Category: Five Friday Happy Bringers

A weekly round-up of various things that provided me with joy and happiness.

Posted in College Teaching, Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers (6/22/12) — Retirement Edition

Posted on by Neal Saye

Yesterday, I retired from full time professorship at Georgia Southern University.  Here are five things about my retiring that make me happy/reflective.

1.  This cool plaque from CLASS (GSU’s College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences).

2.  Turning in my grades this morning.

3.  Enjoying the silly truthfulness of a message I posted on my Department of Writing and Linguistics listserv, when I announced my approaching retirement:  Ten Take-Aways from Being a Professor at Georgia Southern for Twenty-Four Years.

*  The student is more important than the subject being taught.

*  Listen to the student–she or he has a voice.

*  Newton (the ancient classroom building which houses my department) never changes.

*  Deans and department chairs do (pretty regularly)  (Okay, very regularly.)

*  The secretaries really run this place.  Be good to them.

*  How I arranged my classroom tables, what books I used, what my theoretical framework was (though important) paled in comparison to being in love with teaching young people (and some not-so-young people) and LIKING students.

*  Don’t grade everything.

*  At least once every week, tell your students something funny–about you, or them or whatever.

*  Take a walk around campus every now and then just to take in its natural beauty.

*  Don’t take yourself or your job too seriously.

4.  A fun saying-goodbye gathering with department members and other collegaues.

Tim Giles and Interim Department Chair Phyllis Dallas.

Mary Hadley, Thomas Klein and Tim.

Terri Welford and Interim Dean Curtis Ricker.

Interim Associate Provost Mike Smith (former CLASS Dean)

Laura Milner and Mary Marwitz

Fellow blogger Emma Bolden

Poet Extraordinaire Eric Nelson

Michael Pemberton and Angela Crow

5.  Realizing that being sad at leaving such wonderful colleagues and students proves the joy of having been a part of Georgia Southern University for so long.

Happiest of Weekends to You All!

Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers (4/27/12)

Posted on by Neal Saye

Friday, Friday!  Here’s what I’m happy about today:

1.  Breakfast this morning at a cool diner on Abercorn (here in Savannah), named–appropriately–The Diner on Abercorn.

2.  The following quote from one of my creative writing students this semester.  (Part of a reflection letter with one of the assignments.)

“I would recommend my friends take this class, but only my magical friends.  Not the dull, unimaginative type.”

3.  This invention from my just-turned-five grandson Daniel:

He calls it a Mouth Shutter.  Daniel explained it this way–“If somebody is talking or yelling, and you don’t want to listen to them anymore, put this on their mouth and they will shut up.”

Here’s the back of the Mouth Shutter, with tape for securing to the loud person’s mouth:

This makes SO much practical sense to me.

4.  This right-on-the-mark quote from the Abraham-Hicks folks:

“A very good career choice would be to gravitate toward those activities and to embrace those desires that harmonize with your core intentions, which are freedom and growth—and joy. Make a ‘career’ of living a  happy life rather than trying to find work that will produce enough income that  you can do things with your money that will then make you happy. When feeling  happy is of paramount importance to you—and what you do ‘for a living’ makes  you happy—you have found the best of all combinations.”

5.  The promise of weekend.

HAVE A TERRIFIC ONE!

Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers, Savannah Joy

Five Friday Happy Bringers (4/20/12)

Posted on by Neal Saye

Friday! Five Things:

 

1. Rainbows. I saw this double rainbow on my way home from work from Statesboro to Savannah.

2. Elephant Ears. (There’s a long true story here involving New Orleans, Cafe Du Monde, a fortune teller and late night. But that’s for another post.)

3. Learning how to be happier. And taking voluntary steps toward that goal.

 

 

4. Chilling out at Chili’s. Last night I went to Chili’s for those spicy chicken crispers (yum).

 

 

The visit was made more fun by running into Tiffani, a Chili’s worker extraordinaire (whom I had not seen in quite a while). Tiffani ALWAYS has a smile and a laugh. She radiates happiness. Here she is (and of course I had to give her a blog card).

 

 

Go Tiffani!

5. Being able to breathe deeply and feel the essence of life flowing in and out of my body.

HAPPY WEEKEND TO YOU ALL!

 

Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers, Savannah Joy

Five Friday Happy Bringers (4/13/12)

Posted on by Neal Saye

Hey, hey, it’s wonderful Friday once again, and here are Five Things I’m happy about:

1. Today, enjoying so much a great lunchtime experience at Back in the Day Bakery on Bull Street in Savannah. I’ve eaten there before (oh gosh, their cupcakes!) but noon today was especially fun and scrumptious. I ordered the meaty State Fair sandwich, two lavender cookies (yes, lavender) and sweet tea. While at the counter, I noticed a brand new Back in the Day Bakery Cookbook and learned that the owners are on a book tour and will be appearing on Martha Stewart on Monday. (I want to appear on Martha Stewart.)

Here’s cool and hip Stephanie serving the State Fair:

And here’s Stephanie with a couple of beautiful co-workers in front of the new cookbook:

2. Appreciating smart people who can do amazing feats like build bridges. The old drawbridge leading onto Skidaway Island was up when I drove out to visit my daughter this afternoon. A brand new TALL bridge is being built. You can see part of it in this pic I took from my car.

I just find it so amazing that the bridge is going up because of ideas and plans and drawings made by women and men. I need to be smarter.

3. We found out this week that Emily’s twins are one of each–a boy and a girl!

4. The excitement of the promise and newness of springtime.

5. Play

 

Have a good tasting, smart, twin-sized, playful, spring weekend!

 

Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers, Humor

Five Friday Happy Bringers (4/6/12)

Posted on by Neal Saye

It’s Friday, and even though it has been a couple of weeks since I posted the Happy Bringers, here’s what I’m happy about today:

1.  But before I tell you the first happy bringer, I have a confession.  Gather ’round.  For the past two weeks I have been without my laptop because it bit the byte.  I took it to a computer guy who had the nerve to say I should just throw the piece of junk away.  That really hurt my feelings, but he was right.  So anyway, I have been writing my posts from my iPhone (at least one person needs to tell me, with exclamation, what a grand job I’ve been doing).  By the way, back in February I was at a writing conference, and a presenter explained that one of her students (I think he was a SCAD Atlanta kid, probably with too much money, metallic blue hair on the left side of his head, pipe cleaner jeans and a smirk) wrote an ENTIRE ten-page research paper, complete with documentation ON HIS SMART PHONE.  Me, I have trouble simply texting because my fingers are so fat, and I’m always hitting an adjacent key and ending up with weird combinations of letters which Autocorrect then “corrects” into albeit correctly spelled words, buts ones which are NOT the ones I meant and are often grossly inappropriate, as if I use UrbanDictionary as my thesaurus.  And to make matters worse, I always seem to hit Send at the exact moment I decide to look at the screen for a too-late proofing.  (Me: “Yes, I think you shod bug that booty you’ve been wanting to read.”  Them: “Huh?  Neal, is this you?  What’s going on?  Where are you?”)

The first happy bringer, then, is that I have a new computer, which I took out of the box maybe an hour ago.  The coolest perk is that the keyboard has backlighting.  I haven’t figured out why or what good that is, but like my solid white tie, I’m glad I have it.

2.  So, still on the computer idea, my second happy bringer is my daughter and son-in-law who bought the new computer for me as a gift  (thank you!).  As I have gotten a bit older, I’ve developed this amazing strategy concerning the acquisition of goods and services: “Pout and Mope.”  (For this part of today’s post, please pretend you’re not reading a blog about happiness.  Pretend instead you’re reading a blog about, say, mental instability or the Kardashians.)  Pout and Mope works like this:  If I want something but can’t quite decide whether to buy it or not, or if I simply don’t want to pay for it, I quickly brainstorm strategies for getting myself sort of down emotionally.  To get in this fake-depressed state, I think about, I don’t know, Glenn Beck, or something.  Then I hang out where I think people will feel sorry for me and perhaps buy me what I want.  This works REALLY well if there are such folks at Best Buy, Haverty’s, Diamond Imporium or the Apple Store.

For example, for days I complained and moped that I didn’t have a computer to write my blog on (or to surf the web to “learn more about Jesus,” I added, since I thought that might get me a few nearing-Easter points) AND that my eyes were getting in pretty rough shape from having to squint so much with the iPhone blog posting AND also that I’m sure not getting any younger AND we should all do good for others while they’re still alive.  And then, WHAM!  A week later I’m writing on a lighted keyboard.

Moral of story:  If you see me on the street, and your first reaction is “Oh my gosh, WHAT could be wrong with him?!,” just buy me something.  Thank you.

3.  Making fun of Riboclavin.  You remember my hypochondriac buddy, right?  Every time he thinks he has a slight fever, in his mind he’s dead as a doornail.  Well, I regret to inform you that the mental deficiency has spread to Mrdillharris … HIS DOG.  Just look below; it’s so sad how people can sink to such depths.  (If you haven’t read Happy Bringer #2 above, don’t.)  The first pic is somewhat normal, a cute dog.  The second, well you be the judge.

I just don’t know what to do.  No clue.

4.  Allegra D

5.  Appreciating the Savannah iDoctor.  A while back, while simultaneously walking down the concrete steps just outside my second floor office at Georgia Southern AND checking my texts, I saw it happen a millisecond before it happened.  My phone slipped from my fingers (what caused that??) and flipped twice before crashing onto the first step below, then bouncing like a slinky onto the second, then the third.  Picking it up, Humpty Dumpty-ish, the face was, of course shattered.  I had a hip but thin case at the time.  I wanted to hurt or flunk somebody but instead called Apple who said via recording to send the phone in and expect a two-week return time and a large bill.  Riboclavin (from above–he comes in handy occasionally) told me about the Savannah iDoctor, who specializes in fixing iPhones broken by klutzes.  I was amazed: I dropped it off on Wilmington Island at 9 am, grabbed a sausage-egg biscuit and returned forty-five minutes later to find a brand-new-looking phone and a bill half what Apple asked.  (And a recommendation to get an Otterbox.)

Check Eric out if you need similar help:  www.SavannahiDoctor.com

Have a wonderfully fun and joyful weekend and Easter!

Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers (3/2/24)

Posted on by Neal Saye

It’s Friday again!  And here are Five Things I am Happy about:

1.  Feeling Good physically, just in time for the weekend.  (Btw, I gave myself a B- on Neal’s Sick Test.)

2.  Remembering my four-year-old grandson Daniel’s breakout performance at the Latino Festival at Savannah Country Day School.  Watch the first 45 seconds on the video below.  First, Daniel’s thanking the crowd for attending.  Then decides to add, “Hey, Nana” to his grandmother.  Then, well, who knows what caused him to do what he did next?

Friend Louis tried to drag D offstage, but the routine wasn’t quite finished.  That’s my Daniel (who, btw, is co-owner with me of Mr. Happy).  When we asked him later, WHY on earth he did such a thing in front of so many people, D replied very matter-of-factly, “I just felt like dancing.”  That satisfied me.

3.  The color green, hunter green to be exact.

4.  Guacamole.

5.  Musical Linsanity.  This Taiwanese young man named Lin showing us that Linsanity goes beyond the NY basketball court.  Listen to the guy belt out Dolly’s and Whitney‘s “I Will Always Love You.”  (And notice the line: “I wish you joy and happiness.”)

Have a great early March weekend!

  I wish you joy and happiness.

Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers (2/17/12)

Posted on by Neal Saye

It’s Friday again! And here are Five Things I am happy about:

1. The comfort of this beautiful affirmation: “I always have a choice.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. That it’s not Wednesday. (See “The Absent Smile” post.)

3. Having the correct tools for writing a blog:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4. Dear Deer. Earlier this week Riboclavin txted me and asked if I would show him some more pictures of key deer. Why? He just LOVED them, he said, and looking at them made him happy (and I suspect kept his temperature at a healthy status). Some of you will remember my buddy Riboclavin from earlier posts. If not, see Item 4 of “Five Friday Happy Bringers 2/3/12.” I’ve gotten this request for pics of key deer from him approximately every six months since 2006.

Let me explain.

Back in ’06, my older daughter Amy got married in one of those small “destination weddings” on Little Palm Island off the coast of Key West. You know what a destination wedding is, right? Basically it’s where you don’t have to reserve the back room at Ryan’s for the wedding reception because everyone just shows up at the “destination” and–“wham”–every detail is taken car

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Little Palm Island amazed me in its uniqueness:

* You had to be sixteen to even take the boat from the mainland and get onto the island. (My 80-year old Aunt Junaluski served as the flower girl. Kidding.)

* No cell phones were allowed in any public places.

* There was only ONE TV on Little Palm Island (in a clubhouse).

* There were private outside showers attached to each bungalow:

 

 

 

 

 

 

All true! BUT what amazed me, fascinated me, intrigued me (and eventually Riboclavin) were the tiny, adorable KEY DEER. They came right up to you to be petted and fed–organic mash mix only (except for a small bag of Doritos I slipped onto the island).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What beautiful little creatures key deer are. An endangered species, they are related to white tail deer but MUCH smaller, the male averaging only 30 inches tall. They live exclusively in the lower keys and swim between the small islands foraging for food (similar to what I did on my stay, dogpaddling for Shirley Temples and virgin daiquiris).

On the wedding day, the little rascals tried to eat Amy’s bouquet:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But we managed to get to the church (okay, the beach) with bouquet unscathed:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When we returned from the wedding, I shared photos with ANYBODY who would look at them. Riboclavin was enthralled (even more than he is with Zach and Cody, and The Suite Life on Deck). BEGGED me to try to help him procure a key deer, as in HAVE ONE AS A PET! Well, of course, I refused. (He wouldn’t pay my $5000 down payment.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ever since, I have to deal with txts like this from Riboclavin: “Plz! Luv those key babies! Show pics!” I like having power over people.

(Here’s an interesting article from the National Wildlife Federation: http://www.nwf.org/Wildlife/Wildlife-Library/Mammals/Key-Deer.aspx

5. Having the ability to breathe deeply and enjoy life.

Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers (2/10/12)

Posted on by Neal Saye

It’s Friday again!  And here are Five Things I am happy about:

1.  Realizing–as soon as I woke up this morning–that it was Friday again.  I love that feeling.  (I understand that “woke up” and “this morning” might seem redundant to some readers.  However, I’m a college professor.  Take a 3:00 afternoon class, for example.  That’s a bit of an early rise for some students (I wish I was kidding), so I’m always careful to add a time indicator after using the words “woke up.”

2.  Savoring these Fresh Gourmet Dipped Strawberries from Shari’s Berries.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3.  Trying to understand why someone would ask for a to-go box for one piece of leftover bacon.  I ate breakfast at The Original Pancake House in Savannah the other day with some friends.  One of them demolished all his food (the silver dollar pancake meal) except for ONE piece of crisp bacon.  Are you with me?  The meal is over, right?  You get up and pay for your meal.  Head on out to the cattle-rustling.

But no, JoNathan, seeing our waitress with the curly letters tattooed on the underside of her wrist, asked for a to-go box.  She looked down at his place, confused for a second, until he pointed nonchalantly to the SINGLE piece of bacon–as if that was a normal request.  At that moment my eyes met hers, and we communicated via eye language (I’m multilingual):  “Is he KIDDING?  Why not just slip the bacon, unnoticed, in his shirt pocket?  And what type box would work?”  Well, she was a cool professional because she returned with a styrofoam hot dog container.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(I tipped her a little extra for her trouble, patience and understanding.)

And to sort of put Item 2 and Item 3 together, did you know you can get chocolate-covered bacon?

4.  Making the right decision about a lady in Walgreens today with toilet tissue hanging out of the back of her pants.  I was minding my own business, sitting in the little waiting area at the back of the drug store, biding time for a prescription to be filled, and reading my new Bloggers Boot Camp book.  (Did you know that with the right mix of “savvy, in-the-now hipness” and “cutting edge techno-go,” I MIGHT BECOME A MILLIONAIRE JUST BY BLOGGING!   But first, I need to find out what “techno-go” is.  Help!  And I guess strangers need to start sending me money.)

Two other people were nearby–a hefty woman about two feet from me, standing at the Inspiration Books display, holding a box of those purple Peeps and looking (I’m pretty certain) in the direction of a thin book on fasting; and a man sitting two plastic chairs down from me in Richard Simmons-ish shorts.  (Can you even buy those anymore?  And why?)  Well, out of the blue this late-fortyish lady with frosted hair, brand new-looking jeans and a black Northface rushed up to the Prescription Pick-Up counter and breathlessly asked if her medicine was ready.  It was (with an added grape flavor, I couldn’t help but overhear).  But wait just a second, let’s back up a bit–as she rushed forward, a couple feet of toilet paper (white, patterned) flew banner-like behind her, billowing somehow from the exact center of her waistband.

THE DILEMMA BEGAN.

Should someone tell her about the toilet tissue?  If so, who?  I cast my initial vote for Ms. Peeps, but she appeared oblivious to the unfolding drama.  Richard Simmons?  Well, he did smirk just a little when he looked up from his Blackberry and saw Aurora and her trail.  Me?  No way.  I’m shy.  And get my feelings hurt far too easily.  Handle rejection catastrophically (with weeping and nail biting and lashing out at those closest to me).

Four people (five if you count the pimply but pleasant, teenage-looking pharmacist), thrown together by fate at Walgreens.  Not knowing what to do, I quickly txted several friends and family members:  “There’s a lady at Walgreens with toilet tissue hanging from back of pants!  Shud I tell her?”  All said YES!  Except for Riboclavin (See last Friday’s Five Happy Bringers post) who didn’t respond (until hours later).  It makes me SO mad when people do not drop whatever they’re doing and txt me back IMMEDIATELY.  It’s so rude of them.  (I wouldn’t care to bet money Riboclavin was taking his temperature or enjoying a stress-reducing bubble bath.)

To make sure I was doing the right thing, I did the WWJD strategy and decided Jesus would tell her; it’s compassion in action.  I would certainly want to know, wouldn’t you?  (One time–true story–I walked into a class and a courageous girl said, “Dr. Saye, there’s toilet paper attached to your shoe!”  Sure enough, there was.  Don’t ask me why.)

So as Aurora drifted away from the counter and headed toward sure humiliation, I intervened, feeling noble, like Braveheart, and said in a stage whisper, “Excuse me, ma’am, did you know that’s there’s some, uh, toilet paper kind of hooked onto you from behind?”  (I know, I know, it would be SO easy to deconstruct and critique my choice of words, but I was nervous.)  She laughed loudly and shrilly, like she had a nervous disorder, and yelled, “Oh my god, no!”  After she thanked me profusely, balled the tissue up and placed it in her purse, the incident ended.  I felt SO superior to Peeps and Richard.  And that made me happy.

5.  Taking this picture at Party City of a puppy heralding a celebration: