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 |  Day to day stuff....a memoir without order. |
 Imagination is described by Webster as...The act or power of forming a mental image of something not present to the senses in reality. Albert Einstein said "Logic will get you from A to B, but imagination will take you everywhere."  I never realized it until I read it somewhere but there are ways to boost one's imagination: Create a visual journal Draw whatever you see for 15 minutes a day. You don't need to be an artist. Think like an artist Cut out pictures from magazines & piece them together to create an original image. Listen to Bach Close your eyes while playing your favorite music. Or listen to the sounds of nature on a CD or in the great outdoors. Play word games Try thinking of as many words as you can that begin with MAR...or you pick. Daydream Let your mind wander, or focus on a single object & study its characteristics.     Everyone has a story....here's mine.....c   |
| We are supposed to be getting bad storms late tonight. It is very warm now, 85 degrees, but tomorrow the high is to be 64...March has arrived. A renowned and well-loved pizza parlor here in Gainesville, Satchel's, was damaged by fire last Tuesday night. They expect to be closed at least six weeks for repairs. There is to be a benefit concert tonight to help the out-of-work employees, isn't that wonderful? They have great pizza and lots of other things, long lines waiting for food, lots of nostagia and crafts on the walls, and even an old van built in for one of their dining areas. It's a very unique place with good food and live music most nights. Six weeks will be a very long time for a lot of people. Well, I'm off to Home Depot so.... until next time...c |
I actually got a story written for the Flash yesterday, but, alas, it did not win...or even an honorable mention. But I'm not going to be discouraged. There were a lot of entries. I read them all and even picked the winner  .I started a new book last night by Elizabeth Berg (I love her), A Year of Pleasures. It starts with a road trip where she sees gossiping cows and living photos. Didn't want to put it down, but life continues. I also picked up a copy of The Kite Runner (2nd time around for me) for the "Rising Stars Book Club"  . Discussion is open, but there is still time to read this wonderful book.And many more good ones are certain to be picked in the future. Everyone is welcome.Mia has an interesting recipe in her "Invalid Item" blog today. Who wouldn't want to try "good for you" chocolate pudding. I emailed her to find out where and what kind of chia to buy...not much luck through Google, locally anyway. Maybe she will post something in tomorrow's blog. I've gotten a lot of good tips from her blog.Roast beef is in the crock pot for supper and smelling soooo yummy right now. Summer squash casserole (the cheesy kind) and apple-pecan salad for sides. On its second time around, Jim likes shredded roast beef on a burger roll with a little onion and cheese and a squirt of sweet vidalia dressing, wrapped in tin foil and warmed in a 350 oven for ten minutes. Pretty yummy. I must be hungry...all I can write about is food  .I'm still succeeding in my daily reviewing, but I hesitate to take on anything where someone might count on me. I'm never sure from one day to the next which way the wind will blow... A couple of things have surfaced that I would really love to tackle, but I hate to be a disappointment if things don't go as planned on the homefront. And I don't want to tempt fate or whatever it is that makes things happen. I think a little more time and improvement is needed, then I can think more about those kinds of things. The weather is beautiful here today....84 degrees for the high and the same tomorrow. I'm making a list for Home Depot over the weekend . Here's to things continuing to look up....until next time....c |
| It has been dreary and rainy here since last Friday which makes me feel like "Debbie Downer". Where's the sunshine? All the coolness and bleakness stirs my cravings for comfort food so last night was homemade lasagna. Now I'm satisfied and can go back to normal eating .Even the birds seem to be in a bad mood, bumping each other off the feeder perches. I know just how they feel. On a happier note, I got a phone call from a very old friend last night whom I haven't heard from for a long time. Seems her husband is in about the same condition as my Jim, and she is his sole caregiver as well. Why is it comforting to know someone else is in the same boat as you are? It just does not seem right, but there you have it. It was good to catch up on all her news, and to be able to share some of mine. We promised to stay in touch better, exchanged cell numbers and emails. I'm continuing to improve on my reviews, at least in quantity, and the reading is very enjoyable, not to mention the friendly, appreciative emails. Writing-wise, though, is another "story". Prompts are not prompting any story ideas for me lately, but I continue to check out the Flash and the Cramp daily, hoping for a eureka moment. So far I've just enjoyed reading the winners' stories, and sometimes sending a review. It's a good thing I can still blog and review. Otherwise, the well seems to be dry.... until next time....c |
| I've been watching our potential presidential candidates, and they all seem to be such a sorry lot. How will I choose from this bunch? This is the way I usually make up my mind (which I have not been able to do yet). I picture myself in a rubber raft riding the whitewaters of the Columbia River. Now, just because I have never been near the Columbia River or rafting doesn't mean I can't picture this. I've seen a lot of those movies. Anyway, I picture myself on this flimsy rubber boat tossing up and down in the wild waves and treacherous rocks, far from shore, what shore there is. Granite, straight up, lines both sides of the twisting river The sky is black with thunderheads, rain is pouring down, lightning flashes, and water is collecting in the boat. I am screaming bloody murder, and I'm hanging on with all my strength, knuckles white and fingernails bloody. Up ahead, I see more huge rocks and then nothing. I think "falls", and now I realize why they are called that. There is nothing I can do. I am powerless. Then I sneak a quick look toward the stern, and from the list of candidates, I picture the one I want to be there. So far I have drawn a blank. I think I just drowned. until next time....c |
| Jim and I were sitting on the backporch this afternoon, and I was amazed at the number and kinds of birds flying around, even robins. Everytime I see a robin, I can't help myself, that tune just starts going through my head..cheer up, cheer up, you sleepy head...oh I can't get rid of it. In addition to robins, we saw redwinged blackbirds, bluebirds, mockingbirds, wrens, catbirds, phoebes, cedar waxwings, dove, purple and yellow finch...oh, my...there are just too many to name. A front moved in with some rain and I guess that explains the fury. I feel pretty positive our cold cold weather is behind us now that I've seen some robins, big, fat robins. I haven't been able to do much walking since Jim came home from the hospital. I used to walk a couple of miles everyday and I really miss it, but I am afraid to go that far and leave him alone. I even got some walkie talkies that I thought I could carry with me, but he doesn't have enough strength in either thumb to push the button to talk...so now I have two useless walkie talkies. Anyway, I decided to charge up the old ipod and listen to some tunes which is what I do when I am walking. Then I thought about someone's (Mia's) blog I just read about r-ancing and wondered if I couldn't just do that on my backporch. That worked out very well. Do you know I can do a lot of things to music that I find impossible to do to silence? Who knew I could jog and jump and all kinds of things? My tune today was my favorite, Abba's Money, Money, Money must be funny in the rich man's world...oh, I love that song. Not especially the words, but the music just makes me keep moving. It's a good thing it only lasted a few minutes because when it was finished, I thought I was going to have a heart attack...just kidding...but boy am I out of shape! It made me feel GOOD! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCkOmcIl79s Turn it up LOUD. bet you can't sit still! until next time...c |
| My television watching has been reduced to two hours on Sunday evening and now that is finished. Downton Abby had its last episode last night. Everything was wrapped up satisfactorily except for Mr. Bates (the valet). He remains in prison for the murder of his first wife. Julian Fellowes wrote a good one. But now what am I going to watch? TV sucks. So glad for the library. Since tax packages are no longer mailed to us peons, I finally got around to ordering my own. They came in record time, even before I want to work on them. I guess the government can be efficent sometimes...when it is in their interest. Jim's potassium continues to run over the upper limit but his doc has come up with a pretty good plan. She has given him a prescription for the awful stuff he had to take in the hospital to bring it down (K-exalate), and after labs she has him take a dose if it is a little high...seems to be working. And he is doing better in the mornings since we stopped a couple of his other medications. They were making his blood pressure too low and that was the reason he was so weak (dizzy) first thing on arising. Now he is getting into his wheelchair right away and able to eat his breakfast by himself. That really means a lot to me. And the K-exalate is keeping him from the emergency room. We are trying to eliminate as much potassium as possible from his diet. Cow's milk has a lot of it so I looked for alternatives and came up with rice milk. I bought the vanilla kind and he says he cannot tell the difference. I'm eager to see how much it affects his next labs. Two things he loves he must absolutely avoid...chocolate and nuts. They are both HIGH potassium foods plus bad for diabetics (chocolate) and ostomates (nuts)...double whammies. Who would have thought chocolate was high in potassium...not me. High potassium leads to muscle weakness with the most important muscle being the heart. His chronic kidney disease is the culprit. They just cannot get rid of any excess potassium. I am so grateful his new doctor is taking a special interest. We have a renal consult on March 5th. until next time....c |
| I just finished reading Letters For Emily by Camron Wright. If you want to read something that makes you feel good, this book is at the top of the list. If you yearn to be immortal, write a novel. Your family and friends, and if you are lucky, thousands, maybe even millions, of others will come to know you long after you are gone from this earth. And you get to determine how they will remember you. That's the best part. Now that's an incentive to increase your vocabulary and get those fingers moving. I know I went to the library to pick up that biography on Emily Dickinson, but I spied Letters for Emily in the restack cart, read the inside front flap, and couldn't resist it. Emily (Dickinson, that is) is next . She's residing on my nightstand for the moment. Isn't that weird...two Emilys?Camron Wright's real life grandfather inspired his book. He wrote poetry to his family and at the end of his life suffered the symptoms of aging and mental illness, just as Wright's character in the book. Through his grandfather's poems and other letters, Wright's family chose to remember him not as the frail, sick man he was at the end of his life, but for the strengths and sacrifices he wrote about during his life. Wouldn't it be a great gift if we all could be remembered that way? After all, dying is just a tiny part of life. until next time....c |
| My Zen Cat stares at me from the calendar on the wall, and all of a sudden, I am Zen. I have to shake my head to come back to reality. In my email account I had a library notice this morning that the biography about Emily Dickinson is in and ready to be picked up. I'm very anxious to start reading it but probably won't be able to pick it up until tomorrow. Jim has some physical therapy scheduled today and it will be difficult to get away. And it's COLD! Night before last, 24 degrees, not quite as bad last night, and gradually warming back up, thank goodness. I've been working on a knitted shawl for a few months and last night while watching Jeopardy, I actually wrapped up in it to knit some more. The warmth gave me incentive . It was so cold I went to bed a 9:30. Haven't done that in ages.It's so sad about Whitney Houston. What a beautiful voice she had. On "Sunday Morning", a show on CBS on Sunday morning (duh), someone spoke about her and said something I agree one hundred percent with. He wished we could just mourn her death and relish her music and leave the other stuff alone. Me too. until next time....c |
| For the last few years, because of Jim's health, I have been chief cook and bottle washer in more ways than one. Today I donned my home repair and maintenance cap, and installed a set of offset hinges. If you are unfamiliar with offset hinges, they replace regular door hinges and allow an extra two inches to the width of the doorway when the door is open. They do this by keeping the door itself out of the way, utilizing the shape of a Z...sort of. That should be a Z with a completely vertical middle line. Jim was a residential builder before he retired in the 90's so I had a very educated and competent kibitser on the sidelines. Taking down the door was easy. I closed it, lined up a long nail with the bottom of the hinge pin and tapped it up with a hammer until it fell out...two of them. Then, I opened the door carefully and lifting and pulling, slid the two halves of both hinges apart. Thinking ahead I had already charged up the power screwdriver so after laying the door on its handle side edge, I easily removed the six screws from the two half hinges. I did the same with the ones on the door jamb. If you have ever noticed, hinges are recessed into a cutout in the door edge and in the door jamb. The new hinges needed a little extra wood removed on the corners since they were squared and the originals had a rounder arc. This recess is very important to the door's closing correctly. I accomplished this by lightly screwing on the new hinges, drawing the new line with a pencil, scoring it with the blade of a box cutter, then sliding the blade underneath and lifting it out. After carefully preparing all the new recesses, I installed the four half hanges, two on the door and two on the jamb. A power screw driver comes in very handy for this job. Then I stood the door upright and keeping it half open, I placed my foot under the handle side and that little bit of height lined up the hinges exactly. Then I closed the door, hammered in the new pins, and voila...finit. It worked perfectly. Sorry if this sounds like I'm patting myself on the back...but...yes, yes I am....  !til next time....c ps- I forgot to say the reason for all this. Jim's wheelchair barely fit through the door and now he has room to spare without scraping up his fingers on the wheels . |
| I looked for poems about birds today and the following went right to my core... "Hope" is the thing with feathers— That perches in the soul— And sings the tune without the words— And never stops—at all— And sweetest—in the Gale—is heard— And sore must be the storm— That could abash the little Bird That kept so many warm— I've heard it in the chillest land— And on the strangest Sea— Yet, never, in Extremity, It asked a crumb—of Me. Emily Dickinson Not being much of a poet myself, I wanted to know more about the person of Emily Dickinson. In Amazon I found that a couple of years ago a biography had been written about her, Lives Like Loaded Guns: Emily Dickinson and Her Family's Feuds by Lyndall Gordon. I have no idea if this was known before, but in the excerpt the author puts forth that Ms. Dickinson may have had epilepsy and that this may explain many of the strange aspects of her life. She may have been reclusive to avoid seizures in public, she may have remained unmarried due to the laws of the time period, she took drugs routinely given to those with epilepsy, when seen in public she wore white perhaps in hope of reducing overstimulization, i.e. seizures, and that temporal lobe epilepsy is associated with creative genius. Along with epilepsy, she endured many familial struggles, according to the biography. Isn't it astonishing that with all these things to overcome, she found and created so much beauty, beauty she shares with us today. Or could it be that when we struggle, we have a need to search out beauty so that we may capture it within ourselves? until next time...c |
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