Category Archives: Personal Issues

7 Quick Takes — TV Edition

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7 Quick Takes

There has been some good TV this week and as I’ve done enough updating on my so-called life already, I figured I’d give y’all my thoughts on what I’ve watched.

— 1 —

Judge Judy. Nothing new with this one — I’ve just gotten addicted to watching her. I saw an interview with her a few months ago and her philosophy is that if you’ve graduated from high school and are working and trying to live your life decently, she’s chill with that. Her problem comes when people make choices that aren’t wise and that hurt other people. I love her sternness, her wit, and the fact that she doesn’t suffer fools gladly. She’s also a good source of ideas for my NaNo piece.

— 2 —

Hart of Dixie. This isn’t in the class of CSI or NCIS but it’s been a new addiction for me. I don’t think I ever watched anything with Rachel Bilson before and I happened to see ads for this randomly while channel-surfing and watching NUMB3RS. I love the contrast of the Zoe Hart and Lemon Breeland characters.

— 3 —

NCIS. Serious goosebumps when they were off-loading Quincy’s body and the Marines were saluting. (I may be a flaming liberal but I am patriotic and I do believe that we need to treat our fallen heroes with dignity.) It was a lovely two-part episode. Other highlights were the flashbacks with Gibbs and Matteson when they were at basic training and seeing what Di Nozzo’s greatest fear was.

— 4 —

NCIS:LA. It was a tough episode to watch because of the brutality and I genuinely felt sorry for Jada in the end. It also made me wonder if Ruben, one of my seminary classmates from Sudan, was still alive. He was getting his MTS in Old Testament at Trinity and I used to word process his papers for him (all 30 pages). He went back to Sudan to be an Anglican bishop for the Diocese of Renk in what I think would now be South Sudan. At the time, he had a wife (Grace) who was my age (21 at the time) and a 2 year old son.

— 5 —

CSI. Powerful writing for the episode last night (Wednesday), especially when the killer turned out to be Detective Vega — one of the good guys for 8 seasons. Seeing Nick tell Russell (the Ted Danson character who I like) to stop working on the murderer that Vega was trying to drown and instead focus on Vega was very well done and I continue to like the character of Morgan Brody.

— 6 —

The Big Bang Theory. OMG… “Relationship Agreement” between Amy and Sheldon tonight!!!!!! I also loved the Warlords of Ka’a expansion pack that was “Wild West and Witches”. Best line: “Like shooting nerds in a barrel.” My college friends were the guys on the show (math/compsci/engineering geeks who did role-playing games) so this show is endlessly amusing.

— 7 —

NUMB3RS. What can I say? I like crime dramas. It’s not my favorite one but it keeps my attention.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.

7 Quick Takes — More of the Same

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

I need to apologize to someone. Elia of ConservaMom has been referring to the Occupy protesters as “dopes” and instead of just ignoring her site and not reading it (which is what I do when I come across sites that make me want to throw things), I left a really terse comment. She responded to all my points more gracefully than I deserved and I owe her an apology for the comment I left. Elia, I’m sorry. In the future, I’ll just skip her blog on the Quick Takes list. I also still resent her calling the Occupy protesters “dopes” but it’s something on which I’ll have to agree to disagree with her.

— 2 —

The shots of Morgan at the end of CSI this week reminds me of the way I feel like I look at the end of the day. For those who aren’t CSI addicts like I am, she had been in a helicopter that had been hijacked and shot down. There are a lot of days where I feel like I’ve had all those things happen during the day. Yes, I’m a stay-at-home mom and yes, I only have one child. However, Daniel isn’t your normal child and I feel like I’m constantly on my toes trying to reinforce what we do in therapies and also trying to keep the “terrible two’s destructiveness” to a minimum.

— 3 —

KFC has a new famous bowl which features bacon and cheese. I can’t believe people eat stuff like this. It’s mashed potatoes, chicken, cheese, and bacon in a bowl. They were talking about it on KLOVE on Wednesday with people calling in and playing “can you top this?” with worse foods. One mentioned was on the Denny’s menu and it’s a patty melt with mac n’ cheese in it. My dearly departed gallbladder is seizing in a specimen jar someplace.

— 4 —

Speaking of food, I made quinoa for the first time this week. For those not in the know, it’s a “pseudo-cereal” grain-type plant from South America that is a complete protein and has a number of nutrients like iron and calcium. It looks like birdseed and it has a nutty flavor that’s kind of like that of some wild rice components. Daniel didn’t care for the texture though I ate it quite willingly. (I had made my family’s chicken recipe and the sauce will make anything taste good.) I’m scanning all my recipe websites for other things to do with it because it’s not something that would work with pesto. (The grains are too small — it really does look like birdseed.)

— 5 —

I’m currently reading Shirt of Flame: A Year with St. Therese of Lisieux by Heather King. I’ve gotten partway into the introduction and I think I’m going to have to read the chapters in their entirety like I would an essay. It’s so new that it’s not available for my e-reader so I have an actual paper copy. (I like my Nook but I also love real books.)

— 6 —

We have a new speech therapist for Daniel. His former speech therapist is having surgery so Easter Seals put us with a new one. She’s a sweetheart and just engaged Daniel in whatever he wanted to do, which was putting things into a sorter and opening/closing the doors of it. (I learned the signs for “open” and “close” today.) It was educational for me because it showed me that I need to stop flipping out about Daniel not engaging and going with the program. As my mom reminded me, these therapists get paid to do this and it’s not the first time they’ve dealt with an obstinate child. His new therapist is also just going to piggy-back on whatever we’re doing in other therapies.

— 7 —

I have had to change some of the names in my NaNo piece to protect the stupid. If I were to ever edit my piece and submit it for publication, I would have to go back in and redo all the names of the stupid people because I based them on the initials of the real life people from whom I was drawing the inspiration. (Believe me… there could be some really good slander suits if the real life people could reasonably connect themselves to what I wrote.) So… I’m having to go back into my plans and do a “find and replace” — I just wish OneNote gave me the option to replace whatever I found.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.

A Complete Lack of Parenting

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Next door to Metanoia, there are a bunch of housing units and the kids of the families use the church parking lot as a playground. It’s not an issue… except that there are some 9-11 year olds who have decided to use the church walkways as their own personal skate parks. I happened to be at church a few of the times they were doing it and I called them on it… which resulted in one of the boys using some really foul language toward me. I got my revenge when they were having a party and I followed the boy home and dared him to tell his parents the things he had said to me. Needless to say, he was not too happy.

Well… our next door neighbor came over today and asked if something was going on at the church. We replied that there wasn’t and she dropped the bombshell that there were several kids on the roof. Yes… THE ROOF. Jon went over there and lectured them because none of them would admit to it. Holy insurance nightmare, Batman! All we need is one of the punks to fall off and we’ll have a lawsuit on our hands even though we didn’t tell the boys to be on the roof and they weren’t supposed to be there in the first place.

I’m sure the parents are working multiple jobs to get by and all that but I’m wondering if Metanoia shouldn’t send a letter to them telling them the boys’ behavior and telling the parents that they need to discipline their kids. Daniel would NEVER be allowed to get away with the stuff that these kids do but I have a feeling that the parents don’t really care. They’re probably so burned out by trying to make a living that they tell the kids to go play and don’t pay attention to them.

I’d love it if the police happened to be driving by and cited the kids with trespassing/loitering/whatever. I think it would get the message across a lot better.

Blogging Etiquette

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I’ve had someone follow me from another blog and comment on an entry in an aggressive fashion. The offender got his comment deleted and I went into my domain dashboard and I.P. banned him. This is totally annoying to have to do so I thought I should lay out some rules of blogging etiquette.

01.) Don’t use someone else’s blog as your bully pulpit. If you have something to say that you feel needs to be expressed that strongly, GET YOUR OWN FREAKING BLOG.

02.) If you don’t like what someone has to say, suck it up. I’ve disagreed with a number of things that people have to say on their blogs. Given the diversity of blogs I read, I could probably get offended by at least half of them on a given day. However, life is too short to hold grudges so I just suck it up.

03.) If you absolutely MUST speak up, do it gracefully. If the issue is so grievous that you just have to speak up, do so gracefully and respectfully. We can all agree to disagree and maybe what you have to say will give the blogger something to think about.

04.) No chasing commenters. Do not chase someone from a blog where they leave a comment to their own blog to chastise them. It’s rude, will cause your comment to be deleted, and will cause you to be I.P. banned.

05.) Brevity is best in comments. Long comments get sent to my moderation queue on WordPress so any response over a few paragraphs long is going to not post because the program views it as spam. Be brief — save the long diatribes for your own blog.

06.) If you’re just too tempted to rip a blogger a new one, it probably means that you’ve been online too long and need a hobby. I recommend knitting, crocheting, chainsaw juggling, or cake decorating.

Just a few thoughts.

7 Quick Takes — Things Not to Say

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7 Quick Takes

I’m going to do something different and record my Quick Takes as a sound file. If you want to skip listening to the file (which isn’t going to randomly start playing unless you hit the play button), just click on the word “more…” and it will take you below the cut where you can read the transcript.

Continue reading →

7 Quick Takes — Things That Annoy Me on Other Blogs

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7 Quick Takes

Granted, I’m in a bit of a foul mood because I have to go in for a venous doppler ultrasound on my leg to check for a clot tomorrow morning. (Update: no clot!) However, I surf through a number of blogs here and on The Simple Woman’s Daybook each week and there seems to be some common threads about what irritates me each week.

–1–

Music players. Usually, I’m reading blogs after Daniel goes to bed, when he’s napping, or when I’m listening to podcasts so a blast of music tends to be ill-timed. They make the blogs load slower and frequently, it’s not even music I *like*. If I want to be listening to “Stronger” by Mandisa (which is on my list of favorite things right after having my fingernails removed with pliers), I’ll have it playing on iTunes.

–2–

Politically or spiritually-motivated counters. Yes, I’m fully aware that since I opened your blog, 123 babies have been aborted. (Actually, I highly doubt the validity of that number given the small number of doctors actually *trained* to perform abortions and the fact that not all Planned Parenthood clinic actually provide the procedure; but that isn’t the issue here.) I’m also aware that the national debt has gone up $1.3 billion dollars in the last hour and that you are of the opinion that 56 people have ended up in Hell. The problem is… I. DON’T. CARE. If I’m on your blog in the first place, it’s probably because I want to see what you have to say in that particular entry or what your Quick Takes are this week, not because I care about your opinions on the abortion issue, the economic status of this country, or your opinions on the salvation of others. And seriously… if I’m coming to your blog from ConversionDiary.Com or The Simple Woman’s Daybook, I probably agree with your pro-life stance or that Jesus is the Way, rendering your counter irrelevant. (Note: I am pro-life so do not leave me angry comments about how I should care more about the pro-life movement. Such comments will be deleted and you will be I.P. banned.)

–3–

Kitsch. It’s great that you have the Miss Sunshine Award, an adopted leopluridon from the Charley the Unicorn Site, and are a member of the Christian Cheerful Sisterhood. However, that schlock is making your sidebar look nasty and it’s contributing to the load time of your blog. Blogger allows you to make “about me” pages. Put all your affiliations and awards there. (Not objecting to a few well-placed images here — it’s the clutter that irritates me.)

–4–

Badly re-sized images. It annoys my inner balance when I see pictures on the sidebar that are obviously not re-sized correctly and are sticking off. It can also obscure the text and detract from your message (if you have one). There’s a great program called Irfanview that you can download for free here. I recommend it. This also goes for images in the main part of your blog.

–5–

LOL Speak. OMG ur blog lookz teh stupidz when u type liek dis. U R not 5teen. Speakz English plz.

–6–

“My Blogs List” on Blogspot sites. The long column of links with the last posting date is dumb and I do realize that it’s a Blogger issue. Still, would it be too hard to have a nice and simple list of links? I don’t care if they’re alphabetical or by type.

–7–

Country theme. It’s way too overdone not to mention that most people tend to overdo it on the kitsch factor. My idea of country simplicity is a white background with a picture of a farm or a window view of gingham curtains. Besides, the country theme is now “urban” because of all the people doing it.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.