Addiction
Cell phones have joined cars and computers, in my mind. You can't live with them, and you can't live without them.
I saw an article recently, which I quote here:
Women college students spend an average of 10 hours a day on their cellphones and men college students spend nearly eight, with excessive use posing potential risks for academic performance, according to a Baylor University study on cellphone activity published in the Journal of Behavioral Addictions . . . . The study notes that approximately 60 percent of college students admit they may be addicted to their cell phone, and some indicated they get agitated when it is not in sight . . . . Of the top activities, respondents overall reported spending the most time texting (an average of 94.6 minutes a day), followed by sending emails (48.5 minutes), checking Facebook (38.6 minutes), surfing the Internet (34.4 minutes) and listening to their iPods (26.9 minutes)."
I guess the behaviors I see among our kids are not that unusual. But they are disturbing.
Balloons
Last August, we attended the national competition for hot air balloons, held in Longview, Texas. The entire event took place early in the morning, beginning about 6 am and completely finishing by 9 am. Speed is not the objective, but rather the handling of the balloon. It was quite a sight to see over 70 balloons clear the trees behind us and fly in to do their maneuvers:
Gingko Trees
I haven't been too partial to gingko trees in the past. The leaves follow the main boughs rather than spreading out on smaller branches and twigs like most other trees. This year, however, I have revised my opinion of this tree. The weather conditions over our summer and fall have led to the most gorgeous yellow color in almost all the gingko trees I've seen. Spectacularly beautiful! They are really incredible.
Health Issues
I've noticed that older people talk about their health a lot (or lack there-of). Feel free to skip this blog post, because I'm showing my age!
About ten years ago, I tripped on a step and fell on my face, hitting another step very hard. Fortunately, the second step missed my eye, or I would have broken the eye socket bones, or worse. The main result was terrible bruising, and I resembled a raccoon for several weeks.
About a year later, we adopted five of our children, and I've been tired ever since. Everyone always assumed it was just overwork, but about two years ago I went through a sleep study and discovered that I'm on the verge of having sleep apnea. An exam by an ENT determined that my 2004 fall had broken my septum, greatly reducing my breathing ability.
For the next two years, I took decongestants every night, which helped me sleep much better. But the permanent fix recommended by the ENT was surgery to straighten the septum and allow normal breathing. With the busyness of our lives, elective surgery took a back seat for a very long time.
In the meantime, during the last two years, I've continued to fall about once a month. Not a good thing! The falls are related to issues with my back which cause nerve damage in my foot. When you don't lift your foot high enough, it catches on things and down you go! Then the falls start compounding on themselves. In one of them, I hit my head and had a mild concussion, which has caused mild vertigo for several months. The ensuing lack of balance leads to more falls.
Side effects from the constant use of decongestants finally pushed me to have the nose surgery last August. It was unpleasant, but not painful, and I have been sleeping much, much better. In addition, starting on the day of my surgery, the vertigo was gone! I could hardly wait for the surgical followup with the ENT to ask him about the vertigo. You should have seen him grin when I explained about my concussion and vertigo, of which he was previously unaware.
My concussion had caused Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV), in which tiny calcium stones in the inner ear are not in the correct place. He explained that during my nose surgery, he has to lower my head quite a bit (after the anesthesia takes effect, luckily). The position of the head for the surgery is the same as a procedure he does to fix vertigo (Epley procedure or Semont maneuver).
Without even knowing it, the doctor had cured my vertigo. I think it made his day!
Fall
Sunlight glints on the leaves as they take flight in the breeze. It's almost like falling snow, except with a beautiful golden color. I've come to love autumn in Chicago and consider it the best season here. The trees blaze in their red, yellow, and orange hues, each more different than the next. Temperatures are mild, and the dry, moderate weather is a wonderful break between the heat of summer and the frigid cold of winter. It's taken a long time for this Texan to switch allegiance from spring to fall, but after eighteen years in Chicago the time has come.
A School Assignment from Peter
Whale watch is a game that lifts you up to see the true kindness that you have within you. You have to balance the board on a beam. The beam is like your parents who lift you up to guide you in all your troubles and to balance your troubles with good deeds. Sometimes your head gets hit by acorns. That means that sometimes your friends are going to make bad choices and bonk you on the head to follow them, but your parents will pull you back, but not always succeed. On the whale beam, you have to use nice words to tell people where to go on the Whale Watch. Your other family members will lead you to be kind and thoughtful of others and more respectful of your friends and neighbors.
A Different Halloween
When the kids were younger, I planned four weekends of preparation for the big holiday:
-decorating the house and yard
-carving jack-o-lanterns
-planning costumes
-completing costumes
Now that five of the kids are teenagers or older, their interest in Halloween is much less intense. But 11-year-old Peter asks me almost every day about some aspect of the holiday. His solitary experience is substantially different than his siblings, for whom Halloween was definitely a group affair.
A few days ago, Peter brought me this recipe for "Halloween Stew." I believe it is his own creation. Sounds yummy (!).
6 cups of Ginger ale.
2 bags of gummi worms.
Five (5) scoops of surbert Ice cream.
hard shell® chocolate surup.
2 Oreges.
1 can of Peaches.
2 1/4 spoonfulls of sugur.
Music With the Youth
Last night, a small group of musicians gathered for the first rehearsal of a youth-oriented song. "10,000 Reasons" is popular with the high schoolers at our church who attended a servant event last summer in Wisconsin.
Among last night's musicians was Sarah on piano and David on violin. Thought you'd enjoy the photos:
Popcorn Lady
Three of my children attend a parochial high school, so I've been volunteering in the concession stand during football games. The customer service can get very hectic, especially at half-time, so I chose a job that’s on the calmer side: popcorn.
It’s essential to make the popcorn in advance, since the process takes 10-15 minutes, and no customer would wait for it. After the popping stops, you fill paper bags with popcorn and leave them warming in the popcorn maker.
So far, no one else has offered to do popcorn, probably since the way to make the popcorn is not obvious or intuitive. All the better for me—I get my first choice of a job, and it’s somewhat quiet. That’s a rarity in my life. I did, however, get a bad burn last week. From the customer line, Peter yelled out, “Hey, Mom!” When I turned to acknowledge him, my finger brushed against the cooking popcorn kettle. Ouch!
Kaffeetrinken
Jonathan and I developed a wonderful habit during the time we lived in Germany--
Kaffeetrinken. It's not just about the coffee or the sweets, but the whole concept of taking time to enjoy each other's company. One of Jonathan's colleagues is spending the school year in Croatia as a visiting Fulbright professor. Here is an excerpt from her blog:
Drinking coffee in Croatia structures the rhythm of the day. It is an art form and a way of living that requires a full stop, not a brief pause or “break.” People talk, debate, laugh, and listen. They think, read, and write while drinking coffee. They contemplate the coffee and the moment. Devoting an hour or more a day to drinking coffee is not a luxury, it is a requirement in Croatian society.
Exercise
One of the women’s organizations at our church gives regular cash gifts to staff members. I enjoy this immensely because this money goes for personal items, not family ones. With the most recent gift, I bought a new, fancier pedometer to track my exercise.
One recent morning, while making lunches before school, I walked 1,100 steps, which is half a mile. And all before 7:30 am! I’m getting more exercise than I thought!
The Tomato Dance
Since I usually get my tomato plants into the ground quite late, it's imperative to keep them producing as late into the fall as possible. So yesterday when snow flurries appeared, I got concerned that the final harvest was imminent.
We watched the weather report all day, and I considered draping the plants with sheets. But finally, after a busy day of allergy shots, a football game, and a church hayride, all I could do was fall into bed and hope that the tomato plants would be ok.
Whew! The temperature this morning was 41 degrees. And the rest of the week is forecast above freezing, so the tomatoes have another week of production to come!
Gentle Hazing
Recently, both Rachel and Sarah have started their first jobs. Rachel works at a clothing store in a Chicago-area mall, while Sarah is employed at the Dunkin' Donuts store a block from our house.
Yesterday was Sarah's first day of actual work rather than training. Her two older brothers strolled over to buy some fancy coffees. And one of them made it the most difficult order he could think of!
