Lately

So horrible

'Massive traffic homicide investigation': 8 dead, dozens hospitalized in Ocala bus crash

My condolences to their loved ones. And no, to answer the question, their legal status means nothing. They have families. They were on their way to work, like any of us. They should never have had such a tragedy happen.

This made me cry. But they're right, so right.

Haven't done this in awhile

From Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, Book II, number III.

Do soul, do; abuse and contemn thyself; yet a while and the time for thee to respect thyself will be at an end. Every man's happiness depends from himself, but behold thy life is almost at an end while affording thyself no respect, thou dost make thy happiness to consist in the souls, and conceits, of others.

In other words, you grant the power to external validation, not to the internal, which is most important. Your opinion of yourself, your self-esteem, is more important than the thoughts and opinions of others. I have such a hard time with this. Recently I had a review where someone who barely knew me made some terribly incorrect assumptions about my motivation and ability to do my work, which was very disheartening, and it made me feel very bad about myself. Or, rather, it was the trigger, but I made myself feel bad. I felt useless like I'd wasted 27 years of investment in my workplace for nothing.

But we have power over that and only that. No one has the right to really expect their opinion to make or shape you, and more importantly, you should never give control of your life over to someone else, because no one can truly know you as you know yourself, at least if you've tried to gain some insight into your life. Right?

I got a lot done this weekend

 

My favourite MadTV sketch

I really don't like SUVs, unless you have a Land Rover on safari.

A strange heirloom

My stepmother recently sent me something from my great-grandparents' farm that my dad had and I love it. It was always in their living room. It has been put in a place of honour on my bookcase headboard on my bed. 🙂 Behold, the Duncan family ceramic frog!

This child could have been me

Although I do have evidence I could hula hoop at some point. At one point someone I knew who is a graphic designer made it a Yule card cover:

A decent day

Today I was off work. I had a great PT appointment, took friend to the doctor, and went to the dentist who fixed a broken tooth in addition to the teeth cleaning. She figured out why it was breaking (another tooth was too high and was going up against it when I ate). She took that one down and they essentially did a filling with the correct colour on my front tooth which has now chipped in the same place four times. So I have a smile again.😃Plus it was nice to get away from work, with its week of Mondays, or so it has seemed, for a day.

This is so me

So this morning my physical therapist [who is 6'4"] and I were talking about height differences in setting up the table I'm using [I've apparently lost a bit of height, as last time I was measured, by my orthopaedist, I was 5'3", so it's a significant difference), as well as my difficulty feeling the movements of my lower shoulder blades when trying to do my exercises. This led to a discussion of my short arms and he mentioned Tyrannosaurus arms [which a friend also teases me about]. He asked me if I'd ever seen 'Meet the Robinsons' (which I haven't) and showed me this clip, which I found hilarious, although I should probably be a bit offended. I love the dinosaur waving around his tiny arms.

Love this...

A bluesey-Bluegrass version of the classic

My therapist, who is a musician, shared this with me.

My view on things

Hmmm....okay, I'm finally weighing in on this. Although I am not Jewish, I did minor in Judaic Studies, took classes on the Arab-Israeli conflict, get news from a variety of sources, am trained to evaluate them, and at least tangentially know people impacted by the attacks on October 7th and beyond. Don't get me wrong, I'm very much for peace in this conflict. But this, along with a lot of videos showing protesters who don't actually know what their goals are and can't explain them when pressed, make me wonder what this is really all about Also, I'm sorry, saying the university should feed the protesters as one story reported? I'm pretty sure the anti-Vietnam protesters brought their own snacks. My point is that it is not wrong to protest injustice-peacefully-it should be protested, but know what you're protesting and don't be entitled gets parroting someone else's agenda, or destroying property, trespassing, or making threats against other people. Yes, the political situation is horrible. No, there should not be a sort of apartheid in Israel. The response to the terror attacks should have targeted Hamas as much as possible, not civilians. But I don't understand women's groups who support terrorists who use rape as a weapon in a society that would oppress them, or gays marching when they are considered abominations in that culture. The protesters (on both sides) are often ill-informed, they're believing a lot of disinformation, they're not thinking critically, and some of them are downright bigoted. Which is sad, particularly the 'best and brightest' at Ivy League and other prominent schools, which have failed them in their education. That's my opinion, anyway.

NYC says half of those arrested at 2 pro-Palestinian campus protests were not students

A bit vulgar, but essentially true