I'm so glad you could stop by. This is my personal blog of daily life and my journey through life. You will find a strong emphasis on family and friends as well as finding my ancestors through genealogy. Unlike my other blogs this blog is more of a catch-all so any topic is fair game.
[From my Facebook wall]
A 50- something year old white woman arrived at her seat on a crowded flight and immediately didn't want the seat. The seat was next to a black man. Disgusted, the woman immediately summoned the flight attendant and demanded a new seat. The woman said "I cannot sit here next to this black man." The fight attendant said "Let me see if I can find another seat." After checking, the flight attendant returned and stated "Ma'am, there are no more seats in economy, but I will check with the captain and see if there is something in first class." About 10 minutes went by and the flight attendant returned and stated "The captain has confirmed that there are no more seats in economy, but there is one in first class. It is our company policy to never move a person from economy to first class, but being that it would be some sort of scandal to force a person to sit next to an UNPLEASANT person, the captain agreed to make the switch to first class." Before the woman could say anything, the attendant gestured to the black man and said, "Therefore sir, if you would so kindly retrieve your personal items, we would like to move you to the comfort of first class as the captain doesn't want you to sit next to an unpleasant person." Passengers in the seats nearby began to applause while some gave a standing ovation.
Garden Gnome
©2006-2012
Every once in a while there is a bad year where nothing goes right. That year was 1989 for us. I returned to university as a mature student, while raising young children and a rather long daily commute. On December 15 of that year my husband who was a classed engineer and his crew hit and killed a guy. It was a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. On December 18 that year his mother passed away. It had been a long struggle but finally she was at peace. I think she held on just long enough not to pass away on one of our kid's birthdays. On Christmas day, my Mom passed away to a well deserved journey into peace. Later that week my sister-in-law's husband's grandfather died which wouldn't have hit home except I've known the family my entire life, went to school with his grandkids and his wife was my Mom's egg lady. Every week like clockwork she delivered three dozen eggs. It was a bad year!
The pool had been pissy, and we dealt with an algae bloom from out of this world. We were trying to adjust to life with Mommy as a student and I was just trying to adjust period. I was constantly tired while trying to cope living on four hours of sleep a night. Looking back I don't know how I did it but somehow I did get through that first year of university. I was understandably numb after spending the end of the year in funeral homes. Our kids were blissfully too young to remember much especially being in the funeral homes. My husband knew it was not his fault over the death of that guy who selfishly took his life at the expense of the railway crew but he never did return to the rail full time and a few years later he permanently retired from the rail. It's a pity because he loved his job there.
It was a bad year, 1989. It started bad then steadily got worse ending with an explosion of deaths. And yet in the end, we are stronger as a couple because of it. We are stronger as a family because of it. Even a bad year has a silver lining although it is sometimes hard to see at the time.
Garden Gnome
©2006-2011
We have had a bit of a comedy of errors resulting from spills and Mother Nature over the past couple of days. My husband arrived home from hunt camp on Saturday after a week away. The weather had been cooler and a bit damper there than at home so a hot bath with epsom salts was in order to sooth his aching body. I was happily chatting away with him when I realized my feet were wet. I was standing in a puddle of water that had escaped the bathtub! I peeled off my socks, cleaned up the mess while reminding myself how much I had missed him being gone. The next day, I was at the computer doing a bit of blogging when my drink was accidently tipped over my keyboard and desk. As luck would have it the desk was of course piled high so the mess was a bit more than it should have been. I cleaned that mess up but apparently my keyboard did not appreciate it's bath. Last night I briefly looked for the wireless keyboard but gave up telling myself the wired keyboard would be just fine once it dried out. In the middle of the night, I reached for my water bottle. It fell over, knocking the cap just enough to send water over the bedroom floor. I cleaned that mess up and crawled back into bed after refilling my water bottle.
This morning the keyboard made a feeble attempt to do something but managed to only put out stings of 888888. I unplugged it then tinkered online using mouse only so essential didn't accomplish much. A couple of hours later I tried the keyboard again. A few more keys worked but nowhere enough to do any blogging so I finally found my wireless keyboard but could not find one single charged AA battery! I found four dead rechargeble batteries and put them in the charger hoping they would hold a charge but they are getting old. So I decided to walk to the hardware store for batteries. The sky looked a bit threatening so I took the small folding umbrella. In hindsight I should have driven. It started spitting a little after the first block into my walk but by the time I reached the hardware store it was up to a nice rain escalating to a hard down pour on my way home. I was soaked through! The good news is aside of getting a bit of exercise along with a free show and more laundry to do, the wireless keyboard is working. The other keyboard is still in pieces waiting to fully dry out.
Garden Gnome
©2006-2011
Butter Fingers
March 27, 2011
We have a small twenty-inch wide counter between the refrigerator and stove. It is my coffee and tea making station with the upper cabinet holding my collection of teas, coffees, hot chocolate and the breadbox. The area is home to the espresso maker, the only kitchen appliance other than my KitchenAid stand mixer to stay on the counters. Tucked on the side by the refrigerator, I have a small glass butter dish. The electric tea kettle sits just in front of the espresso make when in use but otherwise it is put away.
I have been on an herbal tea kick the last couple of weeks or so. I put an empty herbal tea box in front of the butter dish closer to the edge of the counter to put any of the tea wrappings as some of the herbal tea bags are individually wrapped. Somehow and I'm not sure how but suspect the house gnomes were having a wee bit of St. Paddy's fun the box and butter dish got switched around with the butter dish closest to the edge of the counter. Well you can guess what happened as evidenced from the mess pictured. Most of my kitchen food storage is glass so occasionally breakage it to be expected. I was a bit ticked that there was about a quarter of a pound of butter wasted. However, I was very thankful the thick glass bowl did not hit my foot. It landed about an inch from my foot on my injured leg! My foot is already swollen and painful from the drainage in my leg so having the butter dish fall on it would not have been a good thing.
Garden Gnome
©2006-2011
Many people declare their New Year's resolutions each year. They make a long list of resolutions that usually are broken by the end of the first week of the new year. The problem with making resolutions is they set you up for failure right off the hop, then you feel horrible for breaking them and not living up to those expectations that you get discouraged and give up trying. I don't make New Year's resolutions. Instead what I aim for is to make the new year a better year than the year before. With that comes the realization that I need to work on making myself a better person but nothing is ever cut into stone. I just work on it. What about you? Do you make New Year's resolutions?
Garden Gnome
©2006-2011
Over the past month my personal theme has been taking back control. I think just coming to the realization that this was necessary was a blessing it itself. It seems like once I made the conscious decision to take back control everything started falling into place. After making the decision I simply acted and have continued to act to firm up that control. It has been an extremely rewarding experience, one that has helped build my self-esteem while strengthening my relationship with my family and friends. It has been an amazing blessing being able to draw on my family and friends during this time of personal growth. I can't tell you how much their love and support means! It is such a blessing to be able to share a bit of personal growth with them :)
Garden Gnome
©2006-2010
It's funny that sometimes it takes seriously getting angry at yourself to make a change that is long overdue. I came to the very realization that no one has the right to intrude on my privacy and no one has power over me emotionally unless I allow them that power. It's not that I did not know this before or that it was a revelation nor was it knowledge that I have not relied on in the past. In this case the problem existed because I allowed it to exist. Realizing I was allowing this to happen was a huge blessing because it spurred me into action.
Last week I took the necessary steps to increase our privacy in our home, away from home and while online. The beauty of this is I was able to use the very same technology that invades our privacy. It's scary when you think that Google cameras can go by your house gathering whatever information they want including looking in your windows. It's also scary that you no longer have any privacy in your backyard thanks to Google. But knowing how Google collects the data and how to protect your house from being a see through for Google can work to your advantage. The telephone is a remarkable device except in the hands of telemarketers yet technology exists that you don't have to deal with telemarketers. Spam and unwanted online attention from those you want no contact with can be eliminated using proper filters and blocks. Even the popular Twitter allows you to block those you don't want to deal with. So last week was very much a time for creating filters in real life and online. Thanks to the blessing of technology I was able to achieve this with minimal disruption to restore the peace we so deserve. Peace is suce a blessing!
Garden Gnome
©2006-2010
