Category Archives: birthday

birthday, cleaning, monday

Football Monday

4 Comments

I was busy watching the Broncos game when it struck me that there was something I forgot ot do today – post my blog entry!

I spent much of yesterday being a house drudge. You know, vacuuming, washing, and cleaning. Finally got around to cleaning up the Son’s room so one can see the floor and close the closet doors. (Remember it was a month or more ago that we sold the bunk bed from the room in the garage sale.)

One of the things I had to do was wash a couple of quilts that had been on the bunk bed for a while. So I washed them first and then took advantage of the fact that the day was near 80 degrees (probably the only one for a week or more either side since there is a chance of snow again on Wednesday) and hung them outside to dry in the warm breeze.

As I was doing that, my mind drifted to the thought of how fortunate we have been to have all the handmade quilts throughout our life.  We have quilts from my grandmother and my mom, all of which we use in day to day living. For those of you gasping in horror at the idea of heirlooms like hand sewn quilts being in day to day use, I’ll just point out the many of them were given with the proviso that we use them precisely that way. The people who put the hours of labor and love into them weren’t doing it to create a burdensome thing that needed to be handled with kid gloves and stored away. They made them to be used and for us to remember them fondly each time we use them.

In any case, that led me to the thought that we may be the last generation to be so fortunate. The concept of creating goods of enduring value and usefulness for kith and kin seems to be fading with each succeeding generation. In our generation, the handmade quilts have given way to machine sewn quilts. In the Son’s generation, I suspect that even that will begin to fade. So my question to you is: what is replacing it? There must be something?

On a somewhat different note, Molly continues to function as furball extraordinary. Vacuuming the house yielded at least 2 gallons of Molly fur. It’s one of the reason we have a Hoover WindTunnel vacuum cleaner – one can simply dump the chamber full of fur and continue on. I suspect a standard bagging model would eat us out of house and home in bags with a dog like Molly. On the other hand, having a continuously shedding long haired dog means you get used to finding hair everywhere. The wearing of black clothes is particularly challenging. The other day as I was walking out of a meeting, one of the other attendees turned to me and asked if I had a white long haired dog. i said I did and inquired as to how she knew. She pointed out the hair around my cuffs where Molly rubbed on me as I left for the meeting. She thought it was funny since she used to have a similar dog with the same hair everywhere problem a few years ago.

Finally, it is mom’s birthday tomorrow and I know she reads this blog regularly. So this is an appropriate place to say:

Happy Birthday Mom
birthday, google maps, limerick, MIL

Saturday Rambling

8 Comments

Yesterday was my MIL’s birthday, which we celebrated tonight with the traditional cake and candles. I’d tell you how old she is, but a gentleman never discloses a lady’s age.

L and I went over to MIL’s house for the celebration and we spent the evening in conversation. I fixed a few things on her computer and then we played a new game we invented. I call the game “What does it look like now?” Basically, you go into Google Maps and put in addresses of places where you have lived in the past and then (if you are lucky and it exists) you chose “Street View” to look at what the place looks like now. So we looked at places in Minneapolis from MIL’s younger days, followed by places in California and Colorado, etc. Then we decided to visit the pyramids at Giza (along with the Sphinx) and the Taj Mahal. We ended our tour with a trip to the infamous artifact claimed by the insane to be Atlantis. Of course we also watched some videos associated with places and had a blast navigating by hand between several of the places. (You can tell we are an easily amused bunch.)

What started this foray around the world was a discussion about the number of times we had each been to Washington, D.C. and what we had seen while there. That led us question if the underground tram from the senate to the senate office building is still open to guests of the senators since 9/11. Shortly (and after about 13 intervening topics) that led us to question where exactly was Camp David? (How’s that for a wild careening ride down the old thought train?) That of course led to the old paper atlas and then on to Google Maps and then to all of the above.

It is amazing what a powerful tool a computer and the internet can be to keep a mind engaged and kill occupy a lot of time. For seniors living alone and not getting out much, it can serve as lifeline, communicator, amusement device, news source, etc. It can also serve as a source of reading material (with font sizings suitable to available visual acuity). Think of even 20 years ago when none of this was available and how cut off and disengaged from the world people could become. Those of us that spend our lives on computers often worry about the possibility of the computer leading to social isolation and a lack of people skills amidst users, but this is the other side of the same coin. The combo of computer and internet can make the world a much more social and engaging place, or it can be used to completely eliminate the normal human interactions. The choice and effect is yours to chose.

I’ll leave you with the limerick from my MIL apropos my limericks  in response to a Mama Kat challenge. The background here is that I often tell people that they’ll know I’m fed up with being mayor when they find me naked in front of the bar some Saturday night. She couldn’t resist twitting me about it.

The MIL’s Limerick

There is a mayor named Dan

Voted in by many a fan.

    But if he goes to a meeting nude

    We’ll think he’s very rude

And run away as fast as we can!

Goodnight!