Pro or anti Daylight Savings Time?

Daylight savings sneaked up on me this last weekend here in Spain. Fortunately I had slept late, a prereq for a nice weekend morning, and my Sunday am appointment was not missed either. I noticed that despite having an extra hour, I was still running late in the end. Seems like you go into leisure mode when you think you have an extra hour!

Another shock came today when I went to the store after work and came out of the store to pitch black skies of night. How does that surprise you every single year?

The pro in this case was waking up to light. I really, really don't like to get up in the dark, so I do not mind at all the next few weeks that will give me a day lit morning.

I will miss the longer evenings though. For some reason, even though the temperature didn't change, going for a long walk in the dark doesn't have the same appeal as a sunset stroll. In the heat of summer, however, we had to wait until 10 pm for the streets to cool down enough for a walk. Us and the rest of our Spanish village! Now we are all scurrying to the park at 5 or 6 pm. Our internal meters all seek the same bit of light. Or it could be I'm getting to be more Spanish in my life style? They seem to do things in groups, rarely are people doing things solitaire.

 With Europe changing a week before the USA, I get messed up in my internal calculation of what time it is for my people back home. Then there's my grandpa in Arizona which doesn't participate in daylight savings so while his time doesn't change, I have to try to remember is this the season where he's 8 or 9 hours different from me?

I know a few people who are adamantly anti-time changing antics on the clock. Just leave it alone, they say. They don't care about long days in the summer.

I also have heard the other argument that they should just leave it switched so that the longer light is in the evenings, don't switch back and forth.

Extra light? No change? Which one are you?

Self discovery oddly enough via Pinterest

I'm not an avid pinner. I have a few boards. One is for characters in my books, one is for books I like. One I called "Food I Will Likely Never Make" because I'm a big one for looking but not actually doing -- as I suspect a lot of pinterest is.

The food page is where I made my self discovery. I opened the board for the first time looking for something I thought I'd put there that maybe I would consider making depending on the ingredients. What I discovered is that I am obsessed by the same basic foods.

I have pinned several versions of macaroni and cheese. I know, what am I 12?! Oh comfort food, I love you.

I would have admitted before looking at this that I like cinnamon rolls. Based on the board, I have to say I REALLY like cinnamon rolls. The shameful revelation is that I've never made them and my vehement pinning of cinnamon rolls is the hunt for a recipe that will finally be easy enough that I will actually try. I often eat cinnamon rolls and think I want MORE cinnamon. It seems that I secretly dream of a day when I find a recipe that doesn't involve raising, waiting two hours and kneading etc. but allows for easy mix up dough and LOTS of cinnamon. Disclaimer: I'm living in a country that doesn't have cinnamon rolls (except for Starbucks) so this may be part of my obsession. 

I pin a lot of enchilada related things. Enchilada soup, avocado enchiladas, chicken for enchiladas in the crockpot. If I go to a Mexican restaurant, I often order burritos so this is intriguing that I pin enchilada related things. I do love anything in the Mexican/tex-mex genre. On a side note: I have NOT pinned the four billion versions of adding things to guacamole. Why mess with something that is pretty much perfect? Corn and goat cheese in my guac? No, thanks. But I digress.

I have pinned frozen desserts that don't require an ice cream maker. Granted I've at least chosen two different flavors but I see a pattern again. Few ingredients and a pan in the freezer. I'm looking for the easy dessert fix apparently.

Overnight French Toast is another biggie with me I hadn't realized. Not sure I'm a fan of french toast to the point of obsession and repeated pinning, but I think the truth is, I love the idea of breakfast just being there when I get up on weekends. So the idea of french toast in a crock pot that would be all gooey and ready is appealing. I tried a breakfast egg casserole in the crock pot a few months ago for dinner. Turns out my crock pot here in Spain cooks super hot and scorched the heck out of those eggs in about 6 hours instead of 8. So much for the overnight idea. Scorched french toast just isn't as appealing, nor is getting up at, say, 3 am to turn it on so it's not scorched by morning. This is probably not going to happen. Ever. Thanks goodness for my significant other making muffins, smoothies and such! whew.

A lot of my recipe pins are crock pot ones, as I'm apparently on the trail of homemade food that I don't have to spend much time making happen. I want to eat well I just don't want to participate much. It's another pattern I didn't know was there.

The one trait I'm a bit horrified to admit that the pattern shows is I want it easy and effortless. I wish I was one of those people that enjoys the process and the art. That would seem more noble. I just like to eat yummy-ness but prefer minimal effort which doesn't always go together I find.

I wonder if everyone could go to wherever they hoard recipes and find a pattern? Do you have any food obsessions that you KNOW about or will it come out in some public forum someday?

 

Who said you can tell me what I want?

I was on the search for a new book. I remembered someone had recommended a website for books based on setting and wanted to find it again. I was on a different computer and I couldn't get it to come up.

Then I was on the train coming back from Madrid and in my usual way I'm always jealous of the people commuting who have reading material. I decided to search for my next book on my phone.

I did a search for books by location since I couldn't remember the name of the website and I found this very interesting library mystery list based on locations in the world. (Murder in Far Away Places.) Well, I got interrupted talking on the train, so I didn't finish my perusal of the list.

When I got home on the computer I decided to find that library website and finish looking, but when I did the exact same search, nothing like that came up. In fact the original website I'd seen months ago came up. It definitely is worth a look if you're trying to find a look by location. It has a mystery category but also has books in general by their setting. Books set in

What I find so interesting about this is that on different devices doing the exact same search on Google is resulting in different list. Drastically different. I knew that push marketing and algorithms were at work when I searched, but I always assumed they were somehow pushing the real things I was looking for. After this experience, I have lost faith in Google and push marketing in general. It must be working for them. For me, I know I've seen things that interested me in the side bar push marketing way, but rarely have I bought from there.

When a search has the top color bar of people who have paid to come up first, I avoid those sites unless I'm totally not finding my desires in the list that I assumed were more organic choices below. Now I'm not really sure about any of it.

The same search - a different device - and I couldn't get the same page to come up. Who made you Google or anyone else for that matter the keeper of what I really want or what I'm really looking for? I know in theory they are trying to help me find things faster, but it's disturbing.

Evolution of a blog

This blog was started originally when I moved to Spain between a few friends and myself to keep in touch and I'm grateful to you who have hung with me on this.

The evolution of which I speak now is that I am creating the pieces of a writing career if I do in fact decide to launch myself in self publishing. Even if I decide ultimately to search out an agent and a traditional publisher having a writers blog, writers page on facebook, a twitter account, and other marketing/contact elements is still essential. So for this I am migrating this blog to be attached to my author page on facebook: "Denise M Hartman."

I will then migrate my day job blog to my personal facebook page. So depending on which part of my life you are interested in, you can choose accordingly.

This blog will feature writing things or perhaps random life things. The day job blog will focus on the video production/religious aspects of that side of my life. So there we have it. The evolution as it now stands.

Perceptions of time part 1

I have recognized that I and many of my fellow Norte Americanos are obsessed with the idea of wasting time. Particularly in the US, I think we think about this. Me personally, I have started noticing how many things I view as potentially wasting my time. One that feels huge to me is when you have to load software or some random extra computer things. This feels like a huge interruption to what I'm trying to get done. Sometimes what I'm trying to "get done" isn't particularly important, but ask me to upload something on the way to viewing your kid's funny video and you've lost me.

Other things I put aside and don't do instantly because it will "take too long." Now I don't have a magic number for what too long is and I'm often surprised those things can be done more quickly than I realize. A good example of this is when I set the microwave to warm something for 2 minutes. Often  I stand and stare absently out the window for this 2 minutes. While there is nothing wrong with a quiet moment or two of speculation or meditation, occasionally when I'm there with the two minutes ticking on the micro - I'll do a few things around the kitchen. Recently, I washed my two travel mugs by hand and put them away. They lived on the counter for days because I "didn't have time" to clean them. Or maybe I just didn't feel like it, but that's a different blog.

My own perfectionist nature and my own sense of time and it being "wasted" or "stolen" is a challenge I've only recently recognized in my life. I've toyed iwth the idea of timing things. I'm not sure whether to take one day and time every single thing I do (which seems like it would be a pain and waste a lot of time in that one day) or do I take a few weeks and time every kind of event that occurs in a day. This may be something I revisit on and off this year. I feel like if I did this I could prove to myself that a lot of things don't take that long and some of the procrastination isn't really helping.

I read a business organizational book a couple years ago and it recommended when trying to get a desk or email under control, do everything that will only take 2 minutes or less on the spot, right then. Other things that need more attention need to go on an action, call, or project list for an appropriate time. I've tried to do this, but I often start say, responding to an email, and then discover I need to dig into some old emails or find a contact list from a conference, and the envisioned 2 minutes turns into 10 or 15. Or at least that's how it feels. If I timed it, I wonder, would that be true? Or possible is it worse than I imagine? Did it take 30 minutes? So was I wasting my time? Was it important enough to get that much time? (That's probably another blog and another self help book.)

If you were going to time events in your life, which ones would you be most interested to know how much time they took? I think my ipod has a timer, so I thought about using this and documenting a day or  a series of days. Though I sort of imagine "wasting" a lot of time that day putzing around trying to get the timer thing to work. huh.

Two for the road

Well, many of you have been hanging with me during this odd disconnected journey of blogging in 2010. The update is that I'm behind. Shocking that, I'm sure.

Actually it's not for lack of ideas or things I want to write, it's about internet access and travel. If my math, is right, I can still make it. I'll have to do 2 posts a week rather than one. The trick will be access and probably a bit of perseverance.  I think now I have 3 or 4 ideas that are either started or waiting their turn plus a short story I'd still like to share with you.

I've enjoyed the interaction and feedback on the many random subjects. Writing can be so solitary, it's been fun to have more connections and you are all so kind and interesting in your comments. That keeps me going too. Hang in there as I have to put in 2 a week because of the road time this year. Anyone taking bets on whether I'll make it?

Any topic requests for the mad dash to the end of the year?

You've got a friend request

So the epidemic has begun. Everyone is jumping off the bridge, Dust. And yes, we are following. I succumbed to facebook in February I think. I actually didn't. A coworker here thought it was the right thing to do. He actually sat at my desk with his laptop while I was working (for real) on my computer. He asked me questions and set up the page on facebook. He even chose the photo off the work network. I let him do it because it was easier than saying no. He was stalking everyone to do it.

I resisted because I thought it was something high schoolers did or college age anyway. I didn't think I knew a lot of people on there. Plus it would be one more thing to maintain and feel bad if I didn't do it. For a several months, it stayed pretty static. Granted I didn't try either. I'm so glad it emails when I need to do something or it might be dead by now.

Today I have a plethora of "friends" on my facebook links. I've learned to change my photo and follow links to others pages. I'm certainly not a pro. It's not an intuitive operation but I'm getting the hang of it. I still don't do any cute video posts or music or anything. I can't keep up with the real things I have to do in life much less the fun bits of a facebook page.

So I'm curious now that many of you have joined facebook - Is it going to replace the blogs? If it does, are we are microcosm of the internet at large? Is everyone migrating to a social networking page? Will blogs go by the wayside? I certainly have no answers and can't cast stones since I don't post regularly.

What's funny and Dash touched on it, is the "friendships" established with people I didn't really have more than a brief or nonexistent acquaintance with at some point in the past. I got invited to join an Evangel Alum group. I even put a photo up and as soon as I hit post I realized how stupid it was. All the people who have ended up connected to this site were not in my social sphere THEN. So NOW what are we going to have in common? It's absurd really but an interesting phenomena of the internet.