Sophie's Story

While we were in Door County we stopped at a bookstore that we both like. As I browsed through the shelves I found a book by James Lipton titled "Inside Inside". I like the show 'Inside the Actor's Studio', because I'm curious about people. In that show the guests talk about how they came to their profession, their past, what motivates them, etc. It ends with ten questions that the guest has to answer. That is my favourite part. The questions make great Table Topics if you are in Toastmasters and great ice breakers if you are not. I'm not so fond of James Lipton. He does a good job in the show and does his homework on each guest,but I've always thought of him as a name dropping, self important ninny. I leafed through a few pages and decided that I would buy it. Chapters two and three are about the Method, which I think is a way actors to prepare for their roles and acting teachers he has had. I was interested in this. My step-daughter, Carri...

When I bought my dulcimer I also bought a book on how to play it. One of the things I decided to do was to learn to read music. Actually, that's not true. I already know how to read music, but not very well. I've had two years of piano lessons and played viola for about eight years in high school and college. I did learn how to read music during that time. Reading music is not easy for me. I have trouble connecting the note on the page with the note on the piano of the fingering on the viola. It is much easier for me to play by ear. I can listen to a song or part a few times and play it. That is how I got by. I'm not sure any of my teachers ever realised what I was doing. I imagine that this difficulty connecting the printed note to the sound is a lot like dyslexic people having trouble connecting words on a page to the sound a word makes or what an object is. It gives me a certain amount of sympathy for others. I don't have to learn to read music. There are many musici...

We came back from Door County last night. It is a six hour drive or so and we make two or three stops along the way. We stopped in Green Bay for lunch at Curly's Pub located in the Lambeau Field complex. I am a Packer fan and it just wouldn't be right to drive by Green Bay without stopping. We also stop at a small cheese factory 20 miles away from Shawano to stock up on cheese. The best cheese can be found at small cheese factories all over Wisconsin. There are none nearby here so I have to stock up. It did occur to me that at least in the fall winter and early spring, I could have it shipped to me. As much fun as we had on our trip, I am glad to be home. Towards the end of the week I begin to tire of restaurant food and driving from place to place. I like to get up early and have coffee with the innkeeper before the other guests come down for breakfast. I tend to lose track of how much coffee I drink and by Thursday my stomach lets me know this. (It doesn't help that i...

As you already know, my husband and I are vacationing in Door County Wisconsin. We've been coming here to the same place the same week of each year since 2004. We stay at the same place each year. It's been a good week. On Monday we spent the morning in in Peninsula State Park. It is a nice park mostly wooded with a few beaches that I imagine get a lot of use over the summer. We like to hike around in the woods. There are a few scenic overlooks in the park. One of them is from Eagle Tower. We've been walking past Eagle Tower for a few years now. I know it has a great view from the top and every year I climb the tower part way and then get nervous. I'm afraid of heights. I'm all right in airplanes and tall buildings, but there's something about things like towers and Ferris wheels that makes my stomach feel funny. This year, to celebrate my 40th birthday, I was going to climb all the way to the top. No matter what. The first few levels were all right. I...

My husband needed a few new shirts to wear. His warm mock necks were all worn and I refused to let him wear them when we went on vacation. The day before we left we hit Kohl's to do a little shopping. As long as we were there I decided to look for a few things for myself. I got a nice sweater and jacket set for my birthday and wanted to find a black skirt to go with it. I decided a new pair of jeans wouldn't hurt either. I found a few things, picked out my usual size and went into the dressing room to try them on. They were too loose. I was in shock. Too loose. I've been exercising, doing some things with weights, but that was more because I wanted to tone up. I know that the exercise was helping me and I feel better when I do it, but I didn't think that I had lost any weight. I wasn't trying to lose weight. Every time I did try to lose weight I never did so I just gave up. I couldn't ignore the fact that I had the same size that I'd been for the last ...

I saw a store in the Mall of America once called Successories. The front window had prints with pictures of things on them and a motivational caption. An example is a picture of an eagle flying. Underneath it says "Dare to Soar" "Your attitude almost always determines your altitude in life" There's Determination, Diversity, Synergy and so on. Each has its own picture and saying. Bleach. I've never liked motivational things or speakers for that matter. Everyone gets all pumped up and goes out ready to make changes. Then reality hits and it's just like it was before. There is a parody of Successories called Despair, Inc. Same concept, but the messages are not uplifting. My favorite one is failure. It's a picture of a dejected runner sitting on a bench with his head in hands. Underneath it says "Failure, When your best just isn't good enough" I was thinking about that the other day when my husband told me that Carrie, my stepdaughter ...

Now that we have the elliptical in the basement, I've been getting up around 5:30 in the morning to exercise. I go downstairs with my glass of water. (Hydration is very important, you know.) After turning on the lights I turn on the TV. I don't really like watching TV, there are only two shows that I watch on a regular basis. (CBS Sunday morning and MASH reruns) It would be a lot harder to work on the elliptical if I didn't have something to watch or listen to. Fortunately, we have cable. The cable provider we use has Music Choice. Music Choice is a bunch of channels each featuring different kinds of music along with pictures. There's a 70s channel, a few kinds of jazz,classical,dance etc. There are no commercials. Along with the sound are pictures, sometimes of the performers and little facts about the performer of the song being played at the time. I like it a lot. The channel I set it to when I work out is channel 438 Singers and Swing. Singers and Swing is a combi...

I think I'm coming down with something. I can always tell when a cold is coming on because it starts one of two ways either uncontrollable sneezing or a dry,raw,sore throat that doesn't go away no matter how much water I drink. My husband and I differ on how we each handle a cold. He lays around and doesn't do much because he is sick and he can't. I, on the other hand, try to ignore the cold and do what ever I do normally. I've been like that since high school. When I was in high school I usually had three hours of homework every night. I never wanted to stay home when I was sick because if I did I'd get behind and I was afraid I wouldn't be able to catch up. Once I got out of college and started my first job the habit continued. You'd think that, as a pharmacist, I'd know better and stay home when sick to prevent spreading anything to my customers. The problem was that although I did have sick time, I couldn't use it. If I called in sick, it mea...