My town

Just some random notes about disturbing things that go on in my town:

- There was an armed home invasion by several people including a pregnant woman.

- A 14 year old boy was killed. He recently became a father.

- Statement by cursing guy in library, "They are harassing my girlfriend. If they'd like, she could wup their ass!"

Good book titles...

Well, I only have one that I just saw at the Cumberland County Library:
- I'm on Facebook. Now what?
Perhaps I should read it!?

Destroyer angel, an Anna Pigeon novel (book), by Nevada Barr. The usual elements of an Anna Pigeon novel are here...the great outdoors, the nightime adventures, the threats. I must say that this one was rather more scary than most, quite the page turner. Essentially, it is a battle between four women and the four men who abduct them, as they journey through a forest. Anna is the "wild card". There is a great deal of physical discomfort and damage and general unpleasantness. Let's just say it is quite a "revenge fantasy." One of the women is handicapped and two of the women are teenage girls.

Things that annoy me:
- the sound and the look of people chewing gum
- traffic
- change

I was unnecessarily rude to the woman who answered the phone when I called to complain about my paper not coming this morning. They are trying to have "better" customer service, but it riles me up when I have to answer so many questions each time that I call. I really PREFER to just leave a message. Especially when I have to call one or more times each week. I hate the message that "representatives are assisting other customers". I just don't like the big conglomerate feel of that.

Reasons to go to the beach

Love the deserted beach. I had to run down to Ocean City as my book is due today. Read The love affairs of Nathanial P., by Adelle Waldman. From the perspective of Nate, a male writer living in Brooklyn in 1999. It's fiction.

Anyway, the beach was amazing. Tide coming in, waves roiling all which ways. Foam was blowing across the beach, it was so windy. I was enjoying all of the tracks, footprints, tire prints, shells, etc. Just took a ten minute walk. It was a bit too cold for sunbathing. I look over and there is a woman coming out of the ocean in her bathing suit!

So I came over to get my three hours of computer time at the library. Am cold and hungry right now. Should stick around to read a newspaper and a magazine. Inconsistencies of myself: I am too cheap to buy a book for the Nook, yet I will shell out $1 a day for an actual newspaper.

Not much to say

I think I am losing interest in this blog, along with many other things.  Is it the winter blues?

Dedicating a large part of today to reading the Sunday New York times.  I usually only do that when I am visiting my sister in North Jersey as she has a subscription.  I find the actual paper so much more enjoyable than the online version.

Managed to fit everything in this weekend.  Friday night I volunteered at a concert of Ben Williams and the sound machine.  It was jazzy and very compelling and exciting.  I should go to more concerts, even if I don't know what I am going to hear, like with this group.  Out to breakfast Saturday morning at Dodge's Market in Elmer.  A tasteful array of healthy foods.  Joined some woman friends for a lunch at a friend's house and then up to North Jersey for a family reunion of sorts.  The highlights of the evening were watching Downton Abbey (unfortunately a segment I had already seen TWICE), watching one episode of The killers and going out into the hot tub while it was snowing.

An armed society is a polite society

Somewhat puzzling sign at a Guns across America rally recently.  Picturing the world boiled down to a war between the gun owners and the non-gun owners.  I guess I know who would win.

Have been down with something....a cold, I presume.  I am always so cocky and proud of my record as a person who never gets sick.  Well, now I am humbled.  Spent the entire day in bed yesterday listening to NPR.  So unimaginative of me.  But the path of least resistance.  Hard getting re-motivated.  My sister made me chicken soup and loaned me her wireless.

Was going to cancel my subscription to the local paper but I am reconsidering.  Yeah, it's an "old white man's" paper, but it's all we've got.  I think I would miss it if it went out of business, which it probably will do.  They had an article in the paper about how they laid off a bunch of people.  So, maybe I should just HANG on and help them out with my subscription.  They regionalized (hate it) and I say periodically that "I'm not INTERESTED in Salem or Gloucester counties".  But, then, I saw an article about someone I went to school with and saw an interesting program advertised.

Bacon is the candy bar of meats

Things I am going to miss after I cancel the "local" paper on January 8th:
- cartoons, especially Pickles, where I got the quote above
- crossword puzzle
- Sukoku puzzle
- Having a paper to read as part of my repertoire of reading items each night before bed
- Having a paper delivered to my front door (gosh, I finally trained him....)

Things I am NOT going to miss:
- the daily historical fact about Salem
- news of Elk Township, Salem, Logan Township and other places I have never heard of or don't care about
- the pile of unread papers next to my chair
- lugging all of the papers down to the recycling

Don't get me wrong, I am NOT going electronic. I will just have to make more of an effort to read a paper when I am in the local library or purchase one when I am out.
This way perhaps I can read more of a VARIETY of papers. I got a really good deal on the paper last year, now it is more expensive. Not real wild about the whole REGIONALIZATION thing. What used to cover my town (Bridgeton) now covers Salem County, Cumberland County and Gloucester County. I am still calling it the Bridgeton Evening news but that was several titles ago. Now it is called the South Jersey times.

A committed underacquirer

In other words, I am FRUGAL. Decided to get a new window in my house. I love the big old wooden windows, but really, I have to admit that they do not function! A pane broke out, the storm window is broken and the pulley broke so that the window does not even open. Still, it is very hard for me to part with it. Maybe I will replace them one at a time? The storm windows rattle when the wind blows and some of them don't work well anymore. Costs about $500 for one, I fear. I have 13 windows.

I have love/hate relationships with many things. BRIDGETON, the town that I live in, lacks interesting stores and restaurants, but it is quiet. Our local NEWSPAPER just became "regionalized" and now incorporates Salem, Cumberland and Gloucester Counties. I love having a paper delivered that I can read at night but many articles are now about places I don't care about. Did I mention they also changed their name (I hate that) to South Jersey times? The DENTIST causes me pain and stress and breaks my teeth but I love the feeling AFTER I get my teeth cleaned. And some of them give me free stuff.

Went to an author lecture last night at the Cumberland County College. Heard Joyce Carol Oates. She read a short story called San Quentin. She shared with us the difficulties of teaching writing in a prison in that the prisoners don't really want any criticism of their work. Then she read a story called Ugly out of her anthology which was the One book, one college selection this year (Faithless : tales of transgression). She has quite a range of topics in her writings. She teaches at Princeton and tells her students she doesn't care if they like or don't like a book. The important thing is how did it make you feel. Someone asked her what does she like to read for pleasure. She said that she is a masochist and does not read for pleasure! She reads for review.

The newspapers for reading for free are located at the library

Sign over newspaper rack at The incredible bulk, in Millville last night. Walked around for "Third Friday" with some friends. Festive lights, music, food, and gifts. The only problem was the COLD. We had a yummy dinner at a vegan restaurant. Very healthy food but they use takeout containers and plastic forks, which somewhat spoils the effect. I guess that helps to keep the prices down. Wildflower is the name of this restaurant which has been in business over a year. In our area, that is saying something. It was funny, though. We were sitting there eating our raw veggies and talking about all of our dental problems.

They had the DUMBEST segment on the morning show yesterday. They had five babies in high chairs. The Cake Boss baked a huge round cake for each of them. They were each a different solid pastel color. The baby was supposed to get down with the cake and after a timer went off, there was supposed to be an award for the messiest baby. I asked myself, WHY?!?!?! The babies didn't look like they even wanted to BE there or DO it. They forced one baby's hand into the cake and he started wiping his hands together, like why are you making me get so dirty? The cakes were so BIG that they totally obscured the babies. Boy, we are really desparate for entertainment.

It's a jungle out there

Just finished a class on DRIVING for senior citizens. It was enough to make one paranoid. Even if I don't DO any of those things, there are a lot of people out there who are not yielding when they are supposed to and who are making crazy left hand turns. Those are the two biggest causes of accidents with the aged. We learned about how it becomes more difficult to SURVIVE an accident after age 75. I'm not there yet, but it was somewhat depressing to contemplate. Also learned a bunch of curious facts, such as you can be booked for a D.U.I. if you take your medication wrong. I know I drive other people crazy by driving too slow (the speed limit) but they drive me bonkers by turning out in front of me when they are going 10 miles an hour and I am going 50. So which is greater...the people who HONK at me, or the people at whom I would like to honk? I try not to honk, as much as I may want to. Teacher advised us not to encourage ROAD RAGE but to avoid it at all costs.

I tried to COOK the other day. It was pretty much a failure. I tried to make tuna casserole with a recipe with no measurements, just a list of ingredients. I may try it again with some adjustments. Or, maybe I will just rip up the recipe and forget about it. I had just suddenly gotten an urge for an old fashioned casserole with potato chips on top. I don't have the patience for cooking. Although, as the driving instructor pointed out, we have all EARNED the right to be patient.

My local paper is going to regionalize. I HATE that. It started out being the Bridgeton Evening news. I still call it that even though they changed the name to The news of Cumberland County. Now, any day it is going to become The South Jersey times. Libraries and newspapers and social service organizations do not IMPROVE when they regionalize. They just get more out of touch with the local needs. But of course freeholders and politicians LOVE regionalization. My paper drove me nuts the other day. A guy got murdered. Instead of James Penn III, they wrote James Penn!!! on the caption. Lame!

Captions, oh my captions!

So excited to have discovered how to make a caption for my posts. Reminds me of way back when, when it was cool to be reading The Village Voice. It must have been about 40 years ago, cause most of my memorable adventures were about 40 years ago. The person who organized the letters to the editor would give each letter a headline. When someone wrote a letter about how good the HEADLINES were, the headline read, "Captions, oh my captions!"

Am hanging around the historical society to use the wireless (of course, my main addiction). Also trying to get into this whole historical area and find some way I can be useful. Do I want to index a publication or input cataloguing info? Cataloguing is right up my alley, but I would have to LEARN SOMETHING NEW (Pastperfect software). Sometimes I think I don't want to learn anything new, but that really isn't true. I was overhearing a Power Point class last night and thinking I should really TAKE that class again. Even though I took it once and did nothing with it.

It WAS kinda fun and interesting to read an old newspaper, The Bridgeton chronicle, from December 20, 1862. First of all, it was (and is) HUGE. Pages about twice the size of todays and really tiny print. Each page is composed of 8 columns, about two inches wide. How the heck could people even deal with reading it? Most of us have to resort to a magnifying glass to cope. And I am a lover of newspapers who is quite sad about their pending demise.