Tag: Books

Posted in Books, Humor

83 1/4 Years Old

Posted on by Neal Saye

So here I am sitting in my study chair …

… reading this delightful and heartwarmingly truthful novel which my friend Don loaned me the other day.

“It has really short chapters. You’ll enjoy it.” (Don obviously has keen insight into my attention span.)

The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen, 83 1/4 Years Old is a hoot of a read, and like Don‘s insight, is spot on about old folks.

Hendrik lives in an independent living facility in the Netherlands. He is keeping a daily diary about his “adventures” there.

Here’s one diary entry:

Saturday, April 6

Old people are forever grunting and groaning. Sometimes it’s out of exertion or pain, but more often simply out of habit. I have made a small study of it.

The champion grunter is Mr. Kuiper, not my best friend to start with. Standing up, putting on his coat, picking something up, even if it’s just a teacup; everything is accompanied by a groan as if he’s being run over by a steamroller.

Once I started noticing, it began irking me more and more. That’s wrong. Don’t get annoyed, just wonder at it, my father used to say. Advice meant for others, since my father got extremely worked up about everything.

This morning I plucked up the courage and asked Kuiper what made him groan so when he sat down.

“Who, me?” he replied, genuinely surprised. For half an hour afterward he didn’t make a sound, but then, slowly but surely, the grunting started up again. It was like women’s tennis. There used to be very little grunting, as far as I’m aware, but nowadays I have to turn down the sound when watching tennis on TV. They’re doing it de-liberately. And it’s contagious: the men seem to be doing it more and more as well.

Meanwhile it’s left me with a problem. I’m starting to loathe Kuiper because I notice every little groan. And it’s not just him. Quite a number of the other inmates as well.

And worst of all, I can sometimes hear myself doing it too.

Oh my goodness can I relate to all that! And at 72 1/6 years old, I am finding something new to complain about every day. Just ask Robert.

Go ahead, ask him.

Blog Reader: “Does Neal grunt, groan and complain a lot?”

Robert: “Is Trump a criminal?”

Blog Reader: “What? Huh? Well, okay, but can you give us an example?”

Robert: “He tried to overturn the results of the 2020 election.”

Blog Reader: “No, no! I meant about Neal’s groans!”

Robert: “How much time do you have? Well, here’s a typical conversation when we first get up, after we take our blood pressure and take care of business but before our coffee.

……….

Me: “Good morning” as I give Neal a quick grandmother kiss. “How are you feeling today.” (This is always a dangerous question to ask.)

Neal: “Well,” exhaling deeply but not in a calm or meditative way, more like an old and disgruntled horse, “I can feel the morning cold in the arthritis in BOTH of my wrists today!” (Neal’s arthritis began several years ago after he fell in front of Claire’s—of all places—at the mall.

Neal: “And,” sighing deeply but not in a relaxing way, more exasperation-ish, like Biden after remembering how old he will be at the end of a second term, “the arthritis in my lower back is KILLING me. I’ll probably need to use my tens unit this morning, maybe the paraffin wax on my hands. IF I have time, that is.” (He’s retired, and the only thing he really needs to do all morning is empty the dishwasher.

Me: “Well maybe you should try to frame it all a little diff—“

Neal: Interrupting, “You know what? I think my face feels numb this morning.”

……….

(You get the picture, so I’ll just hush.)

Posted in Christmas Countdown 2023

Countdown to Christmas: 12/18/23 — “Delve into a Book”

Posted on by Neal Saye

This year my Countdown to Christmas is a nontraditional Advent Calendar centering (pun intended) on mindfulness.

On the front of each card is neat little picture, and on the back are the instructions for the short meditation.

Today, the 18th Day of Advent … DELVE INTO A BOOK.

Here are today’s instructions:

Your task today is to commit a while to the almost forgotten art of curling up in front of the fire with a good book. Okay, a fireplace is not a requirement, but try to find a warm, quiet and cosy place away from technological distractions in which to practice this mindful reading exercise.

Magnolia Springs State Park, GA

Choose a book, any kind you want, and first hold it in your hands, feel its weight, run your fingers over its cover. Notice the sound and touch of the pages as you turn them. Breathe in the smell of the book.

Slowly and calmly start reading. Savour each sentence, allow each description to form an image in your mind. Notice the writer’s use of language, take time to re-read particular parts that stand out to you, stop to look up any new words.

Delve fully into the world of the book. Appreciate the places, people and things that it creates for you.

Notice any emotions that the story and the overall experience of reading it makes you feel.

If your mind wanders, be patient with yourself. Just calmly acknowledge what took your attention, then let the thought drift away and bring your attention back to the world within the book.

Our study chairs where I do a Big Bunch of my reading …

Here’s what I’m (slowly!) reading now …

Oh my goodness, if you think some of your “parts” are terrible, READ THIS BOOK.

Robert and I also read books together. Well, more accurately I read aloud, usually while HR drives.

This current Christmasy one is our 182nd book we’ve read together …

Mindful Reading to You.

Posted in Cutesy Tuesday

Cutesy Tuesday: “Little Free Libraries”

Posted on by Neal Saye

An occasional blog post category highlighting what I consider to be … cute.

All the “Little Free Libraries” I keep discovering.

Like this one at Seminole State Park in Donalsonville, GA (which Robert and I visited recently).

And where I found this very cool coffee table-ish book.

As frustrating as it is to me, and as disappointing that I’m sure it is to you, I will probably never be a saint.

Here’s HR and a Little Library at nearby Lake Mayer, where we often walk.

Do you have the Little Free Libraries in your area?

Posted in Uncategorized

Steve Jobs Didn’t Use Deodorant

Posted on by Neal Saye

Today someone asked me what I am currently reading.  Well, I like to try to have both a fiction and a nonfiction book going at the same time.  [Especially if the fiction book I am reading is trash.  (Oh gosh, did I really read the first Twilight book?  Followed quickly by each of the others?  And did Bella REALLY voluntarily become a vampire?  I mean, SERIOUSLY?  HELLO!  With no consideration as to whether she would continue to have a soul?!)  The reason I like a nonfiction book at the same time I am reading a trashy fiction one is simple, and in my opinion brilliant: I then have the nonfiction book ready to read on the elliptical machine at the gym, so that people on each side of me will think I’m smart, not someone who would read love stories about vampires, for heaven’s sake.  However, if I’m not currently reading a nonfiction book, and need to workout, I just take the Bible to the gym, a really big one with the words of Jesus in red letters.]

Back to the topic at hand.  The older I get, the more confused I am about the categories of fiction and nonfiction.  I used to think, let’s say, that U.S. history was nonfiction.  Right?  All objective-y and such.  But really, doesn’t it depend on the history tellers, and their perspectives?   More often than not, those tellers of history are men, thus history/HISstory.  And maybe it’s because I raised two daughters, but I think women surely must have had something to do with U.S. history.  Surely there’s also such a thing as herstory/HERstory.

Here (finally, whew) is what I am currently reading:

 

 

 

 

 

First, the Steve Job’s biography by Walter Isaacson (who, by the way, will be at the upcoming Savannah Book Festival).  I’m only about a hundred pages in so far (I thought Harry Potter was heavy!), but the book really is fascinating.  Not to gossip too much, but it seems that in the early 70’s, when he started working for Atari, Jobs was, according to one source quoted by Isaacson, a “hippie with b.o.” who believed his fruit-heavy vegetarian diet would prevent both mucus and body odor, even without deodorant and showering.  For some reason, that tidbit of info makes me respect Jobs and his staunch individuality even more.  (Also it makes me feel a little proud of my older daughter Amy who stopped shaving her legs one summer when she went to study abroad in Italy.  She also, Steve Job-ishly, stopped using deodorant and went to antiperspirants only–or maybe it was the other way around.  I never understood the difference.)  I’ll let you know when I get to the parts of the book about Macs and Ipods and such.

 

 

 

 

 

The second book, Live What You Love: Notes from a Passionate Life, by Bob and Melinda Blanchard, is a beautifully encouraging examination of how one couple decided to do what they really wanted to do in their lives, from moving to Anguilla and opening up a restaurant to appearing on NBC’s Today show in a wedding cake contest.  I love this Blanchard statement: “Take chances for the things you care about.”

 

 

 

 

 

Finally, I’m reading (okay, I read; it takes less than ten minutes) Edward Monkton’s little The Pig of Happiness.  It’s the tale of a pig who decides to become an extraordinary pig: “I shall see the best in EVERYONE and EVERYTHING.”  I’m actually considering using it as a textbook.  Read it!  (At the checkout line at Barnes and Noble if you don’t want to buy it.)

I adore a good read. 

P.S.  I just hope that somebody doesn’t start writing phenomenonally bestselling stories about pig vampires (with souls!) who are living their love and communicating via cutting edge IPigPhones.

P.S.S.   Listen, forget that first P.S.  AND DON’T STEAL THAT IDEA FROM ME.