Danish wisdom

To look
is to
learn,
if you
listen
carefully.

—PER ARNOLDI

okay, maybe just one look

I guess it wouldn't hurt to show you where I spend an awful lot of my time. I love this room because it's so bright and cheerful, and by swivelling my head just a few inches I get to look out at this park!

Hey, this wasn't so scary after all....

no place like home

"Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam, Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home." —JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

I seriously considered taking part in the virtual house tour arranged by BooMama. I really did. You were to have five photos of your house including the front door, the place where the magic happens (i.e., where you blog), your main living area, your kitchen, and an optional photo. Now I love open houses and house tours of any kind, and even peeking into lit windows on my nocturnal walks, so I was keenly anticipating participating.

I got stuck though at the very first photo. Front door. Hmmm, well, I don't have one. I rent my apartment, and being on the second floor of an old house, it only includes a back door at the bottom of the stairs. And an ugly grey steel door at that. Certainly not a door I even like looking at, never mind putting on display. So, I played with the idea of finding a photo of a door I liked on the Internet, but finally decided to post an old pic of my neighbour's front door instead. The one I can see out of my living room window and the one posted above.

I then took some pictures of the other required locations, uploaded them, and realized that I wasn't so sure I wanted them on my blog after all. My place is my sanctuary, and where I feel most at home (a cliché perhaps, but true), and like a territorial cat, I carefully guard who gets to enter the premises. And it's odd really, because I'll probably end up exposing more personal things about myself than my domestic habitat, but I worry that it could still feel like a potential invasion of privacy. Maybe later, and maybe one photo at a time (there's a shot of the bathroom in the previous entry), but for now I think I'd better pass.

But hey, make sure to check out the fabulous house tour and sneak a peek at the many places that WILL let you look inside!

every room should have a window

Just as every woman should have a room of her own (thanks Virginia), every room should have at least one window.

(Even a bathroom. No, especially a bathroom.) And plants. And books. And at least one cat. But not necessarily in that order.

humour: nature or nurture?

My family is in some ways, hugely, and appallingly (as many families are), dysfunctional. But one of the more positive traits that almost all of my immediate family members seem to share is a well developed, albeit quirky, sense of humour. Now is this something we were born with? Or something we learned, and then applied as a coping tool, or defence mechanism? No matter. I seem to have come by it honestly, as shown by the following e-mail sent to me by my eldest brother.

Names, by the way, have been changed to protect the guilty.

Folks:

The unbelievable has happened; Barbara's ('93) Aerostar and Kyle's ('93) Aerostar have produced a ('95) Aerostar.... (and you thought that 13 year olds were too young for sex (oops) and to produce an 11 year old.... too much)

The happy event was however, necessitated due to the fact that Kyle's Aerostar no longer passed the e-test and at 420,000 km retirement was imminent (some would say way past due....)

Our new addition to the family is now going through its nursing stages (e-test, safety, etc....) and hopes to be able to be a full addition in a month or less. In the meantime, we will wean and assist the soon-to-be retiree into its new lifestyle, as required by the MTO by September 2006. Jason [my nephew] is planning to give it one more trip (to Algonquin Park) in the middle of August.

Since neither parent ('93s) can figure out whether it's a girl (pink) or a boy (blue), they have (appropriately) chosen the colour green (you wonder....), a slightly darker green to distinguish it from its parents.

It has been requested (by the parents), to keep this a quiet affair (no party, no baby shower.... sorry), but when you're in the neighbourhood, come and have a look.

The new baby arrived with the following attributes:

187,800 km
air, cruise, power windows, power locks, power mirrors (all working)!
hitch
(very little) rust
very clean

Brgrds
Kyle

Snort.

a label I can live with

I'm a female INFJ (Sybil) Scanner (Water) Tiger Scorpio. Snort.

In case you're wondering, that description includes my Myers-Briggs personality type (introverted, intuitive, feeling, judging—NF's, by the way, are said to be the most spiritually philosophical of the four temperaments), my Scanner type (scanners love to learn a little bit about everything [which may be why I can't focus on any single one thing in this blog], with Sybil referring to having a number of select recurring interests) developed by the talented Barbara Sher, my Chinese animal sign (it seems appropriate that as a self-professed cat lover I would also be a Tiger, although the Water aspect makes me the calmest of the big cats), and your regular boring (although my particular sign is known to be quite, ahem, feisty) astrological sign. Oh, I'm also the last-born in my family, but the first-born female as there is a gap between the two sets of siblings. This may explain why I appear to have characteristics of both first-born and last-born in case you accept birth order theory. There. Have I forgotten anything? Double snort.

to clean or not to clean

Snort. As a person who just earned a bit of money today by cleaning someone else's house, I cannot of course agree with this entirely, no matter how amusing the pic. And even if I didn't make money cleaning, I still don't think I'd agree. A (relatively) clean house (or at least, one that's not too messy) simply makes me feel better. I don't know whether it's a matter of the outside reflecting the inside, i.e., order in my house correlates with a more organized inner life, or if I just feel more productive if I've at least vacuumed in the past two weeks.

Now most of what I've learned about cleaning I learned from my mom, as I suspect most of us have. And my mom has a reputation for being extremely clean. But here is where it gets interesting. People who walk into her nearly spotless house automatically assume two things: a) that she loves to clean, and b) that she spends hours doing so. Both assumptions, however, are categorically false. Mom dislikes to clean (but likes a clean house which presents a bit of a dilemma), and actually spends relatively very little time cleaning at all. Ah, now how is that possible? Well, the secrets of having a house look clean without having to spend too much time is what I'll be passing on in future entries.

But not now. 'Cause I've spent enough time fixing someone else's house today who didn't know the secrets. This, of course, suggests another option as well. If you don't want to "waste" time cleaning, hire a smarty-pants like me to do it for you!

why I quote

"I quote others only the better to express myself." —MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE

where did the week go?

Okay, I admit to deleting five of the list items that I didn't particularly like from the e-mail I received below, but thought I'd share the rest of them. The funny part though is that I can ALREADY relate to quite a few of them, and I'm not that old. Honestly. It also reminded me of the piece I wrote called You Know You've Been Unemployed Too Long When… which was pretty funny in my opinion, however unlikely it may seem given the topic. And at least one other person must have thought so too as they had copied part of it from my old website and put it on theirs a couple of years back. It was the first time someone had pilfered some of my writing (but they were nice enough to provide a link, which I can't do for the list below as it appeared in my inbox sans source), and frankly, I was quite flattered. Hmmm, maybe I'll resurrect it here sometime. So,

You Know You're Old When…

-- No one expects you to run into a burning building.
-- People call at 9 p.m. and ask, "Did I wake you?"
-- People no longer view you as a hypochondriac.
-- There's nothing left to learn the hard way.
-- Things you buy now won't wear out.
-- You buy a compass for the dash of your car.
-- You can eat dinner at 4:00
-- You can live without sex but not without glasses.
-- You can't remember the last time you laid on the floor to watch television.
-- You consider coffee one of the most important things in life.
-- You constantly talk about the price of gasoline.
-- You enjoy hearing about other people's operations.
-- You get into a heated argument about pension plans.
-- You got cable for the weather channel.
-- You have a party and the neighbors don't even realize it.
-- You no longer think of speed limits as a challenge.
-- You quit trying to hold your stomach in, no matter who walks into the room.
-- You send money to PBS.
-- You sing along with the elevator music.
-- Your arms are almost too short to read the newspaper.
-- Your back goes out more than you do.
-- Your eyes won't get much worse.
-- Your investment in health insurance is finally beginning to pay off.
-- Your joints are more accurate than the National Weather Service.
-- Your secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them either.
-- Your supply of brain cells is finally down to a manageable size.

going once, going twice, sold!

I've sold stuff before on eBay, but thought I'd try Craigslist and Kijiji this time, as those online methods are more direct. You post your items, say how much you want for them, and if you're lucky, someone will come and whisk away said items right after plonking down some Cold Hard Cash in your eager outstretched hands. And it worked! Even though I'd gotten a bit worried after not getting any nibbles for the first five days, it only took one person on the 6th day, and voilà, the breadboxes are no longer mine. What I like about it too is that there's no waiting until the auction is over, no trying to figure out how much shipping is going to cost, let alone what to ship it in, and no packing! Yep, I will definitely try to sell more stuff online this way, and as a quasi-recovering garage sale/thrift-store junkie, I have enough items to keep me busy selling for months. Years, maybe.

Isn't that turquoise blue a lovely colour though? (Okay, it looks more like a light baby powder blue in the photo, but really, it's turquoise. A beautiful deep turquoise.) I have to admit, if it didn't take up so much room, I'm not sure if I would have wanted to part with it!

things which matter

"Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least." —GOETHE

self-pity

Stifling. Oppressive. Crushing. Tiresome. Our political regime, you ask? Well, maybe that too, but no, I was actually referring to the weather. Yes, no doubt you're already quite weary of my whiny wallowing-in-weather woes, and I promise to TRY not to refer to it again this season, but if you will, please indulge me one more time.

I was thinking of going to a reading tonight. A real, get-up-in-front-of-the-crowd-and-read-your-stuff type of event, but I don't think I will. Partly because I've run out of cash to cover the $5 cover charge, partly because I hate having to read out loud even more than speaking out loud, but mainly because it's too bloody hot and I can't seem to move even an inch out of this heat-induced torpor. And it's a shame really, because the topic on which you're supposed to read out loud tonight—self-pity—is right up my alley. I mean, I know a lot about the topic, experience it more fully and frequently than I care to admit, and if you take the adage "write about what you know" seriously, then I could probably mine this topic to death. In fact, I'm experiencing a sort of self-pity right now just thinking about how I COULD go to this reading if I wasn't too scared, and wasn't too sweaty. And I wouldn't even have to write anything new for the occasion, as I already have the perfect column! Ah well. What I'll do instead is include here what I would have read had I actually gone tonight. The following was first published back in 1996, and even though some of the details have changed (I now live on the second floor instead of the basement), the gist of it hasn't. Nope. A whole decade has not changed my perspective on this, and I imagine that no amount of time ever will.

ON WHY I HATE SUMMER

Yes, you read that correctly. I hate summer. There, I have said the unspeakable. Perhaps even broken one of the last taboos. And at the risk of alienating myself even further, of adding an extra dimension to my already claimed status of possible social misfit, I will say it again. I, unequivocally, HATE summer.

The heat—oh, the heat! Maybe it affects me more because I was born in a country with a fairly moderate climate. I don't know. But I do know that it makes me cranky. Testy. Quarrelsome even. That it increases my whining and complaining proportionately. That it only serves to accentuate and exaggerate any negative character traits I already possess. And as for shaving in summer—well, let's not even go there.

Could it be that while some are afflicted with SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) in winter, I actually get hit with GLAD (heat-Generated Lethargic Affective Disorder) in summer? And would that explain why my already-relaxed-enough Type B personality woefully threatens to degenerate into Type C (which apparently doesn't exist, but in my case damn well should!)?

No, I don't really expect your sympathy or understanding. I simply want to present my point of view. To let you know that the comment, "It's a nice day, isn't it," fills me with despair. That I greet every cloudy day with glee. That if I could, I would stay in my cool basement forever.

So, if you should happen to see me out there (on an emergency errand no doubt), I would advise you to stay out of my way. And to reconsider talking to me. Call me later instead. When I'm back in the basement.

And am I the only one who hates summer? Please, if you know of any other fellow summer sufferers, send them my way. Maybe we can start a support group. Complain amongst ourselves. Develop survival strategies so that we don't take it out on others… too much. Perhaps we can even come up with a term for our particular aversion. How about missumery? Let me know.

There, that column would have been perfect given the topic, don't you think? Snort.

nostalgia

"No snowflake ever falls in the wrong place." —ZEN saying

And to think that this was the view from my computer room window only a few months ago. Sigh. Hate heat; hate humidity. Did I already tell you that? Well, it bears repeating. Snort.

ducunt fata volentum, nolentum trahunt

"The fates guide those who go willingly; those who do not, they drag." —SENECA

confession #2

I almost always have to edit my posts. Not the short quotation ones of course, or the ones based on a photo (and why do I sometimes think of them as cheater entries when it's MY blog?), well, sometimes those too, but not too often. No, it's the longer ones that get me into trouble. And it's not as if I don't carefully check and recheck before I hit the publish button. Or that the grammar police in Word doesn't reprimand me every step of the way when initially writing the post. No, even though I have deemed the entry ready to go, as soon as I publish it I see all sorts of things. What, what's that comma doing there? Or more likely, WHY isn't there a comma there? Hey, I don't think I like that particular word or phrase after all! Yikes, that doesn't sound right—better change the order of those two words. And it's the latter (faulty word order) that happens most frequently (even in this entry), which I then conveniently blame on the fact that English isn't my native tongue. But can I really use that as an excuse when I was so young? I mean, I turned eight upon my arrival in Canada, so it's not as if I didn't pick up the English language quickly enough. In fact, all my siblings did, and the eldest was already fifteen. I concocted a nice little theory years ago that the grammar structure of my native language, Dutch, was already firmly imprinted on my brain (why does the word "imprinted" always bring to mind that cute image of ducklings following some other species member as if it were their mother?) by the time I ended up in Canada, but somehow that probably doesn't wash. Sigh. Oh well, it's my story, and I'm sticking to it!

But I'm getting off track. What I find most annoying about the post-publishing process is that while I know by now that I'll find at least two or three little things that need correcting, I never see them all at once. I hit the publish button, carefully read what I've posted, spot something I don't like, change it, publish it again, and voilà, something else glares out at me! By the time I'm finally done, I've published the darn entry at least three times, and wonder if anyone's noticed. The all-time record though was something like ten changes to one entry (I refuse to tell you which one), and at the end of it I almost swore I wouldn't post anything ever again. Maybe publishing a post is akin to printing it, because I have the same problem in that instance as well. I read over what I've written, reread, carefully check it one more time, print it out, and see, as if for the first time, what I don't like. This means I have to print it again!

Now, what I really want to know is, is it me, or does anybody else experience the same thing? Please tell me that you, too, edit your post as soon as you publish it, and that I'm not the only quirky blogger to do this!

p.s. my grammar check frequently accuses me of wordiness (which I ignore), doesn't like how I often begin sentences with "or", "and" or "but" (which I also ignore), thinks I use the passive voice too much (okay, this I do tend to change), doesn't approve of my refusal to capitalize my titles and postscripts (but I like them better in small case letters!) and generally tells me that my sentences are either too long or mere fragments, but hey, why should I give in ALL the time—don't I edit enough as it is?

p.p.s. whew, so far I've only had to go back in once and change two teeny tiny little things!

p.p.p.s. okay, twice now, but who's counting?

p.p.p.p.s. sigh, three times, but that's it, no more!

p.p.p.p.p.s. never mind....

finally!

I get to show you a chipmunk close-up. The only problem is that it isn't my chipmunk, and I wasn't the one to take the shot! The credit goes to the mom of Louis LeBeau—a fellow Catster friend. She WAS able to get a nice close-up of one of the critters at her place, and graciously agreed to let me borrow her photo as I had decided to give up the good fight. Snort. Thanks Louis!

qualifications for walking

"Few people know how to take a walk. The qualifications are endurance, plain clothes, old shoes, an eye for nature, good humour, vast curiosity, good speech, good silence and nothing too much." —RALPH WALDO EMERSON

in my inbox today

FIVE LESSONS

FIRST LESSON - CLEANING LADY

During my second month of college, our professor gave us a pop quiz. I was a conscientious student and had breezed through the questions until I read the last one:

"What is the first name of the woman who cleans the school?" Surely, this was some kind of joke. I had seen the cleaning woman several times. She was tall, dark-haired and in her 50s, but how would I know her name?

I handed in my paper, leaving the last question blank. Just before class ended, one student asked if the last question would count toward our quiz grade.

"Absolutely," said the professor. "In your careers, you will meet many people. All are significant. They deserve your attention and care, even if all you do is smile and say "hello."

I've never forgotten that lesson. I also learned her name was Dorothy.

SECOND LESSON - PICKUP IN THE RAIN

One night, at 11:30 P.M., an older African American woman was standing on the side of an Alabama highway trying to endure a lashing rainstorm. Her car had broken down and she desperately needed a ride. Soaking wet, she decided to flag down the next car. A young white man stopped to help her, generally unheard of in those conflict-filled 1960s. The man took her to safety, helped her get assistance and put her into a taxicab.

She seemed to be in a big hurry, but wrote down his address and thanked him. Seven days went by and a knock came on the man's door. To his surprise, a giant console color TV was delivered to his home. A special note was attached...

It read: "Thank you so much for assisting me on the highway the other night. The rain drenched not only my clothes, but also my spirits. Then you came along. Because of you, I was able to make it to my dying husband's bedside just before he passed away. God Bless you for helping me and unselfishly serving others."

Sincerely,
Mrs. Nat King Cole

THIRD LESSON - ALWAYS REMEMBER THOSE WHO SERVE

In the days when an ice cream sundae cost much less, a 10-year-old boy entered a hotel coffee shop and sat at a table. A waitress put a glass of water in front of him.

"How much is an ice cream sundae?" he asked.

"Fifty cents," replied the waitress.

The little boy pulled his hand out of his pocket and studied the coins in it.

"Well, how much is a plain dish of ice cream?" he inquired.

By now, more people were waiting for a table and the waitress was growing impatient.

"Thirty-five cents," she brusquely replied.

The little boy again counted his coins.

"I'll have the plain ice cream," he said.

The waitress brought the ice cream, put the bill on the table and walked away. The boy finished the ice cream, paid the cashier and left. When the waitress came back, she began to cry as she wiped down the table. There, placed neatly beside the empty dish, were two nickels and five pennies.

You see he couldn't have the sundae, because he had to have enough left to leave her a tip.

FOURTH LESSON - THE OBSTACLE IN OUR PATH

In ancient times, a King had a boulder placed on a roadway. Then he hid himself and watched to see if anyone would remove the huge rock. Some of the King's wealthiest merchants and courtiers came by and simply walked around it. Many loudly blamed the King for not keeping the roads clear, but none did anything about getting the stone out of the way.

Then a peasant came along carrying a load of vegetables. Upon approaching the boulder, the peasant laid down his burden and tried to move the stone to the side of the road. After much pushing and straining, he finally succeeded. After the peasant picked up his load of vegetables, he noticed a purse lying in the road where the boulder had been. The purse contained many gold coins and a note from the King indicating that the gold was for the person who removed the boulder from the roadway. The peasant learned what many of us never understand!

Every obstacle presents an opportunity to improve our condition.

FIFTH LESSON - GIVING WHEN IT COUNTS

Many years ago, when I worked as a volunteer at a hospital, I got to know a little girl named Liz who was suffering from a rare and serious disease. Her only chance of recovery appeared to be a blood transfusion from her 5-year old brother, who had miraculously survived the same disease and had developed the antibodies needed to combat the illness. The doctor explained the situation to her little brother, and asked the little boy if he would be willing to give his blood to his sister.

I saw him hesitate for only a moment before taking a deep breath and saying, "Yes I'll do it, if it will save her." As the transfusion progressed, he lay in bed next to his sister and smiled, as we all did, seeing the color returning to her cheeks. Then his face grew pale and his smile faded.

He looked up at the doctor and asked with a trembling voice, "Will I start to die right away?"

Being young, the little boy had misunderstood the doctor; he thought he was going to have to give his sister all of his blood in order to save her.

hmmm, really?

"The cat has his own life; he expects you to live yours." —NELSON A. CRAWFORD

monkeybunkey

For more photos of this sweet little rascal, check out his blog.

what I enjoy not doing

A while back country dweller talked about the things he most enjoyed not doing. Now I'm not sure if it was a formal meme, but I'm going to officially tag myself (I'm it!) and follow his lead. I liked his list, and many of his items would be on mine as well, but I'm going to concentrate on the one thing I most enjoy not doing that he neglected to mention. (I'm assuming that he enjoys not doing this one thing either, although of course I could be completely wrong.) Care to take a stab at what it is? Nope, that's not it. No, not that either. Give up?

Okay. One word. Ironing.

Oh, I know, you're probably a bit disappointed at my choice as it might seem both dull and a bit anti-climactic even, and maybe not in keeping with the image you possibly formed of me when I said I'd be sprinkling cleaning tips throughout this blog, but there you have it. One of the things my super-busy mom taught me was that ironing is a big no-no. And though not officially forbidden, it clearly and strictly was frowned upon, and mom successfully impressed upon all of us that the lonely iron in the closet was for dire emergency purposes only. Can't say I blame her. With five (5!) kids to more or less raise on her own, working nights, running a household, maintaining a garden, cooking from scratch, and putting herself through school in her early fifties, I think having to iron would have led directly to homicide. I'm also quite sure mom recognized her latent criminal inclinations, and I'm surprised she didn't banish the deadly weapon (who knew it had the potential to lead to such heinous acts?) altogether. At any rate, we learned early on that it was better for no one to even go near it. So, we didn't.

Instead, mom extolled the virtues of fabrics that didn't wrinkle as much (polyester—excellent, cotton-polyester—not bad, cotton—not as good, linen and rayon—you've got to be joking), and taught us to retrieve clothes the very moment (and not a half second later) the dryer stopped. Then (quickly, QUICKLY!), we neatly folded or hung the items away. And to ensure we wouldn't become iron-lovers on the sly, she regularly poked fun at anyone who even dared to admit to ironing sheets, or shirts, or pants, or heaven forbid, underwear, and well, you get the drift. And it worked. I rarely used an iron myself when I left home, and even got rid of the space-waster a few years ago. Oh, and if you're thinking drycleaners, nope, my mom didn't believe in them either. And being my mother's daughter, when I once worked at the drycleaners for a short stint I often ended up saying to the customer, "Are you kidding? You could easily throw that into the washing machine." But not when my boss was around. Snort.

Mind you, isn't ironing enjoying some type of revival* these days? Like knitting?

Um, no thanks.

* Okay, I do see how ironing could be relaxing in a meditative kind of way, but unless you have oodles of time and no better way to get relaxed, I'd say nix it if you can.