The Simple Woman’s Daybook: December 11, 2016

For Today… December 11, 2016

Simple Woman's Daybook

Looking out my window… dark. Weather.Com is saying that it’s 29F here and that snow might be starting soon. I’m kind of excited but wishing that my boots would arrive from L.L. Bean because all I have are my running shoes.

I am thinking… about my Access assessment that I finished last night. After I’m done with this, I’ll proof it and then submit it.

I am thankful… for my shopping trip to Old Navy today. I got some new long-sleeved shirts that should help keep me warm and are in seasonal colors.

One of my favorite things… the Sanctimommy Said What group on Facebook.

I am wearing… jammies. Church clothes were the blue-green fitted tee from Old Navy/black slacks from Kohl’s/black cardi from Kohl’s that I recycled from last night’s Messiah singalong with the Skagit Symphony Chorus.

I am creating… a prayer shawl and some socks for my mommy.

I am listening to… the Classical Holiday channel from DISH Network.

I am hoping… to get a perfect score on my Practical Accounting final tomorrow.  I’ve gotten 98’s on the last three tests and it’s killing me not to get a perfect score yet.  (Why yes… I *AM* Hermione!  How ever did you guess?)

I am learning… random Access things.

In my kitchen… pork fried rice from Haggen that seems to be missing the pork.  So NOT amused.

In the school room… Daniel has a new phrase: “dress for school”.

Post Script… a list of good Christmas carols, even if the versions she picks are occasionally sub-par.

Shared Quote… “Don’t make the same mistakes that everyone else makes. Make wonderful mistakes. Make the kind of mistakes that make people so shocked that they have no other choice but to be a little impressed.” — Jenny Lawson, Furiously Happy

A moment from my day… a Wordle of our recessional hymn today.

Wordle of

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7 Quick Takes: Non-Traditional Thanksgiving

7 Quick Takes

Everyone is talking about how thankful they are for food and family and stuff like that today. I’m thankful for all those things as well but I’m also thankful for some more… non-traditional things today. 😉

— 1 —

Priests who start impromptu Godspell singalongs after Thanksgiving Eve Eucharist. Worship was already done acapella (and done beautifully) because our organist had the night off and we were trying to find Thanksgiving hymns to sing. Someone suggested “Day By Day” out of the 1982 Hymnal and Rev. Helen said we should do it to the tune from Godspell. Okie dokie. Then we started singing parts of the finale and went on to “Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord”. It was awesome.

— 2 —

Evil twin brothers who restrain small children so that their moms can clean the black Sharpie pen off of their faces, arms, hands, necks, feet, and toes. Let’s just say that Daniel went for the Maori tribal look and leave it at that. 🙂 Rubbing alcohol prep wipes are what gets it off well. I think we went through 40 of them? He was also chill with Sean (my evil twin) restraining him while I worked on him. I’m sure the purplish color from the ink/alcohol mixture will leave my nail beds eventually…

— 3 —

Coffeeshops that are open on Thanksgiving for emergency latté runs. I had a migraine this morning, OK?

— 4 —

Soft grey chest kittehs. This is especially true of ones who prevent their humans from doing anything other than watching the season premiere of The Big Bang Theory.

— 5 —

Those who create Biden memes. Y’all make America a greater place to live.

— 6 —

Mythbusters marathons. Because science.

— 7 —

Accounting problems that balance. My homework is refusing to balance right now so I’m thankful for times when things have worked correctly.

For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: November 20, 2016

For Today… November 20, 2016

Simple Woman's Daybook

Looking out my window… dark. It was chilly today with some scattered showers and temperatures in the 40’s Fahrenheit. I am really hoping my boots arrive from L.L. Bean before the snow comes!

I am thinking… about some of the political news and how to deal with it appropriately.

I am thankful… for the chance to spend time with my brother and sister-in-law later this week when they come up for Thanksgiving. There will be football involved as the Apple Cup is happening on Friday and there are some inter-family rivalries between the UW and WSU. My cousin Sarah is the president of the WSU Marching Band and my parents are UW alums so Facebook should be really fun this week!

One of my favorite things… Daniel calmly curled up asleep. I’m enjoying the quiet time to blog before I go back to sleep.

I am wearing… my Online Debate Team shirt and black capri sweats. (In other words, my jammies.) Church clothes from this morning were the usual shirt from Old Navy (charcoal today) with my black slacks and cardigan from Kohl’s. When I got home, I switched out the slacks and cardigan for jeans and a light grey hoodie.

I am creating… Excel files for my Practical Accounting homework and Access forms for my online class. Whee!

I am watching… The Big Bang Theory re-runs.

I am hoping… the advising thing I have to attend tomorrow isn’t a brain-numbing waste of my time. I’m going because it’s a hoop I have to jump through in order to register for classes but I’m not happy about being forced to do it.

I am learning… about employer taxes.

In my kitchen… we chose to just get some pizza for Sunday dinner tonight with my aunt, my uncle, and my grandmother.

In the school room… Daniel’s speech is exploding.

Post Script… someone shared this 12-step program for responding to president-elect Trump.

Shared Quote… I wrote one of my college admissions essays on this fragment of an Enya song:

My life flows on in endless song
Above earth’s lamentation
I hear the sweet though far off hymn
That hails a new creation
Through all the tumult and the strife
I hear the music ringing
It finds an echo in my soul
How can I keep from singing
— “How Can I Keep From Singing”

A moment from my day… I love this Audrey Assad cover of “How Can I Keep From Singing”.

Hosted by The Simple Woman.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: November 13, 2016

For Today… November 13, 2016

Simple Woman's Daybook

Looking out my window… grey and rainy. It’s quite delightful, actually.

I am thinking… about the news that Donald Trump named a white supremacist as his counselor and chief strategist. This jerk and his followers attacked Kristen of Rage Against the Minivan, doxxed her, and sent some of the most vulgar tweets I have ever read. I was one of the people going through her Twitter account and reporting this profoundly sick people to Twitter for harassment. We’re talking tweets about nasty things these men wanted to do to her daughters, calling Kristen and her family sickening names, and a whole lot of things that will require me to take more Ativan if I speak of further.

I am thankful… for IRIS being inundated with calls asking how to help out with their immigration and refugee services. (I know someone who works with them and she reported this on Facebook.) It’s good to know that not all of the country have lost their minds.

One of my favorite things… worship today at St. Paul’s. I love being part of a community that is so alive.

I am wearing… a charcoal shirt from Old Navy and black jeans from Fred Meyer. Church clothes were the shirt with black slacks and a black cardigan from Kohl’s.

I am creating… a chapter outline for my Practical Accounting class and a blog post about political stuff.

I am listening to… chamber music on one of the Dish Network channels.

I am hoping… Trump finds better advisors than his current band of jokers.

I am learning… about employer earnings and deductions.

In my kitchen… Dad made garlic shrimp pasta for Sunday dinner.

In the school room… Daniel came home smelling like Old Spice because they were doing OT stuff with shaving cream on Friday.

Post Script… Do me a favor and read the following links and tell me if I’m overreacting to Trump being elected: this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, and this. Keep in mind that this is just the tip of the iceberg as to what I’ve seen on Twitter and Facebook.

Shared Quote…

“Empathy challenge: Imagine if we’d just elected a man who said he’d shut down churches and force Christians to register with the government.” — Rachel Held Evans

A moment from my day… One of the many Joe Biden memes going around.

*snickers*

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7 Quick Takes: AMERICA, YOU HAD ONLY ONE JOB!!!!! Edition

7 Quick Takes

I wrote these on Tuesday night after the presidential election was called for Trump so forgive some of the cattiness and be thankful that I’m getting it out of my system. 😉

— 1 —

Political Take #1. Am I irritated that Hillary didn’t win? Yes. Did I lose sleep over it? No. I’m an insomniac — I never sleep!

Am I surprised that Trump won? No. I have never doubted the propensity of the American people to vote against their own best interests. Example: a number of people in Kentucky rely on government aid and yet they continually vote politicians into office who cut that aid.

Is my life over? No. The sun still rose on Wednesday morning and was not blocked by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse so I’m counting that as a win.

— 2 —

Political Take #2. Interestingly enough, the date on this post is November 8, 2012… and the 2016 election was on November 8, 2016. #spookycoincidence

And yes, I’ll be taking my own advice from that particular post.

— 3 —

Political Take #3. As I will *READILY* admit that I am a snarky wench who can be petty and partisan to the nth degree when it suits my purposes, I’ve decided that I need a title for Trump once he takes office. My friend Katja suggested the “Idiot-in-Chief”. What do y’all think? Leave any suggestions in the comments if you have them.

— 4 —

Political Take #4. Having said all of that (including getting the partisanship and snarkiness out of my system), we all need to work on healing from the seeds of discord that have been sown in this election. Only when we can heal and work for the common good (and not just for those things that benefit us or for our own pet issues) can we make America (which was *ALREADY* great) a greater country. We are truly *STRONGER TOGETHER*.

— 5 —

Political Take #5. The one good thing coming out of Trump’s win is that Alec Baldwin now has job security on SNL for the next four years.

— 6 —

On to other topics! *in my usual valley girl accent* Like OHMIGOSH!!!! I’m creating queries in my Access class and they are SOOOO COOL! *proceeds to geek out about the various types of queries she can write and information she can sort with them*

— 7 —

OK… one last political take! I saw this in my Facebook memories a couple days ago and it resonated with me.

Finally done!

For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.

7 Quick Takes: More Asthma Exacerbation Edition

7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Sigh… Trick-or-treating on my cul-de-sac almost killed me because of asthma exacerbation (thank God Daniel only wanted to do five houses!) and I had to stay home from class on Tuesday to rest my lungs. I hate missing class but I also didn’t want to be puking from the asthma attack I would get from walking to the classroom from my car. Thankfully, it wasn’t a quiz day so I didn’t lose points for being absent.

— 2 —

World Series. My back-up boys have prevailed and Cleveland is back to stinking at sports! My only regret is that the Cubs didn’t sweep them; but at least they triumphed in Game 7 while playing *IN* Cleveland. (For those who are wondering, I hate all Cleveland sports teams and root against them at every turn. Thank various seminary classmates and obnoxious bloggers for this one.) Here’s hoping this is the beginning of some baseball dominance for the Cubs! They definitely deserve it. I’m so excited for my Illinois friends who are headed to a victory parade that has been a long time in coming. 🙂

And seriously, the rain delay was a joke. These men are being paid millions of dollars — if volunteer softball teams can play in the rain and football teams can play in -20F weather with blowing snow, baseball players can man up and play in the rain! I mean, are they going to melt?

— 3 —

The Write 31 Days challenge. I have prevailed over the Write 31 Days challenge! I need to do one more post aggregating all of the resources I linked but I’m glad I managed to write every day in October, even when I really didn’t want to write or when I was bogged down with homework.

— 4 —

Daniel and ENT fun. The munchkin had an early ENT appointment on Wednesday and was pretty good until we had to restrain him so that the doctor could examine his ears under the microscope. (To be fair, I’d hate to be restrained and have someone poking things into various orifices so I don’t really blame him.) He’s got serious ear wax preventing them from being able to do a decent exam and they couldn’t get it out so they’re going to have to sedate him to clean it out. This should be… interesting.

— 5 —

Election blah. I am so sick of the election that I’m pausing and then fast-forwarding through anything election-related on TV. I voted almost three weeks ago because everyone registered in Washington gets their ballot in the mail and they can choose to mail it back or drop it off in person. Seriously, there should be some chip in the ballot that automatically gets rid of political ads and all political content from TV once a person votes because this is too much.

— 6 —

Interesting… A small town in Macedonia has become a hub for pro-Trump websites. It’s a bit disturbing that Macedonian people are profiting off our electoral dysfunction.

— 7 —

*facepalm* I heard from one of my favorite $tarbux baristas that she had people whining about not having eggnog lattés on Halloween and that there’s some controversy about the green pre-holidays cup. Seriously?!?!?!?!? Eggnog lattés are foul-tasting and it’s not like it’s even Advent yet, let alone Christmas.

Some people seriously destroy my faith in humanity and I’m not even talking about Trump supporters with this one!

For more Quick Takes, visit Kelly at This Ain’t The Lyceum.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: October 23, 2016

For Today…

Simple Woman's Daybook

Looking out my window… dark. It was in the 60’s today with some clouds moving in a little bit ago and a short shower. My joints are feeling better now that the BIG weather systems have rolled on through.

I am thinking… about my week and what is on my plate in terms of school, Daniel, church and everything else.

I am thankful… I’m doing better in terms of this stupid virus than I was last Wednesday afternoon and evening.

One of my favorite things… when all my numbers balance on my Accounting homework. 🙂

I am wearing… jammies. Church clothes were my turquoise/black/white bokeh Easter dress with a black camisole underneath (Kohl’s), my black cardigan (Kohl’s), black tights (Target back from when we lived in Montana), and my black flats (Naturalizer). A couple people commented on how pretty I looked in my dress. (I usually dress up for church but my outfit today was apparently a big deal?) After church, I changed into my blue-green shirt from Old Navy and jeans from Kohl’s.

I am creating… formulas for my Excel submission assignment that is due tomorrow at 11:55 p.m.

I am listening to… “Cops: Reloaded” on TV. I’ll probably switch to various musical pieces in a bit.

I am hoping… to be over this stupid respiratory thing soon.

I am learning… about adjusting entries in Accounting.

In my kitchen… steak, potatoes, bacon caesar salad, and cookies with ice cream for dessert.

In the school room… Daniel’s “fall family meeting” went super well. He’s making progress and his teachers/aides/therapists are smitten with him. 🙂

Post Script… You know you have the respect of your LGBTQ friends when ones that are very anti-religious send you an article from a religious publication you like and ask for your honest thoughts on it. 🙂

Shared Quote… I have two for you today. The one on courage is from my friend Laura.

A lovely RFK quotation.
Laura's quotation on courage.

A moment from my day…

Closing Notes: When I was writing my piece on Friday, a piece of code that was supposed to bold something got inserted in a weird place and I didn’t find it until last night when I was reading over something. It ended up putting the last part of the second C. Everett Koop in bold type… a part that I think *ALL* of us need to read and re-read endlessly in this election cycle.

Well-played, WordPress. Good move, God.

Hosted by The Simple Woman.