Phalacrophobia and Peladophobia

Right off let me tell you that, unless you are a phobiaphile, neither of those are what you might think they are....

For Christmas my BFFZ gave me a deck of phobia knowledge cards....just in case I should run out of phobias I now have all I need to know about more????

Since the phobia card refers to Dwight D. Eisenhower, I will use him as a clue.

For those of you who have no need of phobias or information about them....here's a pic/clue for you

I don't intend to offend any one by being silly about phobias, but having been a participant in so many of them, I figure I can say what I want. Humor is the cheapest coping tool.

 

 

 

PHALACROPHOBIA IS FEAR OF BALDNESS OR  GOING BALD

 

PELADOPHOBIA IS FEAR OF BALD PEOPLE

 

 

Today is National Popcorn Day and no, right now I do not know if there is a name for fear of popcorn....hold on, I'll go Google that....well I didn't find an official one but some folks at Yahoo Answers had a few suggestions and I ran into a list of REALLY weird ones for us to investigate later.

 

For those of you who have bigger problems today is the feast day of St Ulfid who was apparently martyred by Swedes having destroyed with an ax a statue of the god Thor. 

 

One last note:  If you click your mouse in the fish tank you will give the fishies some food....go try it now.

 





Saturdays by the River

The picture was taken at Bart's, well actually The Beanery, a long time eatery next to the Farmington River. It's a town institution and the present owners are definitely not getting rich from profits and keeping the place open is surely a labor of love. The mural was painted by Jan Dagenhart, (in the black shirt on the right). We were celebrating a visit from our youngest quilting friend, Amanda (black shirt under the red car) who was up from Texas. The rest of the gang are some of the regulars who meet for coffee just about every Saturday morning. 

 When the weather is good we meet outdoors...sometimes at the picnic tables but mostly in lawn chairs that we bring along and set up in the shade of some rather young trees so that we can face the river  and watch the chipmunks scurry in and out of the stone walls.

 

I am not sure exactly when we started doing the regularly. I think it was soon after I started working at the hospital and was required to work every other weekend. After the layoff from Philips, the change to a hospital job was stressful. I was thankful to start a new job immediately as I was too young for Medicare, too old for other group policies, (I was told that since I was older than 64 1/2 no one would sell me a policy) and too cheap to pay COBRA.  The hospital does offer insurance to part timers so I jumped at the job.  Working weekends was nothing new. During all but the last few years we provided a 24/7 service but this being a new job...well it was different.

 

Spending a few relaxing hours each Saturday morning with my friends set the tone for a calmer weekend.



 

 We bring along knitting or hand sewing or projects that might need advice. We plan projects, workshops or the day's errands. We chat with the dog walkers and watch canoes and kayaks and kids poling by on boards. We've had our cars washed and drooled at the aroma of Bear's Barbeque. Most of us don't take the time to just sit down in our own yards. Even if you try, you spot a weed or something annoying to attend to. The phone rings or you just remembered you need to._____
By the river it's just that. Sitting. Enjoying.    No Subjunctive....just the present tense....a place we spend far too little time.

I love these ladies. They are indeed family.  We would drive each other mad should we actually live together, but a kinder, more helpful, creative group need not be wished for. I hope to include some of our activities as we go on here.

And you know what? I have ANOTHER Saturday group that shares history. Some of them made their appearance back when I started writing this in 2011.   More about that great group soon1

Quiltyfish vs Retirement or an Agoraphobe attempts to lose the subjunctive.

It's been nearly 2 years since I posted here. Been spending time on Facebook and Pinterest waffling about retiring and being annoyed about minor insurance silliness. (Silly because no claims are involved and no one so far has been harmed by the inefficiency of what to many is life support)..... Anyway this does appear to be a more appropriate venue for longer posts.

Let's bring you all up to date. The above wall hanging designed by Donna French Collins shows Spike's trip to the beach.  I am Spike. The story is how my career in telemedicine came to an abrupt end.  The truth is, Spike has better color than I do but, unlike Spike, I was not alone when that school of Philips blue piranhas arrived.

I recently listened to a series of TED talks that NPR has combined into a Podcast named Spoken and Unspoken.  If you go to NPR.org you can still listen to it. I was especially intrigued by the section by Phuc Tran, " Does the Subjunctive Have a Dark Side? " This really got to me. If a whole culture can survive without the woulda, coulda, shoulda that keeps many of us awake far too long some nights, why can't I ?

This will all make more sense as time goes on and if it doesn't, well just move on. There's someone out there for us all to follow.

Today I will end with  Caren's Rules of Retirement  So Far

1) Do not go into hermit mode and let the agoraphobia win
2) Do regular community service
3) Organize, clear out or clean something every day
4) Do something fun/creative everyday
5) Eliminate the subjunctive

All that stuff about eating right, regular exercise and flossing come under Rules of Good Health and have no place here right now.