Amongst the Whilst

…and if you look to the left you will see – no, no….not that far to the left….to the left on the screen. ON THE SCREEN! Whew. Okay, to the left on the screen you will see a Beautiful Blogger award. Yeah – the white one. How did it get there? I boldly snuck into Realia's blog and stole it.

Okay, I was invited to do so.

Jennifer Morrison presented me with the award last Sunday for the ‘creative risk’ I took in writing the blog entry: $89 With No Provincials. She said, “May you continue to take risks and to write and express you and create your own wonderful art.” Then she said something else which wiped the smirk off my face.…”..the risk you took is something I admire and aspire to.”

You see, Jennifer is not only a blogger but she teaches writing, both fiction and non-fiction, and is working on Post Graduate studies in Expressive Art. Visit her – and take a look at her web page. She is someone to learn from.

The usual requirements come shackled with this award. I need to pass it on to a worthy blogger and list (“…if I like”, she said) seven things about me.

It is interesting that Jennifer created her own definition for the award. Rather than the typical, “You’re a pretty decent writer and I’ve gotta’ give this award to somebody – so here”, she said is was specifically for Creative Risk. So I surmise that to pass it on I need to define the award in such a way that it would be tailored to the recipient. Am I reading too much into this? Probably – but that’s my plan anyway. I haven’t found who I need to present this to yet, but I will certainly let you know when I do.

I am glad that Jennifer qualified the 7-things-about-me list with “if you like”. So this leaves me free to whack the list down to three things. In my previous post I listed ten things about me – and if I list too many more I would end up revealing all that stuff which would land me in the asylum or jail.

1.        My wife showed up with a black Lab puppy a few years ago. It seems, she said, that she was at the Cleaners on this busy street and this puppy walked up and ‘jumped in the car!’ I’ve never quite believed that last part. And she was afraid that the puppy would get run over.
        
        I made my position clear on the matter.

"We can’t keep him. He would tie us down and it would be a lot of responsibility that we can’t handle right now, and besides he is someone else’s dog.” I was pretty adamant in my proclamation. So I outlined that we would call local vets, put up signs around the neighborhood and if no one responded we would take him to the SPCA.

Marilyn wasn’t too thrilled with my exhibition of take-chargeism. She lets me think that I am boss sometime – but now she figured it was going to my head. But I held my position until…

…that cute black puppy climbed on the couch with me and put his head in my lap.

We did all the searching for the owner to no avail. His name is Hutch and he has been with us for about seven years.

2.        “I was at the Jack in the Box drive through and he was just laying there emaciated beside the road. I couldn’t just leave him to die,” Marilyn explained as she showed me this second dog she had brought home a year later.

He was thin…his ribs were showing. He walked with a limp with his head hung down. His nails were worn down to nubs. He was dirty and frightened. Marilyn bathed and fed him while I paced the floor again proclaiming, “We cannot keep another dog. Think of how much trouble Hutch is. We have to take him to the SPCA!”

We did – and a few days later the SPCA called and said they were going to have to put him to sleep in twelve hours.

Well hell. They were going to kill a dog that we had met. A dog that probably had a glimmer of hope in our presence was going to be put down.

We sat on the couch in silence after the news. Finally one of us popped up and said, “Let’s go get him!”

Buddy has been with us for about five years. He had to undergo heart worm treatment and a vigorous plan to bring him back to health. He still limps – the vet says surgery in all probability will not fix it. He is now happy and healthy and an integral part of the family.

We made a pact though – no more dogs!

3.        My goal in life, other than keeping Marilyn from divorcing me and not getting fired from my job, is to figure out how to get those Award Medallions down the side of my blog smaller. I have set them at the smallest size option allowed, but I think that look too big and garish as they are. I have tasked the The Old Professor with helping me figure this out. Amongst his incredulous list of credentials I learned that he has taught Internet Classes whilst professoring all over the place. (Notice the careful use of ‘amongst’ and ‘whilst’. I always have a perverted desire to use those words in a single sentence. It doesn’t matter that they don’t quite fit – my desire is now sated.)

Me and computers are not a match made in heaven. I can so easily get tangled up with the simplest computer activity. My wife bought an ink cartridge for my printer online. When we received it – I studied the silly thing. It didn’t look right. Usually there is tape that you pull off the – printer heads I guess. There was no tape. I pulled another cartridge out of my printer to compare the two. They were completely different. I tried to stick the new cartridge in the printer, and it wouldn’t fit.

“Marilyn! You got the wrong cartridge,” I shouted to her. I shouted because she was in the other room.

She came stomping in. “No I didn’t.”

I showed her how the damn thing wouldn’t fit in the printer. I showed her how it doesn’t even look like the other cartridge. I told her it had no tape. Again I explained that she ordered the wrong cartridge.

Marilyn grabbed the cartridge from my hand, studied it for two seconds, flipped a plastic top off the cartridge, and handed it back to me smirking, “There’s the tape.”

Of course it now fit.

I grumbled under my breath, “Who puts a stupid top on cartridges? How come there were no directions? I guess you got the right cartridge.”

“What did you say?” She bent toward me.

“I guess you got the right cartridge.”

“I can’t hear you.”

“YOU GOT THE RIGHT CARTRIDGE. YOU WERE RIGHT. I WAS WRONG.”

Sometimes you have to admit that you are a failure in life so that the marriage hierarchy can be re-established.

Now I leave you with a quote from Realia's 'About the Blog'. She correctly believes that everyone should have a journal of some sort, whether you consider yourself a writer or not. Blogging serves as a journal. She says,

 ‘Journaling makes you more aware, it causes you to focus on what’s going on within and around you, and to think more critically.  Journaling teaches you to write and think freely, and therefore enhances creativity and opens your mind to alternative ideas and options. If you journal, you are more likely to be aware of, and act upon, the hundreds of fleeting ideas and inspirations that thread in and out of your consciousness every day.  If you are aware of the things that inspire you, you are more likely to seek them out; you are more likely to gravitate to the things, people and situations that fulfill you.’

Visit Realia and learn.