Social Networking Crap

Social networking is taking all of what we write and the pictures we show...unless we know the secret way to say no!  That is just robbery in the worst form!  And that they can get so much info about us and that we GIVE it to them is just wrong!

Is there any way to keep the technical age from becoming the age where there is NO privacy?  I wish I knew the answer.  I've pulled away from one social networking site and have tried to just eliminate my time there bit by bit.  I forgot how addictive it is for me.  I want to care about family members and what's happening with our busy lives has made it almost impossible to really keep in contact.  That's why the social networking sites work and give us a sense of friends and family type of comfort while taking who we are.

As a writer, I find it more than repulsive that because I want to share something it is confiscated.  What in the world has happened to our freedoms?

Words, Words, Words...

Not many of us write them anymore, even in school.  

But I have to say we have no short amount of them to share in person, of through the short hand version used today called texting.  But I think somehow many of us have lost the history of our lives without letters to distant family that includes the daily grind, and beauty, or hand writing a journal, diary, or a simple thought journal.  

Much of our young country’s history has come from journals and those everyday writings of important and normal people, and some has even come from those old ledgers that told the story of businesses or difficult times in family lives.  

That really makes me wonder where will we find those pieces that historically paint who we are for coming generations.  

I think part of the answer may come from the blogs that pepper the internet today, especially those that tell of life and all it’s everyday craziness of our 21st century!

Are there other ways that may bring our daily history to future generations? Probably.  After all, we’re constantly recreating ourselves and our lives, so why not!!

(P.S.  One of my favorite blogs is real, sometimes gritty, but always so well written!  Here it is, I hope you can check it out!  Expat From Hell // BlogCatalog )

Music to Calm The Savage Beast...I Think

I'm sitting  here, banging away at the computer after a very long hard day.  I have on the classical music on my iPod Touch and am working at mellowing my rough edges mood right now.  It's funny, I really love jigs and reels and the wildness that often is connected with all music Celtic but after tough, or miserable day it is more than soothing to get lost in Bach, Rodrigo, or maybe even a touch of Strauss. 

I've asked many people what music drives them when they need to escape a intense day, and it really varies with different people.  But I tend to agree with a friend, you can really tell a person by the music they're drawn to...I wonder if that were always true?


So if you want to comment - what music calms you or even what music drives your everyday life?

Climbing

If you click on the picture you will get a bigger view of the face
of the Rock of Cashel.  You will also see on the left the older boy
that we saw climbing the face.

Watching the Rock was a diversion as we boarded the bus and waited for our driver.   I was one of many that spotted the brick that surrounded  what looks like a door arch, with no door of course.  Between the rocks and brick we all thought it was quite steep to try to climb.   What had all of us captivated after a little while was two boys  who were climbing the Rock's face that day.  (I did capture the older boy here on the left of my picture.)  Personally, I was more than a little nervous for these young fellows who scaled the rocks toward the summit like small mountain goats so skillfully and slowly.  

I have wondered since then....did their mother (mothers?) know where they were?  And that gave me thought of my own boys when they were growing up.  

I wonder how many times they did frightening things I didn't know about.  Which added to my personal consternation.  And then a thought came to me - how many angel hands must support our children all the places they go as they climb toward adulthood?

A World of Music at your Finger-tips

I have always been a rather odd duck when it comes to what I like whether it be in music, or in electronic gadgets.  I'm not quite a geek, though I certainly would love to be considered one, but I have to say I am certainly enamored with the techie gadgets we have today!  Especially if they can give me a plethora of music at my fingertips!

For years I have been looking for a way to get good radio reception in my own personal valley on the West coast of Michigan.  We get only a few radio stations in clearly, and the reception goes from a solid wall of white noise to an occasional piece of music with a huge amount of static!  So that's when I went on a hunt beyond a good radio station and definitely more than listening to my small CD library as well.  After looking around for months in local stores and even online I was really totally frustrated!

I didn't want that expensive satellite radio for the car or home, I just wanted to be able to get lovely classical and Celtic music - all the time of course!  I don't ask for something simple or easy do I?

My search continued for what seemed to be years, but was only really a few months until I finally discovered something I thought I'd never find.  An internet radio.  Getting the stations online from all over the world has really turned into quite a bonus, too!  I mean who wouldn't want to wake to, say a station from Ireland or England and enjoy their fantastic way of looking at the world?  For me there is nothing like waking to good classical music and add to that that British way of speaking and I was hooked.

There are a few glitches that are a definite problem but nothing that someone who loves a challenge to finally get the ability to enjoy great music of any kind as clear as if the it were being piped from the next room.

Since I got my internet radio I've discovered quite a few stations of classical, Celtic as well as other types music theme stations.  My favorites today is a station in mid-England which is fabulous to listen to for the music and their really fun commercials. There's also a station in Ireland with some of the best Celtic music I've heard.  Add to that the fact that I'm listening to a well known Boston station (WGBH!), as well as one in D.C. and New York City and you are truly  getting the feel for what I'm now enjoying with my internet radio!  For me, it was not only the best choice, it was the only choice.

Who knew you could get fabulous reception for almost any station you'd ever want to listen too.

Ireland, One Photo at a Time

Ireland is more than a place on a map, or a country in Western Europe.  For those of us who love this little bit of green heaven on earth the pictures of the countryside can create a longing, and much like the Irish music that echos from the pubs and homes and is almost inhaled by all who live in this grand North Atlantic island it can create such a craving to revisit this place again and again.

The picture below was taken on the day we went to the Rock of Cashel.  We walked the roads to the Rock, and back to the town below.  Cashel is a whole experience in itself but the town and surrounding fields in April was such a beautiful experience for me.

So, here's a little piece of Ireland for you.  It's a lovely taste of the place - from me, to you.

Exploring Mysteries

The summer is made for reading.  I'm not much of a beach person since I burn easily so my preferred place to take in a book is my recliner, or my bed.  Beside each there is a stack of at least three books. You see, I love to sit and read, sometimes for hours.

This summer is a continuation of my mystery addiction that has continued for about a year.  I just finished the last of Charles Todd's WWI Ian Rutledge books.  Good stuff!  I am wandering right now looking for a new book or book series that will capture my attention.  I've done quite a few, but often find myself reading to the middle and then either quitting because it's so bad, or skipping parts to get to the end.  Bad, eh?

I have read so many really good ones that it's hard to read that which does not measure up in my opinion.  I have to admit I enjoyed the last book by Kathy Reichs.  Bones to Ashes was a very good yarn!  I'm not usually much for the modern mystery, but this one I couldn't figure out and it told a fabulous pre-story that captured my attention from the beginning.  I love the series Bones (based on her books) on TV, and am finding the books, though not the same at all, to be very engaging.  From what I've read about the readers and lovers of the show I'm a true rarity since I love both the books and the series.

As you can tell the summer is not for escape reading for me!  I simply love a good read at any time!