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Quote [18 Jun 2003|04:39am] "The time to relax is when you don't have time for it." — Sydney Harris comment

To Be A Kid Again... [14 Jun 2003|04:10pm] [ mood | jubilant ] To be a kid again: - Dot all your "i"s with smiley faces. - Sing into your hairbrush. - Grow a milk mustache. - Read the funnies; throw the rest of the paper away. - Dunk your cookies. - Step carefully over sidewalk cracks. - Try to get someone to trade you a better sandwich. - Give someone a hug around the neck. - Blow the wrapper off a straw. - Refuse to eat crusts. - Make a face the next time somebody tells you "No." - Ask "Why?" a lot. - Have someone read you a story. - Wear your favorite shirt with your favorite pants even if they don't match. - Eat dessert first. - Say "duh" when stuff is obvious. - Put an orange slice in your mouth, peel side out, and smile at people. - Innocently say your prayers. - Ride a roller coaster two times in a row. - Run through the sprinkler with all your clothes on. - Lick all the cream out of an Oreo before you eat the cookie part. - Eat just the chocolate stripe out of your Neapolitan ice cream. - Start thinking now about what you want for your next birthday. - Lie on your back in a field and look at pictures in the clouds. (Author unknown) comment

Fact [24 May 2003|08:13pm] [ mood | relaxed ] "No day is so bad that it can't be made better with a nap." — Carrie Snow comment

"Hang spring-cleaning!" [20 May 2003|04:35pm] I'm on vacation at Lake Tahoe, where it is beautiful and quiet and spring-y and bright. On the way up, we stopped and walked along the edge of a creek, and then drove for a while past a rushing river with snow on the banks. I squealed with glee. I love snow, but haven't seen any for nearly 20 years. We stopped by a small drift so I could touch it and I was so happy. So now we are here and it's wonderful, and while reading on the deck of this little cabin at the edge of the water, this passage made me go, "Hmmm, yes..." :) "The Mole had been working very hard all the morning, spring-cleaning his little home. First with brooms, then with dusters; then on ladders and steps and chairs, with a brush and a pail of whitewash; till he had dust in his throat and eyes, and splashes of whitewash all over his black fur, and an aching back and weary arms. Spring was moving in the air above and in the earth below and around him, penetrating even his dark and lowly little house with its spirit of divine discontent and longing. It was small wonder, then, that he suddenly flung down his brush on the floor, said, 'Bother!' and 'O blow!' and also 'Hang spring-cleaning!' and bolted out of the house without even waiting to put on his coat. Something up above was calling him imperiously, and he made for the steep little tunnel which answered in his case to the gravelled carriage-drive owned by animals whose residences are nearer to the sun and air. So he scraped and scratched and scrabbled and scrooged, and then he scrooged again and scrabbled and scratched and scraped, working busily with his little paws and muttering to himself, 'Up we go! Up we go!' till at last, pop! his snout came out into the sunlight, and he found himself rolling in the warm grass of the great meadow. "'This is fine!' he said to himself. 'This is better than whitewashing!' The sunshine struck hot on his fur, soft breezes caressed his heated brow, and after the seclusion of the cellerage he had lived in so long the carol of happy birds fell on his dulled hearing almost like a shout. Jumping off all his four legs at once, in the joy of living and the delight of spring without its cleaning, he pursued his way across the meadow till he reached the hedge on the further side. "'Hold up!' said an elderly rabbit at the gap. 'Sixpence for the privilege of passing by the private road!' He was bowled over in an instant by the impatient and contemptuous Mole, who trotted along the side of the hedge chaffing the other rabbits as they peeped hurriedly from their holes to see what the row was about. 'Onion-sauce! Onion-sauce!' he remarked jeeringly, and was gone before they could think of a thoroughly satisfactory reply. Then they all started grumbling at each other. "How stupid you are! Why didn't you tell him——' 'Well why didn't you say——' 'You might have reminded him——' and so on, in the usual way; but, of course, it was then much too late, as is always the case. "It all seemed too good to be true. Hither and thither through the meadows he rambled busily, along the hedgerows, across the copses, finding everywhere birds building, flowers budding, leaves thrusting — everything happy, and progressive, and occupied. And instead of having an uneasy conscience pricking him and whispering 'Whitewash!' he somehow could only feel how jolly it was to be the only idle dog among all these busy citizens. After all, the best part of a holiday is perhaps not so much to be resting yourself, as to see all the other fellows busy working. "He thought his happiness complete when, as he meandered aimlessly along, suddenly he stood by the edge of a full-fed river. Never in his life had he seen a river before — this sleek, sinuous, full-bodied animal, chasing and chuckling, gripping things with a gurgle and leaving them with a laugh, to fling itself on fresh playmates that shook themselves free, and were caught and held again. All as a-shake and a-shiver — glints and gleams and sparkles, rustle and swirl, chatter and bubble. The Mole was bewitched, entranced, fascinated. By the side of the river he trotted as one trots, when very small, by the side of a man who holds one spellbound by exciting stories; and when tired at last, he sat on the bank, while the river still chattered on to him, a babbling procession of the best stories in the world, sent from the heart of the earth to be told at last to the insatiable sea." (Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows) comment

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