Dream of the Future

So sometime in the next year I will most likely be buying a new (to me) car. I've started trying to think about what I want in that car, and here's what I've come up with so far:

1. An intimidating (dare I say "manly"?) car horn. I'm really tired of getting almost run off the road by someone and having my only recourse be to toot my little horn that pretty much sounds like a dwarf jumping on a goat.

2. An engine with some get up and go. Awhile back I was accelerating to get onto the interstate and my friend that was in the car with me asked if I was worried that the gerbils in the engine were going to drop dead from the exertion. It wasn't a very nice comment, but it was rather accurate.

3. A stereo system that allows me to listen to the Beatles. You wouldn't know it, but when you only have 2 working speakers-- you can't listen to the Fab 4 (as well as the occasional Metallica song). Well you can, but it will certainly be a version you've never heard before as half of the singing and instruments are just gooooone.

4. Tinted windows- I'm tired of getting sunburned while driving. There should be special window treatments for freckled albinos, you know.


Now-- I will confess that I feel a little disloyal posting this list since my little Rav 4 has been such a loyal and lasting car (155,000 miles and counting!). I feel as though I am tempting the car fates by critiquing my car and that next week you will be getting a post about how my car died on the way to visit my parents and grandparents this weekend. So let me just put this out there into car land: I love you Rav 4-- with your stupid horn, rodents running the engine, broken stereo, and high level of UV exposure......you've been a good car, and if you could continue being a good car for another year or so, I'd really appreciate it.

HA! Take THAT Skinny Girls!

Study: Curvy Women Live Longer, Give Birth to Smarter Children

Monday, November 12, 2007


Real women don't just have curves, they also are smarter, live longer and give birth to smarter children, according to a new study.

In the research, scientists at the University of Pittsburgh and University of California, Santa Barbara, used data from a study of 16,000 women and girls, which collected details of their body measurements and their scores in cognitive tests. The study was published in the journal of Evolution and Human Behavior.

Click here to see an abstract of the study (full study available for purchase)

They found that women with a greater difference between the waist and hips scored significantly higher on the tests, as did their children, according to a report in The Sunday Times Online.


For study purposes, curvy women were defined as those whose waists are smaller than their hips. The researchers suggest that the fat around fuller hips and thighs holds higher levels of omega-3 fatty acids, which are essential for the growth of the brain during pregnancy. Fat around the waist, on the other hand, may have higher levels of omega-6 fatty acids, which are less suited to brain growth, the researchers said.

Waist fat can also be a contributory factor in diabetes and heart disease, which is why curvy women are also believed to live longer than their straighter counter parts, research shows.

Thinner or linear-shaped women lack both omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids around their waists and hips, which would be likely to boost longevity, but have little effect on intelligence.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,310636,00.html

One other thought about last weekend-- while in California, I went and saw a movie I'd never heard of called Bella. And you know, it's not often you see movies as original, moving, and authentic as this one. And above all-- it's a non-preachy movie about the value of every life-- even those who haven't been born yet. So, I'd just like to take a moment to encourage you all to go support this little independent movie to show that there is support for these types of films.

Go see it!

Me and The Waltons (or is it The Waltons and I?)

So I went to visit my friend Dara this weekend in L.A. and had an AMAZING time. Too many stories to go into on here, so I'm just sharing the picture of me at The Walton's house which is on the lot where Dara works. I did not, however, tell John-Boy good night, and I am still kicking myself.

I'm Reading Again

I've stumbled on (in a book recommended by a very cool chick) perhaps the best description I've ever found about why I feel the way I do about travelling.

I read it and I thought-- This is it. THIS is why I love to go places. He verbalized something I'd never even been able to fully work out in my own mind.

And now I'm sharing it with you.....



".....I open my journal and stare.....and do my best to fight off the atrophy that comes from seeing things too frequently. I try to shape a few sentences around this tiny corner of Rome; I try to force my eye to slow down. A good journal entry-- like a good song, or sketch, or photograph-- ought to break up the habitual and lift away the film that forms over the eye, the finger, the tongue, the heart. A good journal entry ought to be a love letter to the world.

Leave home, leave the country, leave the familiar. Only then can routine experience-- buying bread, eating vegetables, even saying hello-- become new all over again."


~Anthony Doerr, Four Seasons in Rome

Tunnel Vision

I started thinking on the drive home tonight about how we are completely surrounded most days by people's dreams. That car your driving? There is some car designer man out there that spent countless hours trying to make that car into something amazing.....that car is the manifestation of countless hours of work. And the roads you're driving on? Those are in the pattern that someone, somewhere started imagining one day. And that rotting old house you drive by every time you go to see your grandparents? Some farmer 100 years ago built that with his bare hands and couldn't wait to move his family in.

Every business you go to started off as someone's dream. Every movie you go to started off as a writer's dream. Every song you hear is someone's words pouring out of the radio. Your new dress started as a doodle on someone's notepad. Your old couch was once someone's baby for months and months while it was being designed and developed. This computer I'm on......this website YOU are on......the list is endless.

It is so easy to forget. EVERYTHING is someone's baby-- the product of their hard work. We are all connected....our dreams are all connected by everything we do every day. We are surrounded by the hard work and dreams of people who have a million different interests and most days we are blind to it all. We take it for granted and ignore each other.

Just take a second tomorrow and take a second look at all of the things you look at but don't see every day. It's kind of fun.

Jet Lagged Thoughts

It has not stopped raining in Hong Kong, for anyone who was wondering. It is a little bit harder than a Portland rain, but no nearly so hard as an Oklahoma rain. Apparently I'm quite lucky that it hasn't rained on me this much on previous trips....(yes Mom,I did remember my umbrella). In the reception area of all of the offices they have these handy-dandy little guys that you stick your umbrella in and they come our wrapped up in a plastic bag. They work great unless you havea little teensy travel umbrealla (like your's truly) and then the plastic bag is about 5 times longer than your umbrella.

And who would of thought that a whole paragraph about umbrella's could be so riviting?

Other thoughts:

Lesson learned about Customs line: pay attention to how many agents are working in each area. 4 agents= a faster line than 2 agents. Too bad it took us 45 minutes of standing in the wrong line to figure that out. Bad news? Wasted time. Good news? Once we moved lines a man from Austria got in line behind me who looked pretty cute and smelled even better! And trust me, nice-smelling men are harder to come by when travelling than you might think.

The bacon here still struggles, by the way.

Oh, and also? Watched the new Die Hard (don't think I've seen the other ones, actually) on the plane on the way from Dallas to Tokyo and it made me cry.....sorta. That was odd. Of course, Bruce Willis action movies have a history of that. The thing is, I don't think they were TRYING to make anyone cry. I guess it was just kind of scary/realistic with the KIND of terrorism that was in the movie. That's my excuse anyway.

Jini got moved up to first class (long story involving a lying mechanic, an footrest that wouldn't work, and a clever passenger who walked the fine line between making it clear she was rather put out but was never nasty about it)....so that meant I got two seats to sprawl my stuff over. You'd be surprised how handy that was.

And now I will bring the rambling missive to an end. I know you are all totally enthralled with my update, but I'm sorry people. The fascinating stories must come to an end for now.

So

I'm supposed to be packing.
I leave tomorrow....
And yet I am not packing.
I did start the washing machine....
That's something, right?

Home "Improvement" Question of the Day

Why do "they" use two different types of screws? Are philip's head screws supposed to be more secure? Are flat-head screws somehow more soothing?

WHY are there two different kinds of screws?

I Got Tagged

So, my cousin Emily tagged me for a blogging game-- I think the rules are that I have to post 8 random facts about myself (though I might point out that I am constantly posting random facts about myself....so apparently I tagged myself for this game a long time ago.....)

So here we go:

1. I really, really like the show My Boys on TBS.

2. I took the ACT for the first time in 7th grade. I filled the math portion in by creating a pattern out of the dots.

3. I don't like Guacamole (in fact, I'm not even sure that is how you spell it). I think it tastes like cold mush.

4. I believe in ghosts. At least I'm pretty sure I do.

5. I would sleep on flannel sheets all year round if it was at all feasible.

6. I am a terrible speller.

7. I haven't been able to drink Mountain Dew since my brother told me that it was made of a certain something when we were kids. I'm not telling you what he said it was made out of....and as an adult I know he was lying (sort of like the time he told me I was adopted, or the time he told me that Mom had flown on the space shuttle to the moon when in fact she was at the grocery store, or the time he was showing me how to get to my classes in high school and took me the long way to all of them)-- but I still can't drink the stuff.

8. I've never been to Canada.

A Salutation Like No Other

I like to share stories at times about the crazy and weird emails and calls we get at the office, but the start of an email that I received earlier this week takes the cake. It is officially my favorite "introduction" email ever from someone trying to get me to buy something from them. It's from a fellow named Gaurav, and it begins thus:

"Esteemed, Hope,your day starts with sweet smiles & tender touch of blowing wind. We added new range of........"



As it happens, my day had NOT started with "sweet smiles" OR the "tender touch of the blowing wind". That's never bothered me before, but now I feel I might be missing something.....

Granny T

Not many people can get to the age of 30 and still be able to say that they have 3 living grandparents...but up until last Saturday, I could.

One of my grandmother's passed away on Saturday night-- and thankfully it was a peaceful end to an extraordinary life.

Hopefully she knew what she meant to me, and that I cherish the memories of daisy chains and pick up sticks.....tea parties and the Andrews Sisters......card games and counting in German......purple martins and springer spaniels......christmas ornaments just for me......the list of random snapshots from my time with her could go on for some time.

The way she always put plastic sheets on the bed (under the cotton ones) well into our teens and the way they would crinkle crinkle crinkle when my sister or I would turn over in our sleep. The way she hid my grandfather's sweets in the oven (or at least that is my memory of it-- in retrospect that doesn't seem to make much sense). The time I couldn't wait to show her that I had finally learned to tie my own shoes. The way she had to correct my grammar at all times (an impulse my father seems to have inherited). The way she adored my grandfather even after he was gone.....and after he died, I never heard anyone else call her Dottie. The way she decided a few years ago that she was to be called Granny T after I'd spend 26 years calling her Grandma.

She was a beautiful, complex, intelligent, loving and independent woman. I was lucky to have had her for as many years as I did.



(and by the way-- she would NOT have approved of the punctuation in this post--that thought shouldn't make me smile, but it does)

Today

Today- I am not in a good mood

Today- I woke up thinking about cleaning supplies

Today- I thought a lot of mean thoughts about people I don't know (who may or may not have been driving near me on the road)

Today- I didn't like any songs I heard on the radio

Today- It took very little to annoy me

Today- I forgot several crucial steps while getting ready for work

Today- I didn't pack a single box

Today- I realized my hair dresser lied to me when he told me he trimmed my bangs (or maybe he was just distracted by his glorious plans that seem to involve me painting my fireplace hot pink)

Today- I lived another day of my very blessed life and was rather ungrateful about it. Hopefully when tomorrow becomes today I'll do a slightly better job.

I Could Watch This All Day

Thought of the Day

"Truth is so rare that it is delightful to tell it."

~Emily Dickinson

A Matter of Perspective

Today I read an article about a woman who made the controversial decision to get married "young". It was called something like "Crazy in love or just Crazy?" I say "young" because the woman that wrote the article was 24 when she got married. Apparently this wild and crazy behaviour scandalized her family and friends who could not believe someone would settle down at such an early point in life.

I supposed I should have been appreciating the wit and wisdom of the article (if there was any)-- but all I could do was laugh. I don't know anyone who would consider 24 "young" to be getting married. And it just reminded me of something I know-- but tend to forget-- and that is the fact that the Midwest Christian view of the appropriate age of marriage is NOT the general world view. I don't know who is right and who is wrong, but it amuses me that in many parts of our country you can be considered too young to get married when in other parts you are an old maid at the very same age.

It was a good reminder for me that you can't live your life based on other people's opinions and expectations since those two things are going to be so different everywhere you go.

Friends

I saw this article today and it struck me as kind of interesting. I've been categorizing my friends ever since...




By Michelle Burford

(OPRAH.com) -- "Friends are the family we choose for ourselves," writer Edna Buchanan once said.

I consider the "family" I've gathered -- with five kinds of pals I count on for completely different things -- among the wisest choices I've made. If you can find even one who embodies any of the characteristics that follow, you can consider yourself fortunate.

The Uplifter: This woman's favorite word: yes. You could tell her you're trading your six-figure income for a career in offtrack betting, and she'd barely pause before yelping "Go for it!" Don't you need someone who looks past the love handles to notice the extraordinarily gorgeous you?

The Travel Buddy: When the hotel in St. Lucia is a bust, one characteristic becomes all-important: flexibility. This agreeable companion need not be the girl you traded pinkie swears with on the playground; it's enough that she's comfortable with quiet (between gabfests) and is a teensy bit mischievous (as in tequila after midnight).

The Truth Teller: Intent is what separates the constructive from the abusive. Once you've established that the hard news is spoken in love (not in jealousy or malice), you'd be smart to seek out this woman's perspective.

The Girl Who Just Wants to Have Fun: One Saturday a pal and I -- and yes, we're both over age 12 -- pored over every glitter lip gloss in a drugstore aisle for an entire 45 minutes. Forget the crisis download (for that, see the Uplifter); this partnership is about spontaneous good times.

The Unlikely Friend: "Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive," Anaïs Nin wrote. My friends -- some twice my age, others half, some rich, others homeless, some black like me, others Korean, Mexican, Caucasian -- have added richness to my life that only variety can

An Open Letter

Dear Woman With Too Many Bumper Stickers,

While I may agree with your sentiment that "Well Behaved Women Don't Make History", I really must insist that you not try to make history by being the world's worst driver. Please-- take yourself and your little station wagon off of the interstate. You see, driving on a freeway when you clearly don't know the location of your gas pedal is demonstrably UNSAFE. Furthermore, to exacerbate this problem by talking on your cell phone while peddling your vehicle like Fred Flinstone down I-44 seems downright silly. So I would like to take this moment to ask that you take your own advice: "Think Globally and Act Locally" by STAYING OFF your local freeway at rush hour. I feel this would be the first significant step towards world peace-- starting with me (and my sanity)

Thank you for your kind consideration.

Sarah

P.S. You may feel that "There is a Village in Texas Missing it's Idiot", but I rather suspect that people who have clearly spent a large portion of their monthly income on little sticky slogans that they like to put all over their rat-trap cars shouldn't talk. Just a thought.

Random Thought of the Evening

I have had several people in my life (over the years) tell me to stop analyzing everything so much. I've always pretty much just dismissed that as an outright impossibility......analyzing people and situations is too much of part of who I am to flip a switch and turn it off.

But I suspect that sometimes it is just an excuse. Analyzing is definitely a part of my personality-- but I wonder how often I'm really just second guessing (and third guessing...and fourth guessing....) myself but rationalize it because I've labeled it as something that sounds more "adult".

Always Be Prepared For Never Being Able To Keep Up

I gave my 7 year old niece, Meredith, a ride home from church tonight. When we finished discussing the pizza we were going to eat for dinner, she was quiet for a minute or so and then the following conversation was had:

M: Aunt Sarah, I just don't get it.
S: Get what, sweetie?
M: How God could have always been here! He must have had a creator. If He's here now, someone had to make Him. How could He have always been here?
S: [silence]
M: Don't you think?


I eventually came up with a response about that being an excellent question that many people have asked before, and that we can never really comprehend it since we're stuck with a severely limited understanding, you know the drill.....all the while worrying that I was not going to satisfy her with this response and that I was going to somehow lead a 7 year old into a crises of the faith....but then I heard giggling. I turned around and she'd picked up a box from my car seat and stuck it on her head. That's when this conversation happened:

M: [in a deep robot voice] I'M A BOX HEAD!
S: [laughing] You are?
M: [deep robot voice] YES. AND I'M HERE TO ANNIHILATE YOU! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.


And what lesson can we take from this? Hm. Maybe-- never underestimate the distraction powers of cardboard? Or maybe it's just never overestimate the attention span of anyone under 10. But really-- I think the main point has to be: When the world starts to not make sense-- talking like a robot is bound to cheer you up.