Juggling Life

Full Confessional Friday

                                             Keep rowing, ladies!

                     Photo Courtesy of Flickr/Commons

Domestic Bliss

One thing I noticed pretty much the day school left out (that would be the day I skipped drinking at a bar in Pacific Beach with other teachers to come home and clean my bathrooms with a toothbrush—and enjoyed it) was that as much as I like teaching, I have missed being home.

Maybe I’m hard-wired this way; I  just really enjoy the domestic arts. What are some of the things I’m really enjoying doing with my time off?

• The aforementioned sparkling clean bathrooms
• Watching Rachael Ray in the morning, running to the store for the ingredients and then making her recipe for dinner that night
• Being available to run Social Butterfly and her friends here, there and everywhere
• Doing laundry every day (as opposed to several loads in one day on the weekend)
• Baking cookies, banana bread, etc. for my family

Of course I’m also loving that I have time to go to lunch with friends, kayak go to the movies with my husband, see some plays (three this summer already!) and not get out of bed at 5:30 a.m., but if I really had to pick what I love the most, I think I might have to give the nod to taking care of my family and my house.

Am I just weird or do some of you feel the same way?

Summer Sandwich

Oroweat Whole Wheat Bagel Thin (toasted), 1 wedge of Laughing Cow light cheese, turkey, fresh basil, tomato. 5 points on Weight Watchers and it is a whole lot of delicious!

Houston, We May Have a Problem

 

Q. Do you lose time from work due to kayaking?

A. Well, no, but that might be because I don’t have a job.

 

Q.Is kayaking making your home life unhappy?

A. Not really, though I do think some people (those who need rides) might be frustrated that I’m incommunicado for a couple of hours at a time several times a week.

 

Q. Is kayaking effecting your reputation?

A. Hmmm. I think word might be getting out that I’m a heavy kayaker.

 

Q. Does your kayaking make you careless about your family’s welfare.

A. Nope. I figure they’re all old enough to fix their own dinner!

 

Q. Do you crave kayaking at a definite time each day?

A. I want to know in the morning exactly when it is I’m going to kayak. If I can’t kayak that day I definitely get antsy.

 

Q. Do you want to kayak the next morning.

A. I do.

 

Q. Has your efficiency decreased since you started kayaking?

A. No—it’s increased. I need to get done with my work quickly so I can go kayaking!

 

Q. Do  you kayak to escape from worries or troubles?

A. Oh, yeah!

 

Q. Do you kayak alone?

A. I have.

 

Seriously, people. I’m going at least 4 times a week and I plan my day around my kayaking time. It’s not going to be pretty when summer ends and real life starts to intrude.

BeFunky: A Giveaway Post

 

          (Photo Editing Courtesy of Social Butterfly and BeFunky.com)

I like to think that I’m a decent amateur photographer. I have a pretty good camera—a Canon Rebel—and, thanks to my ex-future-son-in-law, Music Man, I have Adobe Photoshop Pro on my laptop. Having Photoshop is definitely an asset when you have a blog where you post a lot of pictures. Or even if your house is decorated in Early American Family Photograph (as mine is).

There’s a big drawback to Photoshop though, and that is the expense. There is no way I could afford the setup I have on my computer. So when I got a query about reviewing a new site that offers a lot of the same tools Photoshop has, I jumped on it.

Especially since they this is what they were offering:

We’d like to work with you to on a review as well as offer two of your readers a chance to win a free BeFunky 1-year subscription ($99.95 value) to help with easy editing and creativity for their photos.BeFunky has a huge selection of photo effects, such as Charcoal, Inkify, Old Photo and Stenciler that can applied with just one click.  Last week, the company added four more amazing effects and “smart enhancement tools” that fix some of the common photo problems such as over or underexposure and fuzziness.

I think your readers would have a lot of fun with BeFunky as it’s fast, easy and can save parents money on having their photos professionally re-touched.

Social Butterfly and I had fun noodling around on the site and I have to say I was very impressed with the intuitiveness of the site. All of these photos started with a Droid cameraphone pic of a flowering vine in my front yard.

This is what I started with

It looks a little bright and blown out—I shot it in bright sunlight. I fixed it up a bit—not a huge difference, but it does look better.

Then I started having fun—and there are at least 100 things you could do just with effects. I love the pencil drawing and cartoonizer effects (top left and bottom right). Plus, with the vintage effect I won’t feel so deprived because I don’t have an iPhone with the hipstamatic effect.

If you think you’ll have as much fun with this as I have, leave me a comment telling me what it is your going to take a photo of and fool around with. I’ll pick two winners next Monday. Good luck!

Thanks to BeFunky.com for giving me the opportunity to do this very cool giveaway.

I Think He’ll Fit RIGHT In!

We picked Pedro up at the airport and were in the car for about 5 minutes when he got a sly glint in his eye and asked Danger Boy a question.

Pedro: So your American high school is like High School Musical? You sing and you dance?!

Full Confessional Friday

                       Make some time to play this week!

 

                       Photo Courtesy of Flickr/Commons

Where Has Civil Discourse Gone?

I love newspapers. I’m not totally thrilled with with pared-down, anemic version of its former self that my hometown newspaper (and it wasn’t the New York Times to start with) has become. But still and all, it’s where I turn to find out what’s happening right in my backyard.

I especially love the Letters to the Editor. It’s where I can find out what others are thinking and, sometimes, share my thoughts. I think it’s great that it can be interactive; I have written letters based on someone else’s letter before myself.

This past 4th of July I was moved to write a Letter to the Editor. My 8 a.m. beers had long worn off before I quickly composed this missive and hit send.  July 19 must have been a slow letters day because that’s when it was printed.

I have just returned from the wonderful Fourth of July parade that the Scripps Ranch community puts on each year. Rep. Duncan D. Hunter was one of the parade dignitaries, and his words and actions during the parade left a very bad taste in my mouth; others witnessing this incident had a similar reaction.

Mr. Hunter left the parade route to interact with a man wearing a “Jesus Saves” shirt. He shook his hand and made the following statement, “I saw a bumper sticker that said, ‘Jesus Saves, Obama Spends.’ Good one, huh?”

Apparently Mr. Hunter feels it is patriotic to denigrate our president as we celebrate the Fourth, as well as to espouse partisan politics on what, to me, is a decidedly nonpartisan day. It was a rude and classless act that cast a pall over the parade for me and several of my neighbors. It was certainly not a show of patriotism.

The responses to this letter—in both the paper and the electronic comments section—included these choice reactions:

If the letter’s composer doesn’t like hearing the denigrating political comments, then she better move to another non-free speech country.

Did I say he wasn’t allowed to say it? No—I said it wasn’t the time or place. Big difference.

In all seriousness, there is medication to help you. Next time take a med instead of sharing pointless drivel from "The Wonderful World of Non-Issues" that is your life.

Technically, I think it would be the Letters Editor at the paper that decided my “pointless drivel” was worth sharing. And I’d rather debate the substance of an issue than launch ad hominem attacks.

Also? I was given the DOTD award from someone. I’m going to presume that stands for “Dummy of the Day.” Thanks! I’m so proud!

In my mind the original incident and the above comments have nothing to do with politics per say. They have to do with recognizing that in a civil society there is a time and a place (and a way) to discuss political issues.

In fact you disgust me. And if I see you in Scripps I will tell you that to your face. Especially on the 4th of July. Besides, the quip was perfectly appropriate in its context. In fact, I would argue it didn't go far enough. Perhaps if he remarked that Marty Emerald is a beastly corrupt union concubine you might have a case. Even though that's what I was thinking as she went by.

As for Yobammy, there is no time or place that a jab at someone whose political agenda has set a course to erase the legacy the founding fathers created on the original 4th of July wouldn't be appropriate. If you think otherwise then you are simply a sick individual and I applaud the fact Hunter has exposed you as such.

I’m not really get any facts out of the above, are you?

In all the many years that Randy “Duke” Cunningham marched in the parade (this would before he was arrested and convicted of conspiracy to commit bribery, mail fraud, wire fraud and tax evasion) I politely clapped as he went by. I didn’t like or trust him, but many of my neighbors did. I figured a community parade celebrating America wasn’t the time or place to make my views known.

Am I alone in feeling a line has been crossed and appropriate and polite civil discourse is disappearing in a storm of rude and reactionary rhetoric?

Before and After

                                   Grownup Girl’s new ‘do

              (there’s a ziploc-baggied ponytail in the mail to Locks of Love)

Good News and It’s Precursor

              (Not my ultrasound—but mine did look a lot like this)

Monday afternoon was when I went for my follow up mammogram and ultrasound after there were some irregularities in my annual mammogram three weeks ago. It turns out I have two benign cysts and a non-worrisome calcification. So, good news.

Of course there was three weeks of waiting for my appointment. Time when I didn’t focus on the fact that there were “irregularities.” Or, if it did pop into my head, I reassured myself that advances in mammography have meant that things that would never have been noticed in the past are now picked up. I have had friends go through this and it turned out to be nothing, so that was reassuring. I’ve also had a friend for whom it turned out to be a very big something that ended up taking her life and I couldn’t ignore that completely.

Then there was the 45 minutes while I was having the additional views of my left breast taken, the radiologist reviewing the films, the decision to also do an ultrasound and then the technician doing that procedure. She was great about showing me where the cysts where and how she was sure they were benign cysts. Then she had the radiologist review the area that was not a cyst, but turned out to be a calcification.

It was during that 45 minutes that I looked around the state-of-the art rooms, done up in tasteful and soothing colors that my mind wandered. If the news was not good, this would be the place my journey began. This would be where my before and after would be defined when I reflected back.

If the news was not good the hollowness in the pit of my stomach would not go away at the end of the waiting, but give way to more waiting, bad news and a feeling in the pit of my stomach that I have probably not yet experienced.

I am lucky that I will be able to file this away as a snapshot in time that I will probably only access if I’m reassuring a friend who gets that “we need to take some more films” phone call.

My experience is the reason for the recent controversy over whether or not women my age (46) should have yearly mammograms (I did the baseline at 35 and have been going yearly since 40) because of the stress attendant with all the findings that turn out to be nothing. All I can say about that is, what if it was something? I just can’t take that out of the equation.

This time next year you’ll find me at the mammography center once again.