October 29, 2008 at 7:12 pm (better health, good things)
Tags: body, health, mind, relax, stress
Relaxing is a funny thing. We all say we want to relax more, but then we say we don’t know how to relax.
I don’t think its so much we don’t know how to relax, I think we don’t allow ourselves the time to relax. No one can’t relax in five minutes in front of the TV. We can’t do it while sitting at a red light.
We need to make time each day to do something we really enjoy. Read a book, work in the yard, paint a picture. It doesn’t matter what we do to relax. It only matters that we are doing something that makes us release the stress of the day and allows our body and mind to relax.
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October 29, 2008 at 1:25 pm (general)
Tags: conservation, energy, lifestyle, save, time change
The clock that is. Unless you’ve been under a rock or out of the country you know that once again almost all of us here in the USA will change our clocks again this weekend.
The questions is, why? Supposeably the answer is to save energy. The problem with that answer is that most of the data the supports the fact that clock changing saves energy is from the mid seventies.
Again unless you’ve been under a rock for the last 30 years, your lifestyle has probably changed since the mid seventies. In fact there is some evidence from the state of Indiana, actually gathered this century, that all is clock changing is actually costing more energy.
And apparently Arizona and Hawaii along with most of the US territories don’t care about energy because they don’t change their clocks, ever.
So is the idea of energy conservation just a ploy for the government to mess with our clocks and sleep schedules twice a year? It could be. I’d at least like to see a new study.
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October 28, 2008 at 1:00 pm (Cost of green)
Tags: energy, green, jobs, water
The cost of “green” will actually be a series of posts. I’m not sure how many there will be yet, because I am still doing research.
There are many simple things that we can do in our individual lives to be a little greener that actually saves us money.
But when we start to talk about big things like energy independence and water issues then yes there will be an up front costs, mostly to build the infrastructure. There will also be hundreds of jobs in all sorts of sectors, both short term and and for years to come.
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October 27, 2008 at 10:59 pm (Mother Nature)
Tags: energy, high rises, nature, song birds
I have never understood why all the lights stay on in those big city downtown high rises. Even if every light was a low watt CFL it seems like a huge waste of energy to me.
I read something the other day that made the wasted energy argument seem trivial.
Those city lights are killing migrating song birds each year. According to the article, the birds navigate by starts at night, and all those lights get them more than a little mixed up. Once that happens they get lost in the “canyons” of high rises and actually fly into the buildings and die.
Some large cities are dimming the lights on their building during high migration times. I just wonder why they can’t dim them all the time. It would save birds and energy.
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October 27, 2008 at 12:47 pm (good things, money savings)
Tags: air leeks, energy audit, windows, winter
With winter just around the corner I decided to do an energy audit the other day. I was pretty pleased with the results.
We live in a old house, it was built in 1925. Our windows are original to house with storm windows added on to most of them.
A simple trick to check for leaks around windows and doors is to take a lit candle or incense stick around them on a windy day to see if the flame or smoke gets blown around.
I used a candle and was kind of surprised that the flame did not flicker around some of the windows without the added storm windows. I knew for sure that it would flicker around the back door, but again it did not.
I’m going to try this simple audit again on the next windy day just to make sure, but I feel better knowing that our home seems to be air tight.
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October 26, 2008 at 3:27 pm (better health, good things)
Tags: cold, health, herbs, sleep, tea
Friday afternoon a cold hit me like a ton of bricks. At 4:45pm I was fine. At 5pm I know I was sick.
I was still at work and would be for a couple of hours. All I wanted to do was sleep, but instead I rummaged through my food drawer in my desk and found some tea. That helped with the sore throat until I could leave.
When I hit the door at home, the first thing I did was make another cup of tea, with lemon, honey and a splash of whiskey.
I did take some OTC cold medicine to help dry of the runny nose. Traditional medicine isn’t my first choice, but I don’t refuse to take any either.
I slept 11 hours Friday night. I slept off and on all day Saturday, in between cups of tea and things to eat. I slept 10 hours Saturday night.
It is now Sunday morning and I feel almost normal. No runny nose, no sore throat, no cold. A 24 hour cold is a record for me. Is it the herbs I take to help the immune system, was it the yoga that I do regularly, was it all the tea I drank, was it all the sleep I got. Who knows and who cares. I feel so much better and so much more rested.
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October 25, 2008 at 11:45 pm (general)
Tags: food, free, rice
This is just a reminder to log onto www.freerice.com very day and play for a few minutes. It’s good for you, good for others and fun. Go play a little bit right now.
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October 24, 2008 at 1:05 pm (better health)
Tags: family, health, stress, women, work
Even the best juggler can’t keep all the balls in the air 24/7 without dropping one every now and then. So why do we try so hard. And by “we” I mean women. For some reason men don’t seem to care so much. Maybe they are smarter, who knew?
For years I tried keeping all the balls in the air. I was a mother, wife, department manager at work, president of a State wide organization and oh yea a piano player at church (no joke). I was also tired, grumpy, physically sick and felt like I wasn’t doing enough.
Then the balls started falling. Probably the best thing that ever happened to me. I stopped playing the piano for church (my God will forgive me, because she’s female and gets it), I finished my commitment to the organization but didn’t start another and learned to delegate to people that worked for me. I got to know my daughter and enjoy evenings out with my husband.
I’m a lot less grumpy and tired, hardly ever physically sick and I know I’m doing more than enough.
No one can do it all and no one should feel like they even have to try. Slow down. Smell the roses, hug the people you love and tell them you love and leave for tomorrow or the next day all you can.
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October 23, 2008 at 10:09 pm (health ideas)
Tags: exercise, fitness, health, yoga
I really don’t like to exercise. I was the kid in grade school that did almost anything to get out of PE including writing my own excuse notes (sorry mom). After Junior High I didn’t have to worry about PE because I had major knee surgery when I was 13. My doctor wrote me an excuse note that covered me until I graduated. My idea of heaven.
Now that I’m 45 I realize that I need to do some type of exercise. I’m not really out of shape, I garden all summer and walk a lot each day, but there is that occasional morning stiffness that lasts until 3pm.
Last winter I got involved in yoga, and guess what, I love it. It’s something I can do at home on my own schedule without hundreds of dollars invested in equipment and clothes. I can spend 5 minutes in the morning stretching or 20 in the evening doing core exercises or both.
No I can’t get my foot behind my head or balance on one arm, but I am more limber. And most important it is something that I’m willing to do at least a couple of times each week. I may even keep it up until I’m 83, or older.
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Relaxing is a funny thing. We all say we want to relax more, but then we say we don’t know how to relax. 
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October 22, 2008 at 11:33 pm (general)
Tags: comments
I really did get a comment about my blog on pet food. It came from www.k9confections.com. I can’t figure out what I did wrong, but it’s not showing up in the comments. So I’ll put it in the blogroll. It might be something that you’d like to check out for your own dogs.
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