Category Archives: Mysteries

2025, Art, Mysteries, Seasons

Winter Lights

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Normally I don’t consider myself dull or boring but every now and then I wonder.

  • Midsommer Murders – I’ve seen every episode repeatedly – but every afternoon if I am at home and have the television on, that’s what I settle on.
  • State Fair. I’m not suggesting that the State Fair is boring but seriously, five or six trips every year?  Clearly the repetitiveness has to be a bit of the appeal.
  • A Christmas Carol. Read it every year and watch various versions repeatedly throughout the holiday season.
  • Death on the Nile. Two versions that I like… I don’t want to even guess how many times I’ve watched one or the other of them.  Ditto for Murder on the Orient Express (although only one acceptable version of this).

I joined the Arboretum four years ago during Pandemic – it was one place where it was easy to spend time without worrying about social distancing as well as being comforting.  Since then I have gone often, including every year for the Winter Lights display.  I love walking through the Arb when it’s brisk and chilly, seeing the lovely lights in shapes of flowers, snowflakes, butterflies.  YA won’t come every year because the displays don’t change much.

This year, I ended up parking in the last parking lot near what I’ve always thought of as the “end” of the light tour, several little houses, all lit up and that are a magnet for kids of all ages.  For some reason I decided that instead of heading up to the main building I would do the little houses first and then do the lights backwards.  There were hundreds of visitors at the Arb that night and I was absolutely the only one going in that direction.  A couple of times it was a little funny as I had to step aside on a path to let a glut of people pass in the opposite way.

It was a fun experience and I may do it backwards again next year… since I’m sure I’ll go again.

What’s something you can do/see over and over again?

2025, Mysteries, Nature, Weather

Earmuffs and Mittens

25 Comments

Although I grew up in Missouri, I spent many summer and winter vacations in northern Wisconsin, either at the family homestead or at relative’s cabins on the Eau Claire lakes.  When it was time to pick a college, I announced to my parents that I would only apply to schools in Wisconsin or Minnesota.  When I had been in Northfield for two months, I took my first trip to the Twin Cities.  All it took was that weekend – I knew this was where I wanted to be.  After wasband finished graduate school in Milwaukee, we hightailed it here.  After 40+ years, I’d like to consider myself a Minnesotan rather than a Missourian. 

It is partly the weather that drew me here so I’ve been surprised by what seems to be a trend the last several years of many Minnesotans over-reacting to the weather before the weather even gets here.  So many times there is an alarming forecast and people almost burrow in, stocking up and preparing not to leave their homes.  Then, of course, 8 out of 10 times, the dreaded weather never arrives.

This has happened to me once already, when snow was forecast for the week before Christmas.  On that Tuesday, my book club baled on our rare in person meeting which was scheduled for Thursday.  There was snow on Thursday but not nearly what was threatened.  Main road and highways were fine.

Now I’ve gotten an email from a friend with whom I have concert plans in March, asking if I’d rather get online viewing tickets instead of driving downtown to see the show in person.  Because it’s March, when we often have snowstorms. 

This is a trend that mystifies me.  Does this make me a tough Minnesotan?

How do you handle weather where you are?

2024, Family, Gatherings, holidays, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Ends/Beginnings

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We typically spends New Year’s Eve staying home, drinking in moderation, and going to bed before 9:00. Tonight will be no different. The New Year has never meant much of a change for us, but this January forward will be much different than in the past.

I retire from full-time work January 31. I will be out of the office for the month of February, and then start part time in March. I hope to put in no more than 20 hours a week, doing two evaluations a week and writing the reports. I am a little concerned my agency wants me to do more than I have imagined, as I have been asked to supervise two counseling interns and to continue behavioral consulting at Head Start. They also want me to continue as a consultant to the Youth and Family team and to train staff in diagnosis and treatment planning.

All the while this will be going on, Husband and I will be downsizing and preparing ourselves to move to Minnesota. I think the move will be no later than the spring of 2026. It is very strange to have so much uncertainty in our future after 36 years of much the same activity, people, and tasks.

What does the New Year hold for you? What have been your most uncertain times? How do you celebrate New Year’s Eve?

2024, Food, Gatherings, holidays, Mysteries

In a Tizzy

21 Comments

I’m having a mental disconnect this week.  It’s like my internal clock knows that Thanksgiving is WAY late this year.  I’m itching to bring out my holiday movies and ask Alexa to play some of my silly holiday tunes.

Normally I do a lot of my holiday stuff early but the Friday after Thanksgiving is my official “get going” day.  That’s when cookies start, that’s when I assemble the cards for mailing and wrap anything that has to get shipped.  This year, because Thanksgiving is so late, I’m doing some of my tasks ahead of time.  Cards are all done and got assembled for mailing last night.  Eggs are all packed into their cartons.  All gifts that have to shipped are wrapped.  Today I will sort out boxes for each address I have to ship to.

Although I know what cookies I’m making this year and have a list of ingredients I need, I haven’t started baking yet.  That just seems sacrosanct before Thanksgiving.  But I will be doing the shopping run for those ingredients today so I’m ready to go early on Friday morning.  My goal this year is to get all the cookies done in 7 days.  Fingers crossed.

But all this normally-after-Thanksgiving frenzy is messing with me.  I’m dreaming about my spreadsheets and what order I should do the cookies.  And I’m spending a lot of time going through things in my head. The dreams aren’t bad by any means, but it is a little weird.  Assuming by next weekend, my disconnect will be re-connected!

Thanksgiving doesn’t engender any of this for me.  We go elsewhere and I only have to do two things which can be done that morning.  YA has one dish to make as well.  So no spreadsheets, no lists and no dreams.  Guess I can be grateful that I only have big prep for one holiday at this time of year!

What holiday prep needs to be done at your place but you’d prefer if brownies came in at night and did it for you?

2024, Business, Family, Mysteries, Travel

True Blue

27 Comments

Two COMPLETELY different people live in this house.

Me.
Cashier at a store:  Are you a member of our loyalty program.
Me:  No, is it free?
Cashier:  No, it’s ____ per year but you get ___ % of every purchase.
Me:  No thanks.
 

YA.
YA:  I need one more flight this calendar year to keep my Silver status.
Me:   And this is important?
YA:  Of course.
YA:  I think I’m going to book a flight to Dallas for the Jingle Bell concert in two weeks.   If I fly down on the day of the concert, I can stay overnight and come home the next day.
Me:  You can get the days off?
YA:  I can work on the plane and in the hotel.
Me:  And this is worth the expense to you?
YA:  Oh yeah.
 

I am enrolled in quite a few loyalty programs; all but one is free.  I can’t bear the idea of having to keep track whether I’m making my money back.  The one that I do pay for is Prime and I actually only pay half; YA pays the other half.  I did keep track for the first two years and with the movies, it was a landslide so I quit my spreadsheet after that.  Most of my programs only come up once a year on my birthday.  I get the birthday freebie and that’s all.  The program at my hardware store is probably my favorite – I get discounts and coupons for stuff that I’m purchasing anyway.   Couple of my bakery programs pay off occasionally as well.  But the idea that YA would fly to Dallas to keep her status is mind-blowing to me.  It’s like there’s an alien living in the house with me.

Do you have any loyalty programs that you like?

2024, Business, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Mall Malaise

35 Comments

I worked at the B.Dalton in Southdale almost forty years ago.  It was B.Dalton #1 – the first store in the chain, which eventually got swallowed up by Barnes & Noble.  So I knew Southdale like the back of my hand.  Southdale and Burnsdale  Center were the only two malls where I ever worked.  And not being a massive shopping fan, I never got to know any other commercial centers as well as those two.

Yesterday I needed to kill about 45 minutes so I thought I’d walk around Southdale for a bit.  WOW.  I was there around noon and was a little taken aback by how quiet it was.  And how many storefronts were covered up with photos and notices like the one in the photo about changes coming in the future.  Several stores that weren’t shuttered didn’t appear to be open and the stores that were open were almost all empty of customers.  The only lively spots were The Apple Store and the Hennepin County Government Services.  I didn’t even know that the HC Services had moved to Southdale when they closed their space next to the Southdale Library!

My guess is that big malls like Southdale may not survive.  I can’t imagine what they think they’re going to do liven it up. Even Santa’s workshop/photo op is abysmally small (and not open at noon) up on the second floor! Between the pandemic and the rise of free shipping and the seemingly growing sense that we’ve over-materialized ourselves, maybe big huge commercial centers are dying a quiet death.  I’d probably need more research to really answer this question but unfortunately it’s not research I would relish.  Just have to wait and see.

When was the last time you were in a mall?  Do you have a go-to shopping spot?

2024, books, Fantasy, Movies, Mysteries, Science, space, Uncategorized

Visitors

26 Comments

I had lunch yesterday with a few girlfriends.  Our conversations always range all over the place so one of my friends mentioning she had seen an article about aliens wasn’t too weird.  She couldn’t find the article online (on her phone) but that didn’t stop the rest of us from glomming on. Another friend said she’d seen a theory that aliens are already here.

I suggested that if there were actually aliens here we would never know it.  Considering how far we have yet to go to even get ourselves to Mars, any aliens who have the considerable enough technology to get here would certainly have enough technology to go undetected by us. 

After a bit more silly discussion I asked WHY these aliens would be here among us.  Maybe we’re just an amusement part for these aliens. Another friend said the article claimed that the aliens were here to save us.  Another big WHY from me at that point.  Maybe we’re some alien high-school kids science project – kind of like an ant farm.

None of my friends actually believe in aliens, at least not little green men in mental saucers.  I fall into Carl Sagan’s camp when he says in his book Contact “The universe is a pretty big place. It’s bigger than anything anyone has ever dreamed of before. So if it’s just us… seems like an awful waste of space.”  Although if there were a way to bet that we would be done as a species before we made any contact from elsewhere in the universe, I’d take that bet.

Do you have a favorite alien book or movie?

2024, Family, gardening, Mysteries, Nature, Seasons, Uncategorized

Leaf Me Be!

42 Comments

My gardening juju goes away in September.  Gardening in May and June really gets me going but by fall, I’m so done.  I think it’s because the stuff that needs doing in the fall is just clean up – nothing is going to leaf out or flower or even green up due to my work and attention.  And I detest the leaf situation the most.

My house and yard are in the middle of a weird neighborhood vortex; for some reason, even though most of the neighbors have the same number of trees as I do, way more leaves end up in my yard than the others.  I’ve documented this over the years. So so many leaves.  I’m not rabid about cleaning up leaves; I understand about leaving some leaves and plants for pollinators.  However if I don’t clean up some of the leaves, then I end up with masses of wet and sometimes moldy mess in the spring. 

But I hate raking and bagging leaves.  I’ve always hated it.  In high school, I was part of a church group that did chores for seniors and even then, I told everybody I would do any odd job but raking.  Once YA was old enough I bought her a child-sized rake and I co-opted her into helping — some years I even paid her. 

Now at the ripe old age of 29 she has decided that dealing with leaves is something important to her.  She adores our electric lawn mower and she’s been out several times now, mowing, mulching and bagging.  After a session over the weekend, she informed me that she will probably do at least one more pass in the backyard and once more out front. I haven’t asked her even once to do any of this and she hasn’t even hinted at any money crossing her palm.  It’s just amazing.

And don’t worry, believe me when I say all this activity does not denude our yard of leaves.  Plenty left for the pollinators!

Do you have anything you like to do in fall (or NOT like to do) to get ready for winter?

2024, Business, Health, Mysteries

How Much Is It Worth?

28 Comments

About twenty-five ago, my gym started opening locations in the Twin Cities; sales reps from the gym were available for a few hours in my company’s lunchroom, offering memberships at a huge discount.  Huge.  Another of the selling points was that most major insurance companies were now giving credits for getting healthy.  My insurance company was offering a $25 credit for going to the gym 12 times a month.  The location near my office wasn’t even built yet but I thought it was a great opportunity so I signed up. 

They didn’t start taking the money until the facility was actually built and in that six months, my company ramped up their “get healthy” policy.  If you worked out/went to the gym (the same 12 times a month), you’d get $20 award credits.  If you added the insurance money and the good healthy policy, it was more than the monthly charge for the gym!  It was like getting paid to work out.  Even when the health policy changed about ten years ago (and I didn’t want to mess with it anymore), it was still an excellent deal as the gym never increased my fees.

Except for a few months when I hurt my back, I went to the gym 12 times a months year after year after year.  Swimming laps sometimes, a few classes but most routinely the stationary bike.  (I can read while I’m on the stationary bike… win/win.)  But only 12 times.  In all those years, I think I went more than 12 times a month just a few times.  I wanted to get that credit but nothing more.

When I retired, I was able to change my membership to Silver Sneakers which is free to me.  I was pretty sure when I made the switch that I would never go to the gym again – if it was about the discount and the credit all those years, what value would I put on it if it’s free no matter whether I go or not.

Surprise surprise.  I’m still going to the gym, but I’m going MORE now.  Pretty much every other day.  Still mostly the bike and book show, but occasionally some laps. I keep think I should try the spin class but then I couldn’t read.

So why do I value it more NOW when it’s free than when I was paying for it? 

2024, Family, Mysteries, Poems

Pilgrimage

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“Alexa please tell me the meaning of ‘pellegrinaggio’.”

I was reading a book of poetry by Barbara Kingsolver (How to Fly in Ten Thousand Easy Lessons) and came across “pellegrinaggio” as the title to the first poem in a section on a trip she made with family members to Italy.

Pellegrinaggio

At the end of the long-bowling alley lane
of a transatlantic flight, we crash and topple
like pins in the back of a Roman taxi.
split or spare, hard to say what we are but
family, piled across one another: husband
and wife, our two daughters, his mother
Giovanna who has waited eight years
to see what she’s made of.

Her parents, flung out from here like messages
in bottles, washed up on a new shore and grew
together. Grew celery for the Americans. Grew this
daughter who walked to school, sewed a new
cut of skirt, and became the small interpreter
for a family. They took her at her word but stamped
a map called home on a life she believed would end
before she could ever come here to find it.

What other gift could we give her? But now our taxi
crawls like a green bottlefly through the ear canals
of a city, it is half-past something I can’t stand
one more minute of, and I wonder what we were
thinking. We all might die before we find a place
to lie in this bed we’ve made for her. Beside me
she sits upright, mast of our log-pile ship in this bottle.
Made of everything that has brought us this far.

Alexa coughed up a very thorough definition (pilgrimage) and then surprisingly asked me if the information she had given me was useful.  I said “Yes, thank you.”  YA came into my doorway and asked me why I do that.  I wasn’t sure what she was referring to so she said “why do you always say please and thank you when you’re asking Alexa something?  You know it’s not actually a person?”

I DO know that Alexa isn’t a person. However she does represent the work of a lot of people and is certainly programmed to sound like a person.  I’m not sure when I started saying please, thank you and no thank you when interacting with Alexa.   In this world that seems increasingly abrasive and mean, it just feels nice to me to be polite, even if I’m the only one if affects.

And to my credit I actually rarely say thank you – only if she is waiting for an answer, such as her wishing to know how her definition of pellegrinaggio played out.

Do you have any little quirks/habits that others give you grief for?