Google Analytics Tells An Interesting Story

Here on blogger, we can use google analytics to see what kind of people are stalking reading us, where they come from and what they are looking for.  We can even see such detail as the percentage of Mac vs PC users or Safari vs. Mozilla.  It's really fascinating.  You can break it down by the last 2 hours, day, week, month and all time.

One of the things I love to check out is the keyword searches that let people find me.

The second all time phrase that directs people to me is "pudding pops" because ONE TIME I wrote something about missing the Jello Pudding Pops of my youth.  I think it was the worst post of my entire life. I guess other people out there miss that too.

A lot of the keywords are things like lia sophia or tomgirl, which I would expect, given my blog name.


There are the harmless things like:

4 foot tall marigold pictures
winter squash vines pictures
elementary classroom layout

And then there are things like these:

lady bra catalog grandma- 4 people used that to get to me.  Really?  Lady bra? Is that different from Man bra?

standing and kneeling anal- 3 people!!  Even if you've read my blog only once, I am pretty sure you know that this is NOT the kind of thing I write about! Ever.  And I'm pretty anal about that!

So, when you're out googling something, remember how you phrase it because it will always lead you somewhere and you might be giving off the wrong vibes to google analytics!

First Grade Was A Very Bad Year For Me

I think this must be the week of true confessions.  I talked about AWANA yesterday and my very evil indiscretion there one night.  And promised that I'd share the other time I was a bad ass in my childhood.

If you are new, it will only take a few glances at some of my other posts to know that I am so not a badass and have no respect for them.

I must have been just "trying on" a different persona back then.  And it obviously didn't fit because straightforward is my middle name, today.  There is not a student in this town that would ever tell you otherwise.

I might have a bit of a competitive spirit, particularly when it comes to words and word games.

Although, if I had things my way in first grade, I might never have become the wordsmith I am today.

So, we had these Lippincott readers in 1980 that I think might have been printed in 1950.  They were very Dick and Jane like and by the 80s, Dick and Jane were grandparents and schools had moved on.  But our school wasn't dripping with money, so we used whatever they got out of the trash at the public schools we had.  If you're my parents' age, I bet it was the same books you used as a kid.  If you're my age, you probably had brand spanking new textbooks with modern things like push button telephones and mothers who actually worked and didn't wear aprons all day in the pictures.

Back in my day, we had weekly spelling words.  I know that some teachers in this modern era still do this, but I will confess (here we go again) that when I graduated from Vanderbilt University in 1996, invented spelling was all the rage and we were HIGHLY discouraged from giving kids such things as spelling lists because it would stifle their creativity and make them not want to write.

**That is the only thing I really ever disagreed with in my education at Vanderbilt.  Otherwise, I was completely prepared for what I do and loved every minute of  my education classes because they made sense to me.  I just had some severe issues with invented spelling. Fast forward to 2011 and OOOPS invented spelling may have gotten a little out of control.

Yeah, I tried to tell them.

So, we had a spelling list and had to take it home Monday, practice all week, have a pre test on Thursday and then the real test on Friday.  And I usually aced those tests.  I'm a wordsmith.

But one time, there was a certain set of words that I must not have studied.  Or something threw me off and I thought maybe I wouldn't know them this time.  And until then, I probably hadn't gone into a test thinking I might not know the words because they were probably fat, cat, mat, bat and who can't spell those words?

But these were the big time words.  And I'll tell you them now because NEVER AGAIN AFTER THIS INCIDENT did I doubt my ability to spell these words:  canal, channel, apple and a variety of others that must not have mattered because these 3 are still burned into my retinas.

I thought that "just in case" I forgot the words, I should have my Lippincott reader open to the page where those very words could be found. So I put the book half in my desk and half on my lap.  And I wasn't going to look down unless I didn't think I knew how to spell it.

Boy, that Mrs. T must have had eagle eyes because somehow, she knew what I was doing!!  She was sitting at her desk (this is what teacher did in the old days, they taught from their desks!)  How could she possibly see my lap from there???

I'm not sure if she let me get through the whole test and then called me in from recess, or if she called me out right then and there.  But at some point that day, I had to go up to the board with chalk and write those words as she said them!  Without the book in front of me!!??!!

And I got them right.

Because I was a wordsmith even in 1st grade.

So why the hell did I jeopardize EVERYTHING and do such a dumb thing?

Again, I'm not sure if my mother was more horrified that I cheated or that I did it in a Good Christian School.

Lesson learned.  Lippincott readers are too bulky.  Write the words on a small sheet of paper and tape them to back of the chair in front of yours.  It's much harder to track.

By the End of This Post, My Credibility Will Be Gone

I knew I'd get a lot of mileage out of confess this one day, that's why I did it.  Please keep in mind, it was 30 years ago.  I've never done this again.  I am so serious.  NEVER again.  Not even when someone said I could.  Seriously.

We went to a small, Christian school all through elementary school and it was a good thing.  The only drawback was the size which meant that we didn't have a lot of friends to choose from like we would have if we had gone to public school.  Oh, and the sports thing.  We didn't have much access to sports and therefore, we are not really athletic.

We are not holy rollers or super religious in my family.  My father just didn't know what else to do with 3 girls who were very impressionable young ladies, and we didn't have a convent in town, so this was the next best thing.  When people asked what we wanted to be when we grew up, he'd say "NUNS!  None of this and none of that!"

And well, only one of us is married and it took her 31 years, so there must have been some message we all took in....

But that's not my point.

We also went to a youth group that many of my readers will recognize called AWANA.  Because I am lazy and don't feel like going online to check, I think I remember that it stood for Approved Workmen Are Not Ashamed.

We had fun.  I only went for a couple of years because the older kids didn't really go in my time.  My sisters went longer and my sister a-ster even make a car for the Pinewood Derby that they had one year.  My opinion on that is an entire other post.  Upon asking k-ster if it's called a Pinewood Derby (because it's the lamest name and I couldn't remember just now) he said it's because I'm jealous that I never did the Pinewood Derby.  I am sure I had much better things to do like watch the sink drain or something.

Anyderby.  Awana met at night and as with all of the things in my childhood that have now been stripped out of today's children's lives, there was some healthy competition.  In the way of learning Bible verses.

As a youngster in Awana, you were a Sparky.  You got a red vest.  It was very like Girl Scouts and Brownies and their ugly brown or green vests.  Just like Girl Scout troops, there were Awana troops, which I know now because we had certain numbers sewn onto our vests.  But we didn't think of them as troops back then.  And boys were allowed too.

Before I go any further, for anyone who is a scoffer, I'd like you to stop reading now.  The further I go, the more it sounds like this was some kind of cult or pre concentration camp and I assure you it was not.  We liked it.  There was nothing mean there.   I mean, we got Bazooka gum at the end of the night and yelled YOUTH ON THE MARCH!!!!

No, it was NOT Hitler's Youth Camps.

But there was meaning in some things that not everyone finds meaning in, because they aren't religious.

But as I reread some of this, it really sounds like it might all have been a joke.

It was not.  It was fun.  It got us out of our parents' hair for an hour after supper.

We got gum and we got to YELL in the basement of the church!!

Back to the vest.  So, there was some  badge that had to be sewn on by the mothers and the numbers had to be too and then you got this pin thing that was in the shape of a flat crown about 2 inches wide by 1.5 inches tall.  And as you learned your verses, you got JEWELS!  Each thing you passed in the book earned you a jewel.  And Mrs. Thyng would glue, with special smelly glue, these magical jewels onto your crown.

I don't think there is anything in this world I would not do if it meant I could earn something.  Especially if you broke it down into segments and allowed me to earn something as I passed each mark. There's a name for this condition, I am sure. 

You can see where this is going.  I REALLY liked to earn jewels in my crown pin.  And I was REALLY good at learning Bible verses.  And if we had memorized and practiced the verse at home, we had to get it signed and then could earn our jewels.

And one time, I might have forgotten to get my mother to sign it.

And I REALLY wanted that jewel.  I even think it might have been pink and you know about me and pink.  Even then.


So I signed it for my mother.

I have no idea how Mrs. Thyng knew my mother didn't sign it.  I mean I spelled right and everything.  I signed it just like I was sure my mother signed everything.

In very large first grade print:  Kathy. 

In pencil.

I don't know if my mother was more mad that I forged her name or that I did it in the name of memorizing a Bible verse.  I was a disgrace and it was only first grade. 

How the whole family was not hit by a lightning bolt that very night, I do not know.

Some day, I will tell you about another disgraceful thing that occurred in first grade and you will surely drop your jaw if you didn't already.  It was not a good year for me.

But then I straightened out and I've been so straightlaced ever since I think some people might still be ruing the day I got into so much trouble for these two events.

Lesson learned.  I've never written Kathy as a signature ever again.

I held up an old signed paper on the window and traced over it from then on.

I'm KIDDING.  I didn't even learn about that trick until like 5 years ago.  And I didn't need my mother's signature anymore by then!

Dear God, Are You Trying To Make Me Stop Gardening?

Because if you continue to send these nuggets of torture, I'm going to have to stop.  I cannot deal with these things.

I started noticing one of my tomato plants that had been doing really well was acting weird.  The newest growth was sort of wilting.  I immediately assumed a tomato hornworm was at work, but none of the leaves look eaten and the tomatoes looked great.  I looked all over and didn't see any kind of bug.

Then I saw these perfectly shaped turds all over the place, on this one plant.  Again, I thought I remembered these from the last time I had a tomato hornworm in my garden.  Again, I looked everywhere and couldn't see anything.  Nothing else seemed to be touched, just this one plant.  Anything that makes such perfect turds cannot be anything good.

My tomatoes in this garden are much closer than I like.  It's hard to get between them and when things are as lush as they are right now, I always worry that I will be leaning on a bug or something hideous as I am reaching for another plant.

And this morning, I went back to look at the plants and this is what I found.  Please brace yourself.

Oh yeah, that's a tomato hornworn in all its glory.  It is the FATTEST one and definitely the LONGEST one I have ever seen.  4 inches long.  It's like a picture perfect specimen.  See the red horn?

These things evoke almost the same gut wrenching, heinous feeling in my body that big spiders do.  It's not that I think they will bite me.  It's because they blend so perfectly with the plant.  And even more hideous, and thank GOD it didn't do this, when they eat the actual tomatoes, they live a big smile from what they ate on the tomato!

My uncle b-ster was sitting on my parents' deck when I discovered this beauty and he came right out and just snapped off the branch and killed it for me after I took the pictures.

Because worse than seeing these damned things, or their hideous smiles on the tomatoes, is killing them.  They are as fat as my finger, if not fatter, so you know if I step on it or squish it with a brick it's going to make a big noise and be just awful.

So he squished it for me.

If I had been alone, I would have gone to some great length to get a bucket of soapy water or vinegar and I would have dropped it in there to be miserable until it died.  I just can't squish these things.

I am pretty sure if there is one that large, there have to be more on their way.  Nothing else seems to have been touched yet, but now I have to be super vigilant every day and hope and pray that I don't accidentally touch one.

So really, if you want me to stop gardening all together, just keep sending these awful things my way.  You'll win.

**UPDATE:  After looking online, it appears that this is a TOBACCO hornworm because it has 7 stripes.  Tomato hornworms have 8 stripes. 

Must be all that tobacoo I have growing on the back 40.

Why You Should Hire Me As An Interpreter

I've been a French teacher for ove a decade and in order to become one, I had to pass a test that said I could speak French adequately and therefore probably could teach it. At least at the lower level.

I've enjoyed the French language since I first heard it when I was 6 and had it once a week at school. After high school, I had no plans to continue speaking French, but we know how things never go the way they are planned. So, here I am, teaching others how to speak French, hoping someone catches the bug like I did.  At least one person has as one of my former students got married in France to a real, live French man last year.  Phew, my job is done.

I don't usually fancy myself as bilingual and I am sure that anyone who is French and speaks with me at length would attest to that. But, I can certainly make myself understood and manage quite well when I am in a French speaking country. I have never been in an emergency and had to speak French, but I am pretty certain that I could at least communicate my needs and get the help I needed. And understand what they were going to do to help me.  I like to hope so, anyway.

In the summer, we have a great influx of Canadians around the first week of August, and I always get excited when they are from Quebec and I might be able to speak French to them. Last week, we had more Quebecois in the park than Americans!  People form Quebec are called Quebecois in French.  We don't really have a good English word, so when they talk about themselves in English, they call themselves "quebekkers" and are totally fine with that.

We Americans are always fascinated by the tiny little trailers and vans that Quebekkers come in for camping and this group of 3 did not disappoint.  Two little Westphalia vans and the tiniest, ancient trailer.  For 6 adults and 5 kids.  We can't have tents, so I can't even imagine how 11 bodies fit in this situation.

But, I got to speak French to them.  And that has to be worth the price of admission.

There was also another Westphalia with a couple who stayed for almost 2 weeks and I was able to talk to them just about every day, sometimes for a long time.  They even came to my monthly Table Francaise group and shared a pot luck with us and were amazed that we crazy Americans really speak French to each other when we get together once a month.

As I was talking to this couple, I found myself saying some things that really blew my mind.  Some phrases fell out of my mouth that I didn't even know I had mastered.  It's always the tricky phrases that separate the truly bilingual from the fakers.  Like the phrase "it's not worth it" is like the most difficult thing for me to master, but I think I might have.  Another one is "I realized"  I think if a person can say that properly, no other test should need to be administered because that is one stinker of a phrase.

We had quite lengthy discussions about our jobs.  Mine is pretty simple to explain, but hers is something along the lines of a registrar for GED or technical type education and it took a while to understand.  We discussed the recession.  We discussed some animals that are endangered around here.  We talked at length about where to ride their bikes.  We talked about our favorite activities.  We talked about how disappointed they were with Nantucket.

And all the while, I was really pleased that I could uphold a pretty rapid conversation and not sound like a dolt.  Most of the time.  I have to credit these monthly Table Francaise meetings with some of it.  Speaking real French, beyond French 1, with adults once a month does keep me on my toes.

But, with all of my self praise that you just read about, you really should hire me as an interpreter because I would provide you endless entertainment.  Even in English, my brain goes far faster than my mouth, so I can never keep up and I can't ever find the words I want on the spot.  I'm always great for thinking of comebacks like 5 minutes after the fact.

Imagine that in another language.  I can go on and on about very intricate topics and then say something very brilliant like "his/her mother was/is going to the store" which is like basic French.  And I realize I'm doing it, but I can't stop myself.  Or correct myself.  A wall just goes up and that's when I start gesturing. 

Or someone can say the most common thing, like "did you get up early this morning" and my brain just stops and can't decipher any of it.   I start to panic with an internal dialog going "that's French, right?  I know that's French right?  What does it mean???  Wait does this mean I can't really speak French????"

I can only imagine that if I were an interpreter for say, the government, and could pass all of the tests, and manage to tell someone how to disarm a nuclear weapon, it would be in the moment when I need to tell the disarmer what to do with that crucial last wire, and my brain would take a break. 

And I'd toss in the odd English word, typically that word is "you know", like that will help anything.

And then my undiagnosed ADD would kick in and I'd be off in never never land thinking about bread.  Or something.

And have you ever realized that  interpreters are literally speaking while the person is speaking?  That's the part that fascinates me the most.  I know that I can talk while someone is talking and I will still get the gist of what they are saying, but there is no way I could do it verbatim.  And ongoing.  And sometimes, these interpreters are in horribly loud places with bombs going off and they manage to stay focused.

I'd be too busy thinking about what great fodder the situation would be for my blog and I'd forget all about what I was doing.

Linking with Finding the Funny.

Feel Good Friday- There's a Party Goin' on Right Here

I don't know where the button went, I swear it's in my HTML but I don't see it here.

It's time once again to play Feeeel Goooooood Friiiiidaaaaaaaay!

If you've never been to Feel Good Friday land, it was created by thegirl who is on hiatus, so she entrusted her dear meme to me. 

To participate, you sit yourself down and think about what made you happy this week and tell us about it.  It can be earthshattering or something as day making as you got a valentine from your 4 year old nephew.  It can be one thing or a bunch.  I usually pick 5 things, but it's up to you!

There used to be a Mr. Linky linkup that went with Feel Good Friday, but I didn't get many people linking up, so I'm linky free for the moment.  Just go write your own Feel Good Friday moment on your blog, come back here and leave a comment and we'll be over to check you out really soon.

Today, I'm just going with one thing.

We've never been much of party kind of family.  We never had those yearly Christmas parties of legend, where someone would get drunk and dance on the table, or stand under the mistletoe with the wrong wife.

We didn't do the annual cook-out where the men did all of the grilling and beer drinking and the women made all of the salads while kids played on the Slip n Slide.

Birthday parties were mostly our family and grandmother and then sometimes a kid party, depending on our age.  But, unlike many families, we still do all get together for someone's birthday and have a cake.  I've heard that in my families, that is UNHEARD of by the time a person is the age I am.  We don't have a lot of routines, but that is still one of them.  And my sister e-ster can't have dairy, so she has a birthday pie.  And my mother still gets those big, fat number candles but sometimes we don't have the right numbers, so we have to add skinny ones.  K-ster's family still does this, so I don't think it's so unusual.

My parents do have what many consider a great house and yard for a party.  Perfect for cookouts.  We used to be obsessed in my family with The Guiding Light, the longest running soap until it was cancelled a couple of years ago.  On this show, there was the annual Bauer Barbeque.  Nothing good EVER came out of the Bauer Barbeque, but it was the theme throughout the summer.  Even when people were divorced and lost the house and died and were feuding, somehow, there would always be THE BAUER BARBEQUE.

So, since this picture was taken, we've had one every summer. Yep that was the summer my father became an axe murderer.  And we were all very supportive, as you can see, encouraging him in his new plan.  For his retirement party, we had a band and a tent and a pretty festive time.  People said we should do this more often.

The W girls said, it should be like the Bauer Barbeque!

Since then, we've had something every summer.  Same people, same yard, various reasons for coming (birthday party, just a cookout, wedding- that was a big one and required some yard transformations on that one, retirement).

And this summer, we're doing my parents' 40th anniversary.  It will look surprisingly the same as this one because the same band will come and play and we have the same tent. Lots of the same people.  And the trucks have all disappeared and there will be plenty of room for parking again.

It's amazing how having a party can make things get cleaned up and disappear.

I don't know what it is about a tent that makes people so happy.  But happy, they are.  My sister and her husband and l-ster all got here to enjoy the festivities.  It should be a good time.  And I have something crafty up my sleeve but I can't talk about it because spies read my blog and might tell, so I'll have to share them next week!

Now go write your own feel good friday post and come back and leave a comment so we know where to go!

1970s Wallpaper Flashback

Ok, so Adam Sandler didn't offer me a contract for his next movie. In fact, for 2 days I looked for evidence of Hollywood and all I saw were some trailers going in the direction of Richmere yesterday and I'm not even sure they were for the filming. So sad. But, I'm not a California kind of girl, so it probably wouldn't have worked out.

They probably frown on putting up your own clothesline in California, anyway.

Today, I'm offering you a chance to go back into the attic of your brains.  Back to a time when interior decorators were all about orange, yellow and green.  And probably brown. 

When Harvest Gold and Avocado Green ruled the kitchen.

Back to a time know as the SEVENTIES (ahhhhhh eeeek nooooooooo).

I mentioned to someone a while ago that I remember our kitchen wallpaper so vividly but I've never seen it anywhere else.  Whenever someone posts pictures from their childhoods, I look for the potbellied stoves that were on my walls.  But I never see them.

I see the fake brick linoleum that EVERYONE had and that I still have in my kitchen.  

But never the wallpaper.

Recently, I was going through some pictures for a bonanza we are having, and I came across this one.  I would say this is my 5th birthday, but I can't seem to count the number of candles.  I remember the ballerinas on the cake but I'm not sure I remember having this little party.  It looks like I have a party dress on and there are some matching plates and everything.  I wonder what was in the present.  I wish I remembered.  That was the hairstyle I wore until I was in about 5th grade, so who knows how old I really was in this picture.  But it looks a lot like my kindergarten picture , so I'll go with my 5th birthday.
Anyway the point of this trip down memory lane was to show you what a cutie I was the fabulous wallpaper.

Mom, don't get mad, you had no choice.  It's what they told you was the best way to decorate.  What did they know?  They were probably all on acid. 

It's funny, all my life I was sure there were potbellied stoves on there.  Now all I can see are scales, pitchers, and what might be a spice grinder, like a peppermill.

Anyone else remember this wallpaper?  You can see the linoleum too and it's still there.  You might think it would have worn out by now, me being 48 and all.  But there it remains, every fake brick still accounted for.  The wallpaper is long gone, replaced with stark white paint. 

I've noticed that all of my walls are stark.  I painted in all simple colors, white or cream or linen.  I went a little crazy with milkshake in the bedroom and navy blue below the chair rail, but otherwise, it's as bland as can be. 

It was probably the cooking implement wallpaper and the ships on the wallpaper in the living room that did it.  Those were some strange ships.  They had orange and green too.  It's too bad I haven't found a picture of them to share....  Today I'm not such a big fan of ships.  I wonder why.