Words & Questions

Of Cool Kids & Comments: 2 FAQ Answered. Got More Questions?

/ Ally Bean / 224 Comments

Here is why you are the cool kids  

It’s my takeaway from one of the nicest compliments I’ve received on this blog. A long time ago a blogger told me I was one of the Cool Kids a la high school.

She explained that I wasn’t one of the Popular Kids, like the jocks with their toadies or the mean girls with their wannabes. Nor was I one of the obedient Do Bees who followed all the rules.

Instead she said that I was one of the Cool Kids, a quiet rebel, sitting in the back of the class, amused by what I saw going on, able to do my own thing with my friends.

I was flattered by what she said. It jived with my perception of who I am so I decided that: 1) if you comment here you are my friend;  and 2) as such that makes you a Cool Kid, too.

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This is how I deal with comments

First of all I’m grateful to receive as many comments as I do. Cool Kids are the best. Thank you.

That being said, as many of you have noted, it does take some doing on my part to keep up with all the comments. I’ll admit this isn’t what I anticipated when I started blogging, yet I want to be friendly and conscientious because that’s the kind of blogger I am.

You understand.

Thus my approach to my comment section is to:

  • only post on days when I know I’ll have the flexibility to reply to comments as they come in;
  • check comments frequently, but not obsessively, on the first few days after I post; and
  • close comments on every post after about three weeks.

In other words, in a nutshell, I don’t turn my back on my comment section lest I be swept under and overwhelmed about replying to them.

[Also for those who are interested, HERE is something I wrote about blog comments a few years ago. The post received 388 comments. 🙄]

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Do you have more questions for me?

It’s been a long time since I asked for your questions. I’ve no specific reason why I haven’t done an AMA post recently, just no planning on my part, I guess.

So to correct this lapse and to keep things fresh & different around here, I’m asking you to leave me some questions in the comment section of this post. The questions can be about blogging or me or seeking advice for a problem.

Anything that you’re curious about.

Then starting in July, in a different post [or posts], I’ll answer your questions to the best of my ability which is to say I reserve the right to not answer any questions that I deem unreasonable.

In my answers I’ll make sure to mention you and your blog, adding a link to your blog of course so that the Cool Kids can find you.

How’s that for an incentive to ask me a question!

A Glimpse Into My Heart: Books I’ve Reread + Reader Comments About Randomness

/ Ally Bean / 231 Comments

The quote above is attributed to Francois Mauriac, French author and winner of the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize for Literature. I didn’t know a thing about this man until I researched him, btw.

If we are to believe in Mauriac’s idea, one that I have never thought about before, then it follows that by sharing which novels I’ve reread I’m letting you know who I am.

Heart-wise, that is.

However before I tell you which books I’ve reread I’m going to insert 3 provisos, lest I be misunderstood:

✅ I know that some people never reread anything, but I do reread novels. Never non-fiction though, except that I reread cookbooks which are technically non-fiction so maybe I don’t know what I’m saying here.

✅ I know that some people who read novels then see a movie based on the novel consider that like reading a book for a second time. I am not one of those people: books are books, movies are movies. They are different animals.

✅ I know that technically rereading children’s stories to a child is rereading, but I believe that doing that is not in the spirit of this exercise so I haven’t included any of those books here.

Thus, without further ado, presented in alphabetical order, here are 9 books I’ve reread as an adult:

Alice in Wonderland* by Lewis Carroll

Chocolat by Joanne Harris

Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Tom Robbins

I Capture the Castle* by Dodie Smith

Jane Eyre* by Charlotte Brontë

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

The Screwtape Letters* by C.S. Lewis

Winnie-the-Pooh* by A.A. Milne

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance* by Robert M. Pirsig

* Books on my list with an asterisk are ones included in Books Really Worth Re-Reading, a Goodreads list of 753 books.

QUESTIONS OF THE DAY

Do you ever reread books? Why or why not?

Now that I’ve revealed which books I’ve read more than once, do you feel like you’ve gotten a glimpse into my heart? OR do you think Mauriac’s idea is dubious at best?

What say you about “lame one-liner reviews” currently popular on the back covers of novels?

What book are you currently reading? Is this the first time you read it OR are you rereading it?

AND FINALLY FOUR READER COMMENTS…

About something RANDOM in your daily life:

“… there is plenty of ‘random’ in my life…. looking for things because no one ever puts anything back where it goes. (How can so many pairs of scissors possibly disappear?!?)… I’ll spend next Tuesday morning hanging small bars of soap in young peach trees to serves as deer repellent.”

~ Linda Lou

“I stopped for iced coffee from Bad Ass Coffee today. They use coffee to make their ice cubes, which tastes good, of course, but makes me happy beyond practical reasoning!”

~ Christie Hawkes

“Currently, I am on peony watch – looking out the back window all day. The older peony has already flowered and dropped all it’s petals. The newer peony (which is my favorite; don’t tell the other one) is so close to blooming that I can’t stand it.”

~ Gigi Rambles

“As for random thoughts, I was thinking of how clean my kitchen will be once my kids move out. LOL!”

~ joyroses13

In Which I Say Aloha: Metaphysical Motivation + Mango Madness

/ Ally Bean / 254 Comments

Photo by Shutterbug75 on Pixabay

Talking About Metaphysical Motivation Here

Years ago I had a yoga teacher who based each week of her class on one of the Seven Huna Principles. Are you familiar with them?

I’d forgotten about them but I found them lurking in a folder in my desk drawer where I’d tossed the folder in one of my many scattered moments. The folder contained a formal list of the principles attributed to Serge Kahili King and some of my hand-written notes about them.

Allow me to explain.

According to an article HERE at LearnReligions.com*, in the Hawaiian language ‘huna’ means ‘secret’ as in connecting to your highest self. By using the Huna Principles as guides to better personal understanding, you can “bring about healing and harmony through the power of the mind.”

I’ve listed the principles first with the Hawaiian word, then King’s definition of the word. In the brackets that follow I include information from my hand-written notes, the source of which was that yoga teacher years ago.

THE SEVEN HUNA PRINCIPLES

IKE – The world is what you think it is [This is awareness as in SEEING]

KALA – There are no limits, everything is possible [This is freedom as in CLEARING]

MAKIA – Energy flows where attention goes [This is concentration as in FOCUSING]

MANAWA – Now is the moment of power [This is persistence as in PRESENCE]

ALOHA – To love is to be happy with [This is joy as in BLESSING]

MANA – All power comes from within [This is confidence as in EMPOWERING]

PONO – Effectiveness is the measure of truth [This is wisdom as in DREAM-WEAVING]

Bingo Bango That’s Our Mango

For me this year March Madness has been Mango-centric.

My infatuation with mangoes started years ago when we visited Hawaii. Sure, when you think of that state pineapple gets top billing, but Hawaii also grows the yummiest mangoes that ever were.

I’m always on the lookout for recipes that involve fruit mangoes**.

Thus when I saw a recipe in The Washington Post’s Voraciously food section, I was intrigued. The recipe was for Mango Pudding [available HERE on the other side of a paywall that just goes to prove that Mr. Bezos is mean & greedy]. I tried it and it’s easy to make because you use a blender. I’ve made it a few times now, tweaking it each time to add a bit more flavor.

Then while researching something else I stumbled over a recipe for Mango Pie not hidden behind a paywall, available HERE on THE WOKS OF LIFE.  It’s like a peach pie with similar spices and a top crust. It looks and tastes yummy with whipped cream on it, of course.

And finally last week I found a food network recipe, available HERE sans paywall, for a Mango Bellini. This seemed like a no-brainer. I can’t figure why it never occurred to me to make one before, so I rectified that situation and made one. Then another one. Quite tasty, say the residents of Casa Bean.

* This article has what it calls a Reference Library section at the end so if you want to learn more about Huna go there.

** Should you want to know a little more about why I refer to them as “fruit mangoes” read my answer to Cee’s 2017 Share Your World question: What quirky things do people do where you are from?

Questions of the Day

What do you think of the Huna Principles? Does the wisdom contained within them ring true with you? If so, which one or ones resonate with you?

Referring back to the question I shared in the footnote above, I’ll ask you: What quirky things do people do where you are from?

Do you like mangoes? If you don’t, what’s wrong with you?

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If The Name Fits: An Absurd Conversation With An Amusing Friend

/ Ally Bean / 263 Comments

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“Oh, you got to have friends, the feeling’s oh so strong….” 🎶

A friend who I shall call Wendy was telling me about something someone had said to her that had irked her. This wasn’t a case of trash talking but she felt she’d been dissed.

The someone had told Wendy that because she was the matriarch of her family, Wendy should keep her adult children in line– and that she hadn’t been doing that.

The comment was meant to be a criticism of Wendy’s mothering skills and how her adult children lived their lives.

The person saying it to Wendy was a someone who Wendy described as a snob, a social climber, a fraud. She didn’t usually pay attention to this someone’s opinions, but in this instance Wendy was peeved.

This someone had got her goat.

I figured that Wendy had taken offense at the idea she was failing as a mother because she allowed her adult children to be who they are, but I was wrong.

That was not the case.

Nope, Wendy had no problem with a criticism leveled at her parenting skills, she didn’t care about that. What bothered Wendy was that she’d been called a Matriarch, a name she found insulting because to her it meant she was old. It was in her mind an example of agism.

[Even though Wendy is the matriarch of her family, but let’s not get stuck on reality here.]

Looking for a way to put this perceived slight into perspective, I suggested that being called a Matriarch is better than being called a Crone, an ugly old woman. That’s a word I find derogatory and Wendy agreed.

She wasn’t a Crone.

Continuing on with the idea that there are worse names to be called than Matriarch, I suggested that at least this someone hadn’t called Wendy a Sea Hag, an old witch who lives near the sea. To me that seemed more demeaning than being thought of as the head of a family with the power to influence family members.

But you know what?

Wendy liked the idea of being called a Sea Hag. She said she enjoyed walking on the beach by the ocean so the thought of being a Sea Hag made her happy. She could easily accept that name because it was more in tune with who she is.

And with that admission I said the only thing I could think to say. I said three important words that keep friendships alive, I said: I believe you.

Because I do.

Questions Of The Day

Putting aside any concerns you might have about gendered language, would you take offense if someone called you the Matriarch or Patriarch of your family? Why or why not?

Thinking of all the names, positive or negative or neutral,  you’ve been called in your life, how much do you care about the way in which someone else refers to you?

Do you feel, like I do, that friends who are able to not take themselves too seriously are put on this earth to keep you laughing with them… at yourself… at life in general?

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