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The Subtle Art of Friday

Happy Friday, readers! Happy Favorite Things Friday!! What a great Friday we have here, with anticipating Thanksgiving right around the corner. Fortunately, our two older sons will be coming home, so all six of us will be enjoying our holiday together. This makes me feel extremely grateful. In other good news, Ralphie, our Labrador-who-is-quite-unhappily-and-totally-against-his-will-on-a-diet lost 11 pounds in two months. (much better than I did) His diet is clearly working! Ralphie still has about 10 pounds to go, and he still tries sneaking the other fur babies’ food every chance that he gets, but he is looking healthier and trimmer every single day. We are so proud of our Ralphie! While not trimming much off of any of my own body fat, I did trim 17,000 emails out of my inbox yesterday (and that is honestly, an understatement). I never bothered to delete emails for quite some time and then I started getting warnings from Google that I was running out of storage. I hemmed and I hawed but I finally just hit the delete button and I trashed 17,000 emails. Honestly, once I got past my nervousness, it felt incredible liberating and freeing. If only cleaning out my closets and drawers could be this easy!

Yes, I notice that I am quite chatty today. What can I say? It’s my favorite day of the week. Here is what you really came for, my three favorites for this Friday. Please check out more favorites in my previous Friday posts and please share some of your own favorites in my Comments section:

LitezAll COB LED magnifier – I’ve reached the age where magnifiers are easily in my top ten favorite things category, all of the time, and this is the best magnifying glass which I have ever owned. Why is this one so great, you ask? Because it is huge, lightweight, and because it has three bright LED lights that shine on whatever you are trying to see. And what’s even better, it’s cheap. I got mine at Ace Hardware but you can order one from Walmart or Amazon, as well.

n:p beautiful volumizing dry shampoo – Even when my hair is perfectly clean, I use this stuff. I love how full it makes my (honestly, kind of thin and fine) hair seem to be. In the words of my mentee (5th grader), “I want fluffy hair, like yours.” (What can I say? I grew up in the eighties.) Seriously, when you apply this dry shampoo, it sounds like you are taking a blow torch to your head, but the results are terrific (if you like fluffy hair, like mine). And even better, it doesn’t flake, like a lot of dry shampoos have the tendency to do.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson – This book is really good, but it is not for the person who blanches at the f-word. The f-bomb is used in this book, as often as the word “the” is used in my blog. It’s a fun, light read with the key message “to lighten the F%ck up!”. The book was honestly recommended to me by my 17-year-old daughter, who had the book recommended to her, by one of her best friends, who was given the book to read, from her own father. (We love this friend and her family. I think that my daughter’s friend’s father knows that our girls are a tad high-strung and a little over-achieving at times, to the point that it crosses over to slightly unhealthy. At first when my daughter told me about this, I was like, WTF?!?, but after starting to read the book, I was like, “F@ck yeah!”) Here is an excerpt:

“Then, as we grow older and enter middle age, something else begins to change. Our energy level drops. Our identity solidifies. We know who we are and we accept ourselves, including some of the parts we aren’t thrilled about. And in a strange way this is liberating. We no longer need to give a f@ck about everything.”

Happy Friday Friends!! Only give a f@ck about the stuff that matters! Thanksgiving is great time to ponder what really matters to you. See you tomorrow!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday – Funday

(credit: scootergonscoot Twitter)

I think that there is no other time of year than around Halloween, that you see everyone’s creativity come out more vividly than ever. Fall is certainly a colorful time of year, isn’t it? I love it! Here’s hoping for a fun and wonderful and easy-going week for all of us!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Monday – Funday

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

(credit: Rex Masters, Twitter)

Good morning! Happy Monday! (Let’s try not to make that statement an oxymoron in real life.) I hope that you have a lot of good things on your experience menu, for this upcoming week. You are the chief chef. Make it delicious! If all else fails, just add garlic. It’s the cure-all for everything.

Top 100 Quotes About Garlic: Famous Quotes & Sayings About Garlic

Monday Fun-Day

During our recent vacation, our wonderful pet sitter/dog trainer was kind enough to send us pictures of our fabulous fur babies, while we were away. This is her picture of Josie, our collie:

This is the picture that she sent to us of Ralphie, our yellow Dudley Labrador:

And this is the picture that she texted to us, of Trip, our Boykin spaniel who doesn’t really care for anyone but us:

“Progress, not perfection.” This is our mantra, for the rest of our week, friends. Let’s make it a good one!

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Let’s Have Fun!

I’ve touched on this topic earlier this month in the blog, in a post entitled “Unstuck”, but I think the theme bears repeating. We need to have more fun. We need to allow ourselves to have fun, even before everything gets “done.” Because everything that needs to get “done” will never, ever be completely finished. I once read that we are all going to die with our inboxes full. Facts.

Last night, I was out to eat with some of my dearest friends (first time in long, long while) and we were all discussing this matter of allowing ourselves to have more lightness, and joy, and fun. Instead of resenting others for having their own fun, we have to take over the reins and make sure that we are putting enough leisure and relaxation into our own schedules. Unfortunately, around the time of this particular discussion, the evening got cut short, as one of my friends got an intense, scary and sudden case of indigestion. This put us all into a frantic tizzy. Fully realizing that we aren’t anywhere near our twenties anymore, we didn’t do the old, “roll her over on her side, kiss her on the cheek, tell her that she’ll be fine, and head back out for a nightcap” routine. Instead, we all camped out at her house, stared at her frantically, questioning her about her symptoms every six seconds, reassuring each other that we didn’t need to head to the ER, because at our ages, indigestion can sometimes mimic heart issues. (I am sure that my friend was more than ready for us to leave her alone, when we all finally felt reassured that she was fine, and bid her adieu for the evening. Thankfully, my friend feels much better this morning, kindly answering all of our frantic, thinly veiled “good morning” texts.)

It struck me that this incident actually put an exclamation point on our discussion which we had been having about allowing ourselves to have more fun. Lately, my aging has come into much more acute focus for me. I turned fifty in December. In these last few years, I have witnessed some of my more elderly relatives and friends, suffer some very serious health issues. If I am lucky, and I take good care of myself, I may have about 30-40 more years to really experience the free, exciting fullness of life. I don’t have any time to waste. Do I really want 90-95% of that time left in my life to be spent making sure all of the solemn chores, duties, and responsibilities are “done”? Does perhaps merrymaking and entertainment deserve a little bit more than a mere 5-10 percent of my daily life?

My friend, the one who is thankfully feeling better this morning, texted that the author, Glennon Doyle, was on Good Morning America today, promoting her podcasts. She said that her next podcast will be on the topic of “Fun.” Glennon Doyle said that so many of us are juggling so many different roles in our lives, trying to keep the machine of our lives fully functioning, that we are forgetting to add the element of “fun and enjoyment” to the equation, which really is what keeps the machine of our lives, all greased up.

Earlier this morning I was reading an article about “cave syndrome”, which is the name given to the new phenomenon of people being afraid to re-enter society and normalcy, after what we have gone through this past year with the pandemic, despite being fully vaccinated and well. “Cave Syndrome” seems to be a subset of agoraphobia, not based on rational thinking, but instead, it is a form of being stuck in our fears and our past trauma. And a fair amount of people seem to be suffering from it. Yikes. Cave Syndrome does not bode well for free-wheeling fun.

I read a quote this morning by Larry Eisenberg that says this: “For peace of mind, we need to resign as general manager of the Universe.” I think a lot of us need this reminder, especially us women. A lot of us have the tendency to take on a lot of other people’s worries, duties, responsibilities, feelings, etc. to the detriment of ourselves, and to the detriment of others, and to the detriment of our relationships with ourselves and with others. We aren’t the general manager of the Universe. Some Being who is much more powerful and omniscient than us, has faithfully got the wheel. And that Some Being really enjoys experiencing, and seeing us at frolic and play, the most, out of all of everything that we do.

Don't forget that you always have choices in life-even the choice to have FUN and ENJOY LIFE! | Quotes about having fun, Time flies quotes, Best quotes

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Unstuck

I was reading an article about how, as we climb out of this pandemic, we are realizing just how out of practice we are on things that used to be a regular part of our lives. The woman writing the article was talking about having to learn how to walk around in high heels again. I could totally relate. Wearing heels to the graduation celebrations last weekend felt very precarious, almost like walking on a tight rope. It’s funny to think that I used to not be able to walk in flats, without looking like a duck. It’s time to dust off the wedges.

Lately I’ve been contemplating a lot about how a deep level of heavy, heady seriousness has taken over our collective lives, since the pandemic started. Everything that we do feels more hushed, more judged, more precise, more responsible and thought out. I miss spontaneity. I miss lightness. I miss spontaneous, light fun! It occurred to me that I am going to have to reteach myself how to do this. I am going to have to teach myself again, that it is okay and wonderful, to just have fun and lots of it. It’s okay to swim back up to the surface and to be buoyant. It’s okay to float. The storm is subsiding. It’s good to look around to see all of the survivors. We all have to remember to smile again, and maybe even to playfully splash each other, as we all drift safely to the shore. I think we have to remind ourselves that life is mostly meant to be savored and enjoyed.

25 Powerful & Inspiring Quotes to Share with Your Daughter

Are you passing on love or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Friday Shenanigans

Are you passing on love, or are you passing on pain? Heal your pain and pass on love.

Hi! Welcome to the best day of the week!! Fridays are light and airy here at Adulting – Second Half. On Fridays, I only discuss that tactile, sensory stuff that makes life fun to live! On Favorite Things Friday, I list three favorite products, songs, books, movies, etc. and I strongly encourage you to add your favorite things to my Comments section. I’m a lady who likes a lot of stuff (I’m relatively easy to please, and I’m usually game to try), but even I run out of ideas, having done this “Friday – full of favorites” post for a few years now.

Yesterday, we were about 45 minutes away from our home, in a different town, for one of my daughter’s tennis matches. My husband suggested that we stop off at their Trader Joe’s grocery store after the match, since we don’t have one nearby to us. My son had been going on and on about their Scandinavian Swimmers (Joe’s answer to Swedish fish) and I think that ever since that, my husband has been on a quest to get himself some, too. Now, I haven’t been to Trader Joe’s in years, so I too, was thrilled with the prospect of shopping there. I love novelty, especially in food!

I felt a little excitedly overwhelmed when we entered the store, not wanting to miss out on anything, so I looked up articles on “must buys” at Trader Joe’s. I cannot personally vouch for any of these items, because we just bought them last night and I have not tried any of them yet, but due to rave reviews, here are three things that I made sure were in our cart to buy, and then to try. Please let me know your Trader Joe’s favorites.

Three best sellers at Trader Joe’s which we purchased but I have no description to give because I haven’t tried them yet:

Trader Joe’s Mandarin Orange Chicken (bake and serve)

Trader Joe’s Everything But the Bagel seasoning blend (it’s a spice)

Trader Joe’s Creamy Cauliflower and Jalapeño dip (it’s a dip . . . obviously)

Have a wonderful weekend, friends!! This weekend was a little long in coming, in seems, at least for our household. May health and blessings abound for all of us! I’ll end with some funny Tweets, collected about shopping at Trader Joe’s:

“You think jumping out of an airplane is dangerous? Pfft…try going to Trader Joe’s when you’re starving to death.” – Stacey (Twitter)

“I was so close to fighting someone at Trader Joe’s just now but instead, I bought their snowflake-shaped pasta to calm down.” – Ella (Twitter)

“Trader Joe’s feels like if Jimmy Buffett were a grocery store.” – Sammy Rhodes (Twitter)

“We could go to Trader Joe’s – that’d be fun!” a glimpse into my social life” – Noah Sebastian (Twitter) I totally relate, Noah.

Monday Fun-Day

~repinning because all of my older lady friends at work tell me this... it comes with age!

Sadly, I think that this was really me, most of my life. I just worry about it less now. Monday, Fun-Day friends!! According to scientists, play is important for adults because it helps to relieve stress, it helps to improve brain function, play stimulates creativity, it is good for relationships and finally, playing keeps you feeling young and energetic. Don’t forget to add some play into your day!!