April's Writings – Here and Now
There is nothing like getting a bouquet of roses on Valentine’s Day. The candy is nice, jewelry is nice, but roses are just the most special. It may be silly to others, but I love getting roses for any reason. My own mother does not like fresh flowers because she say that they just die. I tell her that is their purpose and if they make someone happy then they have achieved a fulfilling life.
Happy Valentine’s Day.
Do you ever go to the movies and end up crying in the sad parts? I cry readily. I can’t help it. Anything that is really sad, especially when a main character dies, just chokes me up something awful.
I remember the first time I watched the movie, Steel Magnolias. It was such a great movie with a lot of very popular actresses. I thoroughly enjoyed the movie, but then when the main character collapsed at home, alone with her little boy, I just lost it. Oh my goodness – that movie made everyone in the theater cry. But it was a great movie and I try to watch it every couple of years – and I cry every time.
My first memories of groundhogs are probably unusual unless you grew up on a farm. I did not grown up on my grandparent’s farm, but we did spend a lot of time up there visiting my mom’s parents. I believe that my sister and I were left on the farm for a couple of weeks when she gave birth to my youngest sister. I was not yet in school, so being gone from home for 2 weeks in October was not a big deal to anyone.
My grandparents had bought a huge property when he retired from the Navy. They had cows, pigs, dozens of cats who lived in the big barn, and two hunting dogs. My grandfather would often take the shotgun out to the fields and kill groundhogs. He said they were bigger pests than roaches and needed killing or they would destroy his crops.
So my experience with groundhogs is that they must be killed – not celebrated and expected to guide us on the next 6 weeks worth of weather conditions.
Today I went to my brother’s Facebook page to wish him Happy Birthday and I found out that he has turned off comments so no one can wish him Happy Birthday on his wall. What is up with that? I can’t believe anyone wants to hide the fact that it is their birthday!
So, I’ll just post this birthday wish and instead. Happy Birthday, little brother!
This year I want to do something to give back to the community. I would like to volunteer for a local organization and help people. It’s been on my mind quite a while, and I think this is a good time to get up off the couch and do it.
I can see myself helping children or women who need job skills or someone to help them get through hard times. Just not sick people or an organization that hounds you for money all the time. I can teach kids to read, I can teach English to Spanish speaking children or women, or I can give a ride to job interviews or something that would help a single mom. Even babysitting. Does anyone have a suggestion of what organization I should contact?
I wanted to buy a pack of hot dogs for this weekend. We will be busy shopping and putting up the Christmas tree and I don’t want to have to cook anything special. I have enough on my hands with a holiday decorating and gift buying list.
I thought that hot dogs, mac and cheese and then some baked beans would be a nice, quick dinner. For some reason there are a bunch of different brands of hot dogs at the grocery store and now there are regular lengths, bun lengths, turkey hot dogs, beef hot dogs and regular mixed mystery meats hot dogs.
I had a hard time deciding, but ended up getting Oscar Mayer bun length hot dogs for almost $4 a pack of 8 hot dogs. The hot dog buns were only a dollar, the mac and cheese is only $2.50 and the baked beans were $.89 – so that was a cheap and fast meal for about two bucks per person.
Tonight I didn’t feel like cooking dinner, so I decided to get Chinese Takeout. We don’t have delivery service to my neighborhood, so I have to plan ahead and order the dinner, then I pick it up from the restaurant on my way home. I almost never get home and then decide to order Chinese and go back out to get it. So tonight I ordered the house special and topped it off with a special treat of Chinese donuts for dessert.
There was a news item about road closures tomorrow for a Veteran’s Day parade. I was surprised that they are actually having a parade. This area just does not seem to be in the spirit of many parades. They do have a short Christmas parade downtown, but it seems that whatever day they pick for the Christmas parade is guaranteed to be bad weather on that date. I wonder if they will have good weather tomorrow and I hope they have a good turnout to honor our Veterans.
Ads are on TV for Christmas already. I really don’t like that. We have just finished with Halloween and haven’t even done Veteran’s Day yet. The next holiday is Thanksgiving. I like Thanksgiving and want to celebrate for the day of thanks in which it was originally intended – not for it being the day before Black Friday.
Can’t these holidays get their own due without being tarnished with Christmas advertisements? Why am I having to think about Christmas already?