Hey, No Pressure by Ray LaMontagne

This song has been getting a fair amount of airplay here in Oslo. I really like it; it's a bit of a throwback to the music I grew up with. Great guitar playing--a bit psychedelic, as is this video.

Hard at work in the garden

It has been a mostly chilly and rainy April; I am hoping for a warm and sunny May so that we can get started planting our garden. My husband and I worked in the garden this past Friday evening; when we arrived and started working, it started to hail, but over the next several hours it cleared up and became a nice evening. We have in fact had hail three or four times this past week, despite having temperatures in the mid-forties. Weird weather; it seems to be chilly both here and in New York as far as I understand from my NY friends on Facebook. Go figure. The garden board had decided to cut down an old tree on our premises, so we spent Friday evening clearing away the cut tree stumps and large twigs that covered a large portion of the garden. The smaller twigs and underbrush went into the compost bin. We also turned the earth in several areas so that it is ready to be planted in a week or two, and discovered that the soil appears to be very good--there are a lot of earthworms in the earth and that's supposed to be a good sign. Today I spent several hours in the semi-sunshine raking the entire plot of land and turning the earth in two additional locations. The tree that was cut down must have been quite a large tree, because its leaves covered a large portion of the garden plot. So I had a fair amount of work in front of me, but it was enjoyable work. I enjoy the physical work; time passes without my being aware of it, and I like being outdoors in the sun and fresh air. My back muscles suffer a bit, but the pain passes and then I'm ready for the next round of work.

The pumpkin plants in our living room are now quite large and will most likely do well when planted. My spinach plants are doing well, as are the beet plants. The broccoli and cauliflower plants are taking their time, but will get there. My husband is looking to buy about ten raspberry bushes and we were at different garden centers yesterday to check out prices; I purchased some corn plants as well when we were at one of the garden centers called Plantation (Plantasjen in Norwegian).

I got a good deal on a table/two matching chairs; paid about fifty US dollars for the set. I've also purchased a birdbath online through Natur og Fritid AS; it's so beautiful and I can't wait to set it out for the birds. You can see it here if you want to see what it looks like:  https://www.naturogfritid.no/614151/Hobby_og_hage/Foringsautomater/Fuglebad/Ekko+fuglebad

Lots of photos today, just to keep you updated on what's happening with our garden. I love garden life so far.

ready for planting

the garden entrance, with strawberry patches on either side of the path

the raked garden 

pumpkin plants grow amazingly fast

corn plants 

beet plants 

broccoli plants 

cauliflower plants 

spinach plants

A nice surprise concerning my book Blindsided:Recognizing and Dealing with Passive-Aggressive Leadership in the Workplace

My books can be found on Goodreads, of which I became a member a few years ago. Blindsided is my only published book so far that has gotten ratings on Goodreads, and I was pleased to see that it has garnered 4 out of 5 stars (4 = I really like it, and 5 = It was amazing). It still sells, seven years after it was first published.

I have nearly finished writing a new book about modern workplaces, this time with an emphasis on what employees want. I will be publishing it very soon.

But for those of you who haven't read Blindsided, perhaps now is the time to think about doing so.

This is how I feel more and more

http://www.gocomics.com/aunty-acid/2016/04/24#.VxyR00VnXK8.blogger

Ok, not 99 problems, but the idea of a longer weekend and fewer workdays, yes please!!

Probably my favorite song by Prince

"Some say a man ain't happy, Unless a man truly dies, Oh why, Time, time".

Rest in peace, Prince.

I remembered yesterday that my brother Ray, who died last year at the age of 54, loved Prince's music. So my heart got ripped open yet again (like after David Bowie died), because these artists remind me of my brother. I realized yesterday that this is how the rest of life will be defined--dealing with loss and letting go. The challenge will be to find joy in the midst of all the sorrow.


"Sign O' The Times"

Oh yeah
In France a skinny man
Died of a big disease with a little name
By chance his girlfriend came across a needle
And soon she did the same
At home there are seventeen-year-old boys
And their idea of fun
Is being in a gang called The Disciples
High on crack, totin' a machine gun

Time, time

Hurricane Annie ripped the ceiling off a church
And killed everyone inside
U turn on the telly and every other story
Is tellin' U somebody died
Sister killed her baby cuz she couldn't afford 2 feed it
And we're sending people 2 the moon
In September my cousin tried reefer 4 for the very first time
Now he's doing horse, it's June

Times, times

It's silly, no?
When a rocket ship explodes
And everybody still wants 2 fly
Some say a man ain't happy
Unless a man truly dies
Oh why
Time, time

Baby make a speech, Star Wars fly
Neighbors just shine it on
But if a night falls and a bomb falls
Will anybody see the dawn
Time, times

It's silly, no?
When a rocket blows
And everybody still wants 2 fly
Some say a man ain't happy, truly
Until a man truly dies
Oh why, oh why, Sign O the Times

Time, time

Sign O the Times mess with your mind
Hurry before it's 2 late
Let's fall in love, get married, have a baby
We'll call him Nate... if it's a boy

Time, time

Time, time

A new adventure--our city garden

I don't even remember what prompted me back in July of 2009 to apply for a garden plot in the community garden down the road from where we live. I suppose I had read about the garden in a magazine or newspaper, and just really liked the idea of having our own plot. Since we live in an apartment in the city, we haven't ever had the possibility to plant a real garden. So here we are at this point in our lives, about to become city gardeners. A new adventure.....

The community garden is called Egebergløkka parsellhage, and was started in 1917 as a community potato garden. One of the men who sits on the garden 'board' gave me the keys to the community garden tonight and gave me a tour of it. The community garden is a nice mix of Norwegians and non-Norwegian gardeners who grow everything from potatoes to raspberries. Two people keep bees, and sell the honey that the bees make at the end of the summer season. There are challenges in the form of garden snails (the Iberia snail being the most common) but it is possible to deal with them.

The seven-year wait was worth it, for several reasons. I took a look at the plot of land we've been allotted, and it's quite large, so we'll be able to really grow a few different kinds of vegetables. There is a lot of work to be done, but I can't wait to get started on clearing the plot and doing what's required so that we can begin to plant in mid-May. I will be planting broccoli, cauliflower, beets, spinach, and pumpkins. One of the nicest surprises was finding out that our plot has some fruit bushes already growing there--black currant (solbær), red currant (ripsbær), and gooseberry (stikkelsbær) bushes--which makes my husband very happy. Other garden plots have apple and plum trees growing there. Getting this garden plot has made me the happiest I've been in a long time. There has been so much stress and sadness this past year, that just knowing that I can be outdoors, in nature, in the sun, working in our garden, has given me back some of the joie de vivre that I seem to have lost. I am grateful for this blessing and privilege--to be near the earth and in touch with what is real and good.

Akerselva river in spring

Blackbird outside my window

Last year I posted a photo of a blackbird outside my office window (http://paulamdeangelis.blogspot.no/2015/01/a-winter-visitor-outside-my-office.html). I managed to get a few shots of a blackbird this year as well; I wonder if it's the same one? I set out bread crumbs in order to attract the birds; sometimes I get magpies, other times bullfinches, but this time I got a blackbird. He's a plump little bird and very cute.

Be the One by Dua Lipa

Really like this song.......Dua Lipa reminds me of Nelly Furtado.

The first bumblebee of the season

It's a beautiful sunny day here in Oslo, and the crocuses in the yard are in full bloom, loving the sunshine. The first bumblebee of the season also made its appearance (the first one I've seen at least), in love with the crocuses. It made its way from flower to flower, landing on each of them and then rolling around in the pollen sitting on the top of the filament, quite a happy bee. One cannot take the bees for granted anymore, due to colony collapse disorder and bee deaths. So I was glad to see that this bumblebee was healthy and functioning. A bumblebee watching site on Twitter contacted me to tell me that this is Bombus hypnorum, a tree bumblebee, also called a new garden bumblebee. These bumblebees often live near human settlements, like to build their nests above ground and often inhabit bird boxes. You can read more about them here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombus_hypnorum.

Getting ready to plant our garden

We finally got word that we will be getting a garden plot in a nearby community garden (in Norwegian called 'parselhage'), and will pick up the keys very soon. We've been on the list to get a garden plot for about seven years; last year we were told that this year would be the year. My plans are to plant vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, pumpkin, beets, and spinach). My husband would like to plant fruit bushes, among them raspberry bushes. We haven't seen the plot of land yet, so we don't know how much space we'll be getting. Plots range in size from 800 to 2000 square feet, fairly large by my estimation. I've already started some plants from seed, and they are growing fairly well so far, especially the pumpkin plants (see the photos below).

cauliflower and broccoli

spinach to the right

pumpkin plants

beet plants

pumpkin plants growing large

Lyrics to 'Hey Look Me Over'

Don't ask me why this came to mind--our graduation song from kindergarten, a long long time ago. Perhaps I was thinking about going back to work tomorrow after having been on vacation for over a week, and I got to thinking about school days and the approach of summer vacation and looking forward to that when we were kids. In any case, the song was written by Carolyn Leigh and Cy Coleman, and our teachers 'adapted' the lyrics for a kindergarten scenario. The song has been performed by Louis Armstrong, Johnny Mathis, Bing Crosby, and Lucille Ball, among others.


Hey look us over
Lend us an ear
School days are over
Vacation time is here
No more painting pictures
No clay in a cup
But when you are in kindergarten
The only way is up

And we'll be up like a rose bud
High on the vine
Don't thumb your nose
But take a tip from mine
We’re a little bit short of the elbow room
But let us stand and shout
Hey look out world
Here we come

-------------------------------

and the original song:

Hey look me over
Lend me an ear
Fresh out of clover
Mortgage up to here
But don't pass the plate folks
Don't pass the cup
I figure whenever you're down and out
The only way is up

And I'll be up like a rose bud
High on the vine
Don't thumb your nose
But take a tip from mine
I'm a little bit short of the elbow room
But let me get me some
And look out world
Here I come

Yes, hey look me over
Lend me an ear
Fresh out of clover
Mortgage up to here
But don't pass the plate folks
Don't pass the cup
I figure whenever you're down and out
The only way is up

And I'll be up like a rose bud
High on the vine
Don't thumb your nose
But take a tip from mine
I'm a little bit short of the elbow room
But let me get me some
And look out, world
Here, I, come...

Songwriters: Carolyn Leigh and Cy Coleman

Daffodils and Happy Easter

A beautiful poem for spring by Robert Frost

A Prayer in Spring

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.

Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white,
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night;
And make us happy in the happy bees,
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees.

And make us happy in the darting bird
That suddenly above the bees is heard,
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid air stands still.

For this is love and nothing else is love,
The which it is reserved for God above
To sanctify to what far ends He will,
But which it only needs that we fulfil.

Things I want

Sometimes the things we want are defined by the things we do not want. That’s true for me to some extent, but as I get older, I know pretty much exactly what I want:

a) Peace and quiet = without these, I cannot relax. I do not want to be around people the entire day, and that includes my work day. I want to be able to close my office door and to be by myself. I need peace and quiet at work and at home, in other words, some hours to myself where I am beholden to no one. I want alone time that is responsibility-free and guilt-free, and that is not invaded by pointless conversations or people wanting me to feel guilty for not paying attention to them.

b) Real communication = without it, nothing works. If I cannot have real honest communication, then I’d rather not waste my time and other people’s time talking. I don’t want to fake conversations or interest in things I have no interest in, nor do I want to compete with others for listening time. If I am in conversation with you and all you want to do is to talk about yourself and how lousy your life is or how important your life is compared to others, then I don’t want to be your conversation partner. In other words, don’t waste my valuable precious time complaining to me about how miserable your life is or how important you are, because you have no idea what others might be dealing with on a daily basis. And they don’t burden the world with their problems or their inflated ego.

c) Simplicity = without it, life becomes a meaningless drudgery. The trend these days is to complicate everything. Workplaces are exercises in frustration and lack of effectiveness because administrative routines and rules have become too complicated. We worship on the altar of triviality. At home, the same can be true. I’d rather cook simple hearty meals from scratch, with fresh vegetables and foodstuffs, than load us up with excess salt and sugar from processed foods, pre-packaged foods, or foods that have been suffocated in plastic to ‘protect’ them (plastic wrapped so tightly around vegetables that it cannot be healthy for them). Why can’t vegetables and fruit be free and uncovered? Why must we waste time, money and energy on packing each individual vegetable into its own plastic housing? Why can’t we keep it simple? Grow some of our own vegetables, or support local farmers who do. Buy unpackaged vegetables or those that will be tossed away because they don’t ‘look’ appealing. Cut down on the amount of food purchased. You don’t need pantries stocked full of food, unless you believe the apocalypse is coming.

d) Farewell to competition and to expectations = I’ve reached that point. I no longer want to compete. I don’t see the point of competition anymore. I no longer want expectations of greatness placed upon my shoulders by others who mean that I should aim high and have grandiose ambitions. Those days are gone; they belong to a past time when I was much younger. I’ve seen the light and accepted it, why can’t my leaders at work also see it? My super-productive days are over. I want an ordinary life, with ordinary cares and small worries each day. I want to putter, to garden, to hang out at home, to pursue my hobbies, to not have to measure up to specific metrics imposed on me at work, and to not have to worry about how I look or what I wear. If I want to walk around in jogging pants and sneakers, so be it. I want to walk in the sunshine, to be free to do so, to not have time constraints on me, to not have to have homework anymore in the form of articles to write or articles to read or review. I want to be free of grant applications and progress reports. I want peace, quiet, real communication, simplicity, and an unencumbered life.

Things I do not want

Sometimes there are dry spells when it comes to creativity, energy, and motivation, and I’ve had some dry spells recently, when it seems that writing, photography and all of the other creative things that nourish the soul, are not worth pursuing. A spiritual malaise sets in, and sometimes spills over into the physical realm. The darkness and grayness of winter can sap a person for strength, ditto for soulless workplaces that do nothing to nourish the soul. They rather destroy it slowly.

What I don’t want at this point in my life: I don’t want to work anymore, at least not in the traditional sense. My soul derives nothing from the daily 9 to 5 grind that I used to love so much. It gets zero nourishment from a public sector workplace that is dominated by a bureaucracy that kills all motivation, by numerous leaders who are completely ineffective and who could care less about their employees, and by a level of inefficiency that in and of itself could drive a normal person to drink. Albert Einstein wrote that “Bureaucracy is the death of all sound work”. He wrote that line during the early part of the 20^th century and was completely spot on! The saving grace of any workplace is of course your co-workers, many of whom feel the same way as I do, so there is some amount of shared commiseration while we all plod onward in the muck. But some of them are younger and haven’t experienced soul-sucking environments for years on end, so they are not as weary of the whole thing as I am. I still have several years to go before I can retire, and I honestly wonder at times how I’m going to survive those years without burning out.

I also do not want to work all day in an office the size of a tiny kitchen that I share with another person, with windows that open a crack, with fluorescent lighting that can never in a million years take the place of sunlight, for the prescribed number of hours. I find all sorts of excuses now to be out of my office, to be outdoors, or to leave early. Modern workplace buildings, for all their so-called environmentally-friendly architecture and technology, are completely divorced from nature, from wildness, from the outdoors. There is nothing like fresh air, a gentle breeze, sunshine on your skin, a walk along a river, or just being outdoors, to restore the soul. I want to be outdoors any chance I get. My body makes those decisions for me, and I am learning to just follow what it wants, because it wants healthy things for me.

I don’t want to listen to or to watch endless news stories about all of the horrible things going on in the world for which there are no solutions. All those stories do is create despair. Newspapers and television have become like the Dementors in the Harry Potter books—soul-sucking creatures. They bring up a problem again and again, propose few to no solutions, and suck the energy from those who try by bombarding them nonstop with stupid questions. If you are going to have an opinion about the problem, then for God’s sake have an opinion about the solution to that problem. I know the world is in deep trouble; tell me something else. Tell me about the people working to change things, trying to solve problems, trying to help, and tell me about all that in an intelligent, respectful, and decent way. Stop being belligerent, aggressive, nonstop pandering machines. Stop pandering to the lowest common denominator in listeners--to the basest instincts in people, every chance you get. Don’t encourage bigotry, hatred, and violence by talking about it ad nauseam. Stop making the rest of the world think that America is filled with pro-Trump and pro-Palin idiots. There are over 315 million people in the USA; the news media in Europe would have us think that all Americans support Trump; the American media are doing very little to dispel that notion. All of the Americans I know that are family and close friends, do not support Trump or the other GOP idiots. So there. My appeal to the media here and in the USA—please shut up unless you have something positive to say or some solution for how to get rid of Trump before November.

And while we’re at it—could we please end the reality TV culture and celebrity worship? I don’t want to see another Kardashian (any of them) on my TV screen or in any newspapers for as long as I live. I don’t watch these shows, never have and never will, but it seems as if whatever so-called 'celebrities' do is news-worthy. Here's a quick tip--NOT. Is this what money does to people’s brains? Can heads of the media no longer see what quality is and what crap is?

I no longer read the newspaper at breakfast. I read the comics page (since it is actually more intelligent than much of what passes for news--you need only to read Bloom County to know that) and then put the paper aside until later in the day. I refuse to discuss the grotesque goings-on in the world when I first get up. There are many things to be thankful for--the life we have been given, the chance to live another day, the chance to wake up to sunshine, the chance to love those in our lives (humans and pets), to chance to choose healthy, and the chance to appreciate the world we live in and to take care of it. That's how I want to start my day, and live my day. 

The Serenity Prayer

The best prayer of all---so much wisdom contained in one little prayer. If we followed its advice, we would save ourselves so much pain, complaining and irritation.

The benefits of doing yoga exercises

I found this short article, Yoga Eases Symptoms of Chronic Low Back Pain, at http://www.ahealthblog.com/yoga-eases-symptoms-of-chronic-low-back-pain.html. It's quite interesting, as I just started doing yoga exercises in January. I am not practicing yoga, only doing the exercises, and I am only doing the simple exercises, but have already discovered that I feel more relaxed and have less lower back pain after doing them. I will keep on doing them to see if these effects are long-lasting. Many of the yoga exercises remind me of the types of stretching exercises I used to do for my modern dance classes years ago. The fact that I can still do many of these exercises makes me feel quite good, after many years of not doing them.

Image via: Yoga Eases Symptoms of Chronic Low Back Pain

Change the World by Eric Clapton

Every now and then I wish I really could change the world in a big way--make it less brutal, less bigoted, less cold, less money-oriented, just simpler and kinder....All those things at once. Not sure where we're headed anymore; it all seems so chaotic and out of control--climate change, the overwhelming refugee/migrant situation in Europe, the utter brutality of terrorism, and the looming possibility of a loud-mouth bigot as president of the USA. The latter bothers me immensely, that my fellow countrymen believe in this man, who is clearly a sham. If people think that he has even the faintest idea of what it's like to be poor or lower middle class, think again. He has NO idea what it's like. He's never been poor. Daddy gave him his cushy start in life, and that's ok, but he could have used it for the betterment of mankind, and he hasn't. He just says the things he thinks bigots, whiners and the failures in society want to hear. What surprises me is how many people I know who actually support this man. I find it sad. Listening to Eric Clapton sing 'Change the World' is what I want to do right now--because it reminds me to keep believing in the good. But also, that if we don't do something soon, it will be too late to change the world.

When will reality TV shows disappear?

We’re now well into season 6 of The Walking Dead; episode 10, entitled The Next World, aired on Monday evening here in Norway. Fear the Walking Dead starts up again in April, and tomorrow night the sixth (and final so far) episode of The X-Files airs. I’ve been watching them all and loving them. The return of The X-Files after so many years (it went off the air in 2002) made me very happy; I looked forward to getting involved with Mulder and Scully’s cases and their relationship all over again. And these episodes didn’t disappoint; despite mixed reviews (as always), they managed to hold my attention and left me wanting more. It’s not just that all these shows are sci-fi, horror, apocalyptic, or fantasy shows that appeal to me because I find those genres interesting. It’s that we get involved with the characters at the same time, characters that are dealing with life and death situations, survival, family matters, sickness and death. The zombies have to be dealt with and/or dispatched on The Walking Dead; likewise the mutants and monsters on The X-Files. No matter how fantastic it all becomes, no matter that the survival of the main characters is sometimes very surprising or even unthinkable, I am rooting for all of them to make it. This is television at its best—series that I enjoy following, that give me something to think about and look forward to each week; that entertain me, surprise me, shock me, and involve me. There are other good series too; Sleepy Hollow, Game of Thrones, Wayward Pines, and American Horror Story are just a few that come to mind. I’ve watched them too, but The Walking Dead and The X-Files remain my favorites. I’m just thankful that they exist at all, because most of what is available to watch is reality TV. I wish someone would take a hatchet to anything that even remotely smacks of reality TV, and put all these shows out of their misery forever. They include The Kardashians, all the cooking competition shows, all the lip-syncing competition shows, all the ‘how to survive on a desert island or on a mountain-top’ shows, all the shows about bratty children who fall in line when a nanny appears, all the shows about spoiled adults whose credit cards are maxed-out and who suddenly need professional help to get them out of debt, all the shows about presumably fashionable (not) women telling other women how to dress, all the shows about pawn shop users or those who go scrounging through other people’s garage possessions, and rich men’s wives. The list goes on ad nauseum.

I don’t know what I’d do without the TCM channel that serves up films from the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, that even at their worst, are one hundred times better than anything offered me by reality TV shows. Most of the old films had real substance; a few were fluff, but the majority were not. These were films made about characters you wanted to get to know, involved in life dramas that mattered. Not so for reality TV shows. I wonder how our Western culture became so obsessed with the latter, and with one family in particular; that family’s every move is reported in the media. How did that happen, and why? Or is it just a matter of watching them because there is nothing else on? Why do I not care what happens to a single one of them? Why do I wish they would all crash and burn? All I know is that I am glad I grew up when watching television was an enjoyable experience, when shows like The Dick Van Dyke Show, Leave it to Beaver, The Donna Reed Show, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Maya, Bonanza, Kojak, Sanford and Son, Bewitched, The Bionic Woman, The Bob Newhart Show, The Partridge Family, The Waltons, The Brady Bunch, Hogan’s Heroes, Dallas, Knot’s Landing, All in the Family, MASH, The Twilight Zone, Dark Shadows, Night Gallery, The Night Stalker, Columbo, Cheers, Miami Vice, Magnum PI, Married With Children, Murder She Wrote, St. Elsewhere, Moonlighting, and Remington Steele, among many others, were popular. I watched them all and followed them all. They made an impression on me that has lasted. They were funny, sad, moving, provocative, entertaining, scary, intelligent, but above all, memorable. That cannot be said for reality TV programs. I feel sorry for this generation that has grown up with these shows; they have no real idea of what good television is, except perhaps when they sit down to watch the TV series that we grew up with. It is no wonder that streaming has become so popular; I can watch the shows I’m interested in and ignore the junk. That’s progress.