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 The picture above is from the website for Seattle’s new oyster bar opening in July, The Walrus and the Carpenter, “located at the South end of Seattle’s Historic Ballard Avenue in the newly renovated Kolstrand building” . They even included the full poem on their site! The blurb:
Award winning Chef Renee Erickson (Boat Street Café/Boat Street Pickles) has partnered with Business Manager Jeremy Price and Developer Chad Dale to realize her long time vision for an Oyster Bar. It makes perfect sense then, that she would do it in her own neighborhood.
Opening this July, The Walrus and the Carpenter blends the elegance of France with the casual comfort of a local fishing pub. “The idea is to serve the highest quality food and drink in a space that is stripped of pretense …it should feel like home.”
The newly restored Kolstrand building on the south end of Ballard Ave, will be the perfect home for this rustic, light-filled, oyster haven. Plans for an outdoor space are also in the works. In addition to oysters, the menu will include locally harvested clams and mussels, house smoked fish, frites, and specialty meats. A full selection of wine, craft cocktails, and beer will also be available. And did we mention brunch? Brunch is served Sundays, 10am-2pm.
Ah, summer. Just in time.
I hope every dining experience will also include ruminations on innocence and death.
 Tattoo by Holly Azzara So… how much do you really love Disney’s “Alice in Wonderland”? Enough to get the entire movie tattooed on your body? Alice-themed tattoos are fairly common but few individuals have taken it as far as this client of Medway, MA tattoo artist Holly Azzara. Not content with a playing card or two, she wanted it all, Alice, the Mad Tea-Party, the Garden of Live Flowers, the Cheshire Cat—everything.
I would come to Holly and say “I think this would be awesome” and then two weeks later she would have it drawn up. She knew how important it was to me to have the characters look exactly like they did in the movie and she was very dedicated to my vision. I had the thickest reference folder in her filing cabinet with picture after picture of characters in the movie.
More images of the tattoo and an account of its year-long creation can be found on Holly’s blog. Holly has also created a huge back tattoo of Tenniel’s drawing of Alice and the Cheshire Cat. Apparently it was the client’s first tattoo!
 Tattoo by Holly Azzara
Places are still available on the Lewis Carroll Society UK (LCS) study visit to Guildford. The four-day trip will take place 15-18 July, 2010.
Members of the LCS and guests are invited to take part in this comprehensive study visit to Guildford in the South of England.
The four-day event will include a mini-seminar with lectures exploring the later years of Dodgson’s life.
Although the LCS has visited Guildford several times over the years, this will be a more comprehensive event which includes lectures and short talks presenting the results of new research and visits to places we have not been to before as a Society.
Bookings are now being taken … there are still a number of places left.
Dodgson was a frequent visitor to his sisters’ Guildford home in the final years of his life, and died there in 1898. Guildford is a market town with Saxon roots, located about 30 miles from central London, easily accessible from London airports. For anyone with a spare pot of cash and no existing summer vacation plans, this looks like the foundation of an excellent trip.
Further details about the study visit and a booking form are available from the LCS website.
 Alice considered a little, and then said, "Wash your hands. Cover your cough. Stay home if you are sick. Get vaccinated."
Now that the Alice pandemic has reached the WHO-defined Phase 6, “increased and sustained transmission in general population,” the last few weeks have felt a bit like blogging through the looking-glass: it seems to take all the blogging we can do to keep in the same place. To actually inform our readers of events in advance, well, we would have to blog at least twice as fast as that.
With that excuse, it’s time for a mention of tomorrow’s Mad Tea Party at the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philidelphia. Registration is now closed, but attendees have been promised a look at the library’s first edition of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and lots and lots of tea (we hope proper saucer usage will be observed). Over the next few weeks the library will be offering a tour of Carrollian items in their collection:
This tour will explore both the man and the author, drawing on letters from Dodgson to his publishers, original drawings by John Tenniel (the illustrator of the Alice books) photographs of children taken by Carroll, and, of course, copies of his books.
The tours promises to be “hands on,” but mind the marmalade please. LCSNA members who discover sticky fingerprints on the museum collection during the Spring Meeting on April 24th will take the matter very seriously.
Rosenbach Museum and Library, Philadelphia PA
Wednesday, March 10, 2010 – 3:00pm
Sunday, March 14, 2010 – 3:00pm
Friday, March 19, 2010 – 3:00pm
 If you were previously unaware, there is a grammy award for Best Spoken Word Album for Children. The 2009 recording of Lewis Carroll’s Though the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, read by writer Harlan Ellison, was nominated for that grammy, but lost out to Buck Howdy reading Aaaaah! Spooky, Scary Stories & Songs. Well, Mr. Ellison, a prolific and sometimes irreverent writer, has already won hundreds of awards (according to his website) including the San Francisco Chronicle’s 1984 Most Attractive Male Writer, so he can afford to spread the wealth. The Blackstone Audiobooks TTLG is available on iTunes here, and where all fine Children’s Spoken Word Albums are sold (list price for the audio CDs $33).
 I know that it is asking an awful lot of all you Carrollians out there, but next time you are in Michigan, please stop in at the New Holland Brewing Company and try their Mad Hatter India Pale Ale. Come on, take one (or three) for the team!
(Thanks to Brews and Books for the tip!)
A new bar has opened in Wellington, New Zealand: Alice is located at the back of (where else?) the Boogie Wonderland nightclub.
 Who knew Alice and Humpty Dumpty were on Mars!? They are some of the recently named targets within view of NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander stationed in the Martian arctic. (Click on the picture for a better view.)
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
Sadly, it appears that despite attempts to declare it a historical building, Penmorfa, the Liddell’s former summer home in Wales, has been slated for demolition: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/north_west/7424400.stm
Disney’s “It’s a Small World” ride is undergoing renovations, with every rumor and aspect seemingly designed to generate controversy: larger boats and deeper water to accommodate today’s larger Americans, the rainforest scene replaced by an American patriotic scene, Disney movie characters added into “culturally appropriate” scenes (Mulan into “China,” for example). Here at last is an addition that does seem somewhat appropriate, Alice and the White Rabbit added to “England” – but using Mary Blair’s designs. Since “Small World” was originally designed by Blair, these new figures will at least blend in. http://travel.latimes.com/daily-deal-blog/?p=1552. 
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