Frustrated by tax season? Feeling down after the long, cold winter? Coworkers or bosses got your blood boiling? Kids driving you crazy? April is Stress Awareness Month, so take some time to relax and unwind! There are a lot of resources available from the library and the internet to help combat stress. Some folks find that exercise or yoga helps them calm down. Others enjoy digging deeply into a favorite hobby. Others prefer to get away to a tropical beach!

Try some of these books to get you started:

Manage Your Stress : overcoming stress in the modern world
You, Stress Less : the owner's manual for regaining balance in your life
Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff series

The documentary Monica & David is a love story in the traditional sense; two people meet, fall in love, get married and settle in for a life together. However, it is also a story about the love of mother and child, for without their strong mothers this love story would not have been written. What makes this story so unique is that Monica and David both have Downs syndrome. They were both raised by single moms who work diligently to provide them the tools and training to become happy and fulfilled adults. They are both examples of how strong family support can make all the difference in the lives of people with special needs.
This documentary takes place in the course of a year, beginning a few days before the happy couple exchange their wedding vows, and ending at their one year anniversary. The love and devotion these two share with each other is unmistakable and emanates from the screen. One of my favorite lines in the documentary is spoken by Monica a few days before the wedding when she says, “It’s all about him, and all about me. This is my life, to be with my husband forever”. And in the end the viewer is left feeling that indeed they will make it together as a couple, with the help of their devoted family. There are some sad moments in the film. One of the most heartbreaking moments is when Monica admits she would like to have children with David. Monica's mother expresses her concerns and tells the audience that she doesn't think it would be possible for the couple to care for a child of their own. However, the sadness is out shined by the love and hope that comes across in this film.
This exploration of the marriage of this young couple with Downs syndrome, and the family who strives to support their needs won many awards including Best Documentary in the Tribeca Film Festival. It is a wonderful window into the lives of families with special needs children and is suitable for family viewing.

Friday, April 26 | 7:00-8:00pm | Pittsfield Branch | K-8th Grade | Adults

Author Scott Seegert and illustrator John Martin, both from Michigan, are responsible for the wildly funny and silly Vordak the Incomprehensible book series. They’ll both be at the Pittsfield branch on Friday, April 26 talking about their books, leading a drawing exercise, and will perhaps be bringing a little surprise! If you’re into funny books, drawing, and super villains, then this event is for you.

The Vordak books, including How to Grow Up and Rule the World, Rule the School, and Double Trouble, are most appropriate for kids in grades 3rd – 8th, but this library program will be enjoyed by those grades in K-8th, as well as adults! It’s always fun to hear an author talk about their work and then get to meet them, and here we’re lucky to meet the author AND the illustrator!! Be sure to also check out the Vordak website, with all sorts of fun things to do.

Books will be for sale after the program, and there will be a book signing.

If you haven't seen My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic yet, stop everything you're doing and put a request on The Friendship Express or Princess Twilight Sparkle now!

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is an animated TV series developed by Lauren Faust and based on the long-running Hasbro My Little Pony toy franchise. But don't let its overtly commercial roots fool you - MLP:FiM is a whip smart show for both kids and adults, hilarious and heartwarming at the same time, with an excellent sense of comedic timing and a commendable moral compass. Bright, engaging visuals and upbeat musical sidebars will have you hooked on this charming show in no time.

The Friendship Express is a collection of five non-contiguous episodes from season 1 and 2 of the show, while Princess Twilight Sparkle is a collection of five non-contiguous episodes from seasons 2 and 3. Episodes of the show air at 10:30 AM EST on The Hub, and Netflix currently streams seasons 1-3.

The library is always acquiring additional TV shows, be they hot and new, or oldies but goodies. Here are some new DVDs on their way to AADL:

The Love Boat, Season 1: Volume 1 & Volume 2
See you on the Pacific Princess, where romance blossoms on the way to tropical and exotic ports of call with Captain Stubing, Doc, Gopher, and Isaac the bartender. (The show ran from 1977-1986.)

The Patty Duke Show, Seasons 1 & 2
They laugh alike, they walk alike, sometimes they even talk alike, what a crazy pair! Cousins Patty and Cathy are identical in appearance but not in personality, and they find themselves in wacky situations. (The show ran from1963-1966.)

Hawaii Five-O, Seasons 1 & 2
Book ‘em, Danno! Follow Detective Steve McGarrett, Danno, and the rest of the Five-O squad. McGarrett heads an elite state police unit investigating organized crime, murder, assassination attempts, foreign agents, and felonies of every type. (The show ran from 1968-1980.)

The Killing, Season 1
Following a shocking murder, the lives of the police, suspects and victim's family are intricately woven together in this spellbinding series. Fans of Twin Peaks or The X-Files might dig it. It’s an American drama based on a Danish TV show. (Season 3 is in production now.)

Just one day after announcing he was taking a 'leave of presence' from his 46-year gig as movie critic for the Chicago Sun-Times and his 31-year career on TV reviewing films, Roger Ebert lost his long public battle with salivary and thyroid cancer.

His announcement yesterday said he would just review the movies HE wanted to see and leave the rest of the reviews to his trusted colleagues at the paper. When he lost part of his jaw and thus his ability to eat or speak, he used his good humor and courage to write about his experience fighting, and often triumphing, against, his devastating illness.

Ebert's long career resulted in a 1975 Pulitzer Prize, the first movie critic to receive this honor. The Webby Awards named him their 2010 Person of the Year. And Hollywood, which lived and died by Ebert's laser-beam ethical demand for excellence in all things film, honored him with his own Walk of Fame star in 2005.

Ebert's career took off in a new direction when he and Chicago Tribune movie critic, Gene Siskel, took their 'point/counterpoint' routine to television in 1975. Originally titled Coming Soon to a Theater Near You, PBS picked it up and renamed it Sneak Previews three years later. There were two more name-changes: In 1981, it morphed into At the Movies. Five years later, accompanied by their signature 'thumbs up, thumbs down' rating system, it settled on Siskel & Ebert & the Movies.

Sadly, Siskel died in 1999. He had had brain surgery for brain cancer but it was complications from another surgery that ended his life.

Despite his long fight with illness, Ebert wrote almost seventeen books on movies, the internet, his life (Life Itself: A Memoir, 2011), and yes, even a cookbook for rice cookers (The Pot and How to Use It: The Mystery and Romance of the Rice Cooker, 2010).

Ebert, who was 70, died today in Chicago.

On April 6, The Little Prince celebrates 70 years in print. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry first published The Little Prince in 1943, only a year before his Lockheed P-38 vanished over the Mediterranean. Born in Lyons, France, Saint-Exupéry wrote The Little Prince while living in the U.S. during a two-year, self-imposed exile from the Nazi occupation of his home country. A year after the book’s publication, the author disappeared over the Mediterranean while flying a reconnaissance mission for his French air squadron.

This enduring fable of love and loneliness has lost none of its power. The narrator is a downed pilot in the Sahara Desert, frantically trying to repair his wrecked plane. His efforts are interrupted one day by the apparition of a young boy (the little prince), who asks him to draw a sheep. "In the face of an overpowering mystery, you don't dare disobey," the narrator recalls. "Absurd as it seemed, a thousand miles from all inhabited regions and in danger of death, I took a scrap of paper and a pen out of my pocket." And so begins their dialogue, which stretches the narrator's imagination in all sorts of surprising, childlike directions.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s fable about the wise, humble boy from Asteroid B-612 who befriends the stranded pilot has touched the lives of multiple generations of readers worldwide, with more than 150 million copies in print, in 260 languages and dialects. There are graphic novel versions of the story, and a DVD opera version. There is even a Little Prince Facebook page,which has acquired more than 1.1 million fans since its July 2011 debut, a testament to The Little Prince’s enduring popularity.

When we first heard the Wanna Bees at the Ann Arbor Summer Festival’s Top of the Park last year, we thought that we should surely have them back for more fun! On April 14th at 4 pm at the Downtown Library we will kick off National Library Week with rock and roll for kids!

Wanna Bees

Milo O'Shea, an Irish character actor known for his bushy eyebrows and lovely brogue, has died.

Best known in this country for his roles in the campy science fiction film, Barbarella (1968), starring Jane Fonda and the 1982 courtroom thriller, The Verdict, starring Paul Newman, he also enjoyed considerable success in TV. His large body of work included appearances in The Golden Girl, Cheers, Frasier, and in the fifth season of The West Wing, as Chief Justice Roy Ashland.

He also did some stage work, notably performing in Neil Simon's The Sunshine Boys.

Mr. O'Shea, who was 86, died yesterday in Manhattan.

William Ginsburg, a successful medical malpractice lawyer who had some high profile cases before he shot to the top of the celeb attorney list when he was tapped by Monica Lewinsky's physician father, to represent her in THE political scandal of 1998, died in California on Monday.

Ginsburg won cases for Liberace's doctor who was accused of hiding the performer's cause of death (AIDS) and for the heart doctor who gave the go-ahead for basketball player Hank Gathers,23, to play just days before the Loyola Marymount University star athlete died on the court of a known heart condition. Those wins paled in comparison to the notoriety surrounding his representation of Monica Lewinsky, the White House intern who was caught having a consensual affair with then-President Bill Clinton.

No detail was too salacious for gossip-hungry Americans, fed juicy tidbits by a cooperative fourth estate who covered Solicitor General Ken Starr's determination to try Ms. Lewinsky who escaped prosecution but did appear before a grand jury. President Clinton was impeached by the House of Representatives for perjury and obstruction of justice and later was acquitted by the Senate in February 1999.

Mr. Ginsburg, who was 70, lost his battle with cancer.