Reality

I don't usually watch "reality" TV. I've never seen an episode of "Survivor" or "Real World" or even "American Idol." But last winter we happened upon "The Biggest Loser: Couples" and I was hooked. The transformations the contestants made were incredible. And what's not to like about seeing people sweat and get yelled at by trainers. (I did have to fast forward through Mark crying.) When the show ended I felt so empty inside. I no longer knew what was happening to these people who felt like members of my family. More importantly, that was my one hour of evening television during the week. I looked forward to it all week. I was lost without it. Luckily, I happened upon "The Next Food Network Star." Now I look forward to Sunday nights, 9 p.m. Central. Who will be sent home tonight?

Grasshog

For the first time since we got our new lawn mower, my husband let me mow the lawn this weekend. It really is all that. One can now mow our entire lawn in under an hour and on one tank of gas. I thought we needed something to do in all that time we're saving. So we went out today and got one of these.

Ingrid, 24/7 - Redux

Since Dave outed me (here) I thought perhaps it is time I take up blogging again. Or, well, since it didn't really take the first time, perhaps it is time I take up blogging. So here we go...

Signs it's a new year

1. Al said the line for the salad bar at the cafeteria last Wednesday was about a block long.
2. The number of Freecycle postings is rivaled only by the number of people lining up at salad bars.
3. A new blog post from me. (That might be a sign of the apocalypse, proceed accordingly.)

Free!

All my life I have hung on to things because I felt they were "too good" to throw away or even give to Goodwill. I wanted to know that they were going to someone who could really use them. Now I have a means of finding that someone. I had heard about Freecycle a few years ago, but because I am a procrastinator, didn't get around to trying it out until now. It's amazing. Last night someone came over, loaded up and hauled away 9 concrete patio blocks that had been laying behind our house since we moved in. And he was delighted! If we had to load them up and haul them away, we would not have been delighted. I don't even know where we would have taken them. Which is why they were behind our house for two years. What's more, I had six people offer to take them off my hands. Unbelievable. I must go look for something else to give away...

Brand Recognition

It was not surprising when Madeline started recognizing the Target logo everywhere. After all, it's all over our house, on a mouse pad, credit cards, T-shirts and many household products. And we go to Target all the time. But apparently she's soaking up more branding than I realized. I bought her a pair of neoprene Nike sandals to wear at the pool. She immediately started calling them her "running shoes." They would be very hard to run in, so I couldn't figure out why she would think they were for running. Then she called Al's Michigan visor his running hat. He has never worn it to run. But I made the connection. Al's visor and her shoes have the Nike Swoosh. Al also wears a Nike T-shirt for running, white with a little, tiny Swoosh on it. As her little mind figures out the way the world works she filed away "Swoosh=running." Makes me wonder what other connections she's making...

1/30

One day away from it officially being a month since my last post. Thought I'd better write something. I'm trying to decide what direction I want to take with this blog, but maybe I'll not worry about it and just post whatever pops in my head. I'm getting a little tired of the snide comments by my adoring readers.

P.S. Despite her huge new front teeth, Madeline is still not a vampire.