Life in the Slow Lane

In typical slowlane tradition, I will now provide resolutions for everyone else to keep. (Because frankly, the likelihood of everyone else keeping them is just as high as the likelihood of me keeping them.) 1) Go walking in the rain. 2) Discover a new use for singleton socks. 3) Learn to write legibly with your non-dominant hand (Okay, some of you can take on learning to write legibly with your dominant hand). 4) Clean your oven. 5) Encourage a child to jump. 6) Rid your possessions of one outdated piece of technology and/or the manual to operate it. 7) Conduct rigorous tests to see if you (or someone you love) is truly a princess at heart. These tests should include, but are not limited to, "The pea under the mattress" test and whether or not you can find a pair of glass slippers that fit. 8) Make your random acts of kindness less random. 9) Tell somebody you love them in six languages (not including the five love-languages). 10) Create a Facebook quiz/questionnaire popular ...

I wander into the kitchen to check what time it is. The microwave reads five minutes faster than the stove, so I peak at the clock in the living room. It reads 10 minutes to 8, but I have a vague recollection that it was that time on that clock when I started my laundry three hours ago. The digital clock next to my borrowed bed has to be at least 10 minutes fast, maybe 15, but certainly not more than 20. I know this because it is about ten minutes slower than the alarm clock on the right side of the bed in the master bedroom. The alarm clock on the left side of the head board is half an hour slower than it's twin glaring from the other side of the room. I lean on the door frame in the office, trying to decide whether the clock there is more likely to be on time or not. It's analog, and one of those that have pictures instead of numbers. If it is a canary past a cardinal o'clock, will my laundry be done in the garage where the clock read fifteen minutes after six when ...

If you haven't noticed, it is the first day of August. For many of you, perhaps you are dreading the need to turn your calendar page to reflect the current month. You may not even realize it, but out of all of the pictures to grace a calendar, August is nearly always the ugliest, least inspiring picture. I should know. I check. It happens to be a requirement of mine, before I buy a calendar, to check the image for August, as for me the year begins and ends in August. I've never understood why this eighth month so regularly fails to inspire people in the calendar making business. Perhaps the reasons stated in this article explain some of it, but if there is such disdain for this month, surely a great way to spruce it up would be to give it a half-way decent picture for all 31 days. Maybe when I am rich and famous I will commission calendar pages that are achingly beautiful and I will make them all for the month of August. Everyone will wish it were August year round.

So my brother found this cool place . The word cloud of my blog comes remarkably close to explaining the general orderliness of my thoughts these days.

Can you tell I've missed my blog? I've posted a new poll... come and help me celebrate my school vacation!

A little over a week ago, I had a brilliant idea to post about how people are always asking for an extra day to get more things done because they have way too much to do and this year we got an extra day! But I've been so busy, I am only just now getting around to post about it. And ironically, I found the time to do so on the day when we lose an hour. Sometimes time doesn't march on... I think it skips and jumps and drags its heels and then takes great big leaps.

In the long standing tradition of yester years , I will now bless my faithful readers with New Year's Resolutions: 1. Celebrate National Jigsaw Puzzle Day (January 29) by getting puzzled about something. 2. Play the "left-right" game by taking the following turns from your house and telling me where you end up: Left, left, left, left, right, right, right, right. 3. Don't stub your toe for at least four days straight. 4. Challenge someone to a game of marbles.

Here in the Slowlane we are so pleased to announce the exciting collaboration of Slowlane Labs and From the Kitchen of Slowlane . With the same quality which brought you Chicken Soup for Dummies (okay, so it never made it out of Drafts) we bring you Skin-E Cuisin-E (say it fast). Our goal with Skin-E Cuisin-E is really quite simple: To make healthy, inexpensive, appetizing meals which serve one person (with up to two meals of leftovers) without requiring more than four minutes of prep-time in the morning or 23 minutes of combined prep and cook time in the evening. Other considerations to keep in mind: limited fridge, freezer, counter, and pantry space and a selection of miscellaneous utensils which may or may not be available. By "quite simple" I mean practically impossible. But that is the kind of challenge we take on here in the Slowlane so that you, our loyal readers, don't have to. And observe! All of the meals we have discovered so far! 1. Microwave (barely b...

The first sentences of my blog posts are alarmingly boring. I realized this after stealing another idea from blogs I read for post ideas. I intended to see if taking the first sentence in the first blog post of each month would make a suitable entry, such as here or here , but I fell asleep -- mine was so boring. So I decided to take the last sentence in the first blog post of each month. Would you believe that those sentences combined makes almost as much sense as my usual posts? Frightening, but observe: I guess I have some bad habits that I need to cure in a hurry. Oh, the horrors. But I can just imagine the truth behind Chicken Little's tale... one too many dryer sheets. It also proved to be a most opportune time to get lost on the way to the bathroom. But I don't regret not correcting the giver's assumption, because a queen size bedspread and matching pillow cases from Pakistan is a thousand times better than a proposal from Pakistan. Yes, being able to turn on...