The View from Here

February

Yes, I’ve already turned the page on my calendar. I have to see my favorite month, especially now that January is finishing her turn with a temper tantrum. I hate all this ice and snow! I don’t know how people live in cold climates. I don’t mind the temperatures as much as the inconveniences and dangers. I don’t want to stay inside unless it is my choice. I don’t want to risk life and limb walking to my car. I don’t want to “hope” I make it to wherever I’m driving. That’s my temper tantrum! J

The first thing that greeted me when I turned the calendar page was all the birthdays! Happy celebrations ahead for Marilyn, Jocelyn, Betty, Amber, Mary Jim, David, and of course ME! I also have two students who will have birthdays. It has always been enjoyable to have a birthday in the month that celebrates love. My favorite stores are filled with hearts and balloons and chocolate and stuffed animals. It doesn’t get any better.

I wish the news was filled with stories of love instead of constant reminders that people, especially men in power, cheat and lie. Just a glance through the Bible, specifically Proverbs, should convince them that adultery isn’t God’s plan. Maybe they don’t read much.

February is also the month that my favorite illogical, insane, frivolous entertainment begins its new season. Yes, it’s time for another round of Survivor. Don’t ask me to explain how I got hooked on this silly show. I know it makes no sense. And I’m usually sensible. I’m usually conservative. I watch gardening shows and PBS. I like to think that the child within me is addicted to this show. J

Speaking of my inner child- I am going to celebrate my birthday month by posting a couple of photos of me each and every day this month. (Okay, when the satellite is cooperating.) I won’t always take the time to explain them unless someone asks for details, but I’m going to be sixty! That’s a lot of years and changes and I just thought I would share some of them. Be warned. And yes, I’m starting today. I get to make the rules. LOL

 

Again...

It is unusual for us to have another ice/snow storm this time of year. It is usually a balmy 50 degrees and I’m wandering around the garden looking for the tips of daffodils peeking from the soil. Today it is ugly- a little snow, a lot of ice, and gray clouds. The satellite has been totally unreliable. Thus no internet and I’ve felt cut off from the world. I can’t imagine the poor folks who are without electricity this weekend. My heart goes out to them. At least we have had old movies, gardening shows, This Old House, and golf to keep us company. 

We actually had school for a little while on Friday. I was grumpy and not in the mood to go because of the forecast for ice and snow around the middle of the afternoon. I hate to drive in sleet!! You can imagine my relief when the announcement came at 9:30 that a water main had broken and we had no water! Everyone was safely at home by about noon and when I walked into the house it was already snowing. Truly sorry for the people without water, but I really didn’t want to have school.

I spent a couple of hours yesterday afternoon scanning photos. This is one I can’t remember. It is one of those little photo booth shots, but I don’t remember when or why it was taken.

Not worrying much about the diet today! I have bread baking and plan a big pot of soup for tonight.

We have not ventured out at all today. The front porch is one giant sheet of ice. The temperature is supposed to be rising tomorrow so perhaps we will get out and go to WalMart. Our exciting life…

Walgreens Redux

You may recall that when I last did business with Walgreens I was not a happy woman. I had made three trips to the store and one trip to the clinic and wasted over an hour and a half of my time getting part of a prescription refilled. I left with the reassurance that when I filled my next prescription I could also pick up the 8 tablets stilled owed to me.

Care to guess what happened this week?

Oh you are so good!

Of course when I told the young woman at the counter that I was owed a few tablets of my blood pressure medication she gave me a blank look and said “the computer says you got 5 tablets on the 4^th and 85 tablets on the 6^th”.

“Well, I didn’t get all of them.”

“I can only go by what the computer says, and…”

At this point I just held up my hand and said, “I’m not going to go through all of this again. I’ll just go home and get my receipt.”

‘Well if you don’t want to tell me what the problem is I can’t help you.”

“This is my fifth attempt to get this refilled. I-will-just-get-my-receipt.”

“Well, if you can’t explain this, I just have to go by what the computer says and…”

“No, I REALLY don’t want to talk about this again.” I walked. Quickly.  

About an hour after I got home the pharmacist called me.

“Mrs. Maurer, I understand you came by to get your tablets and the girl didn’t understand what you wanted.  I have your pills and I can mail them or you can pick them up.”

“I’ll just pick them up.”

“Well, I could just mail them if you want. I’m sorry that the girl didn’t understand what you wanted.”

“I’ll-just-pick-them-up.” Does everyone on their staff have a hearing impairment?

“Okay.”

So yesterday evening I picked them up.

No problem.

No hassle.

They were sitting there in a little basket with my name on the bag…and the wrong address!

Good thing I didn’t have them mailed or I might be writing this from the hospital.

 

Happy Birthday!

Today is my niece Megan's birthday! Happy Birthday to a sweet, sweet girl who is also a fantastic cook, great mom, and of course, a wonderful gardener! I'll keep this short because a huge storm is about to take over our sky!

My first kitchen.

You cannot imagine how delighted I was when I opened a package of photos from Karen and this little gem was among them!!! This alone could qualify as the best present I could get for my 60^th birthday, but don’t tell her that.

I only have a handful of vivid memories- little movies in my head-of my early childhood. The others are merely snapshots and snippets. Some become clearer when I see a photo or hear a name or smell wood smoke on a cold winter morning.

The memory of my first little kitchen is one of my oldest and fondest memories. I’ve mentioned it before and I often recall it at Christmas. My grandfather made the little wooden cabinet and table. He bought the chairs somewhere. My grandmother gave me a set of dishes and a couple of old pans. She also gave me a pumpkin pie that I served at the table. Granddad sat precariously on the edge of a chair and balanced on his heels while he ate a big piece of that pie with me. Afterwards I washed the dishes in the little metal sink. I remember that day as one of pure joy!

I suppose this particular memory means so much to me because it is a reminder that before he was a belligerent drunk and a vagrant, my grandfather was a talented man who loved his family very much. Alcohol destroys people. No one knows that better than the child or grandchild of an alcoholic. My childhood includes a lot of not-so-joyful memories because of my grandfather. But I will forever treasure this one, especially now that I have this photo!

Thanks again Karen!

Not that I'm counting...

This week marks the 100^th day of school. Ironic that our staff can’t decide if yesterday was the actual day or today, but we’re only teachers. And there is always controversy over whether we should just count the days the children are in school or those days plus our professional days that exclude them. Someone asked me yesterday, “When is the 100^th day of school?” and I diplomatically answered, “Sometime this week!” The truth is that I don’t really care. We will celebrate every day this week. We will count to 100 every day this week. We will talk about different ways to count to 100. We will talk about remembering the rules of school because we have had PLENTY of time to learn them. J What is foremost in my mind is that we now have fewer than 100 days left to accomplish the monumental task of getting these little jewels ready for first grade. One third are already skilled and confident enough and I am simply “polishing the diamond”.  Others need a little more chiseling here and there.

Megan sent me a link to this article about the vast range of sodium content of food. Please note that it lists a “100 fold difference within the frozen potato product category”. That means manufacturers of some frozen French fries are literally throwing salt on our wounds!! Let’s make them stop. And several people asked me how McDonald’s and others take that little 100mg beef patty and turn it into a 2,070mg burger. I don’t know! Gary and I figured our burger: 100mg for the patty, 250mg cheese slice, 180mg bun, + condiments. Even if we put on three or four or five condiments at 100mg each we still couldn’t reach 2,070. I don’t know what they do unless they start by putting about 1,000mg of sodium into their beef to cover up something.

Gary and Robert are planning their guy’s lunch today. They don’t get a chance to hang out together very often because of their work schedules. I suspect there will be a lot of talk of cars and football and summer plans.

I’m getting more excited about our trip to VT this summer. I know, I know. It isn’t even spring. But I have to at least keep it in the back of my mind so that I will be prepared financially. And I so love a road trip! There is nothing better than driving off to parts unknown, seeing new sights, and experiencing how other people live. Much better than flying in a metal tube all jammed up like sardines with a crying baby and some guy who forgot to shower.

I’m looking forward to seeing my grandchildren again. We have “lost touch” as they have gotten older. They have their own lives and are far too busy to care about mine. That is the natural order of things. We will watch Hope graduate from high school and then she will be off to college in some foreign land and we probably won’t see her until she graduates again. Austin will make polite conversation with us during our visit and then he will return to his world until he graduates. I console myself with the fact that I did the same thing with my absent grandparents. We grew close again after I became an adult and I hope the same will happen with my own grandchildren. If not, they are both on Facebook and I can continue to view their lives from a distance. Of course Katrina and I will have time to visit and talk and plan out the lives of the aforementioned grandchildren. Just because they don’t ask for my opinions doesn’t mean I don’t give them. Lol Teenagers have no idea what goes on behind their backs!

I remarked on Facebook that I wish I had the time and ability to pursue more things that I would like to accomplish. As I turn sixty there are definitely some things I wish I had learned to do. Perhaps I’ll never speak Spanish or play the guitar (both attempted), but there are a few things that might deserve another try. After all, I’m older and wiser now!

Someone’s birthday will be celebrated Thursday, and SEVEN, including mine, next month! Wow! Get the balloons and candles ready!

Have a great day!

Sodium- Just give it up!!

First the basic facts:

Salt is good.

We need salt. It helps maintain the fluid in our blood cells and is vital in transmitting information to nerves and muscles.

Salt helps preserve food. It inhibits the growth of food-borne pathogens.

Salt enhances the flavor of foods.

However,

and you knew this was coming,

we consume more than twice as much salt as we need.

When your body has too much sodium your kidneys can’t eliminate it and it accumulates in your blood. It holds water, which increases your blood volume, which makes your heart work harder to pump it through your body. This increases your blood pressure. Not good.

Most experts now recommend that we consume 1,500mg of sodium per day. Our average consumption is much closer to 3,500mg per day. As much as 75% of that is salt ADDED to our food by the manufacturers! Some key groups are working to drastically reduce the use of salt in food production over the next ten years. In the meantime we have two choices- eat food that is as close to natural as possible and read labels to cut down on our consumption of added salt.

A few weeks ago my husband and I were eating at a local buffet when a young family sat down at the table next to us.  I watched as the father got a plate of macaroni and cheese, salted it, and handed it to his young daughter. This is how our need for salt begins. His daughter’s taste buds have already adjusted to and now expect that “highly salted” flavor in foods.  I see adults add salt to French fries, hamburgers, pizza, and other dishes that already have far too much salt. We have to kick the habit!

So the first thing we need to do is throw away our salt shakers. Quit filling them. Quit using them. I haven’t added salt to anything in years, decades. I don’t even buy salt. I don’t miss it or even think about. Most foods have their own flavor! However, if you have been using a lot of salt for many years, you may be surprised by the “real” taste of your favorite foods. Research shows that it will take about ten weeks for your taste buds to adjust to the change. Yes, that’s some serious time and effort, but it is well worth it.

Label reading can help you make significant changes in your diet, especially in sodium intake. The little sandwich rounds I’ve raved about have 80 fewer calories and 100mg less sodium than the hamburger buns I usually eat. The whole wheat tortillas I eat have 340mg of sodium vs. the 490 contained in white flour tortillas. This is the kind of “diet tweaking” that can make a big difference in your daily totals. WebMD shows the range of sodium content in frozen pizza varies from 450mg to 1200mg! (my favorite is 740mg) Frozen veggies can differ by as much as 100mg.

If you want to do a little pre-shopping planning, try this link to the sodium content of various foods. Scroll down to the Nutrient Database for Sodium. You can look at either the alphabetical listing or the descending order list. Believe me, the descending order one is shocking! We probably shouldn’t eat anything listed on pages 1-5!

I also did a little searching for the sodium content of various foods by brand. I won’t vouch for the accuracy of these numbers since they are taken from other sites and might be outdated or contain errors, but they are probably close enough to warrant careful label reading if you actually have these in your home!

    Swanson, Hungry Man Boneless White Meat Fried Chicken Dinner- 2,160mg of sodium

    Post Honey Bunches of Oats cereal-642mg of sodium

    Oscar Mayer Ham-baked, sliced, 96% fat free- 1,242mg of sodium

    Louis Rich turkey and chicken franks- 1,136mg of sodium

    Pillsbury Grands Buttermilk biscuits (refrigerator roll)- 992mg of sodium

And of course the worst place to find extra salt is in the kitchen of your favorite restaurant. This is where we REALLY get into trouble because most of us don’t know or ASK about the sodium content of our favorite restaurant foods. Chili’s Awesome Blossom onion made Men’s Health Magazine’s “20 Worst Foods” list, and rightfully so. It has 6,360mg of sodium!!! An On the Border Taco Salad packs a whopping 2,410mg of sodium. Feeding the kids? Macaroni Grill’s Double Macaroni and Cheese has 3,450mg of sodium. I love burgers, but the Carl’s Jr. Six Dollar Cheeseburger has 2,450mg of sodium. Go for the Western Bacon version and it jumps to 2,520mg! McDonald’s Angus Bacon and Cheese isn’t much better at 2,070mg. Think I’ll cook mine at home- a frozen Angus beef patty has 100mg of sodium.  Feeling smug because you eat at Subway?? The six-inch Spicy Italian Toasted Sub has 1,850mg of sodium and the six-inch ham may have “6 grams of fat or less” but it also has 1,200mg of sodium.

So…what in the world are we supposed to do with all of this information? Panic? Clean everything out of the pantry? Stop eating out? I plan to just make better choices. Tonight I had the choice of two salad dressings and I used the one that has 220mg of sodium instead of the one that has 360mg. If I want to eat out I’ll choose a restaurant that offers variety and try to eat something better than the blossom!! Moderation has to be our mantra because our minds and bodies rebel at sudden drastic changes and then we go right back to doing what we were doing before. It takes months to replace a bad habit with a good one.

Read those labels this week. Make a few small changes. Make a few better choices. Next week we’ll talk about sugar.

Note: Lately I’ve seen a lot of labels and claims for sea salt. It has fans that prefer it over regular salt because of its texture, taste and trace minerals. However, from everything that I have read it is NOT better for your blood pressure.

Field Trip

After yesterday’s rant and depressing thoughts I’m going to take you on a lovely field trip to help you prepare for spring! Enjoy these photos from my old garden and visit my favorite garden catalog sites. Then come back tomorrow for everything you didn’t want to know about sodium!

High Country Gardens

Wild Seed Farms

White Flower Farm

Bluestone Perennials

Burpee Seeds

Vermont Bean Seed  
 

Show me the money!

My task for this week is to think of three ways to save money so that my school district doesn’t have to lay off teachers and/or consolidate, close etc. First of all let me just say that I applaud our administration for asking. At least we have detailed information about the situation and we are being asked for input about the solution. However, since this is about the fifth time we’ve been threatened with job cuts since I started teaching just twelve years ago, it is getting more and more difficult to think of ways to save the district some money. And I must point out that this is the fifth district that I have worked for, and I was previously in a district that actually was forced to reduce its staff by several employees.

I already buy most of my classroom supplies including staples, paper clips, pens, pencils, markers, erasers, and file folders.  I buy handwriting paper, card stock, paper plates, paper sacks, play dough, baby wipes, glitter, beads, stickers, feathers, paints, and anything else we need for projects or art.

I buy children’s books (at least 50 per year), professional journals, workbooks, and instruction books.

I buy snacks and treats.

I buy supplies and projects for “parent gifts” for holidays.

I buy student gifts for holidays.

I pay for a subscription to an online site that provides worksheets for math and language skills.

I bought the rugs for my classroom. I bought three of the bookshelves for my classroom. I bought the toys, games, puzzles, CDs, CD player, science supplies, and storage containers. I bought the bulletin board decorations and the writing center “white boards”. I bought the calendar and the alphabet chart.

The parents in our district buy construction paper, crayons, pencils, scissors, markers, tissues, plastic bags, and glue. Of course we don’t ask them for as much as the children actually use during the year, so by March I’m buying most of those supplies as well. We are already out of tissue and crayons.

I’m not complaining. I’m just explaining the steps I’ve already taken to try to save jobs, including my own.

The only thing left for me to buy that will save the district a significant amount of money is copy paper. So I will inform my principal that my “carnival money”, raised by working at a booth at our fund-raising event in October, can be used for paper. I don’t know how much money is even in my account. I don’t remember spending any of it last year. So maybe that will help.

I’m not sure yet what my other suggestions will be.

This is a baffling issue for me. On the one hand we have heard for generations that education is a “priority” in America. We even heard during the Bush administration that “quality education” is a priority and that NO CHILD WILL BE LEFT BEHIND. I have never understood that fantasy concept.  Some children can’t even “walk” academically, so keeping them in the race with everyone else is in itself a daunting task. Doing it WITHOUT SUFFICIENT FUNDING is impossible! Each year the Department of Education expects us to do more with less money. How does that work???? With the current budget crisis we have classrooms in this country that are already overcrowded and under-supplied. How does that create a “quality education”?

And the new budget cuts seem even more insulting when we can instantly pledge $100 MILLION dollars to Haiti!! Show me where that money has been hiding!! Why didn’t we use some of it for education if we have had it sitting around waiting for a crisis? Isn’t the collapse of our education system a crisis?

Don’t send me hate mail about the difference between our country and Haiti or about the terrible devastation. Haiti was in trouble before the earthquake. Haiti had starvation, disease, and orphans before the earthquake. Where were the stars and media darlings for the 50,000 orphans that were sitting around waiting for parents before the ground shook?

Countries around the globe are in trouble and it’s wonderful that we can help them. But where will the future doctors and nurses and soldiers and missionaries and construction workers come from if we aren’t educating our own children? How will we continue to maintain an economy strong enough to help out other nations if we aren’t making wise decisions about our own nation? Who will respond to the crisis of 2030 if we are not training future leaders? There will always be wars and earthquakes and floods and famine and orphans until we go home to Jesus. The power to help others comes from a position of moral, physical, and economic strength.

So that is my soapbox for today.

And, please tell me if you think of more ways I can save money for my district.

Wrap up...

Well, here goes another week! We finished our testing and we’re still smiling. The results of the tests were mostly reassuring. This was a standardized test we give three times a year, so we have the early results to compare to this week’s test.  Look at my kinderblog though to see the interesting responses!

I have to tell you may class’s reaction to the sandwich rounds I mentioned yesterday. They have been fascinated!! “Mrs. Maurer what is THAT?” “Why is your sandwich round?” “Why does it have little holes in it?” “Is it good?” “Did you get it at WalMart?” LOL We may have to have sandwich rounds for snack next week!

And I forgot to mention that I am invoking my “teacher power” to change our lunch policy, at least for my own class. Our students have a choice each day of the menu item OR a ham and cheese sandwich. So there is always mayonnaise, mustard, and ketchup on our side bar. Well, on days when the menu item includes French fries several of our students, from all three classes, request mayo on their fries. We had a big discussion in circle about making healthy choices and adding fat and salt and sugar to things that don’t really need more. We talked about enjoying the taste of food and trying new things. Then I told them that from now on they only have two choices for fries- ketchup or plain. No more mayo!!  (At my previous school they served pizza and fries on the same day and Ranch dressing on the side!!) My students were actually proud of themselves for making a better choice and several reminded me- “No mayo Mrs. Maurer!” They are so cute.

I’ve been working on some website updates and computer projects and my book promotion so I’ve been a little behind on correspondence and other things. I’m looking forward to a more relaxing weekend. Gary is still on vacation so maybe we will do something fun.