My Funny Bone by Bonnie Le Hamilton

 

My nephew called me the other day and he asked me to tell him a funny story from something I’d written. My response was to say, “Kid, you’re better off asking your mom.”

He simply kept asking me to tell him a funny story from what I’ve written. Giving up, I tried to relay to him my “easy as pie” scene.

This scene is in the middle of one of my finished novels but the setup is this: a group of girls including the heroine, her two young cousins, two sisters of the hero, his nephew, and one of his cousins. The heroine, the older of the two sisters, and cousin are working on sewing and chatting, while her cousin’s and the little sister were playing, the baby nephew was napping. Also, this room is on the third floor.

    Anyway, while they are in there, a man who was trying to usurp power, tried to kick out everyone in that room. (I might point out the mother of the nephew was not in the room.)

Well, the heroine and her friends moved a huge piece of furniture against the door to keep this guy out, but then the hero’s cousin climbed out the window to get help.

That’s the setup.

Once the guy is dealt with and hauled away, the hero and his entire extended family show up to calm down the little ones and just be together as a family, and they asked about the cousin climbing out the window.

She said, “Well there’s a ledge there, and I was able to get to the balcony, easy as pie.”

At this, the hero looks out the window, studies the barely-there ledge then faces the roomful saying, “I take it pie isn’t easy.”

Okay, that’s the extent of my being funny.

Konnie (the mom of said nephew) can write funny scenes, and she does it all the time. And clearly said nephew can because he is the son Konnie wrote about a while back because she’d learned he made up these hilarious tales about a fictional hero and the people around him, which he had claimed was a show he was watching.

But see, the one thing I didn’t get is the family funny bone. While Konnie on the other hand did get it. This would be one way we are different.

Another way we are different is that Konnie has trouble writing from a male POV. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to tell her she has her male characters all wrong.

I promise if she didn’t have me helping her with her male POVs she’d never be able to finish a believable story.

The converse of that is that I have problems with shy or scaredy-cat female characters. Konnie has had occasion to correct me on that.

Strong female characters I’m great at.

Let’s just say I don’t do shy and retiring.

Maybe this difference is that as a kid, my best friend for many years was a male cousin of ours. I played with the boys more than the girls until around the time I hit puberty.

Konnie on the other hand always played with the girls, and for that matter, she used to be very shy. That was never me.

I was the one protecting her.

Though I can remember one time when it was the big brothers of my friend who protected us.

This would have been in like first grade.

We were on the playground, and I noticed Konnie and her friend (the one time her friend was the boy) were surrounded by fifth and sixth graders.

I ran in to protect my sister, my friend run in to protect me, and well, two of her older brothers were also on the playground but another two were on the football field at the junior high next door and all four of these boys came running to defend their baby sister.

Needless to say, the bullies scattered at this point.

I might also point out this was one of the few times I made friends with a girl, not a boy, but in this case, she was a bit of a tomboy since she only had brothers.

I can’t remember anymore, but as far as I recall, she was the youngest and only girl, of five or six kids. And no, they were not redheads!

But like I said, I usually played with the boys back then.

Actually, that year was an anomaly for both of us, since she was the one with a male playmate that year, and I was the one with a female playmate.

Anyway, now I need to get back to work on my sci-fi.

So, happy writing everyone!

The Washing Machine Saga by Konnie Enos

 

One to two years ago I started noticing that my clothes were starting to look old, even taking on a grey tinge. It was some months after I noted this that my daughter insisted we change from a powder detergent to a liquid one.

Why?

Because those family members with a lot of dark clothes were noticing a visible amount of soap residue on their supposedly clean clothes. Liquid detergent couldn’t be leaving that residue.

Ah! That might explain the grey tinge.

It was a few months later that I noticed my clothes were starting to retain some stains, making them look even older with the still present grey tinge. Then my kids started complaining that the agitator wasn’t working. Though, every time I checked it, it worked.

Then Royce started complaining that his clothes and bedding still stank after washing them. (More like Melinda complained.) I put that up to his sweat issues and the fact he didn’t do his laundry often enough.

Then one day I went to put on a supposedly clean nightgown and it smelled and felt like I’d lived in it for a week. None of my pajamas smelled clean.  That’s about when the kids said the agitator had stopped altogether.

Okay, there is a problem.

Solution. New machine.

New problem, well old problem. No money.

Okay, Jerry has a Home Depot card. I checked it for an available balance.

Okay, real problem.

In the process of making sure we had a working toilet in our main bathroom, we’d maxed out his card. I mean I pay on it regularly but there seems to always be something else that needs repairs. That and the money Jerry invests every year to try to raise a garden. (Try being the operative word.)

So I looked at what money I did have.

We are in luck. I’d saved a substantial sum to cover a once-a-year bill and it ended up being less than I’d anticipated. I planned for that to be a “rainy day fund”.

Well, it’s a rainy day. So I investigated getting a new machine.

I went to Home Depot and looked at some models. I even asked an employee to help me find one that would meet our needs. Our biggest one is a large capacity, mostly because the men in our household tend to just dump all their clothes in at once without sorting. (Mostly unnecessary when most everything you own is jeans or dark-colored t-shirts.)

With the employee’s help, Royce and I debated the merits of models with and without the agitator. We finally settled on one, which was on sale, without an agitator. Due to our inability, lacking a truck, to transport a washing machine, I placed an order, with free delivery and set up, plus hauling away the old machine. This was near Christmas so due to the holiday we had a wait a week or so for delivery.

Now here’s the thing about this machine. It is the most expensive appliance I’ve bought ever bought, (our fridge wasn’t quite this much). This thing is full of technology. We don’t even have to select the water level (size of the load) we need because it senses how much is in the tub and fills accordingly.

Now my kids took right to it and figured out how to use it the very first day. Royce even figured out how to connect it to his phone or something. (He can control it from his phone.) Me, it took a bit. The first couple of times I had to have Melinda set it for me. I understand it’s harder to learn new things as you get older, and this grandma isn’t getting any younger.

Of course, one of the first things we noticed was our clothes were smelling clean again.

I don’t know about anybody else, but recently I noticed the stains on my clothes were much less noticeable. So our old machine hadn’t been cleaning anything for quite some time.

The other day, while I was folding my last batch of clean laundry, I realized that the grey tinge was even fading. I contemplated that fact for a few minutes then figured out this rough outline of just how long our old machine had needed to be replaced.

Hopefully, we won’t have another major repair or expense anytime soon because my “rainy day fund” is gone now. Story of my life. I think that’s the only time I ever had such a fund.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

Cats vs Teenagers by Bonnie Le Hamilton

 

I read somewhere recently that having a dog is like having a toddler and having a cat is like having a teenager. And I question that.

For starters, teenagers don’t normally wake you up in the middle of the night demanding attention, but cats, like babies, are quite good at doing that.

And when was the last time a teenager ever curled up in bed with their parents? I can’t roll over in bed most of the time without Patches screeching at me because he was already there.

Now I can see comparing dogs to toddlers, they can make messes and are loud, unlike cats, but let's face it, cats can make messes too. Sometimes navigating my place is hazardous, not just because Patches is underfoot but because of his toys that he leaves all over the place (sound familiar?)

This person was comparing cats to teenagers because they ignore you and do whatever they want, well guess what, whatever they want is leaving their toys all over the place and purposefully knocking your stuff onto the floor. That sounds more like a toddler to me.

When I was a teenager, I didn’t crawl into my parents’ bed in the middle of the night, and I at least knew how to pick up after myself. Cats do curl up in bed with their “parent” and they don’t know how to pick up after themselves, let alone won’t.

Now I know there are teenagers who won’t pick up after themselves, but they should know how to do it, and if they don’t it's their parents’ fault for not teaching them. Try teaching a cat to pick up for themselves. They are incapable of learning that skill.

And yes, dogs are loud, like a toddler, especially when someone shows up at the door, but you can’t tell me cats don’t know when someone is coming. I know better.

Like dogs, they do have a keen sense of hearing and smell. They know when someone is coming.

I’ve had a lot of cats over the years, and I can’t remember a time when a cat of mine didn’t suddenly leave the room moments before someone knocked on my door. Patches certainly hears them coming and I know by his actions he hears them.

I’ve watched him. He’ll suddenly aim for the bedroom but stop in the middle of the living room focused on the front door for a few seconds. If he settles down and relaxes in his place, whoever it was will walk past my kitchen window aiming for the neighbor’s apartment within seconds. If he changes direction and heads out his cat window, he knows and likes whoever is coming, he went out to greet them. If he runs to hide under the bed, someone he doesn’t know is about to knock on my door.

Dogs are noisier about alerting that people are coming, but cats also alert that people are coming, you just need to pay attention to what they are doing.

And another thing, when was the last time a teenager demanded attention when the parent was busy with something important? Patches seems to think me opening my laptop is time for him to jump onto my desk and curl up on my hand if he is in the room at the time. And when was the last time a teenager ever followed their parent all over the house?

If Patches is home, he’s in the room I’m in unless a stranger has arrived, then he’s under my bed. And if I close the bathroom door, he’s somewhere with a view of that door when I come out, promise. And sometimes he stays right at the door, sticking his paw under it and meowing at me. (If that sounds like a teenager to you, you have problems.)

And when I say he’s underfoot, I mean he is underfoot, because he always wants to be right with me. Usually right where I can’t see him down there. At least toddlers are taller than cats.

Personally, the only toddler-like attribute a dog has and a cat doesn’t is being loud. And I’m glad of that because I get enough of loud dogs every time I talk to Konnie on the phone.

There is one other advantage of having a cat over a dog.

Cats don’t need to be walked.

At any rate, that person comparing cats to teenagers, either doesn’t know cats very well or doesn’t know any, because there is no way a cat is like them. I’ve had too many sleep interruptions from Patches to consider him a teen.

But he is enough of a character I really should put him in one of my stories someday.

 Anyway, happy writing everyone!

Appologies by Konnie Enos

 

I'm sorry, but I've been unable to write a post this week because I'm not feeling well (possibly COVID again since I was exposed in the last week or so). This also means that all the homework assignments I should have gotten done yesterday, and are due today, haven't been done yet. So, instead of writing something here, I'm writing my assignments. Hopefully, I'll feel better by next week. 

Women Unite by Bonnie Le Hamilton

 

I have to get this off my chest.

Men need to stop blaming women because we can’t control our hormones once a month, then still insist we women always control the men’s hormones. Because, somehow, men can’t control themselves.

Have you really thought that through?

You ridicule us for not being able to control our hormones, and then expect us to control your hormones? Who was the brainiac who came up with this nonsense? I’m willing to bet it was a man who didn’t want to take responsibility for his own actions.

I once read something on online about a high school student who got in trouble with her teacher because her clavicle was showing, enticing HIM. As in:

Oh no! She had the audacity to show up in class with her the neck of her blouse open wide enough to show off her clavicle! She must have done it just to entice her TEACHER!

How is this girl's attire at fault for his weird proclivities?

Look, I will admit some women use their femininity to entice men, but let’s get real here. They show off their cleavage (you know that spot between their breasts, which is a bit lower than the clavicle) and find reasons to bend over in front of the guy to give him a view of either their cleavage or butt. They also flirt, bat eyelashes, and get all touchy-feely.

But showing off her clavicle?

That’s like people going barefoot and getting in trouble because they attracted some creep with a foot fetish. No one can predict what will attract someone else, and they shouldn't be held accountable for that's person's reaction.

But that is basically what women are being told every day. He attacked, but it’s your fault.

That’s like me accusing my husband of cheating when some woman came on to him.

And yes, women often made subtle passes at my husband, frequently with me right there, they never realized he was with me until I moved forward and said something. I’d address Tom, but in a way to make it clear he was mine, i.e. I was letting them know he’s off-limits. (By the way, I trusted Tom. He had women make passes at him when I wasn’t there, and he’d go home and tell me all about it, in disbelief that it even happened.)

But I have heard of men who got upset at their women for dressing up, acting like the women did it to attract other men. The only problem is those same men will cheat on and/or divorce their women, who let themselves go.

Let’s make this clear, they hate it when their women dress up but also hate it when they don’t dress up, ever. No woman can win with such a fool. Leave him!

I’m so glad Tom wasn’t one of them. But jerks like this do exist. Try to steer clear of them if you can. I know it isn’t easy. These men can be charming. I get it. I’m lucky. I know I married a decent guy, and I miss him every day.

But all this has got me thinking of ways I can put some of those stories into my novels. There was one where the female professor took care of egotistical idiots from taking over her class. And this is how:

Once they started to try and explain things to her, she’d ask them to wait a second so she could get a pen and paper and take notes. She’d get them, but she wouldn’t take any notes. When the male student questioned that, she replied, “When you tell me something a didn’t know, I’ll write it down.”

Way to go! Bravo! Clapping here.

I really want to write a story where I can use this professor. 0r maybe the one where a lady was giving a talk on her subject of expertise and a man in the audience told her she didn’t know the subject, and that she needed to read the works of – well he said the last name of someone who apparently wrote a book on the subject.

In response, she moved her hair off her nametag and silently let the idiot know what a fool he was. She was the author!

Nice job.

Or the female undergrad who overheard a classmate complaining about her wearing sweats to class every day. She responded, “I’m here to get my degree, not turn you on.”

I must use that sometime, in fact, every female author should use some of this clap back in their novels.

Let’s change the tide one book at a time!

Happy writing everyone!

Of New Years and Goals by Konnie Enos

 

Every year, at the start of each new one, we hear a lot about making resolutions. We also hear a great deal about people breaking them within a short time. And that’s not counting all the people who never set these yearly goals.

I got to thinking about why so many people fail at them.

To replace a bad habit with a good one, I've heard that you have to consistently do the good one for two weeks. Yet some people can try for a month or more and still peter out. I’m one of those people who gave up doing them several decades ago because I never lasted very long, and I inevitably went back to my old habits.

I hadn’t even attempted to work on any goals in years, and then I started back to school.

For both my first and second semesters, I had two different classes requiring me to commit to one goal. I did, but both semesters I either never really started on them, petered out before the end, or just dropped them as soon as I reported my efforts to the teacher.

I looked at is why I didn’t continue working on them. I’d had some hope that the approach to goals one of my teachers took this last semester would help me stay on track, but I stopped as soon as the semester ended.

So I examined my goals. While doing so, I realized I always completed one of my goals. One that I generally started working on first thing in the morning. I often forgot the rest until I noticed the day was nearly over. Then I’d scramble to do just enough to count it. I wasn’t making good habits.

The one teacher's approach was to have us first write some statements about what we wanted to become. One example was, “I am becoming kinder.” We had to write three or four such statements.

Then we had to write an accountability contract, saying not only who we were accountable to (reporting our failures and success to) but what would be the punishment for failure. The example was worded as a punishment, but the directions said it could be a reward instead. These contracts also had fine print about our acceptable excuses for not doing a goal on any given day.

Most of my classmates followed the example given and chose punishments for failure. One student used a reward instead. He is a young, very social college kid on campus. He said he could go out with friends if he completed his goals the day before. He even followed through and had to miss out on some fun!

This got me thinking about the young man’s positive reinforcements.

What if I set a reward instead of a punishment?

Assuming I’d yet again have an assignment to set and follow through on a goal. I decided to try the accountability contract again with a reward. And since I could complete things I started in the morning, I figured I’d have to make getting the hardest ones done the first part of my new plans.

With this in mind, I reexamined my goals. Tweaked some of them and added a couple of new ones. I made sure I had daily, weekly and monthly goals. I updated my contract, this time with a reward.

I was concerned about starting them, but my desire to attempt this new plan helped me put in the effort.

Since January 1^st, I’ve been getting up every morning, doing my exercises, and studying my scriptures. Not to mention a few other goals.

I’m carefully tracking which ones I complete each day and, at the end of the day, I can honestly say I’ve earned my reward. Well, mostly, I’m still struggling with one of them, but the rest I’m getting down. One day I couldn’t complete a goal in the morning because of time constants, and I felt weird all day until I could finally fit it in.  

I realize it’s only a little over a week, but it’s starting to look like I might just manage to form some good habits this time.

Did you make any New Year’s resolutions? How are they going? How do you motivate yourself to accomplish them?

Here’s to a happy and prosperous New Year!

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

Winter Driving by Bonnie Le Hamilton

 

Recently, there was a post on Facebook asking for advice on driving in snow.

Konnie’s response was, “Don’t.”

I laughed.

I mean we’re from Idaho!

Of course, I took driver’s ed in high school, in Idaho. While Konnie put off learning to drive until she was serving a mission for our church, in Tennessee,

Yeah, I know how to drive in winter weather, I’d rather not have to if I can get away with it, but I can and do it.

And Konnie has driven in winter too, but she’s spent most of her driving years in Tennessee, Oregon, Washington, and Vegas. All in places that get little if any snow.

Needless to say, Konnie doesn’t have as much experience with driving in the winter. And I avoid the interstate during the winter if I can. Black ice is no fun.

But I have no choice but to drive in this weather. It’s winter here six or more months a year! This reminds me of something that happened to our father soon after we moved to Tacoma back in high school.

A few weeks after we got there, we woke up to find maybe four inches of snow on the ground. If you’re lucky.

So, by our standards, nothing to worry about, it wasn’t even half a foot of snow let alone three or four feet of the stuff! No problem.

Dad left for work, and soon after mine and Konnie’s ride to our early morning religion class arrived. Aside from our ride saying we were lucky they had four-wheel drive because of how DEEP the snow was. When our father got to work, his coworkers weren’t pleased with him.

They had been calling the boss saying they were snowed in when they were driving Jeeps and SUVs, and he told them if Delmar can get to work in his wagon, you can make it.

And well, Delmar did make it in.

And then there was when I lived in Norfolk Virginia.

One time, Tom and I had tickets to the circus. The circus always came to town in February, and for the two previous years, on opening night, snow was predicted. The first time, they predicted only an inch or two. They got more like four.

The next year, they predicted something like four inches. They got closer to a foot of snow during the show, and everyone was stuck at the arena until the streets could be plowed. Over a mere foot of snow!

The next year, when we had tickets for opening night, they predicted we’d get as much as the previous year. Everyone going that night came prepared to spend the night. I decided it might be wise to get there early enough to get underground parking, but other than that we weren’t worried, despite having a baby with us.

On the way from our car to the entrance of the arena, we saw a lot of people with sleeping bags, pillows, and coolers. And when we got in line, everyone was discussing how they prepared to stay the night if need be.

One of the guys looked over our infant and asked Tom what we had available if it snowed.

Tom grinned and said. “My Idaho driver’s license.”

And it did snow that night, no more than a few inches. But when it came time to driving up and out of the underground parking, the company running it had employees there to help push the vehicles up to street level.

Tom watched those guys push a JEEP up to the street, then drove our wagon up there before the guys could get behind us to push.

I looked back; they were dumbfounded.

It wasn’t that much snow! By Idaho standards.

Another time, I had been shopping at the Exchange and it got to be dinnertime. Tom was out to sea, so, instead of waiting until I got home, I took our then only son to the food court to get dinner.

As I sat down, I saw barely even noticeable flakes of snow drifting into the dirt outside the window.

Didn’t bother me, it was melting on contact, meaning the cold ground was too warm. In my Idaho-trained eyes, nothing to worry about.

A minute or two later another patron noticed jumped to his feet, and yelled, “It’s snowing!”

Within seconds, Billy and I were the only customers in the food court.

One of the employees approached me. “Aren’t you going to leave?”

I glanced at the melee in the parking lot, checked my watch, then told the girl, “The roads will be clear in about twenty minutes.”

FYI, I lived a twenty-minute drive away from the Exchange.

BTW, happy birthday today, Jerry! Konnie’s husband.

Happy writing everyone!