Belated Blog Thank You

First Sue and then Roo were both kind and generous when they chose to honor me with a “Thanks For Writing!” Award. They were especially generous because ever since my medical adventure in the summer of 2010, my posts here fell from nearly daily blogging to irregular bursts of activity. It’s true that I have passed the 12,000 Tweet mark over on Twitter. But the real culprit around here has been life and, sadly, death.

There are a few rules that go with the award:
Add the award Logo
Link the nominators Blog
Nominate 5 - 10 blogs you usually follow
Let the nominees know that they have been nominated and add their links
Say 7 random things about yourself

First, the bloggers:

Sue writes straight from the heart and sometimes makes mine ache with her vulnerability.
Roo inspires me with his photography and damn near always makes me laugh - even when he is writing about serious and important social and political matters.
Cathy Zielske teaches me a lot about digital scrapbooking and a whole bunch more about commitment and life.
Nicole has become the voice of Worcester - the smart, savvy, not-suffering-fools-gladly, frugal and feisty voice of Worcester.
Melanie has triumphed over adversity in the last year or so and never, ever lost her sense of humor.
Jeannette of Everybody Likes Sandwiches brings me recipes which are earthy, creative, healthy and usually have a twist which makes me ask: “Why didn’t I think of that?”

Dancing Morgan Mouse and Wendy have both been quiet on their blogs of late, but not so on Twitter. So I have every confidence that they will be back to blogging soon. Wendy will bring us more slice of life moments of a South African living life to the fullest in London while pining for Cape Town. And Ms. Mouse will share Sydney’s flora, fauna and food with such wit as to make me want to fly nearly 24 hours just to experience it all firsthand.

Seven random things? After 1,500 posts on this blog I’m wondering what I haven’t shared already! But here goes:

1. As a kid, one of my favorite toys were “Liddle Kiddles”. They were the opposite of Barbie, who I also liked, and they had the cutest little house which doubled as a carrying case.

2. I add fruit such as sliced nectarines and strawberries to my homemade Sangria. When the Sangria is gone, I find the remaining wine-soaked fruit to be quite yummy over vanilla ice cream.

3. Back in my pre-teen and teenage days I learned that even though I was a shy kid who had trouble with extemporaneous speaking, I could get up in front of an audience or a congregation and speak from prepared texts with surprising ease.

4. I miss browsing in library card catalogues and encyclopedias. These days dang near everything we could want to know in this world can probably be found somewhere on the internet. But the serendipity of flipping through those tangible resources always brought some additional gift of knowledge.

5. I quit a job once because they insisted on promoting me to a position I didn’t want; on a schedule I didn’t want. The amazing thing was that they did it because they were so happy with my work. But they just wouldn’t let me stay where I was happy.

6. As an adult I have grown to love many vegetables which I never liked or even tasted as a kid. So it pleases me no end that Isabella, at the age of two, already has quite a broad veggie palate.

7. While I am happy to purchase and download an individual song from the internet, I have yet to feel comfortable downloading an entire album. For that I need to buy the physical CD.

Thanks again to Sue and Roo for their kindness!