Grandmas Goulash

She’d had no fear of death, envisioning a stairway that led straight to heaven. She had never anticipated the “No Entry” sign. St. Peter hid behind a cloud, chuckling at the stunned faces. Surely one of them would remember that it was April 1st. A horse lover enjoyed a 5-star meal, then died from shock after learning it was a foliate. Didn’t get my atrocious misuse of this week’s word? Try reading it out loud. Succinctly Yours offers a weekly photo and word as inspiration for your microfiction. How low can you go? Choose the 140 character or 140 word option. This week’s word was   foliate .  

A new laptop is in our future and it can’t happen soon enough. Muffin’s computer still works, but it is just too slow to handle many newer apps. Last year, she had the computer supplied by K12, but that had to be returned at the end of the school year. So we have engaged in a game of musical laptops. Calico and I have ours in the morning, but after Muffin awakes, she hovers over Calico until she relinquishes hers. Calico takes over my laptop as soon as I start my afternoon nap. I’ll get it back sometime in the evening, usually when Calico cooks supper. Calico will retrieve her laptop from Muffin, who hovers until she can reclaim it again. When she’s just playing games, we can let her pout for a bit, but now that school has started, she does need a fair amount of computer time. I don’t mind sharing my laptop, but some of the consequences are a bit annoying. Passwords are at the top of the list. Yahoo mail will not save my login information now, although it happily presents Calico’s...

This week held good news and bad news for Miss Muffin. The bad news? School began on Monday. Just when we had begun to wrap our minds around an August starting date, they change it to July. Although our county is earlier than most, many other Tennessee counties will be joining the trend next week. The good news? Fifth graders here attend the middle school. That promotion is a year earlier than expected and one that Muffin happily embraces. No matter that her classroom is still our home. It’s the title that counts! Homeschooling has held some surprises for me. One is the impact that public school schedules still have. While it’s nice to have flexibility in scheduling, no homeschooler wants to be hitting the books while the other kids are having a vacation. Another is the amount of preparation required. I’m not sure why this surprised me, since I know a number of teachers who spend much of the summer vacations preparing lesson plans. While much of this summer has been devoted to house...

Men made while it was sleeting, soon learned their lives were fleeting. He gloated as one washed by, until his power cord started to fry.   He thought he’d been placed on a pedestal. Then he learned it was the gathering point for the cleanup crew.   At some juncture,  Succinctly Yours  participants realized that Grandma had lost her grip on reality. Snowmen in July?   Need to cool off? Watch this for a minute or two. Succinctly Yours offers a weekly photo and word as inspiration for your microfiction. How low can you go? Choose the 140 character or 140 word option. This week’s word was  juncture .

What bothers you most about aging? In my late twenties, I dreaded the thought of turning thirty. It seemed that fateful day would mark the end of my youth. I spent time plucking grey hairs out of my head and looking for wrinkles. By the time I approached forty, I laughed at that foolishness. My twenties had begun with the need to be a bit rebellious, but most of it was spent in pursuit of traditionally accepted goals. By the time my thirties ended, I had learned to accept and appreciate myself. I gave up worrying about age and pursued a life that reflected my interests and personality. When I received a bouquet of black balloons for my fortieth birthday, I just laughed. Life wasn’t over; it had just started getting interesting. Ironically, the signs of aging began appearing after I had ceased looking for them. It wasn’t just grey hairs and wrinkles. In fact, I saw far less of those. As the print in books became increasingly smaller, I began to suspect that this was not coincid...

It had looked so easy. Fuzz decided to review a few more episodes of Star Trek before attempting another mind meld.   It might have been faster and cheaper than laser eye surgery, but the only thing Puff saw clearly was a future with a seeing eye dog.   “My love for you is torrid, but what’s that on your forehead?” “I think it’s plain to see, that there ain’t no bugs on me.”   The last story brought immediate thoughts of the Advantik commercial. When I searched for it, I was surprised to learn that the song didn’t originate with the commercial. I’m not sure how far back it goes, but I did find this  1928 recording  of the song. Succinctly Yours offers a weekly photo and word as inspiration for your microfiction. How low can you go? Choose the 140 character or 140 word option. This week’s word was  torrid .

After our moving hiatus, it really felt good to get back to blogging activities. The separation isn’t a bad thing, since it lets me look at my blog with fresh eyes. I don’t hate my  landing page design , but the urge for a change has been growing over the last few months. It occurred to me that absence might make the heart grow fonder, but it has only whet my appetite for change. It’s unlikely that anything will change in the near future and the change will only be cosmetic. I plan to extend the design to my drab Facebook page, which suffers from a lot of neglect. I’ve noticed that many bloggers have very active Facebook pages with hundreds, if not thousands, of friends. I’m envious, but recognize that my own count is a reflection of my limited time investment. Calico invested time on her Facebook header and I love the results. It reflects her interests and no one would be surprised to see a certain 10 year old prominently featured! If it were just Facebook, I’d probably ...

Every move I’ve ever made has featured at least one lost item. Even with most of our belongings unpacked, we have yet to find our shower spray nozzle. Thankfully, that isn’t hard to replace. A couple pieces of hardware for Muffin’s loft bed were a bit more problematic. Calico had to order replacements from the bed’s manufacturer and Muffin had to sleep on her air mattress on the floor of her bedroom. The worst loss occurred after the move, when Muffin’s kitten disappeared. No one had seen him since the cable guy’s visit that morning and after a thorough search of the house, the outside search began. Calls were made to the animal shelter and Calico dug out the file that had the kitten’s microchip information, so she could update it with our new address and phone.  Fourteen hours later, long after nightfall, Calico prepared to go search outside for him again. Imagine our surprise, when kitten saunters out of Muffin’s bedroom and stops in the hall for a good stretch. We st...

Miss Muffin has waited, not always patiently, for the arrival of her 10th birthday. We had eaten out twice in the previous week, a dramatic break from our usual eat-at-home style, so we decided on a home celebration for her day. Ribs, a birthday girl favorite, made their appearance and later a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and toffee ice cream. Miss Muffin loves to help make cakes, even her own. Calico selected my grandmother’s favorite dark chocolate cake recipe and it brought back memories of the time I taught her to make it. It’s an awesome cake and a tradition worth passing on. It was colorfully decorated and topped with large candles that proclaimed  10 . And did the birthday girl get gifts? Of course! They centered around several types of peel-and-stick packs for her new bedroom. She abhors the white walls that fill our new home, so these, ranging from large flowers to assorted-sized dots and colorful letters, will let her transform her bedroom into a rainbow-...

As discussed in previous posts, our family did a great job of downsizing our possessions in preparation for our move. We even had to cut a bit more, when, despite Calico’s careful loading, the truck proved a bit too small to hold everything. In truth, there is very little that we’ve missed. Even disposing of the items proved to be far easier than in the past. We used to donate items to various organizations that had thrift shops. That has become increasingly difficult. Some don’t pick up items, while others require a pickup to be scheduled weeks in advance. Even worse are those that want descriptions of items that are being donated. This means that we have to have a place to store our unwanted items until pickup, organize them into specific categories and create an inventory list for the agency. It doesn’t help with battered furniture or nonworking appliances, which, understandably, they aren’t interested in. Some years back, our trash disposal service would remove anything t...

The last few weeks seem as blurred as print without my reading glasses. Although we are not completely unpacked, we have located the basics and our lives are starting to return to their normal rhythm. I’ll be starting my blogging return with a few posts related to our relocation. Today’s post is dedicated to my daughter. It is said that good things come in small packages. Strength, however, is usually equated with the opposite side of the size spectrum. At just a couple inches over five feet, Calico does not evoke thoughts of Herculean strength. A few pounds, added in her forties, increase the impression of softness. Only those, who have seen her in action, realize just how deceptive that appearance is. We were sorely disappointed by the performance of the movers, who loaded the truck for our move from Georgia. This time, Calico decided to load the truck herself. She reasoned that she could do a better job, not to mention saving us a few hundred dollars. Even I, who have wit...