Brenda Kezar

Yay! Spring is finally here! The snow is gone and the birds are singing. The grass is greening up, and the trees are starting to bud out.

And, joy of joys, camping season is right around the corner. Sadly, I don't think I'm going to be ready to "skate around the campground" like I hoped.

For a while now, I've been planning on taking up rollerskating again as a hobby for exercise. And yes, I mean rollerskating, not rollerblading. But, not long after I bought my skates and safety kit (because I'm no spring chicken, safety first), I got a notice that there was a recall on the safety kit! Being a busy person, I made a mental note that "I can't start skating until I get the details of the recall and ensure my safety kit is safe/buy a new safety kit" . . . and then I promptly filed that away and forgot about everything except that the rollerskates were in status "no touchy."

I finally looked into the recall, and it is ONLY for the helmet. So, my elbow pads, wrist pads, and knee pads in the safety kit are fine, and it is just the helmet that needs replaced. That's fine. I hated that damn helmet, anyway.

The safety kit came with one of those suppository-shaped bike helmets. I HATE those things. They look ridiculous. Yes, I biked/skated/etc. when I was younger without a helmet, but I do think they are a good idea. First of all, we know more about safety these days. I used to ride in the back window of my parent's Lincoln Continental when I was a kid, too, and I don't think anyone would think that's a good idea these days. And, I’m older, so I'm more prone to injuries these days, and I don't recover as quickly. I'm STILL working through a problem with limited mobility in my shoulder, and I'm not sure what I even did to it! Slept wrong? Sneezed too hard? Yawned and stretched too hard? Any of them are possible. So I support the idea of safety equipment. I just hate those stupid oblong helmets.

I was delighted to find a brain-bucket style helmet like some motorcycle enthusiasts wear, or, like is (used to be?) popular among roller derby atheletes. Now I have a nice helmet that (hopefully) is good, but is also of a style I can tolerate.

But that wasn't the only glitch I ran in to. I am truly stunned at how rusty and awful I am. I do pretty good on the skates in my garage, but when I get out onto the road and try to go, my shins hurts and I wobble like a new-born calf! Put me on the skates, and suddenly you'd think I'm 95. It's mind-boggling to me because I do so many stretching and balancing exercises, walk on the treadmill regularly, and can go walk-about for four and five miles at a time with no problems. I OUTWALK my dogs!!! Clearly, there are leg muscles used in rollerskating that I have neglected. So I'm going to need more practice. I guess now I'm "in-training" to be able to rollerskate around the campground by the end of the season, lol.

The Web Development continues!

This summer, I plan on going through the textbook from my last class and applying some of the lessons to this web site. It will have the double benefit of improving the site plus reinforcing the things I've learned this semester.

Also, my summer plan is to fix parts of the website that are broken. The main landing for the site is on Wordpress, and then I often use outside links to the blog pages. Unfortunately, I've used several different providers over the last couple of years. Sometimes, I forgot to copy the pages onto the new web host. Other times (like now), the free host I was using closes and deletes my account because I forget to log in. So if you encounter broken pages, just bear with me. I hope to have it all uploaded to the new host by the end of the summer.

Speaking of "several different hosts"...

My intention is to NOT renew my wordpress when it comes due next February. By that time, I hope to have the entire site up and running on some platform where I am doing it all in CSS and html, whether that's still with Hostgator as it is now or with another company.

I renewed my Wordpress this past year because I wasn't happy with the jump in price with Hostgator. The “regular price” was 8x the introductory price; I expect an increase after the promo, but that was a bit much. So I needed to find someplace to keep my site until I figured something else out.

I tried a free site, but that hasn't worked out, so now I'm back to Wordpress AND Hostgator. I hate paying for two sites, though, and plan to spend the summer converting the whole site to html. That will also make the site less likely to have broken pages due to jumping from host to host.

On the writing front, the previous work has completely stalled out, so I am working on Story A Day May. As I've done in past years, I'm not looking to do an actual story each day, but to come up with an idea and at least a few paragraphs (or an outline) each day. So far, I'm running a 50% success rate. That's a win in my book!

Also, I've been working on a picking up a journaling habit and I've done several essays (like the one that will be linked to the end of this post).

So, I am technically writing. It's just not my usual kind of writing.

I started reading Albert Camus's The Plague as prep for the UND Writers Conference . . . and I'm still working on it! I just can't seem to get into it, which is really stunning considering how much I love plague/pathogen books.

I've also started listening to an audiobook. It is Paganism: An Introduction to Earth-Centered Relgions, by Joyce and River Higginbotham.

I picked this book as part of working on the goal of reconnecting with my spirituality (one of the wellness goals). I decided I would dive back into the pagan path, and this book is a good place to start. In addition to info on the different "flavors" of paganism, it includes exercises (including journaling). So you may see some of this journaling/theological exploration questions turned into essays later, as well.

He's doing great. A calm, happy hamster that loves being picked up. I'm pretty sure he knows his name, too, because he comes scrambling out of his hidey holes when I call him.

The only problem is that it is REALLY hard to get pictures of him. If he's in his habitat, it's darker and harder to see him. When he's on his walkabout time, he's usually running around excitedly checking things out (and looking for the forage treats he knows I've placed) that all his pics are blurry!

I'm really glad I gave in to the impulse to get him. He's been an excellent addition to the family, and I adore him. He makes me miss my mice a wee bit less.

On some hamster forums (yes, that's a thing), I found another treat hamsters like and decided to see if Hamilton liked it, too. And yes, he LOVES it.

So now Hamilton has two favorite snacks that he will climb mountains for: Cheerios . . . and dried mealworms. They are icky, but he loves them. And, at least they are dead. I don't think I could deal with handling live ones, lol.

I took the final exam for my UND class this month, and I BOMBED it. Not surprising, as I didn't study a bit. I was just too over it all to focus. Thankfully, I should still get an A for the class, unless I bombed the last assignment, which hasn't been graded yet. I don't think I bombed the assignment, but even if I did, I should still come away with a B for the class, at worst.

In the fall, I will be taking a programming class at UND, but I don't know what language the class covers yet. The course catalog just says will provide an overview of the differences and similarities between several common programming language. Every time I log in to my student portal, it throws me a little, because these classes are numbered oddly. The class I will be taking is CSci 265 Intro to Programming Languages. However, I've already taken CSci 260 Advanced Programming Languages (twenty years ago). Another numbering glitch, you might think, due to the gap in years and updating/changing of the course catalog. But you'd be wrong. These two classes exist in the current course catalog with the same numbers. I don't understand why the advanced class has a lower course number than the intro class. And, oddly enough, the Intro class IS NOT a pre-requisite for the advanced class. Bizarre.

I'm not taking a summer class at UND so that I can spend my time painting, writing (fingers crossed), and pursuing my independent study.

On the Independent Study front, I'm still doing my Spanish lessons plus two classes at Udemy (html and journaling).

I'm learning Spanish through two different main methods:

• Skill Success: 3 Minute Spanish
• Duolingo app

They are my main focus because they are both awesome. If you are looking to learn a language, I would recommend either of them.

In the 3 Minute Spanish class, each lesson is three minutes long, which breaks them into little manageable chunks when I'm at my computer. Since I reach for my phone in those “waiting in line” moments, I thought I'd try a Spanish app, as well for when I'm away from my computer. I tried several apps, and wasn't happy with them. But Duolingo is awesome.

Somewhere along the line, I also somehow joined a Spanish-learner newsletter (did I download a free ebook or something? Probably). One of the newsletters (www.mydailyspanish.com) suggested that to really build your Spanish-learning, you should create a “mini-Spain” or a “mini-Mexico” at home by:

• Switching your phone to Spanish
• Listening to Spanish radio while you cook
• Reading Spanish books
• Listening to Spanish audiobooks on your commute to work

It's great advice. Although I'm terribly rusty now and have forgotten a lot of it, I used to be very fluent in French. And how I became so fluent in it was that my instructors forbade us from speaking English in the class (learn French or keep your mouth shut) and assigning French readers the same sort of “I Can Read” books that we all learned to read with in Kindergarten. In other words, not books designed to teach your French, but books that are in French. It worked very well.

As part of doing these independent study things, I tend to earn a lot of certificates. I've decided to create a separate page for my certificates in case anyone is curious (the grown-up version of show and tell, I guess, lol).I only have a few uploaded so far, so it will take some time to keep adding to them.

By next month, I should have a link to the certificate page in my nav bar, but this month, I'm behind and too lazy. Actually, maybe I'll add it in the sidebar, since it's not a major section of the site. Decisions, decisions. Anyhoo...

I also earn a lot of certificates at work, but I'm not going to upload those here. Some day, I should upload them to my Linked In profile, but since I'm not looking for a job, it's a low priority

Side note: the whole Linked In profile needs an update because it is a wreck. I've got stuff there from my day job, stuff there related to my writing, stuff there related to content and copyrighting from when I considered leaving my old job at the vivarium and starting my own copywriting business...It's a mess. But again, low priority.

This month's playlist. The ten songs I'm listening to on repeat.

• Eyes Closed
• Bad Feeling
• Anti-Hero
• Dark Days
• Don’t Bring Me Down (one of my favorite roller skating songs had to make the list, of course; If you’ve ever watched the episode of Malcom in the Middle where Hal gets roller skates, THIS song would be the one I'd roller-disco to)
• Shadow
• Why Am I Dancing?
• Down Under
• Khan
• Slept So Long

This month's "pondering or rant" is called "Taylor Swift and the Bear." Unfortunately, I don't have it finished yet. When I do, I will add a link here.

That's it for this month. Until next month, Stay Spooky!

~~Here be monsters . . . and corgis.~~