Weekly Features Include Scruffy Sneetch...ers?

To the left of this blog's posts is a column of features. Several of these are designed to changed weekly. You may distinguish them by noticing "week" somewhere in the title. That tip is free.

I've been writing here daily, and intend to keep doing so, but I also thought it would be nice to have some material along the side that changes on a weekly basis.

However, the side column does not leave much room for explanation and no room for discussion, so in the interest of allowing feedback (from anyone, please read, love me, LOVE ME) I've decided to dedicate each Sunday post to the update and discussion of the weekly features. The top five list will be pretty random. The Star Wars quote will be too, I suppose. There may also be other things added as time goes on, but these two will be mainstays, I've put my foot down on that.

Quick tangent, I've been considering referring to myself as "we." I would just find it sort of funny, but I'm wondering if it would come across more as schizophrenic, or worse, pretentious.

Well...without any further ado:

This weeks top five is books by the one and only Dr. Seuss. I know I'm not alone in that I absolutely loved Dr. Seuss as a kid. I love reading his book's to my sons and fear they may be too old to enjoy them soon. To pick a top five, when his works are so extensive, is tough, but these are my definite winners.

I Had Trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew is the absolute best. The message itself is something I've tried to teach my boys. Don't run from your problems. Have no fear.

On Beyond Zebra! is a masterpiece of made up words. Seuss is famous for just making things up so they rhyme, and this, I believe to be his best example of that technique. Plus, I remember my dad tripping over the words, "Floob-Boober-Bab-Boober-Bubs," every dang time he read it and finding that hysterical.

Everyone loves a good bed time book, and Dr. Seuss's Sleep Book is one of the best. It's long for a bedtime story, but I think it sort of lulls the young one your reading to asleep that way. There's a sort of pattern to it that really seems to help one wind down gradually.

McElligot's Pool has a message that goes hand in hand with the purpose of this blog. One may get teased and told they're crazy for being able to have a vivid imagination, but don't give up on your dreams or change what you do to make yourself happy. There's nothing wrong with hope.

The last spot was tough to decide on. So many good titles left out. The Sneetches and Other Stories captured the last spot, however. The story of the Sneetches itself tells a great lesson without being preachy (like The Butter Battle Book) and even though it's a shorter tale, it stands on its own quite powerfully. On top of that, you have What Was I Scared Of? at the end of the book and I always thought a pair of creepy green pants made for a goofy story.

That brings us to the Star Wars quote of the week. It comes from Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back and is Han Solo's response to Princess Leia's insult: "You stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking nerf herder!" His reply: "Who's scruffy-looking?!" The comedy move of overlooking all the other insults (suggesting they are valid) and focusing on one in particular is classic. I still like gags you'd find in an Abbott & Costello film.

The various surveys are not necessarily a weekly feature. Currently, I'd like to know which Star Wars movie you would show your children first (whether those children are real or hypothetical). I'd like to leave these questions up until I think the number of votes represents a decent sampling size. Of course, if you spread the word about this blog and we get more readers (wink, wink), then the poll could be a weekly feature.

Here, I wish I could tell you the "What I'm Reading," section will change weekly, but I have no delusions that I will read a book per week. I do, however, hope to include book, movie and video game reviews down the road.

So that's it for this week's features. Next Sunday will see these changed and we'll talk more about it (okay, there it was, the "we," was it weird?). Regular posts resume tomorrow.