Reusable shopping bags

I have a number of those carry-along, reusable shopping bags. I must confess, though, that I usually buy them because I love the pictures on them, not because I actually carry a shopping bag with me whenever I go to the store. I don't like the ones with eco-slogans on them. The pictures are much more fun. And they make cute (and reusable) gift bags, too.

But I have used them and I do try to do my bit not to overdo plastic use and am quite proud of the fact that my recycling bin is twice the size of my trash bin and the first one is always full and the second one hardly ever is. You know, I do my bit without actually taking part in a protest or anything.

The other day I went into a store and saw another really cute reusable shopping bag. So I bought it. And sure enough, once I'd paid for it, the cashier put it in...a plastic shopping bag.

Memory lane

What it is about the music of our younger years that sticks with us so closely? DH and I took a trip down memory lane the other night by playing snippets from (yes, you guessed it) the music of the 80s. We laughed and recalled memories we connected with some of the songs and bemoaned the fates of some of our favorite bands and musicians.

I blame the Super Bowl for starting us on this trip. It was funny to watch Foreigner play in the pre-game show and while they did look WAY better than the Rolling Stones did when they did the half-time show a few years back, it was still really strange to watch the right voice coming out of the "wrong" singer. Their new lead singer sounded great, and love the story of how he joined the band, but it was still a real "do not adjust your set" moment, wasn't it?

Besides admitting I was in junior high in the 80s (I swear I will never wear leg warmers again, although I'll claim the defense that in a Canadian winter they make a little more sense), it's also a sign of my age to realize that I'm a target demographic. Yep, go into any mid-priced restaurant these days and chances are those songs will be drifting along behind my low-cal, middle-aged, health conscious menu order and provoking me to once again throw caution to the wind and order something warm and covered in ice cream from the dessert menu.

So now you get to live it again, too. I couldn't find Pop Goes the World, but this Canadian classic made us laugh the hardest (or cringe the most, not exactly sure which):



I don't know about you but I'm very glad I don't see many men wearing a pink trapeze tank top with their cycling shorts these days. The leg warmers aren't the only things from the past I can live without.

Product warnings

We've all seen them - those ridiculous warning labels that tell us what any person with a lick of sense should know. Like the "caution - contents are hot and may scald" on your coffee cup, or the "do not use in bathtub" labels on toasters.

Well, I found another one. I was at a belt-testing at a local Tae Kwon Do school last weekend, and part of the upper belt-level testing is that the student has to break two boards - one with a hand move and one with their foot. The boards are about 12 inches square, 3/4" thick and are specially dried to be breakable. I mean it's not like they're going after green lumber or anything. But you do have to hit them just right to break them. (I'm speaking as an observer, not from experience.) But it's also a one-time thing - you break it, it's broken, right?

So while gathering some of the pieces I noticed this...


(In case you can't read the fine print, I'll give it to you again. It says...

"This product is sold for use in HIGH RISK activities. Read [the company's] Terms and Conditions. Consult your physician prior to starting any training program. Injuries, including paralysis and death can result when using this product. USER ASSUMES ALL RISK OF INJURY!

Inspect product before eash use. If any unsafe conditions are found, discontinue use immediately and contact [company] for a replacement."

There are so many levels that this is nonsense that my head hurts just thinking about it. And the real irony? The warning was only on one of the boards...

Thinking spring...

It's sort of warming up around here. The crocuses are out, the tree leaves are budding and the sun is shining. It seems to be a minor inconvenience that it keeps trying to snow but we're working around that.

I was reminded today of a particularly tragic poem that goes...

"Spring is sprung
The grass is riz
I wonder where
The birdies is?"

Until the birdies show up, here's something to get you thinking of spring:

Weighing in

One of the only shows I watch these days on TV is (I confess it) Biggest Loser.

I'm not a real reality show fan because a) they aren't that real, and b) they tend to show people at their absolute worst. The amount of conniving and bickering and underhandedness can be really appalling. There are occasional moments of that on Biggest Loser, too, but for the most part, they show people choosing to change their lives for the better. And they have encouraged a lot of other people to do the same. And that's the part I applaud. It's even inspired me to get rid of that nagging 10 pounds that have been hanging around for the last couple years. (I'm halfway there so far.)

If you watch too, you know that every week they have a weigh in, that ultimate test of the work they've done over the week. Sometimes it's disappointment, sometimes there's tears, and sometimes it's rapture and laughter, and sometimes it the ticket home.

I don't do a weigh in every week. I use a favorite pair of jeans as a much better gauge of whether I'm staying on track. But I do occasionally step on the scale just to see if I'm right or not.

Now, part of the reason I'm making an effort is that my job involves sitting around a lot. I sit at my desk to write, I sit at my art table to paint or draw, I sit on the couch when I'm reading a book for review. The theme here? I sit. Don't burn a lot of calories that way. I've added an exercise ball as a seat just to mix things up a little. And occasionally, I'll get an assignment that gets me out and moving a bit more.

Teaching, that's a moving around more assignment. When I'm in the classroom, I very rarely get to sit down. Hence the comfortable shoes. For freelance, if the interview is in person, I'm on my feet more with walking to the meeting place and back, etc. It's a small balance for the amount of sitting I do.

So yesterday I got an assignment that would have me out and on my feet. Good.

Then I realized what the assignment actually was. I was asked to go visit an annual Chocolate Festival to scout around for a magazine story. Do you see the dliemma? Working, walking and talking - good. Free chocolate and candy at every table - whew. A spider-to-the-fly booby-trap if I've ever met one.

But being the dedicated professional that I am, I put on my favorite jeans (with a shirt and jacket for that semi-casual but still professional look) so I'd have a clue if things were getting out of hand, pinned on my get-in-for-free Media Pass, took a deep breath (and may have gained a couple ounces just by doing that) and in I went.

I came out an hour and a half later, enlightened but not actually lightened at all. I was good (only four samples, not counting the return trip to the pineapple truffle table (highly recommend them)) but the only way to know for sure would be to get on the scale for a weigh in.

So this morning, I got up and...

Ha! Are you nuts? Why would I set myself up like that?

I'll wait until next week to weigh in. That's the dedicated sort of professional writer I am.

Feeling all grown up

There are moments in life, I'm learning, that give you this certainty - sometimes exciting, sometimes uncomfortable - that you really are a grown up. Of course, there's all the other times, too, when that simply isn't the case. But I digress.

Signing mortgage papers was one of those moments for me. "What? Are you crazy? That's an awful lot of money to trust me with!"

Leaving the hospital with my first child was another. "What? Are you crazy? That's a very small person to be trusting me with!"

Leaving the hospital with my second child was almost as bad. "What? Are you sure this is a good idea? Um, alright..."

Seeing the spending limit on a personal credit card was a huge moment. "What? Are you crazy? Did you even look at how much money I make? No wonder our economy's sliding into a big cesspool of ickiness right now!"

But sometimes there's just a momentary glow of honest pride. It happened this week for me when I bought my first internal hard drive. It was the sort of store where you walk in and have to know what you want because they've wasted no frills on colored advertising or sales signs or anything as frivolous as an updated font. Just little technical packages sitting in styrofoam racks with data-font stickers on metal racks.

Now lest I overinflate your opinion of me (Wow - she's so awesome - braving a computer supply store like that...) SG was holding my hand (literally, at one point). But I smiled knowingly at most of the right spots, I made the final 500GB decision and I paid for it myself. It was even debit, not credit. And I glowed with honest pride.

Of course, now I have to return it because my motherboard manual was WRONG but still...

Knee-jerk (elbow-jerk? wrist-jerk?) reactions

America has a lovely thing called the "Do Not Call" list. Since its inception, it has GREATLY reduced the number of phone calls from people trying to sell me things that I neither want nor need (nor have heard of) while I watch my supper getting cold on my plate from a few feet away. Some of the callers were quite gracious, some were bored and some had that hint of desperation in their voices but the answer still had to be no. I didn't envy them their job but the answer still had to be no.

For awhile, it was our policy to invite the charities (but not the polyvinyl fencing guys or the invest in the future of mushrooms guys) to send us an information package so that when we did our year-end planning we would remember to consider their cause. In several years of taking this approach, NOT ONE sent us a tangible piece of information. So the answer became NO. Short, snappy, easy to remember.

Can you tell I'm a fan of the Do Not Call list? But there's still one company/sheister/guy in a dirty T-shirt that calls. I strongly suspect that if I had call display, it would read "Number not available" because I'm sure they know they're violating a law somewhere. It's an automated recording of a woman's voice that says "This is an important message about your current credit c..."

I couldn't tell you what else the message is about because that's the point I hang up.

But here's the thing. I've noticed that the woman's voice in the call is starting to speak faster. Seriously, the recording is getting quicker and is approaching those vocal speed limits usually reserved for the voice-over on medication commercials. Of course, it means I also have to hang up quicker to avoid hearing more of her message. It's like one of those jungle-reflex-survival games or Attack Whack-A-Mole or something. You don't know when that ring will mean another recording or when it might be your father (the only two people that call at those times of day) and you don't want to be wrong.

I think I'm getting pretty good at it though. And this morning when my early morning reflexes surprised me with their quick response to her vocal sprint, I realized something...

I'm wearing her down.













Wooo-hooo! It's about time...


Added: 5-3-09

Gaaack! They must have read my blog because a new message came today. It's Rachel and she's happy to tell me there's no problem with my current account! But it's important that I call about reducing my interest rate!! Please... (CLICK)