Susan's Scribblings the Blog

Monthly Archives: March 2015

• Holy Holiday! It Must Be Easter!

  Posted at 3:22 am by kayewer, on March 29, 2015

  Every year I watch “The Ten Commandments” on ABC, which has been a tradition every Easter weekend (this year it airs Easter Sunday night). This year, there are a bunch of other religious themed movies coming out at about the same time, including “The Dove Keepers,” “Killing Jesus” and “A.D.”

  If you watch television religiously, this is the year to do so.

  Religious television and movies involve a lot of guesswork, close attention to political correctness and biblical accuracy, and a good cast of well-known actors. Producers Mark Burnett and Roma Downey have pretty much cornered the prime time holy programming on other networks. For the Big Three network crowd, ABC keeps Charlton Heston on the air once a year (mostly because the one year they tried to take the movie out of play, the uprising from the people was so loud, they had to comply). People who watch these productions are more nit-picky than Harry Potter fans, so they have to do it in a timely manner and get it right. The Bible provides the script, and a few nervous screenwriters try their best to modernize the adaptations to suit the current viewing audience.

  So far I’ve not seen Roma Downey in anything since “Touched By an Angel,” but I’m sure her performance in “The Dove Keepers” will be right up there and true to form. She is a great actor and knows her genre.

  Unfortunately I’m not into all the epics and serial shows, so I’ll stick to watching Yul Brynner get his comeuppance for a few hours. Sure, it ends the same: as do they all. But once a year, it’s nice to have one thing that is true and trustworthy and is older than I am, like a good movie or holy traditions which allowed me to walk this earth in the first place.

  Bring on the spectacle.

  Like Loading...
  Posted in Uncategorized | 0 Comments

• Recently Spotted

  Posted at 2:28 am by kayewer, on March 22, 2015

  I am wearing one of my favorite tops, which has managed to survive plenty of abuse over the years. I bought it about 20 years ago. Some fashionistas would clutch their pearls at that, but classic clothes that are well made last a long time.

  It’s a warm Lands’ End(R) long sleeve tunic that stretches and snaps back with ease, hides my weight highs and lows and forgives the most wretched stains from Italian food to hoagie oils. I haven’t found them listed in the Lands’ End catalogue for years, so this is one of those times I wished I had bought one in more than one color.

  I hear pearls being rubbed between fingers like rosary beads again.

  Some people are known to discard entire wardrobes at season’s end and buy new clothes the following year, even if they are still rather fresh off the rack. I’m clutching my pearls. . . of wisdom. Imagine if your favorite comic characters changed their clothes every year: who would recognize Charlie Brown in anything but that shirt with the zigzag pattern on it, or Curtis without his hat?

  I keep spot treatment items at work for emergencies, and in a contact center where food is a constant resource it’s a must. Today we have spot remover pens and cloths to remove the most stubborn stains from clothes, and they all advise to not wear the item while treating the stain. Gee, if the stuff to treat the spot is that potent, I can imagine what’s in the food! Is hoagie oil that complex that it takes a science lab to produce something to degrease it and lift it from my favorite top?

  Maybe I just need to wear a lobster bib with my favorite top.

  Like Loading...
  Posted in Uncategorized | 0 Comments

• A Bit Testy

  Posted at 3:16 am by kayewer, on March 15, 2015

  When I went to school, we learned reading and writing, science and social studies, math and arts and crafts. Sometimes we would receive something called the Iowa tests, which measured how well we learned the basics. We didn’t have “test prep.” We studied what we had reviewed in daily classes to take a quiz, which consisted of questions our teacher carefully selected from the material. If we paid attention and absorbed the keys to unlocking the mysteries of the subjects at hand, we could easily pass a quiz.

  So what is with all this test prep malarkey, anyway?

  It seems there is a test called PARCC (Partnership for Assessment for Readiness for College and Careers) which is causing a lot of uproar about measuring student knowledge. A commercial running now on many networks features a father whose first grade son comes home in tears and too tired to go to karate classes because he spent the day in school doing test prep. I always thought karate taught about staying focused and alert, but maybe I’m wrong.

  Folks, everyday classroom studies are what should constitute test prep. What are teachers doing with students all day now, learning some catechism of preliminarily leaked practice questions (or perhaps the actual questions)? When I went to school, if you learned what 2 + 2 was, a test which asked what 3 + 1 equaled didn’t faze anybody. We’re not supposed to know the test before we take it. That stacks the deck in favor of the administrators, whose only agenda may be to answer to some bigger fish who only wants to see a successful lie.

  Of course, statistics show that many students are graduating high school unprepared for the rigors of college and the job market, where grammar and math knowledge are necessary tools. In fact, I just noticed on the website for PARCC that a prominent sentence appeared thus: “Try out a paper practice tests.” If the people at PARCC don’t know the phrase should be either “try out practice tests” or “try a practice test,” there is little hope that this measurement of human knowledge will amount to much of anything.

  Like Loading...
  Posted in Uncategorized | 0 Comments

• All You Shouldn’t Eat

  Posted at 3:00 am by kayewer, on March 1, 2015

  I sometimes hate human beings, and I am one. We are a mentally messed-up lot when it comes to the basics of humanity such as manners, conscience and common sense. If it weren’t for our occasional moments when we act like donkey’s cabooses, we wouldn’t have anything to talk about at the gossip fence. I guess it’s social media now, though I can’t imagine Snuffy Smith’s wife Loweezy turning to Twitter or Facebook to chat with her friend Enviney (look it up, kids).

  My company wanted to thank all of the contact center personnel for working through the severe weather of the past few weeks, so they arranged for lunch to be delivered. A head count was done and sufficient amounts of food ordered so that each person could get a meal; in our case, a burger or chicken sandwich and chips, and/or some salad. Naturally we over-ordered, but not by too much, since the budget is for the year and we’re just into February. There was sufficient for everybody to get their share.

  The next morning I asked the night shift supervisor how the delivery which came after I left at 5:00 went. He said word got out that somebody tried to lift five burgers, so they had to post somebody in the pantry to make sure everybody got fed.

  A worker had to stand guard duty because one of our own was partaking too much.

  I don’t know about some people, but when a freebie is offered and I don’t think I’ll use it or a friend could use it, I turn it down and let somebody else get one. If there is free food, I’m usually counted in with the gang, so I may grab a slice of pizza, then wait until everybody has had theirs if I want a second. If the count is two per person, that’s all I get. If they bring coffee, I don’t drink it, but I won’t grab four slices of pizza to make up for it. I certainly wouldn’t plan on taking food home that wasn’t mine.

  Some folks, however, feel that some slight in their lives entitles them to more than their fair share to make up for it, as if nourishment which will be feces in the toilet tomorrow will heal a bruised ego today. Life doesn’t work that way. When life hands you lemons, if you don’t like lemonade ask for the water: it’s better for you.

  The office fridges are usually okay for storing your lunch, but occasionally things have disappeared, leaving some poor person hungry and possibly short of money to replace the missing food.

  People who take the basics of life from others are high on my list of the despised of the world. People who pick on other people’s food choices are up there, too. One time somebody went off on me when I introduced them to the concept of scrapple, which is a regional staple. Nobody asked them to eat it, but it’s amazing how a simple topic can turn into a reason for prejudice. It was almost like being back in the high school gym locker room. I survived bullying, so I don’t take that malarkey.

  I wonder who the person was who tried to get five burgers. We all make about the same money, so that shouldn’t figure into it. Maybe they had a tapeworm to feed, or they weigh 500 pounds or 110 pounds with a hyper metabolic rate. Whatever the reason, it’s sad to think that, in an adult workplace among peers, somebody would go to that extreme.

  The staff may not do that again, so we would all suffer for the actions of one in a world where the majority is normally righteous. If the stomach is full and the soul starved, it’s the wrong meal for you.

  Like Loading...
  Posted in Uncategorized | 0 Comments

• Feedback

  	Eden on Getting the Message
  	Eden on The Unasked Questions
  	Eden on And Her Shoes Were #9
  	Eden on The Poison Field
  	Eden on Final Tally