My grand neice and darling doing her first crawl
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
The Month of May
My blogability has been next to nothing these past few weeks. I am full of the stuff of life, like going to Andrew's piano recital, cooking out, cleaning the house for company and working. I have had some abnormal stuff though. Abnormalities are like the dust balls of life. Suddenly they are everywhere and you spend your time chasing them around the house on a windy day with the windows open trying to collect them with a broom and dustpan. They allude you!
So in picturama - here is my last few weeks.
Decorations for my parents' 60th anniversary party. Nine shopping days, 27 stores, 32 trips (some stores took two trips) and $101.32.
So in picturama - here is my last few weeks.
Decorations for my parents' 60th anniversary party. Nine shopping days, 27 stores, 32 trips (some stores took two trips) and $101.32.
Still trying to plant the perfect flowers. Every pot in the yard has something dying in it. The impatiens were very cute - until Jack the terrier (or terror) chased lizards through the pots. But, in consolation, he did bring me part of the lizard - right to my pillow.
Ebbie, my darling little mini Schnauzer. She was spayed last month. This week she chewed an eyeball off a stuffed fish, threw up 14 times in one day, Memorial Day, when no vet is open, so we had the distinct pleasure of giving the Pet ER our business again. She had surgery to remove the eyeball which was stuck in her intestine. Not feeling too good - I would say. I am cooking chicken and rice for her for several days. Cooking only rice for me- after paying the bill!
Pool screen finally gave way. New screen goes up- but thankfully the day before company comes in. So much for our savings.
So therefore, blogging has not been on my mind. I do look forward to days of family - spending time with my brothers and their families. I think I will yodel.
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Dietpause
My plants are full of dead buds. If I have to pinch them all off to get more flowers – well I guess I won’t have any more flowers because it is too hard to pinch just the dead flower an
d not the branch. So I will leave the plants “a natural”. Anyway here is the best day of the flowers in the early morning sun. Kind of cool.
Why can’t I diet? I wonder if aging affects one’s diet hormones. I mean, surely there are diet hormones. They hit women monthly. You feel fat, ugly bloated and HAVE to diet. Few ever make it past a few weeks and even fewer make it stick more than a year or two. Then there are those who have hyperdietism – those are the individuals who can diet with a passion, stay thin and fluff-buff(that is look like you work out just enough to have some attractive muscles but not like the man-woman on the Muscle Magazines.) and they even enjoy it!
I should be good at dieting. I start one every Monday. I used to pride myself in self-denial. I went to many showers and parties with incredible delectables and I haughtily said no to it all while wearing a “Jesus Loves you” smile. I looked down on all the poor women who were filling their bodies with everything sinful to eat – unable to stop themselves – but alas I am now one of them.
But I do have the comfort of the setpoint theory. All of our bodies have a setpoint where they just want to be – weightwise. It just so happens mine is higher than yours. I cannot help it, my body demands it and I just don’t have the strength to battle this body any longer. You see I have been through dietpause and all those diet hormones have succumbed to the aging process. I could go to the physician and get some dietgestrone and actually I have. But it made my heart race and made me stay up all night…so I have learned the wisdom of allowing my body to win its battle – to hit its setpoint and to let sleeping diet hormones lie. I have learned to cope. I will just start fresh every Monday morning and go until I give up – be it Thursday, Friday or Saturday. (Sunday is ALWAYS diet day off).
This being Saturday morning, I want some pancakes and bacon, and a cinnamon bun, and just a bite of Bill’s home fries and I would love a small bite of grits – cheesy grits - hmm good. But I promise to eat a nice bowl of fruit along with everything else so I don’t feel too guilty – that is until Monday.
d not the branch. So I will leave the plants “a natural”. Anyway here is the best day of the flowers in the early morning sun. Kind of cool.Why can’t I diet? I wonder if aging affects one’s diet hormones. I mean, surely there are diet hormones. They hit women monthly. You feel fat, ugly bloated and HAVE to diet. Few ever make it past a few weeks and even fewer make it stick more than a year or two. Then there are those who have hyperdietism – those are the individuals who can diet with a passion, stay thin and fluff-buff(that is look like you work out just enough to have some attractive muscles but not like the man-woman on the Muscle Magazines.) and they even enjoy it!
I should be good at dieting. I start one every Monday. I used to pride myself in self-denial. I went to many showers and parties with incredible delectables and I haughtily said no to it all while wearing a “Jesus Loves you” smile. I looked down on all the poor women who were filling their bodies with everything sinful to eat – unable to stop themselves – but alas I am now one of them.
But I do have the comfort of the setpoint theory. All of our bodies have a setpoint where they just want to be – weightwise. It just so happens mine is higher than yours. I cannot help it, my body demands it and I just don’t have the strength to battle this body any longer. You see I have been through dietpause and all those diet hormones have succumbed to the aging process. I could go to the physician and get some dietgestrone and actually I have. But it made my heart race and made me stay up all night…so I have learned the wisdom of allowing my body to win its battle – to hit its setpoint and to let sleeping diet hormones lie. I have learned to cope. I will just start fresh every Monday morning and go until I give up – be it Thursday, Friday or Saturday. (Sunday is ALWAYS diet day off).
This being Saturday morning, I want some pancakes and bacon, and a cinnamon bun, and just a bite of Bill’s home fries and I would love a small bite of grits – cheesy grits - hmm good. But I promise to eat a nice bowl of fruit along with everything else so I don’t feel too guilty – that is until Monday.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Saturday - Not too Shabby
Okay – enough of the deep and heavy. (sounds like the new night cream regime I am following – deep peel and heavy cream)- Oh and I do look lovely! When I take it off that is. Even Bill said my skin looks greatly improved (okay – so not greatly but – improved.) Now that is saying something.
Remember my Lipizzaner stallions? Bill and I drove the grandkids to Sarasota to watch the world famous stallions practice their dressage. We were so close and were able to go through the stables and actually pet them afterwards. Emma rode a pony.
I thought two hours of horse might bore them – but both kids seemed to utterly enjoy them. Andrew thought it cool that they were once war horses – fighting battles with all their maneuvers. Emma thought they did the ballet quite well for boy horses.
Nonetheless, the day was lovely, the breeze warm,and not-yet humid, the horses close-up and the kids engaged. To keep the momentum of the day going, I even planted flowers around my birdbath this evening - looking for the perfect end to a great day. Bill, who was working on his truck, had to find my tools, carry the mulch and potting soil, tell me how and where to plant, had to rescue the bird bath which I tilted a good 30 degrees , clean up the dirt pile and the walkway. He clean up the empty plastic pots and water all when I was done. But other than that, I did the whole thing myself. Should have thought of something else to do. As I sit here tonight $35.00 of flowers are drooping and dying across a bed of mulch that somehow has more dirt in it than mulch. Claiborne, don't you laugh! that's not fair. I heard that!
Remember my Lipizzaner stallions? Bill and I drove the grandkids to Sarasota to watch the world famous stallions practice their dressage. We were so close and were able to go through the stables and actually pet them afterwards. Emma rode a pony.
I thought two hours of horse might bore them – but both kids seemed to utterly enjoy them. Andrew thought it cool that they were once war horses – fighting battles with all their maneuvers. Emma thought they did the ballet quite well for boy horses.
Nonetheless, the day was lovely, the breeze warm,and not-yet humid, the horses close-up and the kids engaged. To keep the momentum of the day going, I even planted flowers around my birdbath this evening - looking for the perfect end to a great day. Bill, who was working on his truck, had to find my tools, carry the mulch and potting soil, tell me how and where to plant, had to rescue the bird bath which I tilted a good 30 degrees , clean up the dirt pile and the walkway. He clean up the empty plastic pots and water all when I was done. But other than that, I did the whole thing myself. Should have thought of something else to do. As I sit here tonight $35.00 of flowers are drooping and dying across a bed of mulch that somehow has more dirt in it than mulch. Claiborne, don't you laugh! that's not fair. I heard that!
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Postmodernism - How did we get there?
Yesterday I taught one of those 8 hour classes at the college where I adjunct. Leadership and World View. Leadership Theory I can teach. I know that stuff but the world view part used an in-depth philosophy book taking a look at various worldviews that replace religion such as New Age, Post-modernism, and Atheism. I have never had a lick of philosophy and don’t know why the college threw it into this course because it did not fit. However after spending hours of time studying so I did not look like a total buffoon – I muddled through student presentations and explanations. The one that struck me to the core is Postmodernism.
This view is born out of a style that began in the 1980’s – a style of architecture, art, dress and other things that demonstrate a rejection of what has been historically accepted as good, beautiful, or right in that industry. It then grew to be a belief – throwing out the good with the bad of that which the previous generation taught as good, godly, right -a rejection of the Bible as infallible, of Christianity as right, and the acceptance of proven science to be infallible and the best value to believe in – that is if it strikes your inner self as good and right. For more on postmodernism read this.
What struck me is that this generation is the peer group of my kids who grew up under the parentage of the Jesus Movement in the 70’s and 80’s and all of our generation’s pendulum swinging fanaticism without foundation. We taught our kids to pray about the color of socks they should wear each day, about healing their little boo-boo and if it wasn’t healed they didn’t have enough faith, that Little House on the Prairie wasn’t a godly show – in fact- all TV was evil, that Santa Claus is dead, that if you pray and believe you too can be prosperous, and that there was no greater joy than singing worship songs for 4 hours at a time, - forget about lunch; then there was the laughter thing that God would glue you to the pew and cause you to laugh for 3 hours to bless you.
Our children of the 80’s have grown to see that the Christianity we have fluctuated in is fallible and they interpret that as an errant Word of God and that the tenants of Christianity are naïve and unreasonable. They have turned their hunger for truth away from Christianity because what we have argued as truth with them is only our fallible fanaticism that we ourselves wrestle with daily - but see – we were there – we KNOW about the sweep of the Holy Spirit in our nation – so some of us hang on to that wave and have never moved on but our kids - they were not their cognitively speaking.
So I watch this young generation taking over the control of the vote, the politics, the businesses – I watch them pick and choose things in the Bible they will value, pick and choose things in nihilism or existentialism, etc they will value, and thinking they have the answer, believing all things are relative, they are led like lambs to the slaughter while those in my generation who have stuck with God have finally decided that seeking the Word for real truth and being willing to question long-held ideas of Christianity and rid ourselves of denominational and religious dogma have opened our eyes to a new solid knowledge and logical, intellectual proof that God is true and REAL; and so is His Word. But now – the postmodern 20-30 something won’t listen – we had our chance.
God help us all.
This view is born out of a style that began in the 1980’s – a style of architecture, art, dress and other things that demonstrate a rejection of what has been historically accepted as good, beautiful, or right in that industry. It then grew to be a belief – throwing out the good with the bad of that which the previous generation taught as good, godly, right -a rejection of the Bible as infallible, of Christianity as right, and the acceptance of proven science to be infallible and the best value to believe in – that is if it strikes your inner self as good and right. For more on postmodernism read this.
What struck me is that this generation is the peer group of my kids who grew up under the parentage of the Jesus Movement in the 70’s and 80’s and all of our generation’s pendulum swinging fanaticism without foundation. We taught our kids to pray about the color of socks they should wear each day, about healing their little boo-boo and if it wasn’t healed they didn’t have enough faith, that Little House on the Prairie wasn’t a godly show – in fact- all TV was evil, that Santa Claus is dead, that if you pray and believe you too can be prosperous, and that there was no greater joy than singing worship songs for 4 hours at a time, - forget about lunch; then there was the laughter thing that God would glue you to the pew and cause you to laugh for 3 hours to bless you.
Our children of the 80’s have grown to see that the Christianity we have fluctuated in is fallible and they interpret that as an errant Word of God and that the tenants of Christianity are naïve and unreasonable. They have turned their hunger for truth away from Christianity because what we have argued as truth with them is only our fallible fanaticism that we ourselves wrestle with daily - but see – we were there – we KNOW about the sweep of the Holy Spirit in our nation – so some of us hang on to that wave and have never moved on but our kids - they were not their cognitively speaking.
So I watch this young generation taking over the control of the vote, the politics, the businesses – I watch them pick and choose things in the Bible they will value, pick and choose things in nihilism or existentialism, etc they will value, and thinking they have the answer, believing all things are relative, they are led like lambs to the slaughter while those in my generation who have stuck with God have finally decided that seeking the Word for real truth and being willing to question long-held ideas of Christianity and rid ourselves of denominational and religious dogma have opened our eyes to a new solid knowledge and logical, intellectual proof that God is true and REAL; and so is His Word. But now – the postmodern 20-30 something won’t listen – we had our chance.
God help us all.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Mein Erbe
There are those days you wish you could go back in time and be a part of something from then to now so that you could have a thousand memories of yesterday that you do not have...but only wish you had. That makes perfect sense to me, hope it does to you.
Sunday was one of those days. I took my parents to the park to take photos in authentic German regalia. They look the part - perfectly the part. I wanted to know German, remember German events, have German memories- I would like to know what '"Gott segnen das wenig eine" means.
I am erasing all the negative things I feel about Germany and the German way of life and embracing my heritage as I help my parents plan an old fashioned German party for their 60th. Just look at them. They deserve 
to enjoy a celebration that is all about them - their way of life, their history - what they enjoy and with whom they enjoy it.
to enjoy a celebration that is all about them - their way of life, their history - what they enjoy and with whom they enjoy it.Sunday, April 6, 2008
Raindrops and Rest Stops
Rain is a wonderful excuse to do very little - except snack and nap. I love a real excuse to be lazy. Some people call it resting or relaxing, some call it chillin', some call it taking it easy ----- what else do people call it? Down time, time for myself, doing nothin', indulging myself.etc. Does it bring any images to mind?
Why do I call it being lazy? I think the phrase you use to describe the act of nothing in particular describes the kind of person you are when you particularly do something . I mean, really, think about it. How would you describe yourself? Easy going? Keeps cool, watches life go by and enjoys whatever you happen to catch in your happy-go-lucky net? Then you would probably spend a rainy Sunday afternoon chillin? True? Come on now! It's true isn't it?
If you are a never-sit-down kind of person, always seeing the spider web on the wall, the glass on the table that needs to be picked up and nothing gets your juices going more than a stressful project with many facets of "to-do's" - you spend a rain Sunday afternoon being lazy.
What about you, Miss Exercise and Health-conscious Yogurt-eating morning power-walker. You relax – don’t you? It sounds a lot like stretching or Pilates for the mind.
So readers, what do you call it? Does it fit your personality? I wonder…..
Why do I call it being lazy? I think the phrase you use to describe the act of nothing in particular describes the kind of person you are when you particularly do something . I mean, really, think about it. How would you describe yourself? Easy going? Keeps cool, watches life go by and enjoys whatever you happen to catch in your happy-go-lucky net? Then you would probably spend a rainy Sunday afternoon chillin? True? Come on now! It's true isn't it?
If you are a never-sit-down kind of person, always seeing the spider web on the wall, the glass on the table that needs to be picked up and nothing gets your juices going more than a stressful project with many facets of "to-do's" - you spend a rain Sunday afternoon being lazy.
What about you, Miss Exercise and Health-conscious Yogurt-eating morning power-walker. You relax – don’t you? It sounds a lot like stretching or Pilates for the mind.
So readers, what do you call it? Does it fit your personality? I wonder…..
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