Author Archives: beth

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About beth

Ann Arbor-ite writes about enjoying life with all of its ironies and surprises.
Jun18

ready to roll.

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now that’s what I call being ready.

—
‘preparation is everything.’
-david robinson
—
David Robinson ( born in 1965) is an American former professional basketball player who played for the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA from 1989 to 2003, and a minority owner of the Spurs. Nicknamed “the Admiral” for his time spent in the U.S. Navy, Robinson was a 10-time NBA All-Star, an NBA MVP, a two-time NBA Champion, a two-time Olympic Gold Medal winner, and a two-time Hall of Fame inductee. He was honored as one of the league’s all-time best players by being named to the NBA 50th and 75th Anniversary Teams. He is widely considered one of the greatest centers in both college basketball and NBA history.
He was definitely prepared. 
Jun17

“food is music to the body, music is food to the heart.” Gregory D.Roberts

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there are Spotify playlists for the exact cook times of different pastas

In an effort to ensure a perfect al dente texture every time, Barilla pasta offers nine Spotify playlists tailored to the precise cook times of popular pasta varieties. Curated as a more entertaining alternative to your everyday kitchen timer, the compilations debuted in 2021, blending both English and Italian music.

There are two playlists apiece for four different pasta varieties: spaghetti, fusilli, linguine, and penne. Each playlist ranges from nine to 11 minutes, based on recommended cooking time. The most popular (based on total followers) is “Mixtape Spaghetti,” which is 9 minutes, 3 seconds in length and includes hip-hop tunes from Jay-Z and Italian rapper Ernia.

At 19 minutes, 12 seconds, the longest playlist of the bunch is the only one dedicated to an entire recipe: “Absolute Carbonara.” This film-themed mix incorporates beloved tracks from Grease, Mamma Mia!, and Guardians of the Galaxy, and is tailored to the exact amount of time you’ll need to prepare a bowl of spaghetti carbonara from start to finish.

—

The famous Italian violinist Niccolo Paganini was a great epicurean and pasta lover.
Most of all he preferred ravioli.
His dream, as he put it, was
“to live in the countryside, play duets and quartets and eat delicious ravioli”.

—

Source credits: Bennett Kleinman, Food and Drink, Barilla

Jun16

generations.

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for those who came out

in support of our march

big, little,

and in between

the spirit is strong

across the generations

 passed on from one to the other.

—

‘the future belongs to those who give the next generation reason for hope.’

*pierre teilhard de chardin

*Pierre was a French Jesuit, Catholic priest, scientist, palaeontologist, theologian, and teacher. He was Darwinian,  progressive in outlook and the author of several influential theological and philosophical books

 

 

 

—

Ann Arbor, MI, USA, July 2025

 

Jun15

on father’s day.

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Mountain gorilla youngster resting on the back of an adult Silverback Virunga National Park, Democratic Republic of Congo  – WWF photo

—

What did Erma Bombeck write about her father?
My dad left the house every morning and always seemed glad to see everyone at night.
He opened the jar of pickles when nobody else could.
He was the only one in the house who wasn’t afraid to go to the basement by himself.
He cut himself shaving, but no one kissed it or got excited about it.
—
for all fathers and father figures here and gone
Jun14

stand up.

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“one of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world

is to stand up and show your soul.”

-clarissa pinkola estes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

—

art credit: sharkey art

 

Jun13

secure or insecure?

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as I was pulling through a parking lot

a paper shredding service truck

was parked in front of a school

not an unusual sight at the end of a year.

what was unusual

was when the two young men

who were the mobile ‘shredders’

suddenly began frantically chasing

huge swaths of paper

all over the parking lot

the wind had  picked up

just as they were carrying out

these giant piles of paper

to feed into their shredder

  in an instant

they were running around

grabbing and gathering up

all the paper

caught up in the swirl

I was driving

 not able to catch an action photo

but wow, were they moving fast

like on those old game shows

where you just had a short time

to grab as much cash as you could.

soon they were back by the truck

with armloads

but I thought about

how ironic it was

they had one job

they came to shred papers

for security reasons

but had almost lost many of them

to a blustery wind

with the potential of them

heading to parts unknown

all around the city

good thing they were young and athletic

soon walking back to their truck

with armloads of paper.

getting back to the work of shredding

security restored

perhaps that’s one of the job requirements

for just this very situation

the people doing the job must be secure

or at least respond in a very secure way.

—

“when you work with someone who is not insecure, that makes you confident. “

-shweta tripathi”
—

Here is their company motto on their website:

“***** Document Destruction is a professional shredding service based in ### MI, specializing in secure and confidential document disposal. With a focus on protecting sensitive information, **** Document Destruction offers reliable and efficient shredding solutions for businesses and individuals.”

Jun12

ode to pretzel rod, the gentle mighty warrior, on his final odyssey.

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below is a repost, originally posted in 2016, when my grandchildren’s beloved pet, pretzel rod, embarked on a crazy near death odyssey, and lived to tell the tale. now here is an update.

June 2025 –  sadly, pretzel rod has embarked on his final odyssey to the great leopard gecko land in the universe. he will be buried in the Pretzel Rod Memorial Apple Orchard in their yard marked by his tiny house, but will be remembered forever as a peaceful warrior who survived against all odds and was a friendly and mellow dude. Happy Trails, Pretzel Rod!!

—

December 2016

pretzel rod, the albino leopard gecko (pre-odyssey).

 last weekend

i stayed with the grandies

while their mom and dad were out of town

and

for some reason

during the last hour i was there

the two friendly house cats

decided to make a snack out of p-rod.

i had no idea this happened until i got home and got the call:

“the cats somehow got the screen off of the top of his terrarium and ate the gecko!”

imagine how badly i felt

that the murder had happened on my watch.

grandie f had just gotten this young gecko

for his birthday 6 weeks ago and was very sad.

he had replaced pretzel,

the tiny, twisty snake who was let go in the backyard.

the next day i picked him up at school and we planned

to make a memorial stone for pretzel rod to put in the garden.

we talked for a while about love and loss and pets and nature.

imagine my surprise when i got a call late that night that he had been found!

he must have crawled into the boys’ dirty laundry

which was on their bedroom floor

to escape the cats

hid out for 24 hours

 then was scooped up

 unknowingly

 put in the washing machine

with the laundry

where he was washed, rinsed and spun.

what?!

he had survived

a feline attack

a day in smelly boy pants

fear

starvation

and

waterboarding?

he was washed, spun and rinsed

but there he was

sitting on the bottom of the washer

and after all of this, he was alive!

f yelled out over the phone:

“and he’s getting stronger by the minute!”

mom and dad said he looked rough and didn’t know if he’d make it

but he was indeed alive.

my task the next day was to get him some special treats

wax worms

(the big macs of the lizard world)

from the pet store to see if he would eat.

sure enough, he had some dinner

the first he’d eaten in a few days.

hopefully he’s on the mend

and we won’t have to go through a ‘second death’.

he looks a little lighter in color,

has some bite marks from the cats,

and doesn’t move as much

but he is alive and that is amazing.

—

“it is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive

but those who can best manage change.”
― leon c. megginson

Jun11

perfectly imperfect? or no end to the distress? (with two s’s)

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this picture of a hotel’s name

was posted on social media recently 

with the poster saying

he has driven by it daily

every day

for eight years

and it always makes him kind of crazy 

how the two s’s are so close together.

many people responded by agreeing

or mentioning other letters

that bother them in this layout

their size, placement, spacing, angle of the letters, etc.

the conversation got quite funny

some even wondering

about how the person/people 

who put the display up

must have felt about it

did they only put up one S by accident 

and someone noticed and had to tell them

to add one more?

were they trying to stylize it?

is that how the owner wanted it?

did they not know how to spell renaissance? 

someone had to have ordered the letters. 

is it something that should really bother people?

I have to admit that I did

notice everything that was mentioned

once it was all brought up.

how do all of you feel about it?

would it bother you

if  you saw it

every day

for eight years?

maybe they just should sell the hotel

rename it, and start over

so everyone can be at peace once more?

—

“perfection is not something the world has to offer.” 

― T.M Cicinski, The Mind Is Its Own Place 

 

Jun10

where will he go next?

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Where will he go next, this phantom from another time, this resurrected ghost of a previous nightmare – Chicago?  Los Angeles? Miami, Florida? Vincennes? Indiana? Syracuse? New York? Any place, every place where there’s hate, where there’s prejudice, where there’s bigotry – he’s alive. He’s alive so long as these evils exist. Remember that when he comes to your town. Remember it when you hear his voice speaking out through others. Remember it when you hear a name called, a minority attacked, any blind, unreasoning assault on a people or any human being. He’s alive because through these things we keep him alive. – Rod Serling

*He’s Alive” from The Twilight Zone, 1963,  the closing narrative from one of his most bone chilling episodes ever written, about history repeating itself, a shadow from the past returns and hovers, and those who will follow at the cost of others

Jun9

these hands were made for talkin’….

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any of these could be me when I’m talking

some of you may remember that i recently almost got accidentally signed up as a volunteer for something. this was due to the fact that when I was talking to my friend and using my hands, as I always do. someone mistook my hand gestures for me having raised my hand, just when they were asking for volunteers. luckily, I was able to clear up the mistake in time.  

recently I had another ‘hands incident’ when I met my friend for coffee who I hadn’t seen in a while, but who has me known for a few years. in the middle of our conversation, she suddenly asked, ‘are you using sign language?  I haven’t taken that class, and if you are, I won’t understand what you’re trying to tell me.’ (keep in mind that I had been speaking the whole time and was not using sign language, I don’t even know sign language.). I assured her that I was not and reminded her that I had been speaking. 

thinking about this later, it made me laugh, but I wondered what was going on?

am I  somehow using my hands more than I used to when talking?

am I more dramatic with my gestures?

should I become a mime?

are my hands getting louder?

—

‘even the smallest gesture can make a huge difference.’

-billy butler