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What’s wrong with my foot?
I’ve been loving most of this whole sabbatical thing. It’s really nice, and some days I have plans with friends or family, while other days I don’t, and both are really nice. Maya has started school at our local community college and is in the process of settling in. I feel like I dodged a bullet with her not moving out, because if she were in college in VT or NY right now, I’d be pretty darned sad. Amongst the relaxation and enjoyment of having time off, however, I’m having some weird kind of health issue with my foot. Feet. Legs. What could be wrong? I don’t know. The pain…
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Friday Randomness (again)
Here I am, one week into my paid sabbatical. The first few nights, I confess that I had nightmares about things happening and not knowing what was going on. Those were lame and boring, and I’ve let them go by the wayside. Friday we went to a couple of movies…the first being the new Woody Allen film, which was OK, but I’m not a huge Woody Allen fan, and I confess I started to fall asleep. Ted bought be a frozen latte, and we went back in for round two, which was Boyhood again. Really liked it the second time. Saturday we went on an interesting hike. The highway that…
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Friday Randomness
Today is the first day of my sabbatical. My company has a newish policy, that every employee has to take a month of paid time off every four years. This is my month, so I can’t look at my email or do any work of any kind. It’s kind of weird. My regular routine is to wake up, come downstairs, get the paper, and check my work email. I’m in California and most of my coworkers are on the East Coast, so often things have started up by the time I wake up. So this morning I woke up, came downstairs, got the paper, and….looked at Facebook. It’s not so…
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Boyhood
‘Boyhood’ is the story of Mason and his family, and follows them from the summer of 2002 until the autumn of 2013. At the beginning of the film, Mason is in 1st grade. His parents are divorced, and he hasn’t seen his father in a few years, as he’s been working in Alaska. His father (Mason Sr., played by Ethan Hawke) has come back to Texas and wants to get to know his kids again. Mason’s sister, Samantha, is two years older than he, and is always ready to goad and torture him if she can get away with it. Their mother Olivia (Patricia Arquette) is a loving, though imperfect…
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Finding Carter & Awkward
I can’t say I ever expected to find entertaining drama or comedies on MTV. I am old enough to remember when it was brand new and played videos all day, and that was revolutionary and cool. No TV shows, no reality TV, none of that. Just videos. As far as TV goes, I’m not a fan of reality shows. I’ll admit to being hooked on season 2 of ‘The Real World’ back in the mid 90s, but that was only because it was filmed in San Francisco, and we were homesick living in Philadelphia. Also, while it was kind of stupid and contrived, it didn’t have all of the truly…
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New Order and Concert Etiquette
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkOr12AQpnU[/youtube] Our friends Marilee and Paul had planned to see New Order in San Francisco on Friday, but life (ok, work) got in the way, so they gave the tickets to us. I was SO into New Order back in the late 80s. I loved them. Ted and I saw them in concert in 1989, where New Order was headlining with the Sugarcubes and PIL (Public Image Limited). The Sugarcubes couldn’t get the audience interested, and PIL were great. New Order was boring, and a lot of people left before the concert ended. So I wasn’t sure that I would pay to see them again, but since Paul and Marilee…
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Kefta Dog with Roasted Tomatoes
A few weeks ago, a shocking thing happened around here. I turned on the TV to the Food Network, and there was an actual cooking show being aired! I know you’re thinking, “No J, you’re confused. That was a cooking COMPETITION, or else it was a show where Guy F guy drives around and takes HUGE bites out of greasy food”. It wasn’t. It was an actual cooking show, where the host makes a recipe, and you decide for yourself whether you might like to try the recipe at home. I was in so much shock that I ended up watching an episode of ‘Sandwich King‘, a show I of…
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Friday Randomness
What’s new, Pussycat? Anything exciting going on? Interesting stuff on the internet? Stupid politicians doing stupid things, another mass shooting to piss us off and bring us further down into despair. Maybe Prince George got another tooth or Kimye said something arrogant. I’m going to stick my head in the sand and ignore it all for the moment. Ted and I celebrated 21 years together last week. Wait, no…it was our 21st wedding anniversary. We were clearly together prior to our marriage. He worked, I worked, and we went out for a lovely dinner in the evening. It was really nice, though the restaurant wasn’t firing on all cylinders this…
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Give All to Love
21 years ago today, I married the love of my life, my best friend, my partner in crime. As with any marriage, we’ve had times that were good and times that were more difficult, but never once have I regretted the choice we made, to marry our fortunes together. 21 years. Our marriage is now old enough to drink. I keep telling people that, and no one thinks it’s funny but me. Oh well. Our coffee table has a glass top, and drawers inside that can display treasures. We have books in both drawers. One side is Jefferson’s Letters, and is open to a piece titled, Bastille Day. We have…
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Wordless Wednesday
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Meena Alexander ~ Poetry Month
I’m not sure how I came across this poem, but when I did, it broke my heart and moved me so much. Meena Alexander is so talented and evokes a pain of which so many of us are unaware. In this poem, she tells of the pain of three young women, unwilling to put her family into a desperate financial situation so that she may be married…also unwilling to deal with the shame of not being married. It is a glimpse into a very different world that still manages to bring our own sexist culture into focus. A School Teacher from South India By Meena Alexander Portions of a mango…
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Wordless Wednesday
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Quinoa Salad with Peaches and Pickled Onions
We’re kind of late to the quinoa bandwagon, but now that we’re here, I enjoy finding recipes that use the protein packed grain. I saw this one online, and loved the idea of peaches, arugula, and tomatoes mixed in with the quinoa. I wasn’t exactly sure about the pickled onions, but the reviews all said it’s key, and kind of makes the recipe, so I went for it. I’m glad I did. The pickled onions were delicious. Smelly when you’re heating up the vinegar, and also smelly when you’re pickling the onions, but delicious anyway. I subbed nectarines from the farmers’ market for the peaches, because we had them and…
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Deserving More
Last night we went to a graduation party for one of Maya’s friends, and of course there were several families there with kids who had also graduated. I was talking to one of the moms about the cost of college, and talking to her brought a couple of things to mind. 1st, the issue of deserving things that you cannot afford. The daughter is going to an expensive private school, even though the family cannot afford that in any way. The cost is about $60,000 a year. The daughter has worked hard and is receiving scholarships through the school that will cover half of that, bringing the cost down to…
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Dirge Without Music
How fitting is this angry poem, that rails against the unfairness and cruelty of death, in our current time of school and other mass shootings. The bitterness that boils up inside me, inside so many of us, as we hear of yet another child, police officer, teacher, friend, shot and killed. So many deaths, so many broken hearts left behind. I don’t know why Congress can’t stand up to the NRA. Yes I do. Money. Money and the fear that they will be thrown out of office, like Eric Cantor was (not by the NRA, not because of gun control, but an example of watching out for your constituency). So…