Wednesday Hodgepodge - 5/2/25

It's Wednesday so that means it's Hodgepodge time.  Joyce asks the questions, we provide the answers and then link up here.  Thank you Joyce.

1. What area of your life feels like you're stuck in a Groundhog's Day loop, doing the same thing over and over? Does it bother you or is that just how life is in this particular season? 

The chores!  The cleaning, the laundry, the remembering to put the rubbish out.......I'm sure you get the picture.  It's called running a home.  It doesn't really bother me except when I forget it's the day to put the rubbish out and it's late, dark and cold outside.  (Our first collection is done very early in the morning so the bins go out the night before.)

2. Something that makes your heart skip a beat? 

The grandchildren.  So many special moments related to them where my heart has skipped a beat.  Of course they are all special and Nanny doesn't have favourites but this is a very special memory - it was the first time I got to hold our eldest grandson Nathan.  He was 6 weeks old by then and it was the day before he came home from hospital.  (He was born prematurely.)

Picture of me holding Grandson Nathan.

3. Do you wear your heart on your sleeve or are you more of a closed book? Elaborate. 

Mmm a tricky one.  I wouldn't say I wear my heart on my sleeve - I can be quite private but I also think I'm easy to read.

4. According to Prevention Magazine, these are 25 of the best foods for heart health-

wild salmon, sardines, liver, walnuts, almonds, chia seeds, oatmeal, blueberries, coffee, red wine, green tea, soy milk, dark chocolate, raisins, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, sweet potatoes, whole grains, apples, oranges, grapefruit, avocado, avocado oil, olive oil 

Which five do you include in your diet most often? Are there any foods on the list you simply cannot abide? 

The top five would be salmon, broccoli, dark chocolate, olive oil and cauliflower from that list. (Although not in that order.)

No thank you to the seeds, nuts, green tea, grapefruit and avocado.

5. What was the last piece of furniture you bought? Is there a piece of furniture you need/want to purchase this year? 

The last pieces we bought were a storage unit and a couple of bookshelves.  We're in the middle of having units made for our living room and at some point we want to change our sofas.

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

We have sunshine today.  It's chilly, but a good day to get out for a walk.  Still need the wellies though - we have had so much rain.

Some Tuesday Twaddle - 4/2/25

You can have so much fun when you're retired.

I thought I must have blogged about this puzzle before but it seems not.  

It was a Christmas present from my son and DIL who are in the US.  They know I love a puzzle/challenge.  The wooden pieces can, apparently, be arranged around each day of the year.  So far I have managed to complete the puzzle for every day to date.  

Note I said for every day, not ON every day.  Most of them have been done on the day but I've slipped up a couple of times but I do have photographic evidence of all the dates.  Some days prove trickier than others.

When I started out I was thinking "I can do this for a year" but then my other son pointed out that, as next January 1st will be on a different day, to complete every combination would take me until 2031.  However, thanks to leap years it'll be 2035 before I've done all the combinations! (I think - haven't quite got my head around the leap year effect yet.)

Anyway I think a year is long enough for a challenge.  My current run on Wordle is 331 days but my win streak was 247 until one day last week.  Thankfully as that was my highest ever winning streak I wasn't too upset when I didn't get the word.  I'm sure there are some people that have done it every single day since it started but having missed that boat I'm not too disappointed if I miss one here or there.

I may be retired but there are still things that have to be done such as washing, cleaning etc.  Time to change the washing over.

Yep, Tuesday Twaddle.

Is it Monday? 3/2/25

Having blogged almost every day of January, I decided that I ought to try and carry on blogging as much as I can.  Certainly on a regular basis at least.

But what to blog about?  Some days, such as Wednesdays (Hodgepodge), Fridays (Fave Five) and Saturdays (SoCS) are easy - there is a theme or a prompt.  That's what made January easier - Linda kindly supplied us with a prompt each day.

Now I'm left to my own devices I'm having to wrack my brains.  Of course book reviews slot in nicely but I'm not reading a book every day - or even every 2 or 3 days so that will still leave some blanks to fill.

I could write about my day - but the highlight of today was emptying the ironing basket.  Not exactly riveting although I did watch an interesting documentary series on Boyzone while I was ironing.

The weather was a bit bland today too and we won't even go near discussing politics.  I think the world is going mad.

I did look to the BBC website for inspiration and found a mad story about a round egg.  Apparently the chances of getting a round (as opposed to oval) egg are 1 in a billion.  Who compiles these statistics?  And can they be believed when we know there are "lies, damned lies and statistics".

Anyway it seems to me they can't be that rare - one was found in Scotland not long ago and a more recent one in Devon.  The one in Scotland was auctioned and sold for £200.  The woman who found the latest one is planning to auction it too.

Personally I like my eggs cooked - breakfast today was a poached egg on toast with smoked salmon and hollandaise sauce.  It was delicious and a much better use of an egg than keeping it to look at.

Book Review - House Rules - Jodi Picoult (2025 #6)

House Rules by picoult-jodi
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

When your son can't look you in the eye...does that mean he's guilty?

Jacob Hunt is a teen with Asperger's syndrome. He's hopeless at reading social cues or expressing himself well to others, though he is brilliant in many ways. But he has a special focus on one subject - forensic analysis. A police scanner in his room clues him in to crime scenes, and he's always showing up and telling the cops what to do. And he's usually right.

But when Jacob's small hometown is rocked by a terrible murder, law enforcement comes to him. Jacob's behaviours are hallmark Asperger's, but they look a lot like guilt to the local police. Suddenly the Hunt family, who only want to fit in, are directly in the spotlight. For Jacob's mother, Emma, it's a brutal reminder of the intolerance and misunderstanding that always threaten her family. For his brother, Theo, it's another indication why nothing is normal because of Jacob.

And over this small family, the soul-searing question looms: Did Jacob commit murder?

Usually I love Jodi Picoult's books but I found this one dragged a bit for me. Picoult had certainly done her research on the subject of Autism and in particular Asperger's and although much of what she's written in this book (which was published in 2010) would still be relevant today the use of the term Asperger's would not.

She's tried very hard to get us inside the head of Jacob, who has been diagnosed with Asperger's and also to show how this affects his Mother and younger brother but she labours the details too much. I found myself skim reading some sections.

I also found the legal case proceedings to be unrealistic in how Jacob ended up being charged with murder and for me the ending of the book was disappointing.


View all my reviews

#SoCS - 1/2/25 - Spoonful

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “spoonful.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy!

Thanks Linda.

You can find out everything you need to know about SoCS here.

Well of course the saying goes that a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.  Rubbish.  Takes more than one spoonful.  If I was still taking sugar I'd have 2 in my tea.  Thankfully, given that I can drink quite a few cups of tea during a day I switched to sweetners quite a while ago now to limit my intake of sugar.

Doesn't stop me eating lots of other sweet things with sugar in them though.  Biscuits are probably the worst culprits for me.

But a spoonful of anything nice is not enough.  It's like suggesting you only eat one square of chocolate.  You just about get the taste doing that.  And just a spoonful of something like tiramisu?  Wouldn't even touch the sides.

Now if we were talking medicine then yes one spoonful is plenty.  And for some things, such as certain alcoholic drinks, coffee or green juice, no spoonfuls at all thank you.