sadness is…

having two uncarved pumpkins stolen off your porch the night before Halloween.

Filed under: Around the house, Sadness is...

it’s coming…

Alice Munro. Too Much Happiness. November 17, 2009. I’ll be waiting.

Filed under: Picks and pans

noise

pitter-pitter-pat

the noises of rain outside

pittering-patter

 

 

Filed under: Haiku

U2 priorities

The U2 concert in Raleigh is tonight!! We’re very excited and are going to try our hand at getting into the pit. From what Katie P has said and from what we saw during the last tour, that’s the place to be. In an effort to increase our chances, I’ve been reading “Joe’s Unofficial Guide to the U2 Queue.” I found this part particularly hilarious about eating and drinking light so that you don’t have to go to the bathroom:

Most venues will have portable toilets, so having to go to the toilet is not an issue in the morning. However, when it gets closer to show time, you only want to drink enough water to sustain life, but not too much where you will have to leave and possibly lose your spot at the front of the stage.

LOL.

Filed under: Around town, Art, In the world

sick day

Sniffles and coughing

afternoon nap on the couch

signs of a sick day

Nibbling saltines

drinking hot peppermint tea

signs of a sick day

Pride and prejudice

making it half way through it

signs of a sick day

Filed under: Haiku

you can’t go back

I’m currently obsessed with two things: Henry VIII (more on that later) and the life, poetry, and stories of  George MacDonald. I just finished MacDonald’s lovely, The Princess and the Goblin, and will boldly state that I liked it better than the Chronicles of Narnia… I think. Well… maybe I can’t say it so boldly after all. I liked it as much, if not more than Narnia… How’s that?

The tale follows Princess Irena and her friend Curdie in a fantastical tale filled with goblins, silver threads, and grandmothers. A journey that takes them through fear, courage, disbelief, and faith — the kind seen and unseen. While the story isn’t fully allegorical (think Narnia), God’s hand is woven throughout.

At one point, Princess Irena has followed the silver thread– which only those with faith could see– to what seems to be a dead end filled with rocks. While the reader knows that she’s been led to the pile of rocks for good reason, she does not and considers turning back:

At length the thought struck her, that at least she could follow the thread backwards, and thus get out of the mountain, and home. She rose at once, and found the thread. But the instant she tried to feel it backwards, it vanished from her touch. Forwards, it led her hand up to the heap of stones — backwards it seemed nowhere.

I was struck by the message of you can’t go back. You can’t turn back from hard things. You can’t turn back to ignorance once wisdom is gained. You can’t turn back to innocence once it’s lost…The story continues:

As the princess lay and sobbed, she kept feeling the thread mechanically, following it with her finger many times up to the stones in which it disappeared… All at once it came into her head that she might remove some of the stones and see where the thread went next. Almost laughing at herself for never having thought of this before, she jumped to her feet. Her fear vanished; once more she was certain her grandmother’s thread could not have brought her there just to leave her there…

The last line struck me. God doesn’t bring us to scary spots or dark corners to leave us there. There’s a silver thread guiding us through it.

Filed under: Art

stop child trafficking now

I wanted to draw your attention to the Stop Child Trafficking Now Walk taking place on September 26-27 across the world. The more I get to know about this organization the more impressed I am with it. While there are two sides of child trafficking, the supply side and the demand side, SCTNOw focuses on the demand. From their website:

SCTNow directs the majority of its fundraising to organizations comprised of Special Operative Teams who gather information about child predators both in the US and abroad. These teams represent the best military, federal and state intelligence and investigative organizations. They track predators to build cases against them that result in convictions.

These teams possess skills beyond the average military or law enforcement individual—skills that enable them to achieve their goals in foreign lands independently, without support of US law enforcement resources.

These teams investigate, gather information, intelligence and evidence and build cases more effectively than law enforcement officials in sovereign states. They understand the risks associated with missions of this difficulty. The teams, selected and deployed for these missions, are made up of elite operatives.

They don’t seek public recognition or fame for their efforts. Their reward is the personal satisfaction that comes from knowing their efforts will take predators off the streets and put them behind bars, resulting in the rescue of innocent children.

There will be a walk taking place on September 27th in Chapel Hill where a group of friends, McCoy’s Marchers, will be walking to raise funds. Find out about walks in your state here and/or donate to my friend’s group here. If you’d like more information, let me know!

Filed under: Around town, In the world

tattered sails

Bry was reading A Book of Strife in the Form of the Diary of an Old Soul by George MacDonald over Labor Day Weekend and I just received my own copy yesterday. It’s a book of poems/prayers that MacDonald wrote for each day of the year where he lays his soul to bare.  It’s made me think about what it means to be an “old soul”… My thoughts aren’t formed yet, but hope to write more about it soon. Until then, I’ll leave you with my favorite poem/prayer so far:

January 12

Doubt swells and surges, with swelling doubt behind!

My soul in storm is but a tattered sail,

Streaming its ribbons on the torrent gale;

In calm, ’tis but a limp and flapping thing:

Oh! swell it with thy breath; make it a wing, –

To sweep through thee the ocean, with thee the wind

Nor rest until in thee its haven it shall find.

Filed under: Art

buying decisions

“The roots of the mortgage contagion lie with all of us and our desire to own just a bit more house.”

-Ron Lieber, New York Times

Over the years as Andy and I have dreamed about and perused various home buying options, we’ve felt the pull for “just a bit more house”, which leads to a bit more mortgage. Our search categories have gone from an upper limit of $200k to $250k to $300k — because, of course we could get the person asking $300k to sell for $250k. It’s all theoretical, mind you, as we’re not in the market to buy, but understanding the pull is good.

As we’ve mused about what it would be like to live in high priced places like Seattle, Portland, and Chapel Hill, it’s led us to discuss how to make a small house work. We anticipate that wherever we end up we’ll need a guest room and an office. But those are more bedrooms, meaning more mortgage. Plus, I’d like a living space that is more than one room. An art room or library, perhaps?

So far, our ideas have revolved around finishing basements, converting garages, building screened-in porches, and, my favorite, buying a pre-fab shed. It’s not quite the same as the Not-So-Big House, which I also love, but let’s face it, those houses aren’t cheap and in some cases, not all that small either.

Perhaps our new motto should go from “not-so-big” to “more with less.”

Filed under: Personal finance, in process

can’t blame him, but…

In an ironic twist, the Founder of Mint.com has sold to the makers of Quicken (Intuit). Some of you may remember my post almost a year ago about how I appreciated Mint’s easy interface and particularly the ability to monitor those expenses that vary from month to month, like groceries, eating out, and household items.

Shortly after I published it, a representative from Intuit commented on the post trying to sell me on their online Quicken product. From her comment, it was obvious she didn’t understand that the problem I had with Quicken, was the one Mint solved. I found it humorous and slightly annoying.

But now, it seems, that Intuit has wizened up and instead of innovating themselves, they’ve bought Mint. I don’t blame them. Buying something you don’t have is a good strategy. And I can’t really even fault the founder of Mint — I couldn’t turn down $170 million either.

But, Intuit? Really? The maker of clunky Quicken? The Mint team is said to remain in tact and will actually take over Intuit’s personal finance division. Time will tell which mind set wins out. I’m pullin’ for ya Mint, but find myself dubious that it will remain as clean and user friendly as it is today.

Read other people’s comments here.

Filed under: Personal finance