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 |   Reflections and ruminations from a modern day Alice - Life is Wonderland |
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Reflections and ruminations from a modern day Alice - Life is Wonderland  Welcome to the place were I chronicle my own falls down dark holes and adventures chasing white rabbits! Come on In, Take a Bite, You Never Know What You May Find... "Curiouser and curiouser." Alice in Wonderland    |
| 30 Day Blogging Challenge PROMPT May 20th What time of day are you most motivated? Least motivated? For me, I’m most motivated and productive in the morning, and least in the mid afternoon around 2pm. What do you do to renew your motivation in those slumps? I wake most mornings with full energy reserves. I can power through most of the day, until about 2:30pm...when the day seems suddenly so much longer than it should be. It feels sometimes like you hit a wall. I have to abandon my desk and computer and walk around the facility. Sometimes I spent a few minutes on the hanger floor talking with the techs. Sometimes I run to get the mail or take some pictures for the social media pages. A hot cup of coffee will give me a little charge at times, giving me at least the spark I need to rally through the remains of the afternoon. My day officially ends at 3:30, when I leave the office to pick up my daughter from school. Emails and texts can continue throughout the day but at least I am not behind my desk any longer. I always get a pick me up when I see her emerge from the back of the school, shouldering her backpack and scanning the crowd for my face. I almost always get a smile then which charges my batteries and motivates me forward like nothing else does. |
| 30 Day Blogging Challenger PROMPT May 19th Write about your ideal weekend. There have been a lot of busy weekends as school comes to a close. May is a month of mayhem for us that way. For most weekends this Spring, we have been a slave to our calendar and haven't been at liberty to chose either the weather or our pick of activity. I am looking forward to next weekend though. There is nothing on the schedule and for the moment, the forecast looks to be perfect with temps in the 70's and no rain expected. We may be able to finally script our ideal weekend at last. For me, the ideal weekend would be spent close to home. This is our first Spring in our new home and we are slowing trying to tame the yard and do a bit of landscaping. We have had so much rain that it has pushed such plans well off schedule. We are catching up to the mulching and the planting. We have finally managed to get a bit of it done so having breakfast out on the deck, watching the birds and enjoying the fresh blooms sounds idyllic. Taking a mid-morning jaunt to the nursery to pick out some more flowers to plant or veggies to build a patio garden would be the next step in a day largely spent pruning, tending and beautifying our corner of the world. A late afternoon visit to my sister's horse farm would give us a break. She lives six minutes from home and her lovely property hosts three goats, chickens, a gaggle of dogs and cats, her two horses as well two baby fresian fillies and her resident donkey. My daughter loves to help clean the stalls, groom the horses and gather chicken eggs. The hours we spend there gives me a chance to unwind from the week, catch up with my little sister and get some snuggle time with her animals. She is quintessential country mouse, but this city mouse, has grown to love sharing this part of her world. There is something about being with her horses that brings me a particular peace that settles into my tired bones and gives me a release from the demands of my life. Saturday night usually would mean a cookout with friends and family. If the night was mild enough, we could lite the fire table and sit on the deck, watching the bats whizzing back and forth in the twilight. It might also mean the pleasant buzz from one two many glasses of red wine and falling asleep to the sounds of a summer thunder storm. I'd kick off Sunday morning, cooking breakfast with the dogs while my family sleeps in. I love this time when I prepare a big breakfast while listening to NPR on the radio and catching up on the world news and events. It is peaceful. The new kitchen is flooded with light and the smells of turkey bacon and waffles soon waft upstairs and wake my husband and daughter. Sunday breakfast is always leisurely. The afternoon might be a trip to a local park or a visit to Jaden's grandparents marina for a picnic. I typically make a big meal to wrap up the weekend, something like roast chicken or baked ziti. The ideal weekend for me at this point in my life is just passing hours at or close to our new home with family under bright sun and blue skies. It is full of simple joys. |
| 30 Day Blogging Challenge PROMPT May 18th Write a poem or stream of consciousness entry about something you do every day. My husband can not physically get out of bed without a series of alarms, programmed at the infuriating frequency of every five minutes. The first one rings in at 5:10am. It is the one that wakes me up, rudely pulling me into consciousness. Lola, our spirited rescue, usually wakes up by the third or fourth alarm. Even as I lie there, trying to ignore the repetitive buzzing, I can hear the jingle jangle of her tags as she makes her way down the hallway and to our room. Soon, she is at my bedside, whining and brushing her body back and forth against the bed. Lola's sudden arrival wakes Turk, our senior dog. He soon forages his way out from under the crush of blankets. Now we are somewhere between the 6th and 7th alarms and we are all up, except my husband and our daughter, who has grown oblivious to the morning routine. The dogs and I make our way downstairs where I put them out on the line. Lola races into the yard while Turk meanders along behind her. After a few minutes, they both come back up the deck stairs. I drop food into their bowls and fit a doggie band over our geriatric Turk. He has become as incontinent in his old age and it fits with his marginal blindness and irrational grumpiness so very nicely. Despite his charming attributes, Lola still tries each morning to engage him in play. He stares at her as she makes exaggerated play bows and brings him toys with an every hopeful flourish of energy. After a few moments, Turk wanders off to tackle his own morning routine of trying to fish something out of the kitchen garbage or the bathroom trash. At this point I usually glance at the clock and think romantically of crawling back into bed, but it is already 5:30. Sometimes if it is a rainy day I can coerce the dogs to come back upstairs to snuggle with our still sleeping daughter for 20 minutes of so before I have to wake her. Most days though, my husband comes racing down the stairs, nearly running late despite all his alarms, and I see him off. I make myself coffee and cling to it while I watch the birds from my breakfast table. Lola begins her vigil, diligently scanning the wood line and swinging birders for the first appearance of her arch enemy, the fat little gray lady squirrel that taunts and teases her. After trying in vane to rub his diaper off with the bottom of my chair, Turk settles at my feet. We greet the morning that way, the three of us...torn so early from our slumber. |
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