Musings
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Money Monday
The meme above has nothing to do with anything, it’s just cute. Today’s post is for those of you who enjoy credit card points. Credit to Sarah for the blog post title. [Update to add: Here’s the TL;DR version if this kind of stuff is confusing. PayPal has a MasterCard Debit card where you can get 5 cents for every dollar spent on 1 category per month. Unlike a credit card, you load the card with funds and then spend them, so there is no interest to worry about.] Like many of you, I enjoy earning money on my purchases via credit card points. I don’t really try with hotel…
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The Flatshare
The Flatshare ~ Beth O’Leary The Flatshare is a ridiculous (and fun) rom-com in which 2 strangers share a one bedroom flat, though they have never met. Leon needs some extra money, he works overnights, and spends his weekends with his girlfriend. Tiffy has recently broken up with her boyfriend and needs a place to live, so she answers Leon’s ad. The rent is ridiculously cheap, because Leon’s flat only has one bed, which they will share, though not at the same time. This is the silly premise, but the author makes it feel realistic enough, and as they start communicating with each other via post-it notes left around the…
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Friday Randomness
In an example of what we call ‘Cognitive Decline’ around here, Sunday found me at a local nursery, looking for a specific flowering plant, but not finding it. When a helpful employee asked me if she could assist me, I said yes, I’m looking for a flowering plant, often (but not always) a hanging plant, kind of fuschia in color, likes shade and cooler weather. “A fuschia?” She asked. Yes, a fuschia. Hence the color. Sigh. I bought 2. I liked the story of this complaint tablet chiseled almost 4,000 years ago, decrying the inferior quality of copper received, as well as poor customer service and mistreatment of the writer’s…
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Back in Stockton
Last week I was able to serve as an ‘emotional support cousin’, helping my cousin Carey to try to figure out the situation with her late father’s ex-wife’s final wishes. Confusing? Maybe. My uncle was married 3 times, first to Carey’s mom, then to K, and lastly to C, his widow. K never had children of her own, nor did her late husband B. She said that her plans were to leave her estate (such as it is) to her step-daughters (Carey and her sister), and B’s step-daughter. K passed away suddenly last month, and as is too often the case, a will and/or trust could not be found. I…
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Action is the Antidote to Anxiety
I saw a meme the other day that was 20 things you wish you had heard before, and the first item was this: “Action is the Antidote to Anxiety”. This is definitely true for me, and I think it’s a lot more helpful for my mental health to write postcards, attend rallies and demonstrations, exercise, and listen to music, than it is to doom scroll or listen to the news all day. So that’s what I’ve been doing. I wrote a lot (for me, I know some do more) of postcards to voters this week, for elections in Florida and Wisconsin. There were 2 protests this week in my town,…
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Miscellaneous Monday
This is my favorite thing that Maya has shoved in my face and made me watch recently. We had a good laugh. It starts with ‘my mom with the cat she didn’t want’, and we agreed, that’s Ted with Mulder. If you enjoyed this video, watch the next one, where mom makes kitty a beautiful dress and sings to her. Friday I slept until 7:15!!! I rarely am able to sleep that late, and it was DELICIOUS. I felt so well rested. I had a relaxing day, which included using a reverse vending machine to recycle some cans for CRV (California Redemption Value), which was kind of novel but a…
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Friday Randomness
I’ve long done Friday Randomness posts, and Elisabeth’s FIG Collective fits in so well, so here are my Random Thoughts/Figs for the week. Saturday – Time spent with friends. Ted’s BFF and his family moved away about 2 years ago, and I know that Ted misses him a lot. They were in the area for his MIL’s funeral. So it was a very sad occasion, but it was really nice to see them and spend some time together. After we came home, Ted was hungry, I was peckish, and Maya was not. So Ted and I walked over to a nearby hotel (which has a spa and is where I…
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Friday Randomness
Today’s randomness post is mostly my contribution to Elisabeth’s FIG Collective, finding joy and gratitude wherever I can. The world is a lot right now, and I’m finding this exercise really helpful. Saturday – We had a nice day on Saturday, Maya went and had brunch with a friend, and Ted and I went to see his parents, and then we had dinner with some dear friends. They were in a horrible car accident several months ago, one that could have easily been fatal (but thankfully was not) – The wife is still healing, but is getting better all of the time. That’s a relief. Sunday – We blew off…
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Supporting Girl Scouts
I was thinking about this troop this morning, of Girl Scouts in the New York City shelter system. Maya was a Girl Scout for 10 years, and made wonderful friends, gained confidence, volunteered a ton, and learned valuable skills. Personally I will be happy if I never eat another GS cookie in my life, but when I see scouts selling in front of the grocery store, if I have any cash I will often donate to their troop. I don’t remember how much the troop keeps from the sale of each box, but just giving them $5 is like selling 10 boxes or something. Anyway, I learned about this troop…
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Friday Randomness
The cartoon above is one I have shared before, first in the summer of 2020 I think, but boy oh boy does it resonate now. HOW ARE WE HERE AGAIN? Onward. This is the first full week of Elisabeth’s FIG Collective, and I’ve been enjoying keeping track of little joys in my life. Appreciated in the best of times, much needed right now. SaturdayWicked – Ted is a member of SAG/Aftra, left over from his days working in radio, and he gets screeners of the films that are nominated for SAG awards. Saturday’s mail included a DVD for Wicked, which we hadn’t bothered to go see in the theater, but…
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Friday Randomness
Elisabeth is encouraging interested souls to write down one thing for which they are grateful every day in February, and is calling this group of interested souls the F.I.G. Collective (FIG = Finding joy In Gratitude) In her comments, Engie said she’s in, but instead of waiting until February, she’s starting NOW. I feel like we could all use a little joy and gratitude, so I’m diving in early too. I started this post on Monday, so I could keep track. Monday – I’m thankful that Monday is Maya’s turn to cook, and that Ted made enough delicious food for dinner on Sunday that we had leftovers, which meant I…
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Focus on What You Can Change
In April of 2020, my darling friend Marilee and I were commiserating about the stress of the world. About how suddenly fraught it felt to get groceries. How isolating to be trapped at home. Marilee and her husband Paul have a business, Spotlight Sojourns, which requires them to spend a lot of time traveling around the world. No travel, no leaving the house, was stressful. Paul made the Venn diagram above, and Marilee shared it with me. I was reminded of Paul’s diagram by Anne’s recent post, where she shared a quote that I liked a lot: “Caring about everything is a disaster. Caring about nothing is also a disaster.…
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Friday Randomness
The Return of Fabulous FridaysLet’s start with the excellent news that Fabulous Fridays are back! Technically, they never went away. In past years, either the CEO or HR sent an email telling us that the perk of a 4 day work week was continuing. When we heard NOTHING this year, our boss decided to err on the side of caution, and told us to work 5 8-hour days instead of 4 10s. So we worked last Friday, and we noticed that gosh, most people were not around, so our boss checked with HR, and it looks like it’s a manager discretion type thing, so YAY! Back to having Fridays off!…
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Friday Randomness
Just some random thoughts that have nothing to do with the heartbreaking fires in Southern California. I don’t know what to say about the fires except that it is shocking and horrible. Lives lost, homes lost, communities destroyed. This drone footage reminds me so much of the fires in Paradise and Santa Rosa from several years ago. I am shallow enough to be specifically sad about the homes that I visited 5 years ago that were prominent in the TV show, Beverly Hills, 90210, which are about 1/2 block from each other in Altadena. I cannot tell you how stupidly happy it made me to stand in front of these…
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Anne Lamott on Dieting
Bay Area author Anne Lamott posts a version of this on Facebook every year. One of my cousins posted it, and I liked what she has to say about radical self care and not dieting, and I thought I would share it with you. That’s it for me, the rest of this post is her words. ************************************************** Here is a version of the anti-diet piece I publish every year just before New Year’s Day: We need to have the same little talk we have every year at this time: You want to feel healthier and that is an excellent goal, but I know many of you are secretly planning to…
