Things Worth Remembering The three habits that lead to success are: Patience, Application, and Vision.
Take care: The person who will tell others' faults to you - will tell yours to others.
It is always better to be underestimated.
There are three things that are better than riches: Health, Freedom, and Honor.
Think swiftly, speak softly, act wisely.
"The world is neither Scottish, English, nor Irish, neither French, Dutch, nor Chinese, but human, and each nation is only the partial development of a universal humanity." - James Grant on founding the National Association for the Vindication of Scottish Rights, 1862
All from: The Book of Celtic Wisdom
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“I’m a Toydarian, mind tricks don’t work on me. Only money. No money, no parts, no deal!” – Watto, Star Wars I: The Phantom Menace
Maybe I’m not quite as bad as Watto, but I do love a good deal – especially now that I’m being forced to rein in the budget something fierce. Since I don’t know if everyone else knows about it, I’m going to put in this link to Amazon.com’s bulk-buying Subscribe & Save program. I l.o.v.e this program. Every time I order something from it, I get free shipping and an automatic 15% discount. Woo-hoo!
What reminded me was that I just ordered some more HE detergent for my front-loading washer today. I get paper products (my much beloved Seventh Generation toilet paper, paper towels, and bath tissues, for example), Dad Windu’s favorite face wash (very hit or miss at the grocery store), “lady items” and other such bulky non-perishables this way. I’m a huge fan of buying local and supporting local merchants, but I’m also a big fan of being able to get my weekly groceries on my bicycle (hard to do when you’ve got lots of bulky items) or – if the load is really light – walking there and back. Plus the local grocery doesn’t even stock Seventh Generation stuff (yes, I’ve requested them) – and that bugs the crap out of me! So the the UPS truck pulls up and delivers 6-7 months of TP in a big o’ cardboard box.
To get the great deal, it makes me pick a recurring period (1, 2, 3 or 6 month time frames). That seemed a bit risky until I realized that I can cancel the repeat order immediately after buying something if I want to. They also send you a reminder email about a week before sending out the next shipment, too, so you can skip the upcoming order if you wish. Generally I order everything on the 6 month plan and move the order date back or forward as needed.
I hope this helps some of you out too.
[Anakin uses the Force to levitate a piece for Padme]
“If Obi-Wan caught me doing that, he would be very grumpy.” – Anakin, Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones
Padawan Learner weighed one of the cats a couple of minutes ago, quite against her will, on the balance scale. Apparently her weight is remaining steady at just over 8 pounds.
Daily math – check
“No you listen! We live in a real world, come back to it.” – Padme, Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones
I have a new calling – budget manager for The City. I’m going to make up this year’s $8,000,000 budget deficit, and then some.
You see, The City planted a tree in my curb lawn on Wednesday. A small, baby linden tree to replace the mature, spreading maple that Padawan Learner loved to climb while he waited for Dad Windu to get home from work. The tree that some jackass distracted driver literally wrapped his giant SUV around nearly 2 years ago, setting it at a jaunty 65 degree angle for 9 months while The City waited “to see if it will make it”.
At 8:45 a.m., a City flatbed truck with two men inside pulled up in front of my house with a backhoe on the trailer. The driver got out of the truck and watched as his passenger climbed up into the backhoe, backed it off and proceeded to dig a hole 3 feet wide and 1.5 feet deep. He returned the backhoe to the trailer and the two men drove away.
At 9:45 a.m., a City pickup truck arrived with two men inside. The driver got out and walked to the front door with a very valuable piece of paper: instructions on caring for my new, baby linden tree. Meanwhile, his passenger took two metal poles out of the bed of the truck and placed dropped them in the newly dug hole. They returned to the truck and drove away.
At 1:20 p.m., two City trucks arrived: a pickup truck (A) full of baby trees sticking up over the back and a water truck (B) filled with The City’s secret formula of water and baby-tree fertilizer. Each truck had a driver and a passenger. Now this is going to get a little tricky, so be sure to pay attention.
The two drivers got out of their respective trucks and watched while Passenger A placed the baby tree in the hole, arranged the poles and guy wires correctly, and covered the roots with the piled up soil. Passenger B stood at the ready with his over-sized garden hose. When the ground was firmly tamped, Passenger B soaked the disturbed soil area well with his proprietary mix. All four men returned to their respective trucks and drove away.
That’s right, The City paid 8 men to plant my small, baby linden tree.
Oh, I should add that two days previously, The City sent another man in a pickup truck out to rake out the bare area where my formerly lovely tree had stood and spread a healthy layer of grass seed down – right where the backhoe dug the hole for the new, baby linden tree on Wednesday.
Now using my advanced degree and keen efficiency skills, I have deduced that the planting of my new, baby tree on Wednesday could have been performed (with a reasonably adequate amount of waste, as required by all government entities) by a total of three men altogether – one per truck, with the stake dropping and instruction giving truck’s tasks handed off to the occupants of Truck B and Truck A respectively.
If we reduced the city workforce by these 5 men alone (6 if we include the counter-productive tasks of the guy who came on Monday to seed my soon-to-be-backhoe’d bare spot), I could immediately save The City approximately $150,000 (or $180,000) without any loss of service to City residents – assuming that each man is paid $30,000 per year.
What efficiencies would you put in place if you were able to get your hands on your city or county’s Budget?
“What’s all this? A battle? There must be some mistake! I’m programmed for etiquette, not destruction!” - C-3PO, Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones
As heard on the ride home from Padawan Learner’s bookclub with Padawan Learner’s friend, R2-D2 (who rarely says much, but notices everything), and his mom, Yoda.
Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.Click.
R2-D2: ”That’s a cool one. We’re almost to my house. Can I use that one?”
PL: (reluctant hesitation)
Obi-Mom: ”Share your guns with your friend, honey.”
Yoda: ”Now that’s not something you hear everyday. ‘Share your weapons.’”
Etiquette before destruction.
“Twilight is upon me, and soon, night must fall. That is the way of things. The way of the Force.” – Yoda, Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi
The autumnal equinox has tilted those of us in the northern hemisphere away from the sun once again, and caused the deciduous trees here to prepare for winter with glorious abandonment – shades of red, yellow, orange and brown danced with green. To me, Autumn’s color always feels like a final present from nature before the harshness, darkness and bone-chilling cold of deep winter sets in. Just a little while ago, Dad Windu, with M-T’s Dad, headed out for what was probably his final fishing expedition of 2008 and was rewarded with this view.
Halloween, marking the cross-quarter, has fled. That twice annual ode to productivity, the time change, has nudged the hands on the clock forward again. Night is reaching deeper and deeper into every passing day. Although I understand the process and expect the days to shorten and the nights to lengthen, it still retains a feeling of mystery to me, as well as a very quiet sense of foreboding. Will the cold be harsher, the snow deeper, the blizzards longer? Will the sun, reflecting off a bright carpet of snow, regularly shine into our windows and warm the house, or will it be hidden by seemingly never-ending sheets of iron grey cloud cover such as we have today?
I saw our first flakes of snow, intermingled in the sleet and rain of this weekend, and woke up to snow on the ground this morning. As cruel and menacing as winter can be here in the Great Frozen Midwest, I’m looking forward to breaching the darkness of winter with flickering candles, the arrival of friends and family for the winter holidays, and long nights curled up with a thick book. If nothing else, there’s nothing more relaxing than sleeping in a cold house under the warmth of several heavy blankets. Instinctively, we have begun to make rich, hearty soups again.
Luke Skywalker: ”Boy, it’s lucky you have these compartments.”
Han Solo: ”I use them for smuggling. I never thought I’d be smuggling myself in them.”
Star Wars IV: A New Hope
Sometimes things get a little crazy around here and I simply run out of time. Then again, sometimes I’m just plain lazy and put things off too long. An.y.way. We were having friends over for dinner and a movie on Friday night and I found myself way, way behind schedule. My revised goal, around 3pm, was to finish getting the house cleaned, take a shower, and have something more presentable than my pajamas on by the time that everyone arrived at 5:30pm. I even called in Dad Windu, who was kind enough to leave work a bit early, to make a run to the store and get the chili started.
As I was getting ready to clean the kitchen floor, I kept tripping over some soda cans and beer bottles. As we don’t drink much besides water and milk on a day to day basis, it usually takes a while for me to gather up a large enough collection to merit the trip to turn them in for recycling. We had arrived at the tipping point it appeared. So I did what any good homeschooling mom would do. I pulled Padawan Learner away from his books for a few minutes to make a completely overdue trip out to drop off the cans/bottles because they were annoying me assist me in reducing the amount of recyclable material that enters our household’s solid waste stream. At the same time, I wanted him to buy some more soda for the boys that would be coming over practice his comparison shopping and currency handling skills.
As he was loading everything into my bike’s baskets (Cool aren’t they? Admit it, they’re hot.), he couldn’t get everything to fit, so I grabbed a bungee cord and strapped a big ol’ box from a case of locally brewed beers onto the rear rack and we tucked several plastic soda bottles into that. I had to laugh because he looked like a “can man” in training.
He was pretty amused by the situation and begged me to take a picture. As he rode away, he said, “You should put this on your blog. You could use Han Solo’s quote about smuggling himself on the Millennium Falcon.” Smart boy, he.
Uncle D, FilmChris and WineChris will be pleased to see a sixpack of Bell’s tucked into the basket. In truth, there was another one on the other side, as well.
“Hold me, like you did by the lake on Naboo; so long ago when there was nothing but our love. No politics, no plotting, no war.” - Padmé, Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith
Date night. Oh, how I loves the date night. As you can probably tell from this overall blog, I really love homeschooling with Padawan Learner. He’s a great kid, a great person really, and we get along well. But one truth of homeschooling is that there will be times when you look at your kid and say, “Wow, you’re just always here, aren’t you?” That’s when a date night is in order. Some grown-up time with the main squeeze. A little flirting. A great meal with candles, low lights and not a children’s menu to be had.
Last Friday night Dad Windu and I had a date night – a date overnight, to be specific. Padawan Learner spent the night at his good buddy M’s house, and DW and I made a night of it. I got dressed up in a long, slim black skirt with a slit up the back, a form fitting dark brown ribbed turtleneck, jewelry (I know!), and my tall, tall, high-heeled black boots. The ones that make DW putty.in.my.hands.
After dinner at a gastro pub that we’ve been wanting to try, we decided to canoodle in a movie theater while watching a movie. Neither of us are horror fans and I don’t enjoy action flicks anymore than he likes chickflicks, so we settled on a comedy. Sex Drive and Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist were the only ones playing and the previews were funny for both, so we chose to go to the earlier one.
Time is a very poor reason to pick a movie. Guess which one was earliest. Yeah. About 25 minutes into it, we both were thinking that we should have gone to Nick & Norah’s. But…it had Seth Green, as an sarcastic Amish auto mechanic! Shouldn’t that have made it funny? Well, not so much. I likened it to American Pie, only way, way, way worse and without any plot, lovable-despite-myself characters or surprisingly funny moments.
But we found a few ways to drive the very poor movie choice from our minds once we got home. Bow chika bow bow. Oh, how I loves the date (over)night.
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