Bits and pieces

Three things I'm loving right now:

1. The idea of hot-cross buns in the morning. Did you know hot-cross buns are a traditional Good Friday food? I did not know, and we're not having any (!), but don't these look good?

2. This book by one of my new favorite authors. Also this one, which a friend recommended, and this, which for some reason I put off reading but then couldn't put down.

3. These Chicago White Sox players wearing 'Boston Strong' T-shirts in their game against the Red Sox gave me a lump in my throat. We'll be in our usual spot on Monday cheering loudly for the runners in this year's marathon, and without a doubt I'll have another lump in my throat as they go by.

I hope you have a very happy (long) weekend.

(Photos by londonbakes for Food52 and AP photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

Fans and frights

A quick post to say an enormous congratulations to our hometown team, the Boston Red Sox. I was a fair-weather fan, to be sure, jumping on the bandwagon only after the team made it to the post-season. But I got the biggest kick out of this group of crazy, bearded guys who liked to have fun, had an enviable work-ethic, and seemed to love each other. We spent far too many late nights watching (resulting in one 8th-grade late slip this morning), but it was worth every single moment.

Meanwhile, the plea this Halloween in my house was to go not just scary, but SCARY scary, and I failed. We had spider webs, spiders, carved pumpkins, and many hanging creatures with black hair, exposed skulls, and broken teeth - but still it wasn't enough for my children. I even hung a black witchy creature by the back door, which scared me half to death each time I was in the kitchen and the wind blew her skirt across the window. At least one of us was afraid.

I hope your Halloween was fun and tremendously scary.

Don't forget

I walked home from school dropoff with a friend yesterday, the day after a tornado ripped through central Oklahoma. My friend said she didn't feel as though she could explain one more tragedy to her 8-year-old daughter and had asked her husband to keep her away from the television. She also said she worries that the media too quickly forgets about earlier events.

I hope we won't soon forget about tornado victims in Oklahoma. NBC News has put together a list of organizations that are accepting donations, if you can help. And in Oklahoma, the media is doing a good job at finding and focusing on the heroes of the story, just as it did in Sandy Hook, Boston, and so many others. Boston, meanwhile, is doing its own good job remembering those affected by the events of April 15. On Saturday, under the name #onerun, anyone who wasn't able to finish the marathon will get a chance to meet at the "one mile left" mark and run together the final leg of the race. Of course, there will be spectators along the way cheering them on. Boston wouldn't have it any other way.

(Photo by Jennifer Green.)