Tag Archives: Zebra Sounds

search engine funnies 2.0

01 Tuesday Sep 2009

Posted by in get along like cats and dogs, something important, I'm sure

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Here it is again:  a quick round-up of search terms that curious people seeking answers to life’s nagging questions typed into their search engine of choice and ended up on my blog instead…

“Jane Killborn”    (hard-core gore thriller author Jack Kilborn‘s eccentric aunt?)

“how to get dogs and cats to get along”    (remains a mystery to all of us….)

“daily mirror cartoon jane”   (can I speak in word bubbles?  That would be fun.)

“guinea hen cooked in pig bladder”   (Cool! I actually talked about that one…)

“something important”   (isn’t that a rather vague search phrase?)

“candid tween”  (I get a lot of visitors with that one)

“find my head”  (if you lose your head, can you find it online?)

“zebra sounds”  (being a fan of blogger/author Judy Clement Wall is lucrative)

And, what remains the most popular random link that googlers follow to reach jane, candid??

“pre-wash cycle”

Yes, where upstanding citizens looking for real advice on how to operate the pre-wash cycle on their dishwasher instead find pictures of my dog licking the plates…

As a writer, one likes to think that people visit said blog on purpose — but if I get a candid tween obsessed, guinea hen cookin’ pet whisperer who lost her head because the dishwasher pre-wash was broken?  I’ll take it.  All are welcome.

support your favorite places, $1 at a time

29 Saturday Aug 2009

Posted by in Foodies, something important, I'm sure

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I first heard about the 3/50 project from my friend Judy, who is also my source for all things topical since I don’t watch the news.  I should say, my sole televised news source is Jon Stewart, so Judy is in good company.  The 3/50 Project is a grass-roots effort to save local economies, three stores at a time.  Now Judy lives on the West Coast, where things often happen a”few” years before they meander their way to Ohio…  at least that was the case with smoothies.

But shortly after Judy’s post, I was visiting my family in Wisconsin and made my annual pilgrimage to my favorite coffee shop in WI, Mud Creek Coffee.  Mud Creek opened a couple years ago, and I was delighted but dubious that the concept could make it in a small town in today’s economy.  Every time I drive up there and Mud Creek is still open, I always stop and frankly just want to throw buckets of money through the drive-through window and say “Please make it!” because it is such a cool little coffee shop and I would be sad if it was gone.

Which is exactly the idea behind 3/50.

On this last trip, my Dear Sister and I went to Mud Creek for a relaxing afternoon break and what did I find on the counter but a flyer for the 3/50 Project.  So I figure, if the concept made it there already, it is time for my town to get on board!

So, here is the premise of the 3/50 Project:

1.  Pick three independently owned (brick and mortar) local businesses you’d miss most if they were gone.

2.  Commit to spending $50 a month at these three businesses (that’s $50 total, NOT $50 each…)

3.  Help save your town’s independent stores, one person at a time.

Now don’t get me wrong — I enjoy the immediacy and ease of on-line shopping, big box store bargain-hunting (I am a Costco addict), and all the other many chains that make shopping and eating out so convenient.  I know that at this point there is no way that the majority of my family’s expenditures can be sourced through local independent vendors.  But $50 a month of money I was going to spend somewhere else anyway?  That I can do.  It’s easy and just feels right.

So, here is my list to start on September 1st:

1.  Tazza Mia Coffee (which I do think is the freshest and best tasting coffee in town.)

2.  Troy’s Cafe (a gem of a restaurant with innovative, fun, affordable food in a relaxed atmosphere.)

3.  Ace Hardware (I know Ace is a chain, but this is the [last?] little, local hardware store around here, one with every little doohickey and thingamabob for fixing things, and a cute Grandpa-guy clerk who knows where everything is on the tightly packed shelves.)

There.  I had to try hard to keep all three choices from being food-related.

So that’s my plan.  I would love to hear what three businesses you would pick, and, dear readers, if you are willing to give it a try…

friends, revisited

29 Monday Jun 2009

Posted by in seasons

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A while back I wrote about friendships — how hard it is to leave them behind when we move and how challenging to keep the friendship alive as the years pass.

Shortly after, I saw a tweet from Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project blog,

half of all friends are replaced every seven years

Really, half every seven years?  The seven year itch of friendships?  Then I read this piece on Zebra Sounds , with a link to an excellent HuffPo articleby Ed and Deb Shapiro.  Technically, it’s about Monica Lewinsky, a dinner party, and forgiveness, but here is a quote that grabbed my attention (along with a note to self to go back and  re-read the inspirational ‘forgive yourself” advice…)

“Within the space of seven years every cell in our body dies and is reformed, our thoughts are constantly changing and our feelings come and go. We are literally not the same person we were a minute ago, let alone a day, a month or a year ago”.

Given the science and the sociology, it seems somewhat amazing that we can maintain friendships at all, with all the changes in our every day lives.   This is our transitory reality, not just when we move out of town, but every move we make, every day, changing us little by little. 

Good thing friendship is not based on science.

If I had any lingering doubt about the lasting nature of friendships, this last week was proof positive.  We saw friends that we had not seen in 10-15 years, and although apparently every cell in my body had changed over twice (and doubled?), it was like a week had gone by, and we had hatched tween children and (just a few) wrinkles in the meantime, but otherwise it was comfortable as an old glove.  Not that they are old.  And neither are we.  Just an expression, really.

I call them old friends in the most attractive, affectionate, slimming, firm, and endearing way possible, seven times over.

put on a happy face

30 Monday Mar 2009

Posted by in Motherhood, Writing

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Happy Monday, folks!  I’ve put away the crowbar for another week — there’s nothing like getting a couple growing boys out of bed on a Monday morning to give those biceps a good workout with garden tools.

No one was smiling this morning.  Well, except me.

See, Monday morning now means a quiet house where I can just write.  Writing gets me out of bed.  Writing gives me energy.  So does reading great writing.

And coffee!  Coffee is really good too.

Finding happiness on a Monday, or any other day, is the basis for the wonderful blog  The Happiness Project.  (Yes, yet another great link found on Zebra Sounds!)  On The Happiness Project, author Gretchen Rubin shares her “adventures and insights as I grapple with the challenge of being happier”.  In one poignant post, she shares the paradoxes of happiness;  just one thing learned during her year-long journey of test-driving every happiness theory she could find.  Good reading!

To me, the true paradox of happiness is its unexpected painfulness.  A broken heart hurts like hell, but happiness/beauty can also pierce the heart with its sweetness.  When I look at my children, I feel so blessed and happy and lucky that it hurts.  The heart aches when sad things happen, but it can also ache with joy.

An alternative is to go through life slightly oblivious to all the intense beauty around us, keeping busy and on task to keep the mind and the heart from feeling too much.  A conscious or unconscious decision.  Plenty of fun and happy and laughs and pleasantness, just not the joy so sharp,  it cuts.

Happiness brings tears to my eyes nearly every day.  Is it a fear that all that makes me happy in this place could be ephemeral?  The knowledge that in this crazy world, anything can happen, any day?  Maybe happiness and sadness are separated by a very thin line, and the heart feels them both as one.  Either way, I cry at inopportune times, but that is me.

my happiness projectAll I have to do is look at those sweet sons of ours in the morning, before they are awake, and breathe deeply in their sleepy necks to wake them up.  It feels like as much happiness as I deserve all day.

Of course, the sleepyheads are so much cuter before they start moaning about the need to get up.  The onset of puberty might also change my tune.  We’ll see.

If all else fails to stir the happiness in my soul, there is always the option of putting on a happy face, even on the days when life’s blessings are less obvious.  Gretchen says it is possible.

The Little One has discovered that a paper plate works in a pinch.

is wordling a word?

23 Monday Mar 2009

Posted by in Writing

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I like the wonderful blog Zebra Sounds where I always find fun, inspiring, and thought-provoking word bites.  This author pulls together information from diverse sources and she weaves it in an entertaining and enlightening way.

I particularly enjoyed her post about Wordle and how it is being used to make a statement in politics, advertising and elsewhere.  Here is the explanation of Wordle’s basics from the official website:

“Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends.”

Here is a Wordle of jane,candid:
janecandidwordle

Wordle can even be a handy gizmo for writers.  Because the size of the word is correlated to the number of times that word appears in the text, I can see which words I use most often.  For example, it is clear to me now that I just use the word “just” too often.  I also must have been writing about the author J.A. Konrath quite a few times, because he and all his aliases, as well as his new book Afraid (to be released on March 31st), appear all over the place.  Scary!

I like the back story of the inventor of Wordle, Jonathan Feinberg, and how shares his toys with the world.  On his Wordle Blog, he tells how he made a Word Vader for his son.  I make up little stories at bedtime about flying lawn care machinery — he creates mind-blowing visuals with some code he just had lying around.  That’s a Cool Parent.

I normally do not like little gadgety internet things, but this one makes words into art, and those are both good things.  Plus, if Zebra Sounds says it is interesting, I usually agree.  I like wordling.  Beware though, it is addictive.  You can randomize your chosen word cloud an infinite number of times — and before you know it, time got wordled away…

I made a collage of Wordles for the Little One, filled with adjectives about him, his hobbies and interests and collections and words that make him smile.  I framed them and hung them in his room.  Free art that is personalized, and a person who shares his toys.  What could be better?