Last week I gave some suggestions on how to entertain yourself during the long cold dark winter months. Learning new stuff is a great way to exercise your brain and pass the time. For those of you who want to learn another language, the Oregon Public Library has a new language learning resource called Mango. You can learn Spanish, French, Japanese, Brazilian Portuguese, German, Mandarin Chinese, Greek, Italian and Russian and more. Learn how to use Mango in this  YouTube video.

The title of the post says “I’m bored” in Spanish.

Next Session is:

Tuesday, January 11
4:00-5:30 pm
Sue Ames Room

• Demon’s Lexicon by Sarah Rees Brennan
  Sixteen-year-old Nick and his family have battled magicians and demons for most of his life, but when his brother, Alan, is marked for death while helping new friends Jamie and Mae, Nick’s determination to save Alan leads him to uncover a devastating secret. (ages 14 & up)

• The Orange Houses by Paul Griffin
  Tamika, a fifteen-year-old hearing-impaired girl, Jimmi, an eighteen-year-old veteran who stopped taking his anti-psychotic medication, and sixteen-year-old Fatima, an illegal immigrant from Africa, meet and connect in their Bronx, New York, neighborhood, with devastating results. (ages 15 & up)

• The Great Wide Sea by M.H. Herlong
  Still mourning the death of their mother, three brothers go with their father on an extended sailing trip off the Florida Keys and have a harrowing adventure at sea. (ages 12 & up)

• The Reformed Vampire Support Group by Catherine Jinks
  Fifteen-year-old vampire Nina has been stuck for fifty-one years in a boring support group for vampires, and nothing exciting has ever happened to them–until one of them is murdered and the others must try to solve the crime. (ages 14 & up)

• Alligator Bayou by Donna Jo Napoli
  Fourteen-year-old Calogero Scalise and his Sicilian uncles and cousin live in small-town Louisiana in 1898, when Jim Crow laws rule and anti-immigration sentiment is strong, so despite his attempts to be polite and to follow American customs, disaster dogs his family at every turn. (ages 14 & up)

• Stitches: A Memoir by David Small
  One day David Small awaoke from a supposedly harmless operation to discover that he had been transformed into a virtual mute. A vocal chord removed, his throat slashed and stitched together like a bloody boot, the fourteen-year-old boy had not been told that he had cancer and was expected to die. (ages 16 & up)

• When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
  As her mother prepares to be a contestant on the 1980s television game show, “The $20,000 Pyramid,” a twelve-year-old New York City girl tries to make sense of a series of mysterious notes received from an anonymous source that seems to defy the laws of time and space. (ages 12 & up)

• Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X.  Stork
  Marcelo Sandoval, a seventeen-year-old boy on the high-functioning end of the autistic spectrum, faces new challenges, including romance and injustice, when he goes to work for his father in the mailroom of a corporate law firm. (ages 14 & up)

• Lips Touch: Three Times by Laini Taylor
  Three short stories about kissing, featuring elements of the supernatural. (ages 14 & up)

• Written in Bone: Buried Lives of Jamestown and Colonial Maryland by Sally M.  Walker
  Written in Bone tells the stories of eight colonists—their lives, deaths, and their place in our country’s history.   Even though these people left little or no written record of their live, archaeologists and forensic anthropologists have learning about their lives by reading and revealing the stories that life and death have written in their bones.   From these tales I discovered how truly tough life was in those days and gained great respect and admiration for the many different people whose sacrifices ultimately led to the birth of the United States.  I have tried to capture the remarkable stories of these people in Written in Bone. – author  Sally Walker (ages 12 & up)

Winter is here which means cabin fever season has arrived. Here are some ideas on how to keep busy and keep from going crazy.

• Organize your closet, room, whatever.
• Learn a hobby. Oregon Library has a monthly knitting and crocheting club called Knit Together. We also have books and DVDs on learning new skills and hobbies.
• Learn a winter sport (ice skating, cross-country skiing, hockey)
• Volunteer. The library has volunteer opportunities.
• Learn to cook. The library has tons of cookbooks.
• Create a human comic book.  Think up a storyline and take pictures of friends acting out the story. Print the pictures, add speech bubbles, glue to blank book, and you have a human comic book.
• Play online games if you’re alone. Here are ideas from the Games page of the Oregon Public Library.

(image by Benoit Dupont)

Find movie times and buy your tickets at Local Movie Showings (fandango.com).

Read the reviews at Rotten Tomatoes.

Enjoy the trailer!

The big American eat-a-thon, better known as Thanksgiving, is happening in a couple of weeks. For many the star of the meal is turkey, but everyone has a must-have side. Mine is my mom’s stuffing. For some, though, it is hard to find something that they can eat at Thanksgiving. Vegetarians and vegans find themselves in this position. Below are links to vegetarian and vegan recipes that most meat eaters would love.

If you’re not up for cooking a dish, about.com offers suggestions on how to easily make a dish veggie friendly.

About.com
GoodMeals.com
The Veggie Table

Happy Eating!

Adoration Of Jenna Fox by Mary Pearson
In the not-too-distant future, when biotechnological advances have made synthetic bodies and brains possible but illegal, a 17 year-old girl, recovering from a serious accident and suffering from memory lapses, learns a startling secret about her existence.

Diary of Pelly D by L. J. Adlington
When Toni V, a construction worker on a futuristic colony, finds the diary of a teenage girl whose life has been turned upside-down by holocaust-like events, he begins to question his own beliefs.

Epic by Conor Kostick
In New Earth, a world based on a video role-playing game, 14 year-old Erik persuades his friends to aid him in some unusual gambits in order to save Erik’s father from exile and safeguard the futures of each of their families.

Knife Of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness
Pursued by power-hungry Prentiss and mad minister Aaron, young Todd and Viola set out across New World searching for answers about why Todd’s colony has no girls and women and why the men can hear each others thoughts. Todd and Viola must find a way to warn the ship bringing hopeful settlers from Old World. Book one of Chaos Walking

Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve
In the distant future, when cities move about and consume smaller towns, a 15 year-old apprentice is pushed out of London by the man he most admires and must seek answers in the perilous Out-Country, aided by one girl and the memory of another. Book one of Hungry City Chronicles.

Unwind by Neal Shusterman
In a future world where those between the ages of 13 and 18 can have their lives “unwound” and their body parts harvested for use by others, three teens go to extreme lengths to uphold their beliefs–and, perhaps, save their own lives.

The section Cool & New lists new releases for the month. Below are a few books to check out in August.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
Against all odds, Katniss Everdeen has survived the Hunger Games twice. But now that she’s made it out of the bloody arena alive, she’s still not safe. The Capitol is angry and wants revenge. Who do they think should pay for the unrest? Katniss. And what’s worse, President Snow has made it clear that no one else is safe either. Not Katniss’s family, not her friends, not the people of District 12. The last book in The Hunger Games trilogy.

The Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare
The first book in the Infernal Device series, a prequel to her bestselling Mortal Instruments books, opens as Tessa’s pleasant life in 1878 New York is coming to an end when her guardian aunt dies. Upon her arrival in London, where her brother lives, Tessa is kidnapped by the Dark Sisters, who force her to learn to use a rare power–shape-shifting–she didn’t know she had. Her rescue by a young man named Will leads her to the Shadowhunters–Nephilim descended from humans and angels–who enforce the magical Accords against demons and other creatures.

Accomplice by Eireann Corrigan
High school juniors and best friends Finn and Chloe hatch a daring plot to fake Chloe’s disappearance from their rural New Jersey town in order to have something compelling to put on their college applications, but unforeseen events complicate matters.

Flipped
When second-graders Bryce and Juli first meet, Juli knows it’s love. But Bryce isn’t so sure. Girl-phobic and easily embarrassed, young Bryce does everything he can to keep his outspoken wannabe girlfriend at arm’s length… for the next six years, which isn’t easy since they go to the same school and live across the street from each other. But if Juli finally looks away, will it be Bryce’s turn to be dazzled? “Flipped” takes Bryce and Juli from grade school to junior high, through triumph and disaster, family drama and first love, as they make the discoveries that will define who they are – and who they are to each other.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Meet charming and jobless Scott Pilgrim. A bass guitarist for the garage band Sex Bob-omb, the 22-year-old has just met the girl of his dreams…literally. The only catch to winning Ramona Flowers? Her seven evil exes are coming to kill him. Genre-smashing filmmaker Edgar Wright tells the amazing story of one romantic slacker’s quest to power up with love in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World.

Scott Pilgrim has never had a problem getting a girlfriend. It’s getting rid of them that proves difficult. From the girl who kicked his heart’s butt — and now is back in town — to the teenage distraction he’s trying to shake when Ramona rollerblades into his world, love hasn’t been easy. He soon discovers, however, his new crush has the most unusual baggage of all: a nefarious league of exes controls her love life and will do whatever it takes to eliminate him as a suitor.

As Scott gets closer to Ramona, he must face an increasingly vicious rogues’ gallery from her past — from infamous skateboarders to vegan rock stars and fearsome identical twins. And if he hopes to win his true love, he must vanquish them all before it really is game over.

via Teenreads.com