Tagged: puttingwordstogether

19
Jan
2026

OUR WAY WITH WORDS

I’ve been thinking about language that is specific to my family. Phrases and words that we use that no one else does (or maybe a few but not the general public, if you see what I mean). The secret vocabulary that we adopt or invent that enters our conversations, maybe as a joke, and sticks. I’m not talking about baby talk, the garbled misinterpretations that small children add to their language and that slip into our adult lexicons, though those would really count as well. And I’m not talking about generational jargon that we gather as teens and young people...

17
Jan
2026

SLUGGARD WITH STYLE

Thinking about writing blog posts ought to count towards actually writing them, if what you put together in your head eventually leads to something. Or? I survived my first week back at work, but it was a close thing. I was exhausted by the end of Friday and it wasn’t even that strenuous a week, AND the monster report layout project that so stressful before the holidays was finally approved and finalized on Friday morning, so that should have been a great ending to the week. And it was. But. SO TIRED. I cannot decide who I resemble more in...

05
Nov
2025

HOPE IS THE FEELING YOU HAVE THAT THE FEELING YOU HAVE ISN’T PERMANENT*

What are you hoping for? I think about hope a lot lately. I remember watching Anne of Green Gables years ago (the Canadian one with Megan Follows, which is BRILLIANT, and which I STILL have on VHS, even though we haven’t even had a VCR since years back) and Marilla’s response to Anne saying that she was in the depths of despair and asking Marilla if she had ever been in the depths of despair, and Marilla responded, “to despair is to turn your back on God”. Which shut Anne up, I think. And even though I am no longer...

22
Oct
2025

TIME KEEPS ON SLIPPING, SLIPPING, SLIPPING, INTO THE FUTURE

My friend Chuck wrote a fascinating post yesterday about time and history and the movement of man through the ages, and he broke down what exactly AGES means. And I felt kind of ashamed, not because I didn’t know what the words meant, but because I’ve never really thought about them, in-depth. Me! Who loves language and linguistics and can spend hours delving into the fine print of dictionaries. I had never really thought about the fact that these words AREN’T actually interchangeable, although I’m certainly not alone in using them as if they were. Eons are subdivided into, in...

10
Oct
2025

IF YOU’RE HAPPY/SAD/WHATEVER, WRITE A POST

When you have things to do, maybe chores, or you are faced with a bunch of choices at once, which things do you do first? Do you choose to get the stuff you DON’T like doing out of the way first? Or do you do the things you LIKE doing before tackling the rest? And why? I tend to get the stuff I don’t like out of the way and leave the stuff I DO like for last, like a treat, almost. If I take my medicine, I get something sweet as a reward, as it were. I’ve noticed that...

03
Aug
2025

ALL OVER THE PLACE

Perhaps the secret to a good night’s sleep these days is staying up until 1 in the morning. At least that way I only get up once more in the middle of the night and am apparently able to fall asleep again quite quickly, even if my brain starts waking. That’s what we did last night because we were at a double-birthday party in Malmö and didn’t get home until after 1 am. I had a really nice time, which surprised me, because I wasn’t really looking forward to going, and I spent quite a lot of the evening talking...

10
Mar
2025

DON’T GET ME STARTED

Why is it that every time I tell someone, almost always someone who is NOT American, that I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT, they just keep on trying to talk about it? Trying to get me to engage in a conversation in which they want me to explain, defend, or continuously agree or react in shock about the batshit crazy takeover of the American government right now. I DON’T FUCKING WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. Because you don’t want to get me started. The whole situation enrages me and fills me with despair and disgust and disbelief. I can’t...

02
Aug
2024

AGING IS JUST ANOTHER WORD FOR LIVING*

Ermahgerd, it’s August! Yesterday, Debbie and Camilla took me out for the afternoon for an early birthday celebration because I’ll be gone over the weekend of my actual birthday. I left work at 12 and picked up Camilla, and then we drove out to Slättarps Gård, which was a lovely location out in the middle of absolute nowhere. There was a café/restaurant, outdoor seating in a garden bower, an art gallery, a florist, and a little boutique. We had a delicious lunch, sitting in the shade of the trees, with beautiful weather, blue skies, warm and breezy summer weather. They...

13
Nov
2023

MOVING THROUGH MORTALITY

Tomorrow we’re going to the funeral of one of Anders’ friends from high school. He was younger than me. 2 years younger, almost exactly the same age as my sister. He was diagnosed with cancer in April and given 4 months, though he held out for nearly 6. I’ve known him and his wife for a little over 27 years. Their kids are the same ages as ours. The four kids have known each other their entire lives. We’ve gone to New Year’s parties with them, crayfish parties nearly every year, graduation parties, big birthday parties for one or another...

06
Nov
2023

BUILDING CLUES

I spent the past couple of days working on another crossword after I got the idea for a really good theme. And then halfway through working on it, I thought of an even better theme-related connection and was able to adapt it. I worked really hard on it, and am really proud of it. Even though I messed up by once again not checking for duplicates until it was too late, I was able to make them work within the theme anyway, so it worked out. I was even able to add an alternate solution to one of the clues,...

January 2026
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