Saturday Morning At The Grocery: Of Red Blazers And Rousing Enthusiasm

January 18, 2017January 18, 2017 / Ally Bean / 44 Comments

You know, my gentle readers, that you can always count me in for some harmless unexpected looniness…

• Walking into our small town Kroger on Saturday morning around 11:30 a.m. I chanced upon a group of people, clapping loudly, who were, depending on your point of view, blocking my path OR gathering together in the floral department to watch an important event.

[I’ll go with the latter explanation.]

Looking in the direction that everyone was looking, I saw 8, maybe 10, little old white-haired ladies, all dressed in bright red blazers. Some of the ladies were in wheel chairs. Some, seated on folding chairs, had their walkers beside them. A couple were standing on their own.

Despite their matching crimson attire, these little old ladies didn’t look they were emissaries from the Devil sent to steal my soul, so I decided to join in and clap too.

# # #

• Naturally I wanted to know what was going on, so I continued to watch. First, an older gentleman, our MC, dressed to the nines in his Sunday best, mumbled something into a microphone… and we all clapped and nodded in agreement with him.

Then with a dramatic flourish of his arms, which left him wobbly, he pulled a shiny white polyester tablecloth off an easel that was tucked in among the roses. Being a latecomer to this event I hadn’t noticed the easel before, but I could tell that underneath that tablecloth was a piece of art.

The crowd, upon seeing the art, oohed and aahed… and we all clapped enthusiastically.

The MC, still tottering, then presented a large award plaque, presumably for first place in whatever this event was about, to one of the little old ladies… and we all clapped and smiled in her direction.

Continuing on, he slowly handed smaller awards to the other little old ladies in the bright red blazers… and we all clapped as each individual received her award.

# # #

• Now I know it’s often said that kids today get too many participation trophies that devalue the winner’s accomplishment, while falsely inflating the value of everyone else’s contribution. And that may be true.

But after seeing the joy on these little old ladies’ faces, I’m going to suggest that when it comes to a Senior Citizen Art Event In The Floral Department Of Your Local Grocery, it hurts no one to give participation plaques to everyone involved.

Especially when each recipient, upon receiving a plaque, grins like the cute kid she used to be.

What Was This Week All About? Anxiety, Awareness, Acrimony, And Adjustments

January 14, 2017August 5, 2020 / Ally Bean / 55 Comments

This has been a ridiculous week. MY MIND AND SPIRIT ARE WHACKED, ON EDGE. In fact, so much so that I’m going to write a listicle instead of a proper post To Remember It all.

• • •

In no particular order…

√ ANXIETY: Our normal temperature for this time of year would be 39ºF. However, on Monday morning it was 7ºF here with a wind chill close to 0ºF, a light dusting of snow everywhere. By Thursday morning, after 65 mph winds on Wednesday night that took down many tree limbs, our temp was 65ºF. Right now on Saturday morning it’s 35ºF outside with gray skies.

These extreme temperature fluctuations make me nervous– and put a wrinkle [pun intended] in my early morning “what to wear?” decision-making process.

√ AWARENESS: I’ve always said that I believe that education is everything. I was naively referring to learning about language and history and math and science and critical thinking and how to get along with people. I was not thinking about learning new terms for sexual deviancy, but thanks to our PEOTUS I now know more about said topic. Unless you’ve been visiting Mars this week you do too, right?

Perhaps we should change the aforementioned acronym to mean Pervert Elect Of The United States.

√ ACRIMONY: I’m disappointed to know that one member of the board at LL Bean, a woman who is a descendent of the founder, has used her vast wealth to fund The Donald’s campaign. I agree in part with the current LL Bean Executive Chairman’s FB message [instead of a proper press release?] reminding us that this woman is free to do whatever she chooses with her money, but I disagree with him about how her behavior does not reflect upon the company.

A company’s board of directors, chosen for their acumen, is the brains behind a company, and as such whatever a director values will influence [obviously] his or her input into how the company operates. Thus any connection to anything or anyone dodgy [Hello Donald] casts doubt on the way the whole company is run.

Not saying I won’t shop there in the future, but it’ll no longer be the first place I go to when I need clothes, bedding, sporting equipment, outdoor furniture.

√ ADJUSTMENTS: My iPad, which by techie standards would be a great-great-grandma, is doing wonky things. It has taken to tweeting not what I write, but a link to the last article that I read. Fortunately I’m not ashamed of anything that research and read, so that aspect of this problem isn’t what worries me. No, it’s the fact that great-great-grandma seems to be on a tweeting bender. The poor dear just can’t help herself. Nor can I.

So I deleted my Twitter app from my iPad and this week have lived a life in which I only see Twitter when I’m using my desktop computer, which means not so often.

• • •

Pillow Talk: Of Snowy Nights and Annoying Logic

January 10, 2017 / Ally Bean / 60 Comments

IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT I woke up with itchy eyes. I have lots of boring medical problems with my eyes so this happens.

Downstairs on the kitchen counter was a bottle of prescription eye drops that I knew would relieve my itchy eyes, but it was all. the. way. downstairs. and I was toasty warm in our bed upstairs.

Botheration.

However, I couldn’t get back to sleep so I begrudgingly got up and went downstairs at 3:00 a.m. to instill [that’s medical lingo!] a drop in each eye.

Of course while I was downstairs waiting for the drops to do their thing, I glanced out the window to see what was happening outside.

Curiosity. Or habit. Maybe both.

I dunno for sure, but I took a look-see. Just ‘cuz.

~ • ~

Is this me OR is this a showgirl featured in a promotional photo for the New York World’s Fair (1939-1940)? { source }

~ • ~

ABOUT FIVE MINUTES LATER I WENT back upstairs to bed where I thought I quietly slipped into bed again. But apparently my blanket shuffling was more disruptive than I realized and I awakened Z-D.

After politely inquiring if I was “ok” Z-D, who knows my habits, asked what the weather was like outside. I told him that it had snowed, but that it had only snowed on the grass, not on the sidewalk, driveway, and street.

He mumbled: “that can’t be.”

I assured him that was what had happened outside. It had snowed on the lawn, not on the hard surfaces. I’d seen it.

Again he said: “can’t happen.”

Then he rolled over away from me taking the covers with him and began to snore. I would have ignored him entirely but he had swiped too much of the blanket and I wanted my part back.

~ • ~

Is this our bedroom OR is this a photo from the New York World’s Fair (1939-1940) Town of Tomorrow Exhibit? { source }

~ • ~

SO I TUGGED ON THE BLANKET which roused him again.

At which point, in his sleepy daze as if the conversation about the weather was still ongoing, he said to me: “you’d have to be some kind of stupid to not know that snow falls on everything outside. It just doesn’t land on the grass, it falls on hard surfaces, too, where you don’t see it because it’s melted.”

And with that he fell fast asleep, leaving me, the stupid person, to realize that: 1) he was absolutely right; & 2) I had no more interest in talking to him if he was going to use annoying old logic.

I mean, really– this is a man who can’t find his car keys at noon when they’re on the kitchen counter right in front of him, but he can tap into meteorological reasoning when awakened from a sound sleep in the middle of the night?

Who does that? Honestly…

Meh.

One Word 2017: When The Words Don’t Seem Right, What Do You Do?

January 5, 2017May 6, 2021 / Ally Bean / 64 Comments

{ File this under: NEVER TAKE YOURSELF TOO SERIOUSLY }

• A FEW WEEKS AGO WHEN I began to think about what my One Word for this year would be I was sure it’d be SMART. My egotistical little brain that craves attention told me that this word was a good one. But after The Orange One made reference to Putin being smart I could not, in good conscience, use the now tainted word “smart” as my one word.

• THEN WHILE READING A CHRISTMAS GIFT, a wonderful book of essays called I’m Judging You: The Do-Better Manual by Luvvie Ajayi, the word BETTER seemed like it’d be my One Word. But the more I thought about this word the less applicable it seemed to my overall mind-set right now.

It’s not that I don’t want to strive to be a better version of me, I do; it’s just that I feel that “better” could be anxiety-producing for me, a reformed semi-perfectionist who has finally become comfortable with the concept of good enough.

• WELL, ON NEW YEAR’S EVE I still had not decided on a word for 2017. In a last-ditch effort to discern what my One Word would be, I approached the problem in a less cerebral, more spiritual way. That is, as I drifted off to sleep I intentionally put the question into my mind, so that when I awakened the next morning the first thing I thought about would be my answer.

And my spirit didn’t let me down. No, thanks to it I had a word for 2017 that allows me to creatively incorporate the essence of smartness with the desire for betterment. Yes, my whole being told me in no uncertain terms to: RELAX.

So I think I will. 😉