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Left or Right?
(Sorry the lettering on this pic is hard to read…it was bad on the original as well…)Â Yesterday, I attended a seminar on brain development. It was interesting to find myself disagreeing with the keynote speaker, as she talked about how children should not be introduced to letters and numbers until their corpus callosum is completely sealed, which happens at around age 6. Kids that learn to read before that age, she said, aren’t really reading, and if they are “forced” to learn prematurely, they don’t develop correctly socially and so on. Whatever. I read before that age, and so did Maya and all of her Montessori classmates, and you…
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Why?
Why did my beautiful daughter have to inherit my mouth, so that she had to go through the pain and torture of braces? Ted has PERFECT teeth, not a cavity, straight and pretty and perfect (except for the few he knocked out in a motorcycle accident). And why did she have to inherit my eyes, so that she now needs to have glasses? Ted has pretty darned good eyes, no glasses until his mid 20s. Still way better than mine in the prescription department. Me? Full on braces, headgear, whole shebang. I swear, they were (ALMOST) worse than childbirth, because I had to keep going back and having pain again…
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Warning…
It’s been 18 hours since my last Diet Coke. Ack! How do I feel, you may well ask? Well, my neck hurts, right at the spot where it kind of meets my shoulder. I’m guessing that has nothing to do with caffeine, and more to do with sleeping on it funny.  I’m also kind of cold. But I just closed the window, so that should help. The giving up of the diet coke has not been easy. I enjoy it. But I really need to take good care of my body, and there’s nothing in soda that’s good for me, so away it goes. It’s been over a month since…
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Wordless Wednesday
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Learning About Brain Fever
One great thing about having a child Maya’s age is showing her the books that I loved as a girl, and seeing if she enjoys them as much as I did, or not. Recently I went through my bookshelf and found a few she might enjoy: Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. This book was HUGE when I was in the 5th and 6th grades. I think I got it from the bookmobile that used to come to our neighborhood. If you’re a man, or a woman who spent too much time living under rocks, so you don’t know this book, it’s about a girl named Margaret, who is…
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Fostering Resiliency
The Center for Human Development in our area offers a “Healthy Choices” program, called “PEP” (Parent Educators Program), which the parents bring to some of the schools. Maya’s school is fairly small (under 200 students) and fairly new (this is their 6th year), and we are working to implement the PEP program in the school. Back when I was on the school board, when we realized this charter school experiment of bringing Montessori Education to the public schools might actually ‘take’, and we were probably going to stay open, we started looking past the immediate needs of getting a permanent location, running water, a principal, and funding to pay the…
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I Stir My Rice…
When we make rice around here, unless it’s baked in the oven, we make it on the stove top. Mostly, we pour some long grain rice in a pot, pour in some broth, cover and bring to a boil. When it’s boiling, we take off the lid, stir the rice, reduce the heat to low, and replace the lid. Then you leave it until it’s done. Sometimes I go in and check the rice, lifting the lid and stirring the rice. Every time someone is over visiting when they see this occur (unless they are members of Ted’s family…I think they all stir their rice, too) they react as though…
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Veterans Day
Today is Veterans’ Day, the day we set aside to remember all of those who died in wars for our country. From patriotism.org: At 5 A.M. on Monday, November 11, 1918 the Germans signed the Armistice, an order was issued for all firing to cease; so the hostilities of the First World War ended. This day began with the laying down of arms, blowing of whistles, impromptu parades, closing of places of business. All over the globe there were many demonstrations; no doubt the world has never before witnessed such rejoicing. In November of 1919, President Woodrow Wilson issued his Armistice Day proclamation. The last paragraph set the tone for…
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Genevieve (Friday Dog Blogging)
A few weeks ago, I was petting Genevieve’s pretty face, and I noticed that she had a large bump on her jaw. What’s that? I wondered. It didn’t seem to cause her a lot of discomfort, though she did pull her head away from it when I pressed on it. That was a Saturday. Monday, I took her to the vet. The vet wasn’t sure what it was, but was pretty sure there was going to be surgery involved. They still needed to do a biopsy, before surgery, because if the lump is cancerous, they remove much more of the area surrounding the lump, so it is much more invasive.…
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Thursday Thirteen Organics
  Cherry and I were at the grocery store on Sunday, buying groceries for dinner. We had a short conversation about organic foods, and how it’s important to support organic and sustainable farming whenever we can. It’s better for the earth, better for the environment, better for our health, and it tastes better. Of course, there is always the issue of the pocket book, because organic foods typically cost between 50% and 150% more than conventionally raised food. We all know that organic food is healthier for us than conventionally raised food. This is even more true for children, due to the fact that their bodies and brains are still growing and developing.…
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An Open Letter to the Democrats
Dear Democrats, Congratulations! I am delighted that you have come in to serve as a balance to the freaks that have been running this country for the last 6 years. We desperately need some moderation out there, someone to keep things under control so that we don’t end up in a theocracy or a monarchy anytime soon. I find it distressing, however, that it appears that you could not have won this race without the Republicans shooting themselves in the face. As I see it, you won because some Republicans couldn’t keep themselves from harassing young boys, or at least being complicit in allowing it to continue. You won because…
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Stupid Grammar Rules
English grammar is a tricky field to negotiate, with many little rules that can easily bug the hell out of you…I have my pet peeves, which would be rules that make sense to me, and people misuse them and abuse them and drive me crazy, but also, there are many rules that just make no logical sense whatsoever. I was thinking this would be a Thursday Thirteen, but I couldn’t think of enough stupid rules to make my list. So I turn the question over to my loyal readers…besides the five below, any really stupid grammar rules that you think need to be retired? Split Infinitives. I never even understood…
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From the Stacks Winter Reading Challenge
Lotus Reads found a great reading challenge that might finally get some of those books on my sidebar out of the way, making room for some new ones. This sounds like a really good idea to me, so I’m in. Here’s the premise, from the woman with the great idea, Michelle at overdue books: “If you are anything like me your stack of purchased to-be-read books is teetering over. So for this challenge we would be reading 5 books that we have already purchased, have been meaning to get to, have been sitting on the nightstand and haven’t read before. No going out and buying new books. No getting sidetracked…
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Time to Vote
Tomorrow is election day, and while I’m cautiously hopeful that the Democrats will be able to wrest control of Congress from the Republicans, and hopefully grow a collective spine while they’re at it, and stop the rapid decline of our country and loss of freedoms, I’m having trouble getting revved up about the local elections here in California. The most exciting part to me will be that the constant barrage of political phone calls will stop. I’m not a fan of Arnold Schwarzenegger. His ‘special elections’ showed a complete disregard for the will of the voters, and they cost California a LOT of money that should have been much better…
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To Thine Own Self Be True…
Is that the same as “know thyself”? I think it’s a bit different. Anyway, MsMama tagged me for an interesting little meme… “KNOW THYSELF” TAG! What is/are YOUR: Easy how-to ways to beat a bad mood? A shower. Something about having that hot water all over me helps a lot. A walk in the rain can help. Ted has been known to make me laugh when I’m blue. Maya can sometimes kiss my boo-boos away… Never-fail lip color? I’m not adult enough to wear lipstick. Mostly it’s just vasaline or chapstick for me. My lips are naturally kind of pink, though….I’ve gotten compliments on my lipstick when it’s just chapstick.…