Behind the Blogger

THE RULES:

• Thank the person who nominated you

Thank you, Laura!

• Answer all the questions down below

Okay…

• Pingback to the creator: Ellyn @ Allonsythornraxx

• Nominate 5+ bloggers you’d like to know more about, to do this tag

🙄🙄🙄

1. Why did you start blogging & why have you kept blogging?

Began in 2003 because it seemed like fun. Have had various blogs through the years to connect with others who enjoy writing in public. It’s a great way to generate immediate feedback.

2. What is your favorite type of blog post to write?

Flash fiction or poetry.

3. What are your top 3 favorite blog posts?

Postcards from Afar

Valentines

Brumation

4. What are some of your favorite things to do to relax?

Read, write, repeat.

5. What are 3 of your favorite things?

My family, my kitty, and reading.

6. What are your proudest blogging moments?

My recent sci-fi stories.

7. What are your hobbies outside of blogging?

There’s something outside of blogging?

8. Describe your personality in 3 words:

Obsessive, solipsistic, and green.

9. What are your top 3 pet peeves?

1. Excessively loud people, including parents who let older children scream in public. (Yes, I realize a tiny percentage of these children are disabled in some way; I’m talking about all the other ones.) This also includes truck beepy backups. Yes, I know what they’re for. Do not care. And it includes grocery and other stores that need to shriek announcements to employees over an intercom system. Text them, ffs!

2. People who pollute the world with their disgusting garbage because the bin is full so hey toss it on the ground why not? And people who litter in general destroying our planet including and especially all the big corporations and the corrupt politicians they bribe.

3. Basically people. All of them.

10. What’s something your followers don’t know about you?

Nothing.

Tag – You’re It!

Anyone who hasn’t done this yet should have a go!

Rory’s S’mores

Another Guy Called Bloke Production!

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At what point in our lives do you think we think we are good enough?

Speaking only for myself… never! I wake every day knowing there are goals to achieve and improvements to make.

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In life, what do you consider beautiful?

Cats, poetry, art of various forms, nature (flowers, sunsets, birds, butterflies, etc.), and of course my family.

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Do you think that when we dream, we can dream within a dream? But if you don’t dream, why do you think that is?

Yes, definitely. I have dreamt about dreaming.

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How do you manage your stress or do you not suffer from stress?

It varies. I don’t handle stress well at all, so I try to eliminate it at the source ~ this is why I gave up dating, where others persevere through unpleasantness. I can’t tolerate the bad. It literally makes me sick. But some things can’t be helped; stuff appears out of the blue. I will get physically ill and have to deal with that. I’ll get migraines and take medicine. My sleep will suffer. Etc. I severely manage down interactions with people so that my stress is minimized.

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Are there things or maybe just one thing you wish to achieve before you die?

I did want to have success as a writer, but I don’t see that happening. I’m not talented enough, nor do I have the patience to endlessly slog away on a novel anymore when I can get instant feedback via short blog posts.

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Some experience many things during their lifetimes, but do you think there is something that everyone should experience at least once?

No.

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Are you afriad to be different? To stand out from the crowd, to push away your peers if needs be and say “I am ME!”

No. I’m more afraid of being one of them, though generally I blend in wherever I go, at least superficially. I realize that sounds contradictory, but it’s not. I blend in just enough so that no one notices/bothers me, and then I get away as fast as I can to be apart from them.

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Which do you think is easier ‘to hate or to love?’

To hate obviously. Humans are all about forming groups and excluding other humans in order to hate and possibly kill them.

Monday Smile & Pick Me Up

My daughter’s birthday flowers are exceptionally lovely. There’s just something about a variety bouquet that brightens up a room like nothing else. My eye is instantly drawn to the lush blooms and vibrant colors. I love the magenta and mauve offset with pale apricot. Such a charming combo.

Posted for the Daily Pick Me Up as well as the Weekly Smile.

Serendipizza

Saturday night I was talking about pizza with friends, which gave me a craving for pizza on Sunday when I drove up to L.A. to visit my daughter. I didn’t know what she’d planned for lunch, but it had been a long time since I had pizza, and I was definitely missing it.

After baby woke from her nap, we walked over to Pico for lunch. I assumed we were headed for the salad and burger place, but I was wrong ~ it was a pizza place! And not only that, it was make your own pizza. Well, not make your own, but choose your own ingredients. Ooh so exciting! So many choices! Macaroni and cheese pizza! What about all mushrooms? I couldn’t decide.

Finally, I just ordered the standard margherita with no alteration. It’s the one in the photo ~ and it was delicious!

The restaurant is One80 Pizzeria on Pico if anyone cares. 😀

What’s Up With Cookies?

I went to Target tonight to get a head start on the weekend’s chores. I have a lot of things to do and am a bit stressed! Now, I assumed that everyone else would be out having fun on a Friday night and I could shop in peace. Wrong! The store was full of shoppers in my way. Annoying.

As I was crossing stuff off my list, I checked the cookie aisle for Game of Thrones Oreos. I read that they’re coming out with a special version for the final season and I want some. Didn’t find any. But! What the heck? There are like 18,000 kinds of Oreos now! When did this happen???

Previously I’ve blogged about trying some alternate Oreos, especially cookie dough which were delicious, but this is just crazy.

Not only that though. I found something else. Something absolutely wackadoo. You will not believe this! I wouldn’t either, so I had to take another photo and practically shove people out of my way. Yes, I am taking pictures of the cookies and what is your problem, buddy???

WHAT HAVE THE KEEBLER ELVES DONE TO MY DAD’S STRIPEY COOKIES!?!?

I’ve previously blogged about stripey cookies too. Normal ones… you know, golden cookie-flavored cookies with fudge backs and stripes. But now they have all fudgey ones and these white ones? Whaaa? They look like those crayon things we did in school that we colored over again. But look!!! They have unicorn ones! Now, I die.

I really wanted to buy some unicorn stripey cookies. But I didn’t. Why not? Idk. I guess I just felt too silly. They weren’t on my list. It was all so disorienting.

I might go back again soon though.

For the unicorn 🦄 cookies!

Thought Provokers

Another Guy Called Bloke Production!

Wait! Lemme put my thinking cat on…

What is one life lesson that you have had to learn the hard way?

Trim your thinking cat’s claws before you place him on your head (ouch!).

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What can you do today that you were not capable of a year ago?

Being a grandma! (Gbaby born June 2018.)

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What is the difference between living and existing?

Ten million dollars.

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If the average human lifespan was 40 years, how would you live your life differently?

I’d be dead.

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If the average human lifespan was 40 years, how would you live your life differently?

I’d still be dead.

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Are you more worried about doing things right, or doing the right things?

The first one of course. The right things are so subjective.

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What impact do you want to leave on the world?

None.

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What impact do you want to leave on the world?

Okay fine, winning the Mega Billions and saving all the cats.

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To what degree have you actually controlled the course your life has taken?

Not a lot.

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Beyond the titles that others have given you, who are you?

A mystery wrapped in a riddle and covered in cat hairs.

FPQ 17: Misty Memories

So, I decided to ask a question about human memory, which has been shown to be incredibly unreliable. With that in mind, here is this week’s provocative question:

“How do you know which of your memories are genuine and which have been altered over time or even made up?”

We don’t. We’ve all read a novel or three where it turns out that every memory the protagonist thought was real had been implanted for some nefarious purpose. Or in the case of The Key to Midnight, real memories were erased in order to save a person from being murdered. (Shock! When I looked up this book just now to make sure I remembered it accurately, it turned out that yes I did, but the author was using a ‘nym. It was actually written by the horror writer Dean Koontz!)

But in reality, most of us are not so special that gobblement operatives are screwing with our minds. More than, you know, shoveling subliminal political messages at us on Facebook and stuff obviously. I think we can rest assured that we’ve not been whisked off to a medical lab in the middle of the night by agents in black suits and our heads flooded full of fake thoughts.

Many of our so-called real memories can be at least somewhat verified by photographic evidence and the accounts of other people who were present. We can usually nail down dates and locations of events ~ though not always, as Fandango points out, which gave him the idea for his post. And there’s also the problem of many similar events blurring together over time. Or something that sounds so real it feels like it must have happened, but was only discussed vividly and repeatedly.

My parents are gone, so now I’m the only one to tell my daughters stories about the past. I hope they’re correct, but there really is no one around to check me. There are things I was told and never questioned, but sometimes I wonder about them now. It doesn’t really matter though… soon all this will be swept away like it never was.

Of course, there’s a world of difference in trying to be honest and accurate, but getting a few details wrong or even an entire setting because your memory went blip, and deliberately gaslighting or being deceptive with the goal of hurting a person for your own benefit, whatever that benefit may be, financial or otherwise. Those things have been done to me and I don’t forgive the people who did them.

Weekly Prompts: Orange

Wow, I didn’t think I had so many orange photos! This is a small selection of what came up in the search. 😀

Celery [SOCS]

Celery contained magical anti-calories, people thought. If you chomped on these stalks, the energy you expended chewing and digesting them would exceed the number of calories in the celery itself. So, all you had to do is eat celery all day and soon you would be celebrating your new trim and fit figure!

But of course if you kept eating pizza and nachos and milkshakes and candy bars with your stalks, the celery diet didn’t work, and you did not end up looking like your favorite celebrity, unless that celeb was President Taft. 😳

Many crazy diets have come and gone since I read about the magic of celery as a teen. Some girls in my high school went on the 3-3-3 diet: 3 bananas, 3 hot dogs, 3 carrots every day. Very phallic. Why doesn’t my phone know phallic? I must not be writing about enough dicks; I blame my DEXIT.

People have jumped on this keto thing, but we all did the Atkins’ fad way back when. It’s nothing new. We’d order bacon double cheeseburgers and throw away the buns, hon. Sure, you’d lose weight because meat is satisfying and pasta is not, ounce for ounce. Sorry, vegetarians. Also, how much cheese can you eat without barfing? 🤮That is rhetorical.

Then came the 1980s when people decided fat was bad and carbs were good. They threw away their butter and chowed down on bagels the size of dinner plates. Why are we getting so fat, they moaned over their vats of spaghetti.

In the 1990s, I watched other moms load up their kids with constant snacks and juices. I tried not to do that; I had my own ideas about nutrition. But kids grow up and have to make their own choices eventually. I did not like to be Dictator Mom, about food or any other thing, except education, and that philosophy worked out well imo.

One of the things now is to shun prepared foods. Oh, that’s the new boogeyman! 🙄 It’s not that we’ve all been stuffing our faces with way too much food for way too long… it’s that we’re not tra-la-la-ing for hours through farmers’ markets every Saturday for fresh produce, and then spending the rest of the weekend cooking from scratch. The heck with writing books or having hobbies! We’re fat because we haven’t been slaving over a hot stove.

Bullshit. I call BS on all ideas of overweight except one: too many calories nommed up. I don’t care if they come from salad or salami or pasta or papayas. Too many in over time leads to fat layers on our bodies. There’s no magic cure except to eat fewer calories over time.

Personally, I love packaged and prepared foods. For single people who don’t want to buy wastefully in bulk, and who don’t want to spend their free time cooking, they are fabulous. But so is celery ~ and it comes in a package too.

Lucky 🍀 7

My Inner Mishmash tagged me in the 7 faves. Since a picture paints 1000 words, I’ll use photos. These aren’t necessarily in order of favoritism, some should be taken conceptually rather than specifically, and a couple are cheats because they include more than one thing. 😀💖