And the Question is; "Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road?"
I had to do this one. This is my favorite ending for that old question:
To prove to the 'possum that it could be done!
Play along, then click on the graphic/link above to leave your comment in Krissy's journal.
We've been having some hearing problems today.
I saw Eler Beth standing in my desk chair and reaching up to the cork board on the wall.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
I heard her say, "Something bad."
"Something bad!"
She actually had said, "Putting something back."
Later . . .
I said, "I'm running out of places to put things."
Eler Beth asked, "WHERE are you going??"
She had heard, "I'm running out to 'Places and Things'."
I forgot to wish AOL Journals a Happy Fifth Anniversary yesterday!! It is hard to believe that J-Land has been around so long. I have only been a member for three years -- three years and five months, actually. I have met a lot of very nice and interesting people and allowed them to entertain me, inform me, inspire me, comfort me, and share highlights from their lives with me, and I hope I've done the same for them. I've had the opportunity to welcome new J-Landers the way I was welcomed, and I've even been able to give some technical journal aid to some the way it was given to me. I appreciate this community of people whom I've come to know, and in many cases, whom I've come to call friends.
So Happy Anniversary J-Land!!
I will try to pop over to the Anniversary Journal to read the entries there.
There is an Anniversary Chat set up for today, and I will try to drop by at some point. I hope as many people as possible can join in, if even for only a few minutes. The link to the chatroom is at the top of your journal, and the times for the chat are at 8pm UK time, 3pm EDT on Saturday 23 August, as well as at 11pm UK, 6pm EDT.
Eler Beth and I went to my Mom's yesterday. I was able to sell a collection of books on Ebay for my sister, Lois, (for $300.00) and needed to pick up the books from her so I could ship them to the buyer. So we spent the afternoon and evening with them and had a wonderful visit.
I took along a tape recorder to continue interviewing my Mother. It's funny, when I pull out the tape recorder or a notebook and pencil and tell her I'm going to pick her brain again, she'll say "Oh my!" and look like she'd rather not. But once she gets going she really enjoys talking about her memories.
I got a bit of a bonus, too, because my brother Alton would interject a few of his own memories while we were at it, and he actually talked a bit about Viet Nam. There was a time when he would never mention his time in Nam, but in recent years he has a bit more.
And my sister Barbara was reminded of a few more of Dad's navy stories that she remembered. At one point I mentioned Dad's CCC stint, and that reminded her of a story he had told her that I'd never heard before. There was a young man in Dad's outfit who, in Dad's words, had "walkin' around smarts, and that was about all." Military ranks were used in the CCC, and one day this young man addressed his Captain as "Sergeant".
"I," the young man was told, "am a Captain!"
"Whal, ya hopes to be a Sergeant someday, doesn't ya?" was the young man's drawling query.
Later on some of the other guys tricked this innocent into standing guard duty on the flag in the rain when no guard duty had been assigned. That same captain came upon him, asked him what he thought he was doing out there in the rain, and then asked him who had told him to do it. Dad said that for the next two weekends, the guys who had played the joke stood guard duty on the flag. I guess that Captain had a soft spot for the poor young man.
I'll begin sharing some of the reaping from these interviews as time goes on. I have enough from Mom now to start putting them in some sort of order.
My niece Kelly (brother Alton's daughter) and her kids stopped by while I was there, and it was nice to see them. Her daughter is not quite eleven and is a bit taller than Eler Beth.
This is something Lois found at a yard sale, and I think it's so cute! It's a concrete morel. I must find myself one of these.
She found this little snail at the same yard sale.
I came home with some new books, too. Well, not new, but new to my shelves. I had asked Mom recently if she still had a couple of old primers that had been my Dad's when he was a kid, and that if she did and if no one else had placed a claim on them, that I wanted them. So she had found them and had them ready for me. There is a spelling book and a mathematics book, and also a book on agriculture and one on business that one of my uncles had given him. Then Lois sent me home with a couple other booksthat she thought I'd enjoy reading (and also with some more that she wants me to try to sell on Ebay for her.). When I got home I found that a package of school books had arrived that I'd ordered for Eler Beth. So I have a lot of books to have fun going through this weekend.
I've done laundry, dishes, and some cleaning so far this morning, fed and watered pets, given some exercise to some pets, and put dinner on in the crock pot. So I think it's time for a cup of something hot and some of those books to look through, and maybe some J-Land reading. I hope everyone is having a good weekend!
We are getting ready to redecorate Eler Beth's room, and her theme is "Foxes". She has been obsessed with foxes for almost a year now. Everyone in the family has stayed on the lookout for anything "foxy". She has fox earrings, a watch with a fox on the face, several fox figurines, a fox keychain, a fox beanie baby, and a Fox Crossing sign to put on her bedroom door!
She is going to be getting a loft bed with a workstation beneath that looks like this one:
She wants to put a curtain around the bottom part that she can draw back or close, and she's going to call that her "fox den".
Today we looked at some paint swatches of earth-tone colors for her wall and trim, and some bright oranges and maroons for some splashes of color. We'll have to replace her blue carpet, eventually, with maybe a wheat color. So we're saying goodbye to the little girl pinks and purples and blues and making a move to a more mature-looking room.
I really like that she wants to use fox colors as her scheme. It will fit well with all of the fossils and minerals she has to display also. Of course, her Barbi collection isn't going anywhere, so they'll just have to fit in as best they can. She has a collection of Princess Barbies, which includes not only the Disney Princesses, but the Dolls of the World princesses; then she also has some of the Dolls of the World that aren't princesses. She told me that she wants a bit more of a grown-up looking room, but she still wants it to be girlie. I said that would not be a problem.
She told me yesterday after she washed her hair and was busy fixing it, "You know Mom, when I turned twelve I suddenly took more interest in doing my hair." And today she said, "Just because I want to do my room like this doesn't mean that I don't like girl things. I think I should be able to like foxes and fishing and hunting and still like clothes shopping and getting my nails done and stuff like that." I just love my little girl!
My sister Barbara is painting something for her that has a fox on it. We don't know what yet. She has this genius for looking at a rock or piece of driftwood and seeing a figure or a scene in it that suggests something to her, and then she paints what she sees on the object. Eler Beth has a wall hanging in her room that Barbara made for her called "The Tea Party". That will stay also. I'll have to get a picture of that to put here.
She and I spent about two hours at the Sherwin Williams web site tonight playing with color combinations. That was fun! I want to paint my living room and dining area this fall, so it wasn't just bedroom schemes we were playing with.
I'm looking forward to doing this. The agreement is that she will do a good thorough seasonal cleaning of her room (with my help, of course, but she'll be doing more of the work than she has in the past), and she will have to get rid of a LOT of things (which is a really hard thing for her to do). The new bed is the reward for getting rid of stuff. She told me this evening that she was going to spend most of the day tomorrow cleaning and getting rid of stuff. I said what about school work? She said, "I'll do tomorrow's work right now!" And dogged if she didn't! When she sets her mind to something she doesn't hold back!
I'm trying to read a few more journals, but there are two impediments to that goal.
1) There is a cat sitting on my chest. He won't sit in my lap; he prefers to sit right up under my chin.
2) There is a little girl (who should be in bed) standing behind me braiding my hair.
Between the two of them, I'm just about to give up and go on to bed.
Heard from my niece in Ocala, Florida today. They took their daughter down to her campus on Sunday (USF), then had to turn around and go back down to get her because of the storm. Now they have to take her back tomorrow.
Andrew's friend "A" in Melbourn says it isn't too bad where they are, but there is a river in her back yard.
My sister Maxine is doing okay in St. Augustine. I hope all J-Landers in the storm's path are safe tonight.
