2015 Project 365 – Week Two

I’m definitely going to have to up my photo game next week – Dr. M took some great pictures, but I was a slacko. On the other hand, that makes this post shorter than it might have been (& it’s not very short). Ha!

Sunday, January 4^th

Thank goodness Dr. M took this selfie showing off his new cap – otherwise the only picture today might have been my screen shot of my daily walk stats. Ha!

Monday, January 5^th  

I took a picture of one of the gifts I gave Dr. M for Christmas. It made me laugh when I saw it so I had to get it for him.

Otis is ready for the winter storm!

It’s started!

Tuesday, January 6^th      

Dr. M got up at 3:00 a.m. to see how things were looking – they were looking snowy!

I took this picture when I got up – glad I had the option of working from home!

Snowy back yard.

Our neighbor called us to tell us to check out the sunset – it was fabulous!

Wednesday, January 7^th  

Back yardigans.

I laughed when I saw this in the parking lot at choir practice. In Ohio, in addition to the back license plates, cars have them in the front. I totally forget about it & pull up too far on a routine basis – thought it was funny to see evidence of someone else doing that.

The moon!

Thursday, January 8^th  

Dr. M had a meeting at school and took these pictures while he was out & about.

I decided that my hat & scarf set needed mittens. These turned out so large that I can put my regular gloves inside them. Ha!

Friday, January 9^th  

Trying out a new way to wear my scarf.

The moon!

Saturday, January 10^th      

Life in our neighborhood. Gotta say that the baby Jesus looks pretty cold!!

My dad sent us this card & it made me laugh & laugh. Dr. M put it in my office so I see it when I close my laptop – moo!

Hope everyone has a great week!

About Today

I’m satiated

Pizza, warm house, Dr. M

Blessed beyond measure

Recent Google Searches

• When is Pentecost this year?
• What is the slip stitch crochet method?
• When is the Superbowl this year?
• Does the Beactive Brace work?
• How do you do the mattress stitch?
• What is the definition of impromptu?
• What is vitamin F?
• Why is Get Fuzzy always a repeat these days?

Boy, I lead such a wild & exciting life – I’d better erase my search history right away! 

Throwback Thursday

Wordless Wednesday

Book Review Tuesday

This has nothing to do with books - but I wanted to share a bit of today's snow with you...

Before we get down to it - go check out Dr. M's blog here. He's talking about his grandfather, and great-grandfather, and the one before that, and the one before that... Very interesting!

My last edition of Book Review Tuesday was a four weeks ago, and yet I've only read four books since then. I guess Christmas slowed me down...

1. We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, by Karen Joy Fowler. Meet the Cooke family. Our narrator is Rosemary Cooke. As a child, she never stopped talking; as a young woman, she has wrapped herself in silence: the silence of intentional forgetting, of protective cover. Something happened, something so awful she has buried it in the recesses of her mind. Now her adored older brother is a fugitive, wanted by the FBI for domestic terrorism. And her once lively mother is a shell of her former self, her clever and imperious father now a distant, brooding man. And Fern, Rosemary’s beloved sister, her accomplice in all their childhood mischief? Fern’s is a fate the family, in all their innocence, could never have imagined. 

The Bug Says: This was a book club book. What a very interesting book! I listened the audio version. The narration was pretty good, other than the fact that the narrator? Liked to put questions into the middle of many sentences. But the book! I'm not going to give away the big reveal (which comes about a third of the way into the book, & probably I'm the only person in the world who didn't already know), but I was fascinated by the whole concept. And very very very (very!) sad about it too. Wow. I gave it four stars.

2.  The Edge of Light (At Home in Beldon Grove #1), by Ann Shorey. It is the summer of 1838 in St. Lawrenceville, Missouri, and Molly McGarvie's life is about to change forever. When her beloved Samuel succumbs to cholera, Molly is heartbroken but determined to take care of herself and her children. But when Samuel's unscrupulous brother takes over the family business and leaves Molly to fend for herself, she knows she must head out on her own. It is a dangerous journey and Molly has to leave her old life behind. Somehow she must find a way to make a living, keep her family together, and fend off some over-eager suitors.

The Bug Says: This was my Kindle freebie for book club. I enjoyed this story about a woman trying to care for herself and her children on the frontier. She even comes up with a way to earn money or barter for goods. And there's a side story about her best friend who is a slave. But I gave it three stars because the writing style was choppy. There might be an unpleasant event about to happen, and the book would skip it entirely & just refer to it in the past. On the other hand it was a very quick read!  

3. White Fire (Pendergast #13), by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child. Special Agent Pendergast arrives at an exclusive Colorado ski resort to rescue his protégée, Corrie Swanson, from serious trouble with the law. His sudden appearance coincides with the first attack of a murderous arsonist who--with brutal precision--begins burning down multimillion-dollar mansions with the families locked inside. After springing Corrie from jail, Pendergast learns she made a discovery while examining the bones of several miners who were killed 150 years earlier by a rogue grizzly bear. Her finding is so astonishing that it, even more than the arsonist, threatens the resort's very existence. Drawn deeper into the investigation, Pendergast uncovers a mysterious connection between the dead miners and a fabled, long-lost Sherlock Holmes story--one that might just offer the key to the modern day killings as well. Now, with the ski resort snowed in and under savage attack--and Corrie's life suddenly in grave danger--Pendergast must solve the enigma of the past before the town of the present goes up in flames.

The Bug Says: You know, I was about to say that I don't know why I keep reading these Pendergast novels because they've just jumped the shark too many times. But really, this whole series, from beginning to end, is just outrageous & unbelievable. And frankly I eat it up. In this one the Corrie character repeatedly did really dumb things, and that was frustrating to me because I think of her as smarter than that. But as I recall, she was equally foolhardy in all the other books, so I suppose she stayed in character. This book was interesting because of the Sherlock Holmes connection, but I just gave it 3 stars because it wasn't quite as good as other Pendergast books I've read.

4. Festive in Death (In Death #39), by J.D. Robb. Eve Dallas deals with a homicide—and the holiday season—in the latest from the #1 New York Times bestselling author. Personal trainer Trey Ziegler was in peak physical condition. If you didn't count the kitchen knife in his well-toned chest. Lieutenant Eve Dallas soon discovers a lineup of women who'd been loved and left by the narcissistic gym rat. While Dallas sorts through the list of Ziegler's enemies, she's also dealing with her Christmas shopping list—plus the guest list for her and her billionaire husband's upcoming holiday bash. Feeling less than festive, Dallas tries to put aside her distaste for the victim and solve the mystery of his death. There are just a few investigating days left before Christmas, and as New Year's 2061 approaches, this homicide cop is resolved to stop a cold-blooded killer.

The Bug Says: Oh I just love Eve Dallas and her sidekick Peabody. These books are a special treat for me. I like some of them better than others, & this is one of the good ones. I gave it four stars.

Currently, I'm reading Still Midnight, by Denise Mina (a Scottish police procedural), and A Long Way Home, by Louise Penny (an Inspector Gamache mystery). Frankly I could listen to Louise Penny's characters just talk about cheese all day - a mystery is icing on the cake!

What are you reading?

Monday Miscellaney

Yep, it's a Monday all right - especially one after a holiday week. I had to get up early & head out into the frozen tundra (well, ok, 10 degree Ohio farmland), and then I had to actually work all day before I got to drive back through the frozen suburbs & naked fields to our little house where I got to eat a bowl of vegetable beef soup made by Dr. M. Hmmm - I guess that's not so bad after all... Plus I got to wear my new hat!

I don't think this big brother stuff is working out so well. I don't understand why, after I've made an online purchase, those exact same items are the ones that show up as ads on Facebook & other ad-driven places. "Why yes, that is a fine looking handbag, and I don't mind admiring the picture of the one I purchased, but I only need the one thanks." Odd. They'd do better to show me pictures of matching shoes!

Did you guys know that it's the Year of the Sheep? Baaa! In honor of that we've put up some of Dr. M's Sheep Incognito prints that I've given him over the years. Here are a couple of them:

Hairy Potter

Haulin' Ass

2015 Project 365 – Week One

Welcome to week one of the year! This week is all about the moon – and thank goodness for that because otherwise the only picture for Friday would have been that empty cookie bag I posted the other day. I’m also including the last of the Daily Walk pictures that I took.

Sunday, December 28^th

Heading home today, but as is my usual practice, I went to the nursing home to sing with my dad & aunts (they lead the singing before the Sunday School service & then they scoot over to their churches).

Dr. M took some last photos of birds at my dad’s house.

Goodbye Blue Ridge!

Late in the afternoon we saw a murmuration of starlings – so cool! Sadly, the iPhone photos are pretty bad. I don’t know if it would have been any better, but I’m thinking about putting my point & shoot camera in the car for just such occasions.

My daily walk – gazelling after we got home. I was gazing lovingly at my new Toms shoes that I purchased on our shopping trip on Saturday.

Monday, December 29^th  

The sparrows were very glad to see Dr. M!

My daily walk – sheepy version.

Tuesday, December 30^th      

Our neighbor’s nativity set.

Frozen cement pond.

My daily walk. That softball was just a bit out of place…

Wednesday, December 31^st

Middle of the night moon.

I picked the wrong day to try a new hair product. I was going to scrunch my hair & let it air dry. Then I saw that it was 10 degrees. My penguin hat didn’t really help with the scrunching process. Ha!

Early evening moon.

My daily walk – listening to a very gruesome murder mystery!  

Thursday, January 1^st

I’ve been thinking about my grandmother, so I asked Dr. M to get me little boxes of raisins. She often gave us raisins for Christmas. (Or maybe it was once & I’ve remembered it as often – ha!)

My last daily walk photo op!

The moon…

Friday, January 2^nd  

The moon!

Saturday, January 3^rd     

Dr. M & I were out & about and saw this giant inflatable nutcracker. Also liked the lighthouse. Also, penguin!

I had been wanting a hat to match my crazy scarf (other than the penguin hat), so I whipped this one up tonight. Easy peasy - & it actually fits my head!

Hope everyone has a great week!

About Today

We’re beyond puddles

Rain roils impromptu rivers

Saturated earth

Housekeeping

No no, not THAT kind of housekeeping. I've been threatening to dust for days, but so far all I've done is glare at it, hoping it will slink away in terror. Unfortunately this is some hard core dust. Sigh.

I finally decided what to do about P365. You'll be delighted to know that I'm going to continue with it, with one big change: I'm no longer going to take pictures of myself while walking. I'm still going to walk (or Move Vigorously) every day, but you'll just have to imagine what that looks like. Instead I'm going to do a screen shot of my walk stats & post them to Facebook each day. I decided that it would be more motivating if I had to show people what I actually did (10 minute stroll around the mall, or 30 minute session on the Gazelle - which would you be less ashamed to post?). I'll probably do a weekly summary on here in some manner.

If I'm not posting walking pictures that means that I have to actually be intentional about taking real pictures. Here is the one I've taken so far today:

Empty bag that once held cookies

So, you know, I'm pretty excited about it. 2015 is gonna be a GREAT year!

P.S. My dad informed me that I could scoot around in that little rolling chair thing so fast he could barely keep up. That made me laugh out loud - little Bug on the move!

Throwback Thursday

Heading out with daddy. After looking at that rolling chair thing I decided that I must be an antique - ha!