Answer Week Fortnight Series: Day 6: Last One!

Three of Four asked, Describe one part of your childhood day-to-day (an activity, a sound, a smell, etc.) that your children will never experience as part of theirs (or, at least, will never experience as the mundane, routine encounter you grew up with). Is this a change for the worse, or the better?

I have to admit, I didn’t come back and check this question for a while, so I kind of bypassed the “day-to-day activity” option. Hmmmm. But I did get stuck on the sounds and smells. So many others have waxed poetic on the sound of the ice cream truck ding-a-ling-ing down the street (including, but not limited to, Eddie Murphy’s monologue bit), but I remember the truck stopping on our street and being terribly disappointed in the weak flavor of those red white and blue rocket bombs, and I also remember how there was a special window built in to the wooden fence around the swim club, so we could buy ice cream “fresh off the truck” during Adult Swim (no ice cream trucks? worse); just as others have, I recall the sound of Ma Bell phones (which people can now choose as a ringtone for their cellphones, for crying out loud) (cheaper long distance? better; too many choices for package deals? worse); and how about the three-tone xylophone “NBC” ID tune (cable TV? worse worse worse). There are also the fire alarm sirens that Three of Four mentioned, we don’t hear those anymore (fewer volunteer fire departments? worse) (although the girls, having grown up in a tornado state, are used to the monthly tornado siren drills in Iowa). Because everyone else has already written about all of these, whatever I wanted to say feels redundant.

There are also the smells, like the smell of ditto sheets, still wet from the mimeo machine, its purple ink smudging where you touched the damp paper (computer printers in schools? better -- and easier on the eyes!); and the salty-smelling school paste – not Elmer’s glue – that stuck to our elementary-school fingers (remember when you'd get all your school supplies from the school on the first day -- for free? that was way better than the two-page lists kids receive nowadays).

See? I couldn’t think of anything new and exciting.

I do have a special place in my heart for theEmergency Broadcast System. You know, the

----beeeeeeeeeeep----whah—whah—whah—

that you’d hear on a regular basis on the radio, followed by “This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. If this had been an actual emergency, you would have been instructed where to tune in your area for news and official information.”

And I remember, as a kid, thinking, how nice of them to tell us what other channel we could go to if they had a fire at the radio station!

Oh, the innocence of youth.

Answer Week Fortnight Series: Day 5

BoyOnTop asked, "If you were on a desert island, with no knitting or fiction, what hobby would you have to have to stay sane?"

I suppose being stuck on a desert island might be just the incentive I needed to write the darn stories down, eh? Yes, I'd probably have to write them down just to pretend I had something to read...

I like this idea!

Of course, that would also be a great time for me to finally hunker down and learn to play that guitar I wanted 15 years ago, that the Consort bought me for our first married Christmas. I took a semester of Adult Education classes, and I did very well. But then I stopped practicing. I keep beginning to remind myself of chords, then my wrist starts hurting and I give up. I'm sure it's just a matter of learning how to hold the instrument correctly. (Not that being alone on an island would include a personal guitar instructor. which is probably exactly what I need.)

Answer WeekFortnight: Day 4

Stew asked, What's one thing you'd like to accomplish in the next year? The next four years?

I never liked this type of question, because I am so bad at answering it. Why am I so bad at it? I'll tell you why.

In the next year, I want to write and submit at least one story.
(This has been on my goal list for the past 10 years.)

In the next year, I want to tone up my biceps and get that tattoo.
(This has been on my goal list for the past 5 years.)

See what I mean? I don't have much self-motivation. If I have the choice between surfing the Web and doing something productive, I will most likely pick the Web.

A large part of this lack of self-motivation is fear. My inner Editor is pretty powerful. She is supported by that Perfectionist who took up residence back when I was a toddler. Both of these Ladies scare the bejeesus out of me. I've tried writing through their commentary, but they are pretty damn loud.

In classic perfection form, I would much rather do nothing than do something imperfectly. I really like the stories floating in my mind. Heck, some of them have been with me for almost a decade. But if I wrote them down, it's more than likely they wouldn't be perfect. And that would suck. And make me sad.

Yes, yes -- I know: "You can't become a better writer unless you write"! As some random blogger whose name and blog I've forgotten said, she was sitting around, wanting to be a writer until she realized that it's not like she would get a call out of the blue from some publishing house, who just so happened to have an opening for a Writer.

I know all this, but here I am waiting for that call. Every year. Perhaps blogging it here for you all will get things moving. I hope so. But with my track record, it's not likely, is it?

I'm also kind of lazy. It wouldn't be that hard to tone my biceps. And I've started hand-weight routines multiple times. But I've dropped those routines multiple times, too. It's always the week that I decide I need to stop snacking that I find a mouth-watering dessert recipe. Or it's one of those work/familiy/life stress weeks. Pshaw.

What I need is a deadline. A timeline. And that's why I'm pretty sure that my four-year goal will actually be met:

In four years, I will be the mom of a college student.

And this is when I start thinking that home-school college is really something I should look into.

Answer WeekFortnight: Day 3

Mizmell asked, What is your fondest childhood memory?

I was stumped at having to pick just one, so I let the question percolate, and decided that I would answer whatever came first to mind when I sat down to write this. And here's what I'm remembering this afternoon:

Split Sister and I are two years apart, and we spent hours upon hours playing together as kids, as you would expect. Our play was always imaginative (I don't remember us playing board games very often), and some of my favorites were games that would fill entire days, if not a series of days and nights.

One was "Desert Island". Our Barbies would have crashed onto an island when their plane lost power, and they would quickly have to begin the task of surviving. They'd weave leaves into clothes, use twigs and nut shells as tools and bowls, and they'd have lots and lots of baby powder food (mix baby powder and water into a thick paste; use as is, or let it dry in little Barbie bowls). They'd explore the island and have lots of adventures, moving from the front yard to the back yard, living under the azaleas by the house, or in front of the garage, or by the old brick barbeque in the back. I can't remember the stories too well, but I know we'd be engrossed with this adventure.

Another was lego weekends. We'd build homes for our figurines (were they Little People? I can't remember), and use the square tiles as plates, the narrow half-square tiles as forks and knives, and those little clear or white onesie cubes as glasses. They'd have beds, furniture, styled kitchens, all made with the generic blocks and tiles (over the years as an adult, I've been disappointed that the only way to get Legos nowadays is as a set to make one particular thing -- Rudolf Steiner would be terribly dismayed). I have no idea what storylines we played during these lego weekends, but I have vivid memories of waking up bright and early on a Saturday or Sunday and being excited to go down to the playroom (before breakfast, even!) in the unfinished basement, to get back to the game.

We also ruined I don't know how many bags of sandbox sand doing "cooking shows" (complete with thick Childean accent), mixing the sand with the wild onions that grew all over the yard.

We had plenty of toys, but the games I remember most vividly are these games of imaginative play. I loved them, and still remember them, thirty years later!

Answer Week: Day 2

KathyR asked, Now that your time in New England is winding down, are you looking forward to going back to Iowa? Or wishing you could stay longer? Or what?

Hmmm. That's a hard one to answer.

I started out by writing out some pros and cons.

Pros about New Hampshire
Glorious landscape
Ocean nearby
Summer mildness

Cons about New Hampshire
Cost of living
Stand-offish nature of people
Feeling of entitlement in this university/medical center town
Whiteness

Pros about Iowa
Being back with our friends
Getting back to our big house
Our big yard
Big-city library
Coffee shop, wine bar, video store, movie theater, sandwich shop, mini-mart all within walking distance
Diversity of people
Midwestern cost of living
Midwestern hopitality
Variety of restaurants and stores

Cons about Iowa
Speakerboxes (the bane of city dwelling)
Midwestern landscape
Humid summer

This year has underscored for me the importance of friendships. Perhaps because we knew we were going to only be here for one year, we haven't really tried to make friends. On the other hand -- no one around here has been particularly welcoming, either. I don't really have much in common with these people. We have an awesome group of friends in Iowa. They are kooks, just like us; they are always willing to lend a hand; they make us feel welcome.

I really don't like the midwestern landscape. Prairie, schmairie. My soul is in the mountains and in the craggy oceanfronts. I'm in a quandary, because although my spirit thrives in a rural woodsy landscape, I like the variety inherent in city-living. I miss my library! The one that always has whatever I'm looking for, that orders books when I suggest it, and that introduces me to different musical artists, rather than reminding me that the 1980s can get boring if that's all you listen to.

I'm glad you asked this question, Kathy, because it forced me to make these lists. Returning to Iowa is going to be great. But I think I'm going to be more insistent that we take time to be out of the city on a regular basis. And I'm going to be so glad our friends will be nearby.

Answer Week: Day 1

Split Sister asked, When was the last time you changed all your passwords?

To which I answer: I change all passwords on an alternate-day schedule. It takes about 37 minutes (I've counted) to do it all. I use a randomizer to get me a series of numbers, and a separate one to give me a few capital and lower-case letters. I mix it up together, until it is pleasing to the eye. I keep the current list of passwords in a self-destruct file, which no one but me can access. (Hackers, you have been warned!)

But I have a friend who isn't so anal about it all. Over a couple of beers, she's bemoaned the fact to me that she had come up with a wonderful password, one she was proud of, and she had used it for a select few important sites. Her hubris prompted her to tell her lovely spouse about this great password. Unfortunately, he thought it was as cool as she did, and he started using it, too. (Woe to hubris. Woe! Woe!)

Her consternation (wait, why are you using my cool password, it won't be secure anymore!) was great. She created another password; cool but not teh cool, since that can only happen once in a lifetime, and hers was now street currency, as far as passwords are concerned. He got hold of that second one, too.

She then moved on to a new method: Take a sentence you will remember, then use only the first letter of each word, including a couple of numbers, as you see fit. (OK, I'm sure her spouse, if he was reading here, would argue that he had that idea way back in grad school*, but, whatev' -- in our story, we'll call it her Next Big Thing.) That has been useful for her. She keeps the same password for all her, ahem, slogging sites. (So she doesn't waste more time than she already does on the Internet.)

That family uses the same administrator password for all computers. Can you imagine a different one for each piece of electronic equipment? Good lord. (I know, she's a silly friend, and she's really slacking off in the password department, but sometimes, a friend must simply frown in sympathy, say "hmmmm", and order another round.)

Hmmmmm. Pass me the Guinness.

*He'll also remind her of the day he brought her, his new wedded wife, to the computer center and said, "and the password is [type] [type] [type] [type]" and she said, out loud, "The password is NEBU?" To which he responded by swishing his hands in the typical CANCEL sign, and hissed "DONT SAY IT OUT LOUD!!" with a look of fear on his face. And his newly beloved looked around at all the undergrads clacking away at the Mac lab surrounding them, and had herself a fun little belly laugh. Mostly because of the look on his face.

Answer Week?

Question week was fun! I learned more than I thought I would (who knew body glide was such an open secret to all but my family??), and am reassured that at least my readership is as normal (or weird) as me on some issues.

I'm feeling a bit uninspired, so I'm taking a page from Boy on Top and requesting questions for me to answer. We'll call it, "Answer Week". How does that sound?