Welcome to the Sunday Dish!

The wacky weather here in Alabama continues. We had glorious spring weather earlier in the week, yet this weekend we’re dropping back into the freezer. And I just washed and put away our winter coats after our spring break trip to the mountains last week, because I assumed we were done with the cold! I’m really hoping this is winter’s last hurrah. Still though, spring is blossoming everywhere–dogwoods, azaleas, cherry trees, tulips, forsythia, and bright green leaves all over my hydrangeas. Despite the ugliness we see on the news every day, spring is such a hopeful time of year.

What I fell asleep reading last night…

This book was very different from what I expected, but in a good way. It’s about three siblings and the mystery they uncover after the death of their mother. With the title and the sweet cover, I thought it’d be, well, a sweet southern story. Those flowers, the super southern title, that pretty blue door. And for that, I’ll say I think the title and cover is a tad misleading, because the book was actually much deeper and lovely than I thought it would be. The author’s writing is gorgeous–lush and lyrical, and I found myself marking several passages about the south, about homesickness, and about figuring out what you want to do with your life. I got much more out of the story than the lighter fare I was prepared for, which was a nice surprise. I also really enjoyed the main characters, despite what felt a little like agenda-pushing around one of them. The two who I’d say were the main main characters were brother and sister, and it was nice to read about that–it seems like mother-daughter or sisters is more common.

 

 

Book I have my eye on…

I can’t even remember where I read about this book, but it got me with “international art scandal” and “Nazi-looted masterpiece.” It sounds like it’ll be a WWII novel but with a much appreciated twist on the norm. Woman on Fire released on March 1 of this year.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few links just for fun…

Are you a Wordle-r? Do you Wordle? I’m not sure how to ask that question! Chances are, even if you don’t Wordle (can I make it a verb?), you’ve heard of the newest brainteaser sensation that’s taken over the internet. If not, this article will tell you about the science behind Wordle.

We live and die by our passwords, don’t we? Everything from our bank account to Old Navy account to the kids’ lunch money account has a password, and “they” tell us to use different passwords for every account (yeah right), to make them difficult to guess, and to change them often. It’s exhausting (also such a first world problem). I ran across this fascinating article that tells you how long it will take a hacker to crack passwords of various lengths. Some of mine were good–one of them will even take a hacker 2 million years to crack (guess how often I forget that password though!)–but one of mine that I actually thought was pretty good will, according to this study, only take a hacker one hour to crack. Hmm.

Bill Gates didn’t allow his kids to have cell phones until they were 14 years old. I love reading about well-known people who made the decision to withhold cell phones from their kids until the kids showed enough maturity to handle the responsibility. I’d venture to say kids and technology is my one soapbox (if you follow me on Instagram, you know I post about it from time to time, especially in my stories), and I’m always looking for like-minded people, even if it’s Bill Gates! (Funny though that he never let his kids have Apple products in the house!)

That’s all from me today. I hope you have a restful day, wherever you are, and whatever your weather happens to be!