Games

A 5-Question Multiple-choice Pop Quiz About A Power Outage That Rankled Ms. Bean

/ Ally Bean / 203 Comments

Yes, my little huckleberries, today I have a pop quiz for you. Anyone who answers all 5 questions correctly will receive a gold star ⭐️ which, I think we can agree, is quite nice. What more could you want? 

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Q1: What was Ms. Bean doing when the power went out at 6:00 p.m. on Friday?

A. Editing a new blog post about the meaning of life.

B. Playing an old-time word game, UpWords, with her sweet patootie whilst enjoying Classic Vinyl on SiriusXM.

C. Making a chocolate soufflé to celebrate the weekend.

D. Writing a strongly worded tweet criticizing Space Karen for ruining Twitter.

Q2: What caused the power to start flickering and turn off in a dramatic ending to a long week?

A. A roofing shingle on our house came loose, crashed down onto a utility line, and *bam* no power.

B. A crazed squirrel a few blocks over ate through an electrical line and *shazam* no power.

C. Torrential rain and high winds knocked over an old tree onto an electric substation and *kapow* no power.

D. Thor the God of Thunder, son of Odin and Freya and source of the name for Thursday, had a hissy fit and *poof* no power.

Q3: What did Ms. Bean mutter when she saw realized what had happened?

A. Now what?!!

B. Where is that damned squirrel!

C. The end is nigh, repent ye sinners while ye may.

D. Holy Fricking Mole-y! I’M. NOT. HAPPY.

Q4: How long did the power outage last and what was the temperature inside the house when it came back on?

A. A few minutes then all was well again; temperature remained at 68ºF.

B. A few hours just long enough for Ms. Bean to fret about the food in the refrigerator going bad; temperature went down to 65ºF.

C. 16 hours meaning that Ms. Bean slept fitfully knowing the food in the refrigerator had gone bad, but not the freezer… yet; temperature plummeted to 56ºF.

D. over 24 hours thereby causing the food in the refrigerator and the freezer to go bad; temperature bottomed out at 54ºF.

Q5: Did Ms. Bean and Zen-Den go to the grocery store on Saturday and spend mucho dinero to buy food to replace what was in the refrigerator when the power went out?

A. Yes, of course they did.

B. Nope, the power outage was just a blip.

C. Maybe, but first they went to buy a lottery ticket feeling it’d be the best way to finance the unanticipated expense of buying food for the refrigerator again having been grocery shopping on Friday afternoon.

D. What makes you think they went grocery shopping on a Saturday?

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Simply Fun: Revisiting The “If I Were…” Prompts + Playing MASH Online

/ Ally Bean / 228 Comments

THE REVISITING PART

First jigsaw puzzle of the season is finished!

Lately I’ve been feeling nostalgic about personal blogging, missing the straightforward simplicity of my early days in the blogosphere. The following is an example of what I’m talking about.

I originally answered these prompts, that were referred to as a meme at the time, in 2011. Most of my answers have changed since then, making me 1/3 the same, 2/3 different now.  [Here is what I said back then.]

Interestingly of the six people who commented on the original post, two are still blogging and keep in touch here: J at Thinking About… and Margaret at Stargazer. Thank you both for hanging around.

And so WITHOUT FURTHER ADO, let me tell you that…

if i were a month i’d be May

if i were a day i’d be Tuesday

if i were a time of day i’d be 9:00 a.m.

if i were a font i’d be sans serif

if i were a sea animal i’d be a manatee

if i were a direction i’d be easy to understand

if i were a piece of furniture i’d be a kitchen table

if i were a liquid i’d be Sauvignon Blanc

if i were a gemstone i’d be a garnet

if i were a tree i’d be a maple

if i were a tool i’d be scissors

if i were a flower i’d be a zinnia

if i were an element of weather i’d be a zephyr

if i were a musical instrument i’d be a piano

if i were a colour i’d be teal

if i were an emotion i’d be amused

if i were a fruit i’d be an apple

if i were a sound i’d be quiet

if i were an element i’d be molybdenum

if i were a car i’d be reliable with good gas mileage

if i were a food i’d be a Parker House roll

if i were a place i’d be a locally-owned coffee shop with some outdoor seating

if i were material i’d be denim

if i were a taste i’d be slightly salty

if i were a scent i’d be orange

if i were a body part i’d be an eye

if i were a song i’d be jazz

if i were a bird i’d be a robin

if i were a gift i’d be inside a pretty gift bag

if i were a city i’d be midsize with a thriving farmers’ market and many parks

if i were a door i’d be solid wood with wrought iron hardware

if i were a pair of shoes I’d be narrow women’s walking/running shoes 

if i were a poem I’d be iambic pentameter

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THE PLAYING PART

I’ll be hyphenating my last name to Bean-Riker!

I stumbled across an online version of the childhood fortune-telling game called MASH.  I knew it as a paper and pencil game.  Maybe you played this with your friends at one time, maybe not.

If you’re unfamiliar with this game, the name is an acronym: M = mansion, A= apartment, S= shack, and H = house.  [There were subsequent versions that included I = igloo and T = tent, making the game MASH IT.]

The gist of the game was you answered a few questions, the first being based on the MASH acronym;  other questions had to do with your future life.  You wrote three answers to each question, then made a swirling line that magically showed you your future.

It was/is pure silliness, which is not necessarily a bad thing at any age.

Anyhow here’s WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW to join in…

•  To learn how to play the old-school paper and pencil version of it go here, How to Play M.A.S.H

• To play the free online version of it & get a snazzy personalized graphic go here, MASH

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And ONE LAST THING, to those who are celebrating it this Thursday, HAPPY THANKSGIVING 

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I Am Colorful, I Am Manifesting Potatoes, I Am Positive

/ Ally Bean / 171 Comments
Hello again, my gentle readers and kind lurkers!

This image represents the predominant colors found in my IG account photos during 2021. I used YEAROFCOLOUR.COM, an app, to create it.

After the strangest warmest Christmas Day on record [69ºF] and the oddest gloomiest New Year’s Day I can remember [rained all day], we here in Chez Bean are ready to get back to doing normal things this week.

Well, normal as it is now defined. That is, we are fully vaccinated, wearing masks when out & about in public, keeping away from people in general– and doing our best to not spread a deadly virus.

You know which one it is.

This is what @MAGICKMOODS, found on IG, says I am currently doing. Who knows, maybe blog posts are really just potatoes… and I’m making a hash of it here? 

To wit, Z-D is back to work on a hybrid schedule of 2 days downtown in his office/3 days at home in his upstairs bedroom office.  He likes the idea so it’s all good*.

This will be happening while I’m back to writing my usual flapdoodle & twaddle.  I never know how much longer I’m going to be writing this blog, but muse is with me and I’m feeling groovy so I shall keep going.

Plus I took a fast online test, a task as they call it, that measures verbal creativity.  The average score was 78 but mine was 93.  Not to brag but as the consummate B+ college student who was never quite smart enough to earn an A, I’m chuffed by this number.  Ha!

While I’m not known for being a relentlessly upbeat Pollyanna, these particular words from WORDSTACKS, a game on my phone, resonated with me. So I share them here.

And with that I’ll end this post by asking: what are you manifesting today?

* Zen-Den can be a bit of an absent-minded professor. He went into work yesterday, on 1 of his 2 days in the office, but came home early. Few people were around, he said, but he got a lot done. On further reflection, and a quick check of the company’s 2022 scheduled holidays, he realized he had the day off.  Uh huh 🙄

One-Liner Wednesday: A Memorable Piece Of Marital Advice From Aunt Ann

/ Ally Bean / 169 Comments

This is one of those you-can’t-make-it-up stories.

Z-D says considering all the bad advice that is on social media lately I need to share this here. It’s a story from my past that imparts some memorable advice.  

Kind of weird advice.

I swear to you that his Aunt Ann said this to me years ago. And I’ll also tell you up front that I can honestly say I took her advice to heart.

But I’m getting ahead of myself here…

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Many years ago I went to a bridal shower held for moi.  It was ostensibly for me to meet about 20 of Zen-Den’s older female relatives, but was in fact a way for them to size me up.

They were not a friendly crowd.

It was an awkward uncomfortable event for me, an introvert, a sweet little lambie tossed in among the wolves, but I did my best to be likable because back then I cared about such things.

At this shower we played a game in which all the women at the shower were to write their best piece of marital advice on a 3×5″ index card.

While they got snacks I was to read all the cards to myself, picking the card with what I believed to be the best advice.  The person who wrote this card then got the door prize.  I can’t remember what it was, but these women wanted that prize.

There was a competitive spirit amongst them.

That I do remember.

I realized immediately that this game was a trap, the Kobayashi Maru of bridal shower games.  No matter whose advice I picked I’d tick off someone and there’d be repercussions, perhaps for decades.  These were women with a penchant for holding onto resentments.

Grudges were their lifeblood.

I did not like this game, but miracle of miracles I read Aunt Ann’s piece of advice and I instantly knew that I liked it the best PLUS I realized that no one there would ever resent me for picking it.

Yes, that’s how timeless and profound it was.

Aunt Ann told me: Never start ironing your rags, because once you do, you won’t be able to stop. 

Is this not so? And was I not fortunate to have Aunt Ann point this out to me, thereby setting me on the course to a life of freedom that comes from having wrinkled rag?

Huzzah!

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To learn more about Linda G. Hill’s One-Liner Wednesday click HERE.

In Which I Answer 20 Questions Because It’s Something Fun To Do

/ Ally Bean / 165 Comments

I haven’t done anything like this in a long time, so why not change it up? After all, variety is the spice of life blogging. Therefore today I’m answering 20 questions I found on View from the Back who got them from The Life And Travels Of Mrs Suvi. 

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Your most memorable fancy dress costume?

• A few years ago I wore a purple cocktail dress with silver sparkly trim to a black-tie business event that was a horrible affair. I was physically and emotionally uncomfortable the whole evening: my dress was tight & my feet hurt while I was standing in a room filled with status-seeking people cursed with negative energy. I vowed to never do anything like it again– and I haven’t.

Which social media platform do you use the most?

• WordPress

Favourite season?

• Autumn

If you had to choose the beach or mountains, which would it be?

• I’d choose the beach because I like walking on sand, looking at the waves, searching for shells or driftwood, BUT I choose this with the proviso that I can visit the mountains whenever I want to.

What can you play very well?

• Candy Crush Soda Saga

What kind of cheese do you like?

• All non-stinky kinds

Life goal?

• To put things or ideas or people together. Metaphorically speaking I see puzzle pieces everywhere and want to make the picture whole. Or maybe I see tesserae everywhere and want to make my own mosaic. In either case I put things together.

How many cities have you lived in?

• I’ll answer this by defining cities as metropolitan regions, thus my answer is 8.

What language do you wish you could speak?

• Spanish

What can’t you stand?

• A mocking tone of voice. The idea that education is of no value. Green peppers.

If you have an hour to kill on your hands, what would you do?

• Depending on the situation I’d: go for a walk;  read a book &/or some blogs;  play a game on my phone;  or become a lounge lizard watching the people go by.

Your favorite routine?

• I’d say it’s showing up to my blog at least once a week, usually on Tuesday, and talking with everyone in the comments. Like I’m doing now. *Hi!*

When do you become hyperactive?

• When I’m forced to travel by plane, often leaving the house before the break of day, I become hyperactive with worry about locking the house and all things related to the hassle at the airport. It makes me crazy until I’m sitting at my gate.

Text message or phone call?

• Text message

Your most precious treasure?

• I like things, but as for precious treasure I’m not sure any one thing would rate that designation. I mean, any thing I have can be replaced so how precious is it really?

Your latest foreign language mistake?

• I probably mispronounced some French word. The few I know trip me up when I try to say them.

What’s the best therapy for you?

• A glass of chilled dry white wine sipped while gazing into nature

If you could be a fictional character, who would you be?

• I rather liked Piper in Charmed. She could make a great meal, stop time in order to decide what to do next, and vanquish evil when necessary. Plus she married her true love. All-in-all, she’s my kind of badass.

Where would you like to travel?

• Dreaming big here: UK. Ireland. Italy. Hawaii. Australia. NZ. Vietnam. South Africa. Argentina.

Where did you meet your spouse/partner?

• We met in college. In fact, this past Valentine’s Day we received a card from our alma mater telling us that we are among about 2,000 couples who met on campus. Of course the Valentine’s Day card was also a solicitation for monies making the card less lovable, but the factoid was interesting.

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If you decide to do this on your own blog please link back to this post so I can go read what you wrote. Deal?