13 Thursday’s Notebook List
1. My new pink sneakers were a compromise. I was going for ruby red slippers.
2. THIS is why I keep my hands in my pocket when I go to town.
3. I don’t like to use toxic pesticides. When the flies, hornets, and ladybugs crawling around my window panes get out of hand, I spray them with Windex. They drop dead pretty fast and then I clean the windows.
4. I was recently reading a blog (I forget where) and the author was complaining about how disturbed she was by the sound of her neighbors fighting. Out here in the country, I can’t even see my neighbor’s house, but the peepers and the hoot owls can get pretty loud, and the sound of foxes mating have been known to wake me in the middle of the night.
5. My husband Joe and I were trying to meditate last night, but my laptop was still turned on in the room above us. It took me awhile to figure out that the squealing I was hearing was the sound of seagulls on the lighthouse slideshow screen saver that he installed for me as a surprise. I was disturbed because it reminded me of the rats under the cupboard in the first farmhouse I rented in Floyd. Turned out they were squealing because they found and ate a bag of potatoes. I didn’t stay in that house for long.
6. “Tearing Down the House!” Update: Last weekend my son and his friends dismantled the old house on his newly purchased 2 acres of property near Asheville, which I wrote about HERE. My husband Joe made the trip to Asheville to join the house salvaging crew and to take videos of the event. HERE is a short before clip, taken at the start of that day, and HERE is an after clip of the end of day one. To be continued …
7. I once wore a crow feather in my hair for a whole summer. My kids and I once lived in a bus for a summer, but not the same summer that I wore the crow feather.
8. Last year at this time I was HERE.
9. I’ve always been interested in what celebrities real names were, like Marie Osmond’s real first name was Olive, John Wayne was Marion, and Bob Hope was Leslie. I find it odd that Dallas Burrows went to the trouble to change his name to Orson Bean and that Albert Brooks’s parents would really name him Albert Einstein.
10. If my son Josh would have been a girl, I would have named him “Rosie Ellen.” I was sure Dylan was going to be a girl and if so, I was going to name him “Rosie Ellen.” Years after my sons were born my youngest brother Bobby named his daughter Rosie Ellen. He insists that he had never heard me mention the name before.
11. It’s warm enough for me to sunbathe on the porch now. Whenever I do, at the start of warm weather, I think of this poem: Pale as spring grass … beneath un-raked leaves … my skin under clothes … is wilted and withered … My shivering flesh … is the first flower exposed … at the first sign of thaw … when green rumors come true.
12. There’s a new anti-war group forming in Floyd (April 24, 7-8 at the library) and a peace vigil on Saturdays in front of the courthouse. I’m glad to see it happening, but I don’t have much heart for it right now. I resent feeling forced to take a stand on surging or withdrawing troops in Iraq (both choices will only result in more death) when I feel it’s criminal that the invasion ever happened in the first place.
13. Veterans against the Iraq war protested at the Pentagon on the 4th anniversary of the US invasion into Iraq. See a clip HERE.
Thursday headquarters is here. My other 13’s are here. View more 13 Thursday’s here.
March 29th, 2007 9:08 am
I’ve been sunbathing almost every day, too. An hour in the sun is good for just about anything that ails me.
It doesn’t hurt that it’s been in the mid-80s here the last few days.
March 29th, 2007 9:21 am
I adore your pink shoes. And yes, the weather has been lovely this past week. Yea! spring is here.
March 29th, 2007 9:40 am
What a thoughtful, awesome post! I really enjoyed it.
March 29th, 2007 10:13 am
You really love those pink tennis shoes…. I would think there would be a pair of ruby red ones somewhere. I saw the original ruby red slippers at the Smithsonian… they look horribly uncomfortable. The older I get the more comfort takes precedent over fashion.
March 29th, 2007 10:20 am
I love you pink sneaks.
Two soliders from South Portland have been killed in the past few weeks. I have no words for how I feel about this. Every pole and tree and the city have Yellow Ribbons. It breaks my heart.
You lived in a bus? And, a crow feather would be so cool.
Happy 13!
March 29th, 2007 10:57 am
It was actually a small cabin (with no plumbing) that attached to a bus. My kids lived in the bus and I (and sometimes Joe) lived in the cabin. It was on a neighboring community farm and the cabin has since burned down. We had to leave the house we were renting and couldn’t find another fast enough, so we part-camped there for one summer.
March 29th, 2007 11:34 am
i wore a braid with feathers woven into my hair all last summer.
it was made and woven in by two beautiful jewesses at a trance festival we camped at with the lets last april this time. they wore pink ones and mine were blue/black, brown and white. though i don’t know what their previous owners were.
they all finally fell out in early september. and we were sad to see them go. the women may come back and stay at a friends yoga and meditation retreat in the village we spend our summers in. we all hope so 🙂
happy thursday sweetie. we will get to the stone soon.
March 29th, 2007 12:37 pm
I lived on a bus for awhile too, in fact, it’s where I was when I heard about John Lennon.
March 29th, 2007 2:43 pm
#1 Have you read the story about the red slippers, in “Women Who Run With The Wolves”? At a workshop I attended, we did a collage of that story and I put big red slippers in the middle of mine and it hangs in the center of the wall in my “College in the Closet”. Those red slippers do inspire me. I like your pink tennis shoes too!
#4 Dare I ask what foxes “mating” sounds like? eek
#5 lol….I’ve been known to yell, from the kitchen, “What did you say?” thinking my kids were asking me something when it was a screen saver(with voices) that they left on on the den.
#7 You are too cool. 🙂 Now I’m somewhat freaked because a month ago, I dreamed about traveling in a bus with you, your husband and your son. I shouldn’t be freaked because all my life I have had dreams that come true or are about something I didn’t know about but anyway, I”ll have to email you the details of the bus dream. I respect my dreams.
#12 Preach it, sister!
Susan
March 29th, 2007 3:24 pm
I haven’t read Women Who Run with Wolves, but I do remember well the red shoes in Hans Christian Anderson’s story The Snow Queen. That story affected me in a big way as a girl.
#4. Almost human. Or like monkeys. Lots of vocalization. I first thought kids were fooling around. I’m not even sure what it was but many in the neighborhood have heard it and I was recently told it was most likely foxes.
#7 When Dylan was little he had a thing about a bus. He would grow up to have one and would let me ride on it. He was so into it that I used to say while kissing him goognight, “Sweet dreams about your bus.”
March 29th, 2007 5:22 pm
Those pink shoes suit you :).
” I don’t like to use toxic pesticides. ” Me either, but apparently Windex is one…either that or you are just gently drowning them.
Ahh, your porch sunbathing reminds me that I need to get more sunlight on this skin of mine…
March 29th, 2007 5:41 pm
I’m pretty sure Windex is mostly ammonia, which is obviously toxic to bugs and probably to humans too in large doses. I don’t consider it as environmenally toxic as bug spray though, and why buy two products?
March 29th, 2007 6:05 pm
I loved the name “Molly” and if I had another child I would have named her “Molly.” Kathy doesn’t remember me mentioning this, do you??
March 29th, 2007 9:04 pm
I use the Windex trick on the little sugar ants that sneak into our kitchen. But what really stops them and keeps them gone is my all time favorite tip ever. We mix a box of Borax with a bag of confectionary sugar, then sprinkle it all around the house. I had a photo of my boys mixing it up in buckets earlier this week, although I didn’t say what they were doing.
March 29th, 2007 9:23 pm
i noticed those fingernails in the last post! 🙂 mine are no better most days…if you dig in the dirt at all, your fingernails don’t stay very ladylike… and i can be found digging on most warm days…
March 29th, 2007 10:22 pm
Very observant of you bluemtmama! I wondered if anyone would catch that.
March 29th, 2007 10:25 pm
I need to start including a time of meditation/quiet time in my day…I’m so bad about that! Nice blog!
March 29th, 2007 10:28 pm
My daughter loves lady bugs! We don’t have a lot of them so they are pretty cool.
Terrific Thursday Thirteen!
Thank you for your visit.
Have a wonderful day!
Happy TT’ing!
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Raggedy
March 29th, 2007 10:52 pm
Interesting list. You’ve obviously led an interesting life.
Thanks for dropping by my TT.
March 29th, 2007 11:03 pm
Since I’ve recently got 2 hearing aids, those birdies sound like they’re screaming their lungs out…especially the bluejays!
I once thought my hot tub was blubbing so I checked it but it turned out to be my underwater screensaver!
March 29th, 2007 11:19 pm
It seems to me that I spent half of my life living in a bus, but then, I’m a tour guide!
March 29th, 2007 11:59 pm
Hello: Thanks for visiting my site and suggesting an additional line for my, as yet, untitled poem.
We had a ladybug infestation in my parent’s house and it wasn’t very pleasant – you don’t mention it here – but when I first saw the baby ladybugs (larva), I was totally freaked out – they’re pretty ugly.
I found pictures of online – here – http://www.ladybuglady.com/ladybugweb9.htm
Have a great week – XINE
March 30th, 2007 6:22 am
Three cheers for Josh (#6).
I don’t remember Sherry mentioning that she loved the name Molly as she mentioned in the comments (referring to # 10).
I do though you remember you wanting “Rosie Ellen” for a little girl – had you had one. And how strange it felt when Bobby named his 2nd baby girl “Rosie Ellen.”
I felt the same when our cousin Chrissie told me that when I was 12ish, I told her that my first daughter’s name would be Chrissie. It was, but I have no recollection of having said that to her.
March 30th, 2007 8:38 am
I’ve never seen the larva! I’ll be on the lookout.
March 30th, 2007 9:35 am
Michele sent me this time.
I’ve already been here, yesterday in fact.
Had an early morning… took little Scarlett to have her surgery at the vet. Poor thing.. I hope this helps.
Did it cool down again over there? It was quite chilly here last night and my windows had frost this morning, so I guess I should hold off on those flowers I wanted to get started.
March 30th, 2007 11:02 am
“I don’t consider it as environmenally toxic as bug spray though, and why buy two products?”
True dat :).
March 30th, 2007 11:13 am
p.s. I did not mean for my first comment to sound snarky…just found the juxtaposition of the ideas funny.
I’ve been on vicodin all week, so please excuse my lack of social graces!
March 30th, 2007 3:10 pm
I’d have never thought to use Windex as a bug spray. Thanks for the hint.
March 30th, 2007 3:54 pm
I didn’t take it as snarky. Sometimes reader’s comments help me to clarify what I’m trying to say. I probably should have said “I don’t like heavy duty toxic pesticides…” I mostly thought that killing two birds (ladybugs and dirty windows)with one common household stone (windex) is kinda funny.
It’s also true that some who are reading might be grossed out by killing ladybugs at all.
March 30th, 2007 11:59 pm
I remember having perpetually dirty hands from my community garden days. There’s something about being gloveless, getting right down in there among (and thanking) the worms.
I recently used Dr. Bronner’s soap to dispatch a roach. Dr. Bronner’s is organic and decidedly non-toxic, but it is slippery and made the bug easier to corral. Once in a while I actually do kill an insect.
April 4th, 2007 1:20 pm
I deeply resent the politics that the Democratic Congress is playing with our troop’s funding. A timeline for withdrawal is the same as not only allowing defeat, at a specific hour no less, but also betraying any allies we have in the region. Good morning Vietnam!
Also, the attached domestic spending projects (i.e. pork) are also revealing of how politicians abuse our system and display the vulnerability of our taxes in a large centralized government.
Background here:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/19/opinion/main2583232.shtml?source=RSSattr=Opinion_2583232
April 5th, 2007 8:58 pm
I love the name Dallas Burrows.
And I feel the same way about a bag of potatoes… 🙂
~S