Benchmark 60

Robbed Again!

2012-01-27T11:15:00.000-08:00

This morning I was snuggled under my down comforter waiting for the alarm to go off because why would Nana get out of bed early? The spouse comes into the bedroom and announces "We were robbed again and this time they took the white pickup."

WTF???

The spouse keeps his vehicle keys in the shop. You remember the shop? It's the building that was robbed in December that we added a fancy new keypad entry device to prevent further break-ins. This time the thief broke in the window. The perpetrator took his/her time deciding which vehicle to steal. He took the spouse's "retirement" pickup. We purchased it last year so that when the spouse retired and gave up his company pickup, he would have a truck because you can't live in eastern Oregon without a truck. It wouldn't be manly!

The thief also took the spouse's new i-phone. He called my brother-in-law at 4:00 A.M. and when asked who it was, he replied "Who do you think it is, faggot?" Great, I wonder how many of the spouse's friends and customers got phone calls like that from his phone number?

The pick-up has On-star, but we never continued the subscription because we live in a small town and never get lost. We thought that On-star could help to recover the vehicle. Nope, they don't help unless you have an active subscription. They wouldn't turn off the engine.

I'm building some serious rage against "them." Today "them" seems to encompass thieves and everyone plotting against my serenity. I'm reserving some of my irritation for On-Star.

When I left home this morning the spouse was still talking to the sheriff.

To Hell With Frugality

2012-01-19T01:00:00.000-08:00

Megan

I haven't seen my grandchildren since Thanksgiving. We stayed home in Oregon this December and they spent the holidays with their parents and other grandparents in Texas. I plan to go to Austin to visit them during their spring break in March.

I talk to them on the phone a few times a week. Megan's first question is always "When are you coming, Nana?" Last week I told her I needed to check my calendar and talk to her mom to decide on a good time. On Sunday her first question was, "Nana, did you check your calendar?"

I hadn't checked my calendar. Having just paid December bills, I had vowed to cut back on extravagances. Flying to Texas every eight weeks is an extravagance. I'm going to Italy with my daughter in April...another extravagance. But then on the phone with my daughter I hear those little voices chanting in the background, "I wanna talk to Nana, I wanna talk to Nana." So today when Megan asked "When are you coming Nana?" I told her I was coming next weekend.

Life is too short to say no to grandchildren!

Hey! We've Been Robbed!

2012-01-17T22:47:00.000-08:00

We've lived in our current house for almost twenty years. We bought it because it is one of the few places in Hermiston that has a view. Our three acres back up to the Umatilla River and a park. Our backyard looks over the river to the Hermiston Butte. We have neighbors on either side of us at a comfortable distance. It's quiet, but not isolated. It's a quick few minutes drive into town (if you don't get stopped at the light at the Mormon Church!)

We rarely lock the doors...usually only when we're going out of town. Last year when we went to San Diego for Christmas we had to search the house to find a key so we could lock the doors. We've never had a problem.

At Thanksgiving we went to Austin to see the grandchildren. We didn't have to search for a key because our son stayed home. Sometime while we were gone the spouse's workshop was robbed. We have no idea when it happened. When we first got home the spouse thought that he had just misplaced his binoculars. After several days of looking in all the places that he might have left them, he realized that he was missing a lot of other things too. When you look at the list of things that he knows are missing, you might wonder how he didn't know immediately that he had been robbed. But, in his defense, the shop is a large building separate from the house and it is filled from floor to ceiling with his tools and toys, including a 28 foot sailboat on a trailer, a refrigerator for beer, cable TV, wood stove, metal lathe, reloading bench, gun safe and wood working bench.

We were fortunate that the majority of the spouse's really pricey toys were in his gun safe. This has been an expensive lesson for us, but we've learned to recognize when the Universe is sending us a message. We don't need another lesson to learn that times have changed and even in small towns we have to lock our doors and not be so trusting. But I can't help but be sad that our trusting way of life is changing. We have a new doorknob with keypad entry installed on the shop door. After trying it out for a week, we've ordered additional knobs to install on the house exterior doors.

The new doorknobs lock automatically. To open the door you have to enter the access code on the keypad. Now every time I take out the trash I'll need to type in a code to get back in the house. Running back in the house for something I have forgotten will take a little longer. Remembering the new code...now that will be the real challenge.

5 Things Nana Isn’t Liking Right Now

2012-01-11T15:39:00.000-08:00

The other day I wrote a list of things that I was enjoying. That got me thinking that an easy post to write would be the stuff that I wasn’t so happy about. In all honesty, it was much harder to come up with this list. Retirement must be agreeing with me!

1. Winter: Don’t tell me that it’s unusually warm or that it hasn’t even snowed yet. It’s still freaking cold! The mid-thirties is not balmy. The only good thing about winter is that there aren’t many bugs or snakes.

2. Extreme Couponing: Have you seen this program on TLC? It’s all about people who use coupons to stockpile massive quantities of food and toiletries without paying for them. These people proudly show off their hoard of body wash, Tabasco sauce, or toilet paper that they stack under the beds of their children, in their dining room, or on shelving units built all around their living rooms. They get all this stuff because “it’s free” with coupons, even though they can’t possibly use it all. While I love a good sale and I use coupons myself, this program glorifies behavior that borders on compulsive. I wonder how many of these families will go on to appear on Hoarders.

3. Presidential Campaigning: I’m already tired of the 2012 presidential election. Last week Newt Gingrich called the house every evening just before dinner and I don’t even live in Iowa or New Hampshire. (The spouse is a registered republican.) I hang up on Newt and never pass his message on to the spouse. It’s only January and it is disheartening to think that we’ve got eleven months of these robo-calls and negative TV ads before we finally vote.

4. Going to the dentist: I spent the morning in the chair at the dentist. I broke a tooth over Christmas eating caramel corn. These days every trip to the dentist is never just a check-up or a simple filling. Pretty soon I won’t have any natural teeth left. I have more crowns than the queen!

5. Exercise: I know I need more exercise and now that I’m retired I can no longer claim that I’m too busy. Now I complain that it’s too cold…and last summer, it was too hot!

I really had trouble coming up with five things I didn’t like, but I did think of some new things to add to my like list.

5 Things Nana Likes Right Now

2012-01-08T12:11:00.000-08:00

1. West Side Story: playing now at Keller Auditorium in Portland. Crisp, clear voices and wonderful dancers. This is an excellent production. My only regret is that there isn’t a sing-a-long performance. I couldn’t dance-along, but I sure know all the words to “I Feel Pretty.” If you get a chance to see this, don’t miss it. Today is the last day in Portland, but it will open in Seattle on the 10th.

2. Domino’s Stuffed Cheesy Bread: After the 200 mile drive home from West Side Story I needed dinner and Domino’s was on the way home. The cheesy bread is all the best parts of pizza without the sauce and toppings. Bread and cheese…what’s not to love? I heated up the leftovers for breakfast!

3. My new down comforter: You know I can’t resist those 50% off the sale price deals at Macy’s. I bought a Ralph Lauren king sized down comforter for less than $70.00. Now we have two down comforters on our bed. Have you noticed that a king size comforter fits great on the bed when there’s no one in the bed? Once two people are in bed, the comforter isn’t large enough to hang over both sides of the bed. It was usually my butt that was hanging out in the freezing night air! Now we’ve got two over-lapping comforters and Nana has a warm butt. Believe me, life is better for everyone when Nana has a warm butt!

4. Christmas is over: I went to the mall to get a haircut last week and I could easily stroll through the stores. The crowds are gone. The spouse is back at work and I get the house to myself for a few hours a day. I enjoy Christmas, but I think I enjoy the after-Christmas lull even more.

5. Grandchildren: You had to know that I couldn’t possibly write a list of favorite things without including my grandchildren. I called them from Portland while I was shopping to find out what I was authorized to buy for them. As much as I love shopping for them, I always check in with their mother to find out what they need. Nana got the okay to buy leggings and “bootiful jammies.” On the phone the first question my granddaughter asked me was “When are you coming, Nana?” It’s nice to be wanted!

Nana Celebrates the 2nd Anniversary of Benchmark 60

2012-01-01T22:41:00.000-08:00

If it wasn't for the Blog Anniversary counter over on the right, I probably wouldn't have realized that it was time to celebrate another blog anniversary. Two years ago I made the commitment to myself to blog for at least three months...and here it is two years later and I'm still at it. Thank you to all of you who have stuck with me. Becoming a member of the blogging community has been a great experience. Although we have never met, I feel like I have friends all over the globe. You have all taught me so much, and I am proud to be a member of the blogging community.

So, now that I've done this for two years, I guess I'll keep at it...

What's in store for the third year of Benchmark 60?

It's probably time to do some remodeling and upgrade my tired decor. I also want to try and publish on a regular schedule. Even though I know how to use that automatic publishing feature, I don't often use it. I'm making a commitment to myself to publish at least once a week. (Yeah, I know that's a kind of wishy-washy goal, but I'm retired and don't have to meet state benchmarks!) Stay tuned for the changes.

There's one last change. I recently was offered an opportunity to host a give away on my blog. (Wow! Someone offered me free stuff just for blogging!) I thought that it would be fun to celebrate the start of my third year with my first contest. So in the next week or so I'll be posting about how you can win a copy of My Memories Suite, digital scrapbook software that lets you easily create digital scrapbooks, photobooks, cards and calendars.

I'm looking forward to new adventures in 2012 and I'm so glad that you're along for the ride! Happy New Year!

Nana Celebrates Christmas

2011-12-25T23:20:00.000-08:00

Our presents have been opened and the Christmas meal devoured. We have enough leftovers to feed us for the rest of the week, but if past history is any indicator, we'll tire of turkey by Tuesday and order a pizza. This has been a low key Christmas. We stayed home, just the spouse and I and our adult son. The spouse and I agreed not to exchange gifts because we didn't need anything and if we did need or want something, then we'd just buy it for ourselves. So we bought ourselves a new television and the spouse ordered new fancy binoculars and next week I'll hit the after-Christmas sales and probably find something I can't live without.

We had dinner about 2:00. I've never been able to determine how long everything will take to cook, so we don't plan a meal time. We just eat when everything is done.

We had Christmas crackers at our dinner table. There's a picture of a Christmas cracker above. They're one of those things that you always see in pictures of English Christmas celebrations. You hold one end and someone else holds the other and you pull until the cracker pops. Inside there's a small plastic toy or charm, a paper hat, and a fortune or joke. In those English Christmas pictures everyone is sitting around the table wearing the paper hats. When I've visited England, I've always purchased crackers to bring home. My children enjoyed the tradition when we could find crackers. Now I can order them online, but it seems a little silly to get them for three adults. Unless the grandchildren come visit us for Christmas the four crackers I found this year in a dusty box when I unpacked the Christmas decorations will probably be our last.

So at dinner the spouse, our son and I held on to the ends of the crackers and tugged them open with a pop. The tradition is that you have to pull the cracker open with someone else. I got a lovely pink paper crown, a small plastic top, and a joke. The problem is that none of us understand the joke. I figure it must be an English thing. Can any of you Brits explain this joke to me?

What do you call a fish with letters running down its middle?

Answer: Rock Salmon

None of us get it...and that's as exciting as our Christmas conversation got this year!

There's a part of me that longs for the excitement of Christmas past when we had small children giddy with anticipation for Santa. This year I had to settle for talking with my granddaughters on the phone.

I'm learning that in retirement the one thing that doesn't slow down is change. Our Christmas is different now that our children are adults, but I've learned to appreciate however we celebrate the holiday.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Nana's New Hat - Let's Try This One Again

2011-12-22T00:16:00.000-08:00

I got to try out my new winter hat today. It has turned cold and I bundled up before venturing outside to tidy up the flower beds for the winter ahead. My friend Shawn and I attended a craft fair in Spokane a few weeks ago and I found two different hand knit hats. I love hats, but they look better on other people. I wish I could carry off wearing a hat and looking stylish. Instead I ...well, I can't think of a good simile. I look like a pinhead.

The last time I worked in the flower beds I was surprised by a snake.

"What kind of snake was it?" the spouse asks me. Like I'm some sort of snake identification expert in my spare time.

"How the hell do I know...It was a SNAKE!!!"

I do tend to believe that all my questions can be answered on the Internet, so I googled "snake identification." Several websites have tools to assist in identifying your snakes, but this is perhaps a better idea in concept than in practice. (Try it yourself here.)

The identification process starts off pretty easy. There are pictures of two snakes and you have to select which one looks most like your snake. Second question, rattles or no rattles? Again, pretty easy. Third question: longitudinal stripes or no stripes? My snake had stripes. Fourth question: belly with four brown stripes running the length of the body or belly without stripes.

Wait a minute! I have to pick up the snake, turn it over, and look for stripes!!!

The only way this identification process is going to work for me is if I've chopped off the serpent's head with my shovel, and, let's get real here, if I were brave enough to slay a snake and not run screaming in terror, why would I care what kind of dead snake it was?

One more thing to worry about. I'll be found dead in the garden from a snake bite and I'll be wearing my new hat and the emergency response people will stare at my lifeless corpse and remark "Wow, look at her pinhead!"

Update: I wrote this a few weeks ago just as the weather was turning cold. Today is the official first day of winter and it's cold every day now. I've taken to wearing my hat all the time...even in the house. The spouse says I look like a homeless person...yeah, he's full of complements, that one! I'm not worrying about looking like a pinhead; I just want to be warm! One good thing about winter...it slows down the snakes!

Chrismas Memories from the Blog Vault

2011-12-19T07:00:00.000-08:00

I put the Christmas tree up last weekend. We have a fake tree. As much as I love the smell of freshly cut evergreen, I like not having the mess even more. The ornaments on our tree trace the history of our family. The following is a reposting of the third post I made to my blog almost two years ago.

December 28, 2009

Memory Tree

I took the Christmas tree down today. Each ornament holds a memory of a past Christmas. My mother died at Christmas two years ago. When we cleaned out her house, I kept several of her ornaments. I think of her as I wrap the tissue around a small plush crown with rhinestones. Ours was not an easy relationship, but as I’m wrapping up the Christmas ornament it’s not the challenges that I remember. Together we would shop the after Christmas sales for half-price ornaments. I have fond memories of teaming with my mom against the crowds to score my discounted decorations. Our bargain hunting treasures were the start of my family’s Christmas collection.

As the years have gone by, we’ve added a few new ornaments every year. This year we picked up a souvenir ornament on our retirement cruise to Alaska, It hung on the tree alongside the green salt dough dinosaur one of the kids made in kindergarten. My son will be thirty this year; his “baby’s first Christmas” ornament dangled alongside the double-decker bus from the Rayner Reunion in 1997. The decorations document births and deaths, major life changes, and the spirit of Christmas past. I remember the love as I put each shiny or tattered ornament in the box.

When my grandchildren were born we started the tradition of buying each of them an ornament every year. I try to find one that reflects their current interests. This year I bought my oldest granddaughter a cow, because she says, “the cow is my favorite animal.” I hope years from now, when she is putting her own tree away, she will remember when cows were her favorite animal and how much her Nana loved her.

Update: I helped my granddaughters decorate their tree this year when we were in Austin for Thanksgiving. We hung the cow ornament on the tree, but the cow is no longer Megan’s favorite animal. When she was four and was asked why the cow was her favorite animal, she always answered “Because they’re tasty!” Now when I see that cow ornament I am reminded of that time in her childhood…and how quickly she has grown up. I haven't bought this year's ornaments yet. Maybe I should wait for the after Christmas sales?

Reflections on an Uninteresting Life

2011-12-18T10:42:00.000-08:00

The spouse doesn’t read my blog. I’m not sure if it’s because he isn’t interested or if it’s just that his technological skills haven’t advanced enough for him to be able to find it. I expect, though, that he just prefers to be in denial. So, last week he saw me chuckling at my computer screen and asked, “What’s so funny?”

“I wrote about your ear wax and I’m reading the comments from the readers.” I innocently replied.

“Well, THANK YOU for sharing my issues with the world.” (If we had a sarcasm font, that sentence would be in sarcasm bold!) But, I like the idea that he believes that people the world over are waiting breathlessly to read my words.

Yesterday I told him I was going to write about his weekend project…I am not making this up; he says he is going to “organize my rock piles.”

“If your life is so uninteresting that you have to write about mine,” he tells me, “maybe you shouldn’t be writing a blog.”

Damn, I hate it when he’s right!

Nana Learns Something New

2011-12-09T00:09:00.000-08:00

The spouse got hearing aids last year. For some time he had been accusing me of mumbling, denying that I'd ever told him about various events, and watching TV with the volume set at levels that caused most humans to run screaming from the room. These symptoms, however, weren't enough for him to realize that he had a hearing problem. Then his brother got hearing aids and it made such a difference in his brother's life that the spouse thought maybe he should get his hearing checked too. A month (and thousands of dollars) later he was sporting hearing aids that were nearly invisible, but allowed him to once again hear.

He's had some challenges in adjusting to using hearing aids. He still has trouble distinguishing conversations in a room with a lot of background noise. He temporarily gave up using his aids at Thanksgiving with a room full of noisy relatives and our granddaughters' constant chatter, but the hearing aids have allowed him to once again be a part of the conversation of daily life.

In the past few weeks the volume on the TV has been creeping up and I was repeating myself constantly. The spouse said "My hearing aids have stopped working for me." So he made an appointment with the hearing aid technician to get them adjusted. There was nothing wrong with the hearing aids, but when the technician looked in the spouse's ears they were packed with wax. Turns out that when you wear hearing aids it can, over time, pack the ear wax into the ear canal.

The next day the spouse went to the doctor to get his ears roto-rootered. He reported that there were chewing gum sized wads of gunk in his ears!

Who knew that hearing aids could cause the formation of giant wax plugs that interfere with hearing. Since the wax vacuum sucked the gunk out of his ears he can hear again and the TV plays at a reasonable level.

Perhaps the most interesting thing I learned from this experience was after writing the above I googled "ear wax images." I was looking for a picture for the top of the post. Take my word for it, you don't want to see those images!

Ear wax, one more thing I get to look forward to on my journey to old age.

WTF Wednesday: Holiday Travel

2011-11-30T19:47:00.000-08:00

I got home late last night from a lovely Thanksgiving visit with my grandchildren in Austin, Texas. There’s nothing like holiday airline travel to fuel a WTF Wednesday post!

The problem with traveling during holiday periods is that the sky is filled with amateur travelers. Aunt Edith flying to Nebraska to spend time with her sister was last on a plane during the Nixon administration. I don’t expect every traveler to be experienced, but why can’t they pay attention to what is going on around them. At the airport security screening in Pasco, a small regional airport with just two security lanes, a woman with six plastic tubs that had gone through X-ray stood at the exit of the machine and slowly started to put away one item at a time from her six tubs. The line of travelers waiting to enter security stretched to the door, but she was oblivious that no more luggage could enter the X-ray machine until she moved her baggage further along the belt.

WTF! My shoes and one suitcase were trapped inside the machine until she moved. I tried to model appropriate airport courtesy by reaching around her for my shoes and moving them down the conveyor. She never figured out that she should move all her belongings to the end of the table before stopping to reorganize.

This trip we flew United. It is not my preferred airline. They have an additional charge for everything. In case of emergency if those masks fall from the ceiling, I bet United would bill you an extra $25.00 for oxygen!

It was two days before Thanksgiving and the flights were crowded, but not full. Our first leg of the journey we flew from Pasco to Denver and had an almost four hour layover. We ate lunch in Denver and then wandered down to our gate. On the way we noticed another United flight going to Austin boarding. Since we had only carry-on luggage, we thought “Hey, let’s take the earlier flight.” We checked at the gate and seats were available, but…

WTF !!! We had to pay an outrageous ticket change fee! We decided to just wait for our original flight. I don’t understand the airline’s reasoning. The flight to Austin was ready to leave with empty seats. Once it left the gate the opportunity for revenue was lost. If they had let us take the empty seats, they would have had an additional opportunity to sell our original seats on a later flight. The closer it got to Thanksgiving, the more crowded the flights become. Doesn't it make sense to fill those early seats and have some space for the last minute travellers?

We were flying small regional jets. Because the spouse was traveling with me, at least I was squished into a seat with someone I know. A definition of hell might include being strapped into a coach class seat on a cross country journey with a stranger’s damp body parts pushing against your thighs and shoulders. On this trip the sensory assault came from the passenger in front of me who had bathed in a musky perfume. It didn’t do much to cover the stench of stale cigarette smoke that hung in an invisible cloud around her.

United charges an additional fee for “preferred” seating. What they consider preferred are the exit rows and the rows toward the front of the economy cabin. You pay a premium price to not sit in the row just in front of the rest room.

Leaving from Austin on our flight home there were a lot of families with small children. Having just spent a week with a six and a four year old, I realize that wrangling children is a challenge. I’ve learned to always carry bribes,um…I mean small educational toys. The only reason Nana eats a Happy meal is for the free toy that can be used as a behavior modification tool. The parents in the Austin airport apparently didn’t believe in behavior modification. Their children were entertained by pushing an empty stroller around and around and through the crowded waiting area. I arranged my carry-on suitcase as a crash barrier, other waiting passengers weren’t so lucky. The smallest child was entertained by a toy cell phone. Every ten seconds the fake phone rang and rang and rang, and then ten seconds later it rang and rang and rang…

WTF! Parents, bring your damn child a SILENT toy or, here’s a novel idea, read them a book in a quiet voice. Yes, your kids are adorable, but the rest of us aren’t interested in their cute utterances.

How quickly the glow of Thanksgiving gratitude faded once I hit the airport. I found my usual cheery disposition turning surly. I tried to regain a sense of thankfulness amid the irritations of travel. Not an easy task, but as evil smelling and uncomfortable as air travel has become, I am grateful that I have the opportunity to spend the holiday with my family. The joy of hearing my granddaughters scream “It’s Nana! It’s Nana!” when we knock on their door makes the trip worthwhile.

I hope you all had a delightful Thanksgiving.

What's Wrong With Us?

2011-11-19T00:05:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted for a few weeks. When I looked at my blog, I was surprised to see how long it actually had been since I posted anything. I haven't been absent from the online community, I've been reading the blogs I subscribe to, but I haven't been writing. I've had a few topics roaming around my head, but the issue I needed to write about, I couldn't bring myself to write. Over and over my thoughts have been drawn to the horrible events at Penn State. Jerry Sandusky, football defensive coordinator, is accused of raping young boys. That by itself is horrific, but the scandal has brought down many others who are charged with not taking any action to protect the children that Sandusky preyed upon. The abuse went on for years and those in power did nothing. They turned a blind eye and maintained the status quo...and more children were abused.

I would like to say that I'm surprised at how those around Sandusky ignored his perverted behavior for so many years, but I've become far too cynical in my old age. Every day, in every community, atrocities like those that happened at Penn State are going on. What is wrong with our society that we can't protect our children?

I know that I couldn't say that something like what has happened at Penn State would never happen in my community, because it has. It is not unusual to read in the court report in the local paper of another conviction of child molestation. But there are also those incidents that are never reported. And don't get me started about the fourteen and fifteen year old girls who get pregnant by older boyfriends and don't call it sexual abuse because they're "in love."

Oregon has a mandatory reporting law that requires educators to report abuse. There was a time when inappropriate behaviors were overlooked. When my daughter was in high school a coach suddenly left his teaching position with the school district for "family reasons." On Friday he was working and on Monday he was gone. Some time later when he came up in conversation, my daughter told me he was having a relationship with a student. It was never reported. He still holds a teaching license.

It was not an isolated incident, but in the fifteen years since my daughter was in high school, we've implemented some safeguards. Oregon now requires school officials to report investigations of inappropriate teacher behavior to the state licensing agency. TSPC maintains a public list of teachers who have been disciplined. It's quite an eye opening read. Click here to visit the Oregon TSPC discipline list.

There was a time when our society was somewhat tolerant of drunk drivers. Our perception of that crime has changed over time. Perhaps it's time for us to raise the awareness of child sexual abuse to the same level as drunk driving. Our children are our future.

Some Things Nana Can't Fix

2011-10-27T20:21:00.000-07:00

As I am falling asleep I’m often writing in my head, reworking sentences into perfect prose. Last night I dozed off after writing a wonderful paragraph. I remember thinking that it would be a perfect blog post and that I needed to get it written down first thing in the morning. At dawn’s early light, okay maybe it was more like 10:00, I booted up my laptop and didn’t have anything to write. Not only can’t I remember the perfect sentences, I can’t even remember the topic. So, today’s post is some random thoughts from a recent week substituting.

A few weeks ago I was at a middle school covering a 6^th grade reading class. At lunch time I was in the classroom reading the teacher’s lesson plan when a girl came in early and started to chat. After a few general comments she says, “I may run out of the classroom crying because my little brother’s father died last night.”

“Oh, that’s awful,” I tell her. “What happened”

“It happened in his home. I think it’s called a home cide,” she says.

“A homicide?” I ask her. “Someone killed him?”

This child is probably 11 years old and she’s telling me about a murder. She’s 11 and she’s discussing how her mother is worried that she won’t be able to collect social security for the baby because the baby daddy never officially declared paternity and now they had to make sure they got a DNA sample before he was buried. She’s only eleven. She’s a child. Children shouldn’t talk about homicides and DNA and paternity, especially with a substitute teacher that they’ve just met.

I’m a problem solver, a fixer. I’m good in an emergency. I know where to go for help and who to contact. It’s one of the challenges of substituting that the students tell me things and a part of me wants to take charge and make it better. It’s not my role to make it better. I can only listen.

Nana Celebrates a Birthday, Cha Cha Cha!

2011-10-23T19:36:00.000-07:00

Today is my birthday. I have nothing special planned. The spouse bought me a chocolate cake with birthday greetings written in red frosting. It is a well known fact that calories consumed on one’s birthday do not count, so I’ve indulged several times today. We usually don’t buy gifts for each other, mostly because there isn’t really anything that either of us want or need. I do reserve the right to buy myself something guilt-free, but so far I haven’t developed the urge for another bauble or techno toy.

The granddaughters called and sang “Happy birthday to you, cha cha cha.” My son-in-law told me the song was accompanied by a complex dance routine.

When my children were small some of their favorite stories were about the days that each of them were born. This evening, after the birthday cha cha cha song, I talked with my daughter and told her that Grandpa Joe had recounted the story of the day I was born. She told me that she didn’t remember ever hearing the story. I told her she could read it in the blog. I think now I’ll have to write and post the stories for each of my children and grandchildren on their birthdays. Whew! That will give me material for at least four postings in the coming year.

My father (Grandpa Joe) called to wish me a happy birthday and, of course, declared that he remembered the day I was born. It’s a story I recall being told numerous times throughout my childhood. I was born in England, in Harrow, my parent’s first child. As was the custom of the time, my mother was attended by a midwife and I was born at home. The midwife had been on holiday and my mother was relieved that she was back on duty when she called her to come to the house late in the day on October 23. My father, anxious to be of assistance, was pleased to be assigned the important task of boiling water. Not sure how much water would be needed, this was after all the birth of his first child, he set numerous kettles to boil on the stove. He was quite proud to be trusted with this vital task. Once his pots were boiling he went upstairs to find out what to do with all the boiling water. He was quite surprised to discover that he was boiling water so the midwife could have a cuppa tea!

Nana Makes A Subtle Change

2011-10-21T13:33:00.000-07:00

Last week I colored my hair. Not a dramatic color change, I just covered the gray. Well, I covered a lot of it. There's so much gray now that I can never get it all. The spouse was oblivious. Today I substituted at the high school in the same classes that I covered several weeks ago. Numerous girls commented on my hair. They had me as a teacher three weeks ago for only two days and they notice that my hair is different. The spouse sees me daily and doesn't notice a thing. Last week I was congratulating myself on a subtle color transition. I was thinking that it was such a natural appearing color that the spouse didn't notice a difference. I'm having to rethink those assumptions after my experience with the students today. Either they are very observant and the spouse isn't, or that understated, refined color isn't as subtle as I convinced myself that it was.

This weekend I celebrate another birthday and the title of my blog will no longer be accurate. I will have surpassed the benchmark. I realized that I need to update the sidebars and the page design could probably use a freshening. On the other hand, if I make a change will anyone notice? I know for sure that the spouse won't!

One More Life Lesson

2011-10-18T21:37:00.000-07:00

Years ago my friend, Darla, told me about a story she read in the newspaper that provided a life lesson and carried a profound message for her marriage.

The police were called to the home of an elderly couple. They found the wife sitting calmly in a rocking chair on the front porch, the husband dead on the floor inside the house. If the narrative ended here it would just be one more elderly widow left to finish out her life alone, but there is more to the story. After finding the body of the husband and the hammer that had been used to kill him, the officers questioned the widow.

“Why did you do it?” they asked.

“For all the little things,” she replied.

“All the little things”…it makes you wonder how much it takes to be pushed over the edge. How many years can the little irritations be tolerated? How much can be overlooked and learned to be lived with? How many years does it take to build up the frustration that will make you snap?

Darla and I joked about keeping a hammer in a glass case that we could break in case of emergency. The spouse and I both occasionally will say “Where’s the hammer?” in a moment of frustration with each other. The spouse and I celebrated our forty year anniversary in August; Darla and her husband have been married even longer. I sporadically think about that elderly woman with the hammer and remind myself to let go of the little irritations.

The universe has once again provided a life lesson.

Nana Experienced the Thrill of Victory

2011-10-04T22:25:00.000-07:00

It's Tuesday. Aside from being the day we have to take our garbage up to the road for Wednesday's pick up, everyone in Hermiston knows that it is Lucky Number Day at Bi-Mart. I had forgotten this well know fact until I pulled in to the parking lot and saw the stream of seniors clumping up to the door with their walkers like battering rams in front of them. If I wasn't desperate, I would have skipped this stop on my list of errands. On Tuesday the aisles are crowded with shoppers who seem to believe that Lucky Number Day is the Hermiston equivalent of winning Powerball.

I was on a mission. A mission to load my cart with lightbulbs. After a week of the spouse complaining about the energy efficient lightbulb in the the lamp by his chair that made it impossible for him to read, I vowed to stock up on those soon to be obsolete, energy sucking lightbulbs that produce enough light for us old timers to read by.

My cart stocked with an assortment of lightbulbs, I headed through the aisles to the checkout, right by the Lucky Number poster, and

I won!!!

The last time I wrote about Lucky Number Day I didn't know a single person who had ever won. Today I became the exception to my own rule. For the first time I experienced the thrill of victory right in the middle of Bi-Mart, next to the seasonal displays of Halloween candy and pressed wood furniture .

What, you may ask, did I win? Eat your hearts out, losers...

We're having Mexican for dinner tonight!

A Fly With a Message

2011-09-28T12:39:00.000-07:00

This morning when I got into my car in the garage, there was a fly on the dashboard. As I pushed the button to raise the garage door and back out, he started flying frantically around the inside of the car. I stopped in the driveway to push the button to close the garage door. The fly settled on the dash next to the glass. I opened the windows and shoved at him with an envelope to encourage him to fly out. I was not successful; he moved to the passenger side of the dash and continued flying frantically up and down against the glass. I headed down the driveway figuring that air currents would soon boost him out the open windows. Three blocks later he was still beating himself against the windshield glass. He never ventured away from the perceived escape exit of the front windshield. After than initial flight around the inside of the car, he never tried to fly in any direction but into the windshield. If he had, there were four other windows wide open that would have led him to freedom.

I stopped at the red light at the Mormon Church and was finally successful at scooting the fly out an open window. Notice I said "the light." There's only one light between my house and the high school. The stop at the light gave me thinking time. Perhaps the Universe had sent the fly to remind me of another of life's lessons. If the light had been green, that fly would probably still be trapped against the windshield of my car and I would have missed an opportunity to ponder.

This is what I was pondering. Like the fly against the window, it is sometimes impossible to see the options that are available to us. Sometimes you have to look farther than just what is in front of you. Even though it is uncomfortable to leave the safety of the dashboard, sometimes the only viable solution will be outside of the perceived safety zone.

So, the darn fly has popped in and out of my head all morning...now I just need to figure out why the Universe thought I needed to be reminded of this lesson. Or, it was just a fly on the windshield...

Nana Googles and Cooks

2011-09-18T20:19:00.000-07:00

Summer will officially end this week, but I’ve felt it coming. There has been a chill in the air when I go out to the hot tub at night and last night it rained. Every day I have been harvesting tomatoes from our tiny garden and I keep thinking that each harvest will be the last, but they keep on coming. I had so many today I had to make another batch of tomato sauce,

I have written before about my lack of culinary skills, so making tomato sauce was a challenge for me. I kept my laptop with me in the kitchen so I could Google for emergency directions. I found a recipe that didn’t require exotic ingredients and collected the necessary equipment. The first step was to peel the tomatoes. I vaguely remembered that it involved boiling water and a slotted spoon. Google found me explicit directions and soon tomato skins were effortlessly sliding off the fruit.

The recipe called for several cloves of garlic. Is a clove just one of the sections of the bulb or the whole bulb? Google once again answered my question. One of the segments is a clove of garlic.

The preparation process probably took an hour: Google, skin, chop and stir. The pot of sauce has been simmering all day. It has reduced down to half the original volume. We had spaghetti for dinner, with what the spouse called V-5 sauce, because it has five vegetables.

I read a blog ( The Simple Dollar) about frugality and once a week there is a feature about frugal tactics that might not save money. Making your own tomato sauce probably falls into the no savings category. Even though the tomatoes were free from my garden and there was no cost for my labor, I have no idea what it cost for that giant pot of vegetables to bubble on the stove for hours. So we had one free meal of tomato sauce tonight and as soon as the sauce cools down, I’ll put another five containers in the freezer. All that work to save $2.50 on a bottle of spaghetti sauce? I’ll have to be satisfied with the praise from my family….

Me: “How is it?”

Son: “It’s okay.”

Spouse: “It certainly has better flavor than that bottled sauce.”

Such high praise. I should cook more often!

Nana Stops in Biggs Junction

2011-09-12T18:22:00.000-07:00

Those of us who live in the eastern part of Oregon are used to driving long distances. We have good highways and relatively little traffic. Portland, the largest city in Oregon, is just one audio book from where I live. I enjoy the 200 mile drive to Portland. The highway parallels the Columbia River and the scenery can be breathtaking.

Starting at Arlington the blue, gray and green of the Columbia River is speckled with bright flashes of parasailers darting back and forth across the river.

Several years ago big horn sheep were reintroduced in the Columbia Gorge. The herd has grown quite large and as soon as we hit Phillipi Canyon I start scanning the hillside for the rams. Quite often I have seen them right next to the freeway.

Over the years I have traveled I-84 I have stopped frequently at Biggs Junction at Jack's Mini Mart. They had the best selection of road food...and a clean bathroom. I could usually count on running into someone from Pendleton or Hermiston at Jack's. It was a favorite pit stop for eastern Oregon travelers. Now it is closed and the roadside services are just like every other freeway interchange: chain gas station mini-marts, McDonald's, Subway...one off ramp just like any other.

Jack's at Biggs Junction

Last week we drove the RV down I-84 and pulled off the freeway at Biggs. We were headed to the Deschutes River. I had never driven into Biggs any farther than one block from the freeway. What a difference one block makes. Just past the Subway and McDonald's it's a different world...

It was like taking a drive back to the 50's!

Random Thoughts on 9-11

2011-09-09T22:11:00.000-07:00

The television has been filled this week with footage of the 9-11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. I imagine many bloggers will post some sort of memorial piece about that day. Most of us remember where we were when we heard about the attacks. It’s another event in my life that I remember because I vicariously participated by watching every second unfold on television. The Kennedy assassination and funeral, the Watts riots, Bobby Kennedy’s assassination and the funeral train, the ’68 Democratic National Convention, the Challenger disaster, and the World Trade Center attack….all images seared in my brain from television.

I love history and I believe that we need to remember the events that have shaped our world and the lessons that our shared history has taught us. I do recognize the impact of the 9-11 attacks. Our world was changed on that day. I have to admit, however, that I’m a little uncomfortable with some of the coverage. On the news tonight Diane Sawyer was interviewing “the babies of 9-11.” These are all children born after their fathers were killed in the attacks. They never knew their fathers and growing up without a father is difficult, but parading these kids out on television and asking them “How does it feel to not have a father?” doesn’t add much to the historical record.

The term hero is probably over-used in the context of 9-11. One does not become a hero just by dying in a terrorist attack. I say that with great respect and admiration of the many heroic acts that have been documented to have occurred that day.

As time passes we may begin to put the 9-11 attacks in perspective. It was a great tragedy but today I found myself wondering about other families who lost loved ones on 9-11: a mother whose child was stillborn, or a wife whose spouse died in a car accident, a husband who lost his wife from breast cancer. Are these losses mourned any less? The children who lost a parent in the terror attacks are not any more tragic than the children who have lost a parent from other causes. Every life is precious. I guess I’m uncomfortable with the idea that the relatives of 9-11 victims are somehow worthy of more support because their loss was 9-11 related.

A city not far from Hermiston has built a 9-11 memorial, complete with pieces of the wreckage from the Twin Towers. There is no direct local connection to the event, no local boy lost. Yes, 9-11 was a great national tragedy, but so was the sinking of the Titanic and there's no local memorial to that event.

The local (Portland) news had an interview with a woman who was in labor on September 11, 2001. Her child will celebrate his 10^th birthday on the anniversary of the attacks. There was no connection to anyone involved in the 9-11 attacks, only that they happened to go into labor while the attacks were taking place, thousands of miles from the actual event. The reporter asked the couple what they remembered from that day and they talked about a long labor and watching the towers fall on television and then the husband complained that there was nothing on network TV that day except coverage of the 9-11 attacks…so they switched to TVLand and watched reruns of The Brady Bunch. Yeah, that didn’t add anything to the historical record either!

Several months after the attack I was in New York. I walked by Saint Paul's Chapel that was being used as a relief station for workers cleaning up the devastation. The fence around the chapel was covered with posters of the missing and with memorial messages. I walked along the fence reading note after note representing loved ones lost in the rubble. On the other side of the sidewalk street vendors had set up shop hawking 9-11 souvenirs. You could buy commemorative T-shirts, FDNY hats, or slick photos of the planes smashing into the Twin Towers. So many lives lost and another opportunity to sell souvenirs...the ying and yang of 9-11.

Nana Visits a Waiting Room and Writes About It

2011-09-07T23:43:00.000-07:00

This morning I had to go to the lab to get blood tests done. I stood behind the sign that said “For patient privacy please wait behind the sign until you are called.” The three foot space between the sign and the receptionist window wasn’t much of a sound buffer; I listened in to every conversation between the receptionist and each patient. I know that the woman in the clean white sneakers and navy plaid shirt last took her medication at 11:00 last night and that the small Asian man ate breakfast this morning. I finally turned in my paperwork, quietly answered each question lest my privacy be invaded, and then took a seat to wait for the lab technician to call me.

An elderly couple entered the waiting area and took their place behind the sign. The tiny woman was hunched over with Dowager’s Hump obvious under her Alfred Dunner shirt. Her husband slowly made his way to the waiting room chairs using two canes. I was far enough away that I could no longer hear the conversations with the receptionist. The elderly man was comfortably seated by the time his wife finished with the receptionist and turned to walk the ten feet to the waiting area. He looked up and saw her heading toward him and he struggled to pull himself up using his canes. He remained standing until she was seated, and then he sat down again.

…and that’s something that you don’t see much anymore. I can’t remember the last time anyone stood up when I entered a room. It was a small gesture, but even though it was difficult for him, he struggled to his feet to show his respect to his wife.

Today I had a glimpse of what was once commonplace…good manners. Perhaps I’ve grown used to incivility, but that elderly couple stuck in my mind all day.

WTF Wednesday: Nana Scores One For Feminists

2011-08-31T01:00:00.000-07:00

The headline is "Pendleton girl flies the big birds" and the article is titled "Adventure in Afghanistan." Like flying a Medivac helicopter in a war zone is a ride at Disneyland!

WTF??? Where do they get off patronizing a highly trained professional woman? So I wrote a letter to the editor.

To the editor:

In 2006 when the East Oregonian reported the death of Army Spc. Ryan D. Walker in Operation Iraqi Freedom, he was not referred to as a boy. Yet Ryan Walker was 25 when he died for his country, a full year younger than Amanda Charlton, who the East Oregonian refers to as a "Pendleton girl" on the cover of the August 26th paper. Amanda Charlton is, according to the article, "one of the Army's few female helicopter pilots." Amanda Charlton is not a "girl." She is a highly trained professional woman and to refer to her as a girl and not even list her military rank demeans her achievements. She is putting her life on the line just like all the military men who are deployed overseas. She deserves to be addressed by the rank she has earned and she deserves to not be patronized.

I realize that I run the risk of criticism that I am hypersensitive about political correctness, but the reality is that sexism still exists in our country and one of the biggest problem areas is our language. Using the word "girl" in reference to an adult woman when the term "boy" is almost never used to refer to an adult male unless an insult is intended is a common example of sexist language.

Come on E.O....it's 2011; you know better!

I emailed it to the editor Friday evening and he emailed me right back and said he completely agreed with me and had spoken to the person who had written the headline. My letter was published in the Sunday paper.

Score one for feminism!

Nana Disproves The Theory That Pre-Planning For Yard Sale Shopping Is Beneficial

2011-08-26T21:35:00.000-07:00

Fridays in the summer are prime time for yard sales. This week, as temperatures hit the high 90s, the residents of Hermiston seemed to realize that the lazy, warm days of summer were almost over and they were losing their opportunities to hold an outside sale. The Nickel Ads had column after column of yard sales listed. This week I followed the spouse’s advice and made a list. Last night I entered all the addresses into Google Maps, organized the sales by proximity, and printed out a detailed plan of attack for Friday morning.

My first stop was an estate sale. I bought a pile of old towels to use for cleaning rags and a Field Guide to Western Birds. I also called the spouse and told him he should stop by to see all the tools and man toys in the basement of this sale. I moved on to the next sale on my list but later received a call from the spouse. He was ecstatic. He had bought every drill bit they had. He found several old Stanley planers which he is sure are valuable (as if he’d ever sell them!) He purchased several tools that he’s not quite sure what they’re used for…but he’s sure they’re good ones. He also bought, wait for it…five chunks of lead and a giant plank of steel!!! It really doesn’t take much to make him happy. Later in the day I heard him talking on the phone to his brother and bragging about his great finds. It’s fun for me to see him so giddy about shopping. I know the feeling, but I usually get that way after Macy’s has a 50% off the sale price special on shoes.

I expected to find some real treasures today because I spent all that time organizing. I think I shattered the spouse’s theory of the benefits of pre-planning. I was even out the door before 8:00! I wasn’t any more successful today than when I follow my usual practice of sleeping in and then late in the morning aimlessly driving around and looking for yard sale signs. That’s what I’m going to do tomorrow. It’s Saturday and there are more sales starting, but I’m not getting up early.

Forty Years Ago Today

2011-08-20T00:19:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week I read a lovely tribute that a blogging friend had written about her marriage on the occasion of her anniversary. You can read it here. Because I try to be open to the messages that the Universe sends me, I realized that it was a reminder that my own anniversary was approaching.

The spouse and I have never been sentimental about our anniversary. Most years we would forget all about it until the anniversary card from my mother would arrive in the mail. She always decorated the envelopes with anniversary greetings and drawings of flowers, so the mailman always knew it was our anniversary before we did. My mother died four years ago and now no one remembers, so it’s nice that the Universe has stepped up to prod my memory.

Today the spouse and I have been married forty years. Forty years! I have been married for two-thirds of my life! I’ve spend as much time married as Moses spent wandering in the desert!

The traditional fortieth anniversary gift is ruby. I won’t be holding my breath waiting for that to arrive.

The spouse and I married in Granada Hills, California at the Catholic church that I had attended as a child. I was Catholic by birth, meaning that my mother had made me attend church every Sunday and Catechism classes every Wednesday night until I escaped to college. The spouse and I met with the priest the night before the wedding because the spouse was a heathen. Since I had attended those Catechism classes every Wednesday, I knew that anyone who wasn’t Catholic was a heathen, but I loved him and wanted to marry him even though he was probably going to spend eternity in Limbo which, if I recall correctly, isn’t such a bad place except Jesus never hangs out there. It’s definitely a D List location.

The wedding party gathered at the church the evening before the ceremony to rehearse. The priest asked to meet with us alone for a few minutes in his study before the rehearsal. He asked the spouse, “Do you commit to raising your children Catholic?” …and there was an uncomfortable silence in the room until I jumped in with “I thought the Vatican changed the rules and didn’t require non-Catholics to agree to that?” And five minutes before our families were scheduled to join us at the rehearsal the priest says, “Then I don’t think I can marry you in good conscience.” Do they learn those blackmail techniques in priest school? The spouse and I sign that we will raise our yet to be conceived children Catholic.

On August 21, 1971 we married in a small ceremony in front of friends and family. The priest wore Kelly green socks and sandals under his long flowing vestments and the wedding party got a case of the giggles when the priest pulled out a plastic squeeze bottle of holy water and spritzed the rings held out by our best man. Perhaps he was warding off demons.

At our meeting the night before the priest had told us that it wouldn’t be appropriate for us to kiss at the end of the marriage ceremony. We did it anyway, so between that and not raising our children Catholic, I’m probably joining my life partner in Limbo. We marched out of the church to the organ playing the tune made famous by the Carpenters in a bank commercial, “We’ve Only Just Begun.” Grab the Kleenex and click the link below...

I dug out my wedding album this evening to look for a picture to accompany this post. I hadn’t looked at the pictures in years. We were all so young and all the men had so much hair! It is hard to believe that forty years have gone by so quickly. Forty years, two children, two grandchildren and a lifetime of memories and it still feels like we’ve only just begun.

Nana Likes Sudoku

2011-08-15T20:15:00.000-07:00

I like doing Sudoku puzzles. My local newspaper publishes a puzzle daily. I always finish reading the paper by doing the puzzle. While I was in Texas for three weeks last month visiting my grandchildren, the spouse saved all the local papers for me. When I got home I scanned through every issue to get caught up on the local news, but mostly to cut out the daily Sudoku puzzle. My son commented, “You know, Mom, you can buy a whole book of those puzzles for $1.00 at the Dollar Store.” Yeah, I know, but there’s something in my frugal nature that finds satisfaction in getting those puzzles for free.

Our local paper publishes three different levels of puzzles: bronze, silver, gold. The bronze are too easy and the gold are occasionally difficult. The silver are, as Goldilocks would say, just right. They are challenging without being frustrating.

I don’t know what it is about Sudoku that appeals to me. They really are a mindless activity. If you are systematic in working through the puzzle, it is unusual to not find the solution…and that might be exactly what speaks to me. Sudoku are governed by a set of rules and if you follow the rules, the outcome is predictable. The numbers all line up, everything is in its correct place. There are no gray areas.

Life doesn’t have those same rules. Oh, there are rules that we’re taught and live by, but the outcomes aren’t guaranteed. We tell our children to study hard and go to college so they can get a good job, and now we’ve got 10% unemployment and a lot of those kids who studied hard and went to college are now unemployed or under-employed and burdened with student loans. We tell people to work hard and save money and then they can enjoy their golden years and now we’re rolling back pension promises and reducing Medicare.

I know, I know…there are no guarantees. But every time I see a job go to an insider rather than a highly qualified outsider, or a criminal get off without consequences, or children going without medical or dental care, I wonder what has happened to the rules that govern our society.

I like Sudoku. It’s predictable. You follow the rules and reach success. I just wish life were a little more like Sudoku.

Regrets, Nana Has a Few

2011-08-14T16:13:00.000-07:00

In my last post I wrote about ten things that I had done right to prepare for retirement. Today I address the things that I would do differently.

Plan: I made the decision to retire quite suddenly. Although I was eligible for full retirement, I didn’t have an exit plan in place. I made the decision to retire when I lost total respect for the people I worked for and it became too difficult to continue to pretend that everything was okay. Granted there was talk of changes to the actuarial tables that would have impacted the amount of my monthly benefits, but for me it was an emotional, not reasoned, thought process that led to my decision. Other bloggers have related accounts of their retirement plans; all in all I think that it is probably wiser to devise an exit strategy at least six months before a retirement date.

Take full advantage of employment related benefits: There were benefits that I received as an employee that are not available to me in retirement. Before retirement I should have had all my dental work done since my post-retirement plan does not include dental. Six months before your final retirement date, get in to see your dentist and doctor and get EVERYTHING checked and fixed. Because I retired with only 30 days notice, I didn’t have time to get an appointment with my dentist and get a few things fixed before my insurance expired. My employer also offered an Employee Assistance Program that offered, among other things, free access to counseling. Heck, it was free. I should have taken the three free counseling sessions and had some assistance coming up with a post-retirement plan.

Start saving for retirement sooner: I had retirement savings, but they took a big, well really gigantic, loss in the stock market crash a few years ago. They are starting to recover but I wish I had more in savings to supplement my income from my pension and future social security income. When I was younger I didn’t think about retirement. Had I listened to advice and acted on it, I would have a lot more money in the bank.

Decide where and how you want to live in retirement and act on it before you retire: If I were buying a house to live in for retirement, I wouldn’t buy the house I now live in. If, for example, the spouse or I had to use a wheelchair, my current house is not fully accessible. Although it is all on one level, there are stairs at both the front door and rear that would make getting in the house a challenge. There is nothing that stops us from downsizing now, but my sense is that it would have been easier to secure funding (and pay it off) while we were both still working.

Get a hobby or a plan for staying active: The first few months of my retirement were a challenge for me. After the retirement trip to Hawaii and cleaning out my long neglected garage, I had no plan for what to do with my days. I am still envious of the people with well thought out retirement plans that include a bucket list of activities. I’m still fumbling around doing whatever pleases me at the moment. There’s nothing that stops me from creating a plan now, other than I’m quite happy doing nothing. Unfortunately, there’s a little voice inside me that isn’t happy about my slothful behavior.

Build relationships with other retired people: When I retired my friends were all still working. It is only now, two and a half years later, that I am starting to build relationships with other retirees…and that is a challenge for a recluse! I’m comfortable going to a matinee or shopping by myself and it is a pleasure to do these things during the week when they aren’t crowded, but it is also fun to have a friend along.

Make a commitment to exercise: Remember these are things that I wish I had done, not things that I did! I have the time now so there are no excuses (except it’s really hot today.) Commit to exercise several times a week. There are days that I realize I didn’t leave the house…I should at least be walking or riding my bike a half an hour a day.

I wish I were one of those people who lives life without regret. I’m packing around a boatload of regrets. Sometimes it’s easy to fix…I can return that sweater that made my daughter comment, “Mom, what were you thinking!” Sometimes it’s a missed opportunity that might never come my way again. I may be piddling away my retirement years, but I don’t regret the decision to retire.

10 Things Nana Did Right to Prepare for Retirement

2011-07-31T18:36:00.000-07:00

The list of things that I should have done to prepare for a comfortable retirement is long, but today I'm writing about the few things that I did do right, not because of good planning but mostly by luck.

1. Pay off your mortgage: When I retired we had no mortgage. I had read once somewhere about the cost of mortgages and how much you can save if they are paid off early. The last time we moved we got a 15 year mortgage rather than a 30. Occasionally, when we could afford it, we paid an additional sum on the principal. Once our children graduated from college we had more disposable income and we accelerated our payments. Once our mortgage was gone, we didn’t increase our spending, but rather increased the amount we saved each month. (Well, we did spend a little more on upgraded vacations!) Owning our home allows us to maintain our lifestyle at a lower total monthly cost.

2. Pay off outstanding debts: We are debt free. If we use a credit card, we pay off the balance every month. Our cars, our boat, our toys are all paid for. When we bought our RV a few months ago, we paid cash. Even with low interest rates, there is a cost to using credit. I prefer to use that money to enhance my lifestyle rather than provide profits for a credit card company. Because we are debt free, it is easy for us to manage our monthly bills. Our monthly living costs are pretty low.

3. Live below your income: We have always lived within our income. When we were first married and had entry level jobs, we lived paycheck to paycheck…but we did not rack up credit card debt. Our credit cards were really a safety net, used only in an emergency when we didn’t have money to pay for an unforeseen event. If we had to use them, we made paying off the balance a priority in our budget. We have never lived large. Once we started earning more than subsistence level salaries, we started saving. We spend less each month than we take in. We don’t buy anything until we have the money to pay for it or until our monthly income is large enough to absorb payments.

4. Try living on your retirement income before you take the plunge: My husband has not yet retired. He would like to retire in the near future. He does not have as generous a pension plan as I do, so we know his retirement will reduce our total income. Since I retired we have lived on his income only and banked my pension checks each month. This has provided us with some insights into living on a reduced income, and safely allowed us to explore if total retirement at a reduced income is comfortable for us. It has also been a good transition period for me. We have not dramatically changed our lifestyle, but I am not as free-wheeling at spending as I used to be when I worked. I know that it takes much longer to rebuild our checking account balance at our reduced monthly income level. If my husband were to retire now, we know we would have to change our spending habits to live below our income. It’s a balancing act and we’re trying to find the perfect tipping point for us.

5. Have a back-up plan for increasing income: A part-time job is a good financial safety net for retirees. I am fortunate to have a teaching license that allows me to substitute in our local schools. Because substitutes are in high demand in our area, I can work as much or as little as I like. I use the money I earn substituting to pay for vacations and flights to see my grandchildren. I substitute one or two days a week. If I don’t feel like working, I don’t have to accept a job. For me, a recluse by nature, it forces me get out of the house and interact with people…and I’ve taken quite a few vacations on the money I earned without diminishing my account balance.

6. Start saving early: When my children were toddlers I purchased US savings bonds every month by having the cost deducted automatically from our checking account. After a few months, we didn’t miss the money. Every month those bonds came in the mail, one for each of my two children and one for my husband and me, until the bank ended the program. The children used their bonds to help pay college costs and we still have our stack of bonds to use in retirement. Both my husband and I took advantage of retirement saving programs offered by our employers. It is surprising how that money has grown over the years. I do regret that we didn’t save more aggressively, but I am thankful that we took the small steps that we did.

7. Have a plan for medical insurance: I could retire early because my employer pays the majority of the cost of my and my spouse’s medical insurance until I am eligible for medicare. Cost of private insurance with my pre-existing conditions would be prohibitive. When I started working for my former employer, I didn’t pay a lot of attention to the early retirement options in my contract because retirement seemed a long way off. I was fortunate to be able to take advantage of this benefit. As you approach eligibility for retirement it is smart to review your employment contract so you know if keeping your employer's medical plan is an option.

8. Get familiar with your employer’s retirement qualifications and benefits: Many retirement benefits are being renegotiated in light of the current financial crisis. It is important to keep on top of changes. I retired before changes in actuarial tables would have reduced my benefits. A good friend of mine retired this year from the Oregon education system because a change in her negotiated contract would end her entitlement to seven years of district paid medical insurance. She decided to retire before the new provisions took effect and that allowed her to keep a benefit that is worth well over $100,000.00 to her over the next seven years.

9. Walk away: Emotionally it was difficult for me to let go of my work life, perhaps because I made the decision to retire only a month before my final day of work. I didn’t try to hang on to elements of my former life. No lunches with former coworkers and/or dropping by to say hello. After Christmas when everyone went back to work, I went to Hawaii. I wasn’t available for questions because I wasn’t at home. It helped me to make a clean break.

10. Enjoy

My next post I’ll tell you about the things that I should have done before retiring.

Nana Ponders Chicken Little, the Boy Who Cried Wolf, the Debt Crisis and Retirement

2011-07-30T02:20:00.000-07:00

I retired two and a half years ago. I am one of the fortunate ones who had an excellent pension plan. The spouse is still working, but looking toward retirement in the next few years. His pension plan is not as generous as mine. Since I have retired I have spent more time reading about retirement issues. I’ve read enough to make me nervous. There are a lot of horror stories about seniors who are reduced to eating cat food because their retirement income is not sufficient to pay for the ever increasing cost of living. I’ve done the math and my pension is adequate to maintain a reasonable lifestyle, but is my pension secure? As our government gets closer and closer to default, I worry about the security of my pension. Will my state government continue to keep the commitment they made to me when I started working over thirty years ago in public education?

I’ve watched a little of the coverage of the debt ceiling “negotiations” on television. If it wasn’t such a serious issue, it would be comical.

When my children were small I read to them every night before they went to bed. We read all the classic fairy tales and stories. As I watch the news I am reminded of Chicken Little who ran around warning people that the sky was falling. There are many people in Washington who have joined him in this chant. Then there is the Boy Who Cried Wolf who gave the warning so frequently that everyone stopped listening…and then the wolf showed up. As we wait for Congress to act, I don’t know which story I’m listening to. Is the sky falling? Is there really a wolf?

I’m too old for fairy tales. It is time for Congress to stop grandstanding and get to work to preserve our economy and our future…and my retirement!

Why Nana Hasn't Posted For a Few Weeks

2011-07-24T22:45:00.000-07:00

This is the reason that I haven't posted for the past few weeks. I'm in Austin, Texas with my granddaughters. I borrowed my five year old granddaughter's laptop to write this. I'm in Austin because we wanted the girls to have swimming lessons and since both their parents work, the only way that was going to happen was if Nana drove them back and forth each day.

For the past few weeks I have been the director of Camp Nana. My sole responsibility is to keep my granddaughters, ages four and five, constructively occupied. They have kept me running from morning to night.

Every morning we go to swimming lessons. The girls have back to back lessons and I sit under the canopy with the parents and grandparents and cheer every accomplishment of our respective charges.

After swimming lessons we go home for lunch and then to the neighborhood pool for more swimming. Despite gallons of sun screen, all three of us are quite tan. The girls practice swimming and are dangerously confident in the water.

Late afternoon we go home to work on projects. We have painted sun catchers and wooden princesses, done paper mosaics, and decorated cards with glitter. Despite numerous cleanings it is still impossible to cross the kitchen floor barefoot without getting sparkly feet. When the creative juices are flowing the glitter seems to just fly!

We don't ignore the culinary arts at Camp Nana. Faithful readers will recall that Nana isn't especially skilled in this area. Fortunately four and five year olds do not have discriminating palates. We successfully made scrambled eggs and instant chocolate pudding, but not at the same meal!

We've taken field trips at Camp Nana, mostly to local play areas. It has been over 100 every day in Austin, so last Thursday we went to the play area at the mall. When it's 103 if Nana isn't sitting in a cool pool of water, it better be some place air conditioned. The girls enjoyed the play area and Nana enjoyed sitting on an upholstered bench in a fully climate controlled area.

Last week one of the girls asked "Nana, tomorrow can we stop at the blow up kitty and take pictures? So, the next day I pulled into the parking lot of the cat hospital and we all piled out of the car and took the picture above. The blow up kitty is a lot bigger in person than it appears when you drive by it on the way to swimming lessons. Tomorrow we're going to take pictures with the giant wild animals at the dental office. It's true that everything is big in Texas...in Austin it's giant animal yard art!

So, that's why I haven't posted. I am at the mercy of two little girls. There are only so many summers in a childhood, and Nana doesn't want to miss any of them.

I'll be back to my regular posting schedule next week.

Jann aka Nana

Nana Crosses State Lines on an RV Adventure

2011-07-05T00:21:00.000-07:00

We have been members of the RV community for just a few weeks and are still trying to figure out how to fit in. We seem to be in the correct age range, but we don't have a small yappy dog. The spouse is sporting shorts and wearing socks with his sandals which passes for native dress in an RV park. I think we're going to fit in with this crowd.

Since purchasing the RV we have been attending garage sales to find the essential RV lifestyle items. I was thrilled to find a small electric coffee pot for only $2.00, but still have had no luck finding a few sets of unbreakable dishes that can also go in the microwave. We may not have dishes, but I do have a string of fish lights to hang on the awning.

Last weekend we thought we had sufficiently provisioned the RV to go on a shake down trip. We loaded up with food and beverages, made the beds, and filled the storage compartments with everything we thought we would need. At the last minute we remembered to get a pad of sticky notes and a pen to keep notes of all the forgotten items. We probably used that pad more than any other item on the trip.

We headed across the river to Washington state and learned our first lesson in RVing: make a reservation! The park at Plymouth was full, as was the next park 20 miles to the west. At that point we headed back to Oregon and decided we would just camp at Umatilla, a mere 5 miles from home. Unfortunately, Umatilla was celebrating Umatilla Landing Days and not only was the RV park full, but we got to practice driving our RV among hundreds of cars parked askew and wandering crowds of people looking for the festivities. We ended up spending the night at the RV park at Hat Rock.

Sunday morning Paul got up and made coffee and then said to me "I hate to ask, but did you pack coffee cups?" We added coffee cups to the list of things we needed, along with a fly swatter and bug repellent.

This weekend we learned how to make a reservation on-line and we purchased an America the Beautiful Senior pass that gives us 50% off the park fees. We stayed at Plymouth Park, just across the river in Washington state.

We are starting to get familiar with how everything works in the RV, although I'm still a little frightened of the toilet flushing! This morning I took my first RV shower, which reminded me of my showering experiences in England...a tiny little bathroom, odd plumbing, and low water pressure.

I drove the RV for the first time...only a few feet in the RV park, but it's a start. I think I'm going to like our little house on wheels.

A Proud American by Choice

2011-07-02T23:19:00.000-07:00

I wasn't born in the United States. My family immigrated to the US in 1955. My mother, brother, Auntie Pam and I sailed from England on the Ile de France to New York. From there we flew to Los Angeles to join my father and Uncle Colin. I have an alien registration card, also know as a green card, that documents my legal admission to the United States in May, 1955. My alien registration card is so old that it is actually green. The newer ones are blue, but are still called green cards.

I am an American by choice, not by birth and I am grateful for the blessings that this country has given me and my family. Both of my parents went through the naturalization process to become American citizens. I claimed US citizenship based on their status as citizens. I didn't have to take the citizenship test.

Generally people applying for US citizenship must take a 10 question test to demonstrate their knowledge across five categories: American government, systems of government, rights and responsibilities, American history, and integrated civics. The test questions are drawn from a list of 100 questions and the applicant must correctly answer six of the ten questions to pass.

Here is a sample test of 10 questions. See how many you can get right.

1. Name 3 rights of freedom guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.

2. Who has the power to declare war?

3. What kind of government does the United States have?

4. Which President freed the slaves?

5. In what year was the Constitution written?

6. What are the first 10 amendments to the Constitution called?

7. Name one purpose of the United Nations?

8. Where does Congress meet?

9. Whose rights are guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights?

10. What is the introduction to the Constitution called?

Remember you need to get six out of 10 questions correct. Here are the answers.

1. Name 3 rights of freedom guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.

The right of freedom of speech, press, religion, peaceable assembly, and requesting change of government.

The right to bear arms (the right to have weapons or own a gun, though subject to certain regulations).

The government may not quarter, or house, soldiers in the people's homes during peacetime without the people's consent.

The government may not search or take a person's property without a warrant.

A person may not be tried twice for the same crime and does not have to testify against him/herself.

A person charged with a crime still has some rights, such as the right to a trial and to have a lawyer.

The right to trial by jury in most cases.

Protects people against excessive or unreasonable fines or cruel and unusual punishment.

The people have rights other than those mentioned in the Constitution.

Any power not given to the federal government by the Constitution is a power of either the state or the people.

2. Who has the power to declare war?

The Congress

3. What kind of government does the United States have?

Democracy

4. Which President freed the slaves?

Abraham Lincoln

5. In what year was the Constitution written?

1787

6. What are the first 10 amendments to the Constitution called?

The Bill of Rights

7. Name one purpose of the United Nations?

For countries to discuss and try to resolve world problems, to provide economic aid to many countries.

8. Where does Congress meet?

In the Capitol in Washington, D.C.

9. Whose rights are guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights?

Everyone (citizens and non-citizens) living in U.S.

10. What is the introduction to the Constitution called?

The Preamble

Regardless of how you gained your citizenship status, take a few moments this 4th of July to celebrate the birth of our country. I am grateful to my adopted home for the opportunities that were available to me because I am a citizen of this great nation.

Happy 4th of July!

2011-06-20T01:29:00.000-07:00

Years ago I participated in a writing group through the local community college. It was a small group of mature adults. The first night of the class we sat in a circle and introduced ourselves. I snapped to attention when I heard an elderly woman say her name. Norma Quick! OMG, I had been reading her letters to the editor in the local paper forever. It seemed like several times a month Norma Quick had something to tell the editor and here she was, live and in person and she didn’t have horns or a tail. I didn’t know Norma Quick, but I already knew that I didn’t like her. Her letters to the editor, although well written, were guaranteed to push my buttons. Politically we were polar opposites.

I read the local paper, the East Oregonian, every night (except Mondays, they don’t publish on Mondays.) I was raised reading the Los Angeles Times and one thing I miss living in a rural area is a big city paper. The East Oregonian is not in the same league; on an average day there’s probably only fifteen pages of newsprint, but all the local news is printed and if you want to know who was arrested for drunk driving or who is filing for divorce, well, The East Oregonian publishes it all…and those damn letters from Norma Quick. I would read her letters and vent to the spouse, who, you may recall, is not particularly noted for his liberal views either. He was not always sympathetic to my position. “When I retire I’m going to respond to all of Norma’s letters” I would tell him.

There are lots of advantages to living in a small town, but one of the disadvantages is that taking a liberal stand in a letter to the editor won’t win you any friends. As a school administrator I needed to keep a lower profile than Norma Quick.

Over the course of the writing class I got to know a little about Norma. We had lively discussions. I’d sprinkle my conversation with comments that I knew would get a rise from her. “I have such admiration for Hillary Clinton,” I’d casually mention, and Norma would move into red state attack mode.

I don’t know what happened to Norma Quick. I can’t remember the last time I saw a letter from her in the newspaper. The class ended a long time ago and our paths never crossed again. During the class I got to know Norma and I admired her spunk. I still didn't agree with her, but I stopped looking for traces of horns and a tail.

I thought about Norma this morning as I wrote my first post-retirement letter to the editor. A small-minded bigot had written that same sex marriage is a violation of natural law and therefore not discriminatory. I imagine that Norma would agree with the writer of that letter. I don’t. I'm secretly hoping that Norma is still out there and will respond so we can have that battle of words that was never possible when I was a civil servant. This one’s for you Norma!

Nana Discovers Craig's List Isn't Just Scams and Prostitution

2011-06-18T22:58:00.000-07:00

The spouse and I have been looking for an RV for almost a year. Since we haven't won the lottery ~~yet~~, we've been searching for the illusive gently used, low mileage, like new but cheap RV. We've looked at vehicles that give the impression they'll collapse in the first stiff wind and others that have served as mold incubation labs. We've met some interesting characters...my first thought being "Would you buy a used car from this person? Would you sleep in a bed this person owned?" My nose has been assaulted by unrecognizable, unpleasant odors and my eyes burned by viewing so many orange and brown color schemes with chunky shag carpet. I had begun to think that we would never find a reasonably priced clean RV.

I read the want ads, searched the Nickel Ads every week, and surfed the Internet. Every evening I checked Craig’s List for new RV postings. Numerous times I found what I thought was going to be the perfect RV, only to find that both words and pictures don’t tell the whole truth. When searching for an RV, it would be very helpful if Craig’s List had a smell-o-vision feature.

I had several opportunities to be scammed. Early in the search I found a low mileage, fairly recent vintage RV for a very good price. There was no phone number listed, but an email address. I responded to the ad and asked the seller to call me because I was interested in seeing the RV. I got an email back that told me the seller had be transferred overseas and that the RV was at a shipping facility and we could buy it through Pay Pal and have it shipped. SCAM! Several weeks later I saw the same picture of the RV on another ad on a Craig’s List listing in another city. There are a lot of opportunities to be scammed on Craig’s List. I was leery of every ad that sounded like a good deal, especially when they didn’t include a phone number for a supposed local listing.

I found our RV on Craig’s List and the ad didn’t include a phone number. I almost didn’t respond because it sounded too perfect. I was pleasantly surprised when we drove to Walla Walla to see it that it was as nice as advertised. A few minor scratches, but it smells good! It has only 24,000 miles on the engine and only 40 hours on the generator. It’s relatively small, only 24 feet. Our search for the perfect RV is over.

The seller of our “new” RV was the son of the owner. His father had purchased it new when he retired. He had intended to travel with his wife. His wife got ill and never recovered enough to travel. After she died he took a few trips by himself. Recently he moved into an assisted living facility.

When I pay attention I find lessons everywhere. The RV was a great deal for us, but when we use it, I will think about its former owner who didn’t have the time to enjoy his retirement. My plan is to have many years to explore in our RV, but none of us know how many good years we will have. That’s an important lesson to remember.

Broadway Sings to Me

2011-06-13T03:39:00.000-07:00

I watched the Tony Awards last night and was reminded once again of how much I like Broadway musicals. I wish real life were more like a musical. How much more interesting a trip to Safeway would be if everyone were dancing and singing. In my regular life it is rare for anyone to break into song. Rare, but not unheard of.

In the early 70's the spouse and I were newly married and living, from paycheck to paycheck, in low-rent student housing in Portland, Oregon. Our best friends, Beth and Dan, were attending college in Eugene. When we could scrape up the gas money we would make the drive to Eugene and spend the weekend with our friends. There's a saying that if you can remember 60s and 70s then you weren't there. I have a hazy memory of this event, but I swear it happened...I'm pretty sure.

It was always a party when the spouse and I got together with Beth and Dan. We were at the end of a long evening of revelry when we stopped laughing long enough to realize that we HAD TO HAVE FOOD...NOW! The golden arches beckoned to us. We ordered at the counter and settled into a plastic booth to feast. All four of us were engrossed in our food when we heard music...and the first line of a current McDonald's jingle.

"You deserve a break today! So get up and get away! To McDonald's!"

Just as I looked up a guy jumped over the counter with a mop and sang,

"Grab a bucket and mop....scrub from bottom to top..."

The entire work crew was singing the jingle and dancing.

I looked at the spouse and my friends, wordlessly asking "Do you see this too?" The four of us sat in the plastic booth with our mouths hanging open. As suddenly as it started, the performance was over and the employees carried on with their regular duties. Dan was the first to speak.

"Did you see that too?" he asked us.

We all nodded.

The next day, no longer under the influence and stone cold sober we once again talked about our trip to McDonald's. We agreed that we didn't experience a group hallucination....well, we're pretty sure we didn't have a group hallucination.

Yep, life would be more interesting if everyone broke into song once in a while.

Here's a YouTube video of the old McDonald's jingle...enjoy!

Nana Goes to Yard Sales

2011-06-12T00:44:00.000-07:00

We had a lovely early summer day today. Perfect weather for a yard sale. Late morning I left the home compound to see what I could find. The spouse decided not to go with me because it was so late. "It's 10:00. All the good stuff is gone" he told me. He fancies himself a yard sale expert. "Most of the sales started on Friday," he says. "You need to get the Nickel Ads on Thursday and circle the ads and make a list. You need to go early on Friday to get the good stuff." Probably good advice, but it sounds like way too much pre-planning for me.

Today I didn't buy a thing, but it's not like I really needed anything to start with. I wasn't looking for anything in particular. I operate from the "I'll know it when I see it" school of yard sale shoppers. It was fun to be out searching for treasure. It's the hunt that I enjoy, even when I come home empty handed. The reality is that I don't need any more things...well, unless they are really cool things.

I wish I had thought to take my camera with me. There was some unbelievable merchandise for sale. I find it hard to believe that people think they can sell some of this stuff...and just as unbelievable is that I see shoppers walking away with armloads of crap they have bought.

One sale I went to was in the front yard of a house enclosed by a chain link fence. Clothing was hung all along the fence. I parked my car on the street and walked up to the entrance where I noticed special items of clothing hung on the gate. Arriving shoppers were greeted by a half a dozen gigantic Triple D braziers in neon colors swinging on the gate. Who buys bras at a yard sale? Who buys used underwear? Who hangs their enormous bras on their front fence?

Last week at an estate sale I bought three duck decoys for $1.00 each. The spouse says he can never have too many duck or goose decoys and for only a dollar, I'll indulge him. Today there were no tools or fishing gear to tempt me.

I didn't find anything that even momentarily whispered out to me to buy it. There were lots of plastic containers, many without their lids, used bedding, and old pots and pans with the Teflon almost gone. I can usually find at least a few books to buy, but today the reading material was limited to Harlequin romances. Do you really think all the good stuff had already been sold?

Next week I'll map out the sales on Thursday and get an early start Friday morning. I'll remember to take my camera. If I'm lucky I can snap some pictures to entertain you...that would be almost as good as finding a treasure.

WTF Wednesday: Sanitized For Your Protection

2011-06-08T00:52:00.000-07:00

WTF Wednesday is a semi-regular feature of this blog. It documents the things that have made me pause, slap my forehead and say "What the f**k!" Well, that and I just like saying WTF. I'm retired. I don't have to watch what I say anymore. I'm not any one's role model.

For two summers when I was in college, I worked as a motel maid for a Best Western Motel in Canoga Park, California. Every morning I jumped on my Honda 55 motorcycle and chugged from Granada Hills to Canoga Park to make beds, vacuum, and sanitize for your protection. The job definitely ranked in the bottom ten percent of jobs, and I joyfully returned to college at the end of each summer.

For someone who doesn't like to clean, motel maid was not a perfect job fit. There were three or four maids on duty each day. At lunch time we all met in a vacant room to eat lunch and watch Days of Our Lives. The rest of the day I was on my own changing sheets and cleaning up disgusting messes...oh, and sanitizing for your protection.

The head maid "trained" me how to sanitize the toilet and then slip the paper ring over the seat. She actually stuck her hands in the toilet to scrub. The few times I actually cleaned a toilet I suited up with elbow length plastic gloves. Most of the time I skipped the scrubbing part of the routine, the toilet usually looked clean enough to me, and I went right to just putting on the paper ribbon to certify the stool as sanitized.

You probably don't want to hear that I sanitized the drinking glasses with the same carefree attitude. I ran them under the cold water in the sink, dried them with a bath towel and shoved them in the "sanitary envelope." Ewwww!

Memories of my summer as a motel maid came flooding back to me last month when I was visiting Austin, Texas. My daughter and I went out to dinner at Chuy's and this was how the flatware was presented on the table...

WTF???

I wondered if the staff at Chuy's was as conscientious as I at sanitizing...just in case, I cleaned my silverware with my napkin before eating.

Nana Reflects on Retirement

2011-06-05T21:39:00.000-07:00

I recently wrote a comment on a blog that said something like “If I’ve learned anything from retirement, it’s…” Which got me to thinking about what I have learned over the past two years of being retired.

There are very few things that can’t be done tomorrow, or never if I don’t get around to it.

Activities expand to fill available time. It now takes me three times a long to get something done that I used to do after work, while I made dinner. Activities that used to be tacked on to other chores have become primary activities. Whew! Sometimes you just need to take a nap.

There are very few things that I absolutely have to do. I no longer have to spend time with people I don’t like or respect. My social calendar is smaller, but much more enjoyable. It takes a lot to nudge me away from home. I no longer attend “duty” events. If I don’t want to do it, I don’t. With no excuses necessary.

It took me two years to be comfortable letting go of my work identity. I can now say simply “I’m retired” without going into what I used to do. I’ve let it go.

It was difficult to let go of the “busy” excuse. I am no longer “busy” in the sense that my time is externally controlled, but I’m still not cooking gourmet meals, keeping a spotless house, or organizing get- togethers with friends. I can’t blame these failings on being busy; I just do only what I want to do now. I’m not busy, face it...I'm just a bad cook, careless housekeeper, and a recluse.

It’s okay to stay up late. I don’t need an alarm clock to wake up. I can take a nap if I want to.

I still don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing in retirement. I don’t even have a Bucket List of adventures and challenges to accomplish. In fact, I’m less interested in travel now because I don’t have to get away to be able to relax.

If I had to do it over again, I'd probably plan better. Or, maybe not. There's nothing to stop me from planning now, except I'm so busy...

Nana Gets Some Heat

2011-05-31T21:51:00.000-07:00

I have written about my experiences substituting in my local schools. I never include personally identifiable information. This past week I have received several anonymous comments from "parents." One of these parents complained to the superintendent and to the local police about my post last Wednesday. In an email to the superintendent, copied to me, the parent complained that I used profanity and wrote about personal issues about the students.

I thought that one of the perks of being retired was that I could speak my mind. I don't represent the school district. When you work for a public agency, and I know that many of my readers do, it is difficult to be viewed as a private citizen. For the past twenty years I resisted writing letters to the editor of our local paper. I didn't speak out on immigration reform, or abortion, or even publicly voice my support for candidates. I know I had the right to exercise my first amendment rights, but in a small town it was easier to stay silent. I sometimes felt like the lone ranger. I am a liberal and that's almost a dirty word in the conservative region where I live.

Today I received yet another email from anonymous complaining that her child was reading my blog. It was the WTF: Wednesday post about the dollar bill. You can read it here. That was the post that got all the nasty comments from a student stalker. Read about that here.

Here's the latest email:

I understand you are one of my daughter's sub teachers. As a teacher myself, I am mortified that I came into my room, where our computer is, to find my daughter reading your blog. I don't know who you think you are, but as a "role model", retired or not, this is completely inapproiate for ANY child to see, let alone thinking it's ok, and funny to act like this. Shame on you!! I will be calling the school concerning your blog.

The superintendent is going to get tired of receiving complaints.

In the blogosphere I have found other like minded writers. I've also found readers who don't share my views, but are accepting of differences and open to rational discussion.

The superintendent is going to get tired of receiving complaints.

So to those anonymous readers out there...get a grip! I am not encouraging your children to read my blog. To find my blog, you only have to google me. It's probably the first link that shows up.

Yes, I occasionally use profanity on my blog. What I write and say in my personal life has no relationship to my occasional work in local school districts. To find my blog on the Internet you have to actually search for it. Children who are using the Internet unsupervised are not my responsibility...based on the language I've heard them use in school, they have heard these words before, but the bottom line is that I don't seek underage readers. They would not be interested in the topic of the life of a recently retired person!

Like most writers, I write about my life experiences. I never considered identifying the students who shared, without being asked, their experience with self-mutilation. I never intended to reveal personally identifiable information about any of them, and I have not done so. Public employees are entitled to a personal life and my blog reflects my personal life, the events and experiences that I find interesting. I do not give up the right to express a personal opinion on a public forum just because I occasionally work for a public agency.

Should teachers only be writing happy stories of children collecting canned goods for the poor or creating amazing science projects? Yeah, that stuff happens, but it ain't all sweetness and light. Remember my post about the student who was stalking my blog? Read it here and that post has the most profanity that has ever been in my blog and it's the student's comments!

Well dear readers...tell me where I should go from here?

The Price We Pay

2011-05-27T22:26:00.000-07:00

In the year since we last celebrated Memorial Day eight more soldiers from Oregon have lost their lives in the conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan. Oregon has lost a total of 128 soldiers in this "war on terror."

At the start of the conflict in Iraq Oregon's former governor, Ted Kulongoski, pledged to attend the funerals of Oregon soldiers who died in the war effort. When I was a school administrator I remember receiving notifications from the governor's office to fly our school's flag at half staff when Oregon lost another soldier, and I remember reading in the newspaper that Governor Kulongoski was attending another funeral. Some months it seemed that our flag was always flying at half staff. I don't think our current governor attends the funerals, but he does maintain a website that shows the faces of Oregon's fallen soldiers. You can view it here. So many young faces. So many fathers who will never see their children grow up. So many young lives lost to war.

This Memorial Day take a moment to mourn those we have lost.

Oregon's Casualties in Iraq

Tobler Brandon S. Portland Ore. U.S. Mar 22, 2003

Contreras Aaron J. Sherwood Ore. U.S. Mar 30, 2003

Stever Robert A. Pendleton Ore. U.S. Apr 8, 2003

Bradach-Nall Travis J. Portland Ore. U.S. Jul 2, 2003

Kesterson Erik C. Independence Ore. U.S. Nov 15, 2003

Blickenstaff Joseph M. Corvallis Ore. U.S. Dec 8, 2003

Wesley Christopher J. Rivera Portland Ore. U.S. Dec 8, 2003

Nakis Nathan W. Corvallis Ore. U.S. Dec 16, 2003

Moothart Travis A. Brownsville Ore. U.S. Jan 27, 2004

Ramirez William C. Portland Ore. U.S. Feb 11, 2004

Rogers Philip G. Gresham Ore. U.S. Apr 4, 2004

Van Leuven Gary F. Klamath Falls Ore. U.S. Apr 17, 2004

Whitham Chase R. Eugene Ore. U.S. May 8, 2004

Roberts Bob W. Newport Ore. U.S. May 17, 2004

McCrae Erik S. Portland Ore. U.S. Jun 4, 2004

Eyerly Justin L. Salem Ore. U.S. Jun 4, 2004

Linden Justin W. Portland Ore. U.S. Jun 4, 2004

McKinley Eric S. Corvallis Ore. U.S. Jun 13, 2004

Huston James B. Umatilla Ore. U.S. Jul 2, 2004

Kelly Bryan P. Klamath Ore. U.S. Jul 16, 2004

Leisten Ken W. Cornelius Ore. U.S. Jul 28, 2004

Weisenburg David J. Portland Ore. U.S. Sep 13, 2004

Isenberg Benjamin W. Sheridan Ore. U.S. Sep 13, 2004

Johnson David W. Portland Ore. U.S. Sep 25, 2004

Mitts David A. Hammond Ore. U.S. Dec 4, 2004

Moore James L. Roseburg Ore. U.S. Jan 26, 2005

Warren Mark C. La Grande Ore. U.S. Jan 31, 2005

Plumondore Adam J. Gresham Ore. U.S. Feb 16, 2005

Davis Kevin D. Lebanon Ore. U.S. Apr 8, 2005

Thornton Steven W. Eugene Ore. U.S. Apr 18, 2005

Wessel Kevin S.K. Newport Ore. U.S. Apr 19, 2005

Kent Aaron A. Portland Ore. U.S. Apr 23, 2005

Rockholt Ricky W. Winston Ore. U.S. Apr 28, 2005

Simpson Jacob M. Ashland Ore. U.S. May 16, 2005

Troyer Tyler J. Tangent Ore. U.S. Nov 19, 2005

Zyla Michael S. Elgin Ore. U.S. Dec 13, 2005

Walker Ryan D. Stayton Ore. U.S. Jan 5, 2006

Nettles Marcques J. Beaverton Ore. U.S. Apr 2, 2006

Loveless Jeremy M. Estacada Ore. U.S. May 29, 2006

Jones Robert L. Milwaukie Ore. U.S. Jun 17, 2006

Tucker Thomas L. Madras Ore. U.S. Jun 16, 2006

Pate Christopher T. Portland Ore. U.S. Jul 21, 2006

Lee Marc A. Hood River Ore. U.S. Aug 2, 2006

Newman Randy L. Bend Ore. U.S. Aug 20, 2006

Henkes Richard J. Portland Ore. U.S. Sep 3, 2006

Haag Chase A. Portland Ore. U.S. Oct 1, 2006

Bright Dean R. Roseburg Ore. U.S. Oct 4, 2006

Jones Derek W. Salem Ore. U.S. Oct 8, 2006

Gibson Brennan C. Tualatin Ore. U.S. Dec 10, 2006

Hill Ryan J. Keizer Ore. U.S. Jan 20, 2007

Fennerty Sean P. Corvallis Ore. U.S. Jan 20, 2007

Browning Brian A. Astoria Ore. U.S. Feb 6, 2007

Windsor Nathanial D. Scappoose Ore. U.S. Mar 13, 2007

Lightner Nicholas J. Newport Ore. U.S. Mar 21, 2007

Walton Brett A. Hillsboro Ore. U.S. Apr 9, 2007

Vaughan Michael L. Otis Ore. U.S. Apr 23, 2007

Peterson Dale G. Redmond Ore. U.S. Apr 23, 2007

Rodriguez Dominic N. Klamath Falls Ore. U.S. Jun 22, 2007

Kenny Joseph P. Veneta Ore. U.S. Jun 23, 2007

Schill Juan M. Garcia Grants Pass Ore. U.S. Jul 2, 2007

Stacy Steven A. Coos Bay Ore. U.S. Jul 5, 2007

Wiens Kory D. Independence Ore. U.S. Jul 6, 2007

Leckel Daniel A. Medford Ore. U.S. Jul 25, 2007

Elizalde Adrian M. North Bend Ore. U.S. Aug 23, 2007

Jensen Drew N. Clackamas Ore. U.S. Sep 7, 2007

McMahon Graham M. Corvallis Ore. U.S. Sep 19, 2007

McBride Zachary W. Bend Ore. U.S. Jan 9, 2008

Young Joshua A. R. Riddle Ore. U.S. Jan 28, 2008

Miller Mikeal W. Albany Ore. U.S. Jan 27, 2008

Ellis Jessica A. Bend Ore. U.S. May 11, 2008

Eggleston Cody J. Eugene Ore. U.S. Oct 24, 2008

Johnson Robert L. Central Point Ore. U.S. Dec 20, 2008

Tillery Joshua M. Beaverton Ore. U.S. Jan 26, 2009

Oregon's Casualties in Afghanistan

Jeffries Joseph Allen Beaverton Ore. U.S. May 29, 2004

Lucas Jeffrey Alan Corbett Ore. U.S. Jun 28, 2005

Baum Tane Travis Pendleton Ore. U.S. Sep 25, 2005

Stump Adrian Bovee Pendleton Ore. U.S. Sep 25, 2005

Blake Joseph Robert Portland Ore. U.S. Aug 17, 2006

Paul Robert Joseph The Dalles Ore. U.S. Sep 8, 2006

Lindsey Nathaniel Bradley Troutdale Ore. U.S. Sep 10, 2006

Nguyen Long Ngoc Portland Ore. U.S. Feb 10, 2007

Bertrand Bryan Pahl Coos Bay Ore. U.S. Jan 9, 2002

Henderson Christopher D. Hillsboro Ore. U.S. Jun 17, 2007

Brennan Joshua C. Ontario Ore. U.S. Oct 26, 2007

Ngo Tan Q. Beaverton Ore. U.S. Aug 27, 2008

Wiley James L. North Bend Ore. U.S. Sep 18, 2008

WTF Wednesday: Bullying Isn't The Only Thing Hurting Middle Schoolers

2011-05-25T00:10:00.000-07:00

WTF Wednesday is a semi-regular feature of this blog. It documents the things that have made me pause, slap my forehead and say "What the f**k!" Well, that and I just like saying WTF. I'm retired. I don't have to watch what I say anymore. I'm not any one's role model.

This week I'm substituting in 6th grade at the middle school. Middle school can be an especially challenging age group. My group this morning was chatty and active. They burst into the classroom talking nonstop and barely took a breath all period. They were eager to share all kinds of things, and very little of it had anything to do with what we were studying. I struggled to keep them on-task and was on the move all period to make sure that everyone was working.

At one point I noticed a student with a three inch scab on his arm. "What did you do to your arm?" I asked him.

"It's an eraser burn." He nonchalantly replied. He seemed to assume that I would know what that was. I didn't.

"What's an eraser burn?" I asked him and when he told me I thought...

What the f**k????

"Lots of kids have them." He called over two other boys and told them to show me their burns.

WTF????

Eraser burns are a form of self-mutilation. Kids rub an eraser over and over on their skin until it burns. Apparently lots of kids do this and some of them are doing it at school. I found several videos of students giving themselves eraser burns posted on YouTube.

All the years I've worked in education and I've been oblivious to this dangerous practice. What the hell are these kids thinking?

If you have teenagers in your life and you see them with burns and scabs, it's time to start asking questions.

Nana Channels Julia Child or Maybe It's Chef Boyardee

2011-05-22T21:43:00.000-07:00

I have written here previously about my culinary legacy. My mother was English and in the English culinary tradition I grew up eating family favorites such as beans on toast, toad in the hole, and watery over-cooked vegetables.

My palate was trained on the popular foods of the 50's and 60's. Highly processed foods were the norm...cheese whiz, Velveeta, and anything made by Hostess! The TV dinner was invented in the 50's and it was an exciting meal when we actually got to eat one. My parents liked an English breakfast complete with bacon and eggs fried in the grease. My dad liked a side of fried bread too. My brother and I liked cereal and fought over which of us would get the free prize.

I was labeled a picky eater at a young age. I prefer to think of myself as discriminating, but I admit that I am not an adventurous eater. I bought a clove of garlic for the first time in my 50's. What? Garlic salt isn't the same thing? Last week I cooked lentils for the first time. The week before I cooked barley. The beef and barley soup was a hit, the lentils and chicken sausage not so much.

If I were just feeding myself, I would survive on grilled meat, pork and beans, and potato chips. Well, that and snack food like microwave popcorn and M&M's. Wash it down with a diet coke and life is pretty near perfect.

Earlier this month I visited my granddaughters in Austin. One thing we do when I visit is cook together. That is something of a challenge for me given my culinary background. Early one morning Megan was eating her breakfast (healthy cereal with no sugar or free prize) and watching me make her lunch.

"I really like when you make my lunch for me, Nana." she said.

"Why is that?" I asked her.

"Because you make triangles" she told me.

It's reassuring to know that I don't need to have great cooking skills to please a five year old. I just have to take the time to cut her sandwich into quarters.

After school that day I taught my two granddaughters a secret family recipe and let them make it themselves. Into their cups of milk they measured two spoons of Hershey's syrup and then gently stirred.

"Oh, look Nana! It's turning CHOCOLATE!!!" Megan shrieked.

They had never made chocolate milk and it was as if Nana had performed a miracle. I guess I do have a few culinary skills to pass on to the next generation after all.

The End is Near

2011-05-21T16:24:00.000-07:00

Today is supposed to be the end of the world, at 6:00 pm eastern time. Apparently the first thing to go is the Internet, as I tried to get in to blogger to post my pre-rapture plans I kept getting the message that “Internet Explorer cannot display the web page.” We still have cable TV service so I’m relying on CNN for news of the second coming. Jesus is running a little late because it is now 6:10 eastern and there has been no breaking news of the faithful being sucked skyward.

I spent my last day on earth cleaning out the cupboards in my utility room. If Jesus shows up, even a little late, I’m sure he will be impressed with my newly cleaned and organized cupboards. I have several boxes of ~~crap~~ Goodwill-worthy items to donate. I also have two plastic storage boxes of miscellaneous cables and plugs from electronics that I am afraid to discard. As soon as I toss an XYZ connector device the spouse will be asking “Where did you put the plug to my XYZ?”

It is difficult to decide what is important to keep and what can be discarded. I kept the set of Christmas dishes, but moved them into a box to store in the garage. I kept both my remote controlled helicopters…duh! There was an entire shelf of vases saved from floral arrangements. I don’t think I am busting any perceptions if I say that I am no Martha Stewart. I don’t spend my afternoons in my cutting garden preparing fresh arrangements for my dinner parties. Why do I keep all these vases? I put all but two large and two small in the Goodwill box. Sorry Jesus, no fresh flowers for your second coming.

I'm still working on the pantry cupboard. There's a part of me that likes a fully stocked pantry...and there's another part of me that recognizes that we frequently don't get around to eating items from the pantry before they are years out of date. Is it safe to eat Hamburger Helper from 2003? I guess that's a dumb question. It probably wasn't smart to eat Hamburger Helper in 2003, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.

I have made a vow to not buy cleaning products until all the half empty bottles and cans are all gone. That may be a long time since cleaning has never been one of my favorite things to do.

It is now several hours after the apocalypse was prophesied to begin. I guess it's time to order my "I survived the apocalypse of 2011" T-shirt.

WTF Wednesday: Failing on Sesame Street

2011-05-18T01:00:00.000-07:00

Last week I was in Austin, Texas visiting my grandchildren, Megan and Hunter. During the day while Megan was in kindergarten, Hunter and I read books, took walks to the park, and occasionally watched TV. You can learn quite a lot watching Sesame Street. The pictures above are similar to the ones shown on the program. Let’s see how well you can do on this learning experience…

Which one doesn’t belong? If, like me, you answered C, you would be wrong. Thank goodness I didn’t answer out loud and humiliate myself in front of Hunter. I’m thinking, well, the tiger, the dog and the donkey all have four legs and they’re mammals…so it must be C, the dolphin.

WRONG! Sesame Street says the answer is A, the tiger.

The tiger???

WTF???

Then the voice of Sesame Street goes on to say “Tiger starts with T. Dog, dolphin and donkey all start with D. So, tiger doesn’t belong."

The day was off to a bad start when I couldn’t answer Sesame Street questions correctly. I guess I can forget about being smarter than a 5th grader…I’m still working at the pre-K level.

Another Fun Evening With David Sedaris

2011-04-26T15:24:00.000-07:00

Last night my daughter, Sarah, and I attended a reading by David Sedaris at the Long Center For the Performing Arts in Austin, Texas. This is the third time we have seen him read in Austin. It has become a yearly tradition for us. David Sedaris is my favorite author. I love his insightful observations of our culture and his masterful descriptions that allow me to see everyday events from a new perspective. Well, that and his writing makes me laugh out loud.

Austin has been a stop on David's book tour for many years. He has outgrown smaller venues and last night's performance at the Long Center For the Performing Arts was sold out. The announcer introduced David by sharing a conversation that they had before the show. Several years ago, after out growing the Paramount Theater, David's reading was booked into a large church in Austin. (This is Texas people, the churches are HUGE!) The crowd in the Long Center chuckled at the idea of David Sedaris, who is known for stretching the limits of acceptable conversational topics, performing in a religious environment. David told the announcer that he had toned down his performance out of respect for the location. To which the announcer reminded him that he had said "cocksucker" four times!

My favorite part of hearing David Sedaris read is when he shares entries from his diary. Last night was no exception. He manages to make a story about waiting in line for coffee not only hilarious, but a reflection of our society. The YouTube clip below is David reading a different selection from his diary on Late Night with David Letterman.

David Sedaris is now an enormously successful author. Those of us who write might have fantasies of making the New York Times best seller list and doing book tours around the world, but last night at the Long Center before the reading started, I took a picture of the audience from just in front of the podium.

Can you imagine reading for a crowd this size? Four tiers of seating and by showtime there were only a few empty seats. We laughed at all the right places and applauded vigorously. I'm not sure of the capacity of the Long Center, but it is well over a thousand people. David signed books both before and after the reading...there was a long, long line.

This is big time success, but his travel schedule is grueling, a different city every night. A lot of rewards, but a lot of work too. I can't wait to hear him again next year.

Nana Remembers

2011-04-19T00:32:00.000-07:00

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

George Santayana

The spouse likes to watch the History Channel. Around our house it's called the Hitler channel because every other program is a documentary about the second world war. On a lazy Sunday afternoon we found ourselves watching yet another documentary, The Third Reich: The Fall. The program told the story of the the fall of the Third Reich through home movies taken by Germans both civilians and soldiers.

At the start of the program there were warnings about graphic images, but the beginning of the documentary focused on the lives of civilian Germans. There were home movies of families on holiday and children's birthdays interspersed with footage taken by German occupation soldiers in Paris. Beautiful, smiling families watched toddlers take their first steps and Nazi troops looked like tourists at the Eiffel Tower. In the early part of the war life in Germany was little changed. There were no shortages of food or goods and the population enjoyed prosperity fueled by the profits of war from neighboring countries. Both the German civilians and the military were unaware of the death, destruction, and misery that lay ahead.

It was at this point in the documentary that I remembered the quotation about the lessons of the past. I wondered if we are at that same point in our history. We enjoy the highest standard of living in the world. We want for nothing. Yes, we'd all like to earn more money and pay less taxes, but most of us do not go to bed hungry. We are safe and our children are educated. Yet, we are fighting wars on three fronts. We are at war, but our everyday life in unchanged. Most of us are untouched by the current military actions. Most of us do not have an immediate family member in the military. We have rained death and destruction on three fronts, but our lives are unaffected.

I was unnerved by the parallels of history. How many of us have home videos of toddlers taking their first steps? I bet our soldiers home on leave are taking videos at amusement parks. I wonder if we are blind to the consequences of war because we have not learned from the past.

I voted for Obama in part because of his anti-war stance. Three years later the war has expanded. When will we ever learn?

Nana Pays Her Share

2011-04-17T13:23:00.000-07:00

Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.

Oliver Wendall Holmes

I spent most of Saturday finishing up my taxes. I had started them early this year, but then I saw that we were going to owe a bundle more than what had already been deducted from our paychecks and I lost interest in completing them. Since Monday is the deadline for filing, I had lost the opportunity to continue to procrastinate.

I am a rule follower. I may complain about some rules, but I believe in following them. I think our society would be a better place if everyone followed the rules. With that being said, I have been know to drive 71 in a 65 zone on our nearly deserted eastern Oregon freeways, but that really is the extent of my law breaking. So, on Saturday I settled in to finish my taxes before the deadline.

Recently the spouse and I have been arguing about politics. He has a job where he spends a lot of time in his pickup driving. He listens to the radio, conservative talk radio. He also listens to NPR, but what seems to stick with him is the anti-Obama, anti-government rhetoric of the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. He comes home ranting about how the rich pay a greater percentage of taxes than anyone else. He's become an advocate of the rich. He seems to forget that we are very far from coming anywhere close to benefiting from tax cuts for the rich, but will be financially impacted to a significant degree with future cuts to social security and medicare.

I usually enjoy political discussion, but I'm ill prepared for debate with the spouse because I don't listen to Rush or Glen. So before I can enter into battle I have to research whatever incident the spouse is ranting about, with hopes of finding out, as Paul Harvey would say "The rest of the story."

This is another one of those issues where there is a lot of common ground. I don't know anyone who doesn't think we should balance the federal budget and begin to pay down our national debt. Everyone I know recognizes that there are areas of waste in the budget. Everyone would like to see smaller government. And is there anyone who wants to see continuation of the wars? Why can't we have a civilized discussion about our federal budget without mud slinging and grandstanding?

Like millions of Americans (and unlike General Electric), I paid my taxes. I don't have any fancy tax loopholes or shelters. My house is paid off, so I can't even take a mortgage interest deduction. I paid my fair share. It was a healthy chunk of money, but when I reflect on what this country has given me and my family, it is money well spent. I agree with Oliver Wendall Holmes. Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.

Nana Mourns a Lost Art

2011-04-07T15:39:00.000-07:00

Last week I substituted in a social studies class at the high school. The teacher had left directions to watch a short video and have students write down fifteen facts. Not a brilliant lesson plan, but the video was somewhat interesting and because there was accountability to produce notes, the students stayed on task. They were to turn in their notes at the end of the period. I also wrote down facts during the video and we compared notes as a class. I wrote my notes on the white board and a student said "Mrs., I can't read cursive."

My teacher-style cursive is easy to read, but more and more these days I have students telling me that they can't read it. It used to be that only the students who had come to our schools from Mexico couldn't read or write cursive, but that's not the case now. Our students from Mexico usually wrote with clear block printing. They had never been taught to write in cursive.

Recently there was a story on the news about schools abandoning the instruction of cursive writing. Since so much writing is done on a keyboard, the thinking is that cursive writing is no longer a useful skill. Based on my experience in the classroom, even if schools have not yet officially dropped cursive from the curriculum, many students have failed to learn this skill.

When I was first learning to write grants, I wrote them out longhand on yellow legal pads using a number 2 pencil. I frequently found myself cutting up the pages and rearranging paragraphs. It was difficult for me to make the transition from writing on a yellow pad to writing on a computer. Now, years later, I do almost all my writing on the computer. But, when I'm struggling with words, I frequently pull out the yellow pad and write out ideas. There's something about the connection of pencil to paper that helps the words flow for me. Cursive is so much faster than block printing. When the words are flowing, I don't want to take the time to print.

I realize that there is only so much time in the instructional day, but I'm not sure that the instruction of cursive writing should be eliminated.

But, maybe I'm experiencing a sentiment similar to what the blacksmiths felt when the automobile was introduced...and we know how that turned out. Time moves on, things change, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. I guess I'm settling in to my status as a senior and mourning the loss of the good ole days.

WTF Wednesday: Kangaroo Therapy Animals

2011-04-06T00:45:00.000-07:00

Where exactly is she putting her hand on that kangaroo?

So there's this woman in Oklahoma with depression and she gets herself a disabled kangaroo as a therapy pet. See the original article here. Apparently city codes do not allow kangaroos to be kept in residential areas and she is now fighting the city to keep her kangaroo.

WTF? Am I the only one who thinks this is weird? Kangaroos can grow to 7 feet tall and 200 pounds.

I am all for therapy, but perhaps this has gone too far. This is a growing area of litigation for schools. Parents of children with disabilities want their children to have therapy animals in school. On the surface it sounds like a good idea. Who doesn't have a warm spot in their heart for the bond between a child and his dog. But then remember that the child is in a classroom with 29 other children and some of them have asthma induced by pet dander. Some children have traumatic histories with animals and intense fear. Do the wants or needs of one child override the rights of other children in the classroom? Does every child with a disability have the right to bring an animal to school? Do the benefits to one child come at the cost of an appropriate educational environment for other students? ...and who is going to pick up the dog poop, teachers?

Everyone understands the role of a guide dog for the blind; both the animal and the disabled person have training specific to the use of the animal. The same is not true of every animal that people claim is needed for real or perceived disabilities. I'm pretty sure that the kangaroo was not trained to provide therapy.

Particularly troublesome to me are the "therapy" animals that people with autism or depression claim are necessary to reduce their anxiety. Can we expect to see these animals everywhere we go? So, in the produce department of the grocery store while I'm sorting through the onions can I expect to be surrounded by an individual with a six foot python draped around her neck, another person with a large rat perched on his shoulder, and a small child with a therapy tarantula mincing his way up his arm. I don't want your therapy animals around me or my food. It's one thing to have a trained dog on a harness, it's another to have random animals invade traditional animal-free zones. I definitely don't want a kangaroo sharing the cereal aisle with me at Safeway.

Nana Ponders Lies

2011-04-04T19:01:00.000-07:00

There are classic lies: the check is in the mail, my dog ate my homework. There are white lies: Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. So lies can be benign, but they can also be hurtful. Sometimes the hard part is figuring out what’s a lie and what isn’t.

This morning I read a blog written by a fifty-something woman who graduated last May with a BS in Liberal Studies. Several years ago she quit her job, took out a boatload of student loans and returned to college to earn a degree.

In schools around the country there’s a big push for all students to continue their educations beyond high school. There is a lot of government money available to assist students in continuing their educations. Low income students can receive grants that they don’t have to pay back. All students can receive loans. Some loans are subsidized by the government, meaning that the government either covers the interest while the student is actively studying or they receive a lower interest rate.

You don’t need a high school diploma to attend junior college, you only need to be 18 years old. Junior colleges usually require placement tests of all students. Students who don’t meet educational standards are required to take non-credit level courses , at the same cost as college classes, to build skills before taking college-level credit classes.

Because the economy is down, a lot of people have returned to college. They’ve been told that education is the answer. If you want a good job, you have to have a college education. People with college educations earn more money than people who just have a high school diploma. So, the blogger quit her job, that was providing for her middle class lifestyle, got her government subsidized loans and followed her dream to become an educator. Now, several years later she has massive student loan debt and has been unable to find any job since she graduated in May. She has a BS degree but still needs another year of college to complete requirements for a teaching license.

My father’s wife (she’s younger than me, but that’s a story for another day) graduated a year ago with a BS in nursing from a state university. She passed her state boards and is a registered nurse. She had been told that there is a massive shortage of registered nurses. She took out a fortune in student loans and went back to school. Since graduating, she has taken temporary jobs and done home care for elderly patients, but can’t find a full-time position…most hospitals want RNs with experience, and she has only her nursing training experience.

So what do these little stories have to do with lies?

We’ve been lied to. A college education is not an automatic ticket to a good job and high pay. Student loans may enable everyone to attend college, but they also place a huge financial burden on the graduate for years after leaving college. Education is important and it can help you get ahead, but it isn’t a magic pill that will solve all your problems.

It is especially troubling to me to see so many young students taking out loans to cover their living expenses while in college. It’s one thing to have debt to pay tuition, but using government loans to support yourself for four years is a one way ride to massive debt.

If you're considering going back to school because there's a lot of student aid available, make sure that you're ready to actually learn something that is marketable. Even if you're attending school on free money, you need to be receiving value for that money. Learn something. A degree is just a piece of paper and is worthless if you haven't acquired the skills and proficiencies you need to be a good worker....and that is no lie!

Nanas Got Nothing

2011-03-29T17:15:00.000-07:00

It has been a week since I posted here, but I have been writing. I just haven't managed to get anything down on paper. The automatic download from the thoughts in my head to my computer screen has not been working. The writing ideas float in and out of my head constantly. I write myself to sleep at night, reworking sentences in my head. When I read the paper, I'm looking for stimulating material to make a story. When I attend an activity with my friends I think about how to make attending the craft show an interesting narrative. So why don't I have anything to post?

This past week I've only "written" in my head and nothing has been very interesting. Two or three sentences about spring gardening and another few on signs of spring in Hermiston. The narrative about buying kettle corn at the craft show put me right to sleep. Even if I had that interface that directly connected my brain to my computer, there wouldn't be anything worth reading.

What exactly are the signs of spring in Hermiston, you ask?

The buckets holding bunches of daffodils have shown up in the aisle by the deli at Safeway, a sure sign that spring is near.

We don't have a Cherry Blossom Festival in Hermiston, but the ten trees that encircle RiteAid are in full cotton candy colored bloom.

See? Not very interesting.

I've been surfing a lot of blogs and I can't even find inspiration to leave comments. What do you do to keep the words flowing? Is it possible that I've used up everything worth saying? There must be a limit to the number of times I can write about cleaning out my closets. Hopefully by tomorrow I'll come up with a better topic or I'll be sharing more closet details.

Nana Remembers Japan

2011-03-21T01:34:00.000-07:00

In 2002 I spent a month in Japan as a participant in the Fulbright Memorial Program. The Fulbright Memorial Program was established by the Japanese government in honor of the 50th anniversary of the Fulbright Program. The program promotes understanding and friendship between the United States and Japan by sponsoring short-term educational and cultural studies in Japan. I was one of 100 educators, two from each state, who had been selected to participate. The program was fully funded by the Japanese government. The entire group spent three weeks in Tokyo and then one week in smaller groups around the country. I was assigned to the group that went to Yamato, a city not far from Tokyo. During our stay in Yamato we stayed with Japanese families and experienced life in typical Japanese homes.

The reception at city hall to welcome us to Yamato.

The Fulbright Memorial Program Yamato Group with Yamato government officials. I'm hidden in the back on the left.

I have thought back to the month I spent in Japan numerous times this past week as I watched the images on the news of the devastation caused by the earthquake and tsunami. I can't stop thinking about the people who made my experience in Japan so memorable. I learned so much about Japan, but also about myself and my own culture. There's nothing like experiencing another culture first hand to provide the fodder for personal growth.

There have been so many terrifying images on the news this week, I am sharing some of my memories of Japan because I can't stop thinking of the people. These are the same people we're watching on the news. In Yamato we had the opportunity to visit Japanese schools. We watched the children arriving to school. They walk together in groups along predetermined routes led by adults or older students, and pick up more students along the way. The older children helping the younger ones.

Walking to school in organized groups

I could go on and on about the similarities and differences of the Japanese and American educational systems. One major commonality was happy, engaged students.

These elementary students performed for us and then taught us a traditional dance.

Tokyo was a cultural shock for me. I'd never seen so many people.

I had always heard about Japan being a homogeneous culture with little diversity and strong pressure for everyone to conform. I was surprised at the individuality I saw in Tokyo.

A mother and a child in traditional dress

Goth with neon wigs!

One minute a family in traditional clothing is walking by....

and the next minute you're standing on the corner next to a guy in a top hat and five inch heels.

The Fulbright Program was founded by United States Senator J. William Fulbright in 1946. Following World War II Japanese students had the opportunity to study in the US as Fulbright scholars. Today those Fulbrighters are leaders in Japan in business and government. The Fulbright Program helped Japan recover from World War II. Numerous Japanese Fulbright scholars attended various receptions held for us during our stay in Japan.

In Yamato we attended an elegant dinner that included the director of the Japan-United States Educational Commission, numerous former Fulbright Scholars and our Yamato host families. One member of our group played the violin and as a tribute to our hosts, he played the Japanese national anthem. It was one of those moments that is seared in my memory. We all stood for the anthem. I looked around the room and noticed the tears in the eyes of the elderly men as they silently mouthed the words. Later I learned that the national anthem is not played frequently in Japan. It is also unusual to see the flag displayed. In fact, following World War II the Japanese were not permitted to display the flag. It is considered by many as a symbol of the extreme nationalism that contributed to World War II. I was surprised that World War II continues to have such a strong influence in Japan.

We reached out to help the Japanese recover from World War II. It is reassuring to see the world respond to the crisis in Japan now.

Aches, Pains and Aging

2011-03-17T00:41:00.000-07:00

The spouse bounded out of bed this morning, jumped in the shower…and came out an old man. Apparently he bent down to pick up the soap, a simple movement he has accomplished effortlessly hundreds of times, except today something was different. Something pulled or twisted or stretched and now his leg refuses to work correctly.

The spouse went into the shower, but Granpappy Amos came out. If you’re a Baby Boomer you probably remember Granpappy Amos as the crotchety grandfather from The Real McCoys, a television series from the late 50’s and early 60’s. Grandpa Amos, played by Walter Brennen, had a bum leg and a distinctive walk. Now the spouse is dragging around his right leg and wincing when he sits down.

Where do these mysterious aches and pains come from? I understand being sore from exercise, or hurting from an accident or illness, but how can I go to bed perfectly healthy and wake up aching? Several weeks ago my shoulder started hurting, not constantly, but off and on. I couldn’t sleep in my usual position because it hurt my arm. Just as mysteriously as it appeared, the pain went away. I hope the spouse’s leg will follow the same course and will resolve itself.

One of the challenges of getting older is not knowing what pains to pay attention to and what pains to ignore. How do I know what is just a normal ache of an aging body and what is a sign of an impending medical crisis?

I do not want to be that senior citizen whose primary topic of conversation is her medical problems. In the years before her death my mother’s main social interaction was travelling from one specialist to another, and then reporting every interaction in minute detail to anyone who would listen, over and over again. She seemed to take pleasure in every new diagnosis. Each new symptom was cause for another trip to the lab for tests and to one or more specialists for treatment. Every ailment brought her back to the spotlight.

I don’t want to be that old person who desires companionship but doesn’t know how to ask for it. With my mother it was difficult to know when she was really ill and when she was seeking attention, like the little boy who cried wolf.

But, maybe along with the aches and pains that age is bringing me, there will be some wisdom. Perhaps the universe is providing me the opportunity to reflect on my past and giving me the opportunity to learn. I may have developed more empathy for my mother, but I hope I won't be condemned to repeat her mistakes.

Nana Spreads Some Goodwill

2011-03-10T12:05:00.000-08:00

I spent yesterday in the closet. Or, should I say closets? As I posted on Wednesday, it was time to clean out my accumulation of shoes. I tried to channel Peter Walch, Oprah's organization guru, and I developed criteria for any pair that I was going to keep.

in good condition
comfortable
fit well
meet a need in my wardrobe or I just love them

I started with 102 pairs, but along the way I found a few more pairs under the beds or tucked away in the back of the closets. My goal was to reduce by 20%. The first five or six pairs to toss was easy and included four pairs of black pumps. I kept one pair of basic black heels, but numerous black dressy pumps...you know, for that once in a blue moon that I dress up. But, a girl's got to have strappy heels for summer dress-up and fancy closed toe shoes for winter. I'm down to only two pair of lime green shoes, summer sandals and spring loafers, but I've still got my four pairs of pink shoes.

I have two big bags of shoes in the trunk of my car to take to Goodwill. I culled 18 pairs from the collection. I said goodbye to three pairs of gray heels...but I still have at least three pairs of gray shoes in the closet. I really was surprised that I had so many gray shoes.

I found a pair of brand new slippers, still in the box, in the back of the closet. So I threw away two pairs of slippers that had seen better days.

Once I was in the closets (notice it's plural, I use two walk-in closets in the two back bedrooms) I started in on the clothing. When my daughter lived at home, she was my fashion Nazi. It wasn't until she moved out that my collection of holiday sweaters grew to epic proportions. Without her input I do have what could best be described as "some poor choices!"

I kept reminding myself that I am retired and my wardrobe meets different needs now. I have two boxes of suits going to Goodwill also. I tried on almost everything in the closet and if it didn't fit perfectly, it went in the donate pile. Eighteen suits are gone, but I still have almost that many left in the closet. All the brown suits went. I don't particularly like brown, so I'm not sure why I bought those particular suits in the first place. I'm left with classic black and blue suits. I guess I'm not totally ready to let go of my working life, or I would have let all the business attire go.

I enjoyed reading the comments from my earlier post. I do wish all of you lived in my neighborhood...what a great field trip we could have shopping for shoes! Oh, I forgot, I'm not buying shoes; I have enough shoes. Let's go shopping for leisure wear...I've got some room in my closet now for a new retirement wardrobe!

Nana Takes the First Step

2011-03-09T00:18:00.000-08:00

I love those television programs that show people with clutter problems...not the hoarders who have filled their houses with garbage, but regular people who have piles of stuff in their spare bedrooms. This afternoon when I was too tired from being retired to do anything, I turned on the TV and discovered that I could watch Peter Walch, Oprah's organization guru, on On Demand. There went my afternoon!

Peter Walch was helping a couple clean out their bedroom and home office. The rooms were filled with stuff that the wife had bought on sale. She had piles of new clothing that she had never worn, in sizes that she couldn't wear. The clothing took up all available space. Her husband had moved into a spare bedroom because there was no room to sleep in the master bedroom. There was an incredible amount of stuff in just two rooms. Peter Walch helped the couple, especially the woman, reduce their possessions to manageable levels. At one point he said "No one needs more than 10 pairs of shoes."

Ten pairs of shoes, he can't be serious? I've got at least 10 pair of black shoes alone. I don't think I would be able to limit myself to only 10 pairs, but how many is a reasonable number?

My friend Shawn often reminds me that I'm the only person she knows who has five pairs of pink shoes. Is five pairs unreasonable? I've got two pairs of heels, loafers, ballet flats, and sandals. Doesn't everyone need a variety of shoe styles in numerous different colors?

I have shoes in my closet that I haven't worn. On the other hand, I have shoes in my closet that are more than just comfortably worn...but they're still good for a few more wearings.

Oregon has four seasons, so one needs shoes for every season. I can't wear boots in the summer or sandals in the winter. But, how many pairs of sandals is reasonable?

The reason I love the organizing shows is because I know that I walk a fine line. I could so easily find myself buried in stuff. I'm always looking for ways to keep myself in check. The television shows that focus on organizing have given me strategies for helping to reduce my personal clutter.

True confession time...I just counted. I have 102 pairs of shoes in my closets. That probably is too many... especially for someone who spends most days inside wearing slippers! I haven't decided on a reasonable number, but tomorrow I'm going to sort through the shoes. My goal is to toss at least 20 pairs of shoes. That would be 20%, Then again, 80 pairs is still a lot. I'm already getting anxious, worrying about what shoes I can let go. Maybe I should look for a 12 step program, or maybe I'll just wait until Peter Walch knocks on my door .

WTF Wednesday: New York Abortion Billboard

2011-03-02T00:27:00.000-08:00

The billboard above reads “The most dangerous place for an African-American is in the womb.” It is located in Manhattan’s Soho neighborhood, about a half a mile from a Planned Parenthood clinic. The billboard was erected by Life Always, a group opposed to abortions.

"They're attacking women for choosing abortion while simultaneously destroying family planning," a spokeswoman Mary Alice Carr of NARAL Pro-Choice America is quoted by CNN before the billboard was taken down. "Their hypocrisy is as large and as obnoxious as this billboard."

Read the CNN article here .

What the f**k?

A Modern Parable

2011-03-01T00:05:00.000-08:00

I read the following posted on Facebook today...

"A public union employee, a tea party activist, and a CEO are sitting at a table with a plate of a dozen cookies in the middle of it.

The CEO takes 11 cookies, turns to the tea partier and says, 'Watch out for that union guy. He wants a piece of your cookie.' "

There are several versions of this floating around the Internet, so I don't know its author.

The Republican Governor of Wisconsin's proposal to strip public sector unions of most collective bargaining rights was approved last Friday by the Wisconsin Assembly.

Everyone by now understands that we are facing huge budget deficits across the United States. Everyone understands that we have to make reductions in spending. The trick is making the cuts that will do the least harm and maintain essential services. Using this budget crisis to abolish workers' rights is unprincipled and dishonorable.

I am tired of the anti-union rhetoric, but I am also tired of extreme positions on both sides of the issue. Tea party members and Republicans are not the only ones who recognize that we need to get our budgets under control. The only way we can resolve the differences is not by heavy handed proclamations, but by respecting each other, finding common ground, and making compromises.

It's another one of those lessons from kindergarten...nobody gets cookies unless you have enough for everyone!

I Stand With Planned Parenthood

2011-02-25T02:30:00.000-08:00

On February 18, 2011, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to withdraw federal funding of Planned Parenthood as part of a larger bill to cut government spending.   If this bill passes the Senate, all funding for Planned Parenthood services such as birth control, cancer screenings, HIV testing, and other lifesaving care will be terminated. Planned Parenthood would lose $363 million in federal funding.

Our elected representatives are facing difficult choices as they try to balance the budget. There are many competing needs, but there are also forces that are taking advantage of the budget challenges to undermine the reproductive rights of women. Planned Parenthood provides free or low cost health services for women across America. As part of comprehensive reproductive health services, they also provide abortion services.  However, no federal money is used to provide abortion services, yet targeting Planned Parenthood for budget cuts is an easy target for the anti-choice members of Congress.

When the spouse and I first married, we were poor college students. We didn't have medical insurance. Planned Parenthood was the resource I used for reproductive health care. Not only did I receive knowledgeable, professional medical care, but I also got my birth control pills for free. If you're poor, birth control can be a luxury. I was so grateful for Planned Parenthood.

All women deserve access to quality reproductive health care that is non-biased.  Reduction of federal funding to Planned Parenthood jeopardizes that access for millions of women. I live in a rural area, yet there is a Planned Parenthood facility 30 miles from my house.

Day in and day out Planned Parenthood is providing critical health care services for families who have no other alternatives. That is why federal funding must be sustained. Now is not the time to play politics with health care funding.

If you are concerned about this issue, let your elected representatives know. Sign the open letter to the representatives who voted for this bill, and to the senators who still have a chance to stop it. You can find a link to the letter at the Planned Parenthood website at

http://www.plannedparenthood.org/index.htm

I stand with Planned Parenthood. I hope you will too.

WTF Wednesday: God Works in Mysterious Ways

2011-02-16T14:53:00.000-08:00

"What kid would want to watch cartoon vegetables?" I commented to my daughter.

Readers who have small children have probably heard about Veggie Tales. I had never heard of them and my daughter filled me in. Veggie Tales is an animated series that features vegetables acting out Bible stories.

What the f**k? Vegetables telling Bible stories? ...and it's on TV? ...and kids actually watch it?

This is not a joke. The series exists and it is really cartoon vegetables acting out Bible stories like Daniel in the Lion's Den, or David and Goliath.

Can you imagine the production meeting where this idea was first proposed?

I know that God works in mysterious ways, but this one is more than mysterious; It's weird.

Nana did NOT buy the DVD for the granddaughters!

WTF Wednesday: Anonymous is Stalking Me

2011-02-08T00:13:00.000-08:00

I just put the picture of the dollar bill to taunt my new stalker. Apparently middle school students have found my blog. I wrote about an incident in the classroom here last Wednesday. Here are some of the messages that have been posted on my blog since then:

"Boner"

Posted by Anonymous to Benchmark 60 at February 7, 2011 5:24 PM

"I want my dollar back you dumb bitch!!!! Go play with zebra poop!!!

Posted by Anonymous to Benchmark 60 at February 7, 2011 12:14 PM

"Fuck you!"

Posted by Anonymous to Plentiful Sufficiency at February 6, 2011 1:16 PM

"U are such a god damn freak! What the he'll is this blog for! I hate you! You had no right to take my dollar! You had no right to blog about it either you price of shit!!!! bONEr!!

Posted by Anonymous to Benchmark 60 at February 6, 2011 1:13 PM

It is easy enough to erase the comments. But, for everyone who looks at teaching as an easy job, here's an example of the other side of the story. While we want to look at students as innocent children, and see our job as shepherding them into adulthood by teaching and encouraging them, the reality is that some of them are nasty pieces of work. Unfortunately, it looks like I had one of those kids in my classroom.

Okay, the smart ones in the crowd are asking, "How do you know it's a middle school student?" To which I reply.... clues! The comment about zebras refers to a discussion in the classroom about zebra prints. (Yes, Nana was indulging in her love for fashion with an especially attractive zebra print jacket which some students thought was quite fashion forward.)

Dear Anonymous,
I don't have your dollar. I left it in your teacher's desk with your name on it. Your mother never came by to claim it. Perhaps you should ask your teacher or your principal to return it to you. I'm sending them a link to this post. I'm sure they'll be interested in reading what you are posting online. Your mother must be so proud!

Sincerely,
Your substitute

Social Networks

2011-02-07T17:13:00.000-08:00

My cyber friend Linda, the baglady, recently wrote about maintaining social networks in retirement. She pointed out that people have differing needs for social contact. Some of us require more social contact than others. Another blog friend, DJan, wrote about the changes to her daily routine since she retired. One of the benefits of joining the blogging community has been getting to know other bloggers who are at the same stage of life as me. I'm constantly learning something new and forced to examine my own thinking.

So the baglady got me thinking about my own social contacts. One of the things that has been challenging for me in retirement is that I no longer have the casual social connections that I had when I was working. There are a lot of informal social outings that come about because of daily contact with a group of people. Someone will mention that there's a craft fair on Saturday and someone else will suggest that it would be fun to go as a group and with little or no effort a weekend becomes full with group activities. There are automatic invitations to holiday parties when you're working. There's also an immediate support system when something goes wrong. You're immediately missed when you don't show up for work. All that stops when employment ends.

I haven't been diligent in establishing new social contacts or maintaining my relationships with pre-retirement friends. It takes work and I haven't put forth the effort on a regular basis. I have enjoyed the few activities that I 've organized. But, there's the gist of the issue... I have to organize it. I've come to realize that my need for social contact isn't very high.

I don't have a best friend. I am sometimes envious of Oprah's relationship with her best friend, Gayle...but not envious enough to work at being a better friend. I think it gets harder to establish friendships as I get older. There's something so comfortable with old friends. You don't have to explain the history and they accept you for what you are and forgive you the obvious flaws. The hard work in building the relationship was done years ago. The problem with old friends is that things change. People die, or move away, or get a divorce. The crowd of old friends is diminishing.

As I get older, family assumes a greater role in my social network. They provide all the benefits of old friends and they're always there...usually with only a few snide comments about not having heard from me in a long time.

I live in a rural area. There aren't a lot of organized social activities in which to participate. I have a writing group that meets a couple of times a month...I organized it. I attend the Lions Club meeting every other Wednesday. I can't bring myself to attend the senior citizen lunches. My old friend, Dick, invited me to go with him, but I guess I haven't fully accepted that I am a senior.

I think I'm just going to adopt a cat for companionship.

WTF Wednesday: Nana Gets a $1.00 and a Boner

2011-02-02T10:26:00.000-08:00

They found it hysterically funny. In my head I was thinking "What the f**k?" But, I am smart enough not to say it out loud in a classroom!

I still don't get middle school humor.

The student insisted that I had no right to take his dollar. I told him to have his mother stop by to see me and I was perfectly happy to give it back to her, after he explained to his mother the significance of the writing on the back. Somehow I don't think his mom will be stopping by.

Nana Ponders the Open Road

2011-01-31T20:52:00.000-08:00

We’re thinking about buying a motor home. We’ve been to the RV show and been overwhelmed by the choices and appalled by the prices. We’ve searched Craig’s List and toured the RV lots in the big city. Part of the challenge is that we’re not sure what we want. We’re not even sure that we will like RVing.

The spouse wants something small that can pull his fishing boat. He envisions being able to spend the night at his favorite fishing spot and beating the morning rush. While others have to get up in the dark to drive to the river, he will be enjoying his fresh brewed coffee at the launching ramp. I don’t mind going fishing, I just don’t like to fish. I like camping…as long as I can be warm and comfortable. My old bones don’t respond kindly to sleeping on the ground in a tent. I need a real bed, preferably with a down comforter and feather pillows. While the spouse is off trying to land the big one, I will sleep late, enjoy a leisurely breakfast and then walk the trails along the river or sit under a tree and read.

Our current thinking is to find a small used motor home and see if we even like RVing. We’re searching for that jewel that has low miles, is in good condition, and doesn’t smell like a pack of wet dogs. So far we’ve looked at a lot of fixer-uppers, but we’re not interested in buying someone else’s problem. Several times we’ve had appointments to view a motor home that was then sold before we could see it. The spouse is sure that those were the perfect RV’s and we just weren’t fast enough. Hope spring eternal…we’ve got an appointment to view another one on Wednesday. This one has relatively low miles and is stored under cover. The owner didn't mention any unusual odors, so we have our fingers crossed.

My fantasy is to take an extended road trip and visit the national parks. Finding our starter motor home is a first step. If we can tolerate each other in close quarters at our local fishing spots and the Oregon coast, perhaps, once the spouse retires, we’ll step up to a more deluxe motor home and hit the open road.

Nana's Buttons Are Pushed

2011-01-18T01:14:00.000-08:00

January 22 is the anniversary of the historic Roe v Wade decision that made abortion legal in the United States. The Supreme Court determined that the Constitution protects a women’s right to privacy. A woman, not the state, retains autonomy over her body.

Every year our local Catholic Church, Our Lady of Angels, recognizes this anniversary by setting up a display of white crosses across the street from the church. A large banner proclaims that each cross represents lives lost to abortion. The display evokes emotion in me, but perhaps not those that the organizers intended.

It makes me angry. Angry at a church that doesn’t trust women. Angry at church doctrine that denies the kingdom of heaven to couples who practice birth control. Angry at the paternalistic church that encourages third world women to reproduce, thus ensuring the continuation of the poverty cycle to a new generation. Angry at a church that would deny an abortion to a 12 year old child raped by her father. I’m angry that this church presumes to impose its beliefs on all women. I’m angry that it would take that most personal decision away from me, or my daughter, or my granddaughters, or any woman.

My child bearing years are behind me. I never had to make a decision to terminate a pregnancy. But then, I didn’t follow church doctrine on birth control either. But just because I never had to exercise my right to control my own body doesn’t mean that that I don’t value that right.

Since the shootings in Arizona there has been much in the press about the level of harsh political rhetoric in the media. The abortion debate has been laden with inflammatory language on both sides, and yet it adds nothing to the discussion. It seems that we are not seeking solutions, but passing judgment.

I am not a supporter of abortion, but I strongly believe that the decision to have an abortion is mine to make. If I cannot control what happens to my own body, then I am a slave to the state. I want my government to trust me, to trust that I am smart enough to make an informed decision. This is an issue of privacy. Only the woman who is facing this decision knows all the reasons why or why not abortion is an option for her, and she shouldn’t have to justify that decision to anyone. Trust us to make a good decision.

As a propaganda device the white crosses deliver a powerful message. If we want to continue with the inflammatory language and media manipulation, perhaps it is time for the pro-choice voices to speak up. I’m thinking of running a similar campaign in the local paper. Picture rows of teddy bears on a blank page. The caption reads, “Each teddy bear represents a childhood lost to molestation by a pedophile priest.”

Yeah, it’s a cheap propaganda device, but effective, don’t you think? I won’t be handing out these fliers on the sidewalk in front of the church, inflammatory ad campaigns contribute nothing to improving our society...someone has to show restraint, trust me.

Nana's Culinary Legacy

2011-01-12T00:10:00.000-08:00

My mother was English. She cooked traditional English food…and by traditional, I mean bland and over-cooked. I grew up with beans on toast, Yorkshire pudding and roast beef, and fried English breakfasts. I don’t think I ate pasta until Chef Boyardee created spaghetti O’s. I mention spaghetti O’s as an example of an international meal in my house.

The only fresh vegetables in my childhood home were served boiled. Canned peas, lima beans and brussel sprouts were the vegetables of my youth. When I tried to think of memorable meals from my childhood, it wasn’t a Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner that came to mind. I mostly remember having to try evil smelling concoctions of kidney, liver, or tripe. The only pie my mom made was of the steak and kidney variety.

My gastronomical horizon was expanded at George K. Porter Junior High School when I took Home Economics. Girls took Home Ec. and boys had Shop. One of the first things I learned how to cook was French Toast…how international is that! In addition to French toast, we also learned to make banana bread in a soup can.

With my culinary history, it’s no surprise that I came into marriage with few kitchen skills. Fortunately we received several cookbooks as wedding gifts and I know how to read. Armed with the rudimentary knowledge of cooking I learned at George K. Porter Junior High and the Betty Crocker’s Cooking For Two Cookbook, I managed to keep my family fed.

I am reminded of my culinary legacy every Thanksgiving. For the past several years we have celebrated the holiday at my daughter’s house in Austin. My daughter has blended the traditions of our family with those of her husband’s. From her husband’s side of the family she makes a rice stuffing. From my side of the family we have little weenies in barbecue sauce in the crock pot and “green salad.” The green salad is cool-whip and Jello pistachio pudding with pineapple and little marshmallows. So, I guess my culinary legacy isn’t any better than my mother’s.

WTF Wednesday: Nana Passes Through Utah

2011-01-05T00:15:00.000-08:00

Then I went to the gift shop and found this displayed on the magazine rack:

and I wondered which wife she is...one, two, five???

WTF Utah!

Nana Celebrates the 1st Anniversary of Benchmark 60

2011-01-02T20:13:00.000-08:00

One year ago I made a resolution to blog for at least three months. Last week marked the one year anniversary of my blog! You can read my pathetic first post here.

I started to blog to give myself something to do in retirement and to document that journey. It has been a year of blogging and this is what I've learned:

I still don't know what I'm supposed to be doing in retirement, but it doesn't bother me much anymore. I'm content puttering around the house, traveling occasionally, and substituting infrequently.
Just because I have more free time in retirement doesn't mean that I am any more productive. It just takes me twice as long to get anything done and I have lost the skill of multi-tasking.
I have made new friends in blog world and my cyber-friends feel as real to me as my other friends.
I've stopped worrying about maintaining a theme in my blogs and just write what I want to write about.
The blog has given me new eyes. I find myself constantly searching for blogable content.
I feel connected to other bloggers and I have been surprised to have so much in common with others, especially other women my age.
I find it easier to express myself in writing than in person. Even though I know that I am not really anonymous, it's sort of like talking in the dark...easier to get my feelings out because I can't see you.

It has been a year of learning and I haven't even considered not continuing to blog. I am grateful to all of you who have followed, friended, and read my blog. I look forward to the next year. Thanks to all of you for your support.

Jann aka Nana

Nana Celebrates Christmas

2010-12-24T00:15:00.000-08:00

I write this several days before Christmas. It has been snowing off and on for several days. I have ventured outside only as far as the hot tub...and if anyone had been watching, that would have been a sight! Stark naked I picked my way through the snow. My bare feet sank through the powder to the underlying ice. It's probably less than 10 feet from the patio door to the hot tub and each time I made this trip over the past few days I worried about falling. Even though I am officially a senior citizen, I don't wear a panic button. If I went down, my naked, lumpy body would be found frozen in the drifts. What a Christmas memory that would make for the unlucky family member who found me!

We planned to drive to San Diego to spend Christmas with my brother and his family. Our children and grandchildren will all meet us there. The snow made us rethink our plan. Although I was looking forward to a road trip, we decided to replace bad roads and holiday traffic with the chaos of air travel.

So, Christmas day I will have everyone I love under one roof...or, we'll be stuck in various airports across the country!
Our granddaughters, who live in Texas, have never seen snow. We've planned a trip to the mountains to introduce them to snow angels, sledding, and numb fingers. Nana has purchased a complete snow wardrobe for each of them.

We last visited our grandchildren at Thanksgiving. Several times we watched our youngest granddaughter, who is three, play "beach party." She has never seen the ocean or a beach, so her concept of a beach party is to put a blanket on the floor and drag all her toys out to share a snack. When asked what she was doing, she replied "It's a beach party," as if it should be obvious to anyone with half a brain. This next week we will go from the snow covered mountains to the sandy shore and show her what a real beach looks like, and we'll probably have a snack on a blanket in the sand.

The last time that my family was together at Christmas was four years ago when my mother died. We all gathered in San Diego to be together and to clean out her house. So again this year, this time under joyous circumstances, everyone I love will be under one roof for Christmas. I will sleep knowing that everyone is safe and warm.

Merry Christmas everyone. I hope you and the ones you love are safe and warm this Christmas.

WTF: Nana Comments on Shopper Style

2010-12-22T00:10:00.000-08:00

I went Christmas shopping last week. Mid-week the mall, while not deserted, was considerably less crowded than on the weekend. At least many of the small kids were in school so the high pitched wails were limited to babies crying. Macy's was having another one-day sale, selling the same stuff that was on sale yesterday and would be on sale again tomorrow at "the best price of the season!" People were carrying around huge bags of purchases. Cashmere sweaters were on sale...buy three get 50% off. Even jeans were an additional 30% off. Judging by the amount of merchandise leaving the store, we should have the best dressed population in the state.

As I looked around the customers at the mall I thought that all the purchases must be for mailing to out of town relatives. The crowd isn't dressing up to the standards of the clothing shown in the stores. Why is this?

People spend a lot of time shopping and there are lots of cute styles in all shapes and sizes. Why then, when I look at a crowd in the mall, is it hard to find anyone who is well-dressed? I sat in the food court and watched the shoppers stroll by. There was lots of flannel, torn jeans and sweatshirts...and these were not the stylish versions of those items. What happens to all that fashionable clothing once it is paid for and wrapped in tissue for the trip home. Is it all sucked into a black hole, never to reappear?

Does everyone save their "good" clothes for some special event that I am not invited to? Perhaps it is time to break out the good clothes anytime you go out in public. What if you were to run in to Oprah or George Clooney and you weren't wearing your best outfit?

Sometime back I wrote a post about the website People of Walmart. The site shows photos of shoppers at Walmart. The mall shoppers weren't quite as outlandish as the people of Walmart, but they were sloppy. When did it become appropriate to wear pajamas and slippers to the mall? When is it ever good for an ample woman to show bare midriff? Why spend so much money on fashionable clothing and not wear it out in public?

If you see me in the mall during the holiday season, I'll be the well-dressed one in the classic, tasteful holiday sweater.

Nana Looks Back to the Future

2010-12-17T00:10:00.000-08:00

I found this piece of writing while cleaning out an old flash drive. It was written when I was assistant principal at the high school. Now that I have been retired for over a year, it is fun to look back and remember what I looked forward to in retirement. It's every bit as good as I hoped it would be!

Occasionally, on cold, dark mornings when I wake before the 5:45 alarm, I stay curled up between my cozy flannel sheets and entertain the fantasy that I have the power to call off school. Ahh, to remain in my snug nest, at least until the first glimmers of sunrise appear! To spend the day, snowed in, with a cup of tea, a novel with no educational value, and a cat curled at my slipper-shod feet would be heaven. I might even make time to watch “The View” or check in to see who joins Reggis as the inept guest host du jour.

This, however, is a fantasy that doesn’t last long. In reality, when we have a snow day I’m awakened with a phone call from the principal long before my alarm is scheduled to go off. I leave my flannel nest even earlier than usual to start making calls to staff to notify them that school is cancelled. I arrive at school well before first light to start answering phone calls from students and parents.

I know, better than anyone, that I don’t want to have the power to cancel school. It is truly a thankless task. Regardless of the decision that is made, 50% of the population will be unhappy. When school is cancelled, the parent in town will look out the window at the plowed and sanded city streets and complain that those school people will use any excuse not to work. When school goes on as scheduled the rural parent will look out at the snow blown landscape and complain that those school people don’t care about the safety of kids. No matter what we do, we can’t win.

The general public doesn’t realize how carefully the decision to cancel or delay school is made. Our assistant superintendent and the bus company representative actually drive the bus routes starting at 4:00 A.M. to decide if it is safe for the buses to be on the road. Even if it’s safe to travel, the assistant superintendent must then consider if the school sites are safe for students once they arrive at school. Consider how many feet of sidewalk must be cleared at each of the seven Hermiston schools just to get kids safely from the buses to their classroom. Then think about clearing parking lots so staff can park. All this is done by our regular school maintenance staff. There is no special SWAT snow removal team on standby ready to spring into action. An early morning snowstorm doesn’t leave much time for maintenance staff to get a school ready for 500 elementary students.

Snow days aren’t much fun for me now. On our last snow day I spent the morning answering the same questions over and over again.

“Yes, school is cancelled.”
I was actually still getting this question two hours after school should have started.

“Yes, the roads in town are clear now but rural roads have not been sanded and the bus company felt it was unsafe to send out the buses.”

I still have the fantasy. Maybe when I retire I’ll enjoy the snow days more. Or, better yet, I’ll enjoy sleeping late, trashy novels, and mugs of tea everyday!

WTF Wednesday: Christmas Kitties?

2010-12-15T00:10:00.000-08:00

Christmas Kittens 460-0825

I saw this sign posted on several street corners in a residential area in Kennewick, Washington. I'm not sure why it struck me as strange, but I was almost overwhelmed by the urge to call the number...

hmmmmm Christmas kitties. I have so many questions for them...

Yes, I'm calling about your Christmas kittens. How do you usually prepare them?

Ugh, yes, how long would I need to cook these Christmas kitties?

How many people will a Christmas kitten serve?

What do you suggest I serve with Christmas kitties?

I promise this blog feature has not turned into an anti-animal rant! I do like animals...especially kitties, but not deep fried!