Happier January

This Happier January Calendar is from the folks at Action for Happiness, who say:

How can we start this new year happier? Things have certainly not been easy over the last year, and we are still in difficult and uncertain times. The best way to try to handle our difficult emotions and experiences is by focusing on what we can control. This month, we're encouraging everyone to focus on small steps to try to boost happiness - for ourselves and others around us - to spread kindness and hopefully inspire others to do the same.

January 1

~ Find three things to look forward to this year.

January 2

~ Make time today to do something kind for yourself.

January 3

~ Do a kind act for someone else to help to brighten their day.

January 4

~ Write a list of things you feel grateful for in life and why.

January 5

~ Look for the good in others and notice their strengths.

January 6

~ Take five minutes to sit still and just breathe.

January 7

~ Learn something new and share it with others.

January 8

~ Say positive things to the people you meet today.

January 9

~ Get moving.  Do something physically active (ideally outdoors).

January 10

~ Thank someone you're grateful to and tell them why.

January 11

~Switch off all your tech two hours before bedtime.

January 12

~ Connect with someone near you — share a smile or chat.

January 13

~ Be gentle with yourself when you make mistakes.

January 14

~ Take a different route today and see what you notice.

January 15

~ Eat healthy food which really nourishes you today.

January 16

~ Get outside and notice five things that are beautiful.

January 17

~ Contribute positively to a good cause or your community.

January 18

~ Focus on what's good, even if today feels tough.

January 19

~ Get back in contact with an old friend you miss.

January 20

~ Go to bed in good time and give yourself time to recharge.

January 21

~ Take a small step towards an important goal.

January 22

~ Try out something new to get out of your comfort zone.

January 23

~ Plan something fun and invite others to join you.

January 24

~ Put away digital devices and focus on being in the moment.

January 25

~ Decide to lift people up rather than put them down.

January 26

~ Say hello to a neighbor and get to know them better.

January 27

~ Challenge your negative thoughts and look for the upside.

January 28

~ Ask other people about things they've enjoyed recently.

January 29

~ Use one of your personal strengths in a new way.

January 30

~ Count how many people you can smile at today.

January 31

~ Write down your hopes or plans for the future.

"Happiness is when what you think, what you

say, and what you do are in harmony." ~ Gandhi

Curled up kitty on a cushion

What better way to start the new year of Caturdays than with a picture of Clawdia, all curled up, and a bit of alliteration.  She is quite aware that I'm aiming my camera at her.  Yep, eyes slightly open, watching me.

#MeetMyPetChallenge

I found something on Facebook called #MeetMyPetChallenge. with about 87,000 members.  It allows cats to answer several introductory questions, so here are Clawdia's very own answers.  She already told our blog readers most of these things months ago (yes, she blogs).

• My legal name is:  Clawdia
• My nickname is:  Pretty Girl
• My breed is:  I'm a CAT.  Somebody said domestic shorthair cat
• My age is:  about 11 years old
• My favorite human is:  either Bonnie or Donna or Sharon
• My biggest fear:  someone knocking on our apartment door
• My favorite things are:  visiting with my human friends who pet me, and chasing red dots and reflections
• What I hate the most:  being picked up
• Where do I sleep?  I'm not telling you my hiding places! ***
• Do I snore?  sometimes

*** Bonnie, answering for her:  Clawdia sleeps on the bed, in patches of sunshine, under the easy chair, in her blue carrier, behind my desk, in a box, in her own cat bed, on the soft back of the sofa.  She snuggles down by me when I go to bed, but when I relax, she figures she's gotten me to sleep after a few minutes and leaves.  She was catnapping in the full clothes hamper in the back of the closet in this photo.  Being black, she can hide in plain sight.  By the way, when Clawdia blogs, this is her signature:

Clawdia, 'til next time    >^. .^<

New Year's Day ~ spinach and black-eyed peas

When I was growing up, my family would eat spinach and black-eyed peas on New Year's Day.  I was in the mood for some black-eyed peas when I ordered groceries recently, so I have a can of them on my shelf.  I happen to have spinach, too, so I know what I'll eat on New Year's Day.  And I'll smile as I remember my parents and siblings around the table.

Why did we eat those two things on New Year's Day?  It was supposed to be lucky because the green of spinach represents dollars and the black-eyed peas are the color of pennies.  Do I believe that stuff?  No, but reading Mae's Food Blog on Tuesday made me smile:  What to Eat for New Year's Good Luck.  I remembered my family's tradition and went looking for an image to use here, though we never combined the two as they did in this picture.

If you want to know more about lucky foods, Woman's Day published an article three weeks ago about 20 New Year's Food Traditions That'll Bring You Good Luck in 2021.  Greens are #15, and black-eyed peas are #20.

Beginning ~ on her 49th birthday

"On my forty-ninth birthday, I decided that all of life was hopeless, and I would eat myself to death. ... However, after a second cup of coffee, I realized that I couldn't kill myself that morning — not because it was my birthday but because I'd promised to get arrested the next day."

Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith ~ by Anne Lamott, 2005, memoir

With Anne Lamott's trademark wisdom, humor, and honesty, Plan B is a spiritual antidote to anxiety and despair in our increasingly fraught times.

The opening sentences got my attention, and I will keep reading to see what happens next.  An Amazon reviewer used this book as a morning devotional and said, "This book is refreshing in its humanity.  Its stories of real, broken, and amazing people helped me see the broken and amazing people in my own life."

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays.  Click the blue link for more book beginnings.

Imagine celebrating tonight

Drenda and Donna were celebrating some other New Year's Eve, since this kind of partying is impossible this year.  So let's just smile with them and imagine sitting across the table as the new year arrives tonight.

Ponder this

My friend's husband was out shopping yesterday and found this at the store.  Candy for Valentine's Day is already on the shelves.  Really?  Are you kidding me?  Noooo, it's still December, people!

Worse, ponder this tonight

You made me smile ~ thank you

On this penultimate day of a difficult year, I felt I should thank all of you who made me smile this year.  You are one of them, so here's a big

THANK YOU

for being you.  Special thanks for smiles from these family members during the holidays:  Getting that "Peace on Earth" card with a peace dove on it (above) from Sandra made me smile.

Getting this Christmas card on Monday from Barbara made me smile, once the US Postal Service began to catch up with their overload of holiday mail and got it delivered.

Getting the toilet paper Christmas tree from Brandy that I shared with you on Friday made me smile.

Getting a card from Whitney's family in the mail addressed only to "Grandma Bonnie" (without my last name) actually made me laugh out loud.  I love all of you, including family that I didn't mention in this post, and I enjoyed ALL the cards people sent me.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

(Did you notice I'm already practicing my focus words for 2021?  The first two are Gratitude and Love.)

Wednesday Words ~ sobriquet and multivalent

"Euphemisms and nicknames ... resolve, in almost every case, to cliché."  I love words.  This morning, the first article I read was about words:  "I Can't Stand These Words Anymore" by David L. Ulin in The Atlantic.  The words illustrated above are among the ones he can't stand.  And here are a couple of excellent words I found for us to think about, using quotes from Ulin's article.  He began this way:

"Recently, I noticed a headline in The New York Times that featured the word tasked.  This is among my least favorite rhetorical strategies — the verbing of the noun.  Contemporary American English is rife with such constructions:  to journal, to parent, to impact, to effect.  I wince a little every time I come across one."

Let's think about a couple of the words I noticed in his article.

sobriquet / sow·bruh·kei / noun = descriptive name or epithet.  Synonyms:  alias, byname, cognomen, epithet, handle, moniker, nickname, surname.  Example:  "... the sobriquets attached to the city where I live, Los Angeles.  La La Land, Tinseltown, Lotus-land, El Lay."

multivalent / mul·ti·vā·lent /ˌməltēˈvālənt,ˌməlˌtīˈvālənt / adjective = having or susceptible of many applications, interpretations, meanings, or values.  Example:  "Language has limits, but it is rich and multivalent nevertheless, which is to say that it has power."

Now go read those words in context.  That's the best way to learn new words.  By the way, "SRIBE" in the words at the top is a deliberate typo for "scribe" in an illustration.  You can see the words as a GIF being corrected when you take a look at Ulin's article.  Okay, one more definition, of the word I used here, a word that is not in the article:

GIF is an acronym for "Graphics Interchange Format."  It's a short, animated picture, without sound.  GIFs are often used as memes, to portray an emotion or a reaction.  How is the word pronounced?  The inventor of the GIF format, Steve Wilhite of CompuServe, prefers "Jif" for a very strange reason.  This article explains why the word should be pronounced "GIF" like the word "GIFT" without the "T."  Enjoy this GIF of Newton's cradle.

By the way, today is the penultimate day of a difficult year, as Jan Edmiston wrote on her blog.  Do I need to define "penultimate" for us?

pe·nul·ti·mate / pəˈnəltəmət / adjective = last but one in a series of things; second last.  Example:  "Today is the penultimate day of a difficult year."