Sunday Stealing

Sunday Stealing

1. Do you like your handwriting?

A. Oh no. My handwriting is horrible. I am the only person who can read it, and sometimes even I can't read it. My mother had beautiful handwriting. Mine is small and cramped.

2. Do you like roller coasters?

A. Not anymore. I didn't mind them when I was younger, but after I turned 30 all of those rides made my body ache.

3. Do you like scary movies?

A. Not really.

4. Do you like shopping?

A. I used to, but it has become more chore than joy since the pandemic.

5. Do you like to talk on the phone?

A. Yes. I prefer that to texting. Texting has its place, but it doesn't replace hearing the sound of a loved one's voice.

6. Do you sleep with the lights on or off?

A. Off, but we have motion lights that turn on if one of us rises in the night.

7. Do you use headphones or earphones?

A. I do not use either. They bother my ears.

8. Do you have tattoos?  Do you want any?

A. I have no tattoos, nor do I want any.

9. Do you wear glasses?

A. Yes.

10. What is your strangest talent?

A. I can roll my tongue.

11. Have you ever been in the hospital?

A. Many times.

12. What color mostly dominates your wardrobe?

A. Blue.

13. What’s your most expensive piece of clothing?

A. Probably my coat.

14. Have you ever had braces?

A. I had braces when I was a tween.

15. Have you ever been on TV?

A. I have, yes.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Sunday Stealing posts and leave a comment. Cheers to all us thieves who love memes, however we come by them.

Saturday 9: Your Mother Should Know

Saturday 9: Your Mother Should Know (1967)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) This week's featured artists, The Beatles, invite us to get up and dance to a song that was a hit before your mother was born. Do you enjoy the oldies? How old must a song be before you consider it "old?"

A. I consider 1950s songs to be "old" - so older than I am. I listen to 1970s and 1980s music a lot, with some other decades thrown in for good measure.

2) Paul McCartney knew bandmate John Lennon's mom, Julia, and credits her with introducing him to the ukulele. Do you recall any of your childhood friends' mothers with fondness?

A. No.

 

3) Paul's own mother, Mary, tried to instill in her son a sense of pride in his appearance and saw to it he always left the house in a clean, ironed shirt. Paul says that, to this day, when he smells fresh laundry, he thinks of his mum. Is there a scent or sound that reminds you of someone you love who is no longer with us?

A. The smell of green beans cooking in fatback (southern style) always reminds me of my great-aunt. Her house always smelled like that.

4) George Harrison was the only member of the band to have any formal musical training. His mother, Louise, supported her son's musical ambitions and made sure he got guitar lessons. Did you take music classes as a child?

A. I did.

5) Ringo Starr was a sickly and often hospitalized little boy. His mother, Elsie, took a job as a barmaid so she could work at night, leaving her days free during visiting hours. When were you most recently in a hospital? Were you an admitted patient, there for an outpatient procedure, or visiting someone?

A. The last time I was in a hospital was pre-pandemic, November 2019, when my husband had his ankle fused together.

6) Mother Winters always gave our own Crazy Sam peppermint tea to calm her stomach. Do you have any tried-and-true home remedies to share?

A. Vinegar helps with acid reflux.

7) Sam's mother always tips 15% in restaurants. Sam has worked in food service and is more judgmental, tipping between 10% and 25%, depending on the quality of the service. What's your tipping policy?

A. I generally tip 15% percent, regardless. If the service is good, I might tip a bit more.

 

8) Sam's mother still gets the Sunday paper because of the sales fliers. She makes separate lists for each store, picking up grocery and household items where she knows they are on sale. Sam thinks her mother's strategy is a waste of time and gas and prefers one-stop shopping (even better, online one-stop shopping). Are you more like mother or daughter?

A. I still get the Sunday paper but that's because I want to read the news, not the ads. I prefer one-stop shopping (or even better, online).

9) Sam is celebrating Mother's Day with her mother's favorite, Hershey Bars. Would you prefer classic milk chocolate, dark chocolate or chocolate with almonds?

A. Dark chocolate.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Saturday 9 posts and leave a comment. Because there are no rules, it is your choice. Saturday 9 players hate rules. We love memes, however.  

Musings on Three Pines

In the past year, I found Louise Penny's books about Armand Gamache, Chief Inspector of Homicide for the police force in Quebec.

(There may be spoilers here, so if you haven't read all the books, you may want to stop reading this.)

There are 17 of the books, and I have listened to all but three of them.

I enjoy the books and like the characters.

My one complaint is that several of Penny's characters have head injuries from which they completely recover. (If I have names wrong it's because I listen to the audiobooks so I haven't the names spelled out on a page.)

Gamache is shot in the head and makes a full recovery, aside from a slight tremor in his hand.

Isabelle LaCost, one of his investigators, has a head injury, and makes a full recovery, except for a slight limp that appears to have disappeared, but I'll know more as I finish up book #17.

Stephen somebody, the 93-year-old godfather of Gamache, (he shows up later in the series) is run over by a van and has a head injury. He lies in a coma for most of the book - and makes a full recovery. (This one in particular I found quite difficult. He's 93. Really?)

I know this is fiction, and in a fictional world I suppose anyone can be shot in the head and make a full recovery. I also know that in real life, such things do not happen. If people do recover from a head trauma, they generally are greatly changed, either in personality or in body or both, because recovery can take not weeks, but months and/or years. 

I would very much like for Penny to find another place for a main character to be injured besides in the head. A shot in the knee, perhaps. 

The head injuries and subsequent quick recoveries pull me from the world of the book. My rational mind jumps in and says, "This cannot be." Anything that distracts a reader from the world of the book is something that needs to be reexamined.

That this has happened at least three times (there may be others that I'm not recalling), makes me think that a head wound is this author's go-to injury. And that would be fine, I suppose, if I hadn't lost a friend to a head trauma after she was run over by a truck, if I hadn't watched an older person have a TIA right in front of me during a newspaper interview, if a friend from college hadn't been in a car wreck and then spent years in therapy relearning how to live her life, if someone else I know hadn't had a head injury and then gone berserk and tried to murder his family a long time ago.

But I know these things, and have some experience with head trauma, however slight, and I don't think my knowledge is anything special. However, it's enough to pull me from the story when the head trauma injuries miraculously heal without much time passing.

This is mostly a note for me to remind myself that, if I ever do find my voice for fiction, that I need to be sure not to pull the reader from the world of the book by using an inappropriate prop for authorial purposes, instead of reaching for a harder or more prudent incident that would keep the reader in the story.

Thursday Thirteen

1. Heavy and strange are my thoughts today, Obi Wan. Or is that Gandalf?

2. Spring here was rather dull; we had a cold snap that took out most of the flowering trees and they went straight to leaf status. However, the greenery is a relief over the starkness of winter.

3. Trying to figure out the rest of my life means trouble for my brain. It makes headaches happen.

4. I am old enough to be retired but I don't want to be retired. My doctor says I should not work.

5. The bird feeder needs to be refilled. It will probably be the last time we fill it as we generally don't feed the animals during the summer.

6. I am going today to have a mammogram. Make sure to get those tits looked at, ladies!

7. While I write this, I am listening to a friend complain about her job. Jobs are weird.

8. There's a cardinal at the feeder, so there still must be a little seed there.

9. I need to remove a lot of books from my shelves. I don't know where to donate them since the library stopped taking them.

10. Sometimes it is really hard to come up with thirteen things.

11. I need a new job skill set. Why couldn't I have studied engineering?

12. Or maybe I could have been a computer tech.

13. I am tired of adulting.

____________________

Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here if you want to read other Thursday Thirteens and/or play along. I've been playing for a while, and this is my 754th time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday. Or so sayth the Blogger counter, anyway.

I'm Alive Because of Roe v Wade

I'm 100 percent certain that if Roe v Wade were not the law of the land in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when I was trying desperately to have a child, I'd be dead.

My endometriosis was severe. Endometriosis is a disorder in which the tissue similar to the inner lining of the uterus (endometrium) grows outside the uterus. This results in pelvic pain and irregular menstrual cycle. The tissue can migrate all over the pelvic area and has even been found in the lungs of some women.

In my case, the first signs were pain. Pain during menstruation. Pain during intercourse. Pain all the time, some months.

Birth control pills helped control the pain so I could function. Otherwise, I would miss an average of two or three days of work a month. Over the counter pain pills didn't help. 

It is hard to hold a job or go to school and deal with that kind of pain. It is hard to have a marriage and have that kind of pain. It's hard to do much of anything with that kind of pain, quite frankly.

Since the use of birth control pills is something that many people believe may be threatened by overturning Roe v Wade, I would not have been able to utilize that outlet to control my health problem.

I married at age 20. I wasn't ready to have a child at the age of 20. We had little money when we married - taxes that first year wiped out our savings, and it took us a while to recover from that blow. (It was called the marriage penalty tax back then. I think they may have done away with that, but I'm not certain.)

The birth control pill was essential not only for birth control but for my pain and problems. We built our house in 1987 and in December of that year, I stopped taking the birth control pill so we could attempt to have a baby.

I was 24 years old.

Almost one month to the day I'd stopped taking birth control pills, I developed a fever and horrible pain in my abdomen. I went to my doctor who sent me off to a gynecologist immediately. He did a sonogram and saw that I had a huge cyst on my right ovary. 

It was the size of a grapefruit, and it had twisted. I had sepsis. And there was a second spot they couldn't identify on the sonogram.

It was possible this second spot was an ectopic pregnancy, (a baby outside of the womb) and without Roe v Wade, the doctor wouldn't have been able to operate. He could only have watched me die.

But because Roe v Wade was the law (and currently still is), the doctor sent me to the hospital, where they performed emergency surgery and saved my life. And while it turned out to be not one but two cysts, technology in 1987 was not what it is today. They couldn't have been sure.

And to be honest, I don't know if any of the treatment I received afterwards to try to help me have a child would be allowed without Roe v Wade. After the removal of the cysts, the doctor put me on a high-powered dose of a drug that stopped my menstrual cycle for months. The idea was to trick my body into a false pregnancy with these pills so as to give my body time to stop creating the endometrial tissue.

But it did not work. As soon as the doctor took me off of those drugs so we could try to have a child again, the cysts returned.

And I had another life-saving surgery because I again had sepsis. The cysts kept twisting and locking in infection. They grew huge. They were the size of grapefruits.

And each time the doctors opened me up and went in, they removed scar tissue and pieces of my ovaries, until finally, in 1992, after having already opened up my abdomen seven times as my husband and I tried to have a child, the doctors performed a hysterectomy. (They left the scar tissue because there was so much of it, but the problems that created is another story.)

I was 29 years old. I would never have a child.

If Roe v Wade had not existed, I would have died before I was 20. The doctors were sure that the birth control pills kept the cysts from coming on sooner, so without them, I'd have had the cysts much earlier, probably before I married. Would they have seen that second spot and decided it could have been an ectopic pregnancy, and let me die?

And if I'd died at 20, what difference would it have made to the world? Is that how people who want these safeguards to women's health removed see the world? What difference does it make if this woman dies, even if the pregnancy is already null and void (ectopic pregnancies generally do not go to term)? Really, is that how they think?

I know Roe v Wade saved my life when I was trying to have a child.

And now I see a future when women who want to have a child but have issues will die. When the treatment they need may be withheld . . . just because.

It is that simple.

And it is that sad.

What kind of bitter, horrible, twisted people wish such a fate on another human being?

Book Writing Question

A very long time ago, a writer friend of mine . . . stopped writing. She'd been a columnist for The Roanoke Times for a very long time, but she wanted to write novels.

She was an excellent writer, and I'd taken a few non-credit classes from her. She was also a cousin, many times removed, but a cousin, nevertheless. I admired her work for the newspaper. I admired her spirit, and her ability to be who she was.

But, she confided to me, she could not write a novel that she thought would sell. She wrote five novels, none of them published. She blamed Hollins College, now Hollins University, the place where we both went to college, she graduating in 1973, me in 1993. Twenty years apart, though we were only 12 years apart in age.

The college had, she decided, beat the writing out of her with the professors' proclamations that one must write literary for it to count. Writing something like, say, a Nancy Drew book wasn't writing. Writing something like Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek was writing. Everything else was banal, unworthy, and unwelcome. They were still teaching that message, more or less, when I graduated college there, too, so many years later.

But the college has produced its fair share of good, if not great writers. Lee Smith, Jill McCorkle, Dillard, Margaret Wise Brown, and so many more. These authors are listed on the university website. But someone like me, who has published thousands of articles, is not listed there. Nor is my friend who wrote for The Roanoke Times.

So having tried, and in her mind, failing, my friend quit writing. "The world doesn't need another book," she told me, and turned her creativity to making handbags and other sewing and needlework projects.

Yet when she passed away unexpectedly several years ago, her husband noted her writing in her obituary, stating that she had written five novels. He did not mention that they were unpublished. Only that she had indeed made this accomplishment.

And it is an accomplishment, even if the novels only saw the inside the inside of a drawer.

I spoke about this memory to my friend's sister-in-law last year, a woman also a close and much-loved friend, but not a writer. She told me she agreed that the world did not need another book. It did not need, nor want, my book, she said, only months before she too passed away.

Was she trying to comfort me for my own frustration at failed efforts to put forth words that seem to stop where my head and heart cannot find common ground? Was she making a dig at me for even trying? Or simply agreeing with her sister-in-law as we discussed a memory I'd dredged up from the deep well of my mind as we tried to come to terms, her with dying, me with the knowledge that she would soon be gone?

My husband, upon learning of this conversation, said my friend was not really a friend if she told me that. It was not a supportive thing to say, he said. I remain undecided. She was ill, after all. And she was basically agreeing with someone she, too, had admired.

However, I find it a good question. Does the world need another book, when one can go to Amazon to see the world drowning in books, books that will never be read or studied, a book that may or may not make whoever wrote it even $1,000, if anything at all? Books given away for free for publicity's sake, books selling for 99 cents, books that someone spent 10 years writing only to see it on the remainder rack at the Green Valley Book Fair, if it makes it into a hard copy at all?

Does that time spent writing a book matter? Is it worth it? Who determines the value? Who determines the need?

How the hell does anyone answer such questions, especially when they become bound up with the images of dead people I loved?

The Water Bill Dream

Last night I dreamed that I received a bill in the mail for $26,000.00. It was from the water facility in New Castle, where I used to write the newspaper (I freelanced for the paper, but it's not a lie to say I wrote the paper. I did.).

The letter received with the bill showed a contract I'd signed on behalf of the paper (that's how tightly interwoven I was with this freelancing for this newspaper) for water services for the small office.

The company had never paid the bill, and here, more than 20 years later, I was getting it because my name was on the contract.

I panicked. I didn't have money to pay this off. My credit was going to be ruined. This was devastating!

Frantic, I tried to contact the former editor I wrote for. He's retired. I finally found him in a parking lot, and I jumped in his truck and told him I needed to talk to him. He said he didn't want to talk to me. I told him I knew where there were a massive herd of deer and that he should see it. He agreed. (I knew he'd never turn down a chance to see wildlife.) He said we were going to the Northstar (that's a restaurant in Buchanan) to eat breakfast first. Then we came to my house, where there was a herd of about 1,000 deer roaming in front of my house, and I panicked again because they were eating all the grass and the cows were going to starve.

I woke up with my jaw locked shut (happens sometimes) and my heart being over 100 beats per minute.

Now where did that come from?

Sunday Stealing

Sunday Stealing

First Job: Babysitting

First Favorite Politician: Jim Olin, who served the 6th District in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1983 to 1993.

First Record/CD: We had some Disney's children's records, including So Dear to My Heart. My first "grown up" record was, I think, the soundtrack from Grease.

First Sport Played: I never really played sport. Just softball or whatever at recess.

First Concert: The Commodores, although I don't think that's right. I think my parents took me to some country singer's concert before I snuck out to that one.

First Foreign Country Visited: Spain.

First Favorite TV Show: Land of the Giants

First Favorite Actor: Lee Majors

First Favorite Actress: Kate Jackson

First Girlfriend/Boyfriend: James. Almost all of my boyfriends were named James. I was looking for the right "James," I guess.

First Encounter with a Famous Person: That would have been when I met Virginia Governor Douglas Wilder, I believe.

First House/Condo Owned: The one I live in now.

First Film Seen: I don't recall the first. Probably some Disney flick.

First Favorite Radio Station: K-92 FM

First Book I Remember Reading: The Cat in the Hat, by Dr. Suess, when I was about four, followed by a memory of reading Bambi, by Felix Salten, when I was in the second grade. I am sure there were many others in between.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Sunday Stealing posts and leave a comment. Cheers to all us thieves who love memes, however we come by them.

Saturday 9: As Time Goes By

Saturday 9: As Time Goes By (1958)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) This song begins with, "You must remember this." Do you often write things down to help you remember?

A. I am one of those people who make lists so I can remember things, and then I lose the lists. I'm trying to do better with this.

 

2) The lyrics tell us that moonlight and love songs are never out of date. Tell us about something else that seems timeless.

A. Stories. People have told stories forever and will continue to tell stories until we've had our last war and destroyed the human race.

3) Originally written in 1931, "As Time Goes By" is best known as the love theme from the 1942 film, Casablanca. According to the American Film Institute, there's only one song from a movie soundtrack that's more expressly identified with the film: "Over the Rainbow" from The Wizard of Oz. What song reminds you of your favorite movie?

A. Into the West, by Annie Lennox, sung at the end of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. It's a beautiful song. I want it played at my funeral.

 

4) This version is from The George Sanders Touch, an LP recorded by an Oscar-winning character actor. There is scant evidence that it sold well. Tell us about something you thought was a good idea at the time, but looking back, would have done differently.

A. Freelancing for the newspaper instead of going on as a salaried reporter.

 

5) This album was really something of a consolation prize for George. He worked with a vocal coach, hoping to win the romantic lead in the film version of South Pacific, but alas, the role went to a younger man. He had fun making this record instead. Have you recently taken lemons and made lemonade? 

A. I made a chicken casserole. This may not sound like an answer to the question, but it is, because we were tired of plain ol' chicken and the casserole was good. So I took plain ol' chicken and made . . . chickenade.

6) He usually played suave but unsympathetic characters. That's why he gave his autobiography the self-aware title, Memoirs of a Professional Cad. What would you call your life story?

A. The Autobiography of Nobody

 

7) The night he won his Oscar, George Sanders accepted the statuette, bowed deeply and then, safely behind the curtain and away from cameras, surprised onlookers by crying. Have you ever cried tears of joy?

A. Not in a long, long time.

 

8) George Sanders wed perennial talk show guest and occasional actress Zsa Zsa Gabor in 1949. Sixteen years after their divorce, he married Zsa Zsa's less famous but also glamorous sister, Magda. After a month, George and Magda thought better of it and had the union annulled. Sam thinks this is one of the oddest romantic tales she's ever stumbled upon while researching Saturday 9. Have you ever known anyone who divorced one sibling and then married another? (Hallmark movies don't count.)

A. I can't think of anyone.

9) Random question: You're in a line of 25 people at the post office. How many of those other 24 are more patient at waiting than you are?

A. Two. I don't mind waiting, generally speaking. But in today's world, I would never go in the post office if there were that many people in there. Too many germs.

_______________

I encourage you to visit other participants in Saturday 9 posts and leave a comment. Because there are no rules, it is your choice. Saturday 9 players hate rules. We love memes, however.  

 

Thursday Thirteen

1. A female cardinal

2. The bird feeder

3. A sparrow

4. Oak trees

5. Sage grass

6. Wooden fence post

7. Metal fence post

8. Fence line

9. Green grass

10. Bull pine

11. Brush pile

12. Chickadee

13. Dove

These are the things I have seen out the window while I was thinking of something to write for today!

____________________

Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here if you want to read other Thursday Thirteens and/or play along. I've been playing for a while, and this is my 753rd time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday. Or so sayth the Blogger counter, anyway.

Gobble Gobble

 

It's spring turkey season!

Sunday Stealing

Sunday Stealing

15 things that make you smile

A. (1) My husband, (2) my brother, (3) my friends, (4) playing my guitar, (5) reading a good book, (6) hearing a good song, (7) seeing a sunset, (8) watching the moon rise, (9) sitting in the dark looking for shooting stars, (10) watching the deer play in the front yard, (11) an unexpected gift, (12) chocolate, (13) an unexpected visit or phone call, (14) writing something that comes out well, (15) having someone else cook.

14 things that make you frown

A. (1) Seeing the face of the former guy in my news feed, (2) hearing bad news about somebody, (3) losing something, (4) not finding the foods I'm looking for in the grocery store, (5) having to cook dinner AGAIN, (6) missing a show I want to watch, (7) not exercising like I had planned to, (8) missing a note/chord when I'm playing guitar, (9) not writing, (10) my husband tracking in dirt, (11) my current governor, (12) missing a phone call from someone I want to talk to, (13) cold weather in springtime, (14) missing a good shot when I'm taking photographs. 

13 things you see every day

A. (1) My husband, (2) my computer, (3) the Blue Ridge Mountains, (4) deer, (5) the shed, (6) the shower, (7) my medications, (8) my guitars, (9) clocks, (10) my calendar, (11) my phone, (12), my desk, (13) my glass of water.

12 things you have always wanted to try

A. (1) Going to Egypt to see the pyramids, (2) getting my Ph.D., (3) writing a book, (4) taking a cruise, (5) learning pottery, (6) walking around the world, (7) being a geologist, (8) being an archeologist, (9) playing on stage in front of 10,000 people, (10) being an astronaut and going into space, (11) acting, (12) learning to speak so I don't sound so "southern."

11 objects that mean a lot to you

A. (1) My watch, (2) my glasses, (3) my computer, (4) my Kindle, (5) my books, (6) my guitars, (7), my cameras, (8) my work hidden in the filing cabinet, (9) the journals that have my poetry published in them, (10) my blog (is that an object?), (11) my phone.

10 places you have been

A. (1) Myrtle Beach, SC, (2) Charleston, SC, (3) Williamsburg, VA, (4) Virginia Beach, VA, (5) Pocono, PA, (6) New York City, (7) Madrid, Spain, (8) Paris, France, (9) California (multiple cities), (10) Florida (Go Disney!)

9 of your favorite foods

A. (1) Baked Lays Potato Chips, (2) Watermelon, (3) chocolate (though I can't eat it much anymore), (4) eggs, (5) meatloaf, (6), chicken, (7), peas, (8) salad, (9) blueberries.

8 things you would rather be doing

A. (1) sleeping, (2) walking, (3) taking pictures, (4) driving, (5) reading, (6) playing a video game, (7) holding hands with my husband, (8) talking to a friend.

7 things you would take to a deserted island

A. (1) My glasses, (2) a big roll of duct tape, (3) a variety of seeds, (4) a big cook pot, (5) a solar powered radio/battery charger thing, (6) my kindle full of unread books, (7) a sleeping mat.

6 things you wish you never had to do

A. (1) Cook, (2) clean the toilet, (3) take out the trash, (4) work for money, (5) pick up the trash after the bear's been in the garbage, (6) cut down a tree.

5 people that mean the world to you

A. (1) My husband, (2) My brother, (3) My father, (4) my friend, (5) my mother-in-law.

4 of your biggest fears

A. (1) not having enough money in my old age, (2) losing my husband, (3) losing my eyesight, (4) getting pancreatic cancer.

3 words to describe how you feel right now

A. (1) Tired, (2) Lonely, (3) Confused.

2 things you're excited for

A. (1) My husband is eventually going to have a hip replacement so he will be out of pain, if we can ever get the surgery scheduled, (2) getting a haircut.

1 thing you want to say to someone

A. "You are the enemy of this country, you should be in jail, and I don't understand why you're still walking the streets."

__________

I encourage you to visit other participants in Sunday Stealing posts and leave a comment. Cheers to all us thieves who love memes, however we come by them.

Saturday 9: Dancing in the Moonlight

Saturday 9: Dancing in the Moonlight (1972)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

 

1) The lyrics tell us the moon is big and bright. Do you often take the time to watch the sun set or look at the moon?

A. I do. This morning I was out early with the camera trying to get a picture of the sunrise, but to get the picture I wanted I needed to walk out in the wet grass, and I was still in my robe and slippers. So, I settled for a shot of the moon, which was still high in the sky. A children's moon, I call it.

Sunrise. I wanted to get the mountains behind the trees.

Early morning Children's Moon.

2) The lead singer of King Harvest, Dave "Doc" Robinson, tells us that everyone feels "warm and right." How would you describe your mood as you answer these 9 questions?

A. I have been in a bit of a funk for a good while now, but these are decent questions. Saturday 9 always has good questions.

3) He sings that his friends don't bark or bite. What about you? Is your bark worse than your bite?

A. I think so. I haven't bitten anyone in quite a while.

 

4) He believes you cannot be unhappy when you dance. Do you agree?

A. I think you can be unhappy when you dance, but it can also cheer one up a bit.

 

5) King Harvest was not the only name the band used. They once performed as E. Rodney Jones and the Prairie Dogs. If you ever played in a band, tell us what it was called. If you haven't, make up a band name.

A. I played in a band called Almost Famous, and this was in the 1970s, long before there was a movie out with that name. My father also had a band. His was called Music Incorporated. If I were going to have a band now, I think I would call it Blue Magic Music, after my blog.

Me getting down with Almost Famous.

6) Even though this was a major hit, King Harvest's record label, Perception, went bankrupt in 1974. This decade has been hard on many businesses -- especially restaurants -- and many closed their doors due to covid. Tell us about a shop or restaurant that closed recently, and that you miss.

A. I don't have an answer to this. I know we've had businesses close, but I did not frequent them generally, so I don't miss them.

7) This very upbeat song came from pain. While vacationing in St. Croix, songwriter Sherman Kelly was the victim of vicious gang attack and was left for dead. He wrote this song during his long recuperation, and it helped him envision joy. Is there a song that reliably lifts your mood? (Yes, you can say this song. Mr. Kelly is right, it IS joyful!)

A. Uptown Funk, I Can See Clearly Now, and Band on the Run.

 

8) In 1972, when this song topped the charts, Wrangler jeans were America's best-selling blue jeans. Do you often wear denim?

A. I wear old lady denim.

9) Random question: Which of these is completely, 100% UNTRUE of you: Greedy, lazy, or jealous?

A. I don't think those can be completely untrue of anyone. Everyone has some pinch of those qualities of some sort or another. One can be greedy with money, food, possessions, or people one knows. One can be industrious about work but lazy about doing home chores. One can be jealous of another's success, or jealous of another's wealth, and so on and so forth. What matters is not that we experience these emotions, but how we react to them, and whether or not that emotion leads to action, for good or ill.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Saturday 9 posts and leave a comment. Because there are no rules, it is your choice. Saturday 9 players hate rules. We love memes, however.  

Periwinkle

I ran across this patch of periwinkle* in the hollow of the lower pasture next to the woods. I thought it a strange place to find a flower I normally associated with a house garden but have since learned it is considered an invasive plant now, having "escaped" from old homesteads and gardens and now flourishing freely along highways and forest edges.

It's still a pretty ground cover, but I will leave it at the edge of the woods and not move it up near the house.

*At least, I think it's periwinkle.

Thursday Thirteen

We are all familiar with fairy tales - but mostly the Disney versions. The actual fairy tales are generally much darker than what we have seen portrayed on the screen.

Here is a list of 13 fairy tales. Do you know any of them?

1. "Puss in Boots" (1697). This Italian fairy tale, later spread throughout the rest of Europe, is about an anthropomorphic cat who uses trickery and deceit to gain power, wealth, and the hand of a princess in marriage for his penniless and low-born master. 

2. "Chicken Little", aka "Henny Penny." Dates back 25 centuries or more. A European folk tale with a moral in the form of a cumulative tale about a chicken who believes that the world is coming to an end. The phrase "The sky is falling!" features prominently in the story and has passed into the English language as a common idiom indicating a hysterical or mistaken belief that disaster is imminent.

3. "Aladdin." Date unknown. This Middle Eastern folk tale is associated with The Book of One Thousand and One Nights (The Arabian Nights), despite not being part of the original text.

4. "Goldilocks and the Three Bears" (1837). This British fairy tale has three versions. The original version of the tale tells of a not-so-polite old woman who enters the forest home of three bachelor bears while they are away. She sits in their chairs, eats some of their soup, sits down on one of their chairs and breaks it, and sleeps in one of their beds. When the bears return and discover her, she wakes up, jumps out of the window, and is never seen again. The second version replaced the old woman with a little girl named Goldilocks, and the third and by far best-known version replaced the original bear trio with Papa Bear, Mama Bear, and Baby Bear.

5. "Jack and the Beanstalk" aka "The Story of Jack Spriggins and the Enchanted Bean" (1734). Jack, a poor country boy, trades the family cow for a handful of magic beans, which grow into a massive, towering beanstalk reaching up into the clouds. Jack climbs the beanstalk and finds himself in the castle of an unfriendly giant. The giant senses Jack's presence and cries,

Fee-fi-fo-fum!

I smell the blood of an Englishman.

Be he alive, or be he dead,

I'll grind his bones to make my bread.

Outwitting the giant, Jack is able to retrieve many goods once stolen from his family, including a bag of gold, an enchanted goose that lays golden eggs and a magic golden harp that plays and sings by itself. Jack then escapes by chopping down the beanstalk. The giant, who is pursuing him, falls to his death, and Jack and his family prosper.

6. "The Monkey's Paw" (1902). In the horror story, three wishes are granted to the owner of The Monkey's Paw, but the wishes come with an enormous price for interfering with fate.

7. "The Three Little Pigs" (pre-1840). This fable is about three pigs who build three houses of different materials. A Big Bad Wolf blows down the first two pigs' houses, made of straw and sticks respectively, but is unable to destroy the third pig's house, made of bricks.

8. "Tom Thumb" (1621). This was the first fairy tale printed in English. Tom is no bigger than his father's thumb, and his adventures include being swallowed by a cow, tangling with giants, and becoming a favorite of King Arthur.

9.  "Cinderella" or "The Little Glass Slipper", is a folk tale known throughout the world and one of the oldest of such stories. The protagonist is a young woman living in forsaken circumstances that are suddenly changed to remarkable fortune, with her ascension to the throne via marriage. The story of Rhodopis, recounted by the Greek geographer Strabo sometime between around 7 BC and AD 23, about a Greek slave girl who marries the king of Egypt, is usually considered to be the earliest known variant of the Cinderella story.

10. "Sleeping Beauty" (between 1330 and 1344). This classic fairy tale is about a princess who is cursed to sleep for a hundred years by an evil fairy, to be awakened by a handsome prince at the end of them. The good fairy, realizing that the princess would be frightened if alone when she awakens, uses her wand to put every living person and animal in the palace asleep, to awaken when the princess does.

11. "The Elves and The Shoemaker" (1812). This fairy tale is about a poor shoemaker who receives much-needed help from three young helpful elves.

12. "The Fisherman and His Wife" (1812). In this tale, a poor fisherman lives with his wife in a hovel by the sea. One day the fisherman catches a fish, which claims to be a one that can grant wishes and begs to be set free. The fisherman kindly releases it. When his wife hears the story, she says he ought to have had the fish grant him a wish. She insists that he go back and ask the flounder to grant her wish for a nice house.

The fisherman reluctantly returns to the shore but is uneasy when he finds that the sea seems to become turbid, as it was so clear before. He makes up a rhyme to summon the flounder, and it grants the wife's wish. The fisherman is pleased with his new wealth, but the wife is not and demands more, and demands that her husband go back and wish that he be made a king. Reluctantly, he does and gets his wish. But again and again, his wife sends him back to ask for more and more. The fisherman knows this is wrong but there is no reasoning with his wife. He says they should not annoy the flounder, and be content with what they have been given, but his wife is not content. Each time, the flounder grants the wishes with the words: "just go home again, she has it already" or similar, but each time the sea grows rougher and rougher.

Eventually, the wife wishes to command the sun, moon, and heavens, and she sends her husband to the flounder with the wish "I want to become equal to God". Instead of granting this, the flounder just tells the fisherman to go home, stating that "she is sitting in her old hovel again". And with that, the sea becomes calm once more, and the fisherman and his wife are once more living in nothing but their old, dirty hovel. 

(This is one of my favorites.)

13."The Frog Prince" 1842.  In this tale, a spoiled princess reluctantly befriends the Frog Prince, whom she met after dropping a golden ball into a pond under a linden tree, and he retrieves it for her in exchange for her friendship. The Frog Prince, who is under a wicked fairy's spell, magically transforms back into a handsome prince. In the original Grimm version of the story, the frog's spell was broken when the princess threw the frog against the wall, at which he transformed back into a prince, while in modern versions the transformation is triggered by the princess kissing the frog. In other early versions, it was sufficient for the frog to spend the night on the princess' pillow.

Do you have a favorite fairy tale? There are many, many more.

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Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here if you want to read other Thursday Thirteens and/or play along. I've been playing for a while, and this is my 753rd time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday. Or so sayth the Blogger counter, anyway.

Redbud and Dogwood

I shot these photos on Sunday; on Monday, we had sleet, snow, and ice. Good ol' Virginia weather!

Mooving On In

My husband and I took a ride on the utility vehicle Saturday evening. Usually, when he visits the cows in the Kawasaki Mule, he takes them sweet feed. 

 The cows see the Mule and think, "Oh, treat!" They came after the Mule, with gusto. And got a little close.