NaBloPoMo

Out For A Walk: Honestly Just A Nice Stroll To See Where A Bridge Used To Be

/ Ally Bean / 199 Comments

PLEASE NOTE: Yesterday Elisabeth at The Optimistic Musings Of A Pessimist interviewed me for her ongoing series featuring bloggers. I was happy to participate. Go HERE to read the interview. 

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I like November.

In my part of the midwest it’s the calm before the storm, the pause before the whirlwind of the holidays. It’s a delightful time to just BE.

Grateful for cool nights and sunny days.

Peaceful and introspective, even.

Consequently while many bloggers worldwide are participating in NaBloPoMo [National Blog Post Month] or NaNoWriMo [National Novel Writing Month], I’m feeling pleasantly detached from writing, inclined to relax into each moment without wordiness.

To wit, as a few of you may recall I used to do posts on this blog in which I shared photos of where I/we went for a walk. Recently I realized that I got away from doing that during the pandemic, shifting into writing more, photographing less.

However today in light of my mellow mood and my lack of verboseness, I’ll post the following photos I took last Friday afternoon when the sun was shining brightly.

We decided to see what was going on with a state project to replace a pedestrian bridge, on a former railroad bridge, that is part of a popular bike path. We wanted to see where the bridge used to be.

And who doesn’t like a post that includes a photo of what isn’t there anymore? 🤔   

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This photo was taken while walking through Loveland OH on a beautiful autumn afternoon.

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Locally referred to as the Loveland Bike Trail, the official name of this path is the Little Miami State Park.

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On the bike trail, which is used by runners and walkers as often as cyclists, you can find this building, the Little Miami Conservancy.

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As you get closer to the closed portion of the path you now see this sign.

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And this sign, a free parking sign, that has been tossed casually onto the ground until it is needed again.

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The pedestrian bridge that you do not see here is being replaced by The Ohio Department of Natural Resources.

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This is a photo of the Little Miami River, part of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System. It is the river over which the bridge that used to be was, and the river that will again have a pedestrian bridge over it once the new one is built.

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June 2014 NaBloPoMo: I Posted, I Commented, I Made A List & Now I’m Finished

/ Ally Bean / 35 Comments

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The final writing prompt for June 2014 NaBloPoMo is:

“Leave your readers this month with commentary about their comments.”

My commentary is: 

You, my gentle readers, are the best.  I’m grateful for your kind interest, thought-filled comments and support.  I realize that you arrived here from all over the place:

I appreciate you making your way here, and as a way of saying thank you I’ve compiled the following list of everyone with a blog who commented on The Spectacled Bean during this month.

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My List Of Blogs Written By People Who Know How To Comment

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Doesn’t Everyone Have A Sofa In The Middle Of Their Kitchen?

/ Ally Bean / 27 Comments

I’ve gotten away from talking about our home redecoration projects here on The Spectacled Bean. I don’t know why, because they continue on behind the scenes and influence my life every day.

Often because the project is in the middle of everything.

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That being said, now that I’m in the final days of NaBloPoMo June 2014 and I need something to write about, I’ll revert to my blogging roots and tell you what we’re up to around Chez Bean.

In July or August when furniture goes on sale, we are going to buy a new sofa and chair for the TV room.  This is why the current sofa got itself moved into the kitchen.  I needed to get an idea of what the TV room would look like without a large blue object influencing me.

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Now having seen the TV room, sans blue, with my makeshift ottoman-esque example of what a khaki-gold sofa might look like against the wall, I think that a neutral-colored, nubby-textured sofa and chair will look great in this room.  With lots of colorful pillows, of course.

So that, my gentle readers, is what’s going on here… right now… in the middle of our kitchen.

Even Though The Hallmark Movie Channel Has Betrayed Me, I Have Learned A Lesson

/ Ally Bean / 20 Comments

WHILE I HESITATE TO ADMIT that I’m aware of anything as sappy as The Hallmark Movie Channel, I feel that I must share with you, my gentle readers, how they have betrayed my forgiving nature.

This is a straightforward story in which I was willing to overlook their sentimental twaddle basic programming because every afternoon they were showing The Good Wife, an award-winning TV show that I’ve always wanted to see. 

In fact, I had even begun to arrange my day in such a way as to make certain that I caught at least one episode of The Good Wife, a modern-day TV show that features a strong female lead in difficult situations that she handles without Prince Charming rescuing her.

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Above is the Hallmark Movie Channel schedule for The Good Wife in which we see that the Hallmark Movie Channel just stopped showing The Good Wife.  * bippity boppity boo*  It’s gone.  Wave bye-bye.

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FURTHER, I’LL EVEN ADMIT THAT last Friday afternoon when I viewed what has now become my last episode of The Good Wife, a well-paced finely nuanced TV show, I was so thrilled by the cliff hanger plot line that I spent moments of my weekend looking forward to seeing the next episode on Monday afternoon.

But it was not to be.  No, when I sat down on Monday afternoon to watch The Good Wife, a smart TV show filled with legal issues and moral quandaries, it was not there.  Instead, The Hallmark Movie Channel was airing…  [ready for this?]… Diagnosis Murder, an old-time TV show, starring Dick Van Dyke, that I vaguely remember as something my mother used to watch way back when.

I’m hurt by this betrayal;  I won’t lie.  But mostly it confirms my suspicions that cable TV’s death is closer than we think it is.  Thanks to The Hallmark Movie Channel I’ve now learned for certain that web-based programming, like Netflix or Hulu, is the way to watch TV shows when your life is busy– and you can’t dork around with cable channels.