Vignettes

   I guess my posts are a series of short, graceful (?) literary sketches. (Yeah, right.  That's what my thesaurus calls vignettes. . . short, graceful literary sketches.)

 Each subject is usually something I've thought about for a while, but with not enough information to fill up one complete post.  Sometimes they come upon me, as I write.    Some are more interesting than others.

  But I've never gotten into the habit of writing on only one subject.  I suppose I could write a couple of paragraphs and post it, and then do the same again and post it, and again.  But that seems like a worthless idea that takes up too much time.  It's much easier to just keep on writing.

  If you remember, once upon a time, I decided to try essays.   Once I wrote about the need for Cursive Writing - and once for -  Scamming Senior Citizens.  (That was when I remembered the value of a thesaurus.)

 I wanted to learn some more about essay writing, so I googled  different ways to approach it.  One approach said, always begin your writing with a title.  Okay.  I did it that way.  I thought of a title.  Then I did some exploring of the subject matter.  It was fun to write notes.  I DID try it a couple of times but I just didn't particularly enjoy it. I guess I just don't have enough subject matter to keep me busy.  I was going to say brain matter, but whatever.   I may try it again some time, though, if something tempts me.  One never knows.

My  Cursive Writing Post:

 I enjoyed that because I felt strongly about it. That of course is the secret to success.  Find something you believe in and write about it..

 A couple of days ago I found in an article in our newspaper about Florida and Common Core, which is  the nation-wide  educational guidelines that so many states have adopted and  found "lacking". Common Core didn't think cursive writing was necessary,  so they left it out.  They didn't include it.

Florida adopted the Common Core, but want to make it more user friendly for Floridians.  So, among other things, they're thinking about adding fourth and fifth grade standards for Cursive writing.  Yea! Add one more state possibly joining the Cursive Writing Team!.

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There are nights when I find sleep eluding me.  As hard as I try, I can't get to sleep.  I can either lie awake or get up and read.  So at 1:30 the other night, I did just that.  I got on my robe, and went into the living room/lanai with my kindle and settled in my chair for an hour's worth of reading.  John Grisham's Sycamore Rowe.  If you haven't read it, I can highly recommend it.  You Kindle readers - it's only $6.49 and on the bestseller list - How different the prices are from a couple of years ago!  Even last year.  It would have cost twice that much and I would have been very annoyed, and waited to read it.   It was like waiting for the paperback copy of a hardcover book to come to the stores, but worse. 

Well, while I was reading, I happened to look up at the door and saw my brother Bob's face in the glass door.  He was grinning and shining his flashlight on his face to let me know who it was so I wouldn't be scared.  He had seen my light on and was concerned that there was something wrong.  He's a late-night person.  Enjoys puttering around, watching tv, etc.  It was not my usual habit to be up at that hour. That's not me at all.

 It made me smile, however, to see him do that, because it reminded me of when we were children.  My three and one-half year older brother would do that to scare/tease  me at night after we'd go to sleep. ) He'd creep to my door, shine the light on his face and say it was the Boogey Man.  Of course I always knew who it was, but as a younger sister, I'd always come through and be completely annoyed, frustrated,  and yell and scream for mommy or daddy.

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Bob came by yesterday morning to see if he could borrow some Little Cesar's dog food from us.  He was out, and would go shopping that afternoon.   (Martini and Gracie use the same food.)  So when he came back at 5:00 for cocktails, he brought two bones for Martini and Gracie, a big bottle of wine, and some cheese. We had a very good cocktail hour.   It was fun to watch the two dogs - I don't think  sharing is found very often in the animal kingdom. They loved teasing each other.  They even growled a bit.  Just like two siblings.  They were always after one bone.  But, after a while they tired of this and decided to each enjoy their own treasure.

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So - we have an invitation to see Lue when she's visiting her  daughter and son-in-law, Gayle and Arthur, in March on Sanibel Island.   They have a new condo there.  That'll be wonderful to be there and  see them all. 

 Bill and Epril said they'd take care of Gracie when we go to Sanibel Island. They love her and always make a fuss over her.  Sanibel is just a half hour further down the road so we can drop her off on the way.  We talked about it with them last night. . .

Bill and Epril stopped by last night just in time for a beer. They were on their way home from Tampa where they'd been getting Epril's Green Card taken care of, and her passport stamped.  Tampa is the closest place they can go for such problems. It's an all-day event because it's several hours from Punta Gorda,.

 It was good they could stop here part way in Venice and tell us all about their day.  They looked really nice - all dressed up. Now, in April, they can go to the Philippines for her sister's wedding and come back here without any problem. They had been worried.  What a relief! We all went out to dinner in Englewood, and then they continued on  home from there. 

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Saw Vincent's picture of the Science Fair on Facebook yesterday.  He looked so proud.  I hope to get in touch with him this weekend so I hear first hand about it all.  Paul worked with him on it during Christmas Vacation. 

If I remember correctly, and I may have some of my facts wrong:

Vincent's second grade science project was: He wanted to show that by putting a toy car on different inclines, would cause it to crash.   Vincent built a ramp with Paul's help. That's down Paul's alley - he loves things like that. Vincent could change the incline, and he kept a chart of height of the ramp each time and the length the car would roll.  And when it would crash. We all took pictures.  Brenda and I spent about an hour that night getting the 8 pictures off the computer.  Thanks Brenda!