Messing about with empathy
Happy Spring!!!
The equinox is at 2:37 a.m. PDT this morning, so whenever you’re reading this, spring is officially here.
For me, that means spring cleaning. I don’t tend to clean constantly, so spring cleaning is a big project. Plus, we are moving soon, and I want the house to look good when we leave.
Whatever spring means to you, I hope it is happy, healthy, and happening.
I’ve been decluttering since January and have removed 5,500 things from my house (about 3,000 of that has been paper.) I find my motivation by watching YouTube videos. When it comes to decluttering, books are fine, but when I’m reading, I’m not decluttering.
One of the YouTubers I follow, Dana K. White, has a decluttering book. I checked it out from the library as an e-audiobook, so I could listen and declutter. It’s a practical, non-emotional guide to getting rid of unnecessary stuff and worth recommending.
If you are new to decluttering (and if so, where have you been the last few years), there are many ways to declutter. Marie Kondo might be the most famous, with her pull everything out, touch each item, and decide if it sparks joy. Hers is not the only way, however.
If you think Marie Kondo doesn’t go far enough, you can follow the Minimalists. They recommend boxing up everything you own and then pulling stuff out as you need it. After three or six months of doing this, donate the boxes. What is left is what you truly need. That is hardcore.
For people who want to declutter but don’t want to become minimalists, I recommend Dana’s method. Decide where something lives, like dishes in a cabinet. Whatever fits in the cabinet can stay; whatever doesn’t fit has to go. There are no emotional decisions to be made because the limits of the cabinet are the bad guy, not you.
Dana reads the book in the audio version, and she has a no-nonsense, slightly snarky attitude that I enjoy. She’s not a drill sergeant, but she doesn’t accept any excuses. Anyone can find success with her method.
Except for books, my stuff wasn’t overflowing their spaces. I just had too much. Dana’s method has worked great for Hubby’s stuff though, which does tend to overflow its container. I explain that once a bin is full, that’s all he can keep. Sometimes, he agrees. That’s progress in my world.
If you are looking for decluttering motivation, check out Decluttering at the Speed of Life: Winning Your Never-Ending Battle with Stuff by Dana K. White. Her YouTube channel is practical too.
Hubby likes bean salad, so when I needed to use up a can of corn and a can of garbanzo beans, I knew what recipe to search for. What I found was a hit. Even I liked, it and I’m not a fan of bean salad.
This Garbanzo Bean Salad included a lot of veggies that we like. I stuck to the recipe, except I used an entire red onion because a quarter of a cup didn’t seem like nearly enough.
I don’t usually make homemade dressing, but the one needed for this salad was easy. I had a packet of dried cilantro in the spice drawer so I used it instead of fresh. I probably should have measured it, but instead I dumped in the entire amount. It tasted good, but there were bits of cilantro everywhere.
If you’re looking for a delicious spring salad, try out this Garbanzo Bean Salad. It’s a hit in this household with both bean and non-bean lovers.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day.
Kermit the Frog says it’s not easy being green, but on St. Patrick’s Day, we can all celebrate with a bit of green, especially if you don’t want to get pinched.
Since I don’t like corned beef or cabbage, I’ll stick with Irish soda bread and green cupcakes. It might be fun to find some other recipes too. Let me know if you have a favorite Irish dish that you eat on this lucky holiday.
The best things in life are the people we love, the places we have been and the memories we have made along the way.
I made my first YouTube video. It was longer than I expected, but I was really pleased with how it turned out. Downloading it was a problem, and in the end, I couldn’t do it. So I lost a night of sleep, and I’m not writing the blog post I thought I would be writing.
I watched a ton of YouTube videos to learn how to make my video, but there was one question I forgot to ask.
Is there a time limit for new YouTubers?
It turns out there is. After I spent all night downloading, YouTube told me that my video couldn’t be longer than fifteen minutes. Oops. Mine was about thirty-five minutes. I never thought to research that question.
Now that I know, I’ll go back and fix my video. This is a small problem, since don’t think I can do what I want in less than twenty minutes. But it’s also not a problem because I’ll simply publish more videos than I first thought I would and that’s a good thing.
My YouTube channel will not be starting today, but it will be starting on Friday, and I’m having a blast recording and editing video, so all is fine. I love learning new things; I just wish I knew what I was supposed to know.
Today is the Ides of March. Since ides means the middle of the month, all the months have them, but thanks to Shakespeare and Julius Caesar, March has the famous one.
Grammar Girl recorded a great segment about the meaning of ides on the Roman calendar. Most of it I’d heard before, but there was one word that was new to me and maybe you too.
On the Roman calendar, the first day of the month was called kalends. That is where our word “calendar” comes from. How cool is that? Since the calendar before Julius Caesar was fluid, the months were often reset on the kalends, the first of the month.
I found an interesting article about how the Roman calendar worked. It wasn’t as easy as looking at a pretty picture hanging on a wall with a chart below it. I’m glad that’ all we have to do nowadays.
Daylight Saving Time starts today. Did you set your clock ahead an hour? I won’t get on my soapbox, but I have enjoyed running as the sun rises. The next time I run, it will be dark. Again.
Today is also Pi Day!!! Hooray! As we know, Pi is 3.14, so 3/14 is Pi Day. Here are some fun ways to celebrate.
I found a 2019 article that says mathematicians have calculated Pi to 31 trillion digits. Pi is an irrational number which means it never repeats a number sequence and it never ends. That is why it is a number worth celebrating.
March is here, the month when I make Irish soda bread. Hubby has been asking for this treat since Valentine’s Day, but I stuck to my guns. It wouldn’t be special if I made it all the time, so March is it.
I’ve included the recipe before, and you can find it here. I’ve tried a variety of Irish soda bread recipes over the years and found them to be all the same.
Part of making Irish soda bread is combining the cold butter into the flour. I use my fingers instead of knives, but I never enjoyed this part until I tried a new way to add the butter. It worked brilliantly.
I grate the cold butter into the flour. No cutting the butter into small parts, no breaking the butter apart with my fingers as I mix it in the flour. Cold butter grates like cheese, and it takes no time to mix the flour and butter into crumbles.
I didn’t invent this idea, but I don’t know where I learned it, so I can’t give credit where it’s due. Whoever discovered this trick, thank you for sharing it with the world.
One more thing I did differently this year was I didn’t work the dough on a floured surface. This reduced my clean-up time significantly. I sprinkled flour over the dough in the bowl and coated my hands with more flour. I then took a grapefruit-size amount of dough and worked it in my hands over the bowl.
It’s supposed to be shaggy, so it didn’t take long to form a nice ball and place it on the baking sheet. The recipe makes three small loaves. The best part was that I didn’t have to clean a ton of flour off my counter as I have in years past.
This is a tasty bread that is easy to make. It took me less than fifteen minutes to get it in the oven. I’ll probably make it again before March is gone.
The latest episode of Freakonomics Radio was about roundabouts (sometimes called traffic circles), those things that cars go around in an intersection. I’m not a fan, but it was interesting to hear the pros and cons of these alternatives to stoplights.
While I didn’t change my mind after listening to this podcast, I was pleased to learn something new (I’m always pleased to learn something new.)
Roundabouts are small, usually only one lane. If a roundabout is larger with multiple lanes, it’s called a rotary. It turns out most of the roundabouts that drive me crazy (we have a couple I encounter all the time in Chehalis) are actually rotaries.
Now I know, and you do too. It doesn’t change my opinion, but at least I know what to call them the next time I encounter one.
I’ve been working on my YouTube channel (more about that later), and that means designing banners, profiles, and other graphics. As much as I would love to use Photoshop, it’s way out of my price range. However, there is a website that helps me make awesome graphics and is free. I’m talking about Canva.
Canva.com allows you to use premade designs or make a graphic using your own photos. I have used it for dozens of projects, and it has saved me hundreds of dollars.
You might think that you never make graphics, so Canva wouldn’t be useful for you. I think you might be surprised. If you’re on Facebook or other social media, Canva can help you make memes, banners, or other graphics in no time flat. If you work or volunteer for an organization, like a church or charity group, good graphics can improve all the projects you do, from brochures to business cards.
The personal uses for Canva are endless, from homemade greeting cards to whimsical gift tags. You can make bookmarks and recipe cards. Without trying, I can come up with dozens of creative ways to use Canva.
Most of Canva’s clipart and designs are free. Some cost a dollar, but I’ve never paid for my creations. They also have a handy pro service for businesses large and small that have a team designing graphics. Canva is a powerful site, yet it is ideal for beginners and experts.
I can gush all day about how great Canva is. Instead, I suggest you check it out. It’s my go-to site for creating all the graphics I like to make, some for my writing, some for my volunteering, and some just for fun. Perhaps it could be yours too.