Hi, everybuddy!

Welcome back, Caboose and Marylyn! And welcome for your very first visit to Essencia Island, Masha, as our very FIRST author ever! Have you run into Fiona? I know I saw her earlier, but I don't know where she went.

Would anybuddy like to try one of these strawberry-brie bruschettas?

Konichiwa (Good day in Japanese)

How is everyone? It has been a while, I hope to be able to catch on with next months book. I have missed reading along with my Buddies so much. I am in Okinawa right now have been here for 5 weeks and have just over one more before I head back to Korea. For those that don't know Okinawa is one of the lower Japanese Islands. It is pretty warm and humid here. When I was here a while back this is where I first started drinking Coffee which is why I prefer it cold, even in the winter (there is no winter in Okinawa).

I didn't start drinking coffee until I was well over 30 and when I did it was Georgia Coffee. I love it more than Starbucks. It is made by Coke but you can only get it in Japan:-( So I have been over indulging to say the lest. Well If you like Coffee please try one of these.

Marylyn

Hello everyone

Sometimes I feel so sorry for my computer I am such a (cluts, correct spelling?) on here. Today it took me almost 30 minutes to figure out just what I was doing wrong to get back into Essencia Island. Well, finally I made it, thank goodness for me that I am persistent with my wants…LOL…Now that all new bees know I am a fun person who can laugh at herself I want to say HELLO and hope to keep up with you. Knowing my nickname is Caboose will give you another clue to my mentality. Good food pictures make me hungry and where is a wild looking man to help me on the camel, heck I have problems walking and chewing gum at the same time. On a more serious note, keep in mind I am opinionated with 64 years of creating thought not just for me but for friends and family too. Lets keep the good times rolling and read to learn have fun and discuss issues.
Caboose

Peeking In

Hi Bonnie and all,

Just peeking in my head to say thanks so much for reading Camel, and to comment that I LOVE these camel pictures. I think I've always had this thing about camels. I remember, many years ago, visiting the camel market in Cairo and really falling in love with the beasts.

Good news about the REAL camel library -- they've begun to raise money for a project I love, which is getting local people to collect and write the traditional stories, which will then be inexpensively published so that new readers can read about their own culture and past. I think it is a great way to incorporate the old and the new, and that Fiona -- especially as she grew by the end of the story -- would have appreciated it.

Okay, get back to your snacks! Best, and thanks, Masha

Hello, Alison and Ellen and Fiona!

I've brought some small toasted bread bowls filled with spinach dip in one, chili in another, and ... hmmm ... I forget what's in that third one. You can load the dip onto one of Ellen's Fritos, if you like, or tear off pieces of the bread bowls for dipping.

Oh, look, here's Fiona! And I think I saw some camels earlier, though I'm not sure any of them were Siti.

What would you like to drink, Fiona?

Mmm--

If I bring some artichoke dip and fritos can I have a few shrimp?

Is Anyone Here?

I'm just relaxing with a virgin pina colada and some cocktail shrimp, waiting to find out which book we'll be reading in June. Does anyone want to join me?

Those pesky camels

Once upon a time, in the days when Aunty Mame** lived among us, she ordered a book for our monthly discussion. Time for discussion arrived, but the book didn't. AuntyMame decided the delivery system must be using camels, and slow camels at that. Thereafter, anytime something was slow in arriving, AuntyMame would send out her own cyber camel to investigate the delays. Eventually, we had camels running all over the world, attempting to get books from one book buddy to another and from a bookseller to any of us. I seem to remember that some of our camels may have had names, but what they might have been I cannot say.

Came the time when we got curious about our camel delivery service and investigated camels and their habits. Camels, we learned, come in two varieties: one-hump camels and two-hump camels. I don't know about the rest of the buddies, but I decided the two-hump variety (bactrian camel, shown here) looked slower ... ha ... THAT must be the reason we weren't getting our books on time! Detouring by their home in the Gobi Desert didn't speed things up, either. (AuntyMame, if you read this, please correct mistakes caused by my faulty memory.)
__________

** AuntyMame was the colorful character who usually arrived at our parties via flying carpet. The trouble was that AuntyMame could not always control her carpet and would arrive with a loud THUMP, shouting "Ouch!" as the carpet swerved into the side of ... say ... the Tuscan villa where we partied after reading Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes. Does anybuddy remember that? Our descriptions of meeting in the huge library room of that (cyber) house, complete with a table big enough for all book buddies to sit around it, was so convincing that someone who discovered our posts a few weeks later mentioned she probably couldn't afford to fly to Italy with us to party! Woo-hoo! Neither could we! Our transportation was mostly by magic carpets, imaginations, and slow camels.

Fi and Siti

This just in ... Fiona Sweeney, of Camel Bookmobile fame, says she can't party until later this month. So when the end of May rolls around, we'll party with Anna and Cerise, the ladies of Windfalls, and with Fi and Matani and Neema and Kanika and Scar Boy and the other villagers of Mididima.

I've heard tell that Siti, the leader and load camel, will also be there. It will be up to us to check out the rumor that she is possessed by the spirit of Mr. Abasi's own departed mother.

One word of encouragement, those so inclined may want to bring along any spare paper you have lying around the house. I hear that Scar Bbb... uh, I mean, Taban ... has run out of paper again.

And for others, you may want to contribute to the ACTUAL camel bookmobile operating in Kenya. Here's how to donate to the camel bookmobile.

Extra incentive to attend our next party: Bonnie ... and maybe others? ... will tell you all about the camels sitting grandly in the history of the Book Buddies. Put on your thinking caps, everybuddy, and try to remember all you can about those errant camels, Bactrian and ... hmmm, what was the other kind? ... oh, yeah, Dromedary. Siti (aka, Mr. Abasi's mother) would be a Dromedary. When you plan what food to bring to the party, don't forget something for Siti to nibble.