Snapshot Sunday #22

 

For the record, I am not a fan of winter.  Once Christmas is done, the cold weather months hold no appeal for me.  At least the sun came out today, but it was still cold.  Of course, I know there are plenty of you who live where it’s a lot colder than it is here.  The only thing I can say about that, is that if I were you, I’d move.

With that being said, let’s see what pictures we have this week.  Prompts, as always, provided by Chantelle at Fat Mum Slim.  Do drop by and join in the photo a day challenge and have yourself some fun.

 

  Prompt:  Mine.  If it’s in this house and has a Starfleet emblem on it, most certainly it belongs to me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Street.  Okay, another cheat rolling into the list here.  I don’t think I left my house this day, not even to set foot outside the home to look at my very own street.  So, here’s an earlier picture of Beal St., the street of my childhood home.

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Something beginning with ‘T’.  I’m in the market for a treadmill, maybe this one, though it’s not exactly the one I want.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Paper.  The paper delivery slip left in my mailbox when I wasn’t home to receive a package, sent to me from my friend in Hungary.  Because I’ve been doing a whole bunch of nothing lately, I haven’t even made it to the post office yet to pick it up.  That’s on tomorrow’s itinerary. 

 

  Prompt:  One O’clock.  This is 1:00am, the remnants of my midnight snack.  Yum.

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Water.  Morning shower.

 

 

 

  Prompt:  Surprise.  So, I’ve got this old denim shirt that I treat pretty badly.  It spends most of its life in my car, so I can drag it inside when I need a light cover-up to stay warm (because I’m always cold).  Anyway, I used to take it to work all the time, carried it into my classrooms all last semester, and for the past couple of weeks, I’ve been wearing it around the house, because it’s been stinkin’ cold.  The point of all that?  The other day, I realized it was torn.  Not at the seam, where maybe someone with my limited domestic skills might could repair it, but ripped right in the middle of the sleeve.  Dang it.  So, Brian was at the store and got me a new one.  It’s even got a tiny amount of quilting for extra warmth.  Nifty.

 

And that’s a wrap on this week’s pictures.  I’m still working on getting some decent bird pictures; maybe I’ll have some to share next week.  It’s an ongoing challenge, so wish me luck.

Do you have a favorite photographic subject?

 

Six Word Drizzle

 

 

Cold, dreary, wet, yucky, blah day.

 

Tell the story of your day in six words; link up with Cate at Six Word Saturday.

Five Written Questions

 

So here we are, another Friday come and almost gone.  This day has slipped away from me, mostly sleeping.  I don’t know why I was so tired today (and cold all day, which always makes me need to snuggle up and sleep, even if I’m not tired), but I was.  Slept late, took a nap, and could almost certainly go to bed right now and sleep another twelve hours or so.  All I know is I better not be getting sick again.

Then we had a heat pump guy out here to give us an estimate on a new system; took him a really long two and a half hours.  I think I told you that we’ve been having issues with the system, right?  Well, it’s reached the point where it seems like replacement is the best option, but that doesn’t necessarily make it a good option.  The whole process is so confusing; we’re about clueless to the ins and outs of the heat pump business, and—of course—everybody has perfectly logical sounding explanations about why their spiel is the best and the guy who just left is full of crap.  Brian says we either just need to buy some extra blankets and sweatshirts, or sell the house and move somewhere we won’t need heat.  Either choice is beginning to look pretty attractive.  Or at least these guys ought to just quote me a price over the phone and not wear me down.

But, enough of that.  We’ll keep reading up and make some sort of decision, so for now let’s get to this week’s questions.

 

1. Flu mist? Flu shot? Or take your chances?

I’m not typically much of a chance-taker, but in this case, I guess I’m guilty.  I’ve never had a flu shot, primarily out of fear.  I know they don’t use live viruses in the injections these days, but I’ve known an awful lot of people who either became sick after receiving the injection or had bad reactions at the injection site.  Me, I don’t seem to have a very strong immune system, so I’m not too keen on exposing myself to extra risk via a medicine that might make me sick.  But, poor immunity or not, I’ve only had the flu once in my entire life, so I’m doing okay so far, though Brian tells me every year my luck is probably running out. 

2. Do your kids have iPads? What are some good educational apps? Price?

Well, my kid’s not really a kid, so we’re not in the market for educational apps.  But, no; no iPads here, and trust me, the first one in the household will belong to me, not Billy.

3. What are your favorite boy/girl baby names?

First, let me say that my non-favorites are “weirdo” names.  I’m pretty traditional, and I don’t think kids ought to be named after weather patterns, geographical formations, etc.  Maybe it’s because my name, while certainly not unusual, has an unusual spelling, and I know what a hassle that is.  Kids have enough to deal with growing up without strange names to go along with everything else.  Having said that . . . for boys, it should be no surprise that I’m fond of William/Bill, since that’s what I named my own kid.  I also really like James and Matthew.  It’s harder for girls for some reason; I don’t think I have any names that I have a real strong affinity for.  In fact, when I was pregnant, my mom was convinced I was going to have a girl, and I was a little terrified, because I could not pick out a name.

4. If an apple a day keeps the doctor away, which apple do you choose to eat? (red/green, gala, red delicious...)

Red delicious all the way.  I’m sure I’ve mentioned that I don’t branch out far in my food choices, the more normal the better.

5. What is your favorite place to escape to for peace & quiet, to think? Why?

Locally speaking?  If the weather’s nice, a walk through my neighborhood, or even just sitting on my deck watching the bird feeder can usually do the trick.  I’ve also been known to go to Sonic and just sit in my car for a really long time, sipping a Coke with their scrumptious ice.  If I could actually travel to the escape, it would definitely be a beach somewhere, preferably without too many people.  Sea Ranch, California comes to mind.

And that wraps it up for this week, but I did want to mention one thing: for the past couple of weeks on 5QF, Mama M has been talking about answering the questions in the form of a vlog, mostly at the urging of one of her friends.  She finally bit the bullet this week and did the vid, but I wouldn’t look for that anytime soon around here.  I like to write sitting on my couch, often wrapped up in my Snuggie, with my hair a mess, and maybe even in my pajamas; in other words, my appearance is not usually fit for public consumption.  So, at least for the time being, it’s still the printed word for me.

And, as always, I invite you to drop over to visit My Little Life and play along, or answer the questions in comments here.  But if you join in on your blog, do me a favor and leave a comment letting me know, would you? 

Wishing you all a good weekend.

Simple Rules

 

  I think I probably annoyed my Facebook friends today.  But in my defense, it’s because a lot of them have been annoying me lately.  It’s bad enough that when it comes to most social issues (you know, of the type you find frequently on social media) I am in the small minority of opinion.  This means that I am frequently annoyed by the things my friends post.  It also often leaves me wondering just how it is we came to be friends in the first place.  Of course, many of them aren’t really honest-to-goodness friends; they’re co-workers, or people I’ve met somewhere along the way, or even people I’ve never even met but have become friendly with in the cyber world.  And I don’t mean that in sort of demeaning way; some of my best friendships have originated in the cyber world; my very best friendship began as a co-worker relationship.  Friends can be found anywhere, and I think life is better with lots of them, even if many of them are sort-of friends.  But, that’s how it is that my newsfeed ends up cluttered with a lot of status updates that annoy me.

So, today, I addressed a couple of them.  To start, I have recently been bothered by a rash of people posting a standardized message on how to change some particular settings to prevent strangers from seeing restricted online activity.  Of course, everyone who posts this is so sincere and well-meaning, even offering to make the same changes for any of their friends with similar concerns.  Never mind that the instructions don’t accomplish the stated goal, much less that they actually have the power to solve most of their privacy concerns themselves, without such a post, if only they would take the time to give it a little thought.  I posted a pretty long status update about that when I saw one too many friends posting the dreaded message. 

Then, later on, I posted my “rules” for deciding whether or not I would “like”, “share”, or “copy/paste” a particular status update.  (Spoiler alert:  I don’t do it much.)  I’ll share them with you here:

1. I must agree with your message. Otherwise, no amount of guilt or shame will cause me to pass it on.
2. If it's mean spirited, closed-minded, or hateful, don't expect me to share, even if it's supposed to be funny. (See rule 1.)
3. Proper spelling/grammar is a must. I might forgive the occasional typo or missing comma, but if you (or whoever you are quoting) has misused your/you're, they're/their/there, too/two/to, or its/it's, I likely won't be sharing it.
4. If it's essentially the modern version of a chain-letter--whether promising good for sharing or threatening ill for ignoring--I'm going to have to take my chances on the ill.
5. About rule 1 and "guilt or shame": Messages that contain words like "95% won't repost", "I'm counting on true friends to do this", or--my personal favorite-- "like if you love Jesus, keep scrolling if you don't", all of these messages will be summarily ignored. It's not that I'm heartless, or a heathen, it's that I have an aversion to manipulation in all its forms.

And, I later amended to add a final thought, that you must check your facts before posting amazing stories to share with the world; Google is your friend.

I really wasn’t trying to be mean, or pompous, though I think it may have come across that way; I was just venting a little bit—hoping that maybe at least one or two of the “guilty” ones would recognize the error of their ways.

Then it occurred to me that I feel similarly about the blogosphere, and I look for many of the same things:  fair-mindedness, interesting topics free of bigger-than-life promises or non-stop sales pitches, posts that leave readers with a positive feeling rather than making them feel bad about themselves, and authors who have a good grasp of the fundamentals of the English language.  And just as I follow my own rules on Facebook, I also try to follow them here.  We’re all members of this gigantic, world-wide society, and I just hope we all do our own little parts to make it a better place.

What rules do you have for your social media?

Z is for Zanzibar

 

I suppose, if I were more of the intellectual type, I’d tell you a little bit about the country-ish* place located in Africa.  (*Technically, Zanzibar is part of Tanzania, but they’ve got some partial autonomy.)  It looks like a lovely place, and it seems Freddie Mercury was born there.  Interesting. 

But, if you’ve been around here much, you probably don’t expect a geography/anthropology lesson, and today is not the day I’m going to break form.  No, instead, I’m going to tell you a little bit about a nifty little song of the same name.

“Zanzibar” is a catchy tune off of Billy Joel’s 1978 album, 52nd Street.  I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but Joel most likely holds the title of My Favorite Musician Ever.  I mean, if you’re like me, at any given time there’s someone who’s tops on your playlist, and if someone says, “hey, who’s your favorite singer?”, you might rattle off the name of whoever you’re listening to non-stop at the moment.  But even so, for most of us, there’s someone who’s always on our playlist, someone that we always return to, year after year, who never grows old.  For me, that someone is Billy Joel.

Anyway, “Zanzibar” is an album cut, but I’ve never entirely understood the decision making process in these things.  There are lots of songs I listen to that I think would’ve been hit singles, but they never got released.  Or maybe it’s that I think they should’ve been hit singles, so someone should give them the chance.  I don’t know.  What I do know is that “Zanzibar” is a lively song, with some nice piano work (as you’d expect from Billy), and some less common trumpet playing, that just really works.  It sounds like it ought to be playing in some smoky jazz dive, which is just about exactly what the song is about.  It’s also got some vibraphone and marimba going on, giving it an even more distinct sound than much of Billy Joel’s trademark keyboarding, and making it sound like maybe it could be honoring the African island after all.  And, it’s got some fun lyrics, mixing sports and sex all together with some typical youthful exuberance.  What’s not to like?  But, even with all that, it never got its chance at the fame of radio play, and I think that’s a shame.  Listen here and decide for yourself. 

Over the years, I’ve heard some fans trying to figure out just where the mythical club Zanzibar was located, but none of the ideas I’ve heard floated ever seem to pan out.  There was a disco in New Jersey by that name, but it didn’t open until almost a year after the album debuted, and besides, it was a disco.  A popular opinion seems to be Zanzibar on the Waterfront in Washington, DC, but, again, not in existence at the time of the song’s writing.  And, there used to be a club in Hell’s Kitchen called Zanzibar, which would seem a likely choice, except that I don’t think it was open back in the 70s, either, and if you browse their website (still running, though it seems the place has been closed for a couple of years), it just doesn’t look right.  Pretty sure that’s not the place Billy was singing about.  So, I’m going to go out on a limb and say the place didn’t really exist, at least not by that name.  Given some of the interviews I’ve heard with Joel, and his descriptions of some of the places he played as he was coming up, I’m pretty sure the club was real, even if it was called something else. 

So, that’s a look at the musical version of Zanzibar, one of my favorite non-singles from Billy Joel.  As an aside, there’s another on the same album, “Stiletto”; that’s also pretty darn good.  Really, the whole album is pretty good.  (Not as good as The Stranger, of course, but what is?)  If you’ve never heard it, you ought to do yourself a favor and change that. 

And, in case you’re video-inclined, here’s a live version of Zanzibar.  I didn’t select this one because of its fine quality, but because the performance was more contemporary to the album than some of the others.

And, that, my friends, brings us to a close of ABC Wednesday, at least for me.  I want to thank the fine folks who keep things running over there for giving me something fun and interesting to do here for the past 26 weeks.  Everyone on the team is welcoming, and makes participants feel like they’re part of the group.  And special thanks to Roger, who’s been helming things this time around, and doing a very fine job of it.  They’re already gearing up for the next go-round to begin next week, so if you’re looking for a fun theme day for your blog, I’d encourage you to drop on by and join in. 

For myself, I’ll be taking a break for round 12, though I may drop by again for round 13, if it’s still going on.  (And I have no reason to think it won’t be, since they’ve been at it six years now!)  Next Wednesday will begin a new weekly theme here at Idle Chatter, Weight Loss Wednesday.  As you might guess, this will be a more personal undertaking, chronicling my ongoing struggle to get to a healthier, skinnier me.  I hope to see you around for that.

 

The King’s Birthday

 

Had he lived, today would have been Elvis Presley’s 77th birthday.  Am I the only one who has a hard time picturing him at 77?  Though I’ll admit to a certain fondness for the conspiracy folks who think his death was staged and that he’s living in some kind of peaceful seclusion, growing old while laughing at the world.  I can picture that easier than him still being the King of Rock and Roll as a septuagenarian.  I’ve written about Elvis before, but as this is Tube Day Tuesday, let’s visit his television history just a bit. 

Elvis had a few television specials, beginning with the one commonly known as The ‘68 Comeback Special, though its official name was simply Elvis.   I was five at the time of its release, so it seems unlikely to me that I have true memories of watching this program live, though it seems highly likely that I actually did, given that the King was always a big part of our household.  But I have seen it, and even now, it’s hard for me to think of it as a “comeback”, because he was never gone from my life.  Still, in reality, I know that his career was slowly dwindling at this time, and that this TV special played a big part in putting him back on the upswing, so I’m glad that his handlers and some television producer-types had the good sense to make it happen.

 

Image courtesy Wikipedia

Then, in 1973 came the concert special I actually do remember, Elvis: Aloha From Hawaii.   Basically, the special was designed as a publicity stunt to take advantage of the newish satellite television capability.  Broadcast live, it was marketed as a chance for the world to see a Presley concert—an opportunity many might not otherwise have.  But, while the concert took place in January, those of us here in the good ol’ USofA had to wait a few months for the television broadcast.  Apparently you didn’t counter-schedule against the Super Bowl, even back then.

The final television concert is actually composed of footage from Elvis’ final tour, Elvis in Concert.  Again, this is not one that I remember watching, though, again, it seems very likely that I did.  It was broadcast in the fall of 1977, only a couple of months after Elvis has passed away.  It seems sort of creepy and sensationalist, but I’m guessing we were tuned in.  But by all accounts, those final few concerts were nowhere close to the best Elvis had to offer, and—based on footage I’ve seen subsequently in various documentaries—not even as polished as he had been when we saw him perform, less than six months before his death.  I understand the network had already invested money in the special, and I’m guessing it brought in some decent ratings, but maybe respect for the legacy he left behind could’ve made them re-think using it.

Of course, Elvis had other television appearances in addition to his concert specials, including American Bandstand, The Steve Allen Show, and his much talked about appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show.   In the early days he was seen as incredibly raunchy and not quite appropriate for television, but there’s no denying he was always a popular guest. 

So, whether it was radio, movies, or television, Elvis Presley was destined to be a force in our culture.  It’s sad to think he’s been gone so long, and there are generations that have not been greatly exposed to his talent, and I feel lucky to have had him as part of the world I grew up in.  And, if those conspiracy theorists are correct, and he really is hiding away on an island somewhere, I wish him a very happy birthday.

Today’s Swirl

 

Today, just some odds and ends . . .

We’re having trouble with our heat pump.  Again.  I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but when the guy came out this evening, it probably marked at least the sixth time they’ve been out this season.  And, incidentally, we live in Oklahoma, not some place with crazy winter weather; we’ve only been running the heat for maybe three months.  I’m just about over it.

Image courtesy of posterize at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

On his way home from work tonight, Brian got pulled over.  The officer issued a citation for doing 50 in a 40 zone; Brian is insistent that he was maybe doing 42mph.  It’s kind of a bummer, since there’s no practical way to contest it.  I’ve heard of people finding information about radar guns being out of calibration, or officers not being properly trained, or what-have-you, and those sorts of things would most certainly make a nice defense for a speeding ticket, but I’m pretty sure the police figure most people won’t go to that kind of trouble.  And at least in this case, they’re correct.  And who’s going to spend money to involve a lawyer to avoid a $161 fine?  Again, not us.  (Yeah, $161; ridiculous, right?)   Brian is beyond annoyed, and it doesn’t help to point out that even two miles over the limit is technically still speeding and carries the same fine; no, that doesn’t help at all.  He’s feeling persecuted by the man. 

Finally unpacked the textbooks that have been sitting around in boxes for about a month.  Everything’s good with the order, but six classes makes for a bunch of books.  It was a little bit daunting. 

I got a 2x teleconverter today for my camera; I’m hoping to get some better bird pictures with it.  It was too dark today by the time I got it, so I’ll have to test it out tomorrow.  You lose some light with the doubler, so it’s definitely a trade-off, but I’m looking forward to seeing how it works out. 

Unexpectedly, I am not watching the National Championship game tonight.  Brian was outside with the heat pump repairman for most of the first half, then went to bed as soon as the half ended.  But, based on the score I did see, Notre Dame is getting whumped up on pretty badly.  Not a terribly big surprise, and Brian will be far from displeased if the whumping continues the entire game.

I’m chugging along with the Ultimate Blog Challenge; today marks the first week complete.  I am planning to post every day this year, not just this month, but this makes a nice way to kick off the new year.  And, I’m also back to daily workouts this year, including a plank challenge that started today.  As I may have mentioned in the past, I don’t really have a lot of strength, so even one plank a day will be a true challenge for me.  There’s a goal by the end of the month to be able to hold the plank for 2.5 minutes—definitely a challenge. 

And, lastly, when I downloaded the image for today’s post, do you know what the security challenge code was?  Hugger-mugger.  How apropos is that?

What’s going on in your world these days?