The 13 Up Date
1. Sometimes when my grandsons want me to play I tell them I’m tired but if they come give me a big hug it might give me energy to play, and it works!
2. I’ve been tired a lot so I don’t think I can handle being retired.
3. The stink bugs are back. When one recently landed on my neck, I frantically brushed it off, releasing its stink, which I had to trick my mind into thinking it was a new kind of scent just to get through it.
4. Colleen to Joe: If you weigh yourself in the kitchen the scale registers a pound less than in the bathroom where the floor is not even. Joe: I don’t have any relationship with the scale.
5. I really relate to this line in Patti Smith’s new memoir, M Train: “Without noticing, I slip into a light yet lingering malaise. Not a depression, more like a fascination for melancholia, which I turn in my hand as if it were a small planet, streaked in shadow, impossibly blue.”
6. So there’s name for a person (my husband) who compulsively buys books that they don’t read, see HERE, which makes me wonder if there’s a name for a person (me) who buys more thrift shop clothes than she will ever be able to wear in one lifetime.
7. Whether you give someone an update or give them the lowdown, it basically means the same thing.
8. In 2009 I had another 13 Thursday Update that started: Last night I swore the moon looked like a Gollum with its eye on the brightest star in the sky.
9. In the past I’ve had blog entries title Blind Date, Double Date, Moon Date and Loose Leaf Star Date. 
10. Do Knot Enter HERE.
11. I covered a women’s Winter Sojourn retreat at the Floyd EcoVillage over the weekend. After my first visit Saturday morning, I got back home and discovered that I had a hen’s egg from my chicken coop in my coat pocket the whole time. It was intact!
12. The juncos stand precariously on snow / They can’t feel the ground beneath them / Their black bodies hop / like clipped silhouettes / as if they floated to the top from the underworld / How long will I live in a house of rooms / fretting that that power will go out? / Counting the days between my sister’s death / and her birthday’s fast approach? – Read the rest of January 19th HERE.
13. “When a person becomes aware of their genius and they live it and they give generously from it, they change the world, they affect the world. And when they depart everyone knows something is missing.” – Michael Meade
__________Thirteen Thursday
February 4th, 2016 12:13 am
You already have insects? We just have a few more inches of snow and a biting wind. I’m thinking it’ll be a while before we see bugs.
February 4th, 2016 12:17 am
The stink bugs come inside in the winter. They have infested Southwest VA.
February 4th, 2016 8:23 am
I enjoy your thoughts, but I love the picture of your grandson on top of the snow mountain. Thanks for sharing.
http://otherworlddiner.blogspot.com/2016/02/tips-to-turn-stories-in-your-head-into.html
February 4th, 2016 12:16 pm
12 very moving
February 4th, 2016 2:58 pm
Interesting how we can be outside of a mood and study it as if it was a work of art.
February 4th, 2016 3:30 pm
We have stink bugs, too. They keep flying into the ceiling lights at night, like moths. I also had ants in my kitchen this morning, and I have never had ants in the kitchen. I think the lack of severe cold is going to make it a very buggy summer.
February 4th, 2016 5:39 pm
I like the quote in number 5, and the pic at top. Mine
February 4th, 2016 7:02 pm
I’m with Joe on the scale issue. Screw that thing.
February 4th, 2016 7:58 pm
seems #5 is resonating with a lot of us! Joe also sounds like a hoot. Nice list!
February 5th, 2016 2:27 am
Love your 13! I can’t believe the hen’s egg was intact! Wow!
February 5th, 2016 9:53 am
#11 lucky you!
#13 🙂
GA residents have an issue with ladybugs going inside the homes. They stay until they die. When my father was so ill 3 years ago and in the hospital for a month, we saw them in his home. Friends complain every year I guess I have never seen a stinkbug…don’t recall any insect smelling bad.
February 5th, 2016 10:09 am
I had a period when I took videos of them. Here is a video of “Stink Bug with Writer’s Block Contemplates Suicide: http://looseleafnotes.com/2014/01/stink-bug-with-writers-block-contemplates-suicide/
We also had lady bug infestations a few years ago but they seem to be gone now. http://looseleafnotes.com/2007/03/bugged-by-ladybugs/
February 5th, 2016 4:49 pm
As always, my dear Colleen, a very rich and special T13. And, your poem is Beautiful and moving, my dear. I know you miss your sister terribly…..I cannot believe it is 11 years today since my sister Robin died. I miss her every day……