We’ve got some great new titles…

At last!  You’ve got some free time, and we’ve got some great new titles as well as some old friends.  Here’s an overview of just a few of the new arrivals:

Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin
If you followed the Obama/McCain election with interest, you’ll love this zippy read.  Described by a reporter for the Associated Press as “the hottest book in the country,” (http://tiny.cc/dXAYC)Game Change will make the members of the History department giddy with excitement.  The book is based on numerous interviews with the political teams and candidates, with some dialogue invented to help get inside the heads of the participants.  It’s a book that falls somewhere between fact and fiction, and it’ll feed your curiosity.

Food Rules, by Michael Pollan
At last, a wise, commonsense little book by a well-respected writer about food. Pollan's advice is at times hilarious: "It's not food if it arrived through the window of your car."  Another chapter quips, "Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food."  This is a quick, bracing little book.  

Secrets of Eden, by Chris Bohjalian
Do you relish a good murder mystery?  According to a reviewer for Booklist, Bohjalian "drops bombshell clues...and weaves subtle nuances of doubt and intrigue into a taut, read-in-one-sitting murder mystery." ( http://tiny.cc/zSP5M )

Leviathan, by Scott Westerfeld
Into Steampunk lit?  School Library Journal writes,"This is World War I as never seen before. The story begins the same: on June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife are assassinated, triggering a sequence of alliances that plunges the world into war. But that is where the similarity ends. This global conflict is between the Clankers, who put their faith in machines, and the Darwinists, whose technology is based on the development of new species. After the assassination of his parents, Prince Aleksandar's people turn on him. Accompanied by a small group of loyal servants, the young Clanker flees Austria in a Cyklop Stormwalker, a war machine that walks on two legs. Meanwhile, as Deryn Sharp trains to be an airman with the British Air Service, she prays that no one will discover that she is a girl. She serves on the Leviathan, a massive biological airship that resembles an enormous flying whale and functions as a self-contained ecosystem. When it crashes in Switzerland, the two teens cross paths, and suddenly the line between enemy and ally is no longer clearly defined. The ending leaves plenty of room for a sequel, and that's a good thing because readers will be begging for more. Enhanced by Thompson's intricate black-and-white illustrations, Westerfeld's brilliantly constructed imaginary world will capture readers from the first page. Full of nonstop action, this steampunk adventure is sure to become a classic." (http://tiny.cc/YdHr3 ).

Cheever, by Blake Bailey
This new biography is receiving enthusiastic reviews from a wide range of critics.  John Updike writes for the New Yorker, "A triumph of thorough research and unblinkered appraisal."  Publishers Weekly exclaims that "This Ovid in Ossining, who published 121 stories in the New Yorker as well as several bestselling novels, has probably yet to find a definitive position in American letters among academicians. This thoroughly researched and heartfelt biography may help redress that situation." ( http://tiny.cc/dBBkw)

Get Me Out!  A History of Childbirth from the Garden of Eden to the Sperm Bank,by Randi Hutter Epstein
The cover will make you laugh, but the contents will give you the shivers.  Health care and obstetrics have come a very long way over the centuries.  Kirkus Reviews describes the book as “[A] sharp, sassy history of childbirth…. The author’s engaging sarcasm, evident even in a caption of an illustration of an absurd obstetric contraption—’Nineteenth-century Italian do-it-yourself forceps. The fad never took off’—lends this chronicle a welcome punch and vitality often absent from medical histories. Roll over, Dr. Lamaze, and make room for Epstein’s eyebrow-raising history.”  (http://tiny.cc/IsMzt)

Stop by, and we'll help you find something to enjoy over the break.  --Sue

From the Winter 2010 Caller

Passions: robotics, engineering
Interest: oldies music

“Robotics is my consuming passion. I’ve taken it upon myself to learn every job on our robotics team to see how they interrelate. Knowing how everything fits together is a huge advantage in figuring out more quickly what part is broken.

 

I would like to work in mechanical engineering, and I am interested in the automotive field. But I don’t want to work for a big company. My dream is to work for another company at first and then create my own start-up."

From the Winter 2010 Caller

Passions: aerial dance, tango

“I started aerial dance classes in 2nd grade and now perform with AWOL, Aerial Without Limits. I love aerial dance because it’s creative, and I love music and combining it with movement in trying to convey a message. I particularly like to choreograph: I listen to music and imagine movements for a long time before I feel ready to put it together and try it out with my peers. I also like that it is a physical form of art— it takes strength and skill, and I have to constantly challenge myself. I see myself doing things I never thought I could.

I also love tango. I’m going to Argentina this summer to study tango. I will also work with an aerial dance company to learn their style of aerial dance, which uses bungee cords. I am interested in how to creatively combine the two kinds of dance. I love both of these arts for similar reasons. Musicality—it’s fun to play with music, and tango is all improvised. You’re silent when you dance in tango or aerial, but there’s a lot of connection.”

From the Winter 2010 Caller

Passions: creating art installations, outdoor exploration
Interest: track & field

“For my first art project I hung an old picture frame with a picture of a galaxy set into it on the big, inviting blank wall of the science building, hung to appear like a window of the building itself. Another time I set up a spider’s web of wires, with tin can phones on the ends, connecting six trees in the campus forest. You could hear the sounds of the trees groaning in the wind through the wires.

Art is a key facet of how I see myself. I enjoy the outdoor program just as much. I’ve been to truly amazing places not many people know of, and seen many wonderful things. These trips are a source of inspiration, and I think about these places every day.

Sometimes something clicks and I think about an idea a lot. The vast majority of ideas I come up with are things I’ll never do, but that’s not an unfortunate thing. Is that art? Thinking about it, for me, is as important as the actual creation.”

On a flawless weeek ten students from Catlin Gabel school took the Nordic ski challenge and skied from Timberline Lodge down to Government Camp.  Twice!  With ideal snow conditions, these students, many of them new to the sport of cross country skiing skied down the Glade Trail all the way to Government Camp.  It was so much fun they decided to do it again.  Admittedly on the first run there were a few falls, several per minute actually, but soon everyone got the hang of it and they made the 2000 foot descent with style and whoops of laughter.  That night everyone stayed in the Huckleberry Inn and wandered beneath the stars through this Alpine village.  On Sunday the group completed a ten mile ski tour in the Bennett Pass area east of Mt. Hood.

From the Winter 2010 Caller

Passions: guitar, singing, visual art

“I like songs that tell or imply stories. It’s a form of communication, a different language. When you’re playing with others or singing together you establish an understanding that’s hard to find anywhere else. Once a week on campus about seven of us eat lunch, talk about music, play, and sing, which I love. I’ve also done some performing locally.

It’s hard to separate visual art and music from each other. They inform each other. If I can’t communicate something on paper, I can turn it into a song.

From the Winter 2010 Caller

Passions: writing poetry and prose, outdoor exploration
Interest: environmental studies

“I’ve always been observational. I was quieter when I was young, and lines of poetry came together naturally. Writing is satisfying, a way for me to sift it all. I write precisely and slowly. Sometimes I’m frustrated because the ideas come but the words don’t, and I just sit there for 45 minutes. But eventually I get where I want to be.

Starting in 8th grade I got good feedback on poetry that I’d written and was pointed to entering contests. I got self-motivated from the contests that I won. But mostly I won because I kept on throwing stuff out there, and some of it stuck. I found out that poetry is not just childhood rhymes but is about seeing emotion in the world—and it’s an art form that gets to people.

Sometimes I can’t make sense of a situation until I write it down in poetry. I get the same release through words that I get in mountain climbing or rock climbing. The outdoor program has influenced my poetry. My recent poems have all been about nature and being outdoors. It’s a challenge: loads of people write about nature, so can I as a teenaged girl say anything new about it?

My class in environmental science and policy is really important to me now. I’ve changed my second choice of major to environmental studies. I see my role in poetry, but environmental studies is about the physical side of life. It’s affected my decisions about eating, shopping, how you get places. You can’t not pay attention to these things. My general job is to change.”

Catlin Gabel's Upper School robotics Team 1540 won the prestigious Chairman's Award at the Oregon regional competition for their extensive support of other teams. Check out the three-minute Chairman’s Award video created by Tucker Gordon and Henry Gordon http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxPocQQC5Cs.

The Chairman's Award qualifies Team 1540 (the Flaming Chickens) to compete at the world championships in Atlanta, April 14–18. This is the fourth consecutive year Catlin Gabel’s robotics team has qualified for the world championships, the most of any team in the Northwest.

Junior Henry Gordon ’11, marketing manager, fabrication co-manager, and Middle School FIRST LEGO league coach, was one of two finalists for the Oregon regional FIRST dean’s list for student leadership and commitment to the ideals of FIRST, as well as for contributions to his team and community. Henry is in the running for one of 10 FIRST dean’s list awards granted at the World Championships.

Congratulations, Flaming Chickens!

 We set out for the mountain on a warm, sunny Saturday morning, ready for anything. We arrived at Teacup Lake, packed our day-packs, and slathered on sunscreen. Who knew summer arrived in February?! There were several beginner skiers and they all picked up the sport easily, quickly wanting to take the most difficult trails and ski down hills. The first big hill we went down was intimidating at first, but we all skied down it, and were proud of ourselves at having accomplished that. We lunched in a sunny patch with a spectacular view of the mountains.

We woke the next morning and ate breakfast before discussing the plan for the day. The girls wanted to ski somewhere where they could make their own trail and avoid groomed tracks, and eventually selected White River. The girls also wanted to pour maple syrup on the snow like they do in Canada, and so after a little cajoling, several of them went and asked for some syrup. After their sugary treat, they sledded for a while before we headed to White River to ski.

We made our way up the canyon with the girls leading the way through the trees. The snow was heavy and deeper than the day before as we were not on a groomed trail. At this point we came to a steep hill above a snow bridge over a small creek that the girls wanted to cross and continue into the trees. We explored this area for a while, not without a few tumbles, before skiing back to the open part of the canyon to find steep hills to slide down. We skied on a bit further and up a ridge before returning to our first slide. At the end of the day we piled into the bus and headed home, with a quick stop for doughnuts on the way.

Bluebird day

Not just the ski, the boot comes off too!

Good friends tie your shoes for you

Munching some snow

Look! One ski!

Sculpting the snow woman

We learned this from the Canadians

A little more sledding

Mt. Jefferson

Big slide

Train!