SoCS: near/far

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “near/far.” Use “near,” use “far,” use them both if you’d like. In fact, if you start your post with one and end with the other, you get bonus points!

I’m going far away today! I’m going to Zurich! That’s Zurich, Ontario, Canada but its far compared to where I’ve been the last year and a half.

We have a lot of faraway names in Ontario. London, Paris, Scotland, Stratford, Cambridge. Our great white heritage. I watched a show about how we destroyed this land that people had been keeping pristine for tens of thousands of years. But white man came in and destroyed it in a mere 100 years. We overfished the fisheries until there was none. We clear cut the forests until there were no mature trees left except one area of bog they couldn’t get at. When there was nothing left the settlers all migrated out west to devour that.

It was fortunate the Saugeen First Nation had some forward-thinking chiefs back then. After the white man’s fisheries had depleted the fish stock, (much of it left to rot as they only had salt to pack it and ship it) these two Chiefs got the fisheries back in the hands of the Saugeen Nation. They used their traditional methods and brought it back to a well-run fishery. Its not as far back in the past as people like to think. Yesterday there was a big announcement that the Saugeen Nation are having land returned that was swindled away from them. Its taken this long to settle.

But that isn’t what I was going to write about: I’m driving to Zurich today. Actually to some rural place near Zurich so I’m on an adventure. Its all the way past Grand Bend! It might even take me an hour! LOL! It makes me realize how close to home I’ve been in the last year and a half!

But I’m excited because this is what I’m picking up:

Can’t wait to play it with my grandnephew and, hopefully, get other family members to play even though they “hate cards”.

Rummy is my favourite card game and I love to play it with my grandnephew who is near to my heart! (bonus point!)

https://lindaghill.com/2021/09/24/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-sept-25-2021/

SoCS: puzzle

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “puzzle.” Use it any way you’d like!

This is going to be one boring post. An old lady talking about her love of jigsaw puzzles. But its stream of consciousness so this is what you get.

I heard a comedian say that blogs posts are writing letters that no one wants to read. That’s exactly right in my case! We all need someone to talk to, to air our grievances so why not go to strangers who don’t know you to clear the excess crap twirling around in the brain. I really wish I had never told anyone I know that I write this because often I need to air my grievances but cannot.

Back to puzzles. I only do them in jigsaw puzzle season. I sort of live by seasons so I have something to look forward to. Now, for instance, is the end of summer and beginning of fall, my favourite season. I decorate with faux leaf boughs. Take down my solar lights. Order my firewood and put it in the wood shed. In a few months it will be winter decorations then a gaudy display of Christmas decorations along with a real Christmas tree.

Christmas lights light up the gloom. The days are so short it gets dark at 4:30. I get no sun in my windows because the sun can’t make it above the trees on the south side of my property.

But in late January I start to get a sliver of sun in the afternoon. February -March the sun comes in fully around 2:00. This is jigsaw puzzle season. I have a board that sits on my ottoman and cardboard trays (box lids) with all the separated puzzle pieces. I can park myself in the sun at any angle.

I even love the organizing of it. You have a box of 500, 750 or 1000 little pieces. In the beginning I go through handfuls breaking it down to 3 trays. The most of one colour or the lightest colour. Flowers, numbers, water anything that differentiates one from the other . . . but the border pieces go on the board to start out. I always do the border first.

OMG. this is too boring to even write! This was in my images from 2015. I guess its not the first time I’ve written about jigsaw puzzles.

its all in the organization

https://lindaghill.com/2021/09/17/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-sept-18-2021/

SoCS: where is that smell?

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “where.” Use it any way you’d like!

Where is that smell coming from? Every morning I sit at my computer and ask myself “where is that smell coming from?” It smells like a potato gone bad. I’ve cleaned my onion/potato cupboard out completely. I’ve checked the corners to see if a little new potato rolled away and hid. I even thought it might be me and smelled my armpits. I don’t now where else to look. And I only notice it sitting at my kitchen table. Where is that smell coming from?

I had this problem before but in my living room. In the winter time I kept getting a waft of a horrible smell but it came and went. It wasn’t all the time. I could not find where it was coming from for the longest time but finally I did find out. I was out getting firewood and got a full waft of cat spray. You know that awful squirt male cats back up and make to mark their territory. I realized I had it along a woodpile about 1 or so foot off the ground. I would bring this wood into the house and when it warmed up the smell hit my ceiling fan sending down a waft of cat spray.

Where do all these cats come from? At least 4 neighbors have cats who make their rounds through here regularly. Being cats, they don’t like getting their paws wet in morning dew so they have made a path they all use. You can see an indentation of a trail they use across my lawn. A couple of years ago a big willow fell down across the little pond of water so now they have a bridge from my place to yet another neighbor who has cats. In the winter its very noticeable in the snow and takes them along side of the bird feeding table. That’s when I yell at them; “Move along buddy! Get away from my birdies!”

Where are my birdies? The robins left in late July. I was used to seeing them and some other birds on my lawn and using the bird bath everyday. I watched mommy bird show her babies how to find worms in the lawn and how to bathe. Then they were gone. No birds around except the winter birds. Nobody uses the birdbath. I googled to see why they left so early and read they start to ‘flock’ at the end of July. They might have been hanging around the area in huge flocks, getting their young ready for the big trip south. You can see flocks of birds at this time of the year flying together. They may be different species, too.

Where do they go?

I googled that, too. The robins go down to the southern states as far as Texas but can overwinter in more northern states. They don’t fly down to the same place every winter but they do fly back to the same nesting place in the spring if they liked it. Robins, like crows, can also remember your face and get to know you. So I hope to see my family of robins in the spring again and I can ask:

Where have you been?

https://lindaghill.com/2021/09/10/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-sept-11-2021/

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “pin.” Use it as a noun, use it as a verb, use it any way you’d like. Have fun!

Hmmm you’re pinning me down here. First thing that came to mind is my PIN number. I am old. I have the same PIN number for everything that needs a PIN number and that number is written on a little piece of paper and buried in my wallet just in case I forget it. Do you ever do that? Try to think of your number and draw a blank? Funny thing is; once you go to use it your fingers just do the right number.

I know security-wise its not wise but I feel OK about it. Although if someone found my wallet and went completely through it . . . OK its not a very good idea but I’ll take my chances. If I had to make new PIN numbers, I would have write them down somewhere. In my sewing room there is a little box with all my passwords in it. Good thing none of you know where I live.

I sew and have pins that are so old they are dull. I have pins from my mom and mother-in-law that could be 70 years old. How do you throw out pins? I have to start throwing out each one that doesn’t slide easily into the fabric instead of putting them back. I have knocked over pins so many times I keep a good magnet handy for picking them up.

There’s a couple of pinned projects lying around right now. I took apart a dress to make a top; its not finished. I made a cover for my lawn old lawn chairs (was going to make 2) because they are disintegrating and get plastic dust on your clothing. But they still work as chairs. I don’t like throwing things out and how do you throw out an old lawn chair anyway? Not good to have pins in a seat cover. I should finish it/them.

Well hell; I’m just right out of pin thoughts.

Its Labour Day Weekend and I live near a beach. Its quiet right now but soon the Labour Day Weekend frenzy begins. Its like the last desperate chance to have fun! People drive too fast and walk in the roads with blown up beach toys. Old noisy tractors taking boats and sea-doos up and down the road all day. Noisy boats and sea-doos driving around, coming too close to swimmers so they can park on a sand bar. And you know all those people are peeing in the water. Pandemic? Bah! We’re outside! The parking lots fill up at the beach and they line the streets. It works up to a climax along with fireworks at all the campgrounds then boom . . . Tuesday everyone is gone. Sand blows across an empty street. Its so peaceful.

Hope you all have a great weekend!

https://lindaghill.com/2021/09/03/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-sept-4-2021/

SoCS: my big day

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “my.” Start your post with the word “My.” Bonus points if you end your post with “yours.”

My First Aid/CPR certification expired during Covid. They gave everyone an extension because classes couldn’t be held and this cannot be done on Zoom. But classes have resumed and I had to go. I need it to teach exercise to seniors.

I had to be in Sarnia, a city about 40-50 minutes away, at 8:30 in the damn morning. This is a major ordeal for me as I am a retired senior who has been home, like many others, A LOT the last year and half. I get up when I wake up.

I need to have two coffees to be able to drive. Then I need an hour to pee and poo so I can make it to town.

The program I volunteer in is a mental health program. I am not only a volunteer, I am a member. They sent me to a course teaching exercise because I deal with depression and anxiety and have found exercise to be essential. But I do have bouts of anxiety. I spent the days before this class anxious about having to go so early and drive in downtown traffic. OK, you can laugh, its only Sarnia but I live a very rural life.

My sleep was so bad I woke up a few times before 5:30. I was tired and anxious when I left at 7:35.

But I did it! It was not easy. She did not provide coffee; it was 8 hours of constant rushing through a usually two day course. Dry as dust. The only break a 40 minute lunch. Anyone who has taken a First Aid/CPR course will know its very physical. On the floor pumping dummy’s chests furiously for two minutes imagining what it would be like actually waiting for an ambulance. We did the choking and Heimlich maneuvers. I don’t know my own strength: I whacked my partner’s back too hard and really did the Heimlich moves instead of pretending. She said, “I wouldn’t want to get in a fight with you!” You got that right, sister! No didn’t say that, I apologized and really did feel bad because she was older than me.

I’m going to interject here and do my duty as an exercise coach. There were 4 women in the class, 3 were exercise instructors and one was a volunteer driver, all retired. The driver had a hard time getting down on and up from the floor. She is a very hardy farmer, probably does a lot of outside work, but when you get older you need a different kind of exercise. You need range of motion for your joints and strength in muscles not used when just walking. You want to able to get up if you fall down. And you need balance training because when you get older its hard to catch yourself and you do fall down. Then you have an exercise in humility. Our coach says things like, “you want to be able to get up off the toilet by yourself” You wouldn’t hear that in a Peleton work out.

Ok that’s my spiel. Its my job.

This morning I woke up at 5:30 again without the alarm. I got up to pee but went back to bed and slept in until 8:30! And I’m feeling so good that I did it! I got through that day and I had only one answer wrong on the test. I got 99%! That surprised me because by around 3:00 my brain was shutting down.

SoC: I just got a text that my sister is at the beach at the end of my road. I’m going down.

Yesterday I left early so I left a mess and dishes. Of course last night I didn’t do dishes or clean up I was so tired. But I am going to leave this mess and go to the beach.

I’m going to have to give up on the bonus point.

https://lindaghill.com/2021/08/27/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-aug-28-2021/

SoCS: ode

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “ode.” Find a one- or two-syllable word that rhymes with “ode,” or use the word “ode.”

Darn it. I’m sitting here thinking up words; mode, code, flowed, mowed, explode but nothing to write a post about.

I’m sitting in my abode, looking at my lawn, unmowed. But its way too hot to work outside and I’m in ‘getting ready’ mode. Hey; that sounds like a poem!

My sister is getting married today. I have lots of time to get ready but I don’t have time to sit here and think up a post that rhymes with ‘ode’.

It doesn’t bode . . . . . nope, no can do. I’m in getting ready mode.

https://lindaghill.com/2021/08/20/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-aug-21-2021/

SoCS: lucky

Hey! I’m here on this hot and sticky Friday the 13th with your Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt. Bit of SoCS trivia for you–I have a Word document with a list of all the prompts I’ve used that’s now 13 pages long! Here’s your prompt for this week:

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “luck.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy!

Yes, when Linda posted this yesterday it was hot and steamy. and the day before that and the day before that. . all week. But what LUCK: today is cool!

I had company this week. I’m so glad this nice weather didn’t happen while she was here because I’ve been looking out at the work I want to do from the cool dark inside. Once a day I run out to water what needs to be watered and run back in muttering, “Holy Moly! Its so freaking hot!”

Lucky to have air conditioning. I didn’t have it my last house because we didn’t need it. Sure, there was a ‘heat-wave’ sometime in the summer but you got through it.

But we all know what is happening now. We’ve all been yacking about climate change but not changing our habits enough to turn it around. Now they are saying its irreversible.

I am so lucky to find the Parkhill Women’s Cannabis Club. What a relief and joy it is to be with regular women like myself who love pot! Women my age who have had to hide something that is beneficial to their lives. Yes, I said beneficial and now I have back-up with my peers. Just regular women trying to make their lives more enjoyable and tired of being made to feel guilty about it.

However I fully admit, being retired makes that so much easier! If I had to go to work on this beautiful day I would be so pissed off!!! And pot is legal now . . . so LUCKY!!!!

OK; trying to think about luck and the songs start;

“If it wasn’t for bad luck, I wouldn’t have no luck at all” That one started right away at the first read. Now it has moved on to “Luck, be a lady toniiiight!” because I’m an old movie buff meaning both; I’m old and I like old movies.

That’s a better one; I’m up and I’m feeling lucky! I’ve had two coffees, finished my post (almost) and its cool enough to work outside! And I am SO LUCKY I can!

And have I can have the windows open today! I’m very happy. I guess I’m very LUCKY!

https://lindaghill.com/2021/08/13/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-aug-14-2021/

SoCS: wee

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “wee.” Use the word “wee” or find a word that contains it and use it in your post. 

There may be a wee problem today linking this to the SoCS site as the URL doesn’t seem to be linking. I have to look how to fix that but it will taint my SoC.

I’m a wee bit stumped. . . .

Today I am going to be at the beach with some wee ones: my grandnephew who isn’t that wee anymore but some friends are bringing their wee ones. I have a wee bit of trepidation because its Saturday, its stinking hot and the beach will be crowded. Not a big fan of crowds to begin with and now I’ve been isolated for so long its even worse.

I got my hair cut on Tuesday and couldn’t believe how noisy it was with the hair dryers and music.

Yesterday I went to an optometrist that is in the big SuperStore. They had a bench set outside of it to keep physical distance. The detention bench, it felt like. I sat out there to fill out my forms then got the first test with the air puff. Sat out again to wait for the optometrist who did the second test and put the drops in. Sat out on the bench for another 25 minutes waiting for the rest of the test.

I started to go a wee bit crazy with the last wait which was supposed to be 10-15 minutes but they were juggling 4 patients. The fluorescent lights, the noise, the people walking back and forth in front of me; it really hit home how isolated and quiet my life has been. I got dizzy at one point and my eyes were reacting to the drops. I couldn’t wait to get home again.

During the whole thing I had to go wee twice which was OK because the bench was practically beside the washroom which was hot, damp and smelled like wee-wee.

Finally I got to pick out some glasses. Can’t wait to get them!

I had two pairs of sunglasses that go over regular glasses and a hat for the drive home. Not very good vision for the drive and could feel a wee headache coming on. Oh, to be in my cool, dark, quiet living room once again.

Now . . how do I link the link?

Yay, did it? It only took a wee bit of looking around.

https://lindaghill.com/2021/08/06/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-aug-7-2021

SoCS: Uh, oh!

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “the last photo you took.” Take the last photo you snapped. What’s the first word that comes to mind when you look at it? That word is your prompt. Enjoy!

“Uh, oh” That’s what I said before I even looked because I already knew the last 4 photos I took were of my pot plants. There is an explanation other than I love my pot plants: our Women’s Cannabis Club met in person on Thursday! We have been meeting once a month on Zoom and have never met in person! Just going somewhere was elating then being with 25 or so women who love cannabis was joyful! We were giddy just being out and with each other! Not all are smokers: some are big proponents of CBD, salves and tinctures. But, OMG, what a relief and joy to meet some new women! Like-minded women! I took the photos in case we were showing off photos of our plants. But we didn’t; we just talked about them.

But this is supposed to be “Uh, oh”. Cannabis and “uh,oh” go together a lot. I’ve had a lot of “uh,oh” moments on cannabis. Like when you discover you ate too much edible. “UH, oh!” Be very careful of edibles! I do NOT recommend them to newbies . It can be a very unpleasant experience.

Back when it was illegal, I dreamt I came home from work and police were coming out of my back yard. “Uh, Oh!”. One of those; “Thank God it was a dream!”

Then there are the times I have just smoked and someone, whom I don’t want to know I indulge, will knock at my door. I peek out the window, “Uh, oh!”

Similarly taking a shower during the day, which I do often if I’ve been outside working. If I’m dirty and sweaty I’ll take off my work clothes and get right in the shower. During this pandemic, when no one should be knocking at your door, I’ve had 3 experiences of getting out of the shower, still in a towel, with someone knocking at the door.

“Uh, oh” well, more like “You gotta be kidding!”

You know, if cannabis was not legal here, I would have to skip today’s prompt or pass my pot photos to the guided painting I did this week. I sent it to our program director so she could post them on Facebook. I am no artist but I’m really starting to enjoy these once a month art sessions. I took the “Wholehearted Inventory” from Brene Brown’s website and one of the questions was; “Do you stop yourself from doing something creative because you are not good at it?”

“Uh, oh!” The answer was yes!

“Uh, oh!” Now I have to put up those photos. I will use the SoCS photo first so they don’t show up in the Reader.

*******************************************************************************************

I just wasted way too much time trying to figure out the ‘crop’ option or make them smaller.

My stream of consciousness has moved on . . .

I want to try this again to get the clouds right. The sky and clouds are supposed to be blurry

The Friday Reminder and Prompt for #SoCS July 31, 2021 | (lindaghill.com).

SoCS: colours

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “color/colour.” Use it as a noun, a verb, or pick a color and write about it–use it any way you like. Have fun!

Thank you, Linda for including the proper spelling. (kidding) I don’t mind that other countries do not include the ‘u’ in many words but they wiggly underline our spelling as ‘wrong’. WordPress should be more inclusive.

Almost every frigging thing I have is blue. I really noticed it doing exercise on Zoom. Blue walls, blue couch, blue clothes, blue shoes . . . one would think my favourite colour is blue. (See that? No, you don’t! TWO wiggly red lines!)

My favourite colour is the green out of my windows. I did my kitchen light green, have my indoor plants by double doors so its a green space.

You can see the guest room walls from the kitchen. I had a can of paint left over from my blue living room and some light mint green left over from my kitchen. I mixed them together for the guest room, a light turquoise, the colours blend beautifully!

I think my brain likes the colour blue. Its not conscious: the vibrations go into the eyeballs and the brain says yes. Does that make sense? But then sense is conscious.

I like purple, too. I goes well with blue.

I love the green in this photo.

The Friday Reminder and Prompt for #SoCS July 24, 2021 | (lindaghill.com)