Inspiration

We survived another sleep-over with our 7 year old great-granddaughter, Ms. B! 

We picked her up from school yesterday, came home for a picnic that she set up. We sanded a couple of bedside tables that I'm going to paint. 

We came inside. She is quite the gymnastic kid so she moved a couple of items, a table, plants and ottoman, so she could do forward hand springs or stand on her hands whenever she felt the urge. She felt the urge often, sometimes in the middle of a sentence.

At one point, after an exceptionally spontaneous handspring, she sat on the ground holding her shin and announced loudly, "It hurts to be cool!"

If you ask Ms. B how old she is she will tell you "7 and a half so technically I'm 8!" She rounds up on her age but not when passing out cookies. She and The Guy (technically The Papa!) made chocolate chip cookies and ordered pizza (forget Keto this weekend).

She went home early this evening. The Papa and I took some Tylenol and are watching the clock. We don't want to be wussy and go to bed before 9 p.m. It would somehow make it official to us that our butts were kicked by a little girl. Two to One and she still kicked butt!

As soon as that long-hand hits the 12...14 minutes from now, I'm fluffing the pillow and calling it a day. Before I sleep though, I will be sending out a little prayer of gratitude...for not falling off my bike, for being able to get off the ground after the picnic, for being Ms. B's star student during a game of School, for Papa making pancakes with sprinkles and Boysenberry Syrup, and to Ms. B for inspiring me to get back on my bike and ride!

I'm sleeping good tonight because tomorrow WE RIDE!

Where's My Glasses!

 I hopped on my blog today to check out the blogs I'm following.

As I scrolled down the right side, a widget from long ago caught my eye. It is some long forgotten link proclaiming myself a Democrat. I hadn't read the description in a long time. These words are the widgets, not mine.

You are a Working Class Warrior, also known a blue-collar Democrat or Occupier.

You believe that the little guy is getting screwed by conservative greed-mongers and

 corporate criminals, and you’re not going to take it anymore.

With my reading glasses sitting next to my coffee on the table,  I had to squint with my "good eye"! "Good eye" meaning not the worst one,  I read, "the little guy get screwed by conservative good-manners!...WTF!!!!

My neck almost snapped as I reached for my readers.

                                                              "...conservative greed-mongers.".

I guess I'm going to find one of those reading  glass necklace holder thingies. Are they called Glass Retainers? I'll hippy it up with some peace-beads and keep my reading eyes safe from fake news!

Photo courtesy of Wish.com

Daily Self-Care Distractions!

Craziness going on in the world! I'm CNN-Twitter-ABCNews-PBS-ed Out! 

Need a bit of self-care, I typically self-medicate my chronic depression and anxiety with Ben & Jerry's Cherry Garcia but my thighs begged me in a dream last night to have mercy on them!

So, what can I do for the sake of my thighs and waistline? I know...random questions about things that will never be! (Sorry, gave up sanity for Lent!)

My sister posted this on FB yesterday:

Not sure of original author...sorry!

A commenter announced that they would love to have their life narrated by Morgan Freeman!

That would indeed be pretty cool but I'm a woman so as much as I love Freeman's voice (and boy do I love it) I think it would be more self-affirming and less condescending to have a woman's voice in the narration department. 

Who would you like to narrate your life story on the next Netflix Made-for-TV movie or do you think your life is Big-Screen-ish?

I've been around the sun 71 times. In that time I've had some highs and some lows but nothing big-screen worthy. My biography is definitely closer to TV, I mean if professional bowling has a show why not me Why not you, right?

After the first 10 minutes of national news, I flipped over to Ed Sheeran channel on Pandora, grabbed a soda, and tried to figure out who would be the voice to my ups, downs and long, long flatlines!

Helen Mirren. That's who I want! It was a tie between her and Emma Thompson. Deciding was a challenge until I figured Mirren should narrate and Thompson would play me!  

Now my sisters-in-law would probably suggest it be more appropriate that Roseann Barr narrate. I haven't won a lot of brownie points with them the last couple of years! We'll leave that part out of the movie!

So, share with us. 

Who would narrate your movie?

Who would be play you?

Maybe Lily Tomlin would make a better me in the movie? What actor  is a cross between Tomlin, Thompson and Cher (okay, just a little Barr)!

Next meaningless and random distraction: What characters in a movie or tv show would you hire to take Putin to the Train Station (wink wink, nudge nudge)?

Tapering Off

 Hi All (or maybe I should say (Hey ya'll!) 

The Guy and I are seriously considering selling our home on the west coast and vaulting all the way to the east coast...Virginia, that is! Or North Carolina, or, uh, maybe just Ohio!!!!

(you'll never believe how much time it's been since I started this post...I got a little distracted!)

Art courtesy of Scoot Smith

So, yeah, we're trying to taper off our deep love of California and our California-ness! There is a certain "west-coast vibe" that many this side of the country have, but we're up here in Northern California. This is where take-it-easy-don't-harsh-my-mellow does not exist, and actually could get you shot if you openly display anything but  rage and distrust! But this is not about that!

This is about being a couple of a certain age who need out! We have been through many huge fires in our life together and several mandatory evacuations and several more evac warnings. We've had summers when we can't swim in our pool because the smoke levels are "unhealthy"! It's weird that the news casters announce that smoke levels are high and we should remain indoors as if we liked walking the river trails inhaling small glowing embers!

Then there's the fact that in good ole California 66% of the cost of a gallon of gas is actually taxes! Yup 66%! But, again, this is not about that!

This is about PTSD and Drought and a bit of ignorance.

The evening news on March 3 announced Wind Warnings for the morning of March 4. You know the big red banner Wind Warning! 

Morning of March 4 the guy takes dogs for a walk. Upon returning he states, "There's smoke rising in the north hill." I responded, "Yeah, I think they're doing a controlled burn today." (they being Cal Fire)

"Not today," responds the guy. "have you seen the wind out there?"

Fifteen minutes later on scanner there is a request for a dozer at the site of controlled burn! Surprisingly (not) the fire has jumped! 

Can you imagine?

Half hour later we receive a mandatory evacuation alert on both our phones! The alert was not for our neighborhood but the fire is north of us and headed south! 

Goose bumps, chest pain, tight jaw and a couple of veins throbbing in our foreheads...NOT AGAIN!

It's only March! We need to get out of here before summer!!!

They've got it under control. Evacuations have been lifted for the immediate area of fire, The sheriff's department announced that the fire was under investigation...apparently Cal Fire was hesitant on taking responsibility for burning on a High Risk day with incredibly harsh winds but too many people have scanners and heard the first couple of calls for help go out. The next day they sent out a press release announcing that a controlled burn went out of control but nothing like, "We sincerely apologize to the Peeps of Shasta County for lighting a fire on a day we warned you all not to!"

We're going to miss this beautiful area. Mountains are my best friends and people have promised me there are mountains in Virginia, though they are a little stooped like my and The Guy!

Sunset from the lookout above Shasta Dam!

 

I swear this is through the windshield on out way to photograph lennies on the mountain. My camera lens is never that dirty!

I do know that east coast color is more vibrant than ours...maybe more of it but can it really be more vibrant.

Well, until next time...The Guy is telling me there are lennies on the mountain and we gotta get up there!

p.s. I know there is a war going on, and a pandemic and apparently some kind of civil war in the U.S. but I thought we could all use a distraction!