QOTD

Ain’t We Just: Rambling Thoughts About Superpowers And Using The Powers For Good

/ Ally Bean / 190 Comments

Let’s just say for purposes of discussion that my superpower is mind reading. A fact [?] I discerned after taking this nifty National Geographic Superpower Quiz.

You see, and this was news to me but considering the source we must conclude that, superpowers aren’t just for fictional characters anymore. To wit, I proudly tell you this is who I am:

“You can read minds! Well, not exactly, but you’re very aware of how others feel.” Yep, true dat

Naturally I wanted to get a deeper understanding of who I am so I went to my old friend, Merriam-Webster, to research the word.

As one does.

According to M-W a “mind reader” is “one that professes or is held to be able to perceive another’s thought without normal means of communication” and that the first known use of the word, which in this case is actually two words but who am I to argue with M-W’s way of explaining things, occurred in 1875.

[A studious aside: In case you’re unfamiliar with M-W’s Time Traveler feature it’s fun for a wordy person. To see what it is like, click HERE and learn what other words* were new in 1875. Information like this is available under most definitions, just scroll down the page to the feature.]

Anyhoo, getting back to the discussion aspect of this post, after learning the aforementioned I started pondering, in an abstract rhetorical way, about how does one use any superpower for good:

• In general do you think, like I do, that determining and acknowledging your superpower is one thing? But implementing it, like a hero** not a villain, is another thing? Two different skill sets, two different moral cores

• And further, specifically, what do you do with the ability to read minds? It’s one thing to know what someone else is thinking but that doesn’t mean you have the capacity, or desire, to change their mind. ‘Ya know?

QUESTIONS OF THE DAY

If you took the quiz, what is your superpower? OR if you don’t need a quiz to know your superpower, what is it?

Are you a wordy person who likes knowing a bit more about interesting words that appear in your life? Is Merriam-Webster your old friend, too?

When you think about fictional heroes with superpowers who comes to mind? Is the source from myths, literature, movies, TV shows, cartoons, comics, or games? Other?

~ ~ • ~ ~

* Ilsa Rey from Writing and Martial Arts is going to find one of the words on the 1875 list, linked to above, especially pertinent. Yep, I’m a mind reader.

** When I think of the word “hero” this brief conversation from the TV show Firefly flashes through my mind:

  • Mal: “Well, look at this. It appears that we got here just in the nick of time. What does that make us?”
  • Mal: “Ain’t we just.”

Home Sweet Home: Do You Know Where You Belong?

/ Ally Bean / 181 Comments

The Tale [Or Tail] Of An Unexpected Visitor

I wanted to sweep leaves off our deck, it being autumn and all, so I’d opened one of the French doors between our dining room and screened-in porch, leaving it open behind me, then I stepped outside into the screened-in porch.

I had a sense of purpose.

These are the steps that Cookie walked up.

Next I opened the door from the screened-in porch to the deck propping the door to the deck open. I began sweeping the leaves off the deck, attentive to what I was doing, when something from the yard, that had climbed up the stairs to our deck, dashed past me.

Like a black and white canine thunderbolt. 

This is the deck that Cookie ran across going through the screen door that was open at the time into the screened-in porch.

I pivoted quickly to see Cookie, our neighbor’s Dalmatian-Great Dane mix, go running across our deck into our screened-in porch through the door I’d propped open.

Never expecting an uninvited visitor.

These are the French doors that Cookie walked through from the screened-in porch into our dining room.

Then faster than you can say “Jack be nimble, Jack be quick” while still standing on the deck I looked through the sliding door that leads from the deck into the kitchen or vice versa. This is when I saw Cookie, the happy-go-lucky goofball, inside our house looking out at me.

Through a locked door.

This is the spot in our kitchen where Cookie stopped moving, choosing instead to stare outside at me still on the deck.

So I ran across the deck into the screened-in porch, through the dining room, around the corner into the kitchen where Cookie was patiently waiting for me to feed her. Or so I assume.

What did I do?

This is Drags pretending to be Cookie so that you can get the idea of what I saw inside my house, on the other side of the locked door, while still standing outside on the deck.

Welp, I conned her out of our kitchen through the foyer toward the front door by shouting “WALKIES” and she fell for it by following me. I opened our front door, she stepped out, and I instructed her to “go home” while pointing in the direction of her house. And with that, slightly confused but obedient, Cookie trotted off.

To her home sweet home.

Deciding Where You Belong

I stumbled across the OECD Better Life Index. The index is a simple little online gadget that allows you to determine which country would best suit your personality.

Apparently I belong in Norway.

It’s easy to determine where you belong by following the link provided above. You’ll be asked to slide some doodads around to indicate how important 11 variables are to you. Then *voilà* you’ll learn which countries are where you’d find other people vibing with your values.

Your soulmates, I guess.

Questions Of The Day

Have you had a neighbor’s dog come for an unannounced visit? If so, how’d that go? What boss move did you do to get said dog to go home?

Upon opening a door to go outside do you immediately shut it behind you— or are you lax about shutting it sometimes?

If you tried the Better Life Index, which countries do you belong in?

Do you feel Drags needs to be featured here more often? I admit I’ve drifted away from using him, but doesn’t he just make you smile?

• 🐲 •

 

In Which I Become An Active Amateur Nutritionist: A Story, A List, A Few Questions

/ Ally Bean / 219 Comments

Is this not so‽

DESPERATELY [SORT OF] SEEKING CALCIUM FOR STRONG BONES

You’re not a very good freezer spelunker.

Z-D said this to me when I couldn’t find a bag of frozen edamame, a bag that he found almost instantly after digging further down into the disorganized mess that is our freezer.

He was right about me. Our freezer is on the bottom of the refrigerator and looking down into it with my bespectacled eyes is the equivalent of 52 card pick-up. It’s a jumble of blurry stuff.

The thing is that prior to March 2020 in the Before Times we had an organized freezer. I had a place for everything and could quickly easily find what I was looking for.

However after March 2020 when Mr. Man began working from home all the time and we began making all our meals at home all the time I lost control of the contents in the freezer because, say what you will about Z-D, he knows food and likes to have lots of it on hand.

Nonetheless, getting to a point here, you may be asking yourself why was I searching for edamame?

Thanks for asking. Please allow me to explain.

• • •

Edamame, also called soy beans, are a good source of calcium which, as you probably know, is good for your bones.

If I am to believe the results of a recent DEXA scan that measured my bone density, I need more calcium so that my bones get stronger or at least remain as strong as they are now. I’m not into a full-on osteoporosis situation with brittle fragile bones, just a pre-osteoporosis situation that is called osteopenia.

There’s always some dodgy name for medical conditions.

And further if I am to believe my Primary Care Physician’s advice I need to eat more calcium in addition to taking a weekly little prescription pill called Alendronate.

My insurance company [inexplicably] covers the full cost of this annoying little pill. You take the pill on an empty stomach then without laying down you wait at least 30 minutes before eating or drinking anything. I’m a person whose digestive track is easily upset, so naturally the pill doesn’t play nice with my intestines.

There are issues.

Plus the ridiculous dosage regime means that after dragging myself out of bed to face the day there’s no coffee for me for a half hour. I resent this intrusion into my morning routine. Obviously this is not a good way to start my day and I’d like to get to a point where I don’t take this little pill even if it is weekly.

• • •

Admittedly I’m not thrilled with dairy products, a well-known source of calcium. I eat a few but to get the recommended amount of daily calcium [1200 mg] I have to think about taking dietary supplements &/or eating more calcium-rich foods.

Because I want to avoid the dietary supplement angle of calcium intake I’ve chosen to become the Queen of Non-Dairy Calcium Information. As an active amateur nutritionist I’ve researched the topic online, going so far as to put together the following list of sources of calcium-rich non-dairy foods that I would will eat.

I share it here because maybe you, too, are trying to eat more calcium because you, too, don’t like taking prescription medicine or dietary supplements. Thus without further ado I present for your edification this *at least it’s a place to start* list.

[Please note: the order of the foods means nothing more than how I wrote them down during my research.]

A NON-EXHAUSTIVE LIST OF SOURCES OF NON-DAIRY CALCIUM

SOY FOODS

  • Edamame
  • Tofu
  • Roasted soybeans
  • Soy milk [calcium fortified]

NUTS & SEEDS

  • Almonds 
  • Brazil nuts
  • Pistachios
  • Sunflower seeds
  • Almond milk [calcium fortified]

VEGETABLES

  • Spinach [low absorption]
  • Black-eyed peas
  • Broccoli
  • Acorn squash
  • Butternut squash
  • Cabbage
  • Celery
  • Green beans
  • Radishes
  • Sweet potato
  • Tomatoes 
  • Zucchini

GRAINS 

  • Oats
  • Corn tortillas

FRUIT & JUICE

  • Rhubarb [low absorption]
  • Pumpkin
  • Dried apricots
  • Orange juice [calcium fortified]

BEANS

  • Great northern beans 
  • Lima beans
  • Pinto beans
  • White beans
  • Hummus

SWEETENERS

  • Maple syrup 
  • Molasses [blackstrap best]

FISH & EGGS

  • Shrimp
  • Canned sardines 
  • Salmon 
  • Egg yolks

QUESTIONS OF THE DAY

Is your freezer in a jumble or is it organized? If organized how do you keep it that way?

What is your thinking when it comes to taking prescription meds? Or taking dietary supplements?

What is your opinion of dairy products in general? Do you like butter?

Do you love Steve from in_otternews like I do? Do his absurd thoughts, like the one at the top of this post, make you laugh out loud?

• • • • •

Hello Cool Kids: A Test About Blues + A Conversation About A Paradox

/ Ally Bean / 229 Comments

A TEST

Neato!

Immediately above you see my results from a simple little online test called Is My Blue Your Blue? What I learned is that I see more blue than most people and consider turquoise to be green.

There are, of course, no right or wrong answers to this test, but there is something to be gleaned from realizing how one person sees color is not necessarily how you see color.

Kind of trippy‽

A CONVERSATION

Groovy!

While reading something on Threads I saw the above quote that is attributed to Widdershins Smith.

Mentioned in passing it wasn’t the point of conversation, but the idea of a Geezer’s Paradox stuck with me. I turned the quote into the little gem you see here figuring that we, my little blue birds of happiness, could discuss it.

Upon reading the quote I nodded my head in agreement but also felt that, while possibly being old enough to be of geezer age, I might not be a geezer because of my gender. I asked Zen-Den, a confirmed male geezer, what he thought and he suggested that BIDDY might be the female equivalent to GEEZER.

Sure, sure, could be.

So I decided to ask ye olde Google how to define ‘geezer’ and stumbled over this interesting article in Psychology Today that discusses exactly what  Z-D and I were talking about: What’s the Feminine Form of “Geezer”?

Hint: The answer has to do with the use of non-gendered language in modern society and your own personal opinion about how word meanings should, or should not, change.

Regardless of whether you prefer GEEZER or BIDDY, the point I’m taking away from this quote and brief research project is that once you stop caring about cool, it finds you.

And how cool is that‽

QUESTIONS OF THE DAY

If you took the test about the color BLUE, what do think? Have you ever considered the idea that everyone sees color differently, sometimes very differently?

What’s your opinion about the word GEEZER versus the word BIDDY? Do you relate to either or neither? 

What do you think makes a person COOL? Is it an attitude or is it something more? Is being cool one of your goals?