Pot Stirring

Monday, March 11, 2024

The fate of day traders is making money or losing money—either or both. Today’s market is losing, falling quick as hot stones leaving bare hands. These are turbulent (AI) times, and stock picking is a wild play-escapade: place bets on a few horses and watch ’em go! A fun ride when potential losses are affordable.

During our lifetimes, we gamble constantly; our choices can make us happy, or less so, or ugg, leave us not at all. Reflecting backward, I find that major life events have evolved from a series of small choices. The smalls that accumulated eventually offered major choices.

Being clear-headed about the pros and cons of making decisions is essential. An advantage of aging is having experienced many decision pitfalls, failures, and successes. Those experiences help with understanding more decision elements that require full consideration.

It feels like I’m always trying to decide something; it could be as simple as what’s for dinner. Decisions, decisions. The bigger decisions, like riding on the stock market, force our emotions swiftly upward and downward. On the bottom line, we’re rarely certain about any decision outcome. We’re placing our bets and going for whatever may happen next.

Dear Friends: Trading, gambling, and deciding–one-pot stirs. Diana

Changes

Sunday, March 10, 2024

Finally, I understand why I’m writing this blog later than the unofficial, typical timeline. You’ll be guessing right: I forgot to change my clocks. Not really, because only two don’t change themselves, and so I think little about time changes. Today, however, I emerged from beneath my comfy comforter wondering why it was so late. I wandered through the house, befuddled by the too-bright early daylight. Finally, cranking up my computer reminded me of DST.

That means I’ll be late for work unless I start moving quickly. I’ll pause to share a bit of fun. On Friday, the department store where I work hosted its annual employee recognition event. I couldn’t attend because I had to stay home with a crew fixing a serious furnace issue.

Throughout last week, the department store’s employees cast private votes identifying employees they considered the best in various categories. Yesterday, I showed up to work and learned I’d been very narrowly beaten for “best dressed” by a long-time employee who’s won year after year. To be fair, she always dresses fashionably and she deserved to win. Everyone, including her, enjoyed that she had serious competition for the first time.

I especially feel this way because working in retail clothing has returned me to fashion. That’s what I hoped for after years of riding horseback and wearing rags. Last summer, I attended an event where I didn’t have the “right clothing.” I was unsure about how to improve my wardrobe, felt out of touch, and didn’t know what looks are in fashion or where to find help.

I decided to search for work in retail clothing, to learn. It happened I chose the right place. The company’s motto, Own Your Style, inspires and invigorates me. I examined women’s clothing racks, decided what I liked, and before long, bought pieces of clothing. In that workplace, I started practicing wearing them.

It’s important to feel comfortable in one’s clothing, and practicing has helped me get used to being in my choices. I’m not trying to be a fashion plate; I simply wish to learn how to mix and match contemporary pieces. The playing has brought encouraging feedback from coworkers and customers, and to my surprise, earned those fun votes.

I’m glad that my coworker won again; I’m also pleased to be voted a nearly as good dresser at work. The upside of this story is that I have appropriate wearables for most occasions. Unfortunately, it also has a downside; after months of working, I’ve brought home little money.

Dear Friends: I’m still recognizable for continuing to wear beloved rags otherwise. Diana

Spring Rushes

Saturday, March 09, 2024

Yesterday, a crew arrived at my home to install a new furnace, replacing a “broken system.” The new heater is working well and is less noisy. My failed furnace was a big issue for occurring and lasting throughout weeks of bitterly cold weather. Now, my home heating problems are history, and other repairs are ahead.

Well, I’ll think about them tomorrow. If the weather is warming, I must crank the tractor and drive into the horses’ dry lot to clean the area. These weeks of nearly unending snow and ice have prevented safe tractoring. Harsh weather and the constant presence of horses have made the space muddy, sloppy, and stinky.

Best now, don’t let me start talking about more cleaning needs, those at my chicken coop. Sweet little beasts are just doing their thing, happily greeting me as I enter their area, and without any complainers in the bunch, except for maybe my two roosters, sounding off and unclear whether they’re greeting me or challenging each other.

Anyway, my coop mess resembles that dry lot mess. Also, don’t let me get started about my puppy’s sheer determination to dig himself out of the yard. I have fortified my dog fence with all the items I found that I could grab and move. Those include tree stumps, lava rocks, paving stones, and concrete blocks. Somebody suggested laying pallets outside, along the fence line, and I’m leaning toward that.

Dear Friends: Resolving one problem releases waiting others to rush. Diana

Bitter Pills

Friday, March 08, 2024

Today, an installation crew has arrived to replace my home heater. They’ll change all but the heat pump. This fix has been waiting for months, a holdoff forced by our very cold weather. Severe cold prevented technicians from adequately assessing why the reduced heat output. While we waited for warmer weather, my home was on “emergency heat,” generated by electricity and outrageously expensive. Plus, my part-time job makes it like pulling teeth to get time off in these days of too few workers.

Finally, all is coming together. Hopefully, the heating system will become operable today.

It’s nagging me that the failed heater problem falls squarely on the shoulders of an independent electrician who replaced my heat pump five years ago. I understand now that the pump he installed generated higher pressure on the heater lines. The independent workman didn’t address that problem. Over time, higher pressures blew holes in the heater lines. My system failed and became unrepairable.

This changeout is an expensive process.

I don’t recall the name of the independent contractor who installed the heat pump. He seemed knowledgeable and probably was. I’m stuck with guessing why he didn’t complete the work of correctly adding a significant new component to an old system. I’ve been angry at that independent contractor since the leaks were diagnosed.

This is an expensive lesson. The upshot is that I’ll not hire another independent worker, regardless of how capable one might seem. Today, Bend Heating is changing the heater. The company has been around for years, has an excellent reputation, and will be available to fix anything that might eventually go wrong in the new heating system.

This little Central Oregon city has always been a boom-and-bust environment. It’s growing like Topsy, and many independent contractors are around today. Well, not for me. No more.

Dear Friends: Some episodes call for “biting the bullet” and moving on afterward. Diana

Peachy Pie

Thursday, March 07, 2024

This morning, while I brewed coffee, an old song entered my mind and got me singing aloud. Now, hours later, I can’t recall that song, but I remember delight upon hearing my cockatoo, Peaches, join in and sing along. I love it when Peaches sings and makes sweet sounds.

It’s very different from Peaches’ typical screams, which sometimes continue for what feels like forever. He’s an excellent watchbird and warns when anything different appears beyond the windows he’s parked beside. He becomes alerted to happenings not in his vision by noticing differences in my dogs’ sounds. If the dogs are barking in alarm (it’s always evident), Peaches joins and barks along with them. Yep, Mr. Peaches is a fine watchbird.

After years of living with this boy, I’m more or less accustomed to his noisiness. I’m used to his noisy gusto greetings to the changing lights in dawnings and evenings. I usually ignore his screamings, but not when trying to concentrate on something totally non-Peaches. If his screams get to me, there’s no use telling him, “Quit.” Peaches is his own being; he does his thing.

His singing is something else—almost lyrical and always smooth; his sounds could accompany some lyrics. I can’t recognize the songs, but clearly, Peaches is copying “his humans” that preceded me. Cockatoos are natural copiers.

This makes me wonder what he’s learned and copied during our years together. Maybe barking like a dog is new, and maybe he has new sounds from our singing duets. I ought to mention that Peaches has great rhythm; he dances to music like a bird on fire. Mr. Firebird!

Dear Friends: Bird intelligence encourages our admiration of the entire species. Diana

Visions

Wednesday, March 06, 2024

I’ve never seen anything more beautiful than giant snowflakes falling and fluffing on the ground. However, there usually is a point of “too much,” and now, enough is Enough. Seeing through a window the many tree branches piled heavily with white is lovely. All’s peachy unless one needs to head outside to work in the snow and cold. That outside work could be as little as removing snow from a vehicle and driving someplace. However, my outside work includes feeding horses and chickens, all hungrily waiting and spotting for me, kicking downhill to the barn.

This rough spring has lasted too long, and happily, it’ll soon be Daylight Savings Time. The lengthening natural light will ease my early morning and late evening animal feedings. I can’t wait to dump my headlamp and walk without kicking through snow or wading in deep mud.

One of my “inside activities” has been looking through old, forgotten photos. I stumbled across today’s header of Kinny, a capture that surprised me. I quickly ordered a print for framing.

I inherited Kinny from my elder sister when she couldn’t continue caring adequately for him. He was seven years old and had always been kenneled inside a run. Kinny had never had a dog buddy; he became aggressive on seeing another dog. It took weeks to introduce and integrate him with my other dogs.

Kinny especially feared my horses, and at first, behaved very aggressively toward them. The horses, in turn, aimed to kick his daylights out. Eventually, Kinny “got it” and joined my other dogs. He learned to run with them on trails and alongside the horses. Kinny turned into a loveable pet, and I still miss him.

The header is a worthy capture of the dog and his shadow. He’s playing and having fun; it’s pure Kinny!

Dear Friends: Sun is shining to melt the snow, ahead of coming bitterly cold days. Diana

“Magical Mom”

Tuesday, March 05, 2024

My mom’s birthday is today, on a date she selected. I never asked why she self-selected the date, and much later, after she was gone, wished to know. By then, I wanted to know more about her early life and realized that many other questions never got asked. I’m always a little sad about my knowledge gaps.

Especially these days when the war in Ukraine raises questions about my maternal family’s life in that part of the world. Back in the very late 1800s, fearing Russia’s recurring violence toward Ukrainian Jews, they sailed to America, winding up in O’Fallon, IL, where my mom and her siblings grew up.

They lived in the most dire poverty. To survive, my grandmother made ice cream and my grandfather traveled into neighborhoods to sell scoops from an ice cart. My mom described her sheer unhappiness while a little girl, for having to go regularly to the local welfare office and request family existence money. When she was very young, her father passed away from TB.

Afterward, her mother found a job as a kosher cook in Oklahoma City and had to move there. She put her small children into an orphanage. Before long, her eldest child, Ruby, got married and became qualified to remove the children from that orphanage. Later in their lives, every single one spoke of Ruby as “a saint.” While still very young, Ruby, too, succumbed to TB.

That family history captured my attention many years ago when a Ph.D. candidate from New York phoned to ask me about the family during its O’Fallon time. While researching its Jewish immigrant community, she discovered in O’Fallon’s newspaper a contemporary article quoting my grandfather’s description of Ukraine’s dire anti-Jewish situation. The researcher sent me a copy of the article. It recreated the reality of my mom’s family in those times touching and blowing me away.

By then, my mom and her siblings were gone, and sadly, no one to question remained. Fortunately, I’m close to my cousin, Mary (her dad was my mom’s brother), and we often speculate on our family’s history, trying to fill in gaps with our combined knowledge.

So, Happy Birthday, Mom. If you could return, you’d find that your known world has evolved into a nearly unrecognizable social and political environment. Plus, these days, you’d not button up and avoid recalling an unhappy past; instead. like most of us, you’d be spilling the beans.

Dear Friends: Our moms–mostly intelligent and capable beyond what their times allowed. Diana

Little Bits On Being

Monday, March 04, 2024

I’m thinking of using today’s title on my WP Page, as a subtitle, to describe these morning blogs. Writing them began many years ago in order to communicate to close friends that all was okay here where I live alone and care for horses. Worries about perhaps tripping on a rock, becoming injured, and maybe needing help made me write, and friends were encouraging. My early blogs were simple hellos, but eventually, a growing readership and feedback stimulated ideas.

Much has changed, from readers’ feedback and modern communication technologies. We all share expanded understandings of the larger political and social worlds and the changing climates. Many modern topics are complex, and variations keep them in our sights for very long times.

I tend to explore ideas and topics from my life experiences and their emotional impacts, always hoping readers may resonate with that personal perspective. Evidence of more reader subscriptions seem to okay my style; so nowadays, the early launched “observations from a retiree in Central Oregon” are more like, “little bits, on being.”

Dear Friends: I’m always exploring and welcoming feedback. Thanks for reading! Diana

Tying Up

Sunday, March 03,, 2024

Yesterday, my job in a large department store had me working in the Men’s Department. I met a couple examining suit jackets, and the man was trying on some. They were preparing to leave in April on a cruise ship that’s headed to exotic places. He’s not bought new clothes in quite a while, and although not particularly happy or comfortable, dutifully tried on shirts and jackets.

I’m very slightly aware of trends in men’s clothing, but did assisyt the couple by searching for sizes and colors they wanted. They proceeded slowly, we became acquainted, and I enjoyed helping them. At some point, they had selected jackets, shirts, and pants and asked me to select some neckties.

I know too little about neckties and approached several large tables. Each was covered in a seemingly endless bunch of neckties, an astonishing array of colors and patterns. Here’s the thing, I like neckties, but have clear preferences and opinions about them as fashion. I enjoy looking at ties and imagining clothing they’d go well with.

However, working in Men’s has taught me that someone might sound casual, as in, “Find me a tie,” but he actually has opinions and preferences. So staring at ties, I’m pushing aside my preferences as too confident for my customer’s comfort. Finally, I picked out a few ties with subtle patterns that color-wise blended with his clothing selections. In the end, that couple themselves selected his ties.

I needed some training on necktie selling and asked a savvy coworker to help me. We went to the tie tables. He chose several he liked and explained why, saying red is a power color, and certain blues go well on the blue shirts he loves, and to him a very subtle paisley is playful. I realized that he plans carefully for wearables at meetings and casual gatherings (typically, he doesn’t wear neckties).

I pointed to my favorite tie, covered in a “tiny flowers” design, and no surprise, he wasn’t interested in it. Earlier, I had sensed that my customer would avoid a flower pattern. My friend and I stared at the tie; it’s not particlarly feminine but has tiny flowers.

This is Women’s History Month. Back when social changes began evolving, socially awakened men wore neckties sporting complex designs and patterns. Back then, tiny flowers would have fitted into modern wardrobes.

At that moment, I decided to start on a learning journey–by buying that tie and wearing it to work. My friend gave me a lesson on necktie tying. Then, the tie’s price made me gasp; Who knew! Maybe expense is one reason men very carefully and specifically select ties.

I brought the flowered tie. Today, I will practice tying and arranging it on a boy-style shirt.

Dear Friends: Working offers learning and fun challenges, so make things happen. Diana

Unequal

Saturday, March 02, 2024

This is Women’s History Month, and that’s cool. Last night, a PBS piece reopened my memories by covering early and evolving passenger aircraft technology, and the airline passenger business. Particularly, the then new role of Airline Stewardess. Some of my friends became early stewardesses and were envied. They routinely flew to exotic places, met and dated handsome pilots, and often married and moved into new life phases. Those were ladies who accomplished what little girls were programmed to do.

That PBS piece reveals a nasty back story to the enviable stewardess role, in a time when most airline passengers were men. The ladies’ work was to ensure men’s comfort. A stewardess’s training for her role was demanding, and it was abusive. She had to perform her stewardess work perfectly, and also, had always to appear beautiful. She had to be slender and physically fit, well-coiffed and perfectly dressed, always wearing specific makeup, and also well-mannered. Oh yes, she couldn’t be married; a stewardess had to be single.

There was more stress because upon turning 32 years old, a stewardess was considered too old for the role. Airlines pushed every birthday girl out of her job. Some of the early stewardesses were college graduates and felt abused. And some stewardesses were secretly married. The formally educated ladies, and those married to attorneys, began learning about unions. They openly started to question the airlines’ goals and personnel management. The work of those bold stewardesses initiated critical changes in the industry.

I’d go on, but you get it, and the story is easy to stream on PBS. What makes it more fascinating, is that the Stewardess history parallels more changes, beginning in the sixties, that altered women’s roles. Not enough, however, because America still lacks an Equal Rights Amendment.

Dear Friends: March’s videos will remind us of more history and revive our memories. Diana