "Breaking Stalin's Nose," written and illustrated by Eugene Yelchin."

"Where Things Come Back," written by John Corey Whaley, is the 2012 Printz Award winner."

I was so pleased with the 2010 results. Now I have two years in a row of what had become (pre-2010) my typical reaction to the ALA's taste. Eh.

La vita è bella

2012-01-14T09:05:00.000-06:00

Buried at the bottom of a lecture playlist, someone recommended La vita è bella.

Watched it last night, haunted by the fullness, the beauty, the suffering, world without end, of a chosen people, just and unjust. When tempted to lay all at the feet of judgement, or to decry such pronouncements, I remember

If you think you understand, it isn't God.--St Augustine

Cuts both ways.

But what is God
and where is God
when his face is turned away?

He is both justice and goodness, in perfect fullness, a ring of pure and endless light, too complete for the crescent human mind to contain.

The Psalms are a comfort. He does not silence when we cry, how long?

When he slew them
then
they sought him
and they remembered that God
was
their rock
and the high God
their redeemer

So we will not go back from Thee:
quicken us
and we will call upon Thy name
Turn us
again
O Lord God of hosts
cause Thy face
to shine
and we shall
be saved

And yet, life is full, and life is beautiful.

Oresteia

2011-12-28T15:52:00.002-06:00

I read the trilogy out loud in Year 12, with my next sister, laying feet to feet on the sofa, both of us eventually falling asleep. Don't remember much from the plays themselves.

But my Year 10 sister is studying them this month--she's reading Classics, and I'm her Classics tutor. AKA she's rubbish at self-motivation, and I have the lovely task of keeping her on task.

And in this case, it truly is lovely, because I found this brilliant 1983 production by the National Theatre of Great Britain. You can watch all of Agamemnon online. And seeing how it is a play, YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE READING IN ANYWAY.

Their version is more modern than the Lattimore translation I read, modern without being contemporary, yet at the same time, it has an Anglo-Saxon torque. Paradox! I love it!

Traditional Greek masks and minimal movement beside prose that takes you back to Beowulf... its chanted, sing-song alliteration, and its stunning, word-canvas kennings... whale-road, ring-giver, bone-house.

There is stupendous rhyming-couplet banter between the chorus and the primary dramatists, eerily reminiscent of Inigo Montoya and Fezzik onboard their ship. (Are there rocks ahead? If there are, we'll all be dead.)

And since the females are played by men, in classic Greek style, every time Clytemnestra appears, she/he terrifies my sister by placing her/his hands on her/his hip and thigh... in a way that, to quote my sister, real women never do, except Robot's Fender.

Reading Resolutions, 2012

2011-12-27T03:46:00.001-06:00

I'm not setting a numerical goal for 2012. During the past twelve months, my numerical goal kept treading on my tail, like the whiting and the porpoise. It's more enjoyable to merely say, I'd especially like to read these books this year. And other titles, as they appear and occur...

"What matters it how far we go?" his scaly friend replied.
"There is another shore, you know, upon the other side.
The further off from England the nearer is to France --
Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance."

What would you like to read in 2012?

Froi of the Exiles, by Melina Marchetta
Liar's Moon, by Elizabeth Bunce
The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories, by Joan Aiken
Sea Hearts, by Margo Lanagan
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Flies Again, by Frank Cottrell Boyce
In the Night Garden, by Catherynne Valente
Passion and Purity, by Elizabeth Elliot
My Man Jeeves, by PG Wodehouse
Phantastes, by George MacDonald
The Art of Life, by Edith Schaeffer
Sarah's Cottage, by DE Stevenson
The Everlasting Man, by GK Chesterton
Descent into Hell, by Charles Williams
All Hallows Eve, by Charles Williams
The Greater Trumps, by Charles Williams
Dombey and Son, by Charles Dickens
Gladys Aylward, the Little Woman, by Gladys Aylward
Devotions Upon Divergent Occasions and Death's Duel, by John Donne
The Drowned Vault, by ND Wilson
Autobiography of George Muller, by George Muller
Planet Narnia, by Michael Ward
The Valley of Vision, by Arthur Bennett
Why Revival Tarries, by Leonard Ravenhill
The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, by Joan Aiken (reread)
Power through Prayer, by EM Bounds

And I'd like to reread my very favorite five books, according to my 17 year old self:

Anne of Green Gables, by L.M. Montgomery
Little Women, by L.M. Alcott
The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis
Tuck Everlasting, by Natalie Babbitt

Reading Resolutions: Realized! 2011

2011-12-26T15:49:00.006-06:00

Last December, I resolved to read [at least] 60 books in 2011. A smallish number, considering the riotous sprees of my youth, when ten books a week was no unusual number... devouring stack after stack of Cherry Ames stories, every LM Montgomery novel ever written, Judy Bolton, DE Stevenson... ahem. I was a series girl. But I met my 2011 goal. Yay! (I'm also a goal-meeting girl.) Here are a few categories:

Best New Discoveries
Author: Charles Williams
(I adore his writing, so abstruse and bizarre and fusty.)
Novel: Pilgrim's Inn, by Elizabeth Goudge
Character: Sam W/Veller (Pickwick Papers, by Charles Dickens)
(Indubitably the literary father of Mervyn Bunter.)

Favorite Classic
The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexander Dumas

Favorite MG/YA Novels
Okay for Now, by Gary Schmidt *also my Newbery prediction*
The Dragon's Tooth, by N.D. Wilson
Fly Trap, by Frances Hardinge
Starcrossed, by Elizabeth Bunce

Most Difficult to Complete (But I Did!)
Heretics, by GK Chesterton

Disappointments from Authors I Liked Last Year
Uncommon Criminals, by Ally Carter
The Five Red Herrings, by Dorothy Sayers

Surprises from Authors I Didn't Like Last Year
Starcrossed, by Elizabeth Bunce

Favorite ReReads
Saving Francesca, by Melina Marchetta
Listening Valley, by DE Stevenson

Books I Thought Would Be Amazing But Really Weren't That Great
The Piper's Son, by Melina Marchetta

(I feel like such a backstabber to even type the above, but if she hadn't set such impossibly high standards with two of my all-time favorite novels, Piper's Son wouldn't have fallen short for me!)

Books I Didn’t Think Would Be That Great But Ended Up Amazing
What is a Family? by Edith Schaeffer
Rees Howells: Intercessor, by Norman Grubb
Wrestling Prayer, by Eric Ludy

Stats for the total list of books read in 2011 here.

Reading resolutions for 2012: upcoming post.

The Vane a little to the East — Scares Muslin souls — away —

2011-11-28T08:58:00.006-06:00

Muslin souls we are not

noel/holly, this side of the Mississippi

c.s. lewis' family wardrobe

4:00 at the american girl place [yummy-yum]

thanksgiving day, in noel's countryside

(the place of the lamb in) the place of the lion, by charles williams

2011-11-12T18:45:00.003-06:00

“Mightn't it be a good thing if everyone had to draw a map of his own mind--say, once every five years? With the chief towns marked, and the arterial roads he was constructing from one idea to another, and all the lovely and abandoned by-lanes that he never went down, because the farms they led to were all empty?”

But how stupid of her, she thought as she tried to run, to be caught gaping like that when she had a job to do. They were a little severe, these new masters of hers. Anthony had told her of the sudden stab in his side that had warned him to be silent, and she supposed the bruise on her shoulder was to teach her to be alert. No doubt she needed it. Certainly there had been an invasion of the court of Damaris, and it was no easy conqueror that sat upon her relinquished throne.

The other creature continued its uneasy perambulation. As it went circling round them it uttered little noises of effort and pain. Sometimes it made a sudden abrupt rush inward, but every rush was diverted from its intended prey; it was, against its will, drawn aside, and thrust back into its own path. The lamb took no notice of it whatever; Damaris glanced up at it occasionally, but with a serene absent-mindedness...

She looked at Quentin; repose was coming back into his face, and with it that beauty of innocence which is seen in unhappy mankind only in sleep and death and love and transmuting sanctity--the place of the lamb in the place of the lion.

If the pattern's arranged in me, what can I do but let myself be the pattern? I can see to it that I don't hate, but after that Love must do his own business.

“It was good of you to look for Quentin.” “Good!” she exclaimed. “Good! O Anthony!” “Well, so it was,” he answered. “Or good in you. How accurate one has to be with one's prepositions!”

If Anthony must go, then he must go. He? it--knew; she didn't. Her limbs were released; she sprang up, the older energies renewed almost to fierceness in her determination to discover that other thing. She would be savage with herself, royal in daring, a lioness in hunger and in the hunt. Of that thing itself, she knew little but that it was blessed, innocent and joyous; it was a marvel of white knowledge, as much of earth as any tender creature of the fields, yet bound to its heavenly origin by hypostatic union of experience. A fierce conquest, an innocent obedience--these were to be her signs.

we interrupt this silence to bring you the following broadcast

2011-11-10T10:40:00.000-06:00

O father, father, pity take: And I will no more verses make

2011-09-14T21:33:00.002-05:00

Still listening to lectures every week, this week The Life and Hymns of Isaac Watts. Great depth and variety of discussion. Led me to discover:

Maddy Prior. Amazing folk/madrigal sound. Rescuing forgotten church music of the 18th/19th century. Her arrangement of Watts' Cradle Song to an old Irish melody is haunting.

and

Ordinary Time. One of their recordings, How Sweet and Awesome (lyrics penned by Watts), has been playing in my head all day.

Common Sense Christian Living

2011-09-08T08:34:00.004-05:00

I'm reading a lot of Schaeffer books this year... this section from Edith's Common Sense Christian Living caught my attention.

... I would say that in my own pictorial view of seeking God's will I see a rushing stream in the mountains or fields, with stones big enough to out a foot on to cross. I picture God showing me one stone big enough to start across on, and then one stone on which to put my foot next. And then the waters whirl around, and I am to stay where I am, on that particular stone, until He shows me the next strep. To rush ahead on my own would be disastrous.

The Bible verses I would refer to for this kind of “waiting” are Isaiah 50:10-11. They are verses that have been a part of our prayer lists for L'Abri though the years. The contrast is a sharp reminder, time after time: “Watch out and don't light your own sparks.”

Who is among you that feareth the LORD, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light? let him trust in the name of the LORD, and stay upon his God. Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks: walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled. This shall ye have of mine hand; ye shall lie down in sorrow.

It is a warning to watch out for impatience in waiting to “get on with it,” whatever “it” happens to be. God tells us that to be in a fog, a dark place, to have no clue of what comes next, is to be in a place where we need to trust Him and keep our hand in His hand, waiting for Him to show us where to go or what to do next. The foolish choice is to turn away from the common sense realization that God means us to wait, and to insist on lighting our own flares.

...Today you and I are involved in a great number of things, fulfilling the purposes for which God has us where we are, doing the combination of routine or imaginative things we are doing. All right--you and I often want to know, “What comes next?” God is saying, “Trust me.” He is saying, “Stay in the place where you are until I show you [in a variety of ways, usually not mystical at all] what comes next.” He is saying, “Blessed is the person who waits in the dark, holding My hand.”

The contrast is the whole thing of choice again. There are those who don't want to wait for God, but who push that off in order to have their own choices. God's word to them is, “All right, choose to light your own sparks and walk in that self-made flare of light. You are free to make your own choice to do your thing. But, you will have this from My hand: you will lie down in sorrow.” It is the negative promise again, fairly and clearly.

As life continues, this thing of knowing the Lord's will is a matter of asking a day at a time, waiting for Him and waiting upon Him in prayer. Sometimes we find that He leads to a second stone that we think is to be permanent, but that turns out only to lead to another one in a year or two. That does not mean you did not know God's will for that time when you found a certain house, only to discover after fixing it up that your work was to be somewhere else and that house had to go! Now up goes a “for sale” sign, or a “for rent” sign on the place you felt would be your place of continuity!

You are not necessarily outside of the Lord's will if you get to Africa and find that you can't learn the language easily, or that you need to be in the hospital with malaria right away. He does not promise us that everything is going to go smoothly. The smoothness of the next step is not the criterion of your having found the Lord's will. satan would like us to be confused on that point! May we never forget it.

You know what today is, right?

2011-08-23T20:21:00.001-05:00

Available today.

Scoop of the e-e-evening: Fly Trap

2011-08-15T19:47:00.008-05:00

Hardinge is a warm bowl of porridge, so studded with raisins that you wonder if Napa has any grapes left on the vine.

“The smells of trout and muffins and blackberry sauce pushed into Mosca's insides like a spoon and scraped her empty stomach.”

Like Moses at the Red Sea, Hardinge uses what is in her hand. When questions need answered, when holes need filled, the work is never done by a one-off, exiting bear. If a strong character is introduced, only to fizzle from sight, you can be sure they will reappear eventually, in blazing glory.

“For a few moments, she stared pensively at Mosca, her eyes widening and narrowing as if to allow in thoughts of different sizes.”

But with every bowl of porridge comes certain vitamins. In Fly Trap, Hardinge's recipe for heart-healthy fiction (aka her worldview) is evident in her treatment of the Beloved, a pantheon of household deities that govern each hour of the day--and night. Mosca, the enlightened urchin, digs “her fingernails into her palms” as she fervently tries “to imagine the universe free of little gods.” Religion is clearly portrayed as the opiate of the masses, forcing a complacent acceptance of fate. As one “misled” character laments, “...I was born under Wilyfell. So I am born to lure other folks into vice. It is my Beloved-given nature--I am doomed to it.”

It was interesting to trace the sinewy themes of free will and doom to the eventual conclusion that you make your own luck; maybe it's okay for some people to hold on to their fool's paradise, but the truly strong have no need of the Beloved.

Which were the very words (or, the very gist) spoken by a Philosophical Taoist acquaintance of mine the day before I finished Fly Trap.

Scoop of the e-e-evening: Okay for Now

2011-08-08T10:57:00.009-05:00

Two words: it's time.

Come ALA's Midwinter Conference, Mr Schmidt better be standing near a telephone. And the conversation should have nothing to do with Newbery honors.

From the publisher: As a fourteen-year-old who just moved to a new town, with no friends and a louse for an older brother, Doug Swieteck has all the stats stacked against him. So begins a coming-of-age masterwork full of equal parts comedy and tragedy from Newbery Honor winner Gary D. Schmidt. As Doug struggles to be more than the “skinny thug” that his teachers and the police think him to be, he finds an unlikely ally in Lil Spicer—a fiery young lady who “smelled like daisies would smell if they were growing in a big field under a clearing sky after a rain.” In Lil, Doug finds the strength to endure an abusive father, the suspicions of a whole town, and the return of his oldest brother, forever scarred, from Vietnam. Together, they find a safe haven in the local library, inspiration in learning about the plates of John James Audubon’s birds, and a hilarious adventure on a Broadway stage. In this stunning novel, Schmidt expertly weaves multiple themes of loss and recovery in a story teeming with distinctive, unusual characters and invaluable lessons about love, creativity, and survival.

My snippet of a review is hardly groundbreaking. Anyone who's read anything this year has given five stars to Okay for Now.* But in case you're still piddling around, reading other books, remembering Mr Schmidt's new book in the back of your mind...

1) Buy Okay for Now.
2) Find a kid--your own, your sibling, some skinny thug on the street--
3) Read it to them, out loud.

My mom adored The Wednesday Wars, and I adored Trouble, but Okay for Now bridges the tones of those stories, not too light-hearted, not too heavy, and the result is one of the best middle grade novels of the 21st century. Oh, I'm exaggerating, am I? You obviously haven't read it yet.

(Plus: The Five Little Peppers!!!)

*Of the 766 books I've read on Goodreads, Okay for Now has the highest average rating. The highest. And that's the result of over 1,000 ratings, in case you were still dubious.

I'm going on holiday, and I'm taking...

2011-07-29T13:41:00.004-05:00

Fly Trap (Hardinge), The Penderwicks at Point Mouette (Birdsall), Okay for Now (Schmidt), and Two-Part Invention (L'Engle).

One week, four books, a lake house in Michigan. Should be wonder-full.

Prelude to the Shakespeare Festival

2011-07-25T11:42:00.002-05:00

Sisters at a beautiful, Regency-costumed production of my third favorite play, The Winter's Tale

First Impressions sneak peek

2011-07-19T08:23:00.000-05:00

The Bennet Family: Jane, Lizzy, Pa, Kitty, Lydia, Mary, Ma

A traveling sales (con) man

The Cousin Drama Club
(like the shirts? "Pride & Prejudiced" with a cowboy boot and Sheriff badge)

You can see many more photos here, at Marie's (Jane Bennet) blog.

Six Month Check Up

2011-07-09T17:27:00.002-05:00

It's been a whirlwind year for reading. Last December, I specifically wanted to explore 18 stories (pasted below), with a 60-book goal for the year. The body count so far: 31

The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexander Dumas
Rated Petruchio for rip-roaring action

The Piper's Son, by Melina Marchetta
Rated Bess Marvin & George Fayne for having to follow the excellent Saving Francesca

Fallen, by David Maine
Rated Princess Mia because the movie trumps the source. Only, in this case, the other way around.

Uncommon Criminals, by Ally Carter
Rated Mrs Bobbsey, because twins are cool, but twins twice is a little redundant

Affliction, by Edith Schaffer
Rated Charlotte A. Cavatica for being helpful and generous

What is a Family? by Edith Schaffer
Rated Mary Poppins for being practically perfect in every way

Heretics, by G.K. Chesterton
Rated Winnie the Pooh for being tubby

What's Wrong with the World, by G.K. Chesterton
Rated Toad of Toad Hall for being all over the place. Poop poop.

Pilgrim's Inn, by Elizabeth Goudge
Rated Martha and Dickon's mother for being British and homey

Five Red Herrings, by Dorothy Sayers
Rated Kitty Bennet for being forgettable, despite her relation to Elizabeth

The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar Wilde
Rated Dora Copperfield for providing humor but mostly annoyance

Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Marmeladov:

“Come forth, my drunk ones, my weak ones, my shameless ones!’ And we will all come forth, without being ashamed, and stand there. And He will say, ‘Swine you are! Of the image of the beast and of his seal; but come, you, too!’ And the wise and the reasonable will say unto Him, ‘Lord, why do you receive such as these?’ And He will say, ‘I receive them, my wise and reasonable ones, forasmuch as not one of them considered himself worthy of this thing…’ And He will stretch out His arms to us, and we will fall at His feet…and weep… and understand everything! …and everyone will understand…and Katarina Ivanovna…she, too, will understand…Lord, Thy kingdom come!”

Which leaves 29 books yet to be read, most likely to include these 6:

Common Sense Christian Living, by Edith Schaffer
The Pickwick Papers, by Charles Dickens
Okay for Now, by Gary Schmidt
The Dragon's Tooth, by N.D. Wilson
Two Part Invention: The Story of a Marriage, by Madeline L'Engle
Fly Trap, by Francis Hardinge

A goodly list, that.

First Impressions

2011-06-20T19:51:00.007-05:00

Some of you may remember that I film a movie every summer with my siblings and cousins. We've done The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Twelfth Night, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night's Dream...

This year our production choice was influenced by the 4-1 girl/boy ratio among the cousins, and the fact that my family lives in the Midwest. Independance Day weekend will find us filming:

First Impressions: Pride & Prejudice on the Prairie

In case you’re not familiar with the Western version…

Pa and Ma Bennet live on a ranch with their five daughters, all single. Sad but true. However, don’t worry, by the end of the story, only two remain at home.

Lizzy’s best friend is a girl named Charlotte who decides that even marriage to a complete nicompoop is better than no husband at all. Said nicompoop is a cousin of the Bennet sisters, one US Marshall Collins. He’s the sheriff’s deputy (think Barney Fife), and the honorable sheriff of his town is a lady named Catherine deBourgh. This tough, sharpshooting Annie-Oakley wannabe also has a daughter, a single daughter! Where are we going to find husbands for all of these girls?

Have no fear, some new guys ride into town one day. Young Doc Bingley, who sets his sights on Jane after their first square dance. Doc Bingley has a best friend, Darcy, who is rather, well, proud. He doesn’t think Lizzy is pretty enough to tempt him—little does he know, the entire film tells how they fall in love.

Lizzy happens to meet a pretty cute cardsharp named Mr Wickham, dashing and all that, but a bitter enemy of Mr Darcy. Why this rivalry? Could it be that Darcy knows of Wickham’s dastardly past, involving Darcy's six year old brother (George) as a hostage in a bank holdup? Or could it be Wickham’s devious plans to get Lydia on the wrong side of the law?

As Bingley drawls in the opening scene of the BBC film, "Country manners? I think they're charming."

Didn't know the meaning of

2011-06-10T19:06:00.002-05:00

August 1991

When we were children we'd play
Out in the streets just dipped in fate
When we were children we'd say
That we don't the meaning of
Fear -OneRepublic

current obsession:

2011-05-25T21:41:00.004-05:00

L'Abri ideas library.

Over 1,000 (free) audio downloads, with titles ranging from Classical Music and the Loss of Meaningfulness in the Post-Christian West to Eastern and Western Spiritual Values to The Use and Abuse of Language - What is Good and Edifying?

University on an ipod.

home again, home again, home from the sea

2011-05-24T19:49:00.004-05:00

My last day off as a California nanny, roaming the tiny downtown shops

This means you

2011-05-13T18:18:00.005-05:00

Library is the name of the game. The name of the game is Library.

You know how on long car rides, you "go on a picnic," and take apples and bread and carrots and dark chocolate and...

Now we're going to the library. We're going to the library, and we're going to return...

Animal Farm.

Check the comments for current letter status.

Can your great brain supply a title within twenty seconds of knowing the letter?

Must be a book you've read.

Fiction preferred. Because fiction makes the world go 'round.

Also chai.

And ginger.

(P.S. No cheating on Google or Goodreads or anything)

in cuileann's city

2011-05-11T22:12:00.000-05:00

through a lens darkly

two by two

at last, we cross ways

endless chai

rosy-fingered dawn

giving her camera a scolding

remember that oregon trail music that played every time someone died?

2011-05-11T21:40:00.000-05:00

What Your American Girl Doll Says About the Rest of Your Life.

I've possessed a Kirsten since age 4.

Kirsten Larson:
You probably got Kirsten because she was blond, or because you read a lot of Little House on the Prairie books...

Whatever superficial motivation led you to choose Kirsten, you quickly learned that life as a Swedish immigrant in Minnesota is not all lingonberry pie and ice fishing. Not halfway through the first book does Kirsten's best friend Marta die suddenly and tragically of cholera. This was shocking and horrifying. Obviously, you were used to cholera deaths (this being the age of Oregon Trail), but this time it was different.

You therefore grew up to be a bit more thoughtful, a bit more reserved than your peers. You also find yourself inexplicably drawn towards crafts like knitting, jam-making, and quilting. You secretly suspect that you'd manage just fine in a post-Apocalyptic setting, should things come to that. You were surprised and delighted to see some of Kirsten's outfits come back into style in certain enclaves of Brooklyn.