7 Quick Takes: 05.22.09

Posted on by Julie Stiles Mills

1. We go from flames to flood here in Central Florida. For weeks, we’ve had brush fires. Now? It’s been raining for DAYS. Thankfully, we aren’t at risk for any flooding, but so many people have been driven from their homes. And in this humidity it is VERY difficult to dry out and prevent mold growth. Here’s the Doppler image from Friday afternoon:

dopplar052209

2. I’m feeling a STRONG need to PURGE my house of stuff. Wednesday, I must have lifted more than 50 books – one at a time. I listed most of them on the FREE swap site www.paperbackswap.com and a few on Amazon and half.com! Check them out and see if you want any of my discards! I also filled two boxes to go to charity. One to our church’s annual rummage sale and another to go to a library one of the missionaries from our church is setting up in . . . I don’t remember what country. oops.

3. I’m really liking paperbackswap.com! I’ve been a member for about a year and I requested my first book today. (I’ve been more interested in getting rid of books than receiving them.) A few weeks ago, I registered with its sister websites, cdswap and dvdswap to allow transfer of credits from one to the other. I transferred two book credits to dvdswap and ordered a dvd for FavoriteSon. It arrived within days and it was in great condition.

So, check out my “bookshelf.” If you see a book you want, order it and I’ll send it right out. (more purging!) I pay the media mail postage, so it won’t cost you a thing. Each book I give away earns me 1 credit and I’m saving up credits for Christmas shopping. Now that I’m on all three sites, I can get books, cds and dvds – All FREE! Did I mention it was FREE?

4. We’re trying out another free swap site too – www.swaptree.com. This site allows trades for books, cds and dvds, but it also allows trades for video games. I’m not sure if we like this site yet. There are no credits. Every item must actually be TRADED with another person. The system matches members up when trades are identified. That means trading only happens between people who want what the other person has listed. It supposedly can handle three way trades also. Each item is valued the same – you give one item, you get one item, no matter whether it is a book, cd, dvd or video game. We’ve listed a bunch of video games and we’ve begun to put items on our “wish list” but we haven’t had a transaction yet. We’ll see.

5. I’m reading fiction. FICTION. Those who’ve been around Compendium for a while know this is a big deal. I read a lot and I buy a lot of non-fiction books (used and cheap, of course), but I keep all my fiction books at the library. Mainly because I don’t read that much fiction and also because when I do, I don’t usually re-read the book later. Well, being physically limited while recovering from surgery, I’ve been trying to REST. Since reading non-fiction equals learning and learning – for me – equals research and idea development and . . . well, NOT rest, I decided to read fiction. I had seen some books reviews for Angela Hunt on Mocha with Linda’s blog, so I got a few of her books. My personal trainer also recommended an author to me. Before my surgery, I had asked for fiction referrals, and I got quite a few, but they just didn’t click for me. When I asked my trainer, she used the adjective I was looking for. FUNNY. Although I hadn’t realized it as I was asking for referrals, I really did want something funny. The author? Janet Evanovich. I read the first one before my surgery and FirstHusband read much of the second one to me during my first few days of recovery. I had to ask him to stop a few times because laughing was painful. Why I wanted funny while recovering from abdominal surgery, I do not know.

6. First day of summer for us! We all slept in, except for FirstHusband, who had to get up and go to work as usual. But NOT as usual. He didn’t have any KID DUTY today! He was so excited about the prospect last night that he asked PinkGirl to guess the first thing he was going to do when he went downstairs this morning. She had no idea. So he showed her. It was the iCarly belly rub dance that Spencer does on Nickelodeon. Basically, you pull your shirt up to show your belly and rub it in big circles while saying “Whoo, whoo, whoooooo. It means you are carefree and happy. umm, hmm. that’s what it means.

7. Working on an overhaul for business website. I HATE the one I have up now. It’s dark and gloomy and amateur and the menu is broken and it’s too fragmented and I hate it. I bought a template from allwebco.com and I’m transferring the content from old, ugly, dark and broken to new, classic, light and functional. It will take a while because it’s summer and the kids are home and my windows of time are just that. Windows. Tiny little windows. When I get it finished I’ll be asking for objective, honest feedback.

7_quick_takes_sm
Join in with your own 7 Quick Take Friday post at Conversion Diary hosted by Jennifer!

use your OUTSIDE voice!

Posted on by Julie Stiles Mills

I was reading one of the blogs I follow and this memory came flooding back.

We were at a track meet. Outside. Under a clear blue sky. The sound system blaring every time the announcer listed the race winners. Track meets last HOURS. We wait and wait and wait to watch FavoriteSon run for less than 12 seconds, then we wait and wait and wait for him to run for 26 seconds . . . It was, you know, a track meet.

PinkGirl gets bored. As I would if I were 8 years old and had to hang out at my big brother’s 3 to 4 hour track meet. So I let her play and check in with me every once in a while. Thankfully, she always finds the fun and usually makes a new friend or two. When the high jump and pole vault events are over I can usually find her on the giant landing pad with a group of kids.

This particular day, one of her classmates, who has a big sister who runs track, came to the meet. They were under the bleachers, playing. Giggling. Squealing like 8 year old girls tend to do. They were DIRECTLY beneath me and the other girl’s father.

Let me give a little background, here. The other girl, who I’ll call ChurchMouse, was invited to PinkGirl’s birthday slumber party back in November. Since I somehow have the ability to completely tune out kid noise that tends to drive other parents insane, (it’s true. I don’t know how I do it, but I do.) I let the girls get as loud as they wanted while they played. At one point, I heard a squeal/scream that penetrated even MY noise threshold and I said, “Was that CHURCHMOUSE?” I had NEVER heard that child before. You ask her a question and you have to lean in for the answer. She’s quiet. Polite. And I know why. I’ve seen her mother interact with her. Zero tolerance for . . . here’s the way I explained it to Pinkgirl:

“ChurchMouse’s mom is just more comfortable with kids who sit still and be quiet. But I need to tell you something. You are a very enthusiastic and curious girl and I don’t want you to sit still and be quiet. If you did, I would be very bored. So if you want to sing and dance, sing and dance. But if you are ever around ChurchMouse’s mom and she wants you to sit still and be quiet, please respect her and obey her while you are around her. But when you come home, don’t ever think that’s what mom and dad want you to do.”

So, back to the track meet. You know, the one OUTSIDE, with all the noise, and the girls playing under the bleachers. There’s a squeal/screech, followed by giggles. ChurchMouse’s father leans down and calls under the bleacher for ChurchMouse to “settle down.”

Settle down? At a track meet? WHY is this necessary? NOBODY on the bleachers seems to care a flip, if they even heard anything in the first place. I say NOTHING to PinkGirl. I consider the possibility that because I didn’t admonish MY daughter, he thinks my parenting is . . . lacking.

And yet, I am unmoved.

A few minutes pass. Then the girls must have overrun his noise threshold again, because he repeats the leaning “settle down” warning and ads a consequence. ChurchMouse will have to come and sit with him. Which means PinkGirl wouldn’t be able to play with her.

So I look at the dad and ask, “Would you be more comfortable if they were quiet, you big fun sucker?” (okay, I said “you big fun sucker” in my head. But hey, it made me feel better.)

He pauses. He looks at me as I walk down the bleachers toward the girls, but doesn’t follow me. At the edge of the bleachers, I see the girls and call PinkGirl over so he can’t hear me talking to her from above. I tell PinkGirl that they should probably move out from under his seat or ChurchMouse will get in trouble and have to go sit with her dad.

We’re inviting ChurchMouse over for play dates this summer and I’m going to let her use her outside voice.

Even inside.