Distant Cousin

Ana (and son) explain a great card trick!

2012-02-13T21:15:00.001-06:00

Ana Darcy Méndez is very, very good at math. She had to be, to navigate a vessel 25 light years from Thomo to Earth! Her son Julio is even better. Both were fascinated by this marvelous card trick:

http://www.wimp.com/mathcard/

Notice that the person performing it begs someone for an explanation. We can offer that gentleman an explanation, since Ana and Julio, her son, spent the better part of an hour playing with it. Ana said it's basically a simple matter of "odds and evens," made more confusing by all the cutting of the cards, which leaves their basic order unchanged.

Math teachers are always asking their students to "Show your work." In case you'd like to see Ana's and Julio's work, here it is, in Ana's handwriting.

If you've read Ana's stories, you'll already know the fun her family has with puzzles and other games. Just imagine them talking this through and jotting down the results. They love this kind of thing!

(Right click to another tab to enlarge.)

Other Méndez family games and puzzles:

Kitten puzzle

Photo puzzle: find Ana!

Find Ana Darcy's shoes!

Méndez family language games

New Mexican town names puzzle

Recipe puzzle

Meet Ana!

Big cats in the bedroom: a caracal and a serval!

2012-02-07T21:41:00.001-06:00

Ana's daughter acquired a caracal cat in Distant Cousin: Regeneration. These little known, medium size cats can make excellent pets, provided the owners raise them from kittens to be members of a human household and follow other suggestions from experts as to their housing and so forth. Julie's Jungle is one such source of expert advice. Servals, another medium size cat, also make good pets under similar conditions.

Caracals resemble half-size mountain lions. Servals resemble half-size cheetahs--long and lean, very active and playful, with beautiful spotted coats. Ana's daughter would love one, but so far, alas, it hasn't happened.

Here, however, are a caracal and a serval playing in someone's bedroom. Any cat lover will first note how these two gorgeous animals act just like standard house cats. Early in the clip, the serval reaches for the caracal's chew toy: notice how lightning fast the serval's paw is, and how equally fast the caracal responds with a warning that "It's MY toy, thanks!" A little later the caracal hisses, which Julie says is common for the breed. They have many different hisses (and some chirps) to signify "Stay away," or "I see you," or "What is that?" or any of a variety of non-emergency situations. It's simply how they communicate.

Enjoy these stunningly beautiful creatures:

Thanks to Cedar Cove Feline Conservatory & Education Center!

See more caracal and serval photos in the right column under the photo of the blue-eyed kitty (near the bottom of that section).

Meet Ana Darcy!

Ana discovers the mola, from Panama!

2012-02-05T19:53:00.000-06:00

(All these photos can be right clicked to another tab for greater detail.)

You might find it strange that a woman from another planet should be interested in exotic textiles and stitchery on Earth, but you really shouldn't. After all, her own people on Thomo have a long tradition of textile styles and patterns, which in some ways resemble those of Eastern Europe, with colorful patterns and layers of frills. Not surprisingly, Ana has been fascinated by textiles which spring from Hispanic cultures, one of which she has married into!

Once her life on Earth settled down a bit and she had a household and time to devote to it, Ana was delighted to pursue her curiosity about out planet's diverse offerings in many fields, including art and textiles. Most recently, we have posted information about the South American textile sculptures called arpilleras, made from Chile to Ecuador and Bolivia. This time, Ana has discovered the Panamanian mola, the riotously colorful and beautiful two-dimensional multi-layered textile creations of the Kuna people living on islands in the Gulf of Mexico on the eastern side of Panama. Some of these can be worn, and Ana wears several!

The photo above, from Wikipedia, shows a Kuna woman displaying a number of her gorgeous creations. Below are the first molas Ana ever saw, in the community room of a church she attended. Each has a Biblical theme: Jonah and the whale, and Noah's ark. Below each is a detail photo revealing the extremely fine stitching that produced them. In some cases, a colorful bit of material is appliqued over another. In others, the top layer is cut to reveal the colored layer underneath. More examples may clarify matters.

The technique of covering different colors with another one is seen in the next two molas. The first is of five animals. Note the ruler on the left, to show the scale. The second is a fish, also with a ruler for scale, and a detail for a closer look.

Ana's rudimentary sewing skills, sharpened by her husband's grandmother, enabled her to piece together several molas to turn into a shirt. Ana was encouraged to try this by the knowledge that Kuna women also recycle their work, often selling the older pieces to tourists. Here's such a project:

And here is a piece of fabric with three small mola designs, turned over to reveal the stitching on both undersides. Can anyone not understand Ana's fascination with this beautiful, ingenious technique?

Ana discovers arpilleras

Readers rate DC5 (Recirculation) and the whole series

2012-01-30T22:00:00.000-06:00

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The newest book in the Distant Cousin set, Distant Cousin: Recirculation, has received reader comments which, in many cases, have included remarks about the entire series to date. The third one below, longer and more detailed, is from a professional reviewer. Thanks to all!

"I love the Distant Cousin characters, they feel like family to me, I am interested in their lives, I worry about them, and I just adore them. I think I've said this about each book, but I think [Recirculation] is my favorite! Highly recommended!"

"Even though it was the fifth book the characters seemed fresh and alive. Al has always done a great job at character development and it continues in Recirculation. The book is about family values, but it doesn't stop there. There is plenty of adventure to keep you reading to the wee hours. If you haven't read the Distant Cousin Series start at the beginning. Book 5 will entertain you and keep you wanting more."

"The best thing about Recirculation is the storyline and the Spielbergian character development, as is the case with the four previous Distant Cousin books. This part of the friendly space alien saga features the teenaged twins, Julio and Clio. We learn much more detail about Julio's engineering acumen and Clio discovers healing powers she did not realize she had. There is a section of the book that takes me back to the Don Juan books of the wonderful Sixties when Clio goes to Mexico to meet with a traditional healer. Ana's flying pod takes the crew on yet another adventure, leaving the reader salivating for DC6. What more could the readers ask?

"There is a lot I could say about the plot, but of course I won't. If you have gotten this far in the series, you already know what to expect. The best thing about the Distant Cousin books is that the reader can so easily visualize the movie in his or her head with very little provocation. The storyline is new, yet familiar. The essence of Spielberg's Close Encounters or E.T. remains pervasive throughout. The characters and dialog tell the story. The whole thing is show, don't tell in a manner that any reader can appreciate. The storyline flows, the characters develop comfortably, and you feel as if you are so glad that you know these people! I was particularly pleased with the pacing of this fifth in the series, the way it begins slowly and gradually accelerates to the end."
Floyd M. Orr, PODBRAM

New to the books? Meet Ana Darcy!

More frisks for Ana! Rebecca Pechefsky plays Bach's Preambulum, BWV 829

2012-01-24T18:03:00.000-06:00

We are not sure if Ana loves the harpsichord because she's from another planet or in spite of being from another planet, but whatever the reason, the clean, crisp resonance of a good harpsichord thrills her soul.

She also loves the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and the skill of Rebecca Pechefsky at the keyboard. Ana owns a smaller harpsichord and has learned to play a small number of pieces, mostly by Bach and mostly polyphonic, herself, so while she isn't a virtuoso on the instrument, she knows enough to appreciate the precision and artistry of Ms. Pechefsky's playing.

Share Ana's delight as Rebecca Pechefsky plays the Praeambulum from J. S. Bach's Partita No. 5 in G Major, BWV 829, above!

Website of Rebecca Pechefsky: recordings, concert schedule, photos, & more

Meet Ana's friend, Rebecca Pechefsky!

Ms. Pechefsky plays a musical puzzle for Ana!

Ana finds a visual version of Bach's musical palindrome

Why does Ana love fugues?

A Bach piece that sounds like the engine of the galaxy (to Ana)

A Bach fugue you can play!

Meet Ana!

Ana bakes a cake from a French children's recipe: a unit cake!

2012-01-09T20:35:00.000-06:00

When Ana landed on Earth, all our foods were new to her, of course: thousands of cuisines, tens of thousands of flavors, millions of recipes. We shouldn't be surprised that some of her attempts at cooking should be unusual and innovative. (They weren't all successful, either.)

One of her early baking experiments was from a French recipe used to teach children how to cook. It's called, as far as we know, a "unit cake," because it can be made using whatever unit of measure (preferably small) one cares to use. Ana used a simple graduated cup measure, and that's what we recommend for this recipe. The teaspoon is the only other unit needed.

You will notice, in the recipe below, that "well-greased" is underlined. That is because Ana's first cake stuck to the pan, and when it was turned out on a plate, developed some unsightly cracks. Making sure the pan is well greased will likely avoid this.

Her husband Matt, no slouch in the kitchen, came to her rescue, making a butterscotch/pecan sauce to cover the imperfections (see above). After all, their house is surrounded by thousands of pecan trees.... This sauce is not really needed, and you are on your own if you want to duplicate it. (Hint: Matt added a few sprinkles of rum to the cake before pouring on the sauce.)

Unit Cake with Yogurt

1 unit yogurt (one cup works well; a smaller measure is also fine)

1 1/2 units flour

2 units sugar (less is OK)

3/4 unit oil

1 1/2 t. vanilla

lemon or orange zest

1 t. baking soda

1 1/2 t. baking powder

chopped fruit (2 apples or pears work well)

Bake in a well-greased bundt pan @ 350º for 30 minutes--not longer, or the cake will be dry

Let it cool 15-20 minutes before turning onto a plate.

See lots more of Ana's unusual and/or favorite recipes in the column to the right, beneath the photo of cranberry-apple pie, including:

Authentic Czech kolaches

Killer Méndez Family salsa

Oodles of pizza experiments

Thai-style crepes

Korean carne al pastor?? Ana??

A bizarre, delicious bruschetta?

Authentic cattle-drive Méndez family frijoles

Edible roses??

Why not meet Ana Darcy?

A recipe poem about a salad Ana does NOT want to attempt

2012-01-06T21:49:00.000-06:00

Ana found this recipe poem about a salad in an anthology of poetry. She likes it because it rhymes, but not because it sounds like something she would like to eat, and never mind her being an extraterrestrial. Her husband was leery of "anchovy sauce" himself. He was able, however, to forestall his wife's worries about the "dying anchorite."

If anyone would care to try this poetic salad recipe and report back to us, we can get word to Ana--if it's favorable!

Recipe for a Salad

To make this condiment, your poet begs

The pounded yellow of two hard-boiled eggs;

Two boiled potatoes, passed through kitchen-sieve,

Smoothness and softness to the salad give;

Let onion atoms lurk within the bowl,

And, half-suspected, animate the whole.

Of mordant mustard add a single spoon,

Distrust the condiment that bites so soon;

But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault,

To add a double quantity of salt.

And, lastly, o'er the flavored compound toss

A magic soup-spoon of anchovy sauce.

Oh, green and glorious! Oh, herbaceous treat!

'T would tempt the dying anchorite to eat;

Back to the world he'd turn his fleeting soul,

And plunge his fingers in the salad bowl!

Serenely full, the epicure would say,

Fate can not harm me, I have dined to-day!

Sydney Smith (1771-1845)

See more of Ana's favorite recipes in the right column, under the photo of cranberry-apple pie, including:

A salad with rose petals

Another strange salad (but not as strange as the one above)

Salads go well with soups!

An extraterrestrial makes mozzarella!

Meet Ana Darcy!

Fennec fox kits playing at home!

2011-12-15T13:58:00.000-06:00

Over the years, Ana's fear of dogs, second nature to everyone on her home planet, Thomo, has relaxed considerably. It began with the judicious introduction of a pair of Rhodesian ridgeback puppies in Distant Cousin: Reincarnation. Who could NOT love pups like these?

Ana has seen fennec foxes in zoos, but never as house pets, yet it isn't difficult to see her taken with these active, affectionate, tiny canids. If any convincing were necessary that they can make entertaining, fascinating companions, these two video clips will provide it. The first is from Julie of http://www.juliesjungle.com/. It seems that the fennec fox is being introduced to Julie's household menagerie, and vice versa, as part of a careful socialization process. Just try to count all the animals who appear! (Ana might have a problem with that enormous dog.)

The second clip shows a fennec fox kit playing with a house cat. They are clearly playmates. The cat seems to want to help the kit stay clean!

Baby fennec fox kit!

Baby fennec foxes introduced to a household

And cats, house cats, caracals, lyxes, servals, and a tiger cub, in the column to the right under the photo of the blue-eyed kitty, at the bottom of that list

Meet Ana Darcy!

So you don't like science fiction?

2011-12-09T21:38:00.000-06:00

Lots of people love science fiction, but not everybody. Science fiction, basically, deals with "imaginary but more or less plausible (or at least non-supernatural) content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities. Exploring the consequences of scientific innovations is one purpose of science fiction, making it a 'literature of ideas.' It is largely based on "writing rationally about alternative possible worlds or futures" (Wikipedia).

Some people are just not that interested in speculations about aliens, futuristic science, and suchlike ideas. It does, perhaps, take a little extra willingness to suspend belief to accept, for example, two characters in different galaxies talking to each other as if they were telephoning between Houston and Kansas City, or dissolving their molecules to be reassembled in another place. That might be called "hard" science fiction. However, there are degrees of science fiction....

Many, but not all, readers call the Distant Cousin stories science fiction. This is partly because of the book covers and partly because the heroine happens to come from another planet. She reached Earth, where her story begins, on a vessel that was propelled by the controlled force of gravity (though to be sure, she never exceeded the speed of light). Furthermore, that heroine, Ana Darcy, is an alien only by virtue of coming from a planet other than Earth. Except for that, she is as human as any of us...and there, of course, lies our tale.

Here is what readers have said about the science fiction aspect of the Distant Cousin series:

"This sequel to Distant Cousin [DC: Repatriation] is, like its predecessor, more mainstream literature than science fiction. Readers will find the science fiction elements kept to the background in a storyline that is more about character and society than about the arrival of extra-terrestrials on Earth."

"I have read a lot of science fiction in the past, and this had a completely different (and believable) spin. It lacked the 'techno babble' that I often enjoy, but, if we can’t understand gravity propulsion anyway I suppose it is not necessary to explain it. The series was a compelling, heartwarming and sometimes scary page turner."

"I loved this book from the minute I picked it up. I usually don't go for Science Fiction books...they seem to be too outlandish or the authors try to make them too "alien" making up so many words and phrases that you lose your spot in the story. This book was nothing like that. It was a wonderfully written story with engaging characters

"As far as sci-fi's go, it's very light on the sci part. I mean, you really don't get bogged down in techy stuff at all & there's a great story in there."

"I would recommend the book to any of you who like science fiction with some romance and adventure thrown in. No little green men/women will be involved, but there will be characters about whom you will care a great deal."

And finally, this, from "Crusty Old Guy:"

"I cut my teeth on old school science fiction with bug-eyed monsters, ray guns, and inhospitable planets. This isn't about those. Well maybe it is, with Earth and some of it's inhabitants being the antagonists. This is well written, as one page induces you to read the next. Characters have life. The plot is plausible (we are talking SF here). It also gives some insight into the people, places, and culture of Nueva Espana. I read this out of curiosity and to add another dimension to my reading of late. My curiosity was pleasantly slaked but I wouldn't recommend this to other crusty old guys. We just aren't the target audience. I highly recommended this to my grand daughter. My wife should even enjoy it. Oh yeah, I'll probably read the next in the series."

We know of only one reader who adamantly refuses anything to do with science fiction, no matter how "lite." To those more venturesome souls, we think you will enjoy meeting your distant cousin, Ana Darcy. We predict you will not hold it against her that she happened to be born on a planet 25 light years away. In fact, we predict you'll be glad she came here.

Meet Ana Darcy!

Ana improvises frantically in the kitchen

2011-12-03T12:48:00.000-06:00

If you have enjoyed looking over Ana's many recipes and cooking inspirations, you could be forgiven for thinking that Ana only meets with success in the kitchen. Like any creative cook, however, she does not always succeed. Being from another planet and another cooking culture, and having an original, quick mind, it is undeniably true she has done some wonderful things with the foods and flavors offered by the cuisines of Earth. Below, however, is an account of one of her experiments that got out of hand, and which she had to scramble to save. You should NOT try this at home!

Ana loves sweets and she loves pies and the opportunities they offer for creativity. She had finished a session of making pumpkin pies and found she had some filling left over. What to do with it?

She looked online, and decided to make cookies. She added a few ingredients and baked them into cake-like pumpkin cookies. They were tasty, but not attractive. What to do then?

She turned them into sandwich cookies using cream cheese frosting. These were delicious, but they looked like little hamburgers filled with mayonnaise. That was not what she wanted. What to do?

She decided to make them into cake bon-bons, as when one mixes up cake batter with frosting and shapes them into balls which are coated with chocolate. Although she was careful not to add too much frosting, she added too much frosting, resulting in a texture that, she said, had "the consistency of dog food that had been sitting in water for a day." Not good, even if it tasted good. In fact, it looked disgusting. There was no way to serve it to anyone. What to do?

She dumped it into a torte pan, baked it, let it cool, and flipped it out of the pan. It was not a handsome dish. NOW what to do??

She toasted coconut and pecan pieces, mixed them with brown sugar and cinnamon, topped it onto the torte, and drizzled white chocolate over it.

It was a "long journey," she said, but "worth the effort." We repeat: do NOT try this at home! See the photo above.

There are more of Ana's cooking ideas in the column to the right, under the photo of craberry/apple pie, including:

Thai-style crepes

Korean-style carne al pastor

Thai-style coconut shrimp

Edible roses

The useful frittata

...and dozens of ideas for frijoles, salsa, & pizza variations!

Meet the fascinating Ana Darcy!

'Tis the season: a great inexpensive gift idea!

2011-11-25T23:10:00.000-06:00

Can there be a better gift than something that gives pleasure reliably, for hours and that will appeal to nearly everybody? That can be enjoyed over and over and lasts forever? That can be shared with others? And can be found easily, and delivered free, right from your computer? And for which the recipient will admire your thoughtfulness and perspicacity?

There IS such a gift, and at less than $3, it's easy to give one to yourself, and to friend after friend!

From now through the Christmas season, the story of Ana Darcy, the extraterrestrial everyone would love to meet and take to lunch, is on sale!

For the people on your gift list who have one of the many Kindle models, or the free Kindle for PC, send them this Distant Cousin!

If they have Apple iPad/iBooks, Nook, Sony Reader, Kobo, or other e-reading apps including Stanza, Aldiko, Adobe Digital Editions, etc., or Palm reading devices, send them this Distant Cousin!

Readers comment:

"I loved this book...I loved some of your ideas. Thank you for writing. It is such a pleasure to read a book that provides entertainment and a sense of wonder. This is time well spent!"

"I am up to Book 3 of the Distant Cousin series and I really recommend these books for anyone wanting something fun and engaging. I have been reading them each night for almost a week and am becoming distressed the Book 3 is almost over. I have many books waiting on my Kindle to read, but I hate to leave Ana Darcy and her story."

"I just finished book 3 and can hardly wait for the next to see what happens next. I have thoroughly enjoyed [them]....I loved Ana Darcy. She is a very believable heroine."

"I just finished Distant Cousin and loved it! I can't wait to read the rest of the series. Great storyline, loveable characters, I really liked seeing how the characters developed and their interactions with eachother. I was pulled into the story and wanted to stay there."

Meet Ana!

"Refreshingly different"

"You suck!"

"Ana Darcy is one of my favorite characters."

Reader cries in public

Bride complains, Commuters commute, Writers Write

Spanish food? A tortilla??

2011-11-18T22:11:00.000-06:00

The Méndez family, before Ana Darcy became a part of it, being good New Mexicans, had never heard of a "Spanish tortilla." It wasn't long after that Ana (from another planet, after all) joined them, exercising her powerful curiosity about the cuisines of the world. She discovered this simple, savory dish--thanks to her Spanish professor friend, Charo Silva (in Distant Cousin).

The photo above shows most of what one needs to know about it: it's a sort of omelet, with potato cubes and onions sauteed in a pan, and an egg slurry poured over them. There's no need for a recipe here--they are easy to find with any search engine. The picture is worth many words.

The Méndez clan like theirs with their favorite salsa on top, but we have it on good authority that many Spaniards slather theirs with homemade mayonnaise or aioli!

There are many more recipe ideas in the right column under the photo of cranberry-apple pie, including:

Méndez family traditional frijoles recipe

Cranberry-orange relish

Thai-style coconut shrimp

Thai-style crepes for the holidays

Korean carne al pastor

Czech kolaches

Plus at least a dozen creative pizza ideas!

Now, meet Ana Darcy!

El Paso from Scenic Drive

2011-11-03T22:23:00.001-05:00

Mount Franklin (above) is the southernmost of the Rocky Mountains, and divides the city of El Paso in half. The view above looks south, as the tip of the mountain drops down to the pass ("el paso") to the right. Scenic Drive, the 1930-era CCC-built road across the mountain, is visible as the lighter line across the side. The photos below show the view from the observation point, approximately at the leftmost point where the road heads down the far side of the mountain. (For more detail, right click any photo to open in another tab.)

Below is the view from the observation point to the south, along the border. Fort Bliss, the Army base where Ana spent some unhappy time in Distant Cousin, is just out of the picture to the left. Right center, the dark, wide highway is Interstate Highway 10, heading east to San Antonio and Dallas. That too is important in Distant Cousin. The tower in the distance, far right, is at the Chamizal Monument, commemorating a treaty agreement between the United States and Mexico. To the right of that is Mexico.

Turning to the right from the above photo and zooming a bit, we see downtown El Paso with Ciudad Juarez behind it. Left center is one of the international bridges between Mexico and the United States. Somewhere in that maze in the distance is one of the venues in Distant Cousin: Regeneration.

Naturally, if you are at the tip of a mountain range you can see to both sides and straight ahead, but not very far back on either side. Below is about as far to the west as can be seen. The University of Texas at El Paso is barely visible on the right. The mountains opposite are on the other side of the pass, in Mexico. The city of Juarez spreads left to right, on the other side of El Paso. Its population is estimated at three to four times the size of El Paso's, which is 750,000.

The Trans-Mountain Road across the Franklin Mountains

The University of Texas at El Paso

Meet Ana Darcy!

What Ana first saw

What Ana saw after that

...and after THAT

See more pictures of West Texas, southern New Mexico, and other venues from the Distant Cousin stories in the column to the right, under the picture of the blue-eyed kitty--->

The View from El Paso's Trans-Mountain Road

2011-11-02T22:11:00.001-05:00

The Rio Grande flows south the length of New Mexico, along the Rocky Mountains to the east, finally passing through the Mesilla Valley before it reaches El Paso, Texas, where it becomes the border between the United States and Mexico as it flows on to the Gulf of Mexico, over 1,000 miles south. The nearest airport to Las Cruces is in El Paso, on the other side of those mountains. To get there, one can either drive through the pass ("El Paso") or take a more recent, spectacular shortcut through the mountains on the Woodrow Bean Trans-Mountain Road.

Ana and Matt have taken the Trans-Mountain Road many times. Ana particularly likes to stop at the observation point to admire the scenic vista. She is from the planet Thomo, after all, and this vantage point, over a mile in elevation and with the horizon over 100 miles away, gives her the unmistakeable impression that she is on a planet, something that does not seem quite as obvious in a forest, for example, or a city. The family enjoyed a fun bicycle ride down this road in Distant Cousin: Reincarnation.

The photo above shows the Rocky Mountains spreading south from Las Cruces (out of the photo to the top left perhaps 40 miles) towards El Paso, which leads south from the bottom of the picture. The Trans-Mountain road can be seen crossing the mountains. The red dot shows the approximate location of the observation point. (Right click any photo to another tab for more detail.) Several mountain-top vistas of El Paso to the south are visible elsewhere--see below.

The next three photos show the view from the observation point, left to right. The green band is the river valley; closer to the camera are small towns, farms, businesses, and roads, including IH 10. Compare to the photo above. Those green fields, only a few miles further north, include the extensive irrigated pecan groves the area is famous for. The Mendez family lives there, just south of Las Cruces. The two peaks on the horizon in the second photo below are Cox Peak and Mount Riley, hills, really, rather than mountains. They are roughly 35 miles distant. On the other side of the river is the Chihuahuan Desert.

Area maps/Satellite photos

More area maps/satellite photos

See also many ground-level photos in the column on the right, under the picture of the blue-eyed kitty

Meet Ana Darcy!

MORE Mexican Dia de Muertos figurines!

2011-10-31T22:06:00.004-05:00

We've pointed out elsewhere how it took Ana a while to appreciate the Mexicans' acceptance of death as a part of life, a view that on her planet might be considered inappropriate. Not everyone on Earth would agree, either. Yet the tiny figurines below clearly reveal that such an attitude is more affectionate than mocking. Thousands of these are made in Mexico. Many are for sale, and Ana loves them now. The examples below will give some indication.

First a professor, perhaps (note the owl, a symbol of wisdom on his desk):

Next, a nurse giving an injection to a patient (note the salt and bread on the table, to nourish the spirits):

A woman selling chickens:

A bride and groom:

A grand señora:

And let's not forget the family dog! (He has stolen a loaf of pan de muertos, the traditional bread made for this day.)

Ana learns to appreciate El Dia de los Muertos

The humor in El Dia de los Muertos

Distant Cousin Reincarnation (in which El Dia de los Muertos plays a role)

Distant Cousin Reincarnation, Kindle Edition
Meet Ana Darcy!

Bhutanese architecture, similar to Thoman architecture, found by Ana in El Paso

2011-10-29T20:09:00.002-05:00

As we know from Distant Cousin, Ana spent many years studying Earth from the moon. The quality of that study improved by several orders of magnitude following the advent of the internet, when it became possible for her to receive images, video clips, and movies from Earth. She was particularly astonished to discover the architecture of the tiny kingdom of Bhutan, half the size of Massachusetts, tucked away high in the Himalayas between India and China.

The larger Bhutanese buildings (see the photos above)--monasteries, temples, and official structures--were not that different from the buildings her ancestors erected long ago on the planet Thomo. After further study she was able to hypothesize why this should be, despite the unlikelihood of there having been any direct influence on her Earthly Proto-Indo European ancestors. Both Bhutanese and Thoman buildings are found in mountainous, lonely, hostile areas. In Bhutan, other people were the danger; on Thomo, the native wildlife was the threat. Both areas are seismically active. Thus in both cases, the walls of buildings were tall and immensely thick at the bottom and tapered toward the top. Arches and doorways were not curved, but squared off. And Ana instantly recognized the purpose of rooftop structures of Bhutanese buildings: they are watch towers, just as on Thomo.

So imagine Ana's surprise to discover, not long after she settled down in southern New Mexico, Bhutanese-style buildings not fifty miles from her, lots of them! The buildings of the University of Texas at El Paso have been built in that style for nearly a century! The reason is well known to people who live there. When the University was just beginning and the buildings being planned, the wife of a university (then a college) official noticed an article on Bhutan in National Geographic. The Bhutanese buildings perfectly suited the harsh, rocky mountains they were in, and the mountains in El Paso looked much the same. She suggested that style to the architects. The rest is history.

The photos below show some of the original buildings at UTEP and then a number of modern interpretations. The style has become famous. Some off-campus buildings now use the style, including a mall. The campus was even visited by a Bhutanese prince!

The architecture of Ana's Mesilla Valley neighborhoods

Meet Ana Darcy!

New Mexican food!

2011-10-26T21:35:00.004-05:00

After having just shown some photos of Mesilla's most famous restaurant, La Posta, it seems the perfect time to show some photos of New Mexican-style food! No one could be surprised that someone from another planet, like Ana, would love it. Everyone loves it.

Here's a shrimp salad with strips (rajas) of fresh green chiles from Hatch, New Mexico. These chiles are NOT picante. They are barely sauteed, fresh, crunchy, and delicately tangy, and probably cannot be duplicated anywhere outside of the region.

Here's a thin steak, Tampequeño style, laid on a red tomato sauce and white cheese, with sauteed tomatoes, onions, and chile rajas on top. Awesome!

Next, we have caldo de pollo (chicken soup). This was a small bowl!

In a bit of cross-cultural pollenization, here's a pizza with fresh chile rajas. ¡Sí, señor!

And finally, we have fresh chiles from Hatch, New Mexico, purchased at a farmer's market. The ones on the right are fresh, of course. The ones on the left have been roasted and peeled and then frozen, saving one the work of doing it at home. If you have a choice, this is the way to buy them. For the gardeners, we are told that the chiles most prized are Anaheim and Big Jim varieties.

New Mexican food

Excellent salsa recipe

Méndez family frijole recipe

Tortilla soup & other Mexican soups

Meet Ana Darcy!

See more food ideas in the column to the right under the photo of cranberry-apple pie a la mode-->

Ana's Favorite Restaurant: La Posta, in Mesilla, New Mexico

2011-10-25T22:37:00.001-05:00

Even an extraterrestrial had no trouble realizing the unique qualities of La Posta restaurant in Mesilla, New Mexico. It's said that it is some 150 years old, when it began as a stagecoach stop.

Here are more photos. (RIght click into a new tab for details.)

When they were younger, the Méndez children loved the piranhas and the parrots (and the toucan, not pictured).

Next post: let's sample the food!

What do Mesilla Valley neighborhoods look like?

More pictures of Mesilla, the plaza, church, and agriculture:

One Two Three Four

While you're at it, meet the extraterrestrial Ana Darcy Méndez!

A look at some Mesilla Valley neighborhoods

2011-10-22T21:43:00.002-05:00

Neighborhoods in the Mesilla Valley, however humble or upscale, tend to be homey, comfortable, and welcoming. Outsiders may not realize that it is against the law to build a home of any material which might burn--like wood. Wood has always been expensive in this area of few forests, and homes made of stone, adobe, brick, or concrete block tend to last...which means that when window frames or roofs become rickety, they are generally repaired rather than having the building demolished. (They also have the lowest fire insurance rates in the United States.)

Above and below are some random neighborhoods in Mesilla, near where the family of extraterrestrial distant cousin Ana Darcy lives, and several small villages to the south along Highway 28, all usually within several blocks of the Rio Grande river. Chope's is a locally popular eatery but the best known restaurant in the area is La Posta, in Mesilla. There are several photos elsewhere on this blog (see below), and we will soon have many more.

Perhaps you can tell: time has not exactly passed this area by, but it does move at a walking pace!

(Right click any photo to open in another tab for more detail.)

More Mesilla Valley photos

More: the Mesilla Plaza & nearby desert

More! the Mesilla Valley area

The Mesilla Plaza & San Albino Church

Pictures of southern New Mexico

Meet Ana Darcy!

MORE of Ana's first sights on Earth: the Davis Mountains & Fort Bliss, Texas

2011-10-21T22:25:00.002-05:00

Ana targeted her landing (in Distant Cousin) in the Davis Mountains close to the University of Texas McDonald Observatory. The picture below shows most of the Davis Mountains, looking south from an altitude of approximately 40,000 feet. (You may right click the photos and open in another tab for better detail.) The observatory domes are not visible in this photo, unfortunately, but they must be in the darker mountains along the far edge, where they give way to the lighter plains beyond. The town of Fort Davis may be the mottled area under the second red gizmo on the plane's wing. There would be a highway leading further into the distance, to Alpine, 30 miles south. It would have required very precise navigation to land in the proper canyon below the observatory--in the dark!

Without spoiling too much, here is some of what Ana could have seen when she was at Fort Bliss, Texas, in El Paso. First, the likely building she ended up in:

Then, the view from that approximate point showing the mountains she noticed (the Franklin Mountains, the southernmost end of the Rocky Mountains).

Next the boulevard with the stately houses (for flag officers, mostly):

Here's the alley she ended up in. The gate leading off base is at the end of it, on the left.

And here's that gate. The alley joins the street on the left, between the palm trees, by the stone column.

More of Ana's first sights: the McDonald Observatory

More: Freeway murals

Ana's Mesilla Valley neighborhood!

Meet Ana!

The humor in El Dia de los Muertos

2011-10-17T22:33:00.002-05:00

We've mentioned elsewhere how Ana, from a different society and different planet, for Pete's sake, came to appreciate El Dia de los Muertos, the Mexican observance of All Souls' Day. After the terrible experiences her ancestors barely survived in their early days on Thomo, they inevitably came to value human life even more than we do, partly because they value it collectively as well as individually. That is, their survival as a people depended on working together. To be sure, they have their disagreements as all people do, but these almost never descend to war, or the taking of lives.

Yet also, like people on Earth, they grow old and die. Ana instantly saw the value of El Dia de los Muertos. Thomans too remember and revere their ancestors. But their attitude toward death is to treat it as an adversary, to be fought at all costs. The idea of accepting it as a part of living was new to her, and took some getting used to.

One thing that helped her understand this notion was the humor Mexicans bring to the celebration. They make, sell, and buy huge numbers of tiny effigies or sculptures whose message is impossible to miss. Above and below are some examples: a skeletal bride and groom, with the legend "Hasta que la muerte nos separa," or "Until death do us part," and an ancestral computer user whose screen reads "Hay amor," "There is love." (Right click any of these to open in another tab to see more detail.)

Finally, another humorous little sculpture less associated with El Dia de los Muertos, a Colombian airliner. In the first photo, "Aero Susto" means "Air Fright." In the third, "Milagro! Volamos" means "A miracle! We're flying!" Note that the plane is laden with products of Colombia: bags of coffee, bananas, roses, and people praying, holding on for dear life, and clutching their hands to their breasts. Nor are the animals left behind!

El Dia de los Muertos explained

El Dia de los Muertos figures into Distant Cousin: Reincarnation

MORE humorous Dia del Muertos figurines

Meet Ana Darcy!

"Refreshingly different," and a reader comment in Spanish

2011-10-05T22:30:00.000-05:00

Reader comments and reviews continue!

About Distant Cousin:

"Refreshingly different," says one reader: "What a nice surprise 'Distant Cousin' was - quite unique. It has humor, moves along at a pleasant pace, and...I found myself smiling the entire time I was reading it. There is a subtle wisdom and numerous life philosophies throughout this book. To sum it up: good story - thoughtful, comfortable, and fun!"

Of Distant Cousin: Recirculation:

One reader writes: "There are many good things that can be said of your writings, Ol' Man, but I never dreamed "prophetic" would come to mind. This book was published before [spoiler snip], right? This was a great surprise on its own, without being so in tune with the events of the last month or so. Maybe you have "el toque" or some such. I really had trouble putting the book down over the last few days. Good good!!!"

And a respected author writes "The beat goes on. Now that the Mendez kids are growing up in interesting (even unique) ways, fans of the Distant Cousins have a whole host of new adventures to look forward to. No. 5 entertains while forecasting the future of the series very well. It even takes a deft do-si-do around contemporary American military affairs. Nice work, as always."

And from a reader from South America, for whom English is a second language: "el libro es espectacular siempre antes de dormir tengo que leer algunas lineas no me puedo acostar sin leerlo, ya estoy por terminar." (The book is spectacular as always. Before going to sleep I have to read a few lines. I can't go to sleep without reading a little. I'm almost finished.")

Thanks to all!

You suck!

Yes, she was right! You do suck!

The Wheelchair Mommy weighs in

Authors weigh in

Ana helps a reader discover the meaning of his life

A bride gripes about Distant Cousin

Commuters read the whole set out loud

A reader cries on the subway

DCSS (Distant Cousin Separation Syndrome)

Language games in a Mexican-American-Extraterrestrial family

2011-10-01T20:24:00.001-05:00

It's normal for families to have at least a few special words just within the family. These might include names of family members garbled by a toddler and picked up and used by adults, like "bubba" for "brother," or a mispronounced name for a food they like, like "spaghetti" (which might be pronounced "pesketti").

The family of Matt and Ana Darcy Méndez is different only in degree. Not only do the parents speak four or five languages, and not only are they eager students of language (Matt majored in English), they made a special effort to teach their twins to read well before kindergarten, and to grow up multi-lingual. The whole family is language conscious and they love nothing better than to find a new, imaginative use for an old word, or to turn words around to catch other family members by surprise.

Some of the Méndez family words originated in the conventional way, in the attempt of a toddler to pronounce a word. They love to drink a "foofy," for example, which is known to most people as a (fruit) "smoothie," a word their young daughter was unable to negotiate. Even after their daughter was older, they continued enjoying foofies. Their son renamed another dish, chicken fried steak fingers, which his grandmother called "steakies." The boy thought she said "snakies," which had a certain logic, since the meat stips could conceivably have been cut from a snake. This beloved dish was called "snakies" for ever after (see Distant Cousin: Recirculation).

The family keeps a grocery shopping list on the refrigerator, where any one of them might write down an item to be shopped for later. "Catte littre," written down by Chaucer-loving Matt, is obvious enough, but can you guess what "carrotas" might be? They are carrots, of course, although the proper Spanish word is "zanahorias." It amounts to a sort of joke, a bilingual joke. "Olivas," rather than the correct "aceitunas" ("olives") is another such. Ana was once defeated, coming home without the desired item after she read on the list, "Shed and Holders." Can you guess? It's a popular brand of shampoo....

Spanish has its own word play, to be sure. Matt sometimes refers to his wife not with the Spanish words, "mi esposa," but as "mi esposible," which is a pun on the phrase "es posible," or "it is possible." There are many of these. There is a joke we need not detail here, where the punchline is a pun on "cincuenta" (50) and "sin cuenta," or "beyond counting."

As does English, Spanish has rhyming lines, like "¿Qué tal, animal?" That's roughly equivalent to "Wassup, dog?" except it rhymes. The answer can be "Perfecto, insecto," which we surely need not translate. Every once in a while, when Matt wants to be sure a fatherly point is understood, he will end with a question: "¿Me entiendes, Méndez?" meaning basically, "Have you got that, Méndez?" Again, however, it rhymes. Another such rhyming line is "¡Qué gacho, Nacho!" which means "How humiliating, or disgusting, Nacho." (Nacho is the nickname for the name Ignacio.)

Here is more of the Méndez family's English language trickery. See if you can guess what is really meant by

sheen cleats

shattered scours

beard knife, and

barn muffins.

They also enjoy creating Spanish phrases which make little sense unless translated to English, like these:

frijoles frescos (cool beans)

dame un freno (give me a break, actually a 'brake,' i.e., on a car or truck)

plátanos duros (tough bananas, i.e., too bad), and

no hace centavos (literally, "it doesn't make pennies," or, of course "cents"~"sense")

We bet that your family has its own special words too. If you'd like to add some, please comment!

More language fun:

Mexican-American dichos (proverbs): chapter one chapter two

Mexican-American nursery rhymes, songs, & games

A grandmother's Spanish nursery rhymes
Meet Ana Darcy!

Ana reminds us to be thankful for teachers

2011-09-26T06:50:00.002-05:00

(Ana lectures to astronomy students.)

One of Ana's biggest disappointments in her new life on Earth has been the low priority many of our nations assign to education, and to teachers. She has been especially disheartened by those whose answer to hard economic times is to cut back on education budgets. This is akin to eating one's seed corn, she feels: whatever the short-term gain might be, the long-term harm is exponentially greater.

It has been mentioned elsewhere that Ana's ancestors on the planet Thomo had a very difficult time adjusting to their new planet at first. One of the most important reasons they eventually prevailed was education. It was obvious to them from their first years on Thomo that each individual had to contribute his or her very best, so the entire society could survive. On Thomo, teachers are revered, the classroom is a sacred space, and education is as important as food and security.

Of interest to us, Thomans have no separate schools of education: they have only teachers and subject areas. Teachers, furthermore, seldom specialize in grade levels, but teach (and learn from) any and all. Many are sought out for their thoughts on social, political, and technical matters. They are not compartmentalized, as ours tend to be. Indeed, Ana's good friend Hleo ap Darshiell, who figures in all Ana's stories, and who she calls "Counselor," was a famous teacher in his day.

Ana has done what she could to foster education on Earth. Her philanthropic activities have been extensive, and she has had a great influence on the private school her children have attended. (See Distant Cousin: Reincarnation for more on this.) Still, the problems faced by our education system are beyond the ability of one person to remedy. Nonetheless, Ana was cheered recently to discover evidence of respect and appreciation of teachers: the website Story Corps collects oral interviews having to do with teachers. She loves to spend time there, and finds herself inspired by many of the accounts of teachers, students, and the great things that can happen when education works well.

Only one example: a neurosurgeon removed a tumor from the throat of a man that prevented him from speaking, curing him completely. The man was then able to ask how his doctor had become a surgeon. The surgeon remembered when he was in middle school he had removed the brain and spinal cord from a frog. His science teacher told him he might become a neurosurgeon some day--which later he did. The man further told his doctor that he should call that teacher and thank him.

"'I want to thank you,'" the doctor told his teacher when he called.

"I was flabbergasted," the teacher replied. "I said, 'Of all the people in your entire career, you want to thank me?'

"It was the same feeling I had when ... when my kids were born," he added. "I started to cry. It made me feel really important that I had that influence on you." He admitted, "I almost am afraid to say that I'm a teacher to some people."

Not anymore, he told the surgeon, "because you called me. I'm a teacher, and I'm going to help as many people as I can to find their passion too."

That can be a lesson for all of us: if a teacher has changed your life for the better, pay it forward! If you can't find that teacher to thank, tell someone else. All of us have reason to be thankful for teachers.

More on education from a Thoman perspective:

Meet Ana Darcy!
Interview with Ana: life on Thomo

Ana's native language, Luvit

Ana's response to dropping SAT scores

Math education & Ana's children

Early education in languages and bilingual reading

Ana's response to the drop in SAT verbal scores

2011-09-20T17:30:00.001-05:00

SAT verbal scores have been dropping since the 1970s, and a recent report shows they are still dropping today. This is worrisome, because language proficiency, particularly reading ability, is a main key to a child's brain development, and a proven predictor of academic success later in life. On the larger scale, it is a matter of national security.

There's a name for this phenomenon: the "Matthew Effect," from Matthew XXIV:29: "For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath." Basically, children who acquire facility with language at an early age continue to build on that advantage throughout their lives. Children who lack that advantage correspondingly suffer more and more from it. The difference can be graphed. Imagine what the upper curve would look like if it began its upward climb at age two! (Thanks to BalancedReading.com.)

The SAT statistics distressed Ana, who has always realized the importance of language proficiency in young children. She made sure that her babies were exposed to many languages (in Distant Cousin: Repatriation), and that they were helped to learn to read (in two languages) in their preschool years (in Distant Cousin: Reincarnation). Her goal was not to produce geniuses, but rather children who found learning exciting and easily accessible. The techniques are simple and have been discussed elsewhere in Ana's blog. (See below.)

To be sure, it is also worrisome that education budgets are shrinking, teachers are being let go, and class sizes are increasing. Having a citizenry which is willing to allow this to happen is another problem, however. In the meantime, there is much that parents of young children can do on their own.

More on early education:

Early math education

Early bilingualism and early bilingual reading: one two three four

Ana's native language, Luvit, examined
Meet Ana Darcy!

Two suns beats two moons

2011-09-16T20:32:00.002-05:00

Recently, a team of astronomers using Kepler, NASA's planet-hunting spacecraft, has found a planet that orbits TWO suns. The planet, called Kepler 16-B, is only 200 light years away, in the Cygnus constellation. About the size of Saturn, and of similar density, it is thought to be composed of rock and gas, and is not believed habitable. Most odd to us, an observer on the planet would see two sunrises and two sunsets every day, one orange and one red, and double shadows when both were in the sky.

Ana Darcy Méndez's home planet, Thomo, would also provide an odd astronomical phenomenon to us, but not as odd as a sky with two suns. Thomo has two moons. The larger one, only a little larger in the sky than our moon, does make shadows, but the smaller one is one quarter that size. Its shadows are barely perceptible even on a dark night. Thomo is only 25 light years from Earth, however. If the Thomans' solar system had two suns, Earth astronomers would have found it long ago, and perhaps even found Thomo!

Ana loves our moon, to be sure, but she also misses her meshi and meshijn ("moon" and "baby moon," in Luvit).

Also:

Habitable planets discovered nearby

Ana on Area 51

Did Ana see the Apollo moon landings?
Meet Ana Darcy!

Babies grow up: fennec fox kit and serval kitty

2011-09-13T22:36:00.003-05:00

Ana Darcy Méndez has never been comfortable around dogs, given some of the predators on Thomo, her home planet, but even so she could probably stand a cute, tiny fennec fox. As active as the little critters are, though, they might bring a little too much chaos to her peaceful household. Their daughter Clio's caracal is more reserved, being a full grown, if large, cat. Ana loves serval cats, however. We wouldn't put it past her to adopt one some day.

Thanks to Julie, of Julie's Jungle, for these pictures of young members of her menagerie becoming accustomed to sharing a human household!

More critters:

Newborn fennec fox kit
Fennec foxes playing--videos!

Something different: hummingbirds!
Meet Ana Darcy!

Bonus! Baby Fox, Baby Fennec Fox!

2011-09-04T17:53:00.003-05:00

On Thomo, Ana's home planet, dog-like creatures were widely feared. On Earth, she still doesn't care for dogs in general. That would include foxes (but not cats, fortunately--she and cats seem to share a wavelength). Ana likes her foxes in zoos. Others must think differently.

We had no idea that a fox might make a pet, but that turns out to be the case. Julie, of JuliesJungle, has a newborn fennec fox kit that she couldn't resist taking photos of with a cell phone. The fox weighs 4.5 ounces in the first photo and 5.5 ounces five days later in the second. Way cute!

Fennec foxes are natives of Africa and the smallest of the canids (1.5-3.5 pounds). They are the prey of, unfortunately, caracals among others, but at least they are not endangered. Here's a pair of adults. Would these make cute pets or what?

Thanks, Julie!

Fennec foxes playing with house pets: videos!

See more animals, including lots of cats, in the column on the right under the photo of the blue-eyed kitty.

Meet Ana Darcy!

Ana's Italian appetizer inspiration: pizzete!

2011-09-04T13:57:00.002-05:00

Readers of Distant Cousin will remember Ana's first encounter with pizza, only a few days after she came to Earth. It made quite an impression on her--she's loved pizza ever since. Here's an example of how she has adapted and extended the idea of pizza.

Ana was shopping for a small party she and Matt were going to have, and in so doing, came up with an idea for an appetizer which, like many of her cooking ideas, turned out not to be entirely original. One of her Italian guests, a professor, was delighted to recognize them from his childhood: pizzete ("little pizzas"). So while not quite an original dish, it is unusual, and we present it here as an idea ripe for improvisation rather than as a fixed recipe.

In the grocery store, she spied a dozen tiny pastry shells in tiny, disposable baking dishes. Everyone likes pizza, but pizza, with its large, floppy slices, makes an awkward appetizer. Ana took several dozen of the pastry shells home to elaborate upon.

This was her procedure:

First, she put small slices of smoked gouda cheese in the bottom of each pastry shell. Then she tossed fresh cherry tomatoes from her garden in olive oil, salt and pepper and a touch of oregano, and added one on top of each slice of gouda. Finally, she added a small slice of her fresh mozzarella cheese and a garnish of basil on top of each cherry tomato. Then she roasted them under a flame until the tomatoes started to collapse, to bring out their sweetness.

Presto! An entire pizza in one bite! To use one of her favorite English words, they were yummy!

More Italian-related recipe ideas:

How to make fresh mozzarella

Bruschetta

Pizza dough & sauce

Pizza experiments: one two three four five
Meet Ana Darcy!

See other Ana-related recipe ideas in the column at right, under the picture of cranberry-apple pie a la mode!

Ana discovers the Italians' best use of the frittata

2011-08-31T22:24:00.002-05:00

Ana Darcy Méndez has always enjoyed talking to people from other countries. In her first years on Earth, she occasionally asked embarrassing questions, but she soon learned to use her cover story, of being an immigrant from Argentina, as an entree to a discussion. It never failed--people are invariably pleased to enlighten interested listeners about their homelands.

Now, married into a locally prominent New Mexican family, she takes pleasure in hosting international visitors and guests, many associated with the local university. It was from one of these, a faculty member from Italy, that she learned that a frittata is not merely an omelette, no indeed. It's a way to make leftover pasta into a new and tasty dish!

The photo above shows the result. She started with a bowl of leftover spaghetti and sauce, wonderful the first time around, but now a little dry. Using the knowledge she gained from her Italian guest, she packed it into a pan, covered it with an egg slurry, added some grated cheese on top, and fried it. (A few minutes in the oven helped melt the cheese and brown the top.) Served garnished, in wedges, it was delicious. The origin of the dish would be nearly impossible to guess!

Ana's other food ideas and recipes:

Savory frijoles

Outstanding, quick salsa

Tortilla soup

Tropical Mexican cocktail

Many pizza improvisations!

Thai-style coconut shrimp!

Korean-style carne al pastor!

Ana makes fresh mozzarella--easy!

Czech-style kolaches!

Cranberry-orange relish: sheer poetry!

Ana gives us some Luvit proverbs from the planet Thomo!

2011-08-26T19:41:00.001-05:00

Ana Darcy's native language, Luvit, is spoken by the people of the planet Thomo. (The photo above represents Thomo and its two moons.) There are a number of Luvit words scattered throughout the various Distant Cousin books, but there is no point in providing more than a few, because Luvit is almost completely unintelligible to us. (There is, on the other hand, a fair amount of Spanish in the books, and not all of that needs to be translated. There is also a bit of French, in the first volume.)

We know, however, that Luvit is related to English, Spanish, and French, and to all the Indo-European languages generally. It was, in fact, one of the first languages to split off from the original, long-lost Proto Indo-European of some thousands of years ago. This knowledge comes to us from Dr. William Sledd, a linguist and philologist, as a result of his studies with the assistance of Ana in volume 1. A more complete account of what he discovered is found elsewhere on this blog.

A number of readers have asked for more samples of Luvit, however, and because the various posts of Spanish proverbs on this blog have been popular, we asked Ana if she would provide us a few proverbs in Luvit. We felt sure there would be proverbs in Luvit, and there are. She graciously assented, and they are listed below. Thoman proverbs are as colorful as Earthly proverbs!

Some preliminary notes:

1. The Thoman writing system is as unintelligible to us as the spoken language. While the International Phonetic Alphabet can precisely indicate the sounds of all languages through the use of an elaborate system of symbols, that too is difficult to decipher by all but practiced linguists. Accordingly, we will render the proverbs as closely as we can using standard English orthography.

2. Ana's editor, your humble servant, happens to be a practiced linguist, and while not terribly familiar with Luvit, we will attempt to point out, in notes which follow, a few words which may show possible connections between three of the great families of Indo-European languages: Germanic, Balto-Slavic, and Italic. (See a chart of the branches here.)

3. You might be surprised, after looking over what seem to be harsh sounding words below, to hear spoken Luvit. It is generally rather soft and smooth sounding.

The Proverbs

1. pez bra:sh nyesu kola:sh

      Without work, there are no cakes.

2. pez bensh, do hoshpodzh nelesh.

      Don't go to the pub without money.

3. neilepsh kuchakh ye hlad.

      Hunger is the best cook.

4. vnochi cherna: kazht

      Every cat is black at night.

And a nonsense tongue twister, with NO vowels:

5. strsh prsht skrz khrk

      Stick a finger through your throat.

NOTES:

1. "Pez," in proverbs 1 and 2, would seem to mean "without." "Bensh," in #2 reminds us of "pence."

2. The symbol "a:" indicates a low central vowel, like the vowel sound in "thought."

3. In proverb #1, "kola:sh" probably means "cake," and might be related to Czech and Polish (and English, for that matter) "kolace."

4. In proverb #3, "kuchakh" must mean "cook." German is "koch." English has "cook" and "kitchen," of course.

5. In proverb #4, "vnochi" probably means "night" or "at night," and might be similar to Spanish "noche," French "nuit," and Italian "notte," not to mention Latin "nox, noctis." Also, "cherna:," "black," might be related to "czerny," "black" in Polish. And perhaps "kazht" is similar to "cat" or German "katte," or even Spanish "gato."

6. For tongue twister #5, we have only one comment: if you say, carefully, "shtrk," you can say a "word" with no vowels. A linguist would say it has a "semi-vowel," that is, a way to slide from one consonant to the next. Apparently, that's all that's needed for a few select words.

Thanks, Ana!

A look at Luvit

Ana has language questions for US

Mexican-American proverbs: One Two

Spanish nursery rhymes: One Two

A Spanish puzzle about New Mexico

Guest Blog! Wheelchair Mommy!

2011-08-19T19:59:00.003-05:00

We are delighted to present a guest blogger today, a vivacious young woman who writes one of my favorite blogs. She has been so occupied with the latest addition to her wonderful family--her third boy!--that she has opted to post something from her own blog from the not too distant past, about her discovery of the Distant Cousin stories!

Two points of interest about her post below. She knows me as a former college student of a few years ago. Whether that had anything to do with it or not, she's a wonderful writer. Her blog is a lively source of information for parents and full of touching anecdotes from a warm-hearted modern family. The second point is that she, like Rebecca Pechefsky, harpsichordist, and Claudia Quintero, a talented painter, have actually met Ana Darcy (even though they may not have realized it at the time)!

Thanks again to the Wheelchair Mommy for her post, and we invite you to visit her delightful blog (link below), and perhaps even become a follower!

Alrighty. Wow. I never minded book reports in school, but when it comes to reviewing a book written by someone I KNOW and want others to read, I seem to be at a loss for words. Imagine that? Me? With nothing to say?

That’s precisely the problem. I have too much to say and I don’t want to give ANYTHING away. I want you to order them RIGHT now and read them so we can talk about them.

When I read the first book I had NO idea there would be second, third and fourth. I was thrilled each time another one came out though! I wonder if there will be a 5th?

Ok. So you probably want to AT LEAST know what it’s about? Well, it’s science fiction. A woman from another planet (Thomo) comes to Earth. There’s a bit of a love story. (She meets someone.) There are HUGE lessons in learning to accept others! (She’s an alien for crying out loud.) There’s humor. There’s action & murder. There’s growth.

I can not pick a favorite out of the 4. I like them all. I would LOVE for Hollywood to pick this up. It would make an AWESOME mini series. Just incredible.

So there you have it. My ideas of how one should review a series, written by a friend; without spoiling anything. . . I will just tell my readers that they must just click below and order now.

Please.

And Thank you!

Meet Ana Darcy!

Sample the Kindle edition!

A reader says "You suck!"
The Wheelchair Mommy's Blog

Ana learns to love the Mexican observance of El Día de los Muertos

2011-08-04T20:51:00.003-05:00

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We may not know many specifics of the human society on the planet Thomo, but we can be sure of certain features in general. Families are important; ancestors and descendants are important. The arts--music, painting, poetry, literature, and so forth, are important. Religion is important. So is food. Security, love, manners, means of getting along, are very important.

We would expect when Ana Darcy (née Anneyn Darshiell) came to Earth she recognized the importance of those things in our society, even if she was unfamiliar with the details. (Her first impressions are recorded in Distant Cousin.) After all, where her people had one basic set of beliefs and customs, we have thousands of cultures and languages and cuisines. These were an unimaginably rich treasure for her to explore. They still are.

Given that she settled in southern New Mexico in an Anglo/Hispanic area, it stands to reason that she would be intimately exposed to the customs of both those cultures. One Mexican tradition struck her as so appropriate to her own society on Thomo that she adopted it herself, immediately. This customary observance might seem strange to the English-speaking world, enough so to deserve a note of explanation here: the custom of El Día de los Muertos, the day of the dead.

The origin of the observance lies some 400 years in the past, with the arrival of Spaniards in Mexico. The Spaniards--Catholic, of course--already observed All Souls' Day, the day following All Saints' Day. They blended this observance into the indigenous Indian celebration of their ancestors. The result is El Día de los Muertos, in effect, a Catholic celebration with Aztec overtones, among others. (This process, common in Catholicism, is called syncretism.)

There is nothing morbid about it--it is a joyous remembrance of one's ancestors. In the English-speaking world, we remember those who went before to some degree, with perhaps a few photos or paintings, a hymn or two, perhaps, and, if we're really thorough, a reading of old correspondence or sharing of family stories with younger family members. In Mexico, this process is formalized and elaborate. Cemeteries are cleaned up and decorated. Whole families spend the day there, have picnics and music, and decorate their houses with altars and flowers. Unlike Halloween, death is regarded as another phase of life, something to be commemorated and revered. Even food and drink are provided, for the spirits of those ancestors.

In Ana's Thoman society, each generation is numbered and remembered individually. There are many epic poems about deeds and persons of the past, somewhat like the ancient Greeks, which keep the past alive and help guide people into the future. Ana herself is the subject of one of these epics (in Distant Cousin: Regeneration). In any case, Ana instantly understood the importance of El Día de los Muertos, and enthusiastically adopted it. (Many Anglo families have as well. Being Catholic is not required for remembering one's ancestors!) The appropriateness of Ana's observation of El Día de los Muertos was featured in Distant Cousin: Reincarnation.

Below are two photos of observances of an El Día de los Muertos celebration (a third is above, at top). These three, from central Mexico, show a cemetery, elaborately decorated and crowded with celebrants, musicians, and the like. (You may right click these to open in another window to better see the details.)

The two below show observances in Mexican homes.

This one shows an altar in a college Spanish classroom in the United States. One of the students evidently remembered an ancestor who enjoyed weight lifting (left foreground).

And here is an altar in a non-Catholic Anglo household, with photos of ancestors, flowers, and items those ancestors enjoyed--including a bottle of liquor, center rear.

If anyone is interested in trying this custom, nothing could be simpler. Several days before November second, merely set out photos or representations of one's dear departed, add characteristic items they enjoyed, along with flowers and candles. Light the candles each night. You will find yourself thinking of those who preceded you more than you ever have before!

The humor in El Dia de los Muertos
MORE humorous Dia de los Muertos figurines

Distant Cousin: Reincarnation (where El Dia de los Muertos plays a part)
Meet Ana Darcy!

MORE Mexican-American Nursery Rhymes, Songs, Games

2011-08-03T15:42:00.005-05:00

Ana's people on the planet Thomo are devotedly child-centered. Their early problems surviving on a harsh, new planet were mentioned in Distant Cousin and several of the later volumes. Children, lots of children, saved them.

If you'd expect them to have lullabies, nursery rhymes, and games for children, you would be correct. We are working on obtaining some examples, but it is far from a simple matter. Not only is their language, Luvit, unknown on Earth, their writing system is illegible to us. The words could be rendered in the International Phonetic Alphabet, but how many of us can read that (or write it)? Nevertheless, before long we hope to have at least a sample or two of children's rhymes, proverbs, or other common refrains heard on Thomo.

Closer to home, Ana's family has been raised speaking Spanish as well as English. (Her children also speak Luvit and Hindi, and have a basic familiarity with several other languages as well, as explained in Distant Cousin: Reincarnation. There is a discussion elsewhere on Ana's blog about raising bilingual, biliterate children--see below.)

All Spanish-speaking countries have many, many traditional children's rhymes, games, songs, and verses, of course. Below are some examples of the ones that Ana learned from her mother in law and grandmother in law in southern New Mexico. Most would be familiar to Spanish speakers from other countries, with minor variations. Ana's children know these by heart!

If you've ever seen the moon reflected in the waves of a lake, you should like the imagery of this little verse.

Allá está la luna,
Comiendo su tuna
Tirando las cáscaras
en la laguna.

(There is the moon, eating its tuna, throwing the husks into the lake.)

Here is a counting game with toes, similar to "This little piggy went to market...."

Éste compró un huevo.
Éste trajo la sal.
Éste encendió el fuego.
Éste lo guisó.
¡Y éste pícaro gordo se lo comió!

(This one bought an egg. This one brought the salt. This one lit the fire. This one cooked it. And this fat bully ate it!)

Here's a song for sleepy children:

Los pollitos dicen:
"Pio, pio, pio,"
Cuando tienen hambre,
Cuando tienen frio.

La gallina busca
el maíz y el trigo,
les da la comida
y les presta abrigo.

Bajo sus dos alas,
acurrucaditos,
hasta el otro día
duermen los pollitos.

(The chicks say pio, pio, pio when they're hungry and when they're cold. The hen finds corn and wheat to feed them and lends them an overcoat. Under her wings, snuggled together, the chicks sleep until another day.) This is the melody:

A traditional nonsense verse with a rollicking rhythm:

Pin, marín,
De Don Pingüe,
Cúcara, mácara,
Títere fue.

Here's a singing game, with children sitting in a circle. A girl sings, counting the syllables and pointing at children in turn. When she gets to the last syllable, that child must get up and dance with her.

Arroz con leche,
me quiero casar
con un mexicano
que sea cantar.

El hijo del rey
me manda un papel,
me manda decir
me case con él.

Con éste no,
con éste sí,
con éste mero
me caso yo.

(Milk with rice, I want to marry a Mexican who knows how to sing/The son of the king sent me a note ordering me to say I would marry him/with this one no, with this one yes, with this very one I will marry.)

Finally, perhaps the most popular and most used rhyme, for when a child is hurt and needs comforting. (If a teacher performs this, generally with a stroking motion or a gentle pat, it's likely that every child within earshot will locate some tiny scratch and form a line so they too can be healed.)

Sana, sana,
Colita de rana.
Sí no sanas hoy
Sanarás mañana.

(Heal, heal, tail of a frog. If you're not well today, you'll be well tomorrow.)

Ideas on raising bilingual, biliterate children 1 2 3 4

Nursery Rhymes Chapter 1

Mexican-American Dichos (Proverbs) Chapter 1 Chapter 2
Mexican-American-Extraterrestrial Family Language Games
Meet Ana Darcy!

MORE Mexican-American Dichos (Proverbs)

2011-08-01T21:40:00.001-05:00

Ana's father in law, and his mother (Abuelita), eventually figured out that their son's/grandson's wife was the famous but elusive woman from outer space--the planet Thomo. Each kept her secret to themselves for a good while, however, because they realized that if word of her real identity were to get out, their peaceful family life in rural New Mexico would be over.

Ana Darcy, for her part, also welcomed her low profile life as the home-making wife of a moderately prosperous landowner. One way she did this was by following her interests in the languages of Earth and becoming fluent in Spanish, since her husband's family was bilingual in English and Spanish, and Spanish is the second language of New Mexico. Abuelita, in particular, was her devoted tutor in the social customs of southern New Mexico and in Spanish, which included many, many dichos (proverbs) from Abuelita's enormous store of practical wisdom.

They are great fun. Many are similar to proverbs in English, of course, but some reflect novel cultural differences. Some of these have already appeared here. Here are some more:

Cada oveja con su pareja. (Each sheep with its twin; birds of a feather stick together)

A cada santa se le llega su día. (Each saint's day arrives; every dog has his day)

Lo barato cuesta caro. (What's cheap is expensive (in the long run))

Panza llena, corazón contento. (A full stomach makes a happy heart.)

Es mejor que haya un tonto y no dos. (Better there's one fool and not two; you've made enough of a fool of yourself already)

El hábito no hace al monje. (A habit doesn't make a monk; clothes don't make the man).

Antes te hablar es bueno pensar. (Think before speaking.)

Comer frijoles y repetir pollo. (Eating beans and talking chicken; talking big but acting small)

De lo perdido a lo que aparezca. (From having lost it to whatever may appear; something is better than nothing)

La mala yerba nunca muere. (The bad weeds never die; the bad penny always comes back)

Más vale andar solo que mal acompañado. (It's better to be alone than in bad company.)

Quien a feo ama, hermoso le parece. (Love makes even the ugly beautiful.)

Mexican-American Dichos Chapter 1

A grandmother's Spanish nursery rhymes

A Spanish puzzle about New Mexico

Meet Ana Darcy!

Matt gets sick; finds his own poem about sickness

2011-07-31T19:57:00.000-05:00

We learned in Distant Cousin (volume 1) that Ana Darcy Méndez was born on the planet Thomo with an enhanced immune system. On Earth she has stayed remarkably healthy, with a few minor exceptions. Her family has generally been healthy as well, with only occasional colds, headaches, or upset digestive systems occurring from time to time.

Once, however, Matt had the flu, which he thought unfair, since he and his children always got flu shots. He spent a number of very uncomfortable days, as anyone who has had the flu will understand. His family tended him compassionately, though he found it difficult to appreciate their solicitude at the time. The sick, Leo Tolstoy once wrote, are not interested in the illnesses (or much else) of others.

Later, he came across a poem by George Bilgere that wonderfully encapsulated the experience of recovering from such a miserable experience. All in all, it brought back the glorious feeling of once again being fully alive and well, something we all too often tend to take for granted--that welcome sensation of eagerness for food, for company, and for all the sensual experiences we had been unable to appreciate when we are miserably sick.

As far as we know, he kept the poem to himself rather than sharing it with his wife. We are not sure why, but it may be the sensual conclusion of the poem. It surely could not be because of "the baker's store," where "everything smells like warm baguettes."

Right click to open in another window the poem Joy, by George Bilgere.

See other poems the Méndez family loves in the right column, under the photo of the LOVE sculpture, including "The World Begins at the Kitchen Table."

Spaceport City, Las Cruces, New Mexico, Virgin Galactic, and their one Extraterrestrial Neighbor

2011-07-18T15:09:00.003-05:00

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This news from the "final frontier" just in! The New Mexico Spaceport Authority expects to have, in a little more than a year, a spaceport built between Las Cruces and the missile test center at White Sands. If all goes according to plan, you, too, will be soon be able to purchase a ticket on Virgin Galactic and ride a space vehicle to the edge of space. Reportedly, it may cost in the vicinity of $200,000, so many of us will have to start planning and saving now.... (Details here.)

It seems fitting that that location is within commuting distance of the first extraterrestrial to come to Earth from another planet: Ana Darcy Mendez, who lives near Mesilla, a suburb of Las Cruces. Ana already has, in fact, a vehicle which has taken several of her family and acquaintances to the edge of space, and for free. (See DC3 and DC4.)

See the maps below (and right click to enlarge in another window). The first shows the junction of Texas, New Mexico, and Mexico where much of the action in the Distant Cousin series takes place. The blue dot is the approximate location of the new spaceport. South of Las Cruces you can see the city of Juarez, Mexico, featured in DC4. Across the river to the east, but unmarked, is the city of El Paso. To the west down IH10, there is Deming, and south of that the border crossing at Las Palomas, which features in DC5. Mata Ortiz (photos here), in DC5, is just out of the picture to the south.

The second map shows the spaceport and Las Cruces, with White Sands national monument above. There are ski areas in the mountains just east of there, and Highway 70 descends to Las Cruces from Alamogordo, featured in DC4. There is a lovely aerial photo of this entire area here, with White Sands visible in the far distance. (You may click to enlarge it.) The spaceport is apparently being built between there and the city of Las Cruces, on the west side of the mountains.

The third map highlights Las Cruces itself, with the University of New Mexico campus area highlighted. It will do doubt offer technical support to the spaceport. Also of interest is the suburb of Mesilla and Highway 28. The Mendez family lives south of Mesilla along this highway. Visible too are the extensive, irrigated pecan groves, and skirting the western side, the Rio Grande river. West of that, at this point, is New Mexico. Mexico itself is to the west further south, off this map.

It seems likely that Ana will keep a very low profile with respect to the spaceport. She has her own, hidden in those pecan groves!

See more maps and area photo in the column at right,

under the photo of the blue-eyed kitty-->

Meet Ana Darcy!

Ana discovers Nora, the piano cat

2011-07-14T21:35:00.001-05:00

Nora, the piano playing cat, is famous, but Ana only learned about her recently. She was enchanted, even touched, by her performance in...but we'll get to that shortly.

From Wikipedia, Ana learned that Nora enjoys the attention she receives when she plays, but that she also plays alone, as well as when there are piano students present. Nora joins in especially when they are playing Bach. Ana likes that!

Nora prefers the D-E-F range of the piano but also plays on the black keys. She has been studied by musicians, musicologists, and other scholarly types for some time. The Times of London has said that her playing is "something halfway between Philip Glass and free jazz."

Ana was thrilled to learn that a Lithuanian conductor, composer, and artist, Mindaugas Piečaitis, has written a concerto for orchestra and Nora (appearing by video) which we all can see and hear. She particularly likes the idea of two species of creatures making music together, and the utterly respectful way the composer and musicians treat the performance of the cat. Their dignity and seriousness, she thinks, ennobles all involved. See if you agree.

This is Nora's five minute concerto:

There is more at this site devoted to Nora and her "catcerto."

The sound of the engine of the galaxy

A Bach duet you can print and play

A musical palindrome

Location Photos from Barbados

2011-07-12T20:01:00.000-05:00

Ana Darcy visited the island nation of Barbados in Distant Cousin and Distant Cousin: Reincarnation (DC1 & DC3). The first two photos below are from the Caribbean side (the west side) of Barbados. The third is from the Atlantic side (the east side). In volume 3, Ana had lunch at a beachside restaurant with a friend, shown in the fourth photo. The last photo shows the approximate view from that restaurant. A party boat is at top center, and the port of Barbados is out of view to the right. Ana watched children play in the surf, which is slightly behind the camera.

See more photos from venues in the books in the column on the right, under the photo of the blue-eyed Siamese, and especially these, also from Barbados:

The home where Ana lived during her training

Other photos from the West Indies, including Barbados: part 1 part 2

A note about the Distant Cousin theme song

2011-07-08T20:37:00.004-05:00

The Distant Cousin theme song is probably not the sort of music readers of the series might expect. What can we say? Ana Darcy likes it!

It's not new music, not that that matters to a woman who's only recently come to Earth--all our music was new to her when she arrived. The composer is Johann Kapsburger (1580-1651), from the early baroque period. Ana likes it because it's polyphonic (with several voices) and because it's calm, sweet, and beautiful. Though less than two minutes long, it amounts to a theme and variations, another form Ana loves.

This performance was just for Ana. A professional musician, Scott Pauley, was honored to play it for her alone, but she gladly permitted us to share it with you, with her best wishes. You will hear it nowhere else, not on YouTube and not on a cd. She hopes you enjoy it.

The instrument is a theorbo, a bass lute, in effect. With 18 strings, and over six feet long, it has a huge tonal range, low to high, and is wonderfully resonant and stringy (and difficult to master). Ana says the people of Thomo have several similar, large stringed instruments, but they don't have the same richness as the theorbo. (There's more information about it at Wikepedia.)

Here is the recording of the performance of the Distant Cousin theme song for Ana. (If you right click it and open it in another window, you won't lose your place.)

YouTube does have other versions. Here are two examples:

With an ensemble and two dancers:

For solo lute in an intimate setting:

More musical items related to Ana Darcy:

A musical puzzle

A Bach piece that Ana says sounds like "the engine of the galaxy"

Why Ana loves fugues

A musical palindrome by Bach that delights Ana

Ana's favorite harpsichordist

Bach's three part "Little Fugue in g minor" arranged as a duet which you can print and play
Rebecca Pechefsky plays from Bach, BWV 829
Meet Ana!

Science, delight, or both? Ana loves baking bread.

2011-07-03T15:00:00.002-05:00

Ana can barely remember her childhood on the planet Thomo, so long ago, but she keenly remembers the smell of baking bread. Psychologists say the sense of smell is our most powerful sense, after all. Thomans don't have wheat, but they have other grains, from which they make an assortment of dishes as we do from the grains of Earth. Ana has loved wheat in all its variations ever since her first experience with tortillas and pizza (in Distant Cousin).

She has employed her scientific side in exploring the possibilities in baking. She has made small, yeast rising rolls some of which she has allowed to rise and bake, others to rise half way, freeze, and bake later, and some to rise fully, to be frozen and baked days after, in order to compare the results. She has similarly compared the use of butter, oil, lard, Crisco, and other variables in the baking process, and she has experimented with varieties of baked items across cultures: Czech, German, French, Mexican, Italian, and many more. The baking process is a miracle of nature to her.

She treasures a poem about baking, which touches on the mystery of making and baking bread. Its imagery is so vivid that it often prompts her to make bread herself, just as Pablo Neruda's poem about tomatoes makes her mouth water, and the recipe poem about orange/cranberry relish brings the lavish Thanksgiving table to her mind.

Oddly enough, the poem is titled "Graduation Speech," by Charles F. Pratt. If you right click it and open it in another window, you can easily sample more of Ana's favorite food poems in the column to the right, under the photo of cranberry/apple pie. With only baking in mind, for example, there are these:

Czech kolaches

Pizza dough

Bakers vs. cooks

Bruschetta
Meet Ana Darcy!

Free book drawing! Thanks to readers; welcome to new readers!

2011-06-25T16:33:00.000-05:00

We have mentioned before that we are so very grateful to those unknown readers who recommend the Distant Cousin stories to other readers. The books have remained popular though our advertising budget is zero and we are pitifully inadequate at publicity. It can only be due to word of mouth, when one reader recommends them to a friend. Other readers may have learned about the books from having stumbled upon Ana Darcy's blog, perhaps while searching for a poem, music, recipes, or matters of language and education. But no matter....

We would like to return something to readers both present and future. We invite everyone to enter a drawing for a free copy of the e-edtion of the Distant Cousin title of your choice. There will be five winners! To enter, send an email indicating your choice of title and e-edition (Kindle, Nook, etc.) to albinoni (at) fastmail.fm. Entries close on July 4, 2011. One entry per person, please, but if you have already read all five volumes, you may enter for a friend and pass the fun forward!

With our thanks and best wishes....

A cat poem Ana cannot forget

2011-06-20T15:52:00.000-05:00

On the one hand it's odd that Ana and cats share some mysterious affinity for each other, since cats do not exist on her native planet, Thomo. On the other hand, it's not mysterious at all. Anyone who knows cats knows that they have a rich collection of mysterious qualities (as well as a number of perfectly understandable qualities too, of course).

Dogs love humans, unless those humans have given them reason not to. Cats, being nearer to their wild origins, are able to exist on their own, without humans. If a cat should therefore choose to live with people and enjoy their company, it would seem to reflect well on those individuals, or so it seems to us.

Ana recently found a poem about a cat which loved a family but could not be with them (because of "allergies," according to the poet). Yet it stayed as close as it could, loving them through windows and doors, learning their routines inside, and following them around the house, but from outside.

The poem does not end happily, as the family "broke," and moved away, inexplicably leaving the cat behind, and Ana saddened to the point of watering eyes. She particularly liked the lines "Little spark of consciousness, / calm kitty eyes staring / through the window."

The poet says he could not get the cat out of his mind. Neither can Ana.

Gray, by Philip K. Deaver

Other cat poems from Ana's collection:

A love poem to a cat

Learning peace from a cat

A nursery rhyme with kittens

Explaining relativity to a cat

A poem about two cats

An Anglo-Saxon cat poem

A mysterious 18th c. cat poem

Ana discovers a poem about tomatoes by Pablo Neruda

2011-06-13T21:06:00.002-05:00

From her first week on Earth, Ana Darcy was delighted by many of the foods and tastes she found here. Among her very favorites are peppermint, lemon, asparagus, mozarella, chilies, and tomatoes. Living as she does in the Mesilla Valley of southern New Mexico, a famous garden area, fresh vegetables are easy to obtain in season. The family garden, accordingly, is small and tends to emphasize herbs and other rarities.

One crop they always grow is tomatoes, however, and she was thrilled to discover a lovely poem to tomatoes by the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda. It was well within her ability to read in the original Spanish, but the English version also makes a tasty poem. Here are both versions.

"Ode to Tomatoes," by Pablo Neruda            por Pablo Neruda

The street                                                      La calle
filled with tomatoes,                                       se llenó de tomates,
midday,                                                         mediodia,
summer,                                                       verano,
light is                                                            la luz
halved                                                           se parte
like                                                                en dos
a                                                                   mitades
tomato,                                                         de tomate,
its juice                                                          corre
runs                                                               por las calles
through the streets.                                        el jugo.
In December,                                                 En diciembre
unabated,                                                      se desata
the tomato                                                     el tomate
invades                                                          invade
the kitchen,                                                    las cocinas,
it enters at lunchtime,                                     entra por los almuerzos,
takes                                                             se sienta
its ease                                                         reposado
on countertops,                                             en los aparadores,
among glasses,                                              entre los vasos,
butter dishes,                                                 las matequilleras
blue saltcellars.                                              los saleros azules.
It sheds                                                         Tiene
its own light,                                                 luz propia,
benign majesty.                                              majestad benigna.
Unfortunately, we must                                  Devemos, por desgracia,
murder it:                                                       asesinarlo:
the knife                                                        se hunde
sinks                                                             el cuchillo
into living flesh,                                             en su pulpa viviente
red                                                                es una roja
viscera                                                           viscera,
a cool                                                            un sol
sun,                                                               fresco,
profound,                                                      profundo,
inexhaustible,                                                inagotable,
populates the salads                                      llena las ensaladas
of Chile,                                                        de Chile,
happily, it is wed                                            se casa alegremente
to the clear onion,                                          con la clara cebolla,
and to celebrate the union                              y para celebrarlo
we                                                                se deja
pour                                                              caer
oil,                                                                 aceite,
essential                                                         hijo
child of the olive,                                            esencial del olivo,
onto its halved hemispheres,                           sobre sus hemisferios
pepper                                                           entreabiertos,
adds                                                              agrega
its fragrance,                                                 la pimienta
salt, its magnetism;                                         su fragrancia,
it is the wedding                                             la sal su magnetismo:
of the day,                                                     son las bodas
parsley                                                          del día
hoists                                                            el perejil
its flag,                                                          levanta
potatoes                                                       banderines,
bubble vigorously,                                         las papas
the aroma                                                     hierven vigorosamente,
of the roast                                                   el asado
knocks                                                         golpea
at the door,                                                  con su aroma
it’s time!                                                       en la puerta
come on!                                                      es hora!
and, on                                                         vamos!
the table, at the midpoint                               y sobre
of summer,                                                   la mesa, en la cintura
the tomato,                                                   del verano,
star of earth, recurrent                                   el tomate,
and fertile                                                      astro de tierra,
star,                                                              estrella
displays                                                        repetida
its convolutions,                                            y fecunda,
its canals,                                                     nos muestra
its remarkable amplitude                               sus circunvoluciones,
and abundance,                                            sus canales,
no pit,                                                          la insigne plenitud
no husk,                                                      y la abundancia
no leaves or thorns,                                      sin hueso,
the tomato offers                                          sin coraza,
its gift                                                           sin escamas ni espinas,
of fiery color                                                nos entrega
and cool completeness.                                 el regalo
                                                                    de su color fogoso
                                                        y la totalidad de su frescura.

A gardening poem

An artichoke poem

A vegetable poem

(More in the right column under the photo of the LOVE sculpture)
Meet Ana Darcy!

Math education and Ana Darcy's children

2011-06-08T13:58:00.003-05:00

We have seen, in Distant Cousin: Repatriation and Distant Cousin: Reincarnation, how the extraterrestrial Ana Darcy and her New Mexican husband Matt have spared no expense in educating their children from an early age. They have always been careful to conduct it in a spirit of fun, following their children's interests--with only a little parental encouragement to practice their music, drawing, writing, and other homework. Both children grew up speaking several languages, because they had been exposed to those languages, and both were reading from an early age (see posts 1 2 3 4).

Their son Julio, in particular, turned out to be keenly interested in mathematics. Julio may have had some innate interest in math, but he also had help: from enlightened parents, from tutors, and from a small bit of otherwordly technology. Here's an excerpt from chapter 1 of Distant Cousin: Reincarnation, published in 2007:

"[Matt] believed [his wife, that] education was apparently crucial on Thomo, Darcy's home planet. Her ancestors had been moved there from Earth thousands of years ago and had had a difficult time surviving, but they had prevailed in style if Darcy was any example. As young as the twins were, they had already surpassed their father in mathematics. [Matt] was hardly gifted in math, but to be bested repeatedly by seven year olds took a little getting used to. Julio in particular loved the math cube that had been a present from Darcy's Uncle Rothan. This was a transparent cube, nearly four inches on a side, which amounted to three-dimensional graph paper. It was wireless—whatever powered it was a mystery to Matt. A small keyboard came with it, and entering coordinates and values in the base unit produced a glowing web of blue lines within the cube that showed the various resulting graphs in different colors. Change the values, and the graph would change. Julio was always bringing it to him asking him to guess what equation had produced it. He never could."

A recent article in The New York Times suggests that this unusual technique by which Julio learned mathematical concepts is now beginning to be realized as particularly effective by educators on Earth.

The article begins thusly:

Like any other high school junior, Wynn Haimer has a few holes in his academic game. Graphs and equations, for instance: He gets the idea, fine — one is a linear representation of the other — but making those conversions is often a headache.

Or at least it was. For about a month now, Wynn, 17, has been practicing at home using an unusual online program that prompts him to match graphs to equations, dozens upon dozens of them, and fast, often before he has time to work out the correct answer. An equation appears on the screen, and below it three graphs (or vice versa, a graph with three equations). He clicks on one and the screen flashes to tell him whether he’s right or wrong and jumps to the next problem.

“I’m much better at it,” he said…. “In the beginning it was difficult, having to work so quickly; but you sort of get used to it, and in the end it’s more intuitive. It becomes more effortless.”

The article goes on to point out:

For years school curriculums have emphasized top-down instruction, especially for topics like math and science. Learn the rules first — the theorems, the order of operations, Newton’s laws — then make a run at the problem list at the end of the chapter. Yet recent research has found that true experts have something at least as valuable as a mastery of the rules: gut instinct, an instantaneous grasp of the type of problem they’re up against. Like the ballplayer who can “read” pitches early, or the chess master who “sees” the best move, they’ve developed a great eye.

Now, a small group of cognitive scientists is arguing that schools and students could take far more advantage of this same bottom-up ability, called perceptual learning. The brain is a pattern-recognition machine, after all, and when focused properly, it can quickly deepen a person’s grasp of a principle, new studies suggest. Better yet, perceptual knowledge builds automatically: There’s no reason someone with a good eye for fashion or wordplay cannot develop an intuition for classifying rocks or mammals or algebraic equations, given a little interest or motivation.

That is precisely what Julio learned to do, years before the technique became understood well enough to publicize.

The people of Thomo, Ana's people, barely survived harsh conditions on their new planet, as we know from the Distant Cousin stories. Their eventual success was due in large part to their collective dedication to education, which they well knew was the ultimate key to survival.

It is no different for us on Earth. In difficult times, whether a result of weather, war, disease, or economic problems, we must not forget that education can be our salvation, whatever it costs. Indeed, it should be one of our top priorities.

Bilingual education and early bilingual literacy: 1 2 3 4
Meet Ana Darcy!

A poem for our daughters makes Ana weep

2011-06-05T13:49:00.000-05:00

Ana Darcy Méndez is generally calm and sweet-tempered. Well, almost always. We surely know people who are angered by injustice, or whose heartstrings can be twanged by sentiment. Such feelings make us fully human. Ana's daily life on our planet passes much like the lives of the rest of us, but sometimes something will strike her deeply, and stab her with pangs of emotion. Sometimes that stab comes from poetry--the economy and insights reach her much more directly than our longer literary forms, which are harder for her to register in their totality.

A poem by Mark Jarman, "Prayer for Our Daughters," made her eyes tear up. Like many of the poems in her growing collection of favorites, there's nothing in it that needs explaining by a person with a degree in English (like her husband). It's perfectly clear as is. If you know Ana and her history at all, you know she loves children, and especially girls. She loves all the poet's lines about daughters: "If they forget themselves, may it be in music/Or the kind of prayer that makes a garden of thinking," and "... may they find themselves, as we have found them/Complete at each stage of their lives, each part they add to."

"Prayer for Our Daughters," by Mark Jarman

Ana's favorite poem

A poem about caring for others

A poem about wading in and getting things done

A Valentine's Day love poem

A poem that made Ana cry

Ana's favorite sonnet about love

(Sample more of Ana's favorite poems in the column to the right, under the photo of the LOVE sculpture.)

Early Feedback from Readers of Distant Cousin: Recirculation (DC5)

2011-05-29T17:37:00.000-05:00

Distant Cousin: Recirculation (DC5) has only been out a little while, but the early comments are fun. There's no point in recapping the reviews at Amazon, but several others, including personal communications, might be of interest.

First, there are the commuters, who have read all four books out loud to each other during their long and otherwise boring commute: "We are loving the new book! Already 1/2 done. Hurry up with the next one!"

If they seem to be taking a long time to get through the book, then know that the audio version of Distant Cousin: Reincarnation takes 13 hours to listen to. (See the earlier reports from the commuters here and here.)

The following comments have been edited so as not to spoil anything for new readers:

"I didn't get a chance to let you know that I finished DC5. I didn't read it until after [something in the news happened], so I found it entirely believable.I also enjoyed the fact that the kids got [major parts in the story]."

and

"After several weeks of work, travel, and visiting kids in California, I at last opened Distant Cousin: Recirculation on the way home Monday night…and just finished it, having had to do a few pieces of work in between. The book is the best yet. You have a gift and we all are most fortunate that you are sharing it with us. ...it was so prophetic at the end….to read this just after [something in the news happened]. You captured the complexity perfectly.

"THANK YOU OVER AND OVER AGAIN!!!!

"Your FAN forever!!!!!"

While we're at, we found two new comments tucked away in corners of the internet:

Under the heading "Crusty Old Guy Likes This:"

"I cut my teeth on old school science fiction with bug-eyed monsters, ray guns, and inhospitable planets. This isn't about those. Well maybe it is, with Earth and some of it's inhabitants being the antagonists. This is well written, as one page induces you to read the next. Characters have life. The plot is plausible (we are talking SF here). It also gives some insight into the people, places, and culture of Nueva Espana. I read this out of curiosity and to add another dimension to my reading of late. My curiosity was pleasantly slaked but I wouldn't recommend this to other crusty old guys. We just aren't the target audience. I highly recommended this to my grand daughter. My wife should even enjoy it. Oh yeah, I'll probably read the next in the series."

One more, about Distant Cousin: Reincarnation (DC3):

"In this latest installment of Al Past's Distant Cousin saga, Ana Darcy's greed-driven uncle brings about a deplorable international situation that only she can set aright. To do so, she must make use of all her unique talents and abilities while placing her life in great peril.... This isn't just another action novel. By now Ana is married, and the author cleverly juxtapositions her Thoman adventures with the family life she longs to share with her husband, Matt Mendez, and their twins. He and the kids manage to find a little adventure of their own, which regularly serves as a refreshing aside from the main story line. As usual, Past serves up delectable portraits of the cuisine in the various parts of the country where Ana finds herself, and his depiction of the landscape in diverse regions of the world gives the reader a genuine sense of presence. Flashbacks and unnecessary references to the two preceding Distant Cousin novels are kept to a minimum thus; even readers who are unfamiliar with those works will find Distant Cousin: Reincarnation to be intriguing and captivating. Whether you are new to the universe of Ana Darcy and her friends, or are fortunate enough to have read Distant Cousin and Distant Cousin: Repatriation, this work holds a great deal of enjoyment in store."

To all those who took the trouble to send in their thoughts, our warmest and most heartfelt thanks!

Baby kitties! Serval kitties!

2011-05-20T21:37:00.001-05:00

As readers will know, Ana's family has a caracal, not a serval. The serval, also a native of Africa, resembles a half-size cheetah, similarly long and lean, and they make wonderful, active, playful pets for people who know what they're doing. Julie's Jungle devotes several pages to the care and feeding of these beautiful cats, and to discussing the arrangements necessary for living in harmony with them.

The pictures below show servals from babies to adults. As is evident from the photos, they can exist peacefully in the proper domestic situation. The Méndez family may be thinking about one! Thanks, Julie!

See more photos of servals and other cats in the right column, under the blue-eyed Siamese.
Meet Ana Darcy!

A Sampling of Mexican-American Dichos (Proverbs)

2011-05-16T20:25:00.004-05:00

Ana's husband's family would probably be called Mexican-American by most people, though some Hispanics in New Mexico insist that since their ancestors actually arrived before the establishment of the country of Mexico, they should be called Spanish-Americans. We don't care to argue the point, and we don't know how Matt's grandmother, Reyes Méndez might feel about it, but in any case their Spanish is peppered with the traditional words of wisdom we generally call proverbs, in English, and dichos, in Spanish (from "decir," to say or speak).

For example, in Distant Cousin: Reincarnation, Matt's grandmother was once asked how she was doing, to which she replied "¡Vivita y coleanda, gracias!" ("Alive and wagging, thanks!").

On another occasion, when things looked very bad for one member of the family, Abuelita Méndez encouraged her great granddaughter by saying "Donde menos se piensa, salta la liebre" ("When you least expect it, a rabbit jumps out"). Who among us has not been startled by that very event? It's true: you never know what'll happen next.

When that same great granddaughter expressed frustration over her mother's habit of getting into trouble, Sra. Méndez defended her, saying, "Mejor libre albedrío que vivir en las sombras" ("Free will is better than living in shadows").

Indeed, the formidable Abuelita Méndez is seldom far from an appropriate dicho. She is known for speaking, and acting, when the time is right ("en caliente y de repente”) ("striking when the iron is hot")!

Here are some more dichos that are surely in her repertoire:

Del dicho al hecho hay mucho trecho. (From saying to doing, it's a long way, i.e., it's easier said than done)

En la tierra de los ciegos, el tuerto es rey. (In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.)

Gato maulador, pobre cazador. (A meowing cat is a poor hunter, i.e., a big talker is a little doer)

Un poquito de veneno no mata. (A little poison won't kill you, i.e., food, drink, etc., in moderation is OK)

Más vale onza de prudencia que onza de ciencia. (An ounce of common sense is worth more than an ounce of science.)

El que quiere celestre, que le cueste. (He who wants it easy finds it hard, i.e., the hard way is the easy way)

Con la vara que midas, serás medido. (With the stick that you measure, you will be measured, i.e., judge as you would be judged)

En boca cerrada no entran moscas. (Flies don't enter a closed mouth.)

Amor con amor se paga. (Love is repaid with love.)

MORE Mexican-American Dichos

A sampling of Mexican-American nursery rhymes

MORE Mexican-American nursery rhymes, games, songs

Mexican-American-Extraterrestrial Language Games

Meet Ana Darcy!

Cats! Time for some caracals!

2011-05-09T20:00:00.001-05:00

Raisin, the Méndez family's majestic caracal, is doing well as far as we know. Despite her keen, predatory appearance, she's actually a calm, sweet-tempered cat, unless alarmed.

Caracals, natives of Africa, are exceedingly rare elsewhere, even in zoos. When we asked at our local veterinarian's office if anyone knew what a caracal was, no one did! Yet they make good pets, provided one can make allowances for them, and there are licensed breeders who can provide them to qualifying customers. One of these is Julie's Jungle, in Florida. Anyone curious as to what special accommodations the mid-size cats require of an owner should go to the information page on her website.

Here are some photos of caracal kittens of various ages and several adults, from Julie's breeding stock, we believe. (Right click for the full size photos.) It's worth noting how all Julie's animals get along with each other, just as some cats can get along with some dogs. As with humans, proper upbringing is key.

Thanks, Julie!

(See more caracals, servals, lynxes, and house cats in the column to the right, under the photo of the blue-eyed Siamese kitty-->)

Meet Ana Darcy!

Distant Cousin Apps Coming Soon!

2011-05-04T16:58:00.000-05:00

Ana Darcy's stories are coming to an app near you!

Thanks to ScrollMotion, the largest developer of branded apps in the iTunes App Store, the Distant Cousin books will be available as individual mobile apps in the largest app marketplaces, for distribution to smart phones, tablets and other mobile devices, including Apple, Android, Windows Phone 7 and WebOS.

The apps seamlessly combine the wonderful experience of reading books and moble devices. For all those times when you find yourself stuck with nothing to do, now you never need to be bored. It's a unique reading experience!

Watch the trailer!

One app reader comments:

I started Distant Cousin…on my iPhone. Now the pitiful Cowboys are playing and they’re not acting as pitiful as usual so I’m reading your book and watching the ‘Boys off and on. Hubby’s on the sofa and I’m in my comfy chair behind him and he hears me occasionally laughing. He finally asks me what I’m laughing about and I tell him about how I don’t care for anything except stories about normal people and you assured me your book was very normal and that I’d like it so I'm reading it.

Now it’s getting about supper time and we’re hungry. When we do takeout our usual MO is I do the ordering, I drive and my husband goes in and gets the food. Meanwhile, my phone battery is starting to run down so while my husband goes in to get our dinner I am sitting in the car with the engine running, phone plugged in and I’m STILL READING YOUR BOOK!

I love Darcy. I can’t wait to see what happens next. It is indeed a page turner, a cute and funny book with lots of laugh-out-loud parts. You were right. I like it! I just thought I’d let you know that it’s been a fun read and I am thoroughly enjoying it.

Another delicious variation on Mexican frijoles

2011-05-01T20:30:00.001-05:00

There have to be a million variations of the savory, nutricious basic Mexican dish centered around pinto beans. We have already covered the recipe used by a chuckwagon cook in the old cattle drive days, here, and we have mentioned a less-spicy, dialed back version for those who might prefer a less hearty, more side dish-like, recipe.

Now we're going to go back to the original recipe, but using Anasazi beans, as recommended by one commenter under the original recipe. These are supposedly the beans cultivated by the original Anasazi Indians, of the famous cliff dwellings in the four corners area. We can't verify that, but we can verify that they are smaller than pinto beans, and far more cute. Their taste is still savory, a little more delicate than pintos, with a silky texture.

Again going back to the original recipe, for peppers we have used chili piquines, the tiny, berry-like peppers that grow wild over much of Texas and New Mexico. They are hotter than fire, however, so we used only about a dozen for a pound of beans, resulting in a low-heat factor that shouldn't scare off the timid.

Notice that these peppers, dried after being harvested, need to be ground before being added to the pot. The traditional Mexican way to do this is with a molcahete (from Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs) and mano, made from rough volcanic rock. It's a country cousin to the mortar and pestle, more or less, and it is also useful in quickly pulverizing other spices too. They are probably available from specialty cooking stores.

The original, historic chuckwagon Méndez family frijole recipe

The milder version

Meet Ana Darcy!

(More recipes in the right column, beneath the photo of cranberry/apple pie a la mode)

A Mysterious Cat Poem about Jeoffry from the Eighteenth Century

2011-04-24T22:20:00.001-05:00

We still cannot say why Ana, from another planet and completely unfamiliar with cats, should be so taken by them, or why cats should be so taken by her. It's a mystery, and one that Ana acknowledges. She even likes poems about cats, as some of those collected here* will show. She was delighted when her husband Matt found this one for her, by Christopher Smart ((1722-1751), about his cat Joeffry. It's a part of a longer poem by Smart called Jubilate Agno, which he wrote in part while institutionalized. To this day, it turns up in freshman literature anthologies, and it continues to be enjoyed for its strange imagery and, well, mystery. Ana too finds it mysterious, though it's no easier for her to explain than it is for the average college freshman. She just knows she likes it. Perhaps you will too.

For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.

For he is the servant of the Living God duly and daily serving him.

For at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his Way.

For this is done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness.

For then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his prayer

...

For when his day's work is done his business more properly begins.

For he keeps the Lord's watch in the night against the adversary.

For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life

...

For he is the cleanest in the use of his forepaws of any quadruped.

For the dexterity of his defence is an instance of the love of God to him exceedingly.

For he is the quickest to his mark of any creature.

For he is tenacious of his point.

For he is a mixture of gravity and waggery.

For he knows that God is his Saviour.

For there is nothing sweeter than his peace when at rest.

For there is nothing brisker than his life when in motion

...

For God has blessed him in the variety of his movements.

For, tho he cannot fly, he is an excellent clamberer.

For his motions upon the face of the earth are more than any other quadrupede.

For he can tread to all the measures upon the musick

For he can swim for life.

For he can creep.

Learning peace from a cat

The world's oldest cat poem

A love poem for a cat

Nursery rhyme with kittens

A poem about two cats

Explaining relativity to a cat
Meet Ana Darcy!

Distant Cousin: Meet Ana Darcy!

2011-04-18T21:18:00.008-05:00

The short video clip above gives an idea of Ana's basic story, but there is much, much more to Ana. She's unforgettable, and perhaps for that reason, hard to describe.

As readers of the books well know, Ana was born on the planet Thomo, and now lives on Earth. People find her history fascinating, and that's partly what her books are about. What readers may NOT know is that Ana has answered questions directly from readers. These contain information that those who only read the books do not know. In that post, Ana talks about the experience of coming to Earth, her religious beliefs, her native language, Luvit, the mysterious creatures who took her ancestors to Thomo from Earth millennia ago, notable Thomans from history, the planet Thomo and its creatures, her impressions of Earth's cultures, and, perhaps surprisingly, why she married "that slug, Matt" (in the words of one reader). All her responses are here. Even if you know Ana from her stories, you might see another side of her in these responses.

On the other side of the matter, here is a collection of readers' impressions of Ana as well as of others in her stories:

"Ana Darcy is one of my favorite characters."

"Thanks, Al, for some wonderful books. It's always a pleasure to read a book where the character is so "fleshed out" that I feel I would know him/her if I met them on the street. Not only would I know them, I'd have to invited them to lunch so we could chat!"

"I love the Distant Cousin characters, they feel like family to me, I am interested in their lives, I worry about them, and I just adore them. I think I've said this about each book, but I think this one [DC5] is my favorite!"

"I just finished book 3 and can hardly wait for the next to see what happens next. I have thoroughly enjoyed {them}....I loved Ana Darcy. She is a very believable heroine."

"Ana Darcy (Anneyn Darshiell) – the initial human envoy from a distant world populated by “cousins” to our species – is both the most famous person on Earth and also a private individual who wants what most women want: a family, a home, and a meaningful life. The Distant Cousin series explores Darcy’s arrival on Earth, her meteoric rise to fame, her impact on world politics and technology...it seems that no one who meets this woman remains untouched by her...."

"What a fascinating concept you have developed."

"These are excellent books and are at a very good price. The first volume made my Top 10 list for 2009."

"...there are only a few books that I tend to think about or miss the characters after reading so that says a lot about your book!"

"I just finished reading Distant Cousin. Although science fiction usually is not my favorite genre, I enjoyed the novel very much. It was not overly technical, and mixed romance in nicely with the story of the extra-terrestrial. Also the book was driven more by character than by plot, which is something that I like. I am looking forward to reading more about Darcy and Matt. Thank you for writing their story."

*
Ana speaks about her planet, religion, history, life, and impressions of Earth

What Ana First Saw

Readers comment

You suck!

Excerpts from Distant Cousin

Distant Cousin for Kindle

Distant Cousin at Amazon (paper)

Distant Cousin at Barnes and Noble (paper)

Distant Cousin at Barnes and Noble for Nook

Distant Cousin for other e-readers & computers

Readers, and Writers, Weigh In

2011-04-17T20:47:00.000-05:00

It's almost always a pleasure to hear from readers. (There are rare exceptions.) Most readers don't bother to contact the author of a book they like, understandably, but some do. This is made easy in some cases because Ana's editor, a reader himself, is a member of several online reading groups where he and other readers and authors interact amicably. Some readers are downright chatty, commenting from time to time while they are in the process of reading a book. It's enjoyable to sample the different perspectives through which readers experience a story. Some recent samples might be of interest.

From a reader whose Kindle battery needed charging:

I started Distant Cousin…on my iPhone. Now the pitiful Cowboys are playing and they’re not acting as pitiful as usual so I’m reading your book and watching the ‘Boys off and on. Hubby’s on the sofa and I’m in my comfy chair behind him and he hears me occasionally laughing. He finally asks me what I’m laughing about and I tell him about how I don’t care for anything except stories about normal people and you assured me your book was very normal and that I’d like it so I'm reading it.

Now it’s getting about supper time and we’re hungry. When we do takeout our usual MO is I do the ordering, I drive and my husband goes in and gets the food. Meanwhile, my phone battery is starting to run down so while my husband goes in to get our dinner I am sitting in the car with the engine running, phone plugged in and I’m STILL READING YOUR BOOK!

I love Darcy. She and Mr. Hernandez are heading east, have just passed the Border Patrol checkpoint and I can’t wait to see what happens next. It is indeed a page turner, a cute and funny book with lots of laugh-out-loud parts. You were right. I like it!

I just thought I’d let you know that it’s been a fun read and I am thoroughly enjoying it."

[Days later] I'm almost finished with your book. Loving it. It's taken me a bit longer than usual .... It seems once I start reading I "suddenly" find a couple of hours have passed before I realize it.... It is truly well written. I love the dialogue. So down to earth with things I hear every day. It's been a truly fun read.

From a reader and outdoorsman:

I’m the dude...that told you a couple months ago I would have an opinion on “Distant Cousin” in a couple days. Sorry it took so long… I had to go through the entire series.

Well done sir. I was entertained.

I have read a lot of science fiction in the past, and this had a completely different (and believable) spin. It lacked the 'techno babble' that I often enjoy, but, if we can’t understand gravity propulsion anyway I suppose it is not necessary to explain it. The series was a compelling, heartwarming and sometimes scary page turner.

From a retired teacher:

I am on page 254 and I just started yesterday afternoon. I'm killing my back by constant reading but only put it down long enough to go to church and a short party last night.

Has this been made into a screenplay yet? I ordered it from Amazon a while ago but it has been at the bottom of my pile of books. Silly me!

[Two days later] I thought that I would just read DC1 and that would be the end of it. HA! Now I really need to reconsider a Kindle because your books aren't in our library.

For a person who never wanted anything to do with fantasy or science fiction I have come a long way! It helps that I'm fascinated by linguistics, harpsichords, geography and sympathetic characters. ....Thanks for writing such a great novel!

A reader from an online readers' group:

I have flown through nine chapters tonight and I am not bored yet. I did take a break to watch the end of NCIS. Sorry, gotta run. A book is calling me back. I will get a few more chapters in tonight and then get to bed. Have to be at work by 6:30 in the morning.

[The next day] Unfortunately I am at work now, but I will struggle to find the time to read another chapter or two

[The day after that] Just finished "Distant Cousin". I am hooked. Guess I will download the next adventure and begin reading today. Thanks for such enjoyable reading....My money was well spent. Thanks.

From a newspaper publisher:

I really appreciated your craftsmanship in writing Distant Cousin. Maybe it was because...I was reading it with something more of a critical eye toward how you were writing than I normally would in simple pleasure reading. ...at times I caught myself looking at it like a creative writing project.... Ultimately, I couldn't decide if you were inside my head or I was inside yours. Either way, it was good fun and I thank you for sharing Darcy's story with me.

From a romance author:

I loved the storyline for Distant Cousin. I fell in love with Ana Darcy. Sometimes she seemed to be quite immature for someone who is supposedly almost a hundred years old. But then I got to wondering how I would react if I was suddenly alone in an unfamiliar world light years away from my home planet with no way of escaping. I would probably curl up in a fetal position and pull the covers over my head. But Ana survived and in a grand way.

From an author acquaintance:

Just a quick note to let you know that I enjoyed Distant Cousin and found it quite absorbing. I really admire your ability to invent--at least I assume you're inventing, but maybe you have more experience with extraterrestrials than I know about! In any case, I know I couldn't have pulled off an ambitious project like that. The last part, by the way, was a pleasant surprise. I was wondering where you could go after the second part wound down, but suddenly I was swept away on a new adventure. And obviously you've managed to construct a lot more of those in the ensuing books....

Another reader from an online readers' group:

Once I start one of your books, I don't want to put it down. That's why I haven't read DC5 yet. Seems as if I've been too busy to prevent having to read it in small increments, and I don't like reading your books that way. They deserve my full attention.

From a former college administrator:

I'm on book three, having read one and two and can't put it down, nor could I the others. You really know how to draw in the reader. You have gained a fan.

More comments:

"You suck!" Part 1

"You suck!" Part 2

A reader cries in public

A bride's complaint

Reading while commuting

Other writers opine

A reader's life is changed for the better

Ana Discovers One of the World's First Cat Poems!

2011-04-14T20:14:00.001-05:00

Ana is an enthusiastic student of ancient history, which makes sense, given the ancient people she comes from. Unfortunately, they left no record of themselves, being nomads and illiterate, but since her people's language has been tied to both the Germanic and Slavic branches of the Indo-European language family, she has taken special interest in the most ancient histories of both groups.

She was fascinated by a documentary about the Book of Kells, the gorgeous eighth century illuminated book of hours that is the treasure of Trinity College in Dublin. The book is one of the world's greatest works of art, but Ana was especially interested in the part of the documentary that described how the monks had gone about creating it. It mentioned in passing an early Irish penman who, in some idle moments, wrote a poem comparing his own work to those of his cat, Pangur Ban. ("Pangur" was a not uncommon cat name. "Ban" is thought to be ancient Gaelic for "white.")

Later, after a little research, Matt was able to present her with a translation of the entire poem. Ana carefully added it to the poetry notebook she keeps with her volumes of favorite poetry.

(Anyone wishing to know more could do worse than to start with the Wikipedia article on the Book of Kells.)

Pangur Ban

I and Pangur Ban, my cat,
'Tis a like task we are at;
Hunting mice is his delight,
Hunting words I sit all night.

Better far than praise of men
'Tis to sit with book and pen;
Pangur bears me no ill will;
He, too, plies his simple skill.

'Tis a merry thing to see
At our task how glad are we,
When at home we sit and find
Entertainment to our mind.

Oftentimes a mouse will stray
Into the hero Pangur's way;
Oftentimes my keen thought set
Takes a meaning in its net.

'Gainst the wall he sets his eye
Full and fierce and sharp and sly;
'Gainst the wall of knowledge I
All my little wisdom try.

When a mouse darts from its den.
O how glad is Pangur then!
O what gladness do I prove
When I solve the doubts I love!

So in peace our tasks we ply,
Pangur Ban, my cat and I;
In our arts we find our bliss,
I have mine, and he has his.

Practice every day has made
Pangur perfect in his trade ;
I get wisdom day and night,
Turning darkness into light.'

(See more of the poems that Ana loves in the column on the right, under the picture of the LOVE sculpture.)

Meet Ana Darcy!

Early Reading and Bilingualism (4)

2011-04-10T20:40:00.001-05:00

Young children who are learning to speak can also learn to read. That's a given (see 1, 2, & 3), but we cannot provide a detailed explanation of how to do it here. Instead, we will offer some preliminary considerations, an overview of the process, and some ways to find more help for those so inclined.

The first and most important consideration is to stress how important it is for the parents or other persons involved NOT to feel that they are actually "teaching," or that a schedule should be followed, or that the child WILL learn to read whether he or she wants to or not. Those notions will make the process unpleasant for the child and likely lead to failure. The learning experience should be fun for the child (and the parent), not a series of pass/fail tests. It should be conducted like a game, with laughter, smiles, and joking around. The parents should be thinking of empowering the child, NOT enabling him or her to get into a better school eventually or amaze the neighbors. Small children love to be empowered--any parent knows the delight in a child's voice when he or she reads "Stop" on a stop sign, or "Kentucy Fried Chicken" while driving by a fast food establishment. That's the kind of delight children should have when reading word cards.

So, assuming that the parents are the sort who enjoy the company of their young children at least periodically, then we can move to word cards. There has always been a controversy about the virtues of the "whole word" method of reading instruction versus "phonics." This controversy thrives in elementary schools, with six and seven year olds and older, and will not be reviewed here. Instead, we'll describe a demonstration we used with college students.

The students were instructed to look at a screen where a word would appear for perhaps one quarter of a second. The first word was "terrific." Every student, as soon as the word disappeared, instantly said it out loud: "terrific!" Then they were told to wait for another word. This word was "syzygy." After it disappeared, the classroom buzzed with the sound of students saying "sssss," "zzzz," "sizzy," and so forth, all laughing. When the word was put back on the screen, some actually figured out how to pronounce it. Here's the point: when they read the word "terrific," they were actually reading--getting the meaning from the symbols instantly, without thinking about it. That's what we do when we read. But when they came to an unfamiliar word, they had to proceed a letter or syllable at a time, maybe getting the meaning in the process or maybe not. That's NOT reading--that's decoding. That's phonics. We all use phonics when we're stuck, but that's not an efficient way to extract meaning from printed language. The whole word method is how we read, whole words or whole phrases at a glance, or even, in proficient readers, whole sentences. And that's how little children best start to read.

We've known parents who use card stock, or cardboard, to make word cards, word cards with single words in large, easy to see letters, words that hold special meaning for their toddlers, like their own names, their words for their parents and siblings, pets, and so forth. (See the photo above.) Children of two or three who are beginning to talk two and three words at a time are ready to try this. It's important not to go too fast. Start with one card the first couple of days, and read it for the child. If the child eventually reads it before it is read for him or her, there should be a general celebration followed by the second card, which is also read for the child. When he or she can differentiate between them, bring out the third card. If the child is distracted or not interested, then postpone any further sessions for several months. You will know when the child is ready to continue when you see their delight.

The children we are familiar with soon get the hang of this process, and even request (or demand) other words be written for them: favorite foods, people, animals, all sorts of unpredictable things. Always stop before the child wants to; don't overload him or her with new words. One or two a day is the limit. The size of the word doesn't matter. "Great grandmother" is easily read. At first, children will recognize words by their first letter, or the presence of double letters, or maybe their overall length, or even by a splash of grape juice on one corner of the card. That doesn't matter.

Eventually, they will be able to read 40 or 50 words, and confusion will set in. This is good! One child had a devil of a time differentiating hand, head, and hair. She first learned hair, because "it has a dot." That left hand and head, which required some extra study. Eventually, she figured out which was which on her own, with the help of her mother's hints. This is exactly how children learn to speak as well--by practicing, studying, and trying again. It's crucial that they not be criticized for their miscues. It's a game. It should be fun.

At some point, perhaps between 50 and 100 word cards, their eyes will be getting accustomed to the letters, and the size of the letters can be reduced to one inch. Parents can create fun activities: flash card games, words laid out on the floor (to accustom the child to left-to-right reading), nonsense sentences, or even sentences of the child's creation. Children can even dictate entire stories which can be written out on card stock for reading later, on their own. One child loved a game where she was given a card that said "There is a pretzel under your pillow," or "Find the cookie on your bed." She learned to take the card along on her search, to consult in case she forgot a crucial detail. Thus she learned, by age four, that writing could lead to food!

As it happened, Ana and Matt Méndez used word cards with their children, for both English and Spanish, only being careful to conduct a single session in one language. They were delighted when three year old Julio, for example, saw the word "pato" and said "duck," or saw "table" and said "mesa!" He understood the meaning of the word instantly, but spoke it in whatever language came to him first. That is real reading: getting the meaning from print instantly. It was not a mistake! (When they got to the sentence stage, this no longer happened.) Both children were soon able to read themselves to sleep in two languages. Unfortunately, however, the Méndez family was unfamiliar with the different alphabets of the other languages their nannies used, so they weren't able to use word cards for them

Several of the parents mentioned in the examples above used a simple, inexpensive book as a guide: How To Teach Your Baby to Read, by Glen Doman. It's still in print (with a co-author), along with myriad other titles promising to give children superior brains. We can't recommend any but the basic book. Parents can easily create their own word cards without paying for commercially prepared materials. We are intrigued, however, by Teach Your Baby Math, also by Glen Doman. If it seems that learning mathematics is too difficult for a young child, we disagree. Basic math is simpler than language: it's completely logical and there are no exceptions! If we had a two or three year old handy, we would try this ourselves. (We wonder if some of the unfavorable reviews for those books might be from demanding parents who set goals and had expectations for their children. We don't know...but we wonder.)

In any case, teaching small children to read in two languages is a good way to help them become bilingual. Each case will depend on many variables. Clearly, it's best if at least one parent is bilingual, the more fluent the better. A child who is even partially bilingual at an early age will have an advantage later on should the opportunity present. As long as the parent-child sessions are no pressure, fun occasions, they will be time well spent, for both parents and their children.

Ana's Children and Bilingualism (1)

Earthly Children and Bilingualism (2)

Bilingual and Biliterate Toddlers: Preliminaries (3)

And now, let's consider early math education!

Bilingual and Biliterate Toddlers: Some Preliminaries (3)

2011-04-09T22:38:00.002-05:00

First, a bit of background on child language acquisition. Children learn to speak mostly on their own. They are not "taught" in any conventional sense. They practice incessantly, make and correct mistakes, and in only a few short years become native speakers, figuring out how their language works all by themselves.

If you have ever heard a child say something like "The dog bited me," that's a bit of evidence of this. Children don't copy adults saying that because adults don't say that. Such a mistake shows the child has figured out how past tense works in English (for regular verbs, at least) and applies it to an irregular verb. If it's a mistake, it's a very good one. We have similarly heard a young child say in Spanish "Yo sabo la respuesta" ("I know the answer"), which is a regularization of an irregular Spanish verb. (The correct, irregular, form is "Yo sé la respuesta.") Both "mistakes" are clues that each child has figured out how verbs work...normally. They are actually excellent mistakes.

Any parent knows that young children are ferocious, instatiable learners. The best thing a parent can do is encourage them and let them learn, all the while keeping them out of the knife drawer and high traffic areas. Ana Darcy Méndez, and the people of Thomo, her planet, knew this well. That's why Ana hired bilingual nannies (in DC2), and later, private tutors for her children in a variety of fields (in DC3). (If only more of us could do that!)

Young children are especially gifted at learning languages, though this ability fades into adulthood. If you attempted a foreign language in high school or college, you probably felt remarkably ungifted. You were too old! You'd have done better at age three!

Now we must make a biological point. Where in the body is language actually learned? In the brain, obviously. How does language get to the brain? Via nervous impulses, of course. The brain receives these nervous impulses from all over the body: from the eyes, from the ears, the nose, the skin, the tongue--all in the same "format," via the nervous system.

The point is that, as far as the brain is concerned, language can be aural (via the ears), or visual, via the eyes. (It can even be tactile, through the fingers: braille.) Printed language IS language, just as spoken language is. To the brain, it's all nerve signals. So if small children are such gifted learners of spoken language, why aren't they also gifted learners of printed language?

It turns out that the reason more children don't learn to read at very young ages is that the letters are too small. Compare cat and eat. What is the difference between those two sets of letters? It's the difference between the letters c and e, one tiny line: -. That's all. It's hard to see if you don't know what to look for. Normal children have excellent eyesight. They can spot a tiny spider across a room--but give them a confusing jumble of letters and it's hard to tell cat from eat. Solution: make the letters BIG, especially at first. Train their eyes! They'll figure out the c/e problem, like they figure out the rest of the language, on their own.

The bottom line is that tiny children who are learning spoken language can indeed learn to read that language too, at the same time and in the same way, without being conventionally taught. And, just as those children fortunate enough to be around two spoken languages can learn to speak them both, they can also learn to read them both--at the same time and in the same way.

The next post will provide a brief explanation of the process and some hints for those interested in pursuing early bilingual reading.

Bilingualism 1: Ana & Matt's Children

Bilingualism 2: Extraterrestrials and the Rest of Us

Bilingualism and Early Bilingual Reading 4

Meet Ana Darcy!

Raising Bilingual Children: Extraterrestrials and the Rest of Us: 2

2011-04-07T21:45:00.004-05:00

It isn't difficult for bilingual parents to raise bilingual children. All they have to do is speak to their children in both languages, and the kids will do the rest. It can be a challenge, however, for parents who are not bilingual to raise bilingual children.

The matter is eased if there are other people present, including other children, who speak the second language. The more they are present, the easier it will be. But if their presence cannot be counted upon, or is sporadic, then the results may be disappointing.

Ana and Matt Méndez wanted their children to be at least bilingual, and Ana's determination, plus their fortunate circumstances, made this possible. They hired nannies, and Ana made sure all the nannies, in addition to their other qualifications, were native speakers of other languages...and that they spoke to the children in those languages.

Ana didn't realize that this was not enough contact to ensure complete acquisition, and with no further contact the children lost most of the languages they were exposed to as they grew older. They retained some familiarity with several, notably Hindi, which is probably enough to give them a head start should they decide to try again later in life. Their experience with Arabic, Japanese, Chinese, and Korean, all from other than the Indo-European family of languages, did not take.

Most of us do not have the option of hiring bilingual nannies, of course, yet there are other ways non-native speakers can help their infant children gain another language. We are familiar with one Texas family which succeeded. Both parents were native English speakers, but both learned Spanish later in life. One parent was fairly fluent, the other less so, but neither had experience in the household, intimate family Spanish that would be spoken around children. They realized they couldn't expect their children to learn to speak like a student in a graduate Spanish literature class!

Their solution was to teach the children to read in two languages. It makes sense! There are countless children's books in Spanish. Libraries have hundreds of them. They can be purchased in grocery stores and other stores all over town--and they contain native-quality Spanish, useful vocabulary, attractive illustrations, and are designed for young readers. For this family, the books, plus the spoken efforts of the parents, occasional contact with Spanish speaking children, and Spanish kid shows on public television, produced young people fluent enough to place out of Spanish in high school and college and go on to learn other languages easily.

The next question, to be sure, is How do you teach toddlers to read?

It turns out not to be difficult at all. That will be the subject of the next post.

(The photo above shows a youngster from another English dominant family, who has also learned Spanish, putting himself to sleep by reading a children's book in Spanish, a skill his mother helped him acquire and that he enjoys to this day. He is also, at the age of seven, interested in learning French.)

Bilingualism, part 1

Bilingual & Biliterate Toddlers: Some Preliminaries (3)

Early Reading and Bilingualism (4)

Meet Ana Darcy!

Bilingualism And Ana and Matt's Children: 1

2011-04-04T21:21:00.003-05:00

Every year or two, it seems, society rediscovers the benefits of teaching young children to speak two or more languages. Fifty years ago, it was commonly thought that doing this would confuse toddlers horribly--despite the abundant evidence of happy, unconfused bilingual children all around the doubters, and all over the world. Many still think exposing toddlers to two (or more) languages is a bad idea.

But the conventional wisdom, if that's what it is, is wrong. There is plenty of scholarly documentation to indicate bilingual children are better off than monolingual children in many ways, including and especially in brain development and flexibility. Countless parents and children have realized this themselves, on their own.

Presently, the Méndez family lives in New Mexico, where bilingualism is probably more common than not, and there's little controversy about the advantages of raising bilingual children. The state Ana first landed in, Texas, is considerably behind New Mexico in that regard, though improving slowly. Any Spanish teacher in one of Texas' many community colleges is familiar with Hispanic students trying to learn Spanish as adults, after their parents made sure to raise them speaking only the dominant language, English.

A similar situation holds for other Texans of ethnic heritage: Czech Texans, German Texans, Polish Texans, Swedish Texans, and many others. They have lost their ancestral language, even though the ability to speak it would not hamper their functioning in an English-speaking society. Instruction in Czech, to give just one example, is offered in high schools and under continuing education programs in the central part of the state. Nearly all the students are second, third, or fourth generation children of immigrants who abandoned their first language at some point. Now, their children want to reconnect. It is possible to hear Czech spoken now in stores and on the streets of central Texas towns: La Grange, Praha (yes, Praha), Moravia (yes, Moravia, Texas), Schulenberg, Shiner, German in Fredericksburg, and so forth.

In addition to the benefits of bilingualism to the individual, the benefits to society are also worth mentioning. Just ask the same Spanish professor mentioned above: who is studying Spanish nowadays? Answer: business people, medical personnel, law enforcement people, all sorts of people. It's a practical, marketable skill. Check the increasing number of students now studying Mandarin Chinese and Arabic. A multilingual populace is an obvious national asset.

But back to toddlers. No one really "teaches" babies a language. They learn language on their own, over just a few years. It's almost a miracle: they acquire whatever languages are spoken around them, painlessly and perfectly. Adults seldom learn a second language perfectly, but children become native speakers.

The record for a child learning languages, as far as Ana's editor is aware, is nine, by a child of British diplomats in India. His parents, his grandparents, his teacher, his nanny spoke different languages, and he learned them all--without having headaches or nightmares. He retained only several into adulthood, but later he remembered that at the time, he thought it was simply necessary to speak differently to different people. His parents took him shopping when he was four, to act as interpreter. It was no problem!

So how do monolingual parents raise bilingual children? That's a good question. It can be done. We will address that in another post very soon.

Earthly Children and Bilingualism (2)

Bilingual & Biliterate Toddlers: Preliminaries (3)

Early Reading and Bilingualism (4)

Meet Ana Darcy!

More Kitties! A Caracal, a Lynx, and Servals!

2011-03-30T22:19:00.001-05:00

We haven't put up kitty pictures lately. Here is a caracal, a lynx, and two fun-loving servals from Julie's Jungle. Thanks, Julie! Raised from a bottle, these gorgeous animals are just like regular house cats...only bigger, about five times bigger.

Note: The Méndez family has a caracal, featured in Distant Cousin: Regeneration and Distant Cousin: Recirculation.

See many other cats in the right column under the photo of the blue-eyed Siamese

Meet Ana Darcy!

Another Look at Those Arpilleras from Ecuador

2011-03-23T21:49:00.001-05:00

People--not just Ana--have been interested in this unusual textile art form from Ecuador. In the previous post on the subject, it may not have been clear just how three-dimensional they are. They are, in effect, miniature sculptures in textiles (with a few other inclusions). Here are front and side views of two arpilleras: a farmacia (pharmacy) and an orange harvest. You can see that each figure is a separate creation, actually a miniature fabric doll, added to many others to create a view of the artist's society and culture. (Click to enlarge. Enlarging the side views gives an especially good view of the handiwork involved.)

Ana's Discovery of Arpilleras

A Poem About Gravity, and Some Heavy Thoughts

2011-03-16T22:36:00.001-05:00

Ana was delighted to find a poem about gravity, and the center thereof. She loved discussing it with her husband. Matt had to show her what a "military Jeep" was (which the poem points out had a high center of gravity), and he had to sketch a picture of an ottoman (which has a low center of gravity). Neither knew that "gravidanza" was the Italian word for pregnancy. Ana was amused by that, and also by the Spanish word for the same condition, "embarazada," which erroneously suggests "embarrassed" to an English speaker.

She was also intrigued by the connotations "gravity" has for human behavior--the absence of which, in a person, the poet calls "flightiness." These connotations are not present in Luvit, her native language, and discussing them constituted a mini-lesson in some of the fine points of English, yet another reason she enjoys poetry.

Earth astronomers, but far fewer of the general population, understand that the original elements of the universe were only three or so of the lighter ones. The more than a hundred heavier elements were generated in the furnaces of the stars, after the big bang. We humans, along with most of the Earth, including the animals and plants, are composed of these star-generated elements. Our elements are eternal: we are literally made of "star stuff," and our elements will be recycled, along with our planet, our sun, and our universe, in the immeasurable course of celestial time. Ana's people not only know this, they celebrate it. The Thoman epic poem about Ana, The Eternal Circle, exalts this process.

That's why Ana liked the conclusion of the poem, the notion that people should have a "center of gravity." She agrees with the poet that the end of life is the "most perfect center of gravity ever."

The Center of Gravity. by Ron Padgett

The Poem at the Center of Ana

Taking a walk in the universe

Meet Ana Darcy!

(See more of Ana's favorite poems in the column on the right, under the LOVE sculpture.)

Ana's Brain Is Filled with Frisks, and a Duet From Bach You Can Play With a Friend

2011-03-13T20:00:00.003-05:00

Why would an extraterrestrial love our music? We've mentioned elsewhere that Ana dearly loves fugues. She tries to follow all the different voices, but usually gets lost in a shiver of wonderment. But that's the point. Those are the "frisks" that fill Ana's brain (among others).

Here's a three-part fugue that's one of Ana's favorites, played by Ton Koopman. It's an outstanding performance. See if you can hear the three melodies interlacing with each other. Just watching his hands play two different melodic threads while he simultaneously plays a third with his feet is disorienting enough. How can humans do this? (By practicing a lot, for one thing.)

Ana's editor, your humble servant, is a musician, but not, unfortunately, on the keyboard. He was a trumpeter in his salad days. He always wanted to be able to take part in playing a fugue, and he finally figured out how to do it: arrange a fugue as a duet for two instruments. A book of his arrangements was his first venture into publishing. It's still in print and still prized by lovers of challenging baroque music.

It so happens that he arranged this same Bach "Little Fugue in g minor," BWV 578, for two treble clef instruments. Yes, it's a three-part fugue--one of the parts was left out, but it's still clearly the same piece of terrific music, and great good fun to play with a duet buddy. You won't feel anything is missing.

This is it, below, a free sample from the book. You may right click it, print it, and call up your duet buddy for a jam session. We predict you'll have a ton of fun!

Where to order the book Baroque Duets

Why Ana Darcy loves fugues

A Bach musical palindrome that drives Ana crazy

The Bach piece Ana calls "the engine of the galaxy"

Ana's musical puzzle challenge

The answer to the musical puzzle

A note on the Distant Cousin theme song (NOT Bach)

Meet Ana Darcy!

Distant Cousin: Recirculation (DC5): Now Published!

2011-03-09T19:51:00.002-06:00

Ana Darcy (née Anneyn Darshiell) was such a famously rebellious teenager that she was willing, if a bit daunted, to leave her own planet forever on her people's greatest-ever voyage of discovery, to planet Earth. The story of what happened to her after that is told in Distant Cousin, volume 1.

Now, sixteen years after she has made a home on her new planet--her ancestral planet--it's her turn: she has her own teenagers to contend with. Like their mother before them, and teenagers everywhere, they are growing fast and becoming adventurous, though perhaps not quite as in control of themselves as their parents might hope. When each gets in trouble, how will Ana and Matt be able to care for them if Ana herself has disappeared halfway around the globe?

Distant Cousin: Recirculation (Amazon, paperback)

Distant Cousin: Recirculation (Amazon, Kindle edition)

Distant Cousin: Recirculation: Maps

Distant Cousin: Recirculation: Photos

Distant Cousin: Recirculation: Excerpt