Games Part 2 by Bonnie Le Hamilton

 

Last week, when Konnie mentioned game night with her kids, it made me wish I lived closer to her. Especially when she mentioned the old board games she has, which her kids don’t want to play.

Considering that one of those board games is one I wish I owned, I WANT TO PLAY!

I think I have duplicates of some of her old games, but I know I don’t have Careers, and I sorely wish I did. It’s so old, it’s really hard to come by nowadays. And I pray Konnie still has that game the next time I manage to get down there for a visit.

And I can think of a few games I have that she probably doesn’t have, but it does little good when I live so far away.

I honestly wish I had someone nearby I could play games with.

Anyone willing to come by? I’ve got a whole trunk full of games. Loads of games. The oldest ones I can think of would be Monopoly, Life, and Mouse Trap, but I have quite a few others. I even have one based on Star Trek TNG, and several different trivia games.

And that barely scratches the surface. I have so many games I’ve had to take them out of their boxes and put them in zip lock bags so I could get all of them in the tote I store them in. And it is still overflowing.

I’d get a larger tote, but where would I put it?

You must remember I have several other collections as well, and this isn’t exactly a mansion I live in.

Okay, it is a two-bedroom, but I could easily fill one room with just my books, or my Nativities, or my Barbies. Note I said, “Or,” not, “And.” At present, my Barbies are tucked away in four totes of graduated sizes.

I can say that my Barbie inventory is up to date, which is something I cannot say about my games, books, or Nativities.

At least I have started an inventory on the books, give me a break!

Nativities are going to be hardest to inventory. I honestly think I’m going to have to go through my house and take close-up pictures of each individual one to have an accurate inventory.

Books and games are easy; I just need to list the names.

Barbies are a little harder since I need their names, age group, and family group. But, like I said, that inventory is up to date; my aide helped me do that last week.

And inventorying my games would be a whole lot easier than an inventory of my books, because all my games are in one place, not just about every room, and well, I have started the inventory of my books, so I have to keep going back to figure out which ones I already have so I don’t write them in twice.

The only page that is current in my book inventory is the page listing my Boxcar Children books. When I started the inventory, I only had the first fifteen books; now I have all nineteen, which were actually written by Gertrude Chandler Warner. And that is all the ones I want from that list. The rest of the books drive me nuts because they don’t adhere to the timeline established in the first nineteen books, most particularly the fact that the kids get older with each book.

Okay, yeah, I am a stickler for details, explaining why I hate most of the Harry Potter movies because of how far they deviate from the books. I particularly hate those stupid shrunken heads! They are not in the books!

Enough said on that subject.

Those books are great, I love the detail, I love the storylines. Well, written. I have read and reread them several times apiece. I’d rather reread the whole series than watch any of the movies past the second or third one. And I do have all the movies.

Which reminds me of something else I need an inventory of. At least they are all in one corner of the living room.

It wouldn’t hurt to get an inventory of my CDs and records as well.

Yes, someone with a lot of collections needs lots of inventories. I really should get all those done.

On the writing front, I am still buried in reading. I keep thinking about yet another story I know I have, but haven’t read in a while, and well, so far, I have managed to find the stories I’m thinking about.

Maybe when I finish this most recent one, I’ll start writing again.

Anyway, happy writing, everyone!

Of Family Togetherness and Making Choices by Konnie Enos

I live with my husband and two of our five children. Being all adults, we have drifted into being more like roommates. We live in the same place, but don’t spend much time together, not even for family meals.

Part of the issue is we all eat at different times. For dinner it is usually just me, him, and our daughter. Our son usually wakes up for the day an hour or two later. If he is awake, it isn’t unusual for him to dish up and go back to his room to continue whatever he is doing.

Recently, to counteract this separation, we’ve been attempting to have both family game night and family movie night.

Movie night is sort of easy. Me, my son and daughter discuss our options and choose what the three of us would like to watch. Then we decide on a time when we are all home and awake.

All home is the easy part since we are most often here. We do leave the house, but our schedule is rather routine, just work (husband), doctor’s appointments, shopping, and church. All awake is the big issue because our son is often awake while the rest of us are sleeping. He has to plan several days in advance to switch it up so that he is awake at an appropriate time for everyone else.

For movie night we’ve chosen after church on Sunday but before dinner. Which is early for my son but fits in everyone’s schedule. Picking what to watch is harder. Personally, I’d go older movies, the ones I watched growing up, but I also like some newer things too. And there is always the fact that I love Star Trek and Star Wars. My kids all have different tastes, and my son (the one still living here) does not like Star Wars. My daughter ( also the one still living here) does like Harry Potter but is not the huge fan her big sister is. That and my son and I aren’t really fans, though I will watch them.

All this is to say that there was some discussion before we manage to agree on anything. So far we’ve watched two of the newer versions of Star Trek.

My kids weren’t sure I’d watch them because they are remakes, and I generally hate remakes. They are never as good. But the newer movies are not technically remakes. They are a remake of an old story. The new Star Trek movies are set in an alternate timeline, much like the original series episode Mirror, Mirror. I rather enjoy watching the interactions of the “original” characters in this new timeline.

My kids have now chosen the original Star Trek moving and I think we well be working our way through them in order. I’m not exactly sure what we will move onto when we have finished them all but there are a lot of them, so it’ll take a while.

Though one drawback is that while my husband does watch, he simply cannot follow the story. So far he’s ended up disturbing out enjoyment by asking questions about what is happening in the movie. Last time we ended up pausing the movie and I chewed him out because I could not hear the movie if he was talking.

My children, being neurodiverse, are sound sensitive therefore the volume is keep barely audible for a normal person like me. My husband, who can’t follow it anyway, can barely hear it with his hearing aids on.

One would think game night would be easier, but it isn’t. The biggest issue is that my husband will not generally play games, which presents the issue of what board games are fun with just three people playing. (We do have several two people games, but that leaves out one person.) And that’s not getting into the issue of what we each like to play. That has been a bigger discussion than what to watch.

I want board games, but my kids are opposed the ones I have, as in the type of games I grew up with. Though my daughter’s biggest objection to Monopoly is that it’s time consuming.

Our first attempt was playing a couple of rounds of Clue. My son likes to keep his score card on tech and talked my daughter and I into it. I gave up halfway through the first round and went and found a pencil. Three is barely enough to make Clue fun.

This last time, we settled on Uno, partly because my husband has played that. Wouldn’t you know it, he ghosted us soon as we mentioned playing. (He hid in our bedroom.)

I’m not sure what we’ll do next time, but I’m holding out for Apples to Apples. My husband might be clueless, but he’ll play it.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

 

Of Authors and Reading by Bonnie Le Hamilton

 

The other day, I started thinking about a story I knew I had, but couldn’t remember the title, and I wanted to re-read it. About all I could remember was that I had it on my reader, and of course, it was a romance. Really helpful considering the long list of romance novels I have. At least I had it limited to just my reader.

Well, I also had it limited to not Brenda Minton, Linda Goodnight, or LDS romance, which did shorten the list, but still not helpful.

I ended up going through my list of romance novels, scanning each one and opening any I couldn’t remember what they were about to see if they were the one I wanted.

The problem is that I skimmed past the title of “Jenna’s Cowboy” several times because Brenda Minton has a book (a really good book, by the way) about a young lady named Jenna and her own cowboy. Whose title I have clearly forgotten, but I do know the story.

Anyway, about the third or fourth time I skimmed past this title, it dawned on me that my Brenda Minton “Jenna” story was not on my reader, but rather in my bookcase.

That’s right, some of my Brenda Minton books are in hard copy.

So, I finally really looked at the icon for “Jenna’s Cowboy” and lo and behold, the author of this novel is Sharon Gillenwater! And when I open the novel, guess what? It’s the story for which I was searching!

But what really got to me was that I stopped in the middle of reading a novel by Linda Goodnight, which had characters by the name of Ace and Chance, to read Sharon Gillenwater’s novel, which had characters by the name of Ace and Chance.

In other words, I have several stories by several different authors using the same character names, which isn’t a problem, except when I read them really close together.

But it did point out why I started thinking about Gillenwater’s story while I was reading Goodnight’s story.

Their themes are completely different. Their characters are completely different, too, but I kept thinking this is wrong. For some reason, I felt I should be reading the novel about the ex-military cowboy with PTSD rather than the recovering alcoholic trying to make amends.

Like I said, completely different themes. Both really good stories, but I found it hard to concentrate on the recovering alcoholic when I was thinking about the PTSD victim, even though the recovering alcoholic is the second book of a series I have started re-reading.

So, basically, I was into the second book of a series when I stopped to re-read a book by an entirely different author, but with some characters of the same name.

Yeah, very confusing.

But I was right, I did have the PTSD story. And it’s excellent and beautifully written. I have no personal experience of PTSD, but I think Gillenwater represented the facts and the experiences of the problem vividly enough for me to understand its implications for the sufferers.

And frankly, I now need to look up whether she has any other books, maybe even see if “Jenna’s Cowboy” is the first in a series. It reads like it might be. And if so, I have another author I like a lot.

Though I also discovered that I have several books on my reader that I don’t think I’ve actually read because nothing about them sounded familiar, so I’m going to have to go back and read them, but after I finish this Linda Goodnight series, I’m on.

And I’m honestly considering digging out that Brenda Minton series, which includes her character named Jenna, who, by the way, is ex-military in her story too, injured even.

All of which has me thinking about, of all things, those cleaning and organizing gurus who insist that once you’ve read a book, you should get rid of it. That you shouldn’t have all those books “cluttering” your house!

My response is, but what if I want to re-read it? What if it’s a book with information I may need again, you know, like a dictionary, thesaurus, or a self-help, all of which I do have. Or maybe a classic, you know, like Shakespeare Unabridged, which I also have among several other classics, including some Agatha Christy and the first nineteen novels of The Boxcar Children.

Does anyone really expect me to get rid of these wonderful books? My apartment would be pretty bare without all these bookcases. Then again, my bookcases also hold Nativities, but those gurus also say to get rid of or cut down on such collections. I won’t be doing that either.

Anyway, happy writing, everyone!

Of Snacks and Tastebuds by Konnie Enos

I have been trying new foods lately, namely focusing on crackers and chips that are supposed to be healthier. In the process, I found From the Ground Up, a company that makes such things utilizing cauliflower as the base rather than flour. Now, I have been choosing to eat a variety of pizza made with a cauliflower crust for some years now, so I thought I’d try them.

There is also several things I knew before I did.

One, as a plant-based food the likelihood of my daughter being able to have them was slim to none. Nuts and soy are plants after all, and even if they weren’t in them, cross-contamination is also a thing. (Though, after inspecting the label, it would seem this company is more allergy friendly than most.)

Two, my husband would eat them no matter what. Whenever I find a food, especially an expensive one, that is friendly to my dietary restrictions he will also want to consume it. It’s annoying but I don’t complain much because it comes in handy when I find out that the new food is unpalatable to me. He’ll still eat it.

Three, my son will not even attempt to try them from the moment I tell him that they are made from vegetables. Although he has had a piece or two of my cauliflower-based pizza and he knows that’s what its made of. To be fair, he was desperate for food and my already cooked pizza was handy. That and he doesn’t find the taste to be that off-putting.

Knowing he will eat my pizza on occasion and wanting to get him to eat more vegetables because a diet of carbohydrates and protein isn’t healthy, I have offered him a taste of these new snacks. Knowing how he feels about vegetables, I don’t mention the cauliflower until after he has tasted them. He usually doesn’t like them anyway.

Now, the other day I got a new flavor of cauliflower crackers. These happen to look very similar to Cheez It’s. When he saw what they looked like he wanted some. I gave him one to try and to my surprise he liked it. Even more surprising, he took a whole box to his room even after I explained what they were made of.

As he grabbed the box he said, “I can have some, right?”

I, rather astonished, told him I wasn’t going to prevent him from eating vegetables.

Five minutes later he brought the box back.

“What happened? Do you not like them after all?”

He said something about the aftertaste and handed it back to me.

That would have been the end of the subject, but my husband saw the crackers and wanted some while he took off to someplace he needed to go. I was reluctant to let him have the bag I had out and already opened, and I asked him how much he needed.

He said he’d eat about half of what was there. I would have preferred giving him some in another bag but reluctantly let him have them as he was in a hurry to leave. He returned a few hours later with the bag barely touched with the same complaint.

So, I have apparently found a snack food that I do not have to hide from my husband. And yes, we have to hide food from him because he will eat it all, even when it’s the really expensive allergy-free stuff our daughter gets. (We’ve had to chew him out more than once about getting into her food, but now we have him trained to stay out of her cupboard.)

Yes, the taste is very different than Cheez It’s, but I like it. So, I will probably buy more since I don’t have to hide them.

Just to be clear. Yes, I hide food from my husband. His eating foods I can’t have or don’t like is one thing. But consuming the last of the snacks I love and an enjoy is another one altogether. So yes, I have been hiding food from him.

Though so far I have only been able to successfully hide one snack. But it is the most important snack to hide. Chocolate. Namely dark chocolate. My latest find is 70% cocoa Dove dark chocolate squares. Seriously delicious.

The 70% or higher cocoa is healthy, in moderation. The size of each piece is perfect too. Not too small, but also not so large that it is a sugar laden no-no. And just one is the melt in your mouth perfection that can completely satisfy your craving all on it’s own. It takes effort to limit myself to just two a day, they are that good.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

 

Mistaken Identities by Bonnie Le Hamilton

This past week, I came across a social media post asking identical twins about something embarrassing that happened simply because they are identical.

Of course, this interested me greatly since I am, after all, an identical twin, but I found myself reminiscing when it came to one of the stories in that post.

In the story, a guy told of a time his twin brother praised a certain restaurant for having great service and excellent food, so the guy decided to take his wife there.

During the evening, he found the food was indeed excellent, but the service was cold and even hostile, until ruckus laughter broke out near the front door, then his twin and said twin’s wife came around the corner! It seems the staff thought he was cheating on his wife when he wasn’t his twin at all.

Boy, did that bring back memories, though it didn’t involve a restaurant. In our case, it involved a grocery store. This was at least a couple of decades ago, but at one point we lived within a mile of each other in the city of Idaho Falls, Idaho, which is the closest geographically we’d lived to each other since we were attending the same college in 1983.

As a consequence of living so close, we shopped at the same grocery store.

Now let’s set the scene, I have mentioned before how different our husbands are in size, but you add the differences between our children, and I would have thought any sane person would conclude we were two different people. I mean, really, I was married four years before Konnie got married, and my oldest son turned two within weeks of Konnie’s wedding. Not only that, but he also had a much taller daddy, so he wasn’t petite like his oldest cousin. Who, by the way, was born when I was like five months along with my second son.

Then you need to consider that Konnie, at the time, had three daughters while I had two boys and three daughters. And not only was my oldest boy obviously older than her oldest, but well, there was less than nine months between her second oldest daughter and my oldest daughter, and her youngest daughter was still an infant when my twins were born.

Needless to say, the math on the possibility of one woman having all those kids just doesn’t work, so I honestly couldn’t see how anyone could get us confused, after all our father was at that point telling us apart by our husbands and children!

So, anyway, one day I ran to the store alone, just to pick up a gallon of milk. When I got to the register, the salesclerk commented, “Forget something?”

Which, in and of itself, was odd, since they normally ask if the customer found everything they needed. I was confused by the statement, but pointed out that it was the first time I’d been to the store that day.

The salesclerk insisted I’d been through her line less than an hour before my milk run.

It took a couple of minutes to convince her I hadn’t been in the store earlier, and I finally managed it by pointing out I was not dressed the way the woman she’d seen almost an hour earlier had been attired. I knew that was so, despite not having seen Konnie that day, because we haven’t had anything identical in our separate wardrobes since our late teens.

Once I convinced her I wasn’t Konnie, she loudly announced to her coworkers, “It’s not a woman leading a double life! There’s two of them!”

To reinforce that newfound knowledge, Konnie and I coordinated our next shopping trip to go together, which was an experience and a half, because we are talking eight kids and two sets of identical twins.

It would have been more fun if our husbands had been there, but oh well.

I can remember once when my twins were still infants, going to Walmart together and turning heads. In fact, one little kid pointed toward my double stroller and said, “Mom! Look! Twins!”

The mom glanced back at our entourage and replied, "More than one set.”

Yeah, we turn a lot of heads when we go to the store together.

Anytime we go someplace together, we turn heads, such is the lot of identical twins. I think the last time we went shopping together was a few years ago when she came here to attend a writing conference with me.

We went to the store I usually shop at, Konnie faithfully following me around the store, both of us using a mobility cart. It was hilarious watching all those people doing all those double-takes.

Anyway, happy writing, everyone.