A little hand written pick-me-up

Yesterday I received a surprise note card in the mail.  I did not recognize at first the name on the return address.  But I was curious about the handwritten address.  It did not appear to be junk mail.  Curiouser.  Some handwritten something, addressed just to me, from a person whose name was, well, familiar, as all Scandinavian American names come to be after living a community like this.  But not instantly recognizable as someone I knew. 

I eagerly slit open the envelope, and as soon as I began reading I knew who the sender was.  This card is from one of "my readers."  When I started this blog, blogging was kind of new.  Many people had online feeds from their favorite bloggers.  I myself had a list I checked every morning, like scanning the morning headlines.  These blog feeds were, in a sense, an early version of the crazy social media we have today.  These writers were my friends.  And my readers were my friends, too, leaving  comments or e-mailing me about one or another post.  Occasionally, one or another with more "old fashioned" social skills would actually pop me a letter in the mail. 

Off the top of my head, I believe I've only gotten real honest to goodness snail mail from a couple of blog readers.  The note I got yesterday was from one woman who has kindly read and supported me throughout all these years of blogging with occasional handwritten notes of thanks. 

You see, this reader grew up near here.  Her parents were both under Joe's care as homebound parishioners when we first moved here.  I can't say that I have met this dear woman in person.  Perhaps I have, once or twice.  It seems I remember an in person conversation.  But I'm not sure.  I do know that I remember her as a person.  A mental image.  This is O and G's daughter.  The one who lives near the Twin Cities.  The one who reads my blog and enjoys hearing about things at home.

Her notes to me throughout the years had a positive impact on my writing.  It brought me a deeper kind of pleasure to talk about things in the northland when I knew that someone who could see it in her mind's eye was enjoying it.  It challenged me to lend visual details to my posts.  To dig a little bit for local things of interest.

I found yesterday I was blue in a different kind of way to think that I won't be able to write about this community, changes in the seasons, little nothings in our life here, for much longer.  It made me sad that this dear reader will hear only news of our new home and community and people.  All good things, of course.  But not the same as hearing about home.

And so yesterday, as I scanned this kind note or thanks and support, I remembered this friend fondly.  And I thought, "I'm going to write her a little thank you note for her kind words."  But then I immediately thought further, "STOP!  You know good and well you will never do that.  So don't even kid yourself."

But I can write a blog post of thanks and kind thoughts.  And I know she will see it.  And I hope she will smile.  Thanks you for your kind words of encouragement throughout the years. 

This meaning or that? aka, Demonstrative Adjective or Demonstrative Pronoun?

I'm a rules person.  I like my grammar nice and neat.  But I find myself frequently telling my girls, Sophie and Clara, during their homeschooling, that some aspects of grammar are open to interpretation.  For example, when to use less common punctuation such as an M-dash, a colon, parentheses, ellipses, etc. 

Yesterday we ran into one that was so clear to me, but the curriculum materials had explained it differently.  I asked Joe, and he agreed with the curriculum.  I looked it up in Writers Inc, and ... gues what!!  I won!!  I mean, I was right.

The dilemma:  Is the word that always a demonstrative pronoun?

When the girls do their grammar lessons, they are given an excerpt from their current reader, a paragraph or two, perhaps five to eight lines.  They are instructed to make certain grammatical observations and notations regarding the given paragraph.

In the example that caused the murkiness yesterday, they were to find and mark all the pronouns.  The hint they were given:  "The words that and which are pronouns."

I don't disagree that that and which can be pronouns.  But I don't think they are always pronouns.  Especially not that.  I still have to think a little bit more about which.

That can be a demonstrative pronoun.  Can you please bring that to me? 
That can also be a demonstrative adjective.  Can you please bring that pencil to me?

This explanation is clear as a bell to me.  It's so fundamental to how I "think grammar" that I absolutely wouldn't consider it even worthy of discussion.

But in Clara and Sophie's grammar lesson, there was that hint:  "The words that and which are pronouns."

The selection in which those thats occurred?

My story will tell much of that little strip of land called Canaan to the south, between us and the accursed land of Egypt, which was only a name to me when I was a child.  For all the wealth and all the armies and all the glories of the nations have passed through that little land and probably always will; and the story of the kings of Canaan is the story of the world.  (from Hittite Warrior, by Joanne Williamson)

I've shaded the two thats in that selection.   Both to me are quite obviously adjectives.  That strip.  That land. 

When I found myself once again in disagreement with the curriculum, I asked my husband, Mr. Languages.  "I've never heard of a demonstrative adjective.  Those are pronouns.  That is always a pronoun."

Hmmm.

But I was unwilling to let it go.  I pulled out Writers Inc, the recommended writing manual for use with our curriculum. 

According to Writers Inc,

504.3 Demonstrative Pronouns
A demonstrative pronoun points out people, places, or things without naming them.
This shouldn't be too hard.  That looks about right.
These are the best ones.  Those ought to be thrown out.

That would seem to imply that the uses in the paragraph above are not pronouns, since the definition specifies, "without naming them."  And none of the examples are of the same construction as the paragraph in the girls' school lesson.

"I'll just look up demonstrative adjectives, to check what they say there."

Writers Inc on adjectives,

from section 513.1 Types of Adjectives
NOTE: Some words can be either adjectives or pronouns (that, these, all, each, both, many, some, etc.).  These words are adjectives when they come before the nouns they modify; they are pronouns when they stand alone.

Yes, I'm a little competitive.  Just a little, really.  But I felt like spiking the football.

But there's still that which to deal with.  My gut reaction is that it's a subordinating conjunction, introducing the dependent clause.  I don't find which in any lists of possible subordinating conjunctions.  But there are so many possibilities, that the lists usually say something like, "and many other words," or, "etc."  So I can probably include it there if I want.  Count it as one of those mury places in the English language. 

But I have to admit that it might just be a pronoun. 

So much to write about: Louisa, Thanksgiving, the Quiet Joy of family time together

Wednesday morning we woke to a lovely frost.

I have been falling short on my writing.  Not becasue I have writer's block, or because I have nothing to write about.  More the opposite.  I have so many things to write about that it's been hard for me to focus on any one thing.  I've been trying hard to stay busy around my home, so that equals less time at my computer.  Which is a very good thing!  But the writing has been hard.  The ideas build up and when I finally sit down at my computer, there is a glut of ideas and no focus.

One reason that things are backlogged in my brain is because I have in my head a lovely post dedicated to my oldest daughter who is studying in Italy with a highschool exchange program.  I want to include some pictures.  But that task of finding and loading images always seems to take much longer than anticipated.  I want to talk about Louisa's adventures.  I want to express a little bit of what theMom has experienced in allowing her teen-aged daughter to embark on such an adventure.  So always, when I get to the computer, I think to myself, "It's too much for today.  Later."

Louisa with a view overlooking her town of Belvedere, with the sea in the background

Another factor in this backlog is the jumble.  The convoluted nature of my mind these days.  A hundred times a day, I compose bits and pieces of blog posts.  While washing dishes or folding clothes.  Taking a shower or watching my kids play.  During all of these times my brain is busy thinking of things to write and ordering those things into sensical patterns of words.  But when I sit down at my computer, either the thoughts don't come at all, or there are simply too many to choose any one about which to write.

So today is a mish-mash.  A mish-mash of thoughts.  A digital convolution of words.

We had a very nice Thanksgiving.  The kids and I, with Joe's help too, got the house mostly presentable for company.  Joe's parents came on Wednesday afternoon.  We had homemade soup and freshly baked gluten free bread for supper.  The soup was a mix of my homemade beef broth that Joe had canned for me, and various leftovers.  Warm and good and sustaining.

Joe had a service at 5:30 at Mt. Olive.  We all went to church at Oak Park at 7:30 that evening.  Then we came home and settled in for the evening.

Joe and I (mostly Joe) got the turkey in the roaster for a slow overnight roast.  It was a free range bird.  They tend to be a bit drier and somewhat tougher than the commercially raised turkeys, so they warrant a little finesse in preparation. 

On Thanksgiving Day, Joe had two morning services, St. Petri  and Nazareth. 

I mostly putzed around the kitchen, and the kids entertained Grandma and Grandpa. 

Apron-clad Joe after carving the turkey; Donna, Grandma, and Grandpa

Besides the turkey, the mid afternoon dinner included roasted sweet potatoes (I had forgotten to buy marshmallows, so that was a disappointment to the kids), mashed potatoes with gravy, cooked carrots, stewed cranberries, and three kinds of pickles (cucumber, green beans, and milkweed pods).  We had pumpkin custard for dessert.  This is simply crustless pie.  But this time there was a twist, since I used some cooked squash Joe's mom had brought, rather than thawing pumpkin.  It was very sweet and creamy, with a delicate buttery flavor.

Jeremy's friend, Peter popped over in time for dinner.  That was a nice surprise.  Peter is kind of part of our family.  He's a friend from the charter school Jeremy attended in southern Minnesota, who now lives up here.  His late mother was Joe's prom date one year during high school.  His uncle, who helped raise Peter, was one of Joe's late brother's best friends.  The families have known each other forever.  And there are many fond memories and sentimental ties.  Peter is fun to have around.  My kids love him like a brother.

Jeremy, Peter,and Elsie washing dishes

After dinner, I set the kids to washing dishes and I sat down for awhile.

I had many contented Mom moments over the weekend.   Really, content is too weak a work.  What I experienced is a feeling of utter happiness and peace and thankfulness to God for the gift of the family He has given me.  Not any single moment, but the blessing of a great couple of days with my kids, in-laws and husband.  I love the moments when my kids play together wonderfully, and we, all of us, are happy and calm in the same room.

We don't have an extra large living room.  It's plenty big, mind you, but one of the smaller rooms of the house.  We have two couches and two easy chairs and a wooden rocker.  We have a piano bench and various other cushions and pillows.  One of the couches is currently occupied with the remains of my ongoing sorting project.  My apologies to Joe's parents for not getting that hidden away out of sight.  But I think they would agree that in spite of one occupied couch, the house is much, much more presentable than it has been for many visits.

The floor is picked up.  And vacuumed, even.

Much of the weekend, the little girls played with their princesses and ponies on the living room floor.  Joe's mom sat reading, Joe's dad did his Dad things (dozed, fixed, looked at newpapers), I crocheted, Joe napped and worked.  The middle kids were in and out, visiting or reading, playing with the littles or doing various of their own projects.  Sophie finished up a ruffle scarf she had started knitting last week.  Stella and John played Legos, and they are each working on their first embroidery project.

Stella's embroidery pattern. 

I love looking across the living room, and seeing all of the kids strewn about, but quiet and peaceful.  It hits me every now and then, what a strange thing it might seem to some, to have this number of people lying about a room.  And it seems a strange and blessed thing to me when they are all doing so peaceably.  Much of the weekend we had seven or eight or even ten of us sitting together in a room with available seating for only six or seven. 

It makes me happy, for instance, to see Clara and Matt sitting together on the piano bench, without even a second thought.  Even though a few minutes earlier they might have been bickering aggressively over dishes chores.

It brings me joy to see my kids all piled up together on the couch.  Littles and bigs and mediums all in a heap.  It brings me a special kind of joy when this occurs in a calm and loving manner.

John's embroidery.  He's starting with the square with the snagged boot.

It brings me a wonderful sense of accomplishment and peace to see my little ones learning skills.  Working with their hands to produce something functional, that will make the world more pretty or pleasant. 

I like to see my Matt in and out, working on his car, in the kitchen helping Joe process the deer that have been hanging to age since hunting season, or heading off to his job at Pizza Hut in Thief River Falls.

I even like it (on occasion) when Jeremy invites the younger kids downstairs to watch or play his many electronic devices.  Yesterday, after Joe's parents left, the kids spent all morning down there.  Quietly playing the games or watching his videos, or whatever.  It was a nice "down time" after the busyness off a holiday visit.

I am so very thankful.  Thankful to God for my family.  Thankful to God for preserving them through my many flaws and failings.  And preserving me through theirs.  God is good and faithful.  He has given Joe and me this great and wondrous gift of ten children.  There are times when the responsibility of it threatens to overwhelm.  But we need not fear.

Moments like the many I had this weekend bring a welcome balm.  A reminder to me of the many, many promises of God.  Both those promises surrounding our temporal well-being and preservation; and also the more fundamental promises of eternal life through salvation in Jesus' name.

Fun blogger interchange

I received a comment the other day related to the yeast bread recipe I posted recently.  It was from Marge, who wrote,

Mary,

Just wanted to let you know that I have been making and enjoying the GF bread recipe you posted a couple of weeks ago. Love the simplicity of it. Thanks.

God bless.....
Marge

I love getting comments on my blog; they let me know that somebody out there is reading it.  But I also like to hear that others can make use of something I've written.

I wasn't sure who Marge was.  I know a few Marges, but I didn't know whether any of them read my blog; nor did I know that any of them would be likely to use a gluten free bread recipe.

So I did a little bit of creeping, as my teenaged kids call it.  I clicked the username and traced Marge back to the Road Sage blog.  Marge keeps a very pretty blog with lots of photos, which makes me kind of jealous, since I am inept with any kind of photography.  It's just a friendly sort of blog with little items of daily interest.  It makes me happy to read it.  What a nice addition to my blog list!

But even more fun than the discovery of Road Sage, is the discovery that I kind of know Marge a little bit.  There are many connections, all the way back to my high school days when I had schoolmates who I believe to be nieces and nephews of Marge's husband, Ernie; on to Joe seminary and working at BLC years when Marge and her husband were both employed at Bethany.  (We used to walk past their house sometimes; they had the nicest Linden in their front yard.)  And on to our location here which is kind of home country for Ernie. 

So now Marge and I have exchanged e-mails. I hope to know you better, Marge, through reading Road Sage.  I am glad the bread is working out for you.  (Since I posted that, I've even made up a few pre-mixes, just throwing all the dry ingredients into a container; and saving the liquid to mix in at the end.  Turned out just fine, too.) 

And I thank you for the encouragement your comment gave.

Thank you to a Faithful Reader

First I want to thank a blog reader who I know a bit personally, but not well.  Thank you, Corella, for sending me the Teresa Bloomingdale address.  It tickled my fancy, and I was able to nod my head and laugh at many spots.

As a blogger, it's always fun to meet someone who reads my blog.  And if that person has little or no connection to myself, its kind of a bonus.  I expect my family and friends to read occasionally, if for no other reason than to find out what's up with Mary and Joe.  But it pleases me in a special way to be able to write things that please strangers or near strangers.

Corella is the daughter of a sainted woman to whom Joe served as pastor in Oakland Park nursing home for the first several years we lived here.  I don't believe I ever met her, but enjoyed getting the photo greeting cards her family periodically sent out; and I've enjoyed meeting her family at a variety of community occasions.

Corella has commented that she enjoys reading the things I write about the area and community in which she was raised.  I fear I've not been doing a very good job of that lately.  I looked back with chagrin the other day at the slim number of posts I've actually gotten done in the last several months.

Thank you, Corella, for bringing a smile to my face.  How thoughtful of you to take the time to pop that address in the mail for me!

Techno-success

I'm really not very technologically inclined.  I do blog, but that's only because Blogger does everything for me.  I just click, and type, and there it is.

But through the years of blogging, I've periodically had to mess with the HTML stuff, if the formatting of something periodically freaks out on me.  I'm not really very comfortable doing this, because I just don't have room in my head to store the translation of all the symbols and doohickeys that make up the HTML language.

So how it works for me, when I run into some sort of formatting difficulty on blogger, is to find something that is working correctly in a different blog post, or a different part of the same blog post.  I then click the little HTML option, find the code for the section I want to emulate, copy and paste that section, and then tweak it for the part I'm working on.

Most of the time that works reasonably well.

This last week, the gadget that links the ads for my Amazon associate account stopped working.  This is a handy little thing that doesn't really earn me any money, but it potentially it could.  I started it for my book review blog, so that if anyone was interesting in purchasing a book I reviewed, they could handily go to Amazon to purchase it.  And if they did, after coming from my link, I'd conceivably get a small portion of the profits for my part in the promotion of the product.  Now in reality, I don't have many readers, and those who do read are primarily low-budget, used book types like myself.  (Or kids looking for answers for their school assignments.  That's a big part, too, for some of the titles.  I can always tell when a certain school district or area has assigned a certain book.  All of a sudden I'm hit with people from the same geographic area checking my review.  Some of them are even silly enough to ask me for specific information about the book.  "What are the major themes in The Evolution of Calpernia Tate?" for instance.)  Since Amazon waits to send any "income" until an associate has earned at least $10, I'm still waiting to see that first payment.  Right now I'm sitting at about the $7 mark, so I have yet to see any earnings.  But it's still fun to include the links, so I keep on doing it.

So anyway, as I was saying, the gadget that Blogger provides to handily link these Amazon products, stopped working.  I went to Amazon associates customer service and asked what the deal was.  But since the gadget is apparently provided by Blogger, Amazon couldn't help me any.  But they did send me a link to some of their own gadgets and widgets and doodads.  So I went to their page and explored a few of their options and nothing worked exactly the way I wanted it to.  One option provided me with the same frame my Blogger widget did, but I couldn't wrap any text around it.  And who wants a big blank spot in their blog?  Not me, anyway.

I was getting a bit frustrated, until I suddenly remembered my former HTML experiments and thought to myself, "Ahaa!  I can do this!"

I simply took the "embed" HTML from the Amazon associates page, and pasted it in the HTML section of my post.  Then I copied and pasted the HTML code from a successfully posted Amazon Associates ad. 

  

I figured if I could compare the two, I could easily change the few things that were different.

But alas!  It was not to be so simple.

(OK, in this part of the post, I had actually included the html as I saw it, but in the Compose window fo Blogger.  I figured then it wouldn't be translated into anything, but still show the code.  But when I ran the preview, there wat the two adds.  One with text wrapped around, the other without.

So you'll have to trust me that the are very different.  Instead of just a few little differences to iron out, hardly anything was the same.  The entire set-up was done differently.)

These babies are quite different. What now?  What now?  What to try?

But wait.  This is like a math puzzle, or a problem on a standardized test.  Look for the patterns.  Figure it out, Mary.

Usually I checked for the differences.  The things that seemed out of place in the code.  But this time almost all of it was different.  Maybe I had to look for the meager similarity, instead.  Upon closer perusal, I noticed that the similarity was the part between the quotation marks.  Although the info was different, both sets of code had the quotation marks and the stuff inside the quotation marks began with http://.  Ahaa!  A web address.

Well, it was worth a try anyway.  I simply took the format that worked the way I wanted it to, but replaced the web address from between the quotation marks with the one from the code Amazon had suggested.

And voile!  I did it.  And since then, I've done it two more times.  I am so cool! 

Of course, I can't really figure out how to spell voile! or how to get the little accent thingy...so I guess I'm not really all that cool.  Live and learn, live and learn...

On Serial Writing

Perhaps like me, some of you enjoy the writings of Alexander McCall Smith.  He is probably best known for his Ladies' #1 Detective Agency series.  I tried the first book of that series once, but didn't get into it.  I see with a little googling HBO now produces a show based on these books.

I've also read Portuguese Irregular Verbs, and enjoyed its quirkiness; but I've not yet read any of the others in that series.



I really like his Isabel Dalhousie books.  I appreciate how Mr. McCall Smith is able to bring his vast life experience into a learning experience for his readers.  He was born in Africa, in what was then Rhodesia, of Scottish parents; studied law and medical ethics, among other things; plays the bassoon, and has an interest in the poetry and art of Scotland. I learn something new in every one of his books.  

McCall Smith seems able to portray people who hold views different than his own in an honest, multi-faceted way.  I totally groove on his turns of phrase.  They are creative and contrived, but somehow, they work for me, making me chuckle at or ponder or visualize a situation, conversation, or individual. 

I recently checked out 44 Scotland Street from the library.  When I picked it up, I started with the preface.  I was interested to find out that it was written in serial form, for The Scotsman, Scotland's national newspaper.  At this point, there are six novels in this series.  It appears that each one was published in daily instalments for the first six months of consecutive years, starting in 2004.

In the preface to 44 Scotland Street, McCall Smith explains that this book has its origins in a conversation he had at a party in California, at the home of author, Amy Tan (Joy Luck Club and Bonesetter's Daughter).  He heard author Armistead Maupin talk about, Tales of the City, originally published in serial form in the San Francisco Chronicle.  This conversation got him thinking about serial writing. And when he wrote an article for The Herald (Glasgow's daily) about his trip to California, he mentioned the above conversation.  Editors at The Scotsman read the article and asked McCall Smith to try one for their newspaper.  The series is still going strong today. 

I wrote awhile back about the idea of serial writing.  I even started another blog to try my hand at it.  I was hoping to spur others on to try, so that we might have a collection of serials going at one time, but although several people have expressed an interest, so far I have only one other author who has posted anything.  But I, myself, have not been consistent either, allowing other writing projects to take precedence.  And I find that writing has, in common with reading, the difficulty of getting back to a story I have set down for a period of time.  The momentum is gone and it gets progressively more difficult to pick the work up again, the longer I let it go.

But I was pleased to see from this book, that I'm not alone in my interest in the idea of serial writing.  It strikes me as a creative way for struggling newspapers to interest and hold on to readers.  And the act of writing serially produces a different sort of novel than one that is planned and finished prior to publication. 

Perhaps I'll be motivated to work more on Tilda and the Gangster.

Camera Trials

I am tired of everyone else having pretty blogs with lovely, vivid, and colorful images.  

I am not really much of a photographer.  Usually if there is something I really want a photo of, I'll ask someone else to take the picture and then at some point, I may or may not get the digital images off their camera or phone or whatever device they use to snap the photo.  (Case in point, my Easter cherry pie, the photo of which is on Rachel's camera, for which we did not have among our dozen or so of such cords the right one with which to attach said camera to our computer.  But I'm not worried.  I'm sure I'll get it sometime.)

It's not really a very efficient way to do photography.  Especially when one of the uses of the photography is colorful, interesting, and visually appealing blog posts.

So when Mom and Dad gave me $50 for Christmas, to be used however I want, I thought to myself that I would put the money toward a digital camera.  But alas, spending the extra money needed to fill in the difference, even though it was only a meager $20, was never very easy to justify in these inflationary times.  Now it appears that the price of the camera I had picked out has leaped by about another $20.  I suppose they added some new features or it's perhaps available in extra fashion colors.  It appears to be the same to me, but what do I know.

A few weeks ago, during Louisa's play at school, Joe's camera bit the dust.  Grr.  He thought it was faulty batteries, but the extras he always carries did not work either.  When he had time, he did some trouble shooting and checked the product website.  Unfortunately, the only thing he was able to determine is that it was time for another camera.

You remember that line from Beatix Potter's The Tale of Peter Rabbit?  "It was the second little jacket and pair of shoes he had lost in a fortnight."

That's kind of how Joe feels about digital cameras these days.  When a person spends upwards of a hundred dollars on something, they'd like to get more than a year or two of use from it.  Joe has had three or four digital cameras in the last several years, each with different style cases and different methods of closing and opening, etc.  Whichever part breaks on the one he's replacing, he tries to find one with a different feature that might help him avoid the same problem.  But it seems that no matter what he comes up with, there is always something waiting to go wrong.

And since he is the primary photographer in the family, he likes to keep a working camera.  He takes photos of things he sees while out driving, things happening around our home and yard.  Perhaps most importantly, he photographs the kids and the silly and endearing things they do; and the important things that happen in their lives. (Like Louisa's play, from which we have photos of the first act of three. Stupid camera.)

Lest she feel slighted, I must also admit that Louisa is quite a prolific photographer.  But as I've noticed is common practice among the photographs of teenaged girls, there is always a tongue in the shot...Really it's true.  Scan the facebook photo albums of your friends.  All of the teenaged girls stick their tongues out for photos.  The most common direction is off to the side toward another teenaged girl...if one does not want the tongues of the featured persons protruding in a surprising variety of angles, one ought not to depend upon the photography of one's teenaged daughters.

The other day in Wal-Mart, the afternoon after Joe had bid his most recent camera adieu, he noticed that the rack on which they display the cheapo cameras now also includes the low-to-mid-range cameras that are equally good if not better than the digital cameras everyone had 10 years ago.  So he picked out a $30 camera for me, on which I can hone my digital photography skills.  I think he is tired of spending big money on cheap, breakable cameras.  He'd kind of like to buy a cheapo, but he wants me to try it out first.

So now I have a camera.  I've read the instruction book (very poor technical writing, in case you're wondering, John, H).  I've played around with a few shots, techniques, videos, and zooming in and out.  I've learned all about uploading and downloading and unloading and all kinds of loading.  I'm ready to roll.

But please be patient with me.  My last real excursion into the art of photography (and one for which I am to this day mocked in family circles) was the black and white photos I took during a childhood trip to California when I had my first camera (think 126 film, flashcube). 

When we were young, until we learned a little bit about taking picutres, or until we could pay for our own film and developing, it was a family rule that we had to use black and white film.  I understand that taking black and white photographs is really an artsy thing to do.  But for an elementary aged kid in the 70s, this was almost a cruel and unusual punishment. 

The particular photo that placed me firmly in the photographer FAIL category, was taken at Sea World in San Diego.  I was trying to visually capture the lovely flamingos in all their pink glory.  I was so disappointed when my film was developed.  The flamingos looked all,... well,... all black and white.

Bloggin on facebook

I have a post for this blog scheduled to go up in just a few minutes.  But since I've just recently joined the modern age (fb) and since I even, with the help of my dear husband, have figured out (I think) how to get my blog posts to show up on facebook, I am giving it a try.

I feel a bit strange about this.  I've blogged for several years now and try not to push my blog on people.  I did recently add a signature onto my e-mail advertising them, but otherwise I putz along with a small readership of those who want to read.

But this facebook thing.  Yes, I know I didn't force anyone to be my friend.  But still, there is a corner of my brain that feels like I might just be forcing myself on you all.

But I suppose you can just "unfriend me" if you feel assaulted.

Poems and Paintings

I'm once again starting a new blog, Poems and Paintings: Day by Day.  One of my long term plans is to edit a poetry book that includes a daily poem and coinciding painting or work of art.

I plan to be adding to this blog little by little.

Hope you enjoy it!

See Pete run. Run, Pete, run.

Tomorrow Peter Bronski, of No Gluten No Problem, is running in the Virgil Crest Ultra, in the mountains and forests of New York.  I follow Mr. Bronski's blog for tips and information of the gluten free life style.  But I also am drawn to the sense of adventure he portrays in his blog.  Mr. Bronski according to his personal business website is "an award-winning writer, photographer, speaker and adventurer."  And somehow he brings that through even in a gluten free living blog.

A little over four months ago, after an extended illness over last winter and early spring, Mr. Bronski began training for the 50 ml Virgil Crest Ultra.  He's kept his regular readers up to date on his progress and challenges, and training statistics.  For those of us who are less than successful at our own personal training, it's inspiring to read about the success of another.  And it gives me kind of a vicarious adventure of my own.

Mr. Bronski is using his run to raise awareness of Celiac Disease and to raise money for Celiac research.

I hope you have a great day tomorrow, Pete!  I'll look forward to checking the race stats when I get home tomorrow afternoon.  Be safe.

See also Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen, by Christiphor McDougall, for everything you ever wanted to know about ultra marathoning.

Aspiring Authors! Serial Writers!

Announcing my exciting new blog, Write Like the Dickens.

Regular readers will notice it is the direct brainchild of the previous post on this blog.