Tag Archives: odds&ends

Share Your World 6/19/17 (plus one)

Posted on by

Running a day late this week, but better late than never! 

What is something that people are obsessed with but you just don’t get the point of?

Fidget spinners.  Lord help me, but I cannot understand how these things have become so freaking prevalent.  I get they’d be useful for kids dealing with hyperactivity, but these things are everywhere.  I know several kids who own three, four, or five of them.  Then there are those youngsters whipping out the stopwatch to time their spinners so they can post their results on social media.  I mean, everyone sees these are just things spinning in a circle, right?

What quirky things do people do where you are from?

The “driving in the neighborhood” wave: four fingers peeled off the steering wheel for a passing car, hand lifted in greeting for neighbors in a yard.

Make sweet tea with enough sugar to keep a kid spinning for days.

Monogram anything that stands still long enough to be tagged.  Hats, shirts, car decals, pet sweaters, organizers, tote bags, travel cups – if it can fit three letters, you’ll find that super flowery script on it around here.

What are some things you wish you could unlearn? 

That wolf spiders carry up to 100 babies on their back, and if you step on them the spiders will scatter everywhere.  That spiders and ticks can climb vertical surfaces.  And that dead skin cells make up some crazy percentage of the dust in my house.  Eww.

Who is someone that you miss having in your life?

My mom.

Optional Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

Last week Bear had a great time at basketball camp and T-man enjoyed kicking back for his first official week of summer.  We let them have friends over on Friday night, and I’m grateful for the sound of riotous laughter coming from the back of the car on the way to and from the movies.  Nothing beats that kind of laughter.

This week hasn’t had the smoothest start, but I’m hopeful this antibiotic will clear my infection without making me feel too puny in the meantime.  I’m looking forward to getting away with the family for a few days and seeing friends I don’t see nearly enough.

Visit Cee’s blog for her weekly Share Your World post.

What’s happening in your world today?

odds and ends 6/15/17

Posted on by

1.  BrightSide and I watched a fascinating 60 Minutes segment on Sunday about technology.  I expected it to be another look at what tech does to the brain, but instead it discussed how companies are using what they’ve learned about the brain to tweak their coding.  For instance:

  • why Twitter and Instagram use a scroll feed
  • the chemical effect “likes” have on our brains
  • the possibility that a random experiment may have linked our accounts to an algorithm for feedback timing

2.  I’m not sure whether to be impressed or terrified.

3.  I did, however, manage not to tweet about it.

Continue reading →

Share Your World 6/12/17

Posted on by

What do you do when you’re not working? If you are retired, what do you do that is not part of your regular daytime routine?

Volunteer with elementary school students, snuggle up with the pups (okay, that might be routine), read novels, and take photographs.

What would you do if you won the lottery?

I’d pay off any outstanding loans, set up a local scholarship fund, and determine how best to donate to our K-12 schools.

What makes you laugh the most?

It’s usually something ridiculous, like a crazy joke one of us makes and then the giggles get contagious.  Before I know it the four of us are holding our stomachs, laughing madly.  Oh, and silly dog videos.

What is your biggest pet peeve with modern technology?

Glitches with the kids’ technology.  I’ve added two parental apps to their tech over the last six months – uKnowKids (for active monitoring) and Kidslox (for daily limits and lockdown hours).  One keeps causing iCloud to identify us as a security risk, forcing me to change passwords repeatedly.  The other keeps locking my kids out of wifi when they shouldn’t be.  We’re all a bit frustrated about this, especially considering these were supposed to make parenting a little easier.

Optional Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

Our weekend plans shifted at the last minute and we ended up taking the kids to Great Wolf Lodge.  It turned out to be a lot of fun – good family time, and the kids have a lot more freedom now that they’re older so there was even some relaxing in there.

We’re into our first official week of summer.  I hope Bear enjoys her time at the basketball camp and that T-man kicks back.  Considering how late he slept today I think he’ll benefit from the week of downtime.

Cee’s weekly Share Your World is a Monday blog event.

What’s happening in your world today?

Share Your World 6/5/17

Posted on by

What’s your strongest sense?

Smell.  This is both a blessing and a curse.  Beautiful or comforting smells are a thousand times more wonderful, but abrasive or horrific smells are close to painful.

Which of Snow White’s 7 dwarfs describes you best? (Doc, Happy, Bashful, Sleepy, Sneezy, Grumpy, Dopey)

These days?  Sneezy.  I’d probably have to change it to Sneezy/Stuffy/Sniffly to be most accurate.

If you could be one age for the rest of your life, what age would that be?

Oh my, this one is hard.  I have the feeling it shouldn’t be, that lots of people might say “___ was awesome, I’d love to live my life out at that age” but I can’t claim that.  I feel like I’m really coming into myself now, but who’s to say I’m not some sort of late bloomer who’ll love my 50s?  I respectfully plead the fifth.

List of Jobs You Think You Might Enjoy: Even if you aren’t thinking about a career change, it can be fun to think of other jobs you might enjoy.

  • Author.
  • Part time photographer.
  • Dog snuggler.
  • Dog sitter for lazy dogs who need napping buddies.
  • Publisher

Optional Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

The chance to visit with neighbors I haven’t seen in a while, family time at the lake with enough memories to last a lifetime, and celebrating T-man’s confirmation at church.  It was a pretty wonderful weekend all around.

This week is the last one of school.  I’m looking forward to the kids finishing their end of year testing so they can roll into summer stress free, and I suspect they will join me in a happy dance come Friday afternoon.

Cee’s weekly Share Your World is her Monday fun post.

What’s happening in your world today?

odds and ends 6/1/17

Posted on by

1.  The car rider pick up line in North Carolina is a special hell for environmentalists right now.  Idling for 30 minutes = bad for the environment.  Overheated, dizzy driver = bad for the cars.  What to do, what to do…

2.  Why can’t they get bird sounds onto white noise machines?  They make a lovely blend of sound coming from the trees, but coming from the speaker it’s like I’m back in the Tiki Room at Disney World. Continue reading →

Share Your World 5/22/17

Posted on by

What one thing have you not done that you really want to do? 

This will have to wait, but I’d love to take a writer’s sabbatical.  Dedicate a block of time solely to writing and see where it takes me.  That would be amazing.

How often do you get a haircut?

I go every five weeks now, mostly for the color.  But when I go my hairdresser trims the split ends off so I guess that counts.

In regards to puzzle what’s your choice: jigsaw, crossword, word search or numeric puzzles?

So funny!  I’ve gone through stages when I’ve been obsessed with the first three, but I’ve never been drawn into numeric puzzles.  If I were to pick one I’d go with word search.  I try to explain to kids what a valuable skill this is – being able to scan blocks of print for letter combinations or patterns – but they don’t seem impressed.

How many cities have you lived? You can share the number of physical residences and/or the number of cities.

Childhood:  Philippines, Hawaii, Virginia (Fairfax), New Jersey, Virginia (Virginia Beach), Massachusetts (Cohasset).

College:  Virginia (Charlottesville), Massachusetts (Scituate).

Adult:  Virginia (Burnt Chimney), Missouri, North Carolina (Burlington), North Carolina (Graham).

An even dozen cities since birth.  Cool.

Optional Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up? 

We celebrated kids over the weekend.  Friday Bear picked her restaurant for a birthday dinner (holla, Texas Roadhouse) then opened her presents that evening.  Saturday we hosted the family dinner for her.  BrightSide made his dad’s turkey (um, YUM) and Aunt Bee rocked the cake again which is pretty impressive considering Bear asked for a tree.  I swear, sometimes I think they throw stuff at my sister just to pull a nutty.  Then on Sunday evening T-man had his confirmation class cookout to celebrate the end of their year’s work together.

This week looks much slower, so I’m looking forward to taking a breath.  I need to get my feet under me before we hit the end of the school year, but the calendar doesn’t look like I’ll be sprinting headlong toward the weekend.  I’m also looking forward to relaxing a bit over Memorial Day weekend.

Cee’s blog hosts 5 questions weekly for Share Your World.  Pop on over and check it out!

What’s going on in your world today?

Share Your World 5/15/17

Posted on by

How many languages do you you speak?

Only one fluently.  I remember bits and pieces of French from high school (s’il vous plaît, bonjour, au revoir, and je ne sais pas come to mind).  My college Italian stuck a little better (ciao, mi dispiace, per favore, and grazie roll off the tongue).  But to count either one I’d have to actually study it again.

What are you reading, watching, listening to, eating?

I’m reading small great things by Jodi Piccoult and Front Burner: Al Qaeda’s Attack on the USS Cole by Kirk Lippold, USN (ret).  I’m watching season three of The Americans.  I’m usually listening to the Sirius POTUS channel in the car and the Jason Mraz station on Amazon at home.

And then there was eating.  Sigh.  In a desperate attempt to feel better (hello, Hail Mary pass) I’m looking into the blood type diet.  You’ve heard of this, right?  It’s the study of our biological breakdowns, specifically that our bodies are designed to process certain foods more easily than others.  Me?  My blood type is A (shocker, right?), so apparently I have lower levels of stomach acid and (insert enzyme and alkaline mumbo jumbo here) which means I have a harder time digesting animal protein and fat.  (What the what?!)

So this is what I’m trying to eat:  Chicken or turkey.  (Not that they’re beneficial, but my system can tolerate them.)  Seafood, except not any of the seafood I’ve been eating for years like clams, crab, lobster, scallops, or shrimp.  Carrots, romaine, and…I’m out.

Foods I am mourning:  Beef.  I don’t eat a lot of it, but I don’t like that I don’t have the option.  Basically all the seafood listed above.  Ice cream, because apparently dairy is the devil, and cashews.  All the beverages.  Beer, soda, liquor…it seems I’m welcome to drink green tea and alfalfa.  Shoot me now.  Peppers, olives, potatoes, tomatoes, and mushrooms – these are all the vegetables that allow me to claim I eat vegetables.  Really?!  Oh, and all the condiments.  Apparently Type As don’t get to eat condiments.  Sweet Jesus.

What was the last photo you took with your phone?

A pic of the “F” Bombs bath fizzers I got for Mother’s Day.  Bwahahaha!!!

What is your favorite time of day?

Early evening.  I like when the heat starts to ease off, and instead of the harsh noonday sun we have something a little softer.  Unfortunately this is also when the buggy bugs are most active, so I usually enjoy this time of day from indoors.

Optional Bonus question:  What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up? 

That the kids and I enjoyed some (ahem) quality time together while BrightSide was on a business trip.

This week I’m looking forward to knocking some things off my long-overdue list.  I’m finally going for my eye exam and getting that weird knot on my knee checked out so good on me!

Cee’s Share Your World is a weekly blog question mishmash.  Click on over and check it out.

What’s going on in your world today?