Green, green, green!

Hastily made replacement "Cat in the Hat" hat, for tomorrow's "Green Eggs and Ham" event at school. 16 March 2010.

By happenstance, the replacement hat wasn't needed...


"The Cat in the Hat" was a special guest at our school's "Green Eggs and Ham" event,
coincidentally - and serendipitously - falling on St Patrick's Day. 17 March 2010.


Sam-Am-I meets "The Cat in the Hat"

Cat in a hat in a tree

Commemorative "Cat in the Hat" pen with artificial bonsai tree.

These sit beside my work computer every day. I figure, why not share them?

"It's fun to have fun but you have to know how..." (The Cat in the Hat/Dr Seuss)

"They do not like it, not one little bit."

The title quote is adapted from the hapless fish's catchcry in "The Cat in the Hat" which, after today's national read-aloud at school to celebrate The Cat's 50th birthday, is at the forefront of my (temporarily) feline brain.



Over on the TrekBBS, someone has once again claimed that, rather than JJ Abrams helm a young-Kirk-and-Spock-at-the-Academy Star Trek film, he should be revisiting "the carnage of the Earth-Romulan War, right before the birth of the Federation (circa 2156-60) and have the entire film be one huge sendoff for Captain Archer".

Well, I'm sure something like that was Paramount's intention for the first ST motion picture after seven successful years of "Star Trek: Enterprise" on TV. But it wasn't to be. For four years (before cancellation), the "Enterprise" telvision audience was miniscule compared even to "Deep Space Nine" and "Voyager", and hardly a good starting point for a new set of films.

As someone who actually enjoyed "Enterprise" - and has enjoyed "Forbidden Planet", "Master and Commander", "Galaxy Quest", Daniel Craig in "Casino Royale", and JJ Abrams' "Lost", most of which have been mentioned in the TrekBBS posts as "good" entertainment - I am confident that the new ST film will be a critical and financial success.

I am utterly disappointed by some ST fans' incredibly negative attitude, so ready to quash any and all new ST production(s) before anything's even started filming. In the old days, they'd say it was 'cos Executive Producer of 18 years or so, Rick Berman, was still around at Paramount... But now, they reject new ST even without quoting that excuse. Whatever happened to IDIC (Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations") and ST fans' famous positive outlook for the future?

You know, if I was sitting through episodes of "Lost" every week and coming out of them saying, "Well, that was crap", I could understand their hesitation and lack of faith, but "Lost" is consistently strong on acting, writing, directing, sets, storytelling strategies and use of interactive advertising (via its website). JJ Abrams, director of ST XI, knows what he's doing.

If it's Thursday...

What a rewarding time at work today. Two Kindergarten classes made their first official visit to the school library and, as teacher-librarian, I gave them a compressed version of all the activities I've been doing with the Stage 1 classes (Years 1 and 2). The topic for the term is "Nursery Rhymes", so we did "Little Miss Muffet" (starring my battery-operated, black, hairy Bungee Spider - he drops down from his web and crawls back up again!), and "Hey, Diddle Diddle" (featuring my handmade cardboard finger puppets).

We followed up with a reading of The Cat in the Hat, because Kindergarten will be otherwise engaged tomorrow afternoon during the time assigned for the national read-aloud.

This afternoon, as school finished and the playground filled with departing children and parents, several of my little first-time visitors returned, cloth library bag slung over a shoulder, hand inside Mum's or Dad's hand, to wave goodbye to me at the library door. Ten minutes later, when I was in the back office, I heard the pitter patter of little feet. Another first-time library patron had entered to announce, "I just needed to say 'Goodbye'. Goodbye!" And back out he went, the way he'd come. So cute! I wonder if I've made as big an impression on these young lives as my first teacher-librarian, the wonderful Janette McKenny, later Janette Mercer (when she married my Year 4 teacher, Milton Mercer!) did for me in 1967?

Tonight, the Sydney Star Trek Meetup Group had its second monthly midweek coffee shop meeting. Another rewarding experience. I'm looking forward to these Meetups very much. I'm in the city every Thursday night, anyway, and it's nice to have a regular group to commune with after a big shop-up at Galaxy Bookshop. Our next meeting, we return to Taronga Park Zoo.

The Cat in the Hat turns 50, how's that?

On Friday 2nd March, at precisely 2.36 pm, school students all over the nation (and perhaps the world?) will celebrate the 50th birthday of the famous book character, The Cat in the Hat in a nationwide read-aloud. Famous for its rhyme and repetition, the original book by the late Dr Seuss (Theodor "Ted" Geisel, aka Theo LeSeig), contains only 236 different words. This wonderfully wacky picture book, and its sequel The Cat in the Hat Comes Back, influenced children in many parts of the world to develop good reading habits over the past fifty years.

Happy birthday, Cat in the Hat. Have a purr-fect day!

(The photographic evidence)