I finished watching NOS4A2 on Netflix and started watching a show on Paramount called The Mayor of Kingstown. Spoiler Alert and Warning!! This show is very graphic, bloody, gory, and at points even nauseating. After the third episode we almost decided to stop watching this show because of all that. If you dislike violence and cruelty, (which I do) then you may want to avoid this show, but if you can stomach it and can distinguish tv graphics from the real world with certai

Decades of studies of happiness and emotional well-being have proven that experiencing greater happiness is within the control of almost every individual. There’s no magic cure for misery, but multiple cognitive, emotional, and physical behaviors can multiply your chances of feeling better about your life. Things Happy People Choose Not to Do They don’t dwell on setbacks or unpleasantness. Ruminating on negative thoughts crowds out space for positive thinking while also creat

I have heard it said that my office looks like a picture of one of those Hidden Object games. And they aren't wrong. I am one of those people who has trouble throwing things away. I will donate. I will refurbish, recycle, renew and reuse. But unless it's trash, I won't trash it. So consequently things stack up sometimes. To be honest, my whole house is a bit like that. Overfilled. Cluttered. Filled to the brim. Make no mistake though, it is organized, regardless of how some p

So they have turned the food pyramid upside down. What used to be a pyramid is now a...what....an upside down triangle? I do agree with some of it and think it's a good idea on those notes, but be careful of following it in it's entirety. Let me break that down to be clearer. On January 7, 2026, the U.S. government introduced a new food pyramid as part of the 2025-2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. This marks a significant shift in federal nutrition policy, emphasizing a

I have had people lie to me. I have had people lie about me. Sometimes the lies were way out there tall tales that no one could possibly have believed. Could they? Sometimes the lies were about the person telling the lie for the most part and I somehow got a dishonorable mention. Sometimes the lies turned out to be a twisted up version of the truth. Has any of these ever happened to you? If so, did it make you ask yourself how their memory of a situation or event could be so

I am hearing a lot about "clean eating", so I thought I'd answer an inquiry about it here. It seems to be really trending right now, the idea of clean-eating. Honestly, it isn't new and it is not any different than what I have been posting about all along. So what is it? It refers to eating foods that are as close as possible to their natural state. This encourages us to make our meals from scratch to make them as “clean” as possible.  Once just a buzzword, “clean eating” is

Besides being the wrap-up of another year, and a month filled with all kinds of larger bills to pay, this month in my family is loaded up with birthdays. Nieces, cousins, aunts, a sister and myself too all have birthdays this month. Even my mother-in-law has a birthday this month. I had several ideas for gifts to give her but none of them panned out. We ended up having to ask her what she would like, which of course takes out any element of surprise. She said she likes to ea

The guy who wrote the following article is a PhD and advocates strongly towards healthy eating. He has his focus on people with Type 2 Diabetes and Pre-Diabetes, but what he has to say applies to everyone. It's a common misconception that eating carbs will make you gain weight no matter what. In reality, this is only true if the carbs come from the wrong places. In fact, high-carb diets can be healthy and beneficial for your body when they are sourced from nutrient-dense sou

You know you have stepped into the age of Modernism when the first thing you do when you leave the bedroom is plug in your phone to charge, plug in your headset to charge, and unplug your tablet which you had charging overnight. When you purchase charging hubs with multiple plug-ins and yes I said that in plural, then you know. The first one is in the bedroom to charge the toothbrush, the shaver, the bug light and a phone, too. I have become a device junkie. I have alarms on

So, here’s the answer to the question. Ultra-processed food items — which aren’t perishable like fresh produce — are becoming cheaper. “Junk food is cheap because you can keep it forever. You can buy it in bulk, you can produce it in bulk, you can deliver it when it’s cheap to deliver it.” Think about the supply chain. Fresh produce, fish and meat need to be refrigerated and restocked, unlike shelf stable items. Those transportation and replenishment costs get passed on to th

I am a very curious person. (In the sense that I wonder about stuff). So I am constantly asking questions about a number of different things. Today I asked the question, "What is the difference between Flair Pens and Sharpie Markers"? This is not an out-of-the-blue type question. I really wanted to know because I tend to do a lot of journaling and 'marking' of boxes and labels and such. So internally I was also asking myself, do I need to buy both? Or does one or the other d

Pretty bad. Thanksgiving often means a table full of rich, carb-heavy dishes that can leave you feeling sluggish and guilty afterward. Cranberry sauce, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and dinner rolls are staples, but they pack a surprising amount of sugar and refined carbohydrates. If you want to enjoy the holiday feast without the carb overload or sugar crash, it’s worth exploring healthier alternatives that still capture the spirit and flavor of Thanksgiving. This post explains

Every now and then I get a whiff of something floating past my ski-jump nose and wonder, what was that? Sometimes it's like perfume or cologne. Sometimes it's something appealing like bacon frying (and it really appeals because I don't eat bacon anymore and I miss it), sometimes it's something icky-nasty. I have a somewhat sensitive sniffer so I have to wonder if this is a scent that has wafted in from the neighbor's or something carried on the wind from a few places down? I

Oh yes, I could rag on and on about taxes and the various thoughts I have about them but I will spare you all that dribble and angst and shoot the arrow right at the reality that the time has come to pay. My huge complaint about it (at this time) which I carry-on about every year at this time is why on earth they decided to make the taxes due just a few days before the Holiday? That's when people are selling their gifts from last year to pay for gifts to give this year and th

Many of us have left our communities of origin searching for careers, love, adventure, and more. These communities traditionally supplied us with safety, comfort, and support. When we felt lonely or isolated, we could come back to our center and be soothed, understood, or supported. But this fracture is also being played out in the networks we built around us for the same visceral feeling of connection. We have had to become mobile and flexible to survive. Working from home o

I am starting to see the possibility of accomplishment and the fulfillment of the goal. YAY!!! I am still hovering over that $40 deal for a Thanksgiving dinner. I may still do that. My closet is for sure getting a bit more organized and I do have a better idea (or at least a fresher idea) of what is in there now. I knew, but some things I had forgotten about. So doing this has done more than help me find space for things I needed to get put away somewhere. That's a good thi

Why did the scarecrow receive a Nobel prize? He was outstanding in his field. In a world often overwhelmed by challenges, it’s easy to fall into a spiral of negativity. However, cultivating a positive mindset can transform how we approach our lives and the obstacles we face. This post aims to inspire you and provide practical strategies for developing a positive outlook, especially when tackling habits like hoarding or being a pack-rat. Positive thinking isn’t about ignoring

Well that can of worms I opened spilled out into my entire office, out into my library, out into my living room, and is threatening to crawl into my kitchen. This is a most frustrating affair. Am I a hoarder and not just a pack-rat? Geez. I am trying hard to organize, sort, consolidate, re-box, re-label, donate, toss and make sense of all this stuff. This all in the hope of finding new space in that closet for stuff that needs a home that is not out in sight. Wish me luck. I

No, not literally and no, I do not eat worms. It's an expression meaning I should never have started this, said that, went there, etc. What did I do? I decided (in my campaign to downsize and clear out) to start making room in my office closet for those things I plan to hang onto and use more than what is already in there. Oh my goodness. What have I done? I am struggling big time to find things to get rid of out of there. I have many hobbies and I have supplies in there fo

I fired the shots. I will no longer employ shots. They are retired involuntarily. I hate shots. So from here forward they will be called by another name, not shots. Shots are tiny little glasses filled with alcohol. No longer are shots a poke in the arm that makes your arm sore for days on end. I have decided to call this ritual 'getting armor'. Yes, cladding myself up in armor against a specific foe that might do me harm. In September I was cloaked in armor against the enem