Tag Behavior

Making Beautiful Music Together – Revisited

Michael 5 Comments

While I was pondering what to post on a day that falls between the second of July (lower case “s” and the Fourth of July (upper case “F,” aka Independence Day), I found that recently I had definitely overplayed the not as entertaining as it used to be “weekend holiday sales theme,” the self-righteous “everybody is wrong about what this holiday means” theme, the angry “why do people keep referencing their [fill your favorite amendment] and what they authors of [that favorite amendment] meant when nobody alive now was around when [said aforementioned amendment] was passed” theme.

What was I to do? I went back and checked on some of the previous Fourth of July aka Independence Day posts and found one that I really like, and it wasn’t even sarcastic or flippant. So I’m reposting that here and then I’ll be back at the end to tell you what I think about it today. (This post isn’t that old and some of you might actually remember it.)

For some reason I was thinking of a time ago when my daughter was a teenager filling her after school day hours with after school activities. Two of those activities, or one with two arms perhaps, were concert band and marching band when she played flute and piccolo respectively. The thing about those particular winds is that, except for perhaps in the fingers of Ian Anderson, they rarely play much that by themselves would be recognizable as music. While she would practice, I couldn’t be sure she was playing the right notes but during the performances, with the other winds, strings, and percussion, all the individual pieces came together to form true music. Every now and then an instrument might be featured in a solo, but for far longer the group played ensemble to make the really good stuff.

In a sappy poetic way, America is like those bands. Alone, we don’t sound like much. We’re single instruments playing random notes that make little sense alone. If you put all the piccolos together, they still don’t make much musical sense, only now they make it louder. Likewise, groups of like-thinking individuals spouting the same lines make little sense even when making a lot of noise. No, it’s not the number of people that make the country, it’s the variety. It might not work for other countries and that’s fine, but for America to work, there must be different voices, playing different parts of the same song.

Lately too many of us have been closing our ears to the other instruments that make up the American band. We’re content hearing only our own part, or worse, playing only solos. Then we question why others aren’t thinking the same thing. Oddly, the others are wondering likewise, everybody convinced their part is the main part, that their idea is the right idea. Why won’t everybody think alike? It really isn’t a matter of why everybody won’t think or say or do the same things. It’s because we can’t. We can’t think the same things because we don’t have the same backgrounds to formulate those thoughts. No matter how hard a piccolo tries, it cannot reach the same notes as a tuba.

You can only listen to a tuba solo – or piccolo or sax or marimba – for so long before you get up and walk out on the concert. The strength of the band, the beauty of the music, is not in the instrument. It is in the players who know when to play their notes, trusting that by allowing the other musicians to play their own notes, they will make beautiful music together.

This Independence Day, take a moment to think about how our differences are what makes us unique as a country. Yes, celebrate those differences, but celebrate the whole also. The music sounds best when all the instruments are playing together. Celebrate this Independence Day and enjoy our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of really good harmony.

We’re quite thankful for the freedoms we have and for those who continue to work to keep them for us.  I was one of those some years ago doing just that.  So maybe that’s why when I talk about what freedom means, or how I’d like to envision an harmonious country, I’m willing to take a few liberties with our liberties.  Be as rebellious as you want, but be mindful that freedom doesn’t come easy.  Nor does it come by the actions of one person, one group, or one party.

Go ahead and selfishly enjoy your freedom tomorrow. Wednesday, get back to the work of playing your part to see that next year you can again celebrate with those you don’t see eye to eye with, but you couldn‘t be an American without.

“Love begins with listening,” says Fred Rogers. In the latest Uplift! we say why we think that listening is an essential way of saying I love you, and might be the greatest gift we can give to somebody. (Approximate reading time = 3 minutes)

Happy Birthday America!

Try to remember

Michael 12 Comments

I often amaze myself at some of the things I remember and some of the things I forget. I reminded myself of the odd things I recall over the weekend while putting on a pair of walking shoes. I have always, or for at least  since I was 5 or 6, put both shoes on then tie both shoes. I know some people will don one shoe and tie it, then do the same with the other. (Can you actually “don” a shoe or does don imply something going over you rather than something you put yourself into? Hmm. I’ll look that up sometime and probably turn it into a blog post.) (Anyway…) I also always put the right shoe on first. I wonder if that’s because I’m left handed, but maybe not because I’m not exclusively left handed. I write, eat, and paint with my left hand but I play sports right handed. I can bat in baseball either left or right handed but it doesn’t much matter because I’m not that good at it from either side. My forte on the ball field was behind the plate, and there I wore my catcher’s mitt on my left hand and threw with my right. Things with a racket like tennis, ping pong, badminton, and probably pickle ball if I ever took that up, I play right handed, but I wonder like with a baseball bat, if I could handle a racket in either hand. I golf right handed but since I really don’t see the point of golf, that was very seldom and very long ago. Of course the piano is played with both hands so I fit right in there. Where was I again? Oh yes….

I often amaze myself at some of the things I remember and some of the things I forget. While putting on a pair of walking shoes I suddenly, without warning, reminded myself why I put both shoes on then tie them. Years and years and years and years and years ago (I am getting up there!) as I was putting on the right shoe and then tying it, then the doing the same with the left shoe, an older, wiser one told me I shouldn’t do it that way. I had never thought of it and by then I probably had no preference, being only 5 or 6 at the time. But the older brother of the boy across the street who I always played with cautioned us against such reckless dressing. I can still hear him. “What happens if you get halfway through and a fire starts right behind you. You’re going to run out of the building and into the street with just one shoe on. If you put both shoes on and then tie them, if you get halfway through when that fire starts and you run out of the building, you’ll have both shoes on. But you better stop to tie them as soon as you can or you might trip.” Now, he was all of 10, maybe 11 years old, twice as old as we were. How could we not heed advice like that for a lifetime. And I still don(?) both my shoes then tie them.

On the other hand, last week I was in the store in front of the light bulb display. Lightbulbs are getting very complicated. There are fluorescent, halogen, HD, LED, and very once in a very great while, an old fashioned incandescent. I needed to replace a bulb in a lamp that I would typically put a 60 watt bulb into. Bulbs today don’t come in those old standard wattages we learned as youngsters. 100 watt for reading, 25 for appliances, 5 watt for night lights, 60 for everything else except the three way bulbs which never seemed to work anyway. Now they are odd numbers like 17 and 23 watt when they’re even marked in wattages. More often, light bulbs now are labeled in something called lumens. What’s a lumen anyway? Spellcheck doesn’t even know from lumens! When that trend started a few years ago, I took the time to learn the equivalent desired luminosity for each typical lamp and its intended use. But now, standing in front of rows and rows of light bulbs, could I remember what number I needed in lumens? Nope. All I could hope for was that one of the cartons would say “60 watt equivalent.” Seeing none that were, I moved on to the next item on the list. Shoelaces.

Now, did those shoes have 3 or 4 holes?

Everyday be fun, fulfilling, and meaningful because there is fun, fulfillment, and meaning in everything we do! We know, and we said why we believe so in the most recent Uplift! Take a peek. It’s only a 3 minute read.

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“The End” is not as near as it once was

Michael 18 Comments

I’ve noticed a disturbing trend that’s been going on for years, and it’s mostly most disturbing (mostly) because I’ve not noticed is before, yet it’s really mostly out there, like more than it isn’t. What you asked? Go ahead and ask, I’ll wait. What? Oh I’m glad you asked. “The End” is missing. That practice that once was a staple on movie end title cards, and in books on their end pages of declaring the end as “The End” is ending, in fact, seems to have indeed ended, and nobody is in a hurry to bring it back.

It may seem a silly thing, in fact it most probably is a silly thing, but that “The End” wrapped things up neater than solving a locked room murder. It closed the book, as it was. It put the stamp of a job well done on a job well done. There was no mistaking when you got to the end that it was the end. Any cliffhangers, unanswered questions, or unresolved loose ends, were more often the result of your not having paid attention to some seemingly unimportant detail than it was to the author’s or screenwriter’s lack of imagination or meticulous care to continuity.

It seems to me, the disappearance of “The End” occurred quite simultaneously to both print and film media, not unlike the unexplained (although welcomed by me), change of printing copyright dates in Arabic numerals rather than Roman numerals. (If you’re intrigue by that, check out my post here. It doesn’t explain it but I do have fun talking about it!) (But back to “The End” which I’m sure you’re now hoping we are getting close to as far as this post is concerned.) I noticed, or I think I noticed, “The End”’s demise in books and at movies because I’ve been on an odd quest (yes, odd even for me) of attempting to read the source material of all the old movies I am so addicted to. I want to see if the observations I made last year about movies based in books in the early days of the Hayes Code were more universal than just those handful of stories i mentioned

Even the most casual of casual readers knows that I much prefer movies of the 1930s, 40, 50s, and in a pinch, very early 60s to any other dreck put out since, but that’s just my opinion. Why do I say “attempting to read” the sources of the screenplays of those early movies? Because the source material is not always 1)known, 2)published, or 3) available even if it is both 1) and 2). But in those cases I have found a source that 1), 2), and 3) and the material ended in “The End” (or the more exotic “Finis”), so did the film. Those that did not, neither did they, and they did not about the same time as movie credits expanded to included everybody who happened to be in Hollywood at the time of filming, perhaps to make up for the lost screen time and then some by not including “The End.”

And so I suppose I’m going to have to watch more and more 60s and maybe even 70s vintage films to see exactly when movie producers decided it was more important for us to know who drove the catering trucks than that the movie is over, now please go back to your real lives.

And now, please go back to your real lives.

-The End-

Bonus points if you can identify the movie from the end title card below.

Do you plan so much you never get around to doing? When you do, are you overly concerned about what others think about what you’ve done? The most recent Uplift! explores why it is better to just do, and then do some more! Approximate reading time – 2 minutes.

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A real job for Artificial Intelligence

Michael 7 Comments

A few months ago I came up with a few suggestions for how to work Artificial Intelligence into our lives. I have a few more, starting with making some sense of my WordPress subscriptions.

Most of the blog posts I read, I read in my email. For me it’s just easier as I can read a post, review the morning headlines, read a post, see which neighborhood was the scene of a shooting, read a post, check out the daily specials at Keurig, Lowe’s, and the local garden center, and then wrap up breakfast with a read of one more post. Last week I noticed my mailbox was quite thin on blog posts.

Given that it was Memorial Day week, the official day of remembering mattress sales, propane grill specials, and summer vacation deals, I thought a little more than nothing about it and assumed some of my favorite bloggers were taking a needed break. As the week went on, a few posts popped up, but the offerings were not even close to meager. A quick check on the WordPress Reader revealed some of the posts were there, but not in my mailbox, the couple that showed up in mailbox were not there in my Reader feed, and three lucky souls had their blogs in neither place. A quick back search through my subscriptions found them still active. Further investigation found I was no longer subscribed to many of the blogs and I began the arduous process of figuring out to which I was still subscribed, of those which was I still to receive notice, and of those was my contact information intact and correct.

So if you noticed some bizarre activity like me subscribing, unsubscribing, or maybe even doubly subscribing to your blogs, I offer my apologies while I continue to rebuild my subscription list.

And I offer, blog subscription maintenance as a fantastic job for some overachieving AI assistant.You know, maybe that’s the only one for this week.I mean, if it can figure out WordPress, it’s done plenty to earn my respect!

Can you be happy without being joyful? Can you be filled with joy and not be happy? The most recent Uplift! takes a closer look at these emotions.

Approximate reading time – 4 minutes

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Remember why we remember

Michael 7 Comments

Most Memorial Days, a blog post writes itself.

  • Remember why we remember.
  • They gave so you can live.
  • It’s not all about parades and picnics.

Toss in a graphic with a soldier kneeling in front of a cross holding a helmet and we’re ready to move on to next week’s post.

This year feels different. I just know those whom we remember when we get around to remembering didn’t give themselves over to our faulty memories for what we’ve turned their country into. I think I can say that because I too served.  You likely didn’t know that. I’ll mention it now and then but it isn’t what defines me. Just another one of the many “used to be”s I used to be. But I used to be one long enough that I spent much time getting to know why we do what we do, or did.

Most of the people I served with were volunteers, those who weren’t had long served their obligations and their continued service was by choice, so we were all there by choice. People chose to serve for a variety of reasons. Some traded education for service time. Some looked to the service to learn or strengthen skills. Some looked to it as an end in itself, a career. Some just felt the need to do something.

None of the men or women I served with were killed in action while we served. Their names won’t be called out at noon today. It makes hearing the names, the bells, and the wail of a single bugle that much more meaningful to think others who held the same positions, did the same jobs, work the same duties would not be picnicking after noon.

Fortunately they won’t have to see what a mess we’ve made of their country.

We are called to serve one another and most days, there are plenty of opportunities to do so. Good caring friends can serve others to make life more meaningful. The most recent Uplift! explains how even among 3 geese, friend mean a more meaningful life!

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Do it for the dog

Michael 12 Comments

This weekend I got to do something I haven’t done for probably close to 20 years. Stay alone – overnight – away from home – with a dog! [woof]

Throughout my adult life, there had always been some sort of animal living with us. (Considering some family members you could say that has been true for my entire life, but that’s a different post for a different day.) When the last dog who had my name on her license as owner went to that big off leash park in the sky, I was already battling Wegener’s and was having difficulty keeping a strong hand on the care part of the care and feeding of pets. I knew my limits, and pet owner was not within them.

Not so though for my daughter who continued the tradition and is and has been for many years the proud dog mom of a now maybe 6 or 7 year old pointer/husky/yeti. There have been times that I have been called upon to provide doggie day care services and have successfully and enjoyably fulfilled those duties, not to mention the meeting the daily expectations of proud grandpop to the grandpup. But when the daughter needs dog sitting of the extended overnight sort, I am not the one called into service. Not that I wouldn’t, I just couldn’t. Let’s say if I were to take the dog for his evening or morning stroll, and upon spotting a follow member of the canine community, or one of the more feisty neighborhood rabbits, and he so decided to pursue fellow canine or feisty rabbit, he would never be accused of being in violation of the leash laws, being firmly attached to a strong, appropriate length lead. It would nevertheless be a questionable defense as it would be very unlikely that the other end would still be firmly attached to my right hand.

Thus, when the daughter anticipates overnight travel (that doesn’t involve an airplane (he doesn’t do well much higher than ground level)) she considers pet friendly destinations or arranges alternate billeting for the pupster. For this occasion she was unable to secure either and I was called and asked if I felt up to just one night with the little fellow. “Of course I can” I replied and oh so nearly convincingly told myself I could do it. Given that she has a fenced in backyard and I don’t, and that the dog, although getting older by the day, still thinks of himself as young and energetic, it was decided I would visit him rather than he stay with me.

And that is how I found myself, Saturday morning, packing an overnight bag including laptop (with drafts for 2 articles and a speech all due within the next month) and heading out the door for the quarter mile walk to the daughter’s domicile. And straight into a pouring rain. A veritable downpour. A like “pair up the animals and ready the Ark” type rain. Concern for the environment be dammed, I headed straight up the driveway and plopped myself behind the wheel of my car for the short but soggy trip, and even that seemed not quite up to the challenge but I don’t own a boat. I felt right then that the next 36 hour period was going to be a mismatch. Unfortunately, when I could be accused of either hyperbole or understatement, I tend toward understating.

To make a long story short (I know, too late), he enjoyed our time together immensely! He was at his tail waggingest, face lickingest, muddy pawed jumpingest best behavior, which for him, are all the things that exhibit good behavior. He never tried to take advantage of an unsuspecting keeper and ate very little of my meals off my plate when his bowl was filled with yummy kibble (and only when I wasn’t watching), did not hide the television remote too well among his toys, and let me have the pillow in bed Saturday night which was only fair since he was using my legs as his. All in all he seemed to have enjoyed my company.

Me? Well I did get to unpack my laptop though never actually opened it, only had to go outside once to forcibly drag him back inside when he refused to come in after treeing some unsuspecting woodland creature, and discovered the desktop cup warmer I got my daughter as part of her Christmas stocking last year works really well. I guess you could say I seemed to have enjoyed his company too!

Well, that dog story was a good story of perseverance. Sort of. Here’s a better one in the most recent Uplift! We know we can do it, whatever the “it” may be, but someone else feels we can’t, but we will try anyway. Because the realty is we believe in ourselves. And reality is more important than feelings. Approximate reading time – 3 minutes

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Motivating the motivators

Michael 7 Comments

Readers who read my posts all the way through know at the end of each I have to link to some other blog (Uplift!) at some other place (ROAMcare.org). If you never read all the way through, now you know too.  While this blog is (usually) fun and (almost) always lighthearted (last week’s post notwithstanding), it generally reflects how I’m feeling at the moment. ROAMcare is a different animal. In partnership with my dear friend and once upon a time work colleague Diem, we created a space where you can go to “Refresh your enthusiasm for life by dealing with challenges, confirming your choices, or just finding that extra motivation you need to push through the day!” I know. It says so right on the home page. Something to Uplift! our visitors. We’re not psychologists, behaviorists, sociologists or any kind of -ist, just a couple people who’ve been through and seen a lot and want to share our experiences with others. And in fact, those blogs are born of Diem’s and my experiences, most often only one or the other, although occasionally we might be doing the same or a similar something.

Anyway…now you know there’s another blog out there and it’s always been more of a motivational tool than this one here. Something else we have on that site is what we call our Moments of Motivation (and the real reason for this particular post). These Moments of Motivation are quick, hopefully catchy and easy to remember nuggets of positivity that we post every Monday to all our social media sites and to the website. Over the last couple years we posted 90 of these little guys. Here is last week’s, which is probably the least motivating moment we’ve posted.

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The point to all this is that over the last couple years of doing what we can to motivate others, I found myself being the most motivated I’ve been in years. Many years! There was a time when I thought that eventually we would run out of motivation. “Who is going to motivate the motivators?” I would ask. Even Norman Vincent Peale must have had a couple negative thoughts. Didn’t Steven Covey have any bad habits? Are we sure there wasn’t at least one guy who could tick off Will Rogers? Surely they all had their down times, as these were people with credentials who knew what they were doing. How could we hope to refresh anybody’s enthusiasm or give them that extra motivational push to make it through the day. Ah, but thought was fleeting. So fleeting I barely remember having it, because before you knew it, we were back brainstorming motivational moments.

Our process was simple. Every so often we get on the phone, or online, or or a video call and talk. What lifted our spirits this week? What good things happened and why if we know. What held us back from doing something? Then we distilled those thoughts into 4 or 5 word sayings. We’d work on a plan of how we’d match phrase to picture and create the graphic. Then I’d expand the thought to a 20 to 30 word blurb, add a link and the tags, and post away every Monday morning. (You can find this week’s sometime after 8am Monday at ROAMcare on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, even Twitter, and at www.ROAMcare.org) You’d think turning it into such a production would turn it into work and the words become just words for us. I don’t know how all the -ists manage it, but for me, that’s what made it even more motivating!

Maybe it’s because we spend so much time saying aloud the things we find motivating. Maybe it’s because we take each phrase and rephrase it 3, 4, 5, more than 5 times and hear it over and over. Maybe it’s because we spend so much time with each phrase. Or maybe I’m just easily motivated. But it’s true. I’ve been my most motivated since we started these motivating moments. Do you need some extra motivation. At the risk of putting myself out of business, maybe you just have to tell yourself, “Get motivated and do!” Moments of motivation. Moments that really do add up to a lifetime.

Oh, where were they when I was working for a living?

No job is just one job, but a series of steps to an ultimate goal. Is “You had just one job” a punch line or a new learning opportunity? We give you our take in that in the latest Uplift!

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Untitled

Michael 13 Comments

I had a very busy month the last couple of weeks. Yes, you read that right. I had more things going on in April than there were days in April! Some of them resulted in more than a few hilarious moments and were more than blog-worthy. Somehow, I couldn’t bring myself to write about any of them.

Last week there was an unsettling piece in the local news.  Four and a half years almost to the day after the Tree of Life shootings added Pittsburgh the list of cities that had hosted mass shootings, jury selection finally began for the trial of the man seen on camera, walking into a local synagogue and shooting 13 people, 11 fatally, while they were attending Saturday morning services. Four and a half years those families had to watch other families of victims of violence find some solace and maybe even some closure from crimes that happens years after the massacre that took their loved ones. Are we so jaded by killing we can take our good old time seeking justice?

During those 4-1/2 years over 1,900 mass shootings have happened in the US (I’m using the definition of mass shooting is one where 4 people excluding the shooter are killed or injured in a single incident.), 53 in April. Perhaps the most heinous was one of the most recent occurring on April 29 when 5 people were killed after asking a neighbor to stop shooting his gun in the front yard in Cleveland, Texas.

After each of the 1,940 mass shootings in the last 4-1/2 years, calls for gun control have been made and successfully opposed in the name if the Second Amendment. You remember that one.

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Some day, somebody from the NRA can tell me how killing 5 of your neighbors because they asked for some quiet, or killing 11 of them while they worshipped their God, is “necessary to the security of a free State.”

I’ll try to find some hilarious anecdotes for next week.

Too often we are defined by the work we do. Is that because we surround ourselves with work friends? We owe to ourselves and our closest contacts to see that our “loved ones” truly are our loved ones. In the most recent Uplift! we talk about why.

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A day in the life

Michael 14 Comments

Has anybody else been blogging long enough to remember when the “my day” posts were popular? A blogger, typically with pictures, would take his or her (or its) readers through a pictorial tour of a particular day. Typical or atypical, both were fair game. Typically, both were quite boring.

Oh look, here’s my chai tea to start the day. I haven’t had coffee since I found out about the fair trade laws and how few roasters comply.

Oh look, here are my clothes laid out for the day. They look so small laid out in the bed. It must be due to the 487 pound weight loss I recently experienced.

Oh look, here is my designer cockapoo. I would have preferred a schnoodle but the breeder said I have to wait at least 7 months and even then he couldn’t guarantee a champagne schnoodle, so little “Doodle,” the champagne cockapoo, came home with me. Doesn’t he look a dear when he has to go wee wee.

And so on and so on throughout the day.

I never considered doing a “my day” post. First of all, any one of my days, typical or atypical, would bore the most ardent reader. For example, let’s take a look at my last week.

Sunday, I went to breakfast with my daughter. Typically we do a Sunday lunch, one of us hosting and cooking. Because I was scheduled to move Wednesday, most of my kitchen was packed, but because I was going to be unavailable for much of Monday and Tuesday, I needed her help packing the last of the “all but the most last of the last minute” items, so it made more sense to eat early and eat close to me, then we’d work together until everything was packed as planned. So for Sunday, my photos would be of my eating a local diner special, cheesesteak omelet (which was very good!), and then putting stuff in cardboard boxes. Yawn.

Monday, I worked. Snapshot of me at the computer reviewing charts for 10 hours. Double yawn.

Tuesday, I waited through 1&3/4 of the 2 hour arrival window to meet the internet service provider technician at the new location who did the install of the lines and modem, then wait through the two hours for him actually to do the install. After that, I rushed to the old apartment to disassemble and pack the computer pieces. Yawn and a half.

Wednesday, moving day! The only part of the whole day that I remember is the movers hoisting the living room sofa up onto the patio, one fight up from ground, to take it through the patio door because it wouldn’t fit through any other door.  That would have made a good video had I known where my phone was while it was happening.

Thursday, because I was scheduled to work Friday and Saturday, priority was given to unpacking, re-assembling, and connecting the computer, and second priority to making the kitchen cookable and the bedroom sleepable.  My sister came to help and we could have gotten some action shots of her emptying boxes or me unthreading 135 feet of various cables. I did take time that evening to go to my Toastmasters club meeting. With all that was going on, why would I take off for two hours of prime unpacking time. Because they’re fun meetings with good people and because I deserved it!

Friday and Saturday were work days. See Monday.

Sunday, we were back to our normal Daddy Daughter Lunch dates with lunch prepared in my new kitchen and more unpacking by the two of use, assisted(?) by her dog, after. Maybe we could have gotten a decent picture of me making chicken enchiladas but mostly another yawn day.

So now you see why I never did a “my day” type of post. And if you’re still here after hearing about “my week,” hehe, my plan worked!

Have a good week!

Life lessons from hockey? Yes, hockey holds many lessons on how we can be better people. From courtesy and respect to people and time management, the most recent Uplift! explores how hockey could be the best life coach ever!

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I’ve been had

Michael 5 Comments

They’re out to get us!

In the course of 12 hours on Saturday I got 45 legitimate, expected emails. I thought that was a lot. That’s why I counted them. But there they were and there they were all with a reason for being there. They were headlines form the two local papers and headlines from the Associated Press and from Apple News and updates from two magazines I subscribe to. Three were from clubs or associations I belong to. There were five from Word Press, three new blogs from those I subscribed and two were stray “likes” to older posts of mine. A few were from stores I routinely order from, one was a delivery update on an order I am expecting. Oh yes, and there were even a handful from real people checking in. I had accounted for 45 emails that didn’t surprise me by being there.

Unfortunately during that 12 hour period, I had received a total of 141 emails. Sixty of those were shuttled to the Junk email box. That left 36. Those 36 were hanging out in my regular Inbox but weren’t expected to be there, nor were they from legitimate correspondents. Yes, they were spam. And not the tasty kind Hormel packs into those neat little tins. These were not only spam, they were phishing schemes designed to wheedle personal information to leverage my embarrassingly low financial accounts. Well, 28 of the 36 were phishing schemes. The other 8 were just annoying.

And just to make things a little more interesting, of the sixty emails that were sent to the junk folder, two were from my electric company following up on the power outages created by the storms during the previous week. Yes, the people who created the rules for our spam filters thought that I would be interested in “Real Russian women looking for love” but not in service updates from a legitimate public utility. [sigh]

Why do I bring this up now. Well, a couple of things happened that make this all a little more interesting. I don’t recall if I mentioned in a recent post but I am in the midst of a move, a personal relocation, a “pack everything you own into 80-100  itty bitty boxes and some strangers in a big truck will get them to your new abode” activity. One of the related activities is notify everybody who routinely sends you real mail – banks, insurance companies, magazine publishers, and such – of my new physical address. The last time I moved, all that sort of stuff had to be done in person or by phone. Now, many of them can be done on line. In the process of updating all the personal information profiles in all these sites are requests from them to add, confirm, or change any emails I’d want from them. From most I prefer no email correspondence. In fact, in most instances, I prefer no correspondence from them. Of course there were some companies I had not had a previous “internet connection” (tee her) and had to complete their profile including an email address along with a local street address, and all of them with the obligatory, “check here to confirm you have read and understand our 574 page statement of privacy practices.” Now I’m wondering if one of those that I so blithely clicked my way through was informing me they would be selling their mailing lists to the highest bidder. And maybe even the second and third highest bidders as consolation prizes.

Yeah, they’re out to get us, and I’ve been gotten.

Into everyone’s life rain falls. We can’t control what happens in life but we can control how we respond. That’s why in the most recent Uplift! We suggested that when life gives you lemons, make banana bread! Read about it here!

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