Posts Tagged ‘#best09’

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Best of Blog ’09: Resolutions


2009
12.31

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My daughter and husband have just joined me at the cabin and Kim brought her computer.  I figure I have just enough time now to get in this one last topic: resolutions.  I’ve been here three or four days – I don’t even remember! And my macbook decided to call it quits.  Now I have a grey screen with a file folder and a question mark.  I did some searching on my blackberry and found out my disc is dead, or perhaps just corrupted and can be fixed.  Thank goodness it’s not my primary computer, so there is nothing there that I will miss if the data is non-recoverable.  Or maybe there it – but since I don’t remember, it doesn’t much matter.

For many years I didn’t make resolutions.  Then I read Jack Smith’s annual New Year’s Resolution.  He’s a deceased columnist for the Los Angeles Times and boy, was he ever good.  He said every year he’d make the same resolution: Try to stay alive and see what happens next.  I love it – becasue the main reason I want to live a long, long time is to see what happens next, with my family, with the world, with technology.

Nonetheless, last year I did make resolutions.  I wanted to develop a blog and a webpage but I knew it would remain one of those nebulous goals if I didn’t make a promise to myself.  Also, I resolved to keep a journal every day.  And you know what?  Basically, it worked.  I did develop trigger finger so I couldn’t write anymore (until after surgery and recovery) so I switched my journal to the computer, but I actually printed and pasted into the handwritten journal I had started.

After my blog was up, I wrote in that and not the journal.  But now I realize that they do not serve the same purpose at all.  So a resolution for this year is write in a journal every day. 

Another resolution I made last year was to ratched down emotional reactions.  Not that I’m not a reasonable person in my reactions to things, but I needed to get some space in some friendships, etc.  I wish I could remember back to last January and how I worded this resolution to myself, but I can’t.  I think I succeeded.

This was uncharted territory – actually succeeding at resolutions!  Could it be that I’ve grown up?  If so, why did it take me until I was 6 3?  Dumb question because actually I know the answer.  We have to continually strive for self-improvement throughout our lives.  I mean, if we really made it to where we should be, I guess we’d all be Buddhas.

So this year.  And I feel like I should hurry b/c up here in the mountains internet connections are capricious, and I want to get this posted. 

2010

Continue my blog and web page for another year to see what develops.

Write in a personal journal every day.

Learn more about photoshop (this is scary b/c it’s SO technical

Learn more about my camera (this is a scary resolution because numbers are involved)

Read every night (hard to find time to read when blogging and photgraphing and doing art, but I need input in order to improve my output.

Read two or three other blogs each day to help the input situation and continue finding members of my tribe all over the world.

Get going with Flickr.

Keep producing in the art department.

Continue with Creative Every Day.

STAY POSITIVE AND SEE WHAT HAPPENS NEXT.

This sounds like a lot but it’s not so much.  So many of these goals are interrelated.  The real hard part – the HARDEST part for me, is that I need to develop some discipline and a routine – but I’ve never been much of a routine person.  Routines and I just don’t get along.  So I’ll have to find a way to merge my tendency to run in all directions with sticking to some sort of routine. 

To all of you out there, my friends and friends-to-be, and even those who will never visit this blog again and think I’m silly, I wish you ALL the best for 2010 with more highs than lows.  We need some lows or there wouldn’t be highs, but may you all  grow and learn and be satisfied.  And I wish for everyone that we learn to accept ourselves unconditionally and let others be who they are.

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Best 09: You are my Density and the Roar and Snore


2009
12.28

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Jumping ahead to tomorrow because I haven’t used any stationery this year!  I kept my journal in a journal until I developed trigger finger and couldn’t write anymore, so it’s been typing most of the year.  Finger is better, had surgery, but that’s all I have to say about stationery.  So…

You are my density.  The immortal words of George McFly in Back to the Future when Marty was feeding him words to woo Lorraine.  Of course, he quickly corrected himself to You are my Destiny.  But we’ve always loved that line.

So…I took my daughter and five of the grandkids to the San Diego Wild Animal Park.

This is the first thing we saw when we entered the park:

Beautiful.  An African Crowned Crane.

We went for the Roar and Snore – a sleepover.

After the park closes, there are about 100 of us “campers” with our guides and staff.  Our tents…

were right next to the elephants – oh my.

We could look out the tent window and see them.

Can you imagine having your night be completely dark and silent except for the occasional roaring of lions?

It was magic, truly.

As usual, we packed a lot into two days.  We walked by the cheetahs several times.

There were evening activities and one of the most fun was when a professional drummer taught us some drumming techniques.

The next morning we had breakfast with the rhinos and giraffes.

The next day we fed lorikeets, among other activities we did on our own – like go up in the tethered balloon – up to 400 feet.

We left, so happy and tired that we were slaphappy.  And this is where “You are my density” comes in.  We tend to laugh LOTS when we’re together.  We laugh so much that my grandson Joe says we need a Laughter 12-Step Program.  We were heading up the 5 and needed a restroom – desperately!  We started laughing out of control, and you know the effect that can have when you need a restroom.  We found one in a small market in the grubbiest and scariest part of whatever town we were in – and then we saw it – The Destiny Inn.

That did it.  We were out of control.  The irony of this depressing building being named the Destiny Inn – well, it was too much.  A dear friend called at that moment and I’m surprised he didn’t call the medics to certify us – I couldn’t stop laughing and we could barely talk.  Everyone in the car was screaming with laughter.  The only thing more perfect would have been seeing the words Density Inn on that drab, ugly wall.

We continued home and had sore rib cages from the laughter.  It was a fantastic weekend – the Roar and Snore was amazing and worth every penny.

To return to the present, not back to the future, my daughter and family were heading to the San Diego area yesterday and I got a text – “We just passed the Destiny Inn!”

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Best of Blog 09: Social Web Moment – a Tweet-up


2009
12.27

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Gwen Bell poses this question for her Best of Blog challenge ’09: Did you meet someone you used to know only from her blog?  Did you discover Twitter?

Yes and yes.

I thought Twitter would be stupid but I didn’t want to get left behind, so I signed up.  I’m amazed!  First I was just following news, then news and Adam Lambert; then news, Adam Lambert and photography sites; then news, Adam Lambert, photography sites, and people involved with the Bakersfield art scene.  I’ve made friends.  One of my new friends, whollyjeanne, uses the word “tribe” for the friends she is making on Twitter. I love that term, tribe, because I feel like we are connecting in such a way with other people who share common interests that we will be honestly using the term friend – becoming part of an extended tribe.  Besides whollyjeanne, there is BeKatherine and daxtonsnini – geographically located all over the United States, but I feel like if one of these people put out a call for help, I’d be there.

So in 140 characters or less, it’s possible to get a real sense of a person.  And I do get updates from certain news sites so I can scan them and click on something that interests me.  I’ve followed people who end up tweeting too much and carry on conversations that could better be held on instant messenger or by texting, and that’s annoying so I drop them.  I’ve wanted to follow people but don’t like the language they use, so I drop them.  That sounds terrible, doesn’t it?  Dropping someone? But I guess that’s what it’s called.  I’ve learned that Adam Lambert’s fans are extremely intelligent, devoted and caring people, that LaVar Burton is a kind man without a mean bone in his body.  Someone named Ben Decker started following me and I gave him a follow back, and I really like this guy.  I’m not sure what he does, but I think he’s involved in events in Los Angeles, or a model, or something.  But he is a lovely person.

But to the main part of the question: did I meet anyone?  Yes.  A group of us Bakersfield tweeps had a tweet-up!

We met at Caffeine Supreme, a downtown business, on a First Friday.  It was really bizarre to walk up to someone, for example, the women in the chair, and say, “You must be glitzyorbit.” And it was.  Or, look, MySoulIsHome is here!  So instead of the web alienating us from real people and personal contact, we wanted to see each other in person.

We toasted marshmallows – that’s me in the hat. LissaFudge and prosejunkie are also in the photo.  Lissa – whose name is Terry – also goes by BacPage and she keeps up a blog that chronicles all events artistic in Bakersfield.  Prosejunkie has a blog and he’s reading and writing about the Best 100 books on the Modern Library list.  Such interesting people!

Dave runs trivia contests at Sandrini’s Bar, so he came and we had some trivia fun at the tweet-up.

I donated packets of greeting cards that I make so there would be prizes.

We even had a visit from the man in red.

It was fun – and we all want another tweet-up soon.  I may even organize it because so many people who wanted to come to this one weren’t able to.  It’s the first thing I’ve felt like organizing in a long, long time.  Twitter is good.

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#Best09 Dec. 26 – My Aha Moment of the Year – I’m Tired


2009
12.27

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It’s almost 11 p.m. and I sat down to write not realizing how late it was.  I’m morphing back into such a night person in the years since my retirement!  The main problem with that is – well, there are two. First, the world doesn’t run on my schedule – American life is a “day person.” And second, I may want to stay up but I don’t want to stay out.  There’s a certain time in the evening when I just have to get into my robe – usually hits by 8 p.m.  I guess I’m a day/night hybrid.

If I had an Aha! moment this year, it would come immediately to mind, right?  I’m glad the question gives me the option of an insight or epiphany.  I’m pretty sure I had some of both.  In fact, I know I did.  So I’ll talk about the one I remember which is the most recent.

I probably do twice as much as most people in a day.  I’m high energy and high speed (but not nearly like I used to be).  I’m saying this because it’s what I’ve been told over and over throughout my life.  I have to take this on the word of other people, because to me I’m me.  I have no idea what’s normal.  I just know me.  I’m getting more tired, however, and I knew I’d hit a new insight, or had an epiphany of some sort when my husband and I had this conversation a little while ago.

Me: Mark, I’ve been thinking about the trip we’re planning for next October.  After the wedding in Maui, I’m thinking we should just go to Thailand instead of trying to also fit in Viet Nam and Cambodia.  I’m just feeling like I don’t want to zoom around.

Mark: We’ve been spending too much money lately, so maybe we should skip Thailand and just go to Maui.

Me:  That sounds fine.

That sounds fine?  No argument?  You have no idea how unprecedented this is.  When we travel, which we both love to do, we are gone about three weeks at a time because we want to see as much as we can, knowing we won’t return.  We keep up a pretty fast pace – I mean, it works for us and we do rest in the afternoons and turn in early.  Or one of us does.  And I can’t stand not traveling.  We didn’t have any big trips this year – I had to cancel a trip to London thanks to Mr. Economy.  About drove me crazy.  I was in London last October and still had things I wanted to see and intended to this time around.

Next year we’re planning to drive Route 66 as far as Oklahoma and veer off to Florida for a soccer tournament a granddaughter is playing in.  Then we’re going to a wedding in Maui and my husband suggested since we were already part way that we should continue to Bangkok to visit friends.  Wow!  Yes, I jumped on that.  Can that much have changed in a few months?

Besides being fine with skipping Thailand, I want to go back to Costa Rica, Italy and France.  China would be good too. I want to go places I’ve been.  I’d even like to go on another cruise.  This is so unlike me – there’s a whole world out there and I’ve only seen a fraction!

It’s also possible that with the current situation of my parents, I’m just out of zip.  It’s so draining mentally.  We’re at a crossroads, and they can’t live independently but they refuse to go anywhere or have anyone in their home so we’re at a standstill.  Something has to give and probably that drains my zip so much that I’m zapped.  Maybe when that whole situation is resolved, I’ll feel like moving ahead again.

But for now, my insight of the year is I’m slowing down and ready to act accordingly. I’m tired.  And running out of money too.

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Best of Blog 09: What was your best web tool?


2009
12.23

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Gwen Bell organizes this “Best of” challenge so she writes the prompts.  Answering them is not quite like being a student because I can ignore them if I want to.  My seventh-grade students had to write several times a year on writing prompts the district distributed, and I sympathized totally when one would say, “I just can’t think of anything to write about!”

Now I find that I have to give an indirect answer to this question (what was my best web tool) to answer it at all.  I’ve been fairly gung-ho on internet stuff – Facebook, Twitter, etc.  I don’t feel I can fairly judge social-networking tools (not that anyone is asking me to), nor can I understand their impact on the rest of the world, if I can’t use them myself.  So it’s been full steam ahead.  I even caught the Google Wave!  But since no one I’m involved with is surfing the wave yet, and since I’m retired, it just sits there on my screen ebbing and flowing, mostly ebbing. (I have some invitations if anyone wants one.).  So that takes care of social networking/work productivity.

I have a web site and a blog, which means I have to understand Google analytics, AdSense, and the associated terminology – what a unique visitor is and so on.  I talked about my blog a few days ago – on my blog!  What I didn’t mention then is that the statistics drive you to get more unique visitors!  Grow the blog! Compete  with yourself!  And silly me, I thought someone might want to buy a photo from my web page. Ever the optimist – photos are a dime a dozen.

I’ve been writing on eHow (I’ve made $12 so it’s not a get-rich-quick endeavour) and eZines.  I have an etsy store, SusanReepPhotoArt (again, thinking someone might want to buy one of the still lives or something) and a Flicker account.  So I’m with it technologically.  Oh, and I have an iPod!  But I forget to listen to it.  And a BlackBerry which I love.

Although, you know what?  Now that my email comes over the BlackBerry, there’s no anticipation to get home and wonder what email I might have.  Just like email replaced the anticipation we felt when we went to the mailbox.  Anyway, I get it all instantly and I’m so used to having my BlackBerry in my pocket, that sometimes I think my pocket is vibrating when it’s empty.

Texting might just be my best web tool.  Better than phoning because you don’t have to worry about hearing the person (For some reason, I can’t hear well over my BlackBerry.  I don’t think I position it correctly.)  Texting is less intrusive, also.  And it can be secret!  Sort of.  As much as anything can be secret.  Not much.

So here I stand.  Or text.  Or tweet.  Or facebook.  Or or or.  I get the idea.  Technology is going to develop at lightning speed so I’ll still have to keep up.  I’m 63 and plan on 40 more years, so I can’t let it eclipse me.  (If my parents had not been so computer-phobic, the internet would be enriching their lives now at 91 and 86.)

I’ve gotta feeling, though, that folks in general are tiring of so much instant communication.  Facebook use, or frequency of use, seems to be falling.  I think we’re all realizing how much time it all eats up from our creative lives.  I checked out a link from whollyjeanne on twitter and bingo!  It was the push I needed to rethink my strategies.  Check it out yourself.  Although I must warn you, the item about hair dye is seriously misguided.  I intend to keep dying my hair for a long, long time.

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Gwen Bell’s Best of ’09: A Business I Found that I Love? Mmmm – Cruise Ships?


2009
12.22

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Business?  That I love?  If you’re talking retail, maybe.  And then it should come with the name Costco, Trader Joe’s, Zappos, Target, Amazon, or Shutterfly. Other than that, “business” and “me” don’t belong in the same sentence.  Or paragraph.  Or essay.  But let me just stretch this a little bit to talk about something I never in a zillion years expected to enjoy – a cruise.  Cruise ships may be many things to many folks, but they are mos’ def businesses.  And a discovery to me.

Gotta have some background here.

1.  I believe in trying as much as possible, embracing life and what it offers, and giving almost anything a chance.

2.  My husband never, ever, wanted to go on a cruise.  Period.

3.  We had a great trip to China which involved three days on a boat on the Yangtze River, which we both loved.  It was a small boat.

4. A worldwide recession exists.

5. Alaska Air kept sending dirt-cheap offers for Carnival Cruises.

6.  I wanted to surprise my husband with an anniversary trip but money was short.

7.  I took a chance and booked a cruise to the Mexican Riviera.

I’m a great planner and researcher of vacations we take, but this time I just went for the best offer, a seven-night Mexican Riviera cruise on the Carnival Splendor.  I added three shore excursions, hoping I chose what my husband would like.  After 41 years of marriage, I hope I have a little insight there!

What we don’t do: We don’t stay up late, we don’t enjoy casinos, we aren’t night-life people, we aren’t big socializers, we aren’t big drinkers.  Not saying we’re opposed to those things, but when you’re in your 60s, some activities just aren’t as easy!   Cruise ships are HUGE on night life, drinking, casinos, and FUN FUN  FUN.  There are SO many opportunities to separate you from your money on a cruise ship.  Not complaining, it’s a business.  A big one.

What we like: Outdoor stuff, nature, culture, hot tubs, relaxing, water, quiet.

First big surprise: A cruise ship that holds 4,500 people is remarkably uncrowded.  We were amazed.  Everything is so well organized that even embarking and debarking go smoothly.  Very few lines at all.  Except for the Mongolian Hotpot line.

Second big surprise:  Every single employee is so friendly that it’s impossible to be annoyed by anything, even the jangling decor and reverberating music on the Lido deck.

Third big surprise: I’m a photographer.  I document.  In excess.  I was so surprised that every single photo of my husband from this cruise shows a much more relaxed man than I’ve seen in a long time.  And my husband could never be called tense in the first place!  He must have been having fun.

If we could like a cruise, anyone can.  I’d just go with one caveat:  go to relax.  Don’t go to soak up local culture, to tour – just go to relax.  Here’s some relaxing:

It’s a huge ship  – but we never felt crowded.

Our room is important to us – we DO spent time in there.  This was so spacious and comfortable.  If that curtain were open you would see…

the ocean.  It’s important to me to be able to see the outside.  I sat on that balcony every night before bed and other times too.

We spent plenty of time in hot tubs.  This one had a great view of the ocean and we saw dolphins. The other spas were on decks in the open.

This was a fabulous deck.

Then there were the shore excursions.  Many people don’t take them; they go ashore and shop, or they aren’t even awake since many seem to stay up in the casinos and seeing the shows.  Maybe that’s why we didn’t find it crowded.  But what a waste of fresh air and ocean expanses!

Catamaran trip around Los Arcos, the tip of the Baja Peninsula at Cabo San Lucas.

Gorgeous pool overlooking the ocean at Mona Lisa Restaurant in Cabo, where our excursion stopped briefly.

Mark and I ocean kayaking in Mazatlan.

Beautiful color as we return to the ship in Mazatlan.

Hiking on Deer Island, Mazatlan.  Can you spot the iguana?

Giving a 3 1/2 month old lion cub a bottle as we return to the ship at Cabo.  Yes, I paid to do this and I’d pay even double the $20!  Or triple!  The money is for environmental habitats for wildlife in Mexico City.

Finishing a visit to Cacti Mundo in Cabo.  Fantastic cactus garden.

Walking on beautiful private beaches in Puerto Vallarta.

Seeing frigate birds (not that I have anything against pelicans and sea gulls).

A beautiful sunset off Puerto Vallarta where the cloud bank and the hills looked like a mouth gobbling up the sun.

More ship fun.  Me sitting on the Serenity Deck (no children allowed).

Waterslide fun.

Finally, frou-frou drinks whenever you want them (and want to pay for them).  But you know what’s especially fun about this?  You can take your drinks wherever you want all over the ship – clubs, restaurants, wherever.  The whole thing is your playground.

So my “business find” of the year is the huge cruise ship industry.  We’ll probably do it again!

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#Best09: Gwen Bell’s Best of Blog Challenge 09: Best Car Ride


2009
12.19

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Last night I didn’t sleep, and this morning I started a bout with the stomach flu – vomiting, diarrhea, all that.  I’m trying to sit up long enough to write a blog but I feel non-compliant, so first I’m going to reference a couple of Road Trip blog posts from this year, and then I’m going to write what I want.  I’ve been especially impressed with my cats today and I want to tell you about it.

One problem I have is the inability to pick just one of anything.  So one terrific car ride was I70 through Utah with dear friend Michael Purcell.  Another was a drive to Fossil Falls, although that was a mistake.  A third was a drive to Red Rock Canyon, where I meant to go in the first place instead of Fossil Falls.

Now, the cats.  I was catless in Bakersfield and not happy about it, so last April I went to the animal shelter and got two six-month old female cats.  Tiger and Lily.  If you’re a regular reader, don’t be confused.  Tiger started out as Jujube, became B’Elanna Torres, and settled on Tiger.  There’s a problem with cats letting you know their true names.  Lily went from Abba Zaba to Beverly Crusher and settled on Lily.

I know they are just cats, but I think they were very aware that I wasn’t well, and they stayed on my bed all day.  Since I wasn’t moving much, it didn’t matter that cats were draped over my legs, etc.  I’m very grateful for that.  Now that I’m in a chair typing, they’ve gone outside, but Lily just came in to check on me.

I was going to write more, but I’ve used up the current energy supply.  So while Scotty gets some more dilithium crystals, I’ll take another nap.

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Best of Blog ’09 – Catching Up- Life Changes in a Flash


2009
12.18

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I’ve missed writing about Challenge, Best Place, Album of the Year, New Food, Change to Place I Live, Rush, Best Packaging, Tea of the Year, Word or Phrase, and Shop.  Why so many?

We were on a cruise to the Mexican Riviera, all going well, when we got an email from my sister saying “sad news,” and then in the body that my uncle had died.  He’s my dad’s only surviving sibling – but my dad is 91 so what can you say?  But then came an email saying “critical, not dead.”  My mom, whose short-term memory is gone, mixed up the message and told my dad his brother was dead.  Then another the next day – my mom had broken her elbow and wrist after slipping in the rain.  She’s 86.

All in a matter of a few days – and dealing with my mom and the fall, my sister and I realized irrevocably that the next step in my parents care had arrived.  We needed someone in the home with them at least four hours a day, at least five days a week.

All I’ll say about that is how do you get someone when your parents keep forgetting they’ve agreed to it?  Is it possible to preserve their dignity?  All I know is that my sister and I need relief or we’re going to crack.  So that’s what’s kept me from doing the Best of Blog, and I’ve missed writing.  Today, the 18th, is the first time I’ve been able to sit down and think.

Challenge I’m in the midst of the challenge of the year right now, dealing with aging parents.  Stubborn, aging parents.  I hope I remember that I’m conditioning myself to be fine with help, fine with anything.  I’ve told my kids I want them to visit me regularly when I’m old but please, don’t get involved with my day-to-day care, errands, cooking, shopping, etc.  Get someone to do this.  Have me live in a place that takes care of things.  The burden my parents have placed on us kids by not even considering they would get old is just about too much.  I’m trying to face the challenge with grace and patience, but it isn’t easy.  My son-in-law’s grandma was hospitalized in this same time period with congestive heart failure, is home now, and on seven meds.  Her daughter, my husband’s mom, says when it’s her turn, just push her out the second story window.  I must tell her that it’ll have to be higher than the second story!  This challenge will be ongoing.

For a sampling of what this is like – before it got as bad as it is now – I have a story posted about my parents which is also recorded for our local public radio station.

Best Place Am I allowed to say my bed, with my wonderful latex mattress, my own pillows and my Chinese silk comforter?  That’s about my best place, besides my bathtub with bubbles.  We didn’t travel much this year so I have no new best places.  It seems like comfort is high on the list, though.  So I’m going to list two things besides my bed and my bathtub.  One is our cabin in Alta Sierra.  I go as much as I can, often alone, and work up there on my art.  I write, sit, watch the blue jays, walk, let my mind go.  I enjoy the silence.  I never even put my iPod on the iHome because I don’t want to break the silence.  My other best place is my studio at home.  We converted the grandkid’s playroom to a studio and I love to be in there working.  My best places are all close to home.

Album of the Year No brainer.  For Your Entertainment by Adam Lambert.  It would be my best album of the year even if it wasn’t any good because I am a glambert, or grambert, through and through.  But it IS good; in fact, it’s fantastic.  Adam’s voice is the most amazing instrument with such a preternatural range.  I love listening to him.  The album itself has so many types of songs on it that it can’t be confined to type.  Just buy it, listen, you will be amazed AND you will be entertained.

New Food This really isn’t a new food, but I’m in the midst of a duck craze.  One of our local restaurants, Valentiens, cooks duck to die for.  I’ll go soon again.  When will I be out of my duck rut?  Who knows.  I love it.

Change to the Place I Live This is so easy!  We have an entire room in our house that we use as a playroom for the grandkids.  They’re getting older now, and the young ones live in Colorado.  I’ve been itching for a studio – so we made the room a studio!  Wow.  An easel, paints, photos, a paper cutter, all my stuff, everything I need.  It’s a new life.

Best Packaging and Tea of the Year I have no idea.

Best Rush I think it is yet to come.  Monday afternoon I’m going to the Leno show and Adam Lambert is the guest!  I may actually faint for the first time in my life.  I feel positively giddy at the thought of being so close to him.  Sigh.  My kids read this and they will think their mom has gone bonkers. But I took my two oldest grandkids shopping today (15 and 14) and someone thought I was their mother, not grandma!  So maybe I can get by with semi-bonkers.

Word or Phrase I’m more interesting in banishing words and phrases than adding them because so many redundancies emerge.  But I will say this – I love the vocabulary that is Twitter – tweets, tweeps, tweet-ups – perhaps because I love Twitter!  I hear that 5% of Twitter users account for 75% of tweets.  Can that be so?

Shop I’d love to be clever about this and tell about my wonderful discovery, but I can’t because the best shop is and will always be Trader Joes.  Trader Joes fans out there?  Here’s a story.  A couple of years ago, my husband, a friend and I were sitting in a church in Rome waiting for an opera concert to begin.  Yes, in Italy.  We were talking and one of us mentioned Trader Joes.  The woman in front of us turned and said, “Did you say Trader Joes?  I love Trader Joes!”  We then discussed our love of Costco, I would add Target and Cost Plus World Market.  That does it for me.

I don’t think I’m interested in being a ground-breaker right now in terms of discovering new things.  I’d like to stabilize my life first is all.  Somehow, I don’t think it’s going to happen, so that brings me right back to the first topic – Challenge.  The challenge is to meet the daily changes that keep coming and coming at me (at us all) with grace and patience.  The challenge is to find the good and the fun and make the most of everything.  After all, the fact that so many things are hitting me at once right now – not-so-good things, must in itself be good.  Because if I didn’t have a large, loving family and people I cared about, I also wouldn’t have the challenges.  I’d be sitting in a sterile, controlled vacuum and it would be boring.

Life is anything but boring.  I’m not knocking boring.  I’d love to experience it for a day or two or maybe even three.  But not for long.

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Best of ’09 Challenge – My Blog Find? MJ’s Big Blog or course!


2009
12.07

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Posted in Art, General | No Comments »


First I looked at the question for today – best blog find of ’09.  Gotta be honest here, I don’t spend a lot of time surfing the web.  Actually, I spend no time.  If I find something it’s because someone else told me about it, or I’m looking for specific information.

BUT I did make a marvelous find thanks to Twitter.  Love Twitter.  Love my tweeps.  And I love Adam Lambert so I was idly doing a twitter search on him one day and I found…MJ’s BIG BLOG.  Oh my God, what a treasure chest!  What a cornucopia of Lambert information.

So let me say this before you all start thinking, OMG, what’s a 63-year-old woman doing being obsessed with Adam Lambert?  I’ll tell you what.  He has a HUGE fan base amongst cougars, which is a term I object to because I am most decidedly not on the prowl.  But it seems to be the term applied to older women who are still breathing and out there.  Or rich.  Something else I am decidedly not.

I think it started like this.  We saw this alien from the planet fierce on Idol.  He was gorgeous, he was daring, he was sexy, but most of all, he could sing – I don’t think there’s a note he can’t hit.  And we loved him and as he began to reveal himself, we loved him inside and out.  We became Glamberts with an instinct to protect this beautiful person.  He was our secret fantasy but not for long because soon we became his mothers, his grandmothers, his protectors.

Did you know that during the Idol tour he asked his fans not to give him gifts but to donate instead in his name to Donor’s Choice to raise money for arts programs in public schools?  And raised over $250,000?  Like I said, gorgeous on the inside.

And then there was MJ’s – found it on Twitter, and MJ subtitles it “American Idol – I Love this Cheesy Show.”  Anything idol can be found on MJ’s including news round ups, sales figures, video, anything.  If she’s missed something, someone sends it from her loyal followers.  And not just Idol – she covers So You Think You Can Dance and X-Factor, which I’ve never watched, and that amazing show Glee.  If she covered Survivor and Top Chef, it’d be perfect.  (For all of you that have been holding your breath, wondering if I would reveal my television habits, I just did.)

She live-blogs every single show so anyone can follow the commentary. I ashamed to say how many shows from the Idol Concert Tour I “watched” with MJ.  Just to gauge the fan reaction to our alien from the planet fierce.

So that’s my blog find – MJ’s Big Blog.  And it’s fun.  It’s fun to have something to be interested in besides global warming, wars, Iran, etc. Not that I don’t have plenty of interests – I do.  But you know what I mean.  Something frothy to be consumed by, something fun.

So this glambert, who goes by Grambert on MJs, says thanks, MJ.  Thanks, Adam.

P.S.  I have a granddaughter named Daxton – an unusual name.  Never heard of another one.  While searching Adam Lambert on Twitter, I came across a fan called “daxtonsnini.”  What?  Turns out her name is Nita but her 3-year-old grandson calls her nini, and his name is Daxton!  Wow – a 3-year-old little boy Daxton in Oklahoma!