Randomly Random Post

So, Mr. Wonderful and I went to visit the eye doctor last night. I had my eyes checked out first, and when I came out the doctor was telling me how much contact lenses have improved since the early 90s when I briefly experimented with them. Then Mr. Wonderful had his checkup and the doctor told him he'd made the prescription for bifocals in case he needed reading glasses. It made me smile, because I married a man who is a year-and-a-half younger than I am, and the doctor thought HE needed reading glasses.

Well, I was talking to my husband about it, laughing about the bifocal prescription. So he said, "Let me see yours," and when I showed him my prescription he pointed out, "Yours is for bifocals too."

Eek!

***

Oh, and since it's the Fourth of July, I should wish all my American friends a joyful Independence Day holiday. Hope you are all having fun!

***

Shopping for glasses is not fun, but Mr. Wonderful found some he liked fairly early on in our first tentative foray. Since there was a big sign out front of the store that said "Free Glasses for family members", I valiantly struggled to find a pair that I liked too.

When we took our choices to the salesperson to find out the price, she made the calculations and said, "I've given you a 30 percent discount on both pairs. That's the promotion we have on right now."

Um, excuse me?

There is a SIGN out front that promises FREE GLASSES. Isn't there some kind of law against false advertising?

Needless to say, we still have some shopping to do.

***

I love summer because The Boy is happy. He's always giggling now, instead of moping (or worse).

But the cat is skittish. I don't know if that's summer or what. The other night she got herself wedged between the floors of the house. That's right. She found the wiring closet open in the basement, jumped up on the breaker box, and from there squeezed herself into the space between the joists at the top of the closet.

When the basement was finished, the ceiling they put in did not extend the extra six inches INSIDE the closet. Why would it? The closet is just a narrow space where all the electrical and computer wiring built into the house converges. Close the closet door and it's all hidden. Except, well, some computer geeks like to have complete access all the time, so they don't bother closing the closet door.

We didn't use to have a cat, though. And even still, I would not have believed a cat could get up there. But ours did. And The Boy has scratches on his arm and chest to show for it.

But the worst thing was the next day, when Mr. Wonderful came home early and needed to take an important work call on our home phone. The phones were messed up because the cat's escapade had disturbed the wires. It was a good thing about the work call, actually, because I had gone the entire day not realizing that the absence of telemarketing calls was due to the phone being down, not because it was our "lucky" day and our number wasn't coming up on the lists.

***

A long, long time ago, way back before I was married, I remember getting a book on Numerology* out of the library. It was next to the books on Astrology, which I was interested in researching at the time.

So anyway, I went through the exercises in the book, calculating this number and that number based on the letters in my name and the numbers of my birth date. The one thing I remember clearly about this is that the number 8 was the only missing number in my profile.

Fast-forward more than 25 years.

It just occurred to me that the date of my heart procedure, August 8, 2008 is written as

08/08/08

I think I just got back my missing number.

--
* Thanks to my attempts to refresh my memory on what Numerology is all about, I think I just gave my spam filter a good workout. Nothing says "sucker" on the internet more than someone looking for a free psychic reading. The things I do for this blog. Sheesh!

Idiosyncratic Patriotism

I have nothing to write. Honestly. Nothing. But I'll try.

Yesterday we had good weather. It did not rain on our parade.

Oh yes, yesterday was Canada Day. We always have a parade. Not many cities in our area do, so it's a good parade. Not much competition for the acts. I've put photos on Flickr and Facebook, and there will be a few on Shutterchance too.

This time, for the first time, The Boy didn't go with us. We weren't going to stay long, because my hip doesn't allow me to get around like I used to. (Needless to say, sitting on the curb by the side of the road for two hours to watch the parade? Not gonna happen.)

[ASIDE: I wanted to write "kerb" but it looked wrong. So I looked it up and it's the British spelling of "curb". My Canadian dictionary differentiates between "curb" (to restrain) and "kerb" (a stone edging). In my mind I differentiate it too. But the "kerb" spelling just looks weird, so I'm going to use the American spelling instead. I guess I am idiosyncratic in my patriotism.]

I wish I could convey sound as well as pictures. Do you know the sound of those high-pitched, whiny little horns that the Shriners with the funny shoes play? Similar to a bagpipe without the drone? Well, one of the Shriner guys was trying to teach himself to play "Amazing Grace" by ear. He may have been inspired by the Scottish pipe band nearby. "Amazing Grace" sounds wonderful played on the bagpipes. It makes me cry sometimes. But that whiny little horn? And his ridiculous attempts to get the notes right? It was sad. (And I don't mean in a good way.)

When we got back The Boy had gone to play with his friend. (I guess they didn't go to watch the parade either.) I said to my husband, "We have to teach him to leave a note when he goes out and we're not home." He agreed. Then I came upstairs to my computer so I could upload the photos, and the first thing I noticed was that my calendar had been switched to July. (I think it was sitting on May before.) The second thing I noticed, written on my scratch pad, was a little note.

It said -- and I quote (everything except the name, which he wrote out in full):

gone 2 call on D.
be back wheneve

Better than Amazing Grace on bagpipes, don't you think?

This Post Is About Rude Noises

Yes, this is a post about rude noises.

What are rude noises, you may ask. Rude noises are what comes out of your body when you have excess air in your intestines. Or something like that.

When I was growing up, our word for "fart" was "rude noise".

You know what? You can make just as many jokes and laugh just as hard whether you call it a "fart" or a "rude noise". My father could very easily channel the nine-year-old boy he once was. When we were kids, I seriously doubt he ever said "rude noise" with a straight face.

I intend for this to be a funny, lively post. Please use the comments to tell us your fart-related stories, from your own childhood, from your kids, or even your friends and relatives. Oh, and to make it all serious and scientific, let's make a collection of euphemisms for flatulence, too. And funny rhymes. Anything you can think of that is funny and fart-related. Visit once. Visit often. Contribute more than one. Let's see how many comments this post can muster. Oh, and lurkers, please de-lurk for this one.

Pleeeease.

***

Okay, I'll start.

(For this story, you have to know that my sister has two boys, and she has grown to be just as stern a mother about certain things as our mother was. Well, she likes to give that impression anyway.)

My sister's eldest son, M., came home from supper at a friend's house with this story. The friend's dad is a real joker, and apparently at supper he burped rather loudly. The dad's response to burping was to repeat the following poem:

Excuse me for my rudeness
It wasn't very smart

and then with false delicacy he declined to finish the rhyme. So my nephew M. stepped in rather happily and provided the ending:

But if it went the other way
It would have been a fart

The father was very impressed, and said, "Hm, I'll bet your dad taught you that one, eh?"

And M., not wishing credit to go where it wasn't due, clarified, "No. My mom."

***

Your turn.

Strike That, Remove It

Just to clarify, now I am not going to have a private blog after all.

I totally changed my mind about the whole thing. It just seems like too much hassle to make my blog go private. Sigh.

I am so scatterbrained sometimes. Well, lots of times. This is one of those times. I really didn’t think this one through properly, so now I am backtracking.

So sorry for the inconvenience.

---

A DESCRIPTION OF THE IDIOTIC THOUGHT PROCESS I WENT THROUGH TO COME TO THE CONCLUSION THAT I AM *NOT* GOING TO TAKE THIS BLOG PRIVATE AFTER ALL:

From what I understand, when this blog goes private I will have to personally invite readers. For that I need an email address. I am guessing that you would then use that email address as an ID to log in to the blog.

This next part is something that feels stupid to ask, and is totally unenforceable, but if there are spouses out there who sometimes read this blog, I would like it if they have their own login. (I know, I know. My spouse stopped reading blogs ages ago and relies on me to tell him what's going on in my blogfriends' lives. But maybe there are others out there who actually check blogs once in a while.)

Whatever I do, it's going to be awkward getting there. And I'm still not sure what the final result will be. I should do a trial run with my old Photography blog.

Okay, that's what I'll do. Some of you whose email addresses I have (and can remember where to find) will receive invitations to read my old Photography blog. It's just a test run, so don't feel left out if you don't get one.

Omigosh, maybe I shouldn't do this. It all seems so complicated.

Oh crap! I think I just changed my mind.

Some people might call this episode a "brain fart" but I have never liked that term. (I can hear my mother's voice in the back of my head saying, "Karen, don't be vulgar." It just seems like something she would say.)


Yeah, mid-life sucks.

Bigtime.


Um, I think maybe I'll just go make myself a cup of (decaf) tea and knit for a while, 'kay?

The Next Step

First I hid my blog from the general public. Now I'm taking the next step.

I am about to make this blog private to the point where readers have to log in to access it. That means that even if others click on the links people may have in their sidebar, they can't read the blog unless I give them permission. That way I know who is reading my blog.

If you'd rather not go the extra step, I understand. I still have public blogs for my knitting and gardening. Oh, and I am still (barely) keeping my Shutterchance blog alive.

Sadly, I'm just not as interested in the internet as I used to be -- which is weird, because I still spend a lot of time here.

Coincidence

Sometimes the celestial spheres align and the universe sings in harmony.

Today I missed my opportunity to travel 45 minutes to a yarn store that's closing and has everything on sale for 50% off.

We had our day all planned when my husband got a call from his mother, who needed him to go with her to the emergency room to get something checked out. It wasn't anything serious, but it definitely needed attention. We are not used to being the family members who are called on when these situations arise, but, well, things have changed.

Being a yarn store, the place we had planned on going has eccentric hours. It closed at 4:00 today. My husband didn't get home until after 3:00. (His mom was well looked after and she will be fine.)

Sometime around 5:00 today I was online, visiting my usual haunts, when I saw that one of my knitting friends had sent me a message.

This friend said that she had been to the yarn store in question today, but had actually left her knitting project behind while she was there. She told me she had seen my favourite yarn* on sale and wondered if maybe I would like to go along with her when she went back to pick up her things.

Would I?!

--
* It's not called "Knit & Chat" for nothing. This is the type of thing we talk about.

Relics

There's a little black spot on the sun today
It's the same old thing as yesterday
There's a black hat caught in a high tree-top
There's a flag pole rag and the wind won't stop

There's a storm moving in. The dishwasher has run through another one of its endless cycles and I am putting clean dishes away in order to make room for the ones we have used today. I wipe the little puddles from the bright plastic IKEA cups, purchased years ago and stored in the low cupboard by the fridge where a four-year-old could reach them and pour himself a drink when he was thirsty. Those days a willing independence seemed like an attainable goal.

I have stood here before inside the pouring rain
With the world turning circles running 'round my brain
I guess I'm always hoping that you'd end this reign
But it's my destiny to be the king of pain

The cups are still stored in the low cupboard, though my son is now taller than his grandmother by several inches. She's in her eighties, and her already small stature has been further bowed by osteoporosis.

When we are young we grow and when we are old we dwindle. We wither. Pain and other indignities settle upon us, and we struggle on despite the breakdown of our physical selves.

There's king on a throne with his eyes torn out
There's a blind man looking for a shadow of doubt
There's a rich man sleeping on a golden bed
There's a skeleton choking on a crust of bread

In middle age we step up, taking care of old and young alike, if necessary changing plans that were only tentative anyway. Growth on one side, decay on the other -- and in the middle we just muddle through, clinging to hope that the future will be as long and as short as we need it to be. That independence will come as soon and be maintained as long as possible.

There's a little black spot on the sun today
It's the same old thing as yesterday

Sometimes we cling too long to the wrong thing, still storing plastic cups in the low cupboard, years after the necessity has passed.

King of pain
I will always be king of pain

This One Time... at Band Camp?

So, I was watching House last night and the patient was a girl who originally presented with an arrhythmia problem. (She had hallucinations too, poor girl -- where do they come up with these people?) So in their usual brainstorming about what might be troubling the unfortunate girl, one of the residents (the female, I forget her name) casually tossed out "Wolf-Parkinson-White syndrome?"

My fingers might have pointed at the TV just a little bit. You know, in a repetitive movement that might have signified the joy of recognition. Just a little.

Then later in the show the hallucinations were supposed to be caused by pain (lots of it). House said, "Arrhythmias hurt. What if her hallucinations are her body's reaction to pain?" Well. Um. Arrhythmias hurt? Hurt like having your fingers bent back (which is what House did to the girl to cause her enough pain to bring on a hallucination on purpose)?

No. I don't think so.

It was kind of cool where they did a sort of emergency catheter thing where they killed the extra pathway in her heart. When I think of all the planning and expertise going into my procedure, it sort of made me scared for the girl that all she had were three residents playing around with that equipment doing the procedure.

She came through it, of course. But something tells me that show is NOT very realistic....

***

There are only a few days left of school, and none of them are really going to be that strenuous, academically. But I have to get the boy's summer activities all set up. It can be difficult to find activities for a boy his age -- a tween (although I still think that word is better for girls than boys, even though it applies to the age and not the gender).

With the area we live in, it's feasible to enroll in activities that take place in a few different cities, including the one where my sister lives. My sister, who is concerned that I might not be able to get my son to activities when I'm recovering from my procedure, gave me information on day camps in her area (actually, on the campus of the university where she works) and offered to have him stay at their place for a few days and go to one of those camps.

It's all very cool. But frustrating.

Frustrating because I have found so many different camps and activities that would be great, and that my son is interested in, but now the juggling begins. Which camps are available which weeks?

These are the activities I'm working on for the summer:

• Photography course, offered by a private art gallery (they had phone registration, so he's in that one, which is lucky since it starts July 2)
  
• Rock Band camp, offered by a music store (I have to physically go there and register, no phone or online registration)
  
• Paintball camp (I'm trying to contact them to get the registration info, but it's a bunch of young guys running it, so...)
  
• Science and Engineering camp, offered by my sister's university (same thing he's been to before, only a different university running it; no phone or online registration at this one, sigh!)
  
• Computer Game Design (one of the Science and Engineering camps available, but there's only one spot left)
  

The trouble is, the Game Design one is the only one available during the week that would make sense for my son to stay with my sister, and that's the one that might not have a spot for him.

Also, some of the other camps are only offered in specific weeks. So I have to juggle the Science and Engineering camp with the Rock Band camp and see which ones I can get him into and when. And all this "register in person" stuff is going to kill me. I'll be driving all over the place today.

Wish me luck!

--
NOTE: The title of this post is actually quite inappropriate, considering the way the movie American Pie ended. But I still couldn't resist. Oh, and if you've never seen American Pie...lucky you!

Random Blather

The last lease payment has been made on my car. We are currently thinking of getting a (fuel-efficient!) Nissan Versa to replace it. With gas prices so high, we are getting dinged by Mr. Wonderful's commute. By judiciously sharing both cars, we can save a lot on our current gas consumption.

***

We have two new TV addictions. So You Think You Can Dance (season 4) and House (in syndication). House is a new discovery for us, so we get to enjoy the unfolding of an entire season night by night, instead of waiting a week between episodes. Now if only it wasn't on so late, so we could also enjoy Numb3rs, which follows it.

***

Oh and by the way, I am scheduled to have my procedure on August 8. I need to show up at 6:00 AM (I am soooo not a morning person) and it's a 45-minute drive to the hospital. Yeah. Other than that, all I do now is wait.

What I Know Is, Doctors Use It Too

So, as most of you already know, I had my much anticipated appointment today.

This is kind of long and detailed.

Skip to the end if you'd like.

No?

Okay then, let's begin...

I didn't know what to expect as we drove the 45 or so minutes to the big city to the southwest, the one that has a med school at its university and whose hospital therefore houses the specialized specialists that the general specialists in the surrounding area refer their cases to. I went to the Arrhythmia Clinic, but first I had to report for an ECG, and even though we were half an hour earlier than the fifteen minutes early they told us to show up, I was called in quickly for my test and I was in and out in a couple of minutes. (The small room where they performed the test had a hospital bed instead of the usual skinny vinyl-cushioned thing on top of a metal cabinet that you usually see in medical offices. It was sooooooo nice and comfortable.)

I was feeling buoyant as we ascended to the fifth-floor clinic and I reported to the secretary to check in. The waiting room was practically empty, something you don't see very often in our part of the world where there are always more patients than there are doctors to see them. Unfortunately, it was still a very long wait. First I had to wait until my scheduled appointment time, and then it was another ten minutes before they called me. But finally we were ushered into an examination room by the clinic's resident Resident.

The Resident was a very competent young man, but communication was not always easy. I have known people who are anxious when they must speak with someone who has a thick accent, and I am certainly not one of them -- I guess I'm good at guessing what people are trying to say -- but there were times when even I gave up trying to understand and I just nodded and smiled. Still, it was his job to ask me a lot of questions and so I answered them as best I could. One of his questions was whether my tachycardia had ever been recorded. I told him it had, at the hospital, and that my cardiologist would have a copy of that reading.

When it came time to crawl atop the metal cabinet and have my blood pressure taken, well, my heart did me proud. It's a giving, helpful heart really and right there and then it went into tachycardia. I told the Resident and he confirmed it and there followed a scramble to get me back to the diagnostic testing area where they could give me another ECG. Luckily when we got there the receptionist was just hanging up the phone and said, "Is that Karen?" and it was all arranged.

When we got back to the examination room, the resident pored over the readings and then checked something on the computer. I was amused to notice that he had googled my condition and consulted Wikipedia. (Wikipedia's information is actually quite detailed.) So anyway, back in January, based on a smattering of terms I heard the ER doctors throwing around and a knowledge of my own symptoms I was able to diagnose myself as having Wolf-Parkinson-White syndrome, a specific type of SVT. So I had already read the exact same Wikipedia article that the Resident called up.

But don't think I am not impressed with the man. At one point he was incredulous that I had never been diagnosed despite having an ECG in my mid-20s. He could tell just by reading the printout of my resting heart rate that I had a problem. But then again he's working in an arrhythmia clinic, and Wikipedia wasn't around in the early 90s.

And so it comes to this. I am going to get the permanent treatment for my condition, catheter ablation. I have signed the consent form already. There are a few things that worry me, but I am trying not to think about it too much. The procedure is done with local anesthesia. I will be awake (though sedated -- hopefully heavily). The other part that bothers me is that I will end up with two scars, one of which will be on my neck. I hadn't known about the neck one before the doctor explained the procedure in detail.

Still, to eliminate this condition, to not have to take medication, to be able to enjoy again the things I have had to give up, all that will be worth it.

Just Another Random Sunday

My friends are abandoning the internet in droves.

That would be funny, wouldn't it. Me having droves of friends. Even on the Internet, I don't have droves of friends.

So anyway, I abandoned the Internet myself for a while yesterday, to read the novel The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs. It was a good read. As a knitter, I found it interesting to read a novel with a yarn store owner as the main character, but there's not a lot of "insider" stuff in the novel that would make it unapproachable for anyone who has never knit. In fact, there were times when I found myself wishing there was a little more detail there.

The book is described as being like "Steel Magnolias set in New York". So if you liked Steel Magnolias and you are looking for a book recommendation, this is the novel for you.

(Oh, and I just saw on IMDb that it's being adapted into a movie with Julia Roberts as the main character.)

***

As usual our weather here heats up like turning on a light switch. One day it's so cool and windy you want to wrap your jacket around you and hunch over when you walk, the next day (literally overnight) it's so hot and humid that sweat drops fall from your face to your shirt after just 5 minutes touring the back yard surveying what needs to be done in the garden.

***

Our weather is kind of like gas prices. One day you raise your eyebrows at $1.25 CDN a litre ($4.63 USD a gallon). The next day it's $1.29 a litre ($4.78 a gallon), so you wait for it to crawl back down. Five days later you are scrambling for a place in line at the rural gas station that's selling for $1.29 a litre when everyone else is at $1.34 ($4.97 a gallon).

A mere six weeks ago, I was incredulous that gas had reached $1.20 a litre. And before we went on vacation at the beginning of April, gas was still at under $1.00 a litre.

I realize the numbers are kind of boring, and I'm not telling anyone anything they don't know, but I want to have a record of this that I can come back to -- because predictions say that oil will go to $200 a barrel and our lives will change because of it.

Of course, people's lives have already changed.

***

But except for the price of gas and the relentless march of time (and weather), my life doesn't change very much from day to day. Maybe something will change tomorrow when I go for my appointment at the arrhythmia centre.

Ten Ways the World Has Changed

I found this meme, so I thought I'd write something up. The problem is, though, that the lists could all be very much the same from person to person, depending on their age. Before I read this meme on Maryse's blog, I had no idea of her age. Now I know, based on her answers, that she is very close in age to me. Not that it matters -- it just makes it harder to come up with unique things to say.

Anyway, here is my attempt to come up with a list of ten ways the world has changed since I was in school.

10 Ways the World Has Changed Since I Was in School

By "school" I mean university with maybe a smidgen of high school thrown in. I was 24 when I graduated from a five-year program back in 1989.

1. One of the reasons why I was older when I graduated was that we had an extra year of high school back then. Yes, in Ontario, grade 13 existed! It was considered preparation for university, for those students who were going on. The province funded the teachers and classrooms, but we had to pay for our own textbooks.

2. CDs were brand new technology, and vinyl was still the norm. The club music we liked to listen to came out on EP -- an extended play record that had maybe two long mixes per side -- as opposed to LP, which were "long play" records that contained a collection of music, usually one or two radio hits plus a bunch of other stuff. There was no way of buying music one song at a time. (Even singles, that played at 45 RPM, and thus were often called 45s, had an A side and a B side.)

3. Portable music was played on cassettes carried around in Sony Walkman-style players clipped to belts or carried in pockets. I remember the first advertisement I saw for a CD player you could wear the same way as a Walkman. It cost over $500 (in late 80s dollars!) and was advertised in an upscale magazine read mostly by trend-conscious affluent types. The ad could just as easily have been for precious gems, as it presented an elegant woman in a silver evening gown with the CD player perched provocatively on her hip.

4. Trend-conscious affluent types were called yuppies and young wannabes who wore Lacoste alligator shirts and penny loafers were called preppies. Preppies wore their collars turned up, and the girls often wore a string of real or imitation pearls with theirs. Preppy girls usually had short hair, since it was fashionable at that time in a way it has never been since. Boys had their hair cut short, and over their ears. Everyone wore high-waisted pants with legs cut straight and narrow.

5. It was still a smoker's world back then. Cafeterias on campus (and most restaurants in the city) had tiny non-smoking sections, but these were considered a courtesy and no real thought was given to how room ventilation actually worked, so the best you could hope for was that at least you would not be sitting directly across from someone who would blow smoke in your face. It was small consolation in a room that was always choked with smoke anyway. In first year I used to eat my lunch sitting on a bench in a quiet, smoke-free hallway around the corner from the cafeteria.

6. If you had a computer on your desktop it was most likely at work and probably a mainframe terminal. I did get to use the Macintosh computer almost as soon as it was first available, but it felt like a toy to me. No weird commands to memorize, what you saw was what you got. Nowadays, WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) has no meaning, since that is the norm. There is no alternative to compare it to.

7. Canada still had low-denomination bills. Nowadays we have $1 and $2 coins, affectionately known as loonies and toonies. For those of you who may not know, this is because the $1 coin has an impression of a loon on the tail side, so as soon as it was released people started calling it the loonie. The word "toonie" came about when the $2 coin was introduced because it echoed loonie nicely, and because its pronunciation suggests twonie.

8. Germany was two countries, democratic West Germany and communist East Germany. The city of Berlin, where my husband's family comes from, was harshly divided by the Berlin Wall. My husband tells stories of a visit to Berlin when he was 10 years old, seeing guards with machine guns in the subway stations on a route that happened to pass under the wall for a couple of stops.

9. Cadbury's Creme Eggs were called "Easter Creme Eggs". I can still sing the jingle. (Luckily, I only have access to the printed word and you will be spared from hearing it.)

10. Movies did not use CGI for special effects. CGI has improved the animated film genre tremendously, and there are many live action films where CGI melds flawlessly and improves the story. However, there are other modern examples where CGI is overused. There are even a few examples I could mention where "old school" methods would have given a better result than the CGI that actually made it into the film. But then again, bad filmmaking is not unique to any time period. That much hasn't changed.

Ambiguity

"Where you put your time and attention says a lot about who you are. It says a lot about you as a human being. You have some idea in your head of all the stuff that is high priority to you. All the stuff that really matters. If I sat down and asked you what’s really important to you - you would say ‘oh my family and my church group and I’m a deacon.’ But then I go and I look in your email box, newsfeeds and web browser… If I went and got all CSI on that, what would the last two weeks of your electronic life say about how it maps to the stuff that you claim is really important?"

— Merlin Mann (found on Jenn's Tumblr blog)


I'm really confused as to what this person is trying to say.

Part of me thinks there is a serious flaw in this argument, being that most of the things that are important to people might never be reflected in an electronic record.

For example, my concern for my family, and our health -- of course you would not find evidence of that in my inbox, newsfeeds, or web browser. I stay in touch with my family by phone or by seeing them in person. I contact doctors the same way. I run around seeing doctors, ordering prescriptions and making sure medication is taken on time. Now I am learning (again through visiting the doctor) that I need to be concerned about correct dosage for a boy who is growing, since dosage is by weight and too low a dose of certain medications is worse than not taking it at all.

Anyway, (until now) none of that was in any way reflected in an electronic record. The things that are important to me I try to keep private. So I was ready to condemn Mann's assessment as short-sighted and narrow, until I flipped the argument around and realized that he could be trying (rather badly, IMHO) to say something else.

If he is trying to say that time spent online is time taken away from "important" things, then the point is more apt. If I spend half an hour following a series of links leading to information, and finally horrific videos, about harlequin ichthyosis (warning: do not do this), instead of, say, cleaning out my fridge -- then yeah. There is a disconnect between what I profess to be important and what I spend my time doing.

I still haven't quite made up my mind about the author's original intent, though.

It's All in the Interpretation

There was a little girl*
Who had a little curl**
Right in the middle of her forehead

And when she was good
She was very, very good
But when she was bad she was horrid***

--

* By "girl" I mean "middle-aged woman".

** By "curl" I mean "zit".

*** This much never changes. Ever.

Ah Well

Today I went to Len's Mill Store and while I was there I picked up three bags of buttons for no other reason than that I like buttons.

I like sorting buttons.

Sorting buttons reminds me of when I was a kid and my mother used to sew a lot of our clothes. At that time she had a fair-sized collection of buttons.

Now I have my own buttons.

I bought three bags of buttons and by the time I had got rid of all the ugly ones, I had two-and-a-half bags of buttons.

Actually, I didn't get rid of the ugly ones first. Who would do that? What I did was I separated all the beautiful and unusual buttons, and all the colourful ones and any buttons that had other redeeming qualities. The leftovers (ordinary black and brown buttons, and men's shirt and raincoat buttons) were consigned to the "ugly" bag.

The rest look something like this:

I bought other things at Len's Mill besides buttons, since I didn't actually go there for buttons. I went there for some fabric and some batting so I can finish the potholders I am making for my latest knitting swap.

I found the fabric I wanted in a bin of quilting scraps that was sold by the pound. I picked out four pieces of fabric, twice as many as I needed, and took them to the counter to be weighed and priced. It cost me a whole 38 cents.

It took me forever to find the batting. I kept getting lost.

The fabric section is in the basement of an old factory building. The ceilings are low and fabric is piled six feet high in haphazard rows with many dead ends. The aisles are littered with bins of scraps and displays of zippers and buttons, ribbons and trims, quilting supplies and ancient dog-eared books of patterns and instructions.

Tucked in a back corner somewhere I found a rack of craft batting packaged in store-label bags of varying sizes. The smallest bag was $2.99. Over in another area, by the quilting supplies, I found a package of fusible batting, which was more costly but I thought it might be more useful, especially if I could iron it onto the back of my cheap fabric scraps. I might be able to use both types of batting if I do it this way.

I came home because I was hungry and I had planned to make myself a grilled cheese sandwich but then I remembered that the grocery store I last shopped at had a big batch of crumpets, which are not always available, so I had bought six packages and I remembered how delicious and chewy crumpets are when you toast them just the right amount, so the edges are crispy but not burnt.

Then I remembered how we found this wonderful gourmet grocery store in Waterloo last weekend when we were car shopping, Dave's Gourmet, and we had bought (seedless) raspberry rhubarb jam. So that is what I had on my crumpets.

The great thing about that store, Dave's Gourmet, was that it had a whole wall of teas. Almost every brand of organic or specialty tea you could think of was there. So I bought myself some decaf chai latte mix. Since giving up caffeine, I have really missed chai lattes.

We also found Mr. Wonderful's favourite imported spring water, Fiji, and mine which comes from Norway and in the States (at least in Las Vegas) is called Oasis but is called Voss here. There's no mistaking that it is the same water though, since it comes in a stylish cylindrical bottle with distinctive lettering up the side -- just that the lettering said oasis when we got it in Vegas, and voss here. (I think this is just like how Danone yogurt is called Dannon in the States, and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was called Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone.)

So anyway I didn't have any imported spring water or chai latte to drink at lunchtime, but I did have crumpets and jam and it was good.

But writing this blog entry almost made me late for picking up The Boy from school, though luckily he was late coming out anyway so it all worked out in the end.

The way things very often do, I find.