(Because some people like Blogger and some like WordPress, i am putting the same content at both. If you would prefer to read this on the other site, it is linked here.)
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It’s thankful day, and it could not have arrived soon enough.
A goodly portion of yesterday was spent on hold on the phone for reasons i would much rather not go into right now (but a good bit of it is percolating for a Random and Happy Tuesday post, so stay tuned).
While listening to awful hold music or worse, ads for services i did not want or need, i got to thinking about the furniture upon which i was sitting. At least, part of the time i was sitting on furniture, part of the time i was sitting on hold in the car, but that’s another part of the story.
Thus today, furniture in my home for which i am thankful.
The biggest (and potentially most beautiful if you make it every morning) piece of furniture for which i am grateful is the bed. It’s king size, and back in the day when the kids were smaller it would hold two adults, three cats and four children. It’s comfy and cozy and lulls me right to sleep at night.
We used to have a huge dining table, until the day Sweetie set one of his guitar amps on it and it split in half (with Bigger Girl sitting at it having lunch, she just laughed and took another bite of her sandwich, she knows how things go around here). Now we have a smaller table that fits better in the space we have, with nice chairs.
The porch swing is a favorite piece, especially when the weather is cooperating.
In our bedroom are a dresser and a chest of drawers, both part of the set that belonged to Grandma Mary. Besides being well built and nice looking, they keep me determined to not have more clothes than we can reasonably fit in them, apart from hanging clothes.
Our bedside tables are our treasure troves, and you could probably read our personalities just by peeking in (but please don’t because you might get TMI).
The huge, green metal desk that was military surplus and weighs about a ton held two bookshelves and pretty much all of our homeschool stuff went in it. It’s still around for sentimental reasons (and because it is just plain too heavy to move without more people than i care to invite over for the purpose).
My computer desk is where i would want to be all day long if i didn’t have to go make a living.
Comfy and squooshy chairs in the library take the place of any couches here, and are ever so much nicer to me.
Sweetie’s grandmother’s low chest holds spare blankets and memories.
Then there are the bookshelves, i haven’t counted but it’s over half a dozen, all overflowing.
Sometimes it’s a good idea to take stock of the mundane things, like furniture, and remember why it’s important and be thankful for having it.
Please join us and our gracious and wonderful hostess Kristi from ThankfulMe, write up your own list and link up to Ten Things of Thankful.
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Today is:
Chinese New Year Parade -- San Francisco, CA, US (North America's largest Chinese community celebrates the Lunar New Year in style)
Clam Chowder Cook-Off -- Santa Cruz, CA, US (if you love clam chowder of any variety, this is the place for you; through tomorrow)
Curling Is Cool Day -- embrace the Olympic sport the whole family can play; sponsored by Wellcat Holidays
Defenders of the Motherland Day (formerly Red Army Day) -- Russia and some former Soviet Republics
Homeland Defenders' Day -- Kyrguzstan
Motherland Defenders' Day -- Transdniestria
Diesel Engine Day -- Rudolph Diesel received his patent in Germany on this day in 1893
Dog Biscuit Appreciation Day -- while i can't figure out who started this one, even Mr. Google says it's celebrated today
Easy Divorce Day -- marking the passage, in 1915, of the Nevada law granting easy divorces after only a 6 month residency, the first such in the US
International Dog Biscuit Appreciation Day -- internet generated
Iwo Jima Day -- commemoration of the US flag raising
Katsuyama Sagicho -- Katsuyama, Japan (Chinese influenced fire festival held the last weekend of every February; large stages are built and decorated, then burned the next day)
National Banana Bread Day
National Day -- Brunei
Open That Bottle Night -- time to finally drink that bottle of wine you've been saving for a special occasion; after all, the final Saturday in February only comes once a year (sponsored by Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher of The Wall Street Journal)
Parke County Maple Fair -- Rockville, IN, US (pancake meals, a Covered Bridge Art Assn. show, and more; this weekend and next)
Pebbles Day -- Pebbles Flintstone was born this day around 10,000BC
Republic Day (Mashramani) -- Guyana
Showa-Shinzan International Yukigassen Tournament -- Japan; snowball fighting (yukigassen) at its best, through tomorrow
St. Milburga of Shropshire's Day (Patron of birds)
St. Polycarp of Smyrna's Day (Patron against dysentery and earache)
St. Serenus the Gardener's Day (Patron of bachelors, falsely accused people)
Swamp Cabbage Festival -- LaBelle, FL, US (also called Hearts of Palm, gear up for two days of food, entertainment, and family fun)
Terminalia -- Ancient Roman Calendar (festival for Terminus, god of land boundary markers)
Birthdays Today:
Emily Blunt, 1983
Niecy Nash, 1970
Michael Dell, 1965
"Bobby" Bonilla, 1963
Howard Jones, 1955
Patricia Richardson, 1951
"Too Tall" Jones, 1951
John Sanford, 1944
Johnny Winter, 1944
Peter Fonda, 1939
Sylvia Chase, 1938
Donna J. Stone, 1933
Paul Tibbets, 1915
William L. Shirer, 1904
Victor Fleming, 1889
W.E.B. DuBois, 1868
Emma Hart Willard, 1787
George Frederic Handel, 1685
Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, 1646
Samuel Pepys, 1633
Debuting/Premiering Today:
"Fortune and Men's Eyes"(Play), 1967
Pinocchio(Disney Cartoon), 1940
Today in History:
Emperor Diocletian orders the general persecution of Christians, 303
Traditional date for the publication of the Gutenberg Bible, the first Western book printed with movable type, 1455
France begins its fifth "holy war" against the Huguenots, 1574
Baron von Steuben arrives at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania to help to train the Continental Army, 1778
The first US raw-cotton-to-cloth mill is founded, in Waltham, Massachusetts, 1813
The first US pharmaceutical college is organized, the College of Apothecaries in Philidelphia, 1821
Santa Anna begins his siege of the Alamo, 1836
John Newman leaves the Anglican Church and is welcomed into the Roman Catholic Church, 1846
In Mexico, American troops under General Zachary Taylor defeat Mexican General Antonio López de Santa Anna, 1847
Great Britain formally recognises the independence of the Boers in the area between the Orange and Vaal rivers, signing the Bloemfontein Convention with the Orange Free State, 1854
The London Times publishes the world's first classified ad, 1886
Charles Martin Hall, assisted by his sister Julia Brainerd Hall, produced the first samples of man-made aluminum, 1886
The French/Italian Riviera is struck by an earthquake that leaves 2,000 dead, 1887
The Tootsie Roll is introduced by Leo Hirshfield, 1896
In France, Emile Zola is imprisoned for writing his "J'accuse" letter accusing the government of anti-Semitism and wrongly jailing Alfred Dreyfus, 1898
The Cuban state of Guantanamo is leased to the US, 1903
The US acquires control of the Panama Canal Zone for $10 million, 1904
The Rotary Club International is founded in Chicago, 1905
Russian Tsar Nicholas II dissolves the Diet of Finland, 1909
The US state of Nevada enacts a convenient divorce law, 1915
The February Revolution begins in Russia, 1917
Plutonium is first produced and isolated by Dr. Glenn T. Seaborg, 1941
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is founded, 1847
The first mass inoculation with the Salk vaccine begins in Pittsburgh, 1954
First meeting of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), 1955
The United States Environmental Protection Agency announces its intent to buy out and evacuate the dioxin-contaminated community of Times Beach, Missouri, 1983
Supernova 1987a is seen in the Large Magellanic Cloud, 1987
A small fire occurs in the Russian Space station, Mir, 1997
An avalanche destroys the Austrian village of Galtür, killing 31, 1999
Unknown criminals pour more than 2.5 million liters of diesel oil and other hydrocarbons into the river Lambro, in Northern Italy, causing an environmental disaster, 2010
A study published in Science Journal suggests that the earliest European Palaeolithic artwork in Spain was in fact made by Neanderthals not homo sapiens, 2018
have a grea weekend
ReplyDeleteThank you for being an everflowing source of thankfulness, and for your calendar with events big and small through space and time.
ReplyDeleteThat was a great list and we enjoyed the tour of your treasures!
ReplyDeleteAs one who is a homebody and works from home I agree with the importance of gratitude for your surroundings. Lovely post. Hope your other being on hold issues are resolved.
ReplyDeleteThere are so many things that I'm thankful for that I can't deserve which one or more to write down Mimi. But the the two that I always write down and that is 1. thank God for my life each day and 2. having a wonderful wife, Mary Lou who loves me. That sounds pretty good to me. See ya.
ReplyDeleteCruisin Paul
"dysentery and earache"???
ReplyDeleteI know, you only report 'em...
There's a chowder cook-off taking place here, too. Good ideas tend to spread, I guess. :-)
Wonderful thankful post about finding the 'sacred in the ordinary.'
ReplyDeleteHappy Day to you,
A ShutterBug Explores,
aka (A Creative Harbor)
Ah yes...and the roof that keeps everything dry. Don't forget the roof.
ReplyDeleteWe love our furniture too. We have a lot of Broyhill and we love it. Well made.
ReplyDeleteI hate being on hold. Sometimes it takes them forever to get to you. Oh well, sometimes it's all we can do is wait.
We are most happy for the things we have too. It's good to be thankful.
Have a fabulous weekend, my friend. ♥
Furniture either comes with a history, and/or develops one through time. In either case, I'm thankful for my furniture, too! :-)
ReplyDeleteWonderful list of thankfuls. Especially a king sized bed. We have a queen and it feels small with us and several cats :)
ReplyDeleteWe do have to be thankful for things we might take for granted.
ReplyDeleteExcellent oT!
ReplyDelete(Nicely engaging and entertaining. Could totally see the desk and imagine the bookcases)
It is funny the way that certain familiar pieces of furniture almost seem to have personalities. Even when they're bust, I find it hard to get rid of certain pieces! And others, well, I never could quite find it in my heart to like them - !
ReplyDeleteLovely TToT. I enjoy the thematic approach you often employ. From your description, I know that you have a most comfortable house.
ReplyDelete" Comfy and squooshy chairs in the library". Perfect!
Once you've experienced a king size bed there's no going back to smaller lol
I loved reading about your furnitures. It made me think I could easily write a story or two about the history behind all the furniture we have. I suppose many people could do the same, unless they swap out their furnishings to keep up with what now in style, or because the pieces have completely worn out.
ReplyDeleteBeing on hold with annoying music is not my favorite thing to do either. Thank goodness for speaker phones that allows one to lay the phone down and actually get something done other than standing there holding on to the phone.