Tag Archives: Featured

Science, Technology, Uncategorized

Elusive Darkness

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Today’s post comes from Barbara in Rivertown

Just as “sound pollution” makes it difficult in most of our country to find a place where there is complete quiet, “light pollution” means it’s difficult to find a place that is totally dark. You may have seen a map like this of the United States, showing our light-polluted spaces. Some of the ramifications in my life:

– The only time I have really seen the Milky Way was on a trip to Utah in 1995.

– I’ve learned to use an eyeshade in the times of more daylight, allowing me to sleep better. And when I get up in middle lf night, I don’t really need a night-light to find my way to the bathroom.

A dancer friend writes a couple of blog posts a month, and her November 28 post is about what she calls “holy darkness”.    I quote:

– “Darkness is the absence of light but it is not the absence of the Divine.”

– “Years ago friends told me about a lecture exploring how electric lights have completely changed our relationship to night and experience with darkness. Our conversation inspired us to experiment with fasting from electric lights for an entire night. We call it our holy darkness practice. We bring out candles and get very cozy. “

I hope to find a night soon, at this darkest time of year, when I can spend at least a couple of hours with just candle light, and experience what I can of darkness. How long I will last without my lamps, lighted screens, and phones I cannot say. I might read a book by candle light, or find someone to tell stories with. I will be sure to do this AFTER supper… I don’t feel like cooking over a candle flame.

What would you do with an evening of “total” darkness, except for candle light?

Family, holidays, Kids, Stories, Uncategorized

Christmas Fun

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Today’s post comes from  Crystalbay.

I always look for inexpensive gifts for all my grand kids, then buy 12 of them. Last year, I found little attachments for iPhones to enhance the quality of pix. Only $10 each. This year, I found something called, “Flashing Disco Ball”. This amazed me on video tape. It’s a golf ball sized ball with LED lights inside it and has two sets of helicopter-like rotor blades. It senses any object within six inches, so just putting your hand or your foot within this distance, the ball rises over and over and over.

I thought I’d try using it to make sure that it even worked as advertised, then turned it on. Boy, did it ever work. The damn thing flew all over the room every time my palm approached it!! YEAH!! A great gift!! Then, things turned ugly as I decided to bring it in for a landing. I moved all over the room trying to retrieve it but each effort just sent it off in a different direction. It’d gone up and wouldn’t come down. I tried sneaking up on it with the intention of grabbing it. I did this with reservations, thinking either I’d break the rotors, or the rotors would slice my fingers. Again, it darted away.

By this time, I was desperate to bring it home, so I grabbed a broom to just whack it. It sensed the broom and made a beeline to the other corner of the room. Eventually, it just disappeared on the floor. I’ve yet to find it. It later occurred to me that if I’d just refrained from trying to catch it and it had no more resistance to something 6″ away from it, it would’ve come down on its own!

Now then, I plan to charge up all 12 (minus the one I can’t find) so that all of them can fill Steve’s living room at one time. Just try to imagine that!

What are some of your more memorable holiday gifts?

Family, Fifty Words, History, Technology, Travel

A Good Soak

56 Comments

I was just thinking the other day how sad it is that our ancestors went thousands and thousands of years without the joy of a long hot shower.

If you went back in time, what wouldn’t you want to do without?

Family, History, holidays, Stories

A Simple Misunderstanding

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I have a dear friend at work who has the most delightfully quirky elderly relatives.  They are, by and large, aunts and uncles in their 80’s and 90’s, all who speak in thick, German-Hungarian accents with very local idioms.  My friend, I will call her Donna, can relate their conversations with great accuracy, even down to the accent. She recently had two priceless conversations.

The first was with an uncle who told her “Sweetie, I have to tell you, I’m not doing so good”.  He apparently had some sort of “spell” and totaled his car after running into three others after going into reverse when he meant to go forward.  He didn’t go to the doctor since he had just been there two weeks before.  He then told Donna “Don’t be surprised if you get a call one of these days to tell you that I woke up dead”.  ” Waking up dead” happens a lot out here.  It is a one of my favorite phrases.

The other conversation was equally serious. Donna sent out a short, humorous Christmas letter this year letting people know that her oldest son and his wife had another child. Donna put photos of the two grandchildren on the page, and ended her letter with “I never thought I would be sleeping with a grandpa!” referring, of course to her husband.

Donna got a phone call from a very elderly aunt and uncle, both in their 90’s, after she sent out the letter.

Her aunt told her “We got that Christmas letter, then. That was pretty dirty. You shouldn’t talk like that. We prayed for you.”

Donna realized that her aunt and uncle missed entirely the news that she and her husband were grandparents, and thought she was bragging about sexual exploits. She patiently told them about the new grandchildren and that she was referring to her husband in the last sentence.  She told them, “You know,  I’m not one of them runaround girls “,  another lovely local phrase.  Her uncle then said:

“That is pretty funny!  Oh!! You!!” accompanied by a quick, sharp, wave of the hand to emphasize the silliness and loving exasperation he felt.   As Donna always says, you can’t make this stuff up.

When have you been misunderstood?

 

 

 

Family, Food, History, Kids, Uncategorized

Pinkelwurst und Grunkohl

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Our son phoned the other day to ask if I had a recipe for pinkelwurst.  Pinkel is a sausage especially popular in northwest Germany where my family comes from. It consists mainly of bacon, pork, beef suet, oats or barley, onions , and other spices.  It is eaten with kale, or grunkohl.  People in Germany take long winter walks called “Grunkohlfahrt” or Kale walks, and then return home to pinkel, kale, and schnapps.  I have never eaten it, nor do I think I will ever make it. I certainly don’t have a recipe for it.  I don’t care much for kale.  Son said it was ok, he found a recipe and translated it from the German. He has a friend who is a butcher, and they have plans for making it.  He then reminded me that I had the job of assembling the crib for their child, due in April, when I visit them over Christmas.

Daughter then texted me, asking if I could send her the blueberry coffee cake recipe. I found it and sent it. Then she asked me if I could make just one more kind of cookie to send her in the care package I had promised her, since she isn’t coming home for Christmas. They were chocolate mint cookies. I said I would if I could find the ingredients. I found them and made the cookies last night. All the care packages went out in Mondays’ UPS shipment.

My paternal grandmother always phoned my dad when she needed things fixed around her farm or house, even though my uncle lived a mile up the road from her.  Dad always went to help her, even though she always bragged about how well his brother was doing, and never had anything good to say about my dad.  Grandma never forgave Dad for his untimely conception before she and Grandpa were married.  In her mind,  Dad could never do anything as well as his brother, but she depended on him all the same.

I find it interesting how family members depend on one another. We really do need each other, but oh, the stress of it sometimes.  I worry that my children are far too dependent on me.  Pinkelwurst?  Really? Why assume I know all there is to know?  What will you do when I don’t make cookies anymore?  Why did Grandma criticize yet demand?  Oh, these families!

What does (or did)  your family depend on you for?

What do (or did) you depend on your family for?

 

 

pets, Stories, Uncategorized

Compassion

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Today’s post comes from tim.

i have been raising fish for about 20 years.

i don’t know a lot but i know what i know. cichlids are my favorite because they are colorful and tend to be more on the active side rather than the docile and the tank thus has movement

people complain about koy being dirty fish but i really like them my koi tank has only two koy left in it along with 3 tetra’s. it is a boring tank. it at its peak this go round had 5 koy and 6 tetras and the action was pretty good

when you have cichlids you need to have have male only and they need to be one per species or the alpha hormones kick in and fighting to the death is guaranteed.

last week i had a koi acting odd and then he went and lid down on his side in the back of the tank and breathed with great difficulty and couldn’t get his balance to swim. the other big koy (the sick one was the biggest and the leader ) went down and offered comfort and never left the sick ones side. instead of dying the next day as i expected the others brought him food and hovered right above his head for the week and the healthy fish even went so far as to rub its own scales off in a nervous reaction to losing his friend.

my dogs are unbelievable companions. they follow me around and offer nothing but love. never anger or frustration. on occasion they let me know they need a little more but usually they are appreciative and loving in the best ways they know how.

people do have natures like cichlids koi or mutts, is it genetic or environmental? a little of both. i believe some breeds of dogs are good natured and some aggressive to a fault. fish the same way, no one has a problem making broad generalizations about animal breeds.but with people it is stereotyping. bob newhardt when asked by johnny carson what was his nationality said he was a german irish…. he said i am a meticulous drunk.

got any good generalizations that can be expressed in light bulb joke form?

how many irshmen di=oes it take to change a lightbulb? none they just lay down and let the room spin

Media, The Future, Uncategorized

So, What Now?

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I have mulled over this topic  for the past couple of weeks,  as one man (and  few women) after another has lost his job, credibility, and respect with accusations and admissions of sexual harassment and assault.  My first thought through all this has been “They are really lucky I am not their mother!!!!”

My husband used to assess low and moderate risk convicted sex offenders, usually those who had committed crimes against children,  for their suitability for treatment. We know from research that the sooner those folks are integrated back in the community and have jobs and stability,  along with ongoing therapy and careful monitoring by their probation officers, the less likely they are to re-offend.

What do we do now with the Al Frankens, Roy Moores,  and John Conyers  of this country?  How do we heal, and promote inclusivity for all our citizens? I wonder if the model of Truth and Reconciliation, used in South Africa after the end of Apartheid has relevance here.  I believe that in that circumstance people admitted their wrong doing, faced their victims, and engaged in meaningful acknowledgement of the damage their actions had caused. Then they ceased engaging in the behavior that was so harmful and wrong.  People could move ahead.

So, what do you think we should do now?

Fifty Words, Food, Travel

Grocery Shopping

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Husband and I are on the road today, driving to Newell, SD to get two lambs from the butcher shop.  It is five hours round trip.  It is a long way to go for groceries, but I really need the day off. and will enjoy the drive.

What is the farthest you ever traveled to buy something?

holidays, Music, Songs, Uncategorized

Planning the Pageant

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I always look forward to the MPR airing of the Festival of Nine Lessons  Carols from Kings College in Cambridge, England.   I have been in the chapel at Kings on a couple of occasions and sat in the choir stalls next the choir during an Evensong service.  This Sunday, our church is having its second annual performance of  Lessons and Carols, and I am really excited because I get to plan it.

Our bell choir director asked me to finalize the program for the service again this year.  She is more interested in the music than the lessons, and you have to take both into consideration when you plan the service.  The hymns and musical numbers need to reflect the meaning of the lessons. For example, the first lesson is about the Adam and Eve story, and the music that follows needs to reflect the Fall.  Hence, the musical number is will be that of the choir singing Lost in the Night, a mournful and serious (but kind of hopeful) Finnish Christmas carol.  The Kings service always starts out with a lone boy soprano singing the first verse, acapella, of Once in Royal David’s City.  We don’t have any boy sopranos, but we have a female high school Junior who has a pure and high voice and who is willing to give it a try.  Local people from other denominations will read the lessons, and our bell choir and vocal choir will perform songs.

Our church was founded by German immigrants, and is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).  I am of German ancestry, but most of my relatives were members of the  Missouri Synod Lutheran Church.  For reasons too complicated to go into now, I was raised in a Norwegian Lutheran Church.  I adore Scandinavian hymns, and planning our Lessons and Carols gave me complete control over the hymns that the congregation will sing at the service.  I made a point of finding as many appropriate Scandinavian hymns as I could. These people need to be educated.

We will sing Swedish,  Norwegian, and Danish Christmas carols, ones I  loved as a child, but none of which we sing regularly in our church. Some include:

Bright and Glorious is the Sky (In Danish, De Jlig Er Den Himmel Bla)

Rejoice, Rejoice, Believers (In Swedish Haf Trones Lamp Fardig)

Savior of the Nations, Come (A German hymn but popular in Norway)

I suppose this is sort of self-serving, but it is fun, and no one has complained yet.

What pageantry have you been a part of?  What are your  favorite carols?

 

 

Family, Food, holidays, Stories

Cookie Exchange

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My mother wasn’t a big cook and except for the holidays, she wasn’t much of a baker either. On the holidays however she pulled out all the stops. We made many kinds of cookies and then they were used as gifts for our teachers, the minister, the postman and relatives. This is a tradition that I’ve continued in my life. I do nice trays for my milkman, my hardware store and my library in addition to having cookies all through the season.  If you invite me over during December, I show up with a plate of assorted goodies.

About 10 years ago my boss asked me if I knew anything about cookie exchanges as she thought it would be a nice “morale booster” at the office. I didn’t know a thing but thanks to the magic of the internet I because knowledgeable over night! Despite having 15 kinds of cookies on my front porch (it’s cold out there) I now organize the office cookie exchange every year.

Then this year a good friend of mine decided to do a cookie exchange and asked if I were interested. I enjoy her parties and know a lot of the same people she knows so I said “Sure.”  So now I have two cookies exchanges on the calendar despite a porchful of holiday treats.

There were quite a few of us today. We drew numbers, went around the room and told the “story” of our cookies and then split into groups and took 2 dozen cookies in each of three rounds.  A little different protocol than the classical exchange but pretty good for the big number of folks who were there.   We also had beverages and other appetizers to keep us going.  The stories were hilarious and the company fabulous.

Guess I’m taking cookies to the office tomorrow.

What holiday cookie would you take to a cookie exchange?