https://www.campaignlive.com/article/mattel-evolving-beyond-ad/1406220
Does anyone else find this sorta scary? Not the first part (Click on the link just above) but the part about AI Barbie? Are we heading toward a world where AI becomes our best friend?
if you don’t know what the question was, go HERE before reading this post.
And the answer is Here:
A few months ago I had a mouse problem and set traps in several hidden spots I thought they’d be attracted to. I never did catch the mouse, but guess what critter I did catch?
The jam I’d smeared on the little bait bar was completely gone, by the way. Obviously, the guilty rodent was better than I am at avoiding entrapment. True story!!!!
Two days ago I was without electricity for 5 or 6 hours. There are two lines into the house and one was totally out and the other on 1/2 power. They always tell you to unplug appliances so they won’t be damaged by a surge when the electricity comes on. The fridge was on 1/2 power so had some current coming in. It is plugged in behind a little cupboard I had built to hold bread so critters can’t get into it and when I reached back and unplugged it, I heard a pop and a big pain shot through my hand. Yolanda was there and came running over asking what was wrong.. I said I must have come in contact with a live charge when I unplugged the fridge but when I looked back to see if it was completely unplugged, guess what I saw?
I’ll tell you after at least 5 people guess!!!!
Okay, 5 people guessed, so you can find the answer HERE.
Image by Israel Palacio on Unsplash.
Click on photos to enlarge.
My kitchen looked much larger before I added the center island on wheels, but it has a lot more work and storage space now. I moved my grandmother and mother’s crocks down from where they usually reside on top of the cupboards just for this photo. We were asked to also photograph our favorite cup. This Talavera cup is my favorite, partially because it is the biggest cup in the cupboard, but I also love its design.
The Lens Artist Challenge this week is Inspiration found in the Kitchen
Reclaimed Words
I fall victim to your shallow spell,
shattered by your drifting gaze
that catches on me, then drifts on,
to mingle with the gathering haze.
The damp roils in and sunlight dims,
night mingling with the fading day.
The shattered call of evening birds
echo and then fade away.
When I call out, words split in two,
spilling their meaning to the sand.
When I attempt to gather them,
they fall again from twitching hand.
As you retreat, your power fades
and I reclaim each scattered word,
change their order and intent
into phrases less absurd.
Words once wasted assume power
directed at another ear.
Amazing how the selfsame words
gain power with a loved one near.
For The Sunday Whirl: Wordle 611 the words are: mingled dim damp shallow spell gaze drifts shattered call twitch words split
The Day That Death Came to Town
I do not know how long ago it was that the first person died. I was not told if it was a woman or a man, an adult or a child. I was told only that the person lived in the first house on the east side of town. Then, every day for 30 days, a new person died, always on the same street in a straight line from the first death to the last, as Death visited house by house. Sometimes he would skip a house or three or five, but every day, he would visit a new house on that street, moving always Westward until at last, a month later, he passed out of town. Ever since, people have remembered the day the first death occurred as “The day that Death came to San Juan Cosala.” I was told this story by someone who came late to San Juan, but she lived in the town for three years and she was told this story and repeated it to me.
Photo by lilartsy on Unsplash. “Everybody Knows” stories are supposedly true town stories passed down to me by different mouths.
As July 4 looms in the near future, this poem by Alicia Ostriker so captures the state of the nation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xCQzHurMHc
Thanks to Kenneth Salzmann on “How to Grow A Poem” for bringing it to my attention. Check our his site for interviews with intriguing American poets as well as links to their poems.
And thanks to Stephanie McCabe on Unsplash for the illustration.
Here is another story of the pueblo. (If you haven’t heard the others, they are HERE and HERE.)
The Martyr Dog
There was a pothole in the road that because of neglect got larger and deeper every year until it had swallowed most of the road, leaving only a space on one side large enough for one car to pass. People in the pueblo said it was dangerous, and everyone said that it needed to be fixed, but as is often the way, everyone waited for someone else to do the task and no one ever did anything about it. Then one day, a little boy fell into the hole and was unable to climb out of it. He was thrashing about, but could not swim. By then the hole was too deep to climb out of and there was no one close to hear his cries. But there was a stray dog in the neighborhood who did hear his cries and although even if he had jumped into the hole to save him, the sides were so steep and straight that he would not have been able to carry him out, so he went up and down the street barking and barking until at last a man came to see what the problem was and pulled the child from the hole.
What happened then was very strange, but it must be true because many people have told the story which has been passed down over the years, reporting that once the dog saw that the boy had been saved, he ran through the town directly to another hole even deeper with straighter sides and when he reached it, he jumped in and drowned. And people all say it was as though the dog had made a promise to the gods that if they spared the boy, that it would sacrifice itself in his stead. And to this day, if a dog wanders into a church during a service, no one ushers it out or makes any fuss. I have witnessed this myself on two occasions. In one case the dog even walked up onto the stage where the priests were standing and no one took notice. It is my idea that the story of the martyr dog has something to do with the fact that both the priests and the people accept the rightful presence of even dogs in the church. No one has told me this. It is my addition to the story that no doubt others have added to, as well, over the years.
After Kristina and I finished our meal in our favorite vegetarian restaurant, we had to order this chocolate cake with avocado and cocoa frosting. It came with a shot of yellow milk, which was milk with turmeric. Who could resist sampling this unique combination? I generously let Kristina drink all of the milk!!!!
For Brian’s Last of the Card Challenge
Still reading through journals of my past . Here is something I wrote. Since there is no attribution, I believe the words are my own:
“To be ourselves, we must complete ourselves.”
I think this is something I’ve always felt, even when I was too young to know this is what I was feeling. Even at this stage of life, I feel like I’m not finished becoming me, and if incarnation is a fact, perhaps this continues into the next life. I hope so, because then there is hope for the whole world, including some of its largest villains. Here is another quote from the same page–one in which I was doing a lot of philosophizing.
Those who are governed by reason desire nothing for themselves which they do not also desire for the rest of mankind.
Next to it, I scribbled in pencil, “Baruch Spinoza,” which makes me think that either the quote was his or something I wrote after reading something he had written. I looked it up and it is, indeed a short version of what he had written.
And, one last intriguing quote, unattributed, which I’d like to have your comments on:
Conscience is not innate, but acquired, and varies with geography.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 