Pick a favorite song. Look over the lyrics. Pick one line and write it at the top of the page. Then set the timer and start writing. Continue where the lyric left off (just writing whatever comes to mind) or skip a line and write about the lyric (what it brings to mind).
Archive for May, 2008
How to break old stuff!
Yesterday, Liam and I sat together in the living room while I worked and he read Living Bird (a magazine put out by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology). He started giggling. Then he chuckled. Next thing you know, his body shook while he laughed out loud. Now it’s nearly impossible to get any work done when someone is enjoying a good joke in a piece of writing that is only feet from where you sit! So I had to know the source of such good humor.
Pete Dunne: How to Destroy Your Binoculars
Nobody could have anticipated this problem. Only a few decades ago birders took pains to keep their binoculars in good working order so they would provide years of service.
No longer. Now, with new-and-improved, super-whiz-bang binoculars appearing every other week, birders who already own quality instruments that don’t have the latest technological innovations—coatings that deflect images of European Starlings and House Sparrows; squishy gel-packed bodies as squeezable as toilet paper—are crying for an excuse to ditch their built-to-last-a-lifetime glass so they have an excuse to buy the latest and greatest.
But they can’t. Their current binoculars work just fine. Replacing them will mean hours of negotiation with their conscience, their spouse, or both.
So here, for the benefit of birders suffering new binocular envy, are several proven ways to destroy the binoculars you are using now. I have personally tried every one and will attest to their success.
With that introduction, Dunne then reels off six detailed methods for deep-sixing your aging binoculars. And they are hilarious! Here are two:
1. The ol’ bioncular left on the roof of your car trick. Although this used to be the binocular abuser’s default setting (the equivalent of the dog eating your homework), unfortunately this is not the fail-safe technique it used to be. There are instruments out there now that can take a standard tumble onto tarmac and survive. In order to achieve maximum damage levels as defined by the new, enhanced, bino-destructo scale, you must place your instrument with barrels parallel to the car roof (i.e. not standing upright) so that you can achieve freeway speeds before the instrument goes airborne. If possible, when backing up to retrieve the wreckage, (for insurance purposes) run the instrument over with tires of your car…
(snip)
5. While scanning for hawks, consume a New-York-deli-sized roast beef sandwich (making sure that half the mayo lands on the glass), then introduce the binoculars to a six-month old Labrador retriever with the counsel, “Now be a good dog, Armageddon, and leave those binoculars alone.” Leave the room. Make sure the instruments are within reach and remove all doggy toys from the vicinity.
And if all else fails:
6. Loan them to me. I guarantee you’ll need new instruments by the time you get them back.
We laughed so much reading about the destructive methods of cleaning the lenses using the equivalent of a brillo pad and packing the binocs in a backpack, on a hot day, with a loosened jar of honey to ooze and lubricate the working parts of the instrument.
It occurred to me that this format would make an ideal writing exercise. How many of us have kids who want the latest X Box or Wii or the best saddle for a horse or the newest bicycle or the most recent iPod (the iTouch!) even while the stuff they have works perfectly and used to entertain them for hours? I see that show of hands. Everyone!
So turn them loose. Let them write about how to destroy that old stuff in order to justify the expense of the new stuff.
Hmm. Am I’m unleashing criminal activity against otherwise still-in-good-condition stuff? For the record: I said write about it. Don’t actually do it. 🙂
Itchy feet, adrenaline, firing nerve-endings
That’s the end of May all over for me.
I wake up in the morning and if it’s sunny, I’m flinging clothes off my body, sliding my feet into cool flip-flops with the green trim on the black background. I don’t care about my hair, I throw on lip gloss (no lipstick by June) and I wander around my backyard making up reasons to be outside rather than indoors: someone’s got to encourage the baby birds to get out of their nests and what tree will grow without a pep talk?
We bought a swing for our yard last year (one of those very midwestern ones with the two seats and little awning over the top to shade the sun). I drape myself over the canvas, ears plugged into my iPod, swinging with one leg thrown over the side, forgetting I own a business or homeschool children, soaking up the green of our lush yard.
Some days I round up the kids and we head to the zoo. Okay, that’s not quite accurate. MANY days we head to the zoo, like, every chance we get. The Cincinnati Zoo is a seductress with its riot of thousands of bulbs in bloom and the spring eruption of zoo babies (every shape and size from the 300 pound rhino to the very adorable ape baby clasping mama).
Most days I strike a big black X over the previous date on the calendar because each day that goes by means we’re nearer to the most fateful, important day of our academic calendar: Memorial Day! That’s the day our YMCA opens the outdoor pool with its dangerous red and yellow slides, groovy snack bar and luxurious lounge chairs. That date signals the end of routine, objectives, plans, duties, responsibility and hiding my white skin under turtlenecks and jeans.
There’s just something about May that makes it nearly impossible to focus on anything important. I’m like the battery in my MacBook Pro. I was able to sustain a charge for long stretches of time at the start of the fall. But now, with merely a week left before M. D. (you know, that auspicious date!), I can hold a charge for about fifteen minutes and then my mind and body are all like: “Are we there yet? Get me out of this house!!”
So that’s precisely what I’ll be doing today – walking with Liam around the neighborhood, heading out to the zoo, stopping for lunch somewhere outdoors and eating our first ice cream cones. I will go braless and shoeless. 🙂 Yay for the end of spring!
What are you up to? What’s May like in your corner of the world? (I know that Down Under, life is just getting into the swing of routine – quite the opposite to us Northern Types.) I’d love to hear from you!
Email: Thanks Anne for sharing!
Julie-
When my 16 year old daughter showed me this earlier today I HAD to send it to you so you could be encouraged – BRAVE WRITER works!! (But you already knew that.) All those lessons that were erratically joined together after I would sit and read the directions a few minutes before administering- All the “Quick we are going to do a 10 minute FREEWRITE†so I could try to get organized as to what we were doing that day- They are PROOF that Brave Writer really does work. All we have to do is “JUST BEGIN…†anywhere.
After I read this article my daughter showed me I got excited and very, very encouraged. Funny, I had been nagging her to start a BLOG thinking this would get her writing… Meanwhile, she is using her MY SPACE to do just that. Sometimes (most of the time) we just need to get out of the way of LIFE and let our kids LIVE IT and share it.
Thanks for helping me see that what my kids have to say is important and for encouraging me to tell them that what they say is important.
Annette Tyrrell
Elyria, Ohio
Monday, March 03, 2008
The Worst Event In Human History
You probably don’t notice it, don’t load it, and don’t care. Yes, I am talking about the dishwasher. Well ours broke, and in a family of 6 who never use the same cup twice, this is no light thing. We kids called it “The First Day of the Dark Ages.”
At first we just stood there, staring at the white lid smudged with finger prints and peanut butter. When we opened it, there was a puddle of water in the bottom that just seemed to say, “Good Luck Now!!” I recall tearing up, not of sadness, but of fear. A million things went through my head. I hated LOADING the dishwasher, and now I would have to wash all the dishes by hand? Now I’m not just talking about pots and pans—I’m talking about plates, cups, bowls and yes, silverware. I could just see it, one by one by one: washing and rinsing and drying. It was horrible, but we had to do it.
“What were you thinking,” you might ask, “when at the end of the day, you faced that mountain of dirty dishes two feet high and stretching the span of the counter?” Then you looked at the helpless dish rag, lying limp on the counter and you knew it just wasn’t capable of doing this job. Well… we went out and bought some ammo: heavy duty soap, scrubby pads and even a steal threaded rag. We knew it would be tough, but we were a tough family.
Our first mission was to decide who would wash when. Of course nobody spoke up, too frightened to say a word. All we knew was that we had to begin, just begin, and hopefully it would all work out. I remember that first time, soap up to my elbows, hands wrinkled and pruned and the front of my shirt soaking wet. But, as the days passed, it got easier. I began to develop strategies and methods for washing and rinsing. I even had a preference of dish soap. I also began to love this time of solitude—not having to worry about anything (except how to get off the burned lasagna). I could just exist, just me and the dishes. But this was not always the case.
Now, when it’s just one person, it’s easy because they can do it how they want to and nobody else cares. But when you have two or more people, that’s different. I am a very controlling person and when someone tells me that I should do the mugs, then the utensils, I get grouchy. One opinion that I am unflinchingly rigid on is “the soak.” That phrase is non-existent in my vocabulary. I do not “soak.” I believe there is nothing that I can’t get off NOW. In fact, I enjoy incredibly stuck-on food. I consider it a challenge for which I am always well-prepared. It just takes the right combination of rag/scrubber, cleaning solution, and raw muscle power. It’s simple: I’m a beast at the sink. So…I guess…it’s not SO bad; maybe not the worst event in human history.
Friday Freewrite: Meddle much?
What is the best way to treat meddlesome people?
