I decided to take a few days off. Friday, I went down the rabbit hole of Grey’s anatomy songs, with video, and realized the best songs were usually played at some of the saddest moment. I turned into a blubbering mess after listening. I realize that I did it to myself and should know better, but on the plus side – I got a good cry in 😁!

Yesterday, words seem to fail me. I had a piece I tried starting three different times but got frustrated because I just couldn’t get find the tone that I was looking. I had both thoughts and images of the story competing in my head. I just couldn’t capture the essence of the images with the right words. But I think I’ve got it now, so that will be tomorrow’s post 😊!

In the meantime, I will catch you up on books I’ve read and a couple of movies you might want to check out if they suit your tastes.

Books: first up – Silver Tears by Camilla Lackberg. This is the follow-up to The Golden Cage that I happen to stumble upon by accident at the bookstore. I try to track my favorite authors so that I can keep up with their work, but this one slipped by me. If you read and enjoyed The Golden Cage, this is a great sequel that I suspect is the second book in a trilogy. And the lead character is still my spirit animal in many ways but two – no spoilers though 😁. Next up – The Final Girls Support Goup by Grady Hendrix. Now if you read his novel, The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires and enjoyed it, you should give this one a shot. Both are a mix of spoof, black comedy with a dab of horror. This one puts a spin on 80”s horror. Fair warning, the lead’s neurosis can get a bit overwhelming, so I strongly suggest taking breaks as needed. My next planned read for the week, Stephen King’s Billy Summers.

Movies: I finally got around to seeing Freaky which was ok. It had some really funny moments and some real duds as well. When I looked at its IMDB page I noticed it had two writers and I understood why it was so hit or miss for me. But I didn’t pay to watch it so no loss there 😆. I also watched Gunpowder Milkshake on Netflix – loved (big fan of Karen Gillan) and I took a little detour into foreign film land with Unknown Origins, also on Netflix, described as offbeat, quirky and exciting. Exactly how I would describe most of my recommendations for today, except for Silver Tears.

Now it’s your turn – hit me with some recommendations that are offbeat, quirky and exciting. Can’t wait to see what you turn up!

First, I am just fine and, no, my house didn’t actually try to kill me, I think 😬. I just knew when I bought a two-story house, this was bound to happen. And it finally did – I slipped on my stairs and nearly slid down the staircase 😳.

So how did it happen you ask? Well, I was walking down the stairs and I turned to say something to my sister, next thing I know my right foot slid forward while my left leg stayed behind creating a lovely z pattern with my toes facing left, my knee facing right and my thigh to hipbone connection was also rolled to the left, wedging me in the stairwell. And since my weight was on my left hip, I couldn’t pivot my left leg around and the right leg was preventing me from sliding down the stairs further, so there was no moving that leg. And that’s how I got stuck 🤷🏼‍♀️. Hot mess, I know 😆.

After assessing the awkward situation, I realized that I need my sister to push my upper body forward so that I could take the weight off my hip and swivel it around, hence, becoming unstuck. My sweet 4-year-old nephew “helped” lift me off my ass along with his mother. And in the end, I only bruised my knee and hip. I didn’t even pull a groin muscle, which was surprising given the odd position I landed in 🤔.

While I’m not a particularly clumsy person, I do have a foot placement problem 🤣. I have slipped down a few staircases in my time because I step on the front edge of the stair instead of stepping on the solid middle part 🤦‍♀️. This is the first time I managed to get stuck in the process, but if you’re going to do it, do it right 😁. I’d like to say it won’t happen again but given the fact I have sprained my ankle more than once because I can’t seem to place my feet correctly, I can’t swear to it 🤪.  

So, keep me in your thoughts as I navigate a house that is fraught with danger (😱 – pause for dramatic affect)  and let’s hope it’s not actually trying to kill me 😆😆😆.

While I’ve recovered (mostly) from the depression that sidelined me from my life for about a year and a half (RIP 2017 -2018 🪦), I’ve discovered a lovely new side effect has emerged. Thanks to depression (with a side of menopause) my brain is broken 😞.

I confirmed my suspicions with my therapist after having done some limited research on the topic. You see I had been feeling like my brain was struggling to function the way I was used to. I am foggy at times more than I am clear headed, my synapses don’t seem to fire the way they used to and there are days when I fight to find the word I’m looking for. And at times it works in ultra-slow motion. I feel like I’m losing brain cells and it worries me. I want my brain to work like it always had because the way it is now is frustrating.

It’s not an all the time thing. When I feel really good about something I’ve written, I know my brain is working in a way that I’m used to. But when I find my brain unable to make connections that shouldn’t be that hard, I know the broken bits are showing themselves again.

It’s funny, I get the NY Times crossword puzzle for my IPad ($40 a year for a puzzle a day, if that’s your jam 😁) and I can tell when my brain is on fire because I can feel it while trying to solve the days puzzle (well not Friday and Saturday’s, their the usually the hardest 😜). Other days, I’ll stare at the clues and my mind is a blank 😶. Those are the days that concern me the most.

I tell this story for three reasons. The first is that if you or someone you know has suffered with depression and you think your brain isn’t working right, this might be why and you are not crazy. The second is to let people know that they do not have to go through any part of depression or other mental health problems alone. There is a whole group of us willing to offer support and any help we can.

The third and final reason is I am looking for suggestions to help me get my brain in proper working order. I and others struggling with this issue, so please share if you have heard of or tried something that might help 😊.

So, I will sign off today with this last thought – if you are struggling, find a therapist that can help and keep looking until you find the right one for you. And I am here to cheer your on in your recovery so “GO TEAM GO!”

Am I the only one surprised that we are a third of the way through August? I mean I was already shocked at how fast July went. I swear when I was in school, the days just seemed to drag on forever.

But here we are, on a Monday, and in another week, we will be halfway through the month and closer to cooler weather in the south, if all goes well (though the news on climate change isn’t looking good 😬).

I thought today I would do a few updates and share a few anecdotes about my weekend. And then you could share some about yours if you like. Symbiosis at its finest 😆.

Updates: I have found a few live ants (but no outbreaks thankfully 😮‍💨) but the carcasses are still plaguing me, especially the ones upstairs 😡. Time for another good vacuuming and we’ll see what turns up after that 😁. As for the name change on the home warranty paperwork, I called again last week and apparently they don’t hyphenate. Instead, they turn it into one long, single name 🙄.  So this morning I attempt to create an online account for the 10^th time and guess what? Same error message – name doesn’t match the address 🤦‍♀️. If this isn’t an exercise in patience, I don’t know what is.

As for the weekend – Saturday saw another out of nowhere, violent storm tear through our city again. And the tree went down, again. Before resetting it for the third (or maybe fourth 🤔) time, I dug the whole a little deeper and I drove the stakes into the ground like I was killing a vampire! If that f 🤬🤬🤬er goes down again it won’t be from lack of effort to keep it alive. I beginning to think that it’s trying to commit suicide (herbicide?) 😱!

The storm also destroyed my neighbor’s effort to host their daughter’s birthday movie outside 😞. I felt so bad because a lot of effort went into creating a screen for the event and it was posts holding it snapped like twigs. Fortunately, the party went off without a hitch and she seemed happy. What is it about young kids and the “can’t you stay for one more minute” that sucks you in every time? But she’s a sweet kid and I’m easily manipulated by children 🤪.

Sunday, I just threw in the towel and chilled the entire day. Until my friend sent me a list of the most annoying songs, which we debated the veracity of because 1. Barenaked Ladies are NEVER annoying (their song One Week was on the list), 2. Cher is a GOAT (Believe was the song they chose) and 3. The Joker by the Steve Miller Band – are you kidding me?!? Best barfly song of my college years 😁! I’ll post the link to the list below and you decide…

https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/18894/most-annoying-songs-ever

That’s how my weekend ended and I’m pushing forward with feeling the Zen from last week. Hope you continue the journey with me 😊.

Ok, so yesterday’s post probably should have been titled “No joy in Mudville”. I got my “ville’s” mixed up – Whoville, Mudville, Greenville and so on. Somedays the brain farts and we just have to ride the ride 🎢 until the end (otherwise known as life during menopause – at least for me 😆).

I thought I would end the week with a favorite photo of mine. Just my way of continuing to spread joy.

Have a spectacular weekend!

Note: It took me an hour to get to this point 🤦‍♀️ 😁. Somedays you just gotta work with what you got going on in your brain 🙃.

I was so hopeful for Colin Duffy! And I think I jinxed him by rooting for him in the finals (kind of how I jinx my favorite Amazing Race teams each season 🤦‍♀️)! I mean Nate Coleman earned the silver but I so wanted a fellow Coloradoan to win or at least medal. I guess the asshole for the week of the Olympics goes in part to me 🤪.

But a sincere congratulations to Nate Coleman (silver), Jacob Schubert of Austria (bronze) and a special congrats to Alberto Gines Lopez of Spain for taking home the first gold in this new event 🍻!

I’m still giving NBC Universal partial asshole credit as well for putting out a Kevin Hart “humor” piece about the 4×100 meter men’s relay and showing all the failed attempts (usually because of bad baton hand offs 🙄) by the American men in this event for several Olympics. NBC created it and put it out into the universe and guess what? They failed to advance to the finals because of a bad baton exchange! So F🤬🤬k off NBC with your bad juju!

OK I’m a little (lot) cranky today. A lot of ugly in the news world and I am not here for it. I try not to read the news, but I guess I’m a glutton for punishment 🤷🏼‍♀️. 🚂 meet 💥 meet can’t 👀 away.

So, let’s switch that up and share something that makes you happy. That will in turn help me get rid of the grumpy uglies 😁. I’ll start:

Comments are open, let’s see what ya got!

… my mower is working again! Woo Hoo 😃!!! I went to look at how the fuses were arranged, jiggled them a little (Hah, I first typed giggled 🤣) to test the ease at which they might come out, then thought “let me just check to see if anything attached to the electrical system is working…” and surprise, surprise it was. Sometimes just getting Zen about things works 😁. Let’s keep that good energy flowing!

The cooler weather is holding strong with a steady rain since the a.m., so bonus number 2.

Now let’s talk about the Olympics. In checking the list of sports that are part of the Olympics, I am happy to say that I have been able to watch a variety of different sports. So far, I have caught parts of at least 23 different sports and multiple events under certain sports like swimming and track and field. I’m proud of myself for branching out so much 😊.

My new favorite sport added this year – Sport Climbing! I watched the qualifying today and I gotta say it had me intrigued. It’s made up of three different types of climbing and the scoring is unique (your finish in each section is multiplied and the lowest scores qualify/win this event). And apparently the three types of climbing are usually separate events in normal competitions, so the climbers have their specialties that don’t necessarily translate across each event. I admit I got sucked in and I am rooting for the Colin Duffy, the 17-year-old from Colorado (my home state 😊) who qualified in third place. Also going to send good energy to Nate Coleman the other US competitor who qualified in the eighth and final spot. GO TEAM USA!

I also caught some of the horse jumping (after having completely missed dressage 😡) and sadly, none of the Americans made it to the finals in individual jumping 😞. Let’s hope team competition goes better. And on a side note – Bruce Springsteen’s daughter Jessica competed.

My last nod to the Olympics is my continued irritation with the coverage by NBC. The gymnastic events were only streamed live on the Peacock app and usually began in the wee hours of the morning, which, ugh. And then they only show limited highlights in the evening hour after the spoilers have gotten out 🤦‍♀️. And I’m sure this is the only event getting the short shrift. So I say do better NBC!

But let’s put that aside as I continue to find the positive energy that started yesterday and keep it going throughout the week. Reese is testing that resolve as she refuses to eat and then gets sick as a result (AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH). God love her she is so trying at times (insert signature dramatic sigh here).

In the end, all is pretty well balanced for me at the moment, so I am sending some of the positive energy surrounding me out to you my lovelies, in hopes it will give support to those who need it. Hugs!