SYW: Least Favorite Day, Energy, and Other Musings

January 24, 2022 / amoralegria / 1 Comment

Monday, Monday…I can trust that day
Monday, Monday…to find Melanie’s Share Your World today!

This is a good segue into Melanie’s first question, which is…

“What’s the worst day of the week for you?” Why?

It’s not Monday, as it probably is for many in the working world – but I’m retired so Monday is just fine, and so are Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday! I have a different schedule every day. Monday is mostly free of scheduled activities and commitments, but it’s the day I have to do our weekly calendar, fill my pill cases, and usually do laundry and/or run the dishwasher (i.e. clean up the kitchen, thus filling the dishwasher). But it’s pretty laid back. Sunday, I guess I would have to say, is my least favorite, because it’s the only day I have to get up early to go to church! But really, I can’t think of a “worst day” of the week. I have random “bad days” but they don’t fall on the same day of the week.

With the recent energy crisis here in the UK, would you prefer electric, gas, oil or some other means of heating your home?

Downloaded image from Google, courtesy of https://www.insideindianabusiness.com/articles/iea-awarded-illinois-wind-farm-project

I would prefer to have solar panels and a system for storing solar energy at my house, but I cannot do that, because I live in a senior community and our house is rented. We have all electric, except water & heat, which are gas. That said, when we were living in our own home before we moved here, I was some years ago given the opportunity by our energy provider to choose wind energy. I signed up for 100% wind energy – there are extensive wind farms in southern Illinois. I hope my instructions were followed, but I have no way of verifying that all of our household’s our energy was in fact generated by wind turbines. More and more people in this area are signing up for solar power – they have the panels installed on the roof and a system for collecting and storing that energy. It requires an initial large financial commitment, but in the long run, it saves money. You can get energy credits and “sell” your energy back to the company. I wish this community would go solar!

In your household, who takes care of the bills, taxes, and other financial stuff? Is one person responsible or is it a shared chore?

We share financial matters, but I do more of it in terms of the amount of time spent on it. I pay the bills, keep track of medical/drug/charitable expenses by putting them all on spread sheets, and then when we are compiling our tax information, I print out the spread sheets and give them to my husband. I also keep spread sheets of our trip expenses and our children’s debts to us. Dale takes care of getting financial documents together, compiling all the things we have put into our yearly tax folder, and getting them over to our tax preparer. We also have investments, and managing these is a shared responsibility.

If you can have any one job (real or fiction) in the galaxy (yes, the galaxy, I’m widening the search radius, imagining relocation to other planets possible), what is that job?

galactic explorer and journalist/travel writer; also perhaps being an interplanetary travel agent, helping people plan trips to wherever. I would expect perks from this job – free or almost free travel credits on flights aboard space ships!

Who are you grateful for?

My husband, Dale. He does so much to take care of me and does all kinds of tasks that I get frustrated doing or my ADHD interferes with me doing, as well as a lot of household chores. He has been having some more health issues lately, and I feel as though I should learn to do the things he customarily does. I think I take him for granted too often! Living in a senior community, we find out when someone in independent living passes away, often leaving a husband or wife behind. Sometimes it happens suddenly, and sometimes after a long illness. But it’s always hard, and there are a lot of widows and widowers here! This may sound morbid but it’s just part of getting older.

SYW: Our Planetary Emergency and Looking on the Bright Side of Life

January 19, 2022 / amoralegria / 3 Comments

This week Melanie has a Dalek to introduce this week’s Share Your World!

Oversized Bronze Dalek Figure Stands 23cm Tall | Doctor Who Figurines Collection All Doctor Who Collectables and Memorabilia — Exterminate! EXTERMINATE!

Questions

Fill in: ‘If I were really completely honest, I would say that …’ This is a question for ‘radical honesty’. What are the things you wouldn’t normally say? Things you would otherwise actually hide? What’s on your mind? What would you really like to be able to say?
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I would talk about the emergency facing our planet: that is, climate change and the havoc it will wreak, not just in a once-a-month meeting of an environmental committee or a conversation over dinner – I would talk about it ALL THE TIME! I would tell people not to litter their masks on the ground – instead, take them home, cut the loops, and dispose of them. I would insist that people recycle. I would chase after scofflaws who litter. I would tell managers at supermarkets that it should be against the law to use plastic bags for loading groceries and demand that they stop or at least charge a quarter for each bag. I would not bite my tongue when someone I’m having lunch with asks for or uses a plastic straw that the wait staff leaves on the table. I would go immediately to the management of the restaurant to tell them not to use straws because plastic straws represent 7% of plastic waste that ends up in the ocean and in landfills. I would be much more “in-your-face” aggressive about anything I were to see relating to pollution of the water or air and other environmental problems (diminishing animal habitats, etc.) and I would demand that our politicians DO SOMETHING NOW!

But of course, I can’t really do much to influence politicians, because it’s not just American politicians – it’s leaders all over the world who are not doing enough to address this crisis.

I would tell everyone to watch the Netflix movie Don’t Look Up and discuss how the premise of the movie is an allegory for the attitudes of politicians toward the serious, life-threatening problem of climate change.

Have you ever broken anything? What about rules?
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I have broken things, although not many, considering my klutzy-ness. But rules? Sure, I’ve broken many, but not serious ones, nothing that would hurt or impact another person. In high school, my friends and I used to joke about how many rules we broke – we even made a list of all the school rules we’d broken. I think there were at least 25 on the list! As a mature adult, overall, I obey laws and rules if they make sense.

Are you also afraid of spiders? What is your biggest fear, other than spiders? (if you’re not afraid of spiders, use your biggest phobia instead).
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I’m not really afraid of spiders. I see them all the time and usually they aren’t bothering me so I let them be. Sometimes I like to watch them. I had a boss once whose son had tarantulas in a tank behind his father’s desk. It was really cool when they shed their skins – it looked exactly like a tarantula itself! Once, I tried to take one of these shedded skins home to show my son, but it disintegrated almost as soon as I touched it.

I have a phobia of pests that run really fast, such as mice and cockroaches. Oh, and also millipedes! We used to see them often in our old house because the basement was often damp. Fortunately, I haven’t seen a millipede where I live now. I hope never to see cockroaches either; we did have a mouse in the garage once. Management put out traps for them near the garage door, but no mice ever got caught in them, so they were eventually removed.

Do you think time goes faster as you get older?
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Oh, definitely! There is a scientific basis for this perception. Older people literally have so many memories stored in their brains that ordinary happenings barely register, so they lose track of time easily. (This is also the reason why older people forget things that happened yesterday, but can remember seemingly inconsequential things from their childhoods.) For example, I might get on my computer, expecting to be on for about an hour but then when I’m ready to get off, I look at the time and it’s 3 hours later!

GRATITUDE SECTION (as always, optional)

Please share something that really inspired you from this last week or month.

I joined a group which met this week for the first time in my senior community. One of the activity directors thought of it. It’s called “The Bright Side” group. We met on Tuesday and discussed ideas on what this group could be or do in the community. For example, I suggested that we buy birthday cards and give every person who has a birthday that day a card, signed by at least one of us. Even if we don’t know the individual personally. We used to have a birthday party every month for people whose birthday was in that month, but Covid restrictions put an end to that.

The group is going to meet twice a month and share positive stories or brainstorm ideas for making the people in our community look on “the bright side” of life!

SYW: Grammar, Genets, Sibs, & Alter Egos

January 5, 2022 / amoralegria / 6 Comments

Monday Melanie starts 2022 with the following Share Your World questions:

What frivolous, but annoying thing that people do be considered a sin (crime)?
And how should violators be made to repent (be punished) for it?

Confuse possessives with plurals by adding an apostrophe where it does not belong!!This is extremely common these days. Don’t they teach grammar in elementary school anymore or were these people asleep in class? It should be a crime, punishable by having to spend a whole day in a grammar class in which the attendees would write out many examples of both plurals and possessives, using all the rules for making plurals and possessives in the English language.

Cake’s is not a word, although the supermarket would have you think so! What belongs to the cake? Frosting? A message written on the top? No. They mean simply “more than one cake” which is a plural. The rule in this case is to add an “s” to the end of the word, NO APOSTROPHE! I have a dear friend that makes this mistake all the time and it drives me crazy!! But I don’t tell him about it because he would feel I am just lecturing him in my teacher mode! At the very least, he’d be embarrassed and since I only see his writing in emails, I’m letting it slide. There is one common exception to this rule which confuses a lot of people: its and it’s. “Its” is the possessive. (Its paws, its timing, etc.) “It’s” is a contraction of “it is.” If it doesn’t make sense to substitute “it is” where you’ve written “it’s” in a sentence, then correct it by removing the apostrophe.

Imagination IN and impracticality and logic aside, if you could pick one animal to have as an exotic pet based solely on how cute and adorable it is, what would it be?

A genet. I had never heard of this species until I went on a safari trip in Tanzania, and at one of the lodges, the owners had genets (they left food out for them so the genets would hang around) who would crawl out onto the rafters and stare at the people below. They look like cats, which is probably why I like them so much, but they are not cats. However, they are so CUTE!!

*A genet looks down on diners at Ndutu Safari Lodge.*

Do you have any siblings? If so, where do you rank in birth order? And do you think either of these facts contributed to the person you became?

I am the youngest of 5. I have three older sisters and one older brother. I’m sure it contributed to the person I became, because I tended to get away with stuff more often than the others. And I was the rebel, or “black sheep” of the family, so I think I made my mother rethink all of her child-rearing methods that she had developed raising four other children before me. Letting me excuse myself from dinner because “we eat so late” and I wanted to watch a TV show during that time. (Not sitting with the family during dinner was always verboten!) And letting the cat stay with me in bed instead of making him sleep in the garage. Things like that, I was able to get away with. Still, I fought a lot with my mother, but not my dad – he was always calm and hated conflict. Then my siblings, one by one, went away to school, and I ended up with only my brother, or alone, living at home with my parents. I think that had an effect also. I loved one of my sisters the most, and always wanted to stay up until she got home from school so I could see her right away. It was hard when she went away, because she served as a buffer between my brother and me. My brother teased me mercilessly, and I wanted that sister at home to comfort me, to distract me with songs or games.

We all have things that make us happy, but what makes you deliriously, giddily, tail wagging-ly happy?

I wish it were my grandchildren, but I don’t have any. It is my cat that makes me the most happy, although I wouldn’t say “giddy” – I love to watch her antics, to play with her, to hear her purr when I stroke her. Speaking of wagging, did you know that cats wag their tails? People associate wagging with dogs, but my cat does wag her tail by flipping it back and forth when she is content. It’s almost an unconscious gesture, because if I pet her when she is almost asleep, her tail starts flipping.

*Who could resist a face like this? This is my adorable fur baby Hazel.*

If you had an alter ego, who or what would it be? Describe some fun or interesting things about them!

I don’t know if my alter ego would be male or female. I guess I would want her/him to have the skills and personality characteristics that are the opposite of mine. My alter ego would be confident, organized, and a risk-taker. (S)he would do things I would never do, such as ziplining, hang gliding, going on archaeological digs, and white water rafting. (S)he would be athletic and agile (unlike me) and be an excellent photographer. (S)he’d have a blog, far more exciting than mine, about traveling all over the world. At home, (s)he would have an awesome job: graphic designing, travel consultant, linguist or anthropologist, famous novelist or painter, architect designing eco-friendly buildings. (S)he would get involved in environmental projects that would really make a difference in preserving species from extinction or mitigating the effects of climate change.

I guess my “alter ego” would be damn near perfect!! 🙂 😀

What are some hopes or accomplishments you’d like to see happen in 2022?
My number one priority is for the federal government to really get serious about mitigating climate change, and that the population in general become more aware so they can pollute less and love our planet more! I have many other hopes, but I’m afraid they are just pipe dreams: Trump and his cronies get convicted for corruption, lying under oath, and deception of the public. Everyone gets vaccinated against Covid-19 so no new variants have a chance to take hold and wreak havoc. And a personal accomplishment would be for me to waste less time, so that I have time for all the things I “don’t have time” to do! And that the exciting trips I have booked for this year don’t get cancelled!!

SYW: New Year Revelations

December 30, 2021 / amoralegria / 2 Comments

SHARE YOUR WORLD AS THE YEAR ENDS 12-27-2021 is Melanie’s final SYW for 2021.

SHARE YOUR WORLD QUESTIONS

Melanie writes: 2022 Is bearing down on the world. In my opinion 2021 was 100% better than 2020, but it hasn’t been without its own set of problems and fresh worries. I’m hopeful that 2022 will somehow see a return to ‘life before Covid’ , but I also realize that’s a foolish hope.

At 12 a.m. on December 31st/Jan 1st, what will you be doing? (use your own time zone please)

Toasting the New Year with my husband, sister, and brother-in-law. We will probably be drinking one of the wines I’ve brought to their house to share on that evening.

Is there a tradition you have for New Year’s Eve?

The four of us have gotten together on New Year’s Eve for several years. They provide the venue and games, we provide the food. This year we’re having pizza and have the chance to sample several wines from my “collection.” We play games, always Scrabble, but since we’ve acquired some new games in the last couple of years, including a Trivia game, we will play those as well. We play games until midnight, then turn on the TV to watch Chicago bring in the new year! And we toast! Shortly thereafter, Dale & I take our wines (if anything is left) and go home to bed.

Do you have any hope or reason you find that next year will be better?

Oh yes! Because of vaccines, we are not in the situation we were a year ago. But Covid still rages, preying on primarily the unvaccinate, but frightfully also many vaccinated! Dr. Fauci says that the omicron variant seems to produce milder symptoms, thus fewer hospitalizations in the long run. And travel opportunities are now available! I know several people who have traveled already, mostly to Europe. After a few false starts, we now look forward to a trip in March to Southeast Asia. Travel requirements will make things more complicated, but we are ready to face them, after staying within 50 miles of home for two years!

On the other hand, I think the political situation in the U.S. will get worse. Too many people believe the 2020 election was “stolen” and that Biden is not a legitimate president. In the latest polls, 70% of Republicans now believe the Big Lie!! Due to the vast array of media sources, Americans live in different universes. Bridging that gap, enlightening those who are convinced the virus is a hoax and the election was stolen, will not be easy! So there will be more violence, less civility, and meanwhile, people will continue to die from gun violence every day, while Congress does nothing to stop it.

What’s the biggest personal lesson you learned during 2021?

Not to take life for granted. It is important to live life as fully as possible and to take obstacles in stride. I do not think life will return completely to what it was at the beginning of 2020. Changes have already been made that will affect us for a long time to come. And Covid may be with us for a long time, but it will become manageable, people getting vaccinations every year just like we do for the flu. We will, we must, adapt!

GRATITUDE SECTION

Describe in 1-3 words how you feel going into 2022.

Excited, hopeful, cautious!

Happy New Year 2022 Wallpapers - Top Free Happy New Year 2022 Backgrounds - WallpaperAccess

to all my friends on WordPress!!

SYW: Health Care in the U.S. and Other Wishful Thinking

December 14, 2021December 14, 2021 / amoralegria / 5 Comments

A new week, a new set of questions from Melanie’s Share Your World.

SHARE YOUR WORLD QUESTIONS

What is your opinion of the state of health care in your country? Adequate or inadequate? What could be done to improve it?
Hoo boy! This is one that has been highly and hotly debated in the last several years! How to get all Americans good health care while at the same time letting insurance companies run the show? It ain’t gonna happen! We need what Europe has: “free” health care for everyone – I know it isn’t really free, but it is run by the government and taxes pay for it, with the wealthy paying much more than the average worker. There are people who combine travel with medical needs, going to Spain, for example, to have hip replacement surgery which, even for Americans who don’t pay into their system, is many thousands of dollars cheaper than having it done here.

The United States has an excellent medical system; by that, I mean that it has the most advanced technology and research, and perhaps the most highly trained medical personnel, but, as we have seen in this pandemic, the “excellence” is spotty – concentrated in some areas, very inadequate in others. It is not evenly distributed and even with sophisticated equipment, many hospitals lacked basic PPE for all medical personnel when their hospitals were flooded with Covid patients. Many more people died than would have if hospital staff had everything it needed to treat them.

People (especially children, it seems) come to the United States to have some advanced procedures done that aren’t available in their countries, and they get special visas to stay in the U.S. for as long as their treatment lasts. Doctors Without Borders sends well-trained American doctors to poor countries to help people who have little or no health care. We hear about both of these efforts, but until Covid-19 hit us hard, the deficiencies of our health care system were largely unknown by the general public, (except, of course, people who already had had horrific experiences dealing with the cost and availability of health care). We did hear about people dying because they didn’t have insurance and couldn’t pay specialists who could help them. This is a travesty, revealed especially once “Obamacare” (Affordable Care Act, or ACA) was being debated. President Obama clearly wanted to make health care more affordable and more equitable, but because of the influence of big pharma and corporate insurance lobbyists, the middlemen – the insurance companies – were allowed to administer the program. When I retired, I had the option of a COBRA policy from my school district, which I would have to pay for. I compared the cost of that policy with what I could get of equal value from the ACA. Registering for the ACA was initially less expensive, so I dropped the COBRA, meaning I could not later get it back. My medical insurance from my employer ran out in August of the year I retired, so I got a Blue Cross Blue Shield “silver” policy – a deductible that wasn’t prohibitive and a “reasonable” monthly premium of about $550. It was difficult to be responsible for this entire cost, (even though the premiums are calculated on a sliding scale according to your income) since I was no longer working, but I figured that I only had to have it for a year and 9 months and then I could get Medicare. In January of the following year, only four months after my employee insurance benefits ran out, the monthly premium of my BCBS silver policy went up by more than $200 a month. Now it was higher than the COBRA would have been, but I was stuck with it. The following year, it went up again – this time to over $1,000 per month! Fortunately, I turned 65 in the middle of that year and was then eligible for Medicare, but even so, the cost was nearly prohibitive for those first six months. I imagined what it was like for people in low-wage and no-insurance jobs; although they had subsidies from the ACA, their costs must have gone up too. I heard horror stories of dilemmas far worse than what I experienced. So, while the ACA did make medical insurance affordable for millions more people than before, there were millions of people that still couldn’t afford it. The ACA was and is far from perfect.

I believe health care is a right, that should be available to all. That is why I am in favor of a single-payer system. However, with the innate distrust of the government that is embedded in American culture, I don’t know when or if it will ever become a reality. Perhaps another entity could administer it, so it wouldn’t be associated with a government “welfare state.”

What are two words that describe you best?
scatterbrained
intelligent

Do you have a morning routine? If so, what it’s like?
Yes, we get up around 8 am, and go to the kitchen, where Dale gets his coffee and I warm up water for tea. We each get a banana, and sometimes a small piece of cheese. Then we sit in our living room in front of our fireplace (in cold weather seasons) or on our screened porch (in warm weather) and read. Unfortunately, this is so pleasurable that we let it go on too long before we really start getting ready for our day, which, 5 days a week, starts with an exercise class between 10 and 11 am. Then we have a proper breakfast, take our morning meds, get dressed and go.

What’s something that really makes your blood race?
Wishing I lived in a country that values its children more than guns.

Do you enjoy singing festive songs during *insert festive celebration that you observe to replace “Christmas” if it’s not relevant to you * Christmas carols or songs? Yes, of course – because it’s only one season a year. I also like to listen to the radio station that plays all Christmas music during the month of December. By New Year’s Day, I am sick of all these songs and want to go back to “normal!”

Admiring holiday lights in Rosemont while listening to Christmas songs on 93.9 FM

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GRATITUDE SECTION (as always optional)

Feel free to share something that brings peace to you.
Knowing that my son is OK, taking care of himself and no longer using drugs & alcohol. Until 6 months ago, worrying about my son was a constant stressor, but he has managed to finally get out of his rut and do the things he needs to make progress in his life. He calls often, sometimes with problems that frustrate him, but we always talk it out and he realizes his problem isn’t unsolvable. He is surrounded by people who care about and support him. He is a joy to be with now!! I look forward to spending Christmas with both him and our daughter and son-in-law.

SYW: Pillow Talk, Piñatas, Summer Night Irritations, & Being Free as a Bird

November 13, 2021 / amoralegria / 2 Comments

Here are Melanie’s Share Your World questions for the week:

QUESTIONS

How many pillows do you sleep with? If over one or two, is it because you sleep better ‘propped up’ a little?
I have a chronic mucus build-up in my sinuses and throat which no meds totally work for. It is often, inconveniently, worse at night. I like to read in bed before I go to sleep, so I prop myself with two pillows. When I go to sleep, I use mainly the “My Pillow” I bought at Costco years ago (before I knew the CEO’s politics!). It creates a depression for my neck and poofs up around each side of my face. I’m a back sleeper, so I mostly use that pillow plus a foam wedge to stay a bit elevated. I also use a small pillow under my knees, and if I turn onto my side, I put that pillow between my knees. On my side, I tend to also use a firmer pillow to reduce strain on my neck and shoulders. So, in total, not counting the wedge, I use three pillows. (If one ends up on the floor, I shake it out before using because a person is never more than 18″ from a spider.)

What would be the worst thing you could put in a piñata?
Olives. Also raisins. But olives would be worse, because they’d be messier! If raisins weren’t picked up by the greedy kids, at least birds would eat them. I don’t think birds eat olives, though, so uncollected olives would litter the ground.

What noise annoys you the most?
A mosquito buzzing in my ear. I remember many summer nights at our cottage up north, when mosquitoes would sometimes get in, because people were constantly opening doors to come in or go out. The mosquito would always find its way to my ear and face. As soon as it started buzzing, I would sit up with a start. Sometimes I would have to actually get up and turn on the light, and try to find the offending insect in order to kill it. Mostly, though, I would put my head completely under the sheet, which also made me lose sleep because I like fresh air when I sleep.

Was a mosquito this big in May (2020) a sign of a season of overly robust mosquitoes?

If cartoon physics suddenly replaced real physics, what are some things you would want to try?
Floating or flying in the air, with no fear of falling. I would like to experience what it would be like to be a bird. I would be able to take the direct routes to places I would like to visit, saving me airport and airplane hassles!

GRATITUDE SECTION (as always, OPTIONAL)

Please share something good that has happened to you over the past month.
The weather has been unseasonably warm in late Oct.-early Nov. (which I know is a sign of climate change, but I liked it anyway!)

My son has been clean & sober nearly five months and recently got a job as a production assistant for a studio. As he says, it’s entry-level, but it’s a foot in the door of the field he wants to work in, and hopefully it means no more dead-end retail and food service jobs!

SYW: Graveyards, Scary Books, Black Cats, and Multiple Dimensions

October 29, 2021October 29, 2021 / amoralegria / 3 Comments

Here it is, the end of the week, and I am only now getting around to participating in Melanie’s Share Your World!

Here are her Halloween-themed questions:’

Name something you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark forest or in an abandoned building (yeah it’s a retread. But there are new participants to SYW too who probably never answered it)
Anyone with a gun, knife, or other weapon. On the other hand, I wouldn’t go into a dark forest or abandoned building by myself for fear of running into such a person.

Do you believe in multiple dimensions or worlds?
Yes. There are definitely other “worlds” (planets) outside our solar system – several have already been discovered. With the number of stars just in our galaxy alone, I think it is highly probable that life exists on many of these planets. As for multiple dimensions, some scientists are exploring the idea of multiple universes or life mimicking our own in some other dimension. Don’t we already have at least four dimensions? And I remember the rock band The 5th Dimension. That’s enough proof for me!

Would you ever go to a graveyard at night?
I don’t know why I would do that, although I do enjoy exploring graveyards & cemeteries in the daytime. There are so many stories of past lives to contemplate there.

What is the most frightening book you’ve ever read?
I tend not to read really scary books. I’ve seen a few very scary movies, but they only last a couple of hours while typically I take at least a week to read a book – and I like to read before I go to bed!! I once decided to join a Halloween book group which was reading Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill. I think I had read 20 pages or so and had to stop because it was too creepy and scary for me! I have never tried to participate in a scary book group again!

BONUS QUESTION (just for silliness’ sake!)

If you could have a spooky Halloween pet (black cat, owl, bat, rat, wolf), which would you pick out of the five choices? No contest – a black cat. I love cats!

GRATITUDE SECTION (As always, optional)
What are you grateful for? My “tortie” cat, Hazel, who is mostly black!

SYW: Hauntings, Accidents, Cold Weather Comforts

October 19, 2021 / amoralegria / 2 Comments

Here are some new questions for the season from Melanie’s Share Your World.

Are you easily frightened or startled?
Yes, sort of. I am startled when my husband sneaks up on me – he walks as softly ass a cat! Sudden loud noises like thunder really close by also scare me. For some reason, spiders and other arachnids don’t scare me at all. I let them crawl around my house and catch insects, but I draw the line at my personal space! (No spiders in my bed please!)

(Purely whimsical supposition. Suspend disbelief for a bit)
If you were a ghost, what location do you think you would haunt? Is it the same or different from the location you’d want to haunt? Wherever DJT happens to be – I’d follow him around the country to all his rallies! I would never leave him in peace until he dies.

What do you see in your mind’s eye when you close your eyes? (I know somebody will answer ‘the inside of my eyelids”, so I took the temptation away by answering that first! Feel free to use that answer if you like though, or pass. It’s ALL good!) I usually see undulating patterns, or the light in the vicinity that I just saw with open eyes. The patterns are sometimes really cool.

If a Semi (Big Rig in Americanese) (lorry or trolley over the pond) were about to smash into a crowd, and you could divert the vehicle’s course to hit only one person, would you? How would you decide who would become the victim? See my answer above about whom I would haunt. In real life, I don’t wish death on anybody, but sometimes I do wish certain people would die – soon – of natural causes!

GRATITUDE SECTION

Please feel free to share what makes you feel warm and cozy when the wind blows cold? Alternatively (for those on the other side of the world), what makes you feel relaxed and comfortable when the thermometer starts rising?

Fuzzy slippers, hot chocolate and warm popcorn, my cat’s warmth.

It hasn’t gotten very cold yet, although some nights have been in the 40s. The temperatures these last few days are about 10 degrees F above normal. That is something I’m grateful for: sunny, warm (not hot) days that last well into autumn.

WWTW: The Orange Man Himself

October 19, 2021 / amoralegria / 2 Comments

Every week Fandango’s hosts a challenge, for those who choose to accept it, called Who Won The Week? It is the opportunity that fellow bloggers have to highlight someone in the news (good or bad) that takes the ‘prize’ for that week.

My choice is Donald J. Trump. On October 14, the former president (never again!), frustrated by the lack of proof of election fraud in the 2020 elections – dubbed the “safest” election in recent times (not to mention a record voter participation) – told his followers that if the “massive fraud” is not exposed, they should NOT VOTE in 2022 or 2024 as a sign of protest. In a statement on Wednesday, Trump said, “If we don’t solve the Presidential Election Fraud of 2020 (which we have thoroughly and conclusively documented), Republicans will not be voting in ’22 or ’24. It is the single most important thing for Republicans to do.” Of course, other Republican leaders rushed to ‘correct’ this idiotic mistake by the man to whom they have given their overwhelming loyalty and tacit support as the leader of the GOP.

GREENVILLE, NC – JUNE 05: Former U.S. President Donald Trump exits the NCGOP state convention on June 5, 2021 in Greenville, North Carolina. The event is one of former U.S. President Donald Trumps first high-profile public appearances since leaving the White House in January. (Photo by Melissa Sue Gerrits/Getty Images)

Meanwhile, many conservative states have passed or are considering legislation to restrict voting turnout and have either fired or threatened state election officials, who have been besieged by threatening phone calls and messages (some have received death threats, including local election officials who are Republicans and Trump supporters) and many of these officials are being primaried by more loyal Trump supporters who would go along with falsifying results of future elections if Republicans lose in their districts.

If Trump’s supporters follow his directive – and there is little reason to think they won’t – it may not be difficult for Democrats to maintain and even increase their Congressional majority. That would be good for the Biden administration, who currently must curry favor with two conservative Democratic senators, Joe Manchin and Kristin Sinema, who seem to currently have the power to shape Biden’s “Build Back Better” comprehensive reconciliation infrastructure bill.

I don’t have high hopes that all Trump supporters will not vote in the midterm elections, but Trump has only one concern: himself. His fans still don’t get that he has no interest in improving their lives or helping the country; he only cares about himself, as a true narcissist. Even so, I like to think right now that maybe electing Democrats isn’t a lost cause after all, and for that reason, Trump gets my vote for the person who “won” the week.

SYW: Games, Scary Movies, Nature, etc.

October 11, 2021 / amoralegria / 2 Comments

Melanie’s back with a new set of Share Your World questions today!

QUESTIONS

(Two ‘seasonal’ and two plain today)

What is the scariest game (board or on-line) you ever may have played?
I have never played a “scary” board/on-line game. I have never heard of a scary game, but I’m not a big “gamer” in terms of online/video games. Perhaps when I was a child, I may have gotten scared by some game like Hide and Seek if I felt left alone and couldn’t find anyone. I don’t remember, so it probably didn’t happen. I have played games that are thrilling and exciting, but not scary.

What’s just ‘over the rainbow” for you?
Traveling – we finally got our new passports!

mDo you have to watch something upbeat after watching a suspense or horror movie so you can go to sleep?
I don’t normally watch those kinds of movies. I have a few that I like in that genre, but no, I wouldn’t watch them late at night! I went alone to Silence of the Lambs at a local theatre many years ago. It was dark out when I left the theater, and I started to walk home, only about 2 blocks away. Once I left the downtown area and started down a street that was not well lit, I saw a man coming toward me, on the other side of the street! He didn’t make any threatening gesture and I couldn’t even see what he looked like, but I started running and didn’t stop until I got inside my apartment building! Never again!

The Silence of the Lambs - Where to Watch and Stream - TV Guide

Is there intent behind every action?
EVERY action? No, I don’t think so. I often do things without thinking, although I don’t think that is a good thing to do in general. I usually don’t even remember most of the “actions” I have taken during any particular day.

GRATITUDE SECTION (as always, optional)

Feel free to share some gratitude with folks today! Thanks!
Although it’s probably got some connection to climate change, I am grateful for the warm, summerlike weather we have had the last week.

I am also grateful for nature. Yesterday, I was sitting on our screened porch and noticed a bird at the foot of a tree. It looked bigger than most birds I see around here, but maybe it was a pigeon. But then it flew up on a low branch on a tree and I saw that it was a hawk! And it was trying to catch a squirrel! I watched the drama of predator and prey play out for at least five minutes. The hawk was unsuccessful, though – the squirrel escaped every time the hawk tried to grab him. Lots of flapping of wings and scurrying up the tree and onto higher branches. I think the hawk was young, probably born this year and now out fending for himself, but apparently he has much to learn about swooping down and grabbing his prey before it can get away. Each and every time, the squirrel outwitted the hawk. I sat there, watching the scene and in the back of my mind, I was wishing I’d had my camera right then – I could have gotten some great shots! But I was content just to witness the scene. There are dramas unfolding every day in the natural world!

I have a new phone, and it takes sharper photos than my previous one. Here are a couple of photos taken at one of the ponds of the heron who comes here every day.

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