By Melody J Haislip, on August 29th, 2011 Sablet Welcome to Maison des Pelerins
Maison des Pelerins and La Baume des Pelerins, or “les Pelerins,” as we affectionately refer to our dream come true, of owning our own home in Provence, are located in the heart of the Vaucluse. We wanted to be a part of village life, and Sablet was the perfect place for that. “Pelerins” is French for pilgrims.
Me: Marianne, details are a bit sparse in your BlogCatalog bio, and I have cribbed the above description from your blog. Will you tell us how a “California girl” like you came to live in a tiny Provençal village in France?
Marianne: We don’t exactly live there, rather we travel there, usually twice a year, for an immersion into a more relaxed way of life. During the 80s, my husband was working between London and Paris. He spoke French and I had always been interested in cooking, and especially French food, so it was a very natural affinity. In the summer of 1985, we first visited Provence on vacation and really loved the towns and villages there. The reason we chose a village and not a “house in the . . . → Read More: Living The Dream In Provence
By Melody J Haislip, on August 17th, 2011 Konway East, looking right at home on the red carpet.
From Konway’s bio: “Word on the street is that Konway’s page is where the cool kids all hang out.” Well, I’m a cool kid, so I decided to check it out, and …
My goodness, I just got lost on your blog for over an hour. I was reading post after post and leaving comments, when it suddenly struck me how in sympathy we are in our thoughts. In fact, so simpatico are we that I have put in a call to my yenta (matchmaker) and asked my astrologist to do our charts (I need your date, place and time of birth, please) to make sure that our union will truly be as blessed as I foresee.
Me: Konway, I went all the way back to your first post and found that you began your blog in April of 2010, and apparently never looked back. I’m always interested in learning how people discover their gift. Does this also mark the beginning of your writing career, or have you been a writer for much longer?
Konway: I don’t get paid enough . . . → Read More: Inside The Mind Of Konway East
By Melody J Haislip, on June 8th, 2011 Me: Helen, you call yourself an expat, but where did you begin life? What was your childhood like?
The Western Highlands of Scotland, under snow
Helen: I was born in Scotland and lived there until I was seven. Then my father moved to work in London, and we lived in Surrey, in a village which was then very green and peaceful and which has since become a hellhole of commuter housing.
I was an only child … and blessed that fact when playing with friends who had brothers and sisters … but every year I spent some time on my grandfather’s farm in Scotland. In summer the family would hire a row of cottages on the west coast of Scotland and all the kids would assemble there, with parents and other relatives taking it in turns to supervise us – which meant, in effect, perfect freedom!
At home, in Surrey, I used to take . . . → Read More: Scotland England France Costa Rica Follow Helen’s Journey
By Melody J Haislip, on May 23rd, 2011 Denise and family in the Colorado Rockies
Denise, BlogCatalog wants to introduce you and your writing to the BC family and to the world. I have read several of your stories, and it was love at first sight. I find your ideas and your style so in sympathy with mine that I know we’d have lots to talk about. Like I’m sure if I ever met Dolly Parton, we’d end up in the kitchen talking over coffee. Some things you just know.
However, since this is all in my mind, and your new friends at BlogCatalog and I would like to know the real life you, I have some questions which I hope will allow us all to know you better.
Me: I found while I was reading over your blog that I was nodding my head in agreement. You are a consistently positive thinker, and the way you live your life spills over into your writing. Is this a natural technique, or was it a conscious decision that shaped your style?
Denise: My life has been a complicated yet interesting one. Although I was a child of divorce, and . . . → Read More: There’s More To Simply D Than Meets The Eye
By Melody J Haislip, on September 24th, 2010 Yesterday, the first part of the health care reform plan went into effect. Since HealthCare.gov summarizes the benefits beautifully, I hope you will forgive my cut-and-paste inclusion below. Please keep in mind as you read that, should the Republicans regain control of Congress, it is their stated plan to take away these new benefits.
Under the much-maligned “Obama Health Care” Plan:
Insurers Will No Longer Be Able To:
Deny coverage to kids with pre-existing conditions. Health plans cannot limit or deny benefits or deny coverage for a child younger than age 19 simply because the child has a pre-existing condition like asthma. Put lifetime limits on benefits. Health plans can no longer put a lifetime dollar limit on the benefits of people with costly conditions like cancer Cancel your policy without proving fraud. Health plans can’t retroactively cancel insurance coverage – often at the time you need it most – solely because you or your employer made an honest mistake on your insurance application. Deny claims without a chance for appeal. In new health plans, you now have the right to demand that your health plan reconsider a decision to deny payment for . . . → Read More: A New Day For Health Care
By Melody J Haislip, on June 29th, 2010 Image via Wikipedia
For the last six years, along with millions of others worldwide, I followed “Lost” almost religiously. I was there from the beach, to the caves, to the hatch. From the cages, to the present, through the atomic detonation, the sideways adventures, the loss of Jacob and Jack’s elevation to guardian of the island. All the way to the meeting in the church, Jack’s emotional reunion with his father and friends, through Jack’s final moments, the opening of the doors into the light, and the ending of this chapter in the lives of a group of people to whom I’d become extraordinarily attached.
The ending brought me to tears, and over the following two weeks, I found myself thinking of it again and again. I had saved the two-hour recap and the final episode, and I watched them once more, this time actually sobbing aloud for long minutes after the final scene had played out. The next day I went to Netflix and began watching the series from the beginning. Although I had to switch to Hulu to see Season 6, and to ABC.com in order to see the last few episodes . . . → Read More: Review Of Lost The Finale
By Melody J Haislip, on June 17th, 2010 In an unusual twist on a fairy-tale story, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, the two richest people in America, have joined forces in a campaign aimed at persuading other members of this most exclusive peer group of the super rich and famous, to pledge one-half of their respective fortunes to charity. If they’re able to accomplish their goal, the landscape of philanthropy will be changed out of all recognition. If the individuals on the Forbes 400 list of the wealthiest Americans could be cajoled into becoming a part of this effort, an approximation of half of their collective net worth could be as high as $600 Million, according to Fortune magazine.
Calling it, “The biggest fundraising drive in history,” Fortune, in an article posted June 16th, described the way the campaign began. A little more than a year ago Gates and Buffett, with a combined net worth of $90 Billion, held a secret dinner meeting in New York. Among the attendees were George Soros, hedge fund guru, talk-show host, Oprah Winfrey, media mogul Ted Turner, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and David Rockefeller, who was asked to act as host. The 95-year-old Rockefeller said . . . → Read More: A Real Life Fairy Tale
By Melody J Haislip, on June 13th, 2010 The story of 98-year-old Verna Oller, the “Secret Millionaire“, is all over the internet. “Secret Millionaire Leaves Entire Fortune to her Hometown”, trumpets the headline on Huffington Post. Intrigued, as I always am by this kind of story, I clicked on the picture of the sweet-faced Ms. Oller, where I learned that she had, indeed, left her $4.5 Million fortune to her hometown of Long Beach, Washington.
How did she accumulate such a fortune? Well for one thing, she preferred to cut her own hair, for free, rather than to pay a hairdresser. She was frugal, not to mention ingenious, creating her own bootlaces using the zipper from an old coat. Why buy new shoelaces when an elegant solution like that is available?
Showing her genius as a canny thrift store shopper, she returned and replaced for $2 the new coat given to her by old friends, Carolyn and Guy Glenn, and I have to admit that her reasoning is faultless. Why, indeed, pay more? Apparently a lot of her wardrobe came from thrift stores.
Simple, slow and steady, this was the path Verna Oller followed, working until she was in . . . → Read More: Angels Among Us
By Melody J Haislip, on May 28th, 2010 “Shattered”, Karen Robards’ latest bestseller, is another winner, and I’m thoroughly engrossed and more than halfway through. The heroine has already survived one near-death experience. She’s convinced someone is watching her and she’s in serious danger. However, she has yet to confide the whole story to her boss, with whom she’s been in love forever, and she continually puts herself in harm’s way with a single mindedness that in other circumstances would be truly admirable. Obsessed with the mystery surrounding her, plucky Lisa walks alone through the dark, echoing parking garage, and I take a little break to ask myself this question. Why do people ignore their inner early-warning system?
We are equipped with a sensitive array of detection devices. Our ears can pick up patterns in footsteps that tell us if we are being followed. Wind from the right direction brings our noses the scents of flesh, of sweat and tension and ill intent (with perhaps a hint of your pursuer’s cheap cologne). Our eyes offer us 180 degree views, with access to the rest at the turn of a neck. If taste buds could speak, they would tell of the millions of tiny . . . → Read More: Don’t Go Down In The Basement
By Melody J Haislip, on May 18th, 2010 Born January 8, 1942, Britain’s Stephen William Hawking, CH, CBE, FRS, FRSA, is one of the most famous theoretical physicists in the world. Who hasn’t seen a picture of the tiny, twisted husk that houses the brilliant intellect, will and spirit of this indomitable man? Among his many awards, is the Presidential Medal of Freedom. It’s the highest civilian award in the United States, presented to him in 2009 by President Barack Obama. What a pleasure to see two of my three favorite famous people together. If only the Dalai Lama could have been included, I don’t know if I could have survived it! I’m such a fan.
I don’t recall the first time I heard of Stephen Hawking, but in June of 1993, I was elated when he made a guest appearance on “Star Trek: The Next Generation”. The scene took place on the holodeck, where Data had gathered several historical characters for a game of poker. His opponents were Dr. Hawking, Albert Einstein, and Sir Isaac Newton. As the scientists argued good-naturedly, I thought, “What a man; all those brains and a sense of humor, too!”
Renowned for his towering intellect, . . . → Read More: Stephen Hawking the Man Behind the Legend
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