Hodge Podge Wednesday

Well, we are at Day 17 of rain, rain and more rain.

We are growing gills and webbed feet around here!

Occasionally we get a glimpse of sun for 15 minutes or so

 and I can nearly hear the choir of angels singing from above!

 And we've seen three rainbows this week -

 but the sun is so short-timed that the rainbow is gone

before I can get my very-slow-limping-booted self

 to grab my camera and capture it to share with you!

What a hot, humid, unbearably wet awful summer its been-

 dark, gloomy, grey and rainy days....

not good for taking nice bright inspiration pics for the blog. 

I really do have so much beauty to share with you, too.

I need to just pretend it is pretty outdoors right now.

Please indulge me as I share some last year flower pics.

Have you ever heard of the linky party called

Hodge Podge Wednesday

over at the blog From This Side of the Pond?

 It's a fun question-and-answer party;

one to help us learn a bit more about one another,

 and to sneak in a post

 when lack of time, energy or sun

may prohibit one posting anything else.

It's an easy one to be a part of,

and thanks to A Haven for Vee I discovered it!

OK here goes mine:

1.  July 15th is National Give Something Away Day.      What can you give away? 
Answer:  I have a few things in line, and do giveaways on my blog about once a quarter. Will you? Yes.


2. Do you have a mantra? 
Answer:  "A stranger is just a friend I haven't met yet." and "Never, ever be late!"


3. Who does the grocery shopping in your house? How many times a week do you shop? Do you make a list or pray for inspiration in the produce aisle?
Answer:  My wonderful hubs loves to shop at the grocery (yuck) and/but was freaked out when we first got married because I had been a vegetarian most of my life. Apparently I just never bought enough meat. So now he goes almost always - a few times a week, with a list (there is a nice shopping app on iphones available by the way.) 

4. Is there a TV show you're embarrassed to say you watch? 
Answer: The last time I watched television was the last episode of Downton Abbey. We just never turn it on and have to set timers for when fav shows like that are on because we wouldn't even think of it otherwise.  We're voracious readers here. 

5. A recent article listed fifteen words we should eliminate from our (written) vocabulary in order to sound smarter: that, went, honestly, absolutely, very, really, amazing, always, never, literally, just, maybe, stuff, things, and irregardless
Of the fifteen, which word is your most overused? Answer:  In blogville I use the word amazing much too often, but it is because I am sincerely and truly AMAZED at some posts - whether it be beauty, an impressive before/after or a most delicious dessert. They get the comment "amazing" from me often. As for the most overused and loathed in life in the USA overall- not necessary by myself but by my young nieces and every person 21 and younger? Like, like, like, like, like!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  *

* Solution suggestion: Give a roll of coins to visiting young folks or whilst you travel with them, and make them pay you a penny/nickle/dime/quarter back every time they say the word "like." When it's time to leave your home you let them keep what they have left. They will have earned it for fun spending, and you will have taught them a lesson. Perhaps you will be instrumental in breaking them of a really horrible habit early enough. Like, totally fer sure.

6. So apparently dying your hair gray (in your youth!) is a thing right now. It's called 'The Granny Hair' trend. Your thoughts?  Answer:  It's funny, but works for me. I am no granny yet, but perhaps I will be trendy for the first time in a very long while, haha. 




7. A while back Buzz Feed asked members to share the most beautiful sentence they've read in a piece of literature. A hard thing to narrow down, at least for me, but let's try. What's one of the most beautiful sentences you've ever read in a piece of literature?

Answer:  Sharing three, a quote from my 3 favorite books:



“Their love was something which coloured the air between them like sunlight.”                                         
 ― Joanne Harris, Blackberry Wine


“There are times...when we are in the midst of life-moments of confrontation with birth or death, or moments of beauty when nature or love is fully revealed, or moments of terrible loneliness-times when a holy and awesome awareness comes upon us. It may come as deep inner stillness or as a rush of overflowing emotion. It may seem to come from beyond us, without any provocation, or from within us, evoked by music or by a sleeping child. If we open our hearts at such moments, creation reveals itself to us in all it's unity and fullness. And when we return from such a moment of awareness, our hearts long to find some way to capture it in words forever, so that we can remain faithful to it's higher truth......when my people search for a name to give to the truth we feel at those moments, we call it God, and when we capture that understanding in timeless poetry, we call it praying.” 
― Mary Doria Russell, The Sparrow



“Whatever you are physically...male or female, strong or weak, ill or healthy--all those things matter less than what your heart contains. If you have the soul of a warrior, you are a warrior. All those other things, they are the glass that contains the lamp, but you are the light inside.” 

― Cassandra Clare, Clockwork Angel

8.  Insert your own random thought here:

Answer: 

Time is our most precious commodity and should not be wasted in ugly behavior. It should be well spent creating beauty or passing kindness outwards into the world....so when we look back on our lives we will know our time was well spent.

- Michele M.,  The Nest at Finch Rest blog

As always, thank you for your visit!

♥

~Michele