my new computer

I'm manifesting a new computer.

2 years ago, here is how it would have went:
"I need a new computer. This computer is old and slow. I'm so tired of this computer being so slow, it takes forever! I can't even watch videos because they're so broken up because of this darned thing. It takes 15 minutes just for it to start up! I can't run the new programs and gadgets because this thing is so old. etc. etc. etc."

Now I know that that line of thinking will probably just create a scenario whereby my current computer works even slower (essentially perpetuating the same thing) and may not actually get me a new computer. Remember, you get what you think about whether you want it or not. Why not make it intentional?

What does that mean?
I ASK (setting the intention)
I decide exactly what it is I want: A new computer. An Apple MacBook Pro to be exact.
I picture that computer on my desk. I see myself using that new computer as I'm using the current one. I think about how fast the new laptop is (especially with my wireless keyboard) and how I can do video conferencing with the Muses and create great podcast visualizations (my genius, I'm told) and all kinds of other great stuff.
I ALLOW
I RECEIVE
These 2 are similar in that now I just wait. I know eventually it will happen whether by my saving for it, or a financial windfall, or financing it, or a gift or an exchange. It really doesn't matter. I have just have to be ready to recognize the opportunity when it comes and be grateful for it when it does.

I'm talking about computers mainly because I really do want a new one and every time I'm posting I'm reminded of it. It doesn't have to be this or even anything material. You apply the same principal to anything you want. More time. Greater joy. Experiences. Relationships.
My mantra has become, "don't focus on what you DON'T want, focus on what you DO want!" Then you might actually get what you want.

It has come to my attention

That I have not blogged in awhile. That is if you count a week as awhile. Just because I'm not writing doesn't necessarily mean nothing is happening, as my M-I-L says. Halloween is happening, a holiday I greatly enjoy (mainly for the cool fact that we all get to dress up in costumes!). In past years I have had great enjoyment and taken great pride in hand making many of our costumes, including the Pirate and Belly Dancer, the Goddess, the Spinosaurus and the Garbage Man.
This year I'm taking a break from costume making (frankly, I just don't have the energy for it right now) so we're creating costumes out of things we find or have. What will we be? You'll just have to wait to see!

Note to Karen

Sorry I abandonded the chat on Facebook yesterday. The damn US census called and they've been bugging me for awhile so I finally answered their crazy questions so they'd leave me alone. Then the kids came home from school and I forgot what planet I was on.
I'm still thinking about food though. I want bread. I went to Lakewinds Co-op and had a crazy hungry food buying spree. Coconut ice cream, pomegranate jelly (for said bread), honey dijon potato chips, Pomegranate red tea (sensing a theme? I also went to pick up my last fruit share from the CSA and they'd accidentally taken me off the list! I lost out on 5 pomegranates, among other things, and now I'm compensating with tea and jelly)
Oh, and Tiramisu. I inhaled it and it was de.lic.ious
caio. M

I am quite the buckler-of-swashes

It may seem I'm a bit behind the times, considering that International Talk Like a Pirate Day was over a month ago. It's not that I didn't know, I'm just already preparing for the next one. In fact I'm so prepared that I just bought tickets for the Gasparilla Pirate Festival in Tampa Florida in February.
The hubby still needs needs a Blackbeard style Baldrick and I seemed to have misplaced my petticoat. Alas, tis probably better that way. With a Pirate name like this, I'm better suited to going in drag and waving a scabbard or two. Arr!
(BTW, you can call me MISS Iron Mary, Mrs. Iron Mary would be my mother)

My pirate name is:

Iron Mary Bonney

A pirate's life isn't easy; it takes a tough person. That's okay with you, though, since you a tough person. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

Up Nort(h)

Up north we call it "up nort" (using a thick scandanavian accent). It doesn't seem like it would be so far, yet 200 miles pretty much straight north (in Minnesota) darn near gets you to Canada.
This past weekend I took the kids to see my family "up nort". It was MEA weekend (no school Thurs & Fri) so we had a couple of extra days.
The ride has the potential to be long and boring. Sometimes I listen to podcasts (this time I forgot to download new ones) but mostly I just listen to the sounds of Godzilla movies from the back seat. So this time I had my camera handy and became a bit of an armchair, er, drivers chair photographer. Here is your car photo tour from Shakopee to Little Falls to Motley, Akeley and Bemidji.
While it was no longer peak colors, there were still some fabulous sights to behold. The further north you go you tend to see more pines so there is a little less of the other colors. Although birch trees (of which there is also more of) turn a really bright yellow.


This was taken as we passed the Badoura State Forest Nursery near Akeley, one of 2 state nurseries where they grow trees to sell to the public. For as long as I can remember we've driven past these trees and I've always been fascinated that the grow in perfect lines, rows and rows of them.
Thanksgiving dinner. Just roaming around on the side of the road. Must not be turkey season in Minnesota. 2 weeks until deer season, didn't see a single one of them.

This one's for you, Karen!

View of Mud Lake, near Puposky. Yes, that is a plane wing. Yes, it is flying really low. Yes, I almost threw up. No, I'm not going to explain why I was in a small plane flying really low over an obscure lake in Northern Minnesota. Maybe some other day. We'll call that one overcoming your fear.

Walter

Walter Weiner
1992-2008

We found him as a puppy when my husband (then boyfriend) was out driving around and saw him being walked. He brought me to see him and of course we had to get him. Who wouldn't want a dachshund puppy? They're incredibly soft and silky and a little extra wrinkly. Walter was brown, long and happy. Plus he had this funny little bent tail, like the very end had been folded over crooked and stuck like that. That crooked little end of the tail got caught in the blinds one year and came right off.
He was named Walter after Walter Payton. When we got our 2nd dog we of course named her Payton. What relevance does her name have now, without him? He had many nicknames: snausage dog, brown guy, little guy, the thuringer, crabby old man, Walt.
He lived off and on between us. At the house in Alpine Village he pooped behind the couch, ate a wallets and shoes and CDs, and drank a screwdriver late one night. He awoke in the morning smelling quite sour.
He lived with my mom, temporarily, when we both moved away. He then moved in with me when I got an apartment in college. Hubby (still boyfriend) would come to visit us on the weekends. We'd go for walks and visit a field nearby where we'd unleash him and let him run free, as all weiner dogs should. I brought him to friends houses where he became a star and the center of attention.
He loved (or really hated) squeaky toys, removing squeaker in record time with each. Old socks turned in to tug-of-war battles that made us laugh at his herka-jerka pull. We'd play keep away like the one night he ran until he puked.
He insisted on sleeping in the bed with us. Torturing us with whines and barks if we didn't let him. Like a good weiner dog he burrowed under blankets to sleep in hot, stale air (how do they do that?). He hated his cage.
We joked that when it came to food he had to have his "fair share" and that whatever portion we gave him it was never the one he really wanted. I blamed the rabbits until I discovered it was he who ate my young tomato plants. We used to say he'd eat anything as long as it came off the kitchen counter. We experimented. The only things he didn't eat were cherry stems and orange peels. On Friday, his last day, he ate fresh cherry tomatoes from the plant on the deck fed out of my hand. Then he got a $5 Angus tenderloin bought and grilled just for him.
He famously bit everyone. Except my husband - a fact he is quite proud of and proves that indeed, Walter did love him best. He bit our neighbor Diana in Illinois and tried to bite the English sheepdog who lived next door. That one bit back and made a quarter size hole in his side that required stitches. He even bit me many times. New Year's Eve he bit my thumb and caused a bruise under the nail that took almost 6 months to grow out. He had jaws of steel.
He was a character and a personality unto his own. Whether they loved him, hated him or tolerated him, it seemed at least that everyone knew him.
We'll miss you, little buddy.

The Moon

"I will get you anything your heart desires," the King said. "Is there anything your heart desires?"
"Yes," said the Princess. "I want the moon. If I can have the moon, I will be well again."