Tag: tiny tuesday

Tiny Tuesday

September is Suicide Prevention Awareness Month. September 8 through September 14 is Suicide Prevention Week. World Suicide Prevention Day is today, September 10. You do not have to be in crisis to reach out for help. If you are experiencing depression, sadness, stress, or anxiety, or you are worried about a friend or family member who is, here is info for assistance in finding the right resource for your needs.

•988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline: 24/7/365, you can call or text 988.
•Crisis Text Line: Text Hello to 741741
•YouthLine: Text teen2teen to 839863, or call 1-877-968-8491
•Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline: call or text 1-800-422-4453
•National Domestic Violence Hotline: Text START to 88788 or call 1-800-799-7233 or text LOVEIS to 22522.
•National Deaf Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-855-812-1001
•Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN): 1-800-656-4673
•The Trevor Project for LGBTQIA+ kids and teens: 1-866-488-7386 or text START to 678678
•Veterans Crisis Line: If in danger, call 911. For more info, call 800-273-8255 (press 1). Please keep msgs under 160 characters.
•Trans Lifeline for transgender and questioning callers: 1-877-565-8860 [available between 7 a.m. and 1 a.m. PST (9 a.m. to 3 a.m. CST or 10 a.m. to 4 a.m. EST), but operators are often available during off-hours, so no matter when you need to call, you should].

A few other LGBTQIA helplines that offer support, but not necessarily crisis intervention:

•LGBT National Hotline: 1-888-843-4564
•LGBT National Youth Talkline: 1-800-246-7743
•LGBT Senior Hotline: 1-888-234-7243

•SAMHSA National Helpline: 1-800-662-4357: If you are struggling with addiction or are concerned about a loved one’s alcohol or drug abuse, you can contact the hotline for the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. This US government agency offers support and information about treatment and recovery. For any kind of emergency situation related to drug or alcohol use, call 911 or your local emergency line.

Tiny Tuesday!


Eva Ruby, the tiniest member of the Batpack, did start coughing less over the weekend, so we thought things would be okay. Then yesterday, her appetite went away, and in the evening, we feared we saw a little blood in a liquid-y stool (sorry; dog people overshare). Off she went with the Supreme Ruler of Her World, Tom, to the emergency vet. After x-rays, bloodwork, and no coughing for the doctors, she was thought to be on the mend from whatever caused the cough. For a dog her size, eating even a blade of grass could have irritated her throat. She had no fever, nothing too alarming in the x-rays, but her bloodwork showed she was severely dehydrated. So she got sub-Q fluids, anti-nausea meds, and about four hours worth of monitoring before Tom brought her home. Now she’s on a bland, small-portion diet several times a day, and the credit card bill is not so tiny. Worth it for that smile and our peace of mind.


There is one topic about which Eva is serious and wants to have a word. (We think it’s from hanging out in a house with too many fashion dolls.) She says, “This is the day after Labor Day. Pack those white shoes away immediately. You’ll see them again at Easter and beyond. Yes, Florida, even you. If Texans can pack away their white boots and strappy heels, so can you other coastal fashionistas.”

Into the closet. See them next spring!
Approved year-round choices.

She does, however, make allowances for sneakers, tennis shoes, running shoes, and gym shoes. This is not simply because they’re sporty. They’re also optimal dog-walking shoes. Priorities…

As for me, I tried to rewatch this 1998 movie while Tom and Eva were at the ER. There was a lot of stopping and restarting because of ongoing texts. It was still fun seeing Sigourney Weaver play Katharine, a treacherous boss, and Melanie Griffin play Tess, who’s smart, sweet, and sexy. As she tells Harrison Ford’s Jack (why are so many RomCom leading men named Jack?), “I have a head for business and a body for sin.” A stellar supporting cast portraying working women (Joan Cusack is gold, as always) and sleazy men (though there are good guys, too). Bonus: A brief but good appearance by Olympia Dukakis as a personnel director at an employment agency is one of several characters who show the value of women mentoring women in the workplace.

Tiny Tuesday!


This is a link to NASA’s information on this month’s Super Blue Moon. I started trying to get good photos of the moon on Sunday, and last night Tom drove me around chasing it with my camera. I’m using the wrong camera–I have at least one better–so what looked huge to us in the sky looks a bit tiny and poorly defined in the photos I shot. Still, we got to see the beauty, especially from points where it would have been physically dangerous to stop and shoot photos. It may also be impressive tonight into Wednesday.


My second DNC-inspired RomCom rewatch was 1993’s Dave, with such a great cast in Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver, Frank Langella, Ben Kingsley, Laura Linney, Charles Grodin, Kevin Dunne, a quick and fun glimpse of Bonnie Hunt (“We’re walking; we’re walking.”), and who may be my favorite movie Secret Service agent, Duane, played by Ving Rhames. Even though I’ve seen this movie several times, it still makes me laugh.

I have two potential DVD rewatches today, starting with 1987’s Moonstruck, to honor the Super Blue Moon. I never stop quoting this film that ties with Notting Hill as my favorite RomCom. I’m trying to remember if this is the movie the Revere family quotes in my contemporary romance A Coventry Christmas Wedding. ETA: Corrected to name the right novel.

Tiny Tuesday!


Doing research for the Saga yesterday and needed to find inspiration circa 1975. That’s how I came across copies of “The Game of Jaws.” I read about it and don’t remember what ages the game was marketed toward, but it probably included children who were too young to have seen that movie.

I did a deep dive into the film because even though it forever changed my relationship with water (and not just salt water, any water that wasn’t safely contained in cement), I was crazy about both the novel and the film Jaws. My research opened up an unplanned and light way to start the new section of the novel.

The summer of ’75 was a bit chaotic for me, and as is usual, the only person who was damaged in the long run was…me. One of my favorite lines from the remake of Freaky Friday is the mom (Jamie Lee Curtis) calling out to her daughter (Lindsay Lohan) as she drops her at school, “Make good choices!”

I made bad choices that summer. But I still remember it with great affection because of the big version of this wee shark taking a bite out of a coloring book, instead of me. It’s the way I prefer my sharks’ diets.

Tiny Tuesday!

I just finished reading this novel from Ann Patchett, Tom Lake (which was really good and made me cry at the end), and in the process of reading, I discovered a small bookmark I’d forgotten (to add to the Sunday Sundries bookmarks I’ve already shared).

Lisa in Iowa (aka “Nurse Lisa”)’s two dogs (gone years ago to the Rainbow Bridge), featured front and back, from a holiday photo shoot. They were such good girls and provided a lot of stories and photos back in the day on LiveJournal.

Sophie

 

Phoebe

Tiny Tuesday!

During May’s power outage, I colored every day during the sunlight hours. Coloring gave me the opportunity to think of my characters and what I wanted to write when I could get back on the Internet and my computer.

I was feeling way more stress and anxiety during this weather event and its power outage. For the first time, I decided to take my anxiety meds, though only in half-doses. Just an attempt to take the edge off.

I also opted to read instead of color, choosing comfort books. I stuck with one of my favorite authors since I was a teenager (my mother, sister, and I all shared and devoured these novels). I’ve reread my favorite Mary Stewart books many times, so I decided to begin with books I don’t remember reading at all, but if I did, it was only once.


First up on Tuesday: Thornyhold. Not so much her usual romantic suspense, this one had a little more magic, a fun change from a small paperback.

Tiny Tuesday!


In April of 2020, I posted about this idea I found: The Coping Skills Toolbox. I shared the above photo of the box I put together to help me with quarantine anxiety (not only was the world gripped by a pandemic with no preventative medication and few effective treatments for some populations, including my own, but I was laid off from my job of six years due to the pandemic).

Looking back at that post reminds me that I’ve been forthright on this site for at least the last four years about how anxiety has been a lifelong struggle for me. I was prescribed medication for it when I was eighteen that I never used. In 2022, I was prescribed medication on an as-needed basis, which I used very little of. I will occasionally take medication to help me sleep.

Medications are rarely my first option. What I have to take for my physical health, I take. But I’ll always try to manage anxiety in other ways. This is not in any way a judgment about people who manage their physical and emotional health through medication. For a variety of reasons, it’s simply not my first choice.

I still have that “toolbox.” I’ve long-since rewatched the comfort movies and reread the comfort novels that were in it, so they’re no longer in there. It still holds my Magnetic Poetry Journal that I sometimes put poems in, along with the magnetic board I can use to arrange words. It still holds a small coloring book and two tins of coloring pencils. The toys–Superman, Batman, and the tiny plastic cars–are still in there. The bottle of bubbles is not.

After looking at the book I often use as ideas for my Tiny Tuesday posts (shown above, on the right), I decided to add to the box again because of two things I found listed in the book.


This morning, I added my Magnetic Poetry Haiku Kit and a movie. I don’t know if Sliding Doors is a classic at twenty-six years old, but it’s a comfort movie for me. I watched it earlier, and it inspired the haiku I created which is now written in the journal, too. As you can see from my photo below, all the words I wanted weren’t available to me, so I added them to the photo. The haiku goes with the theme of the chapter I’ll be writing when I can get my brain directed that way again.


There is a quote from the movie that’s one of my favorites, when one of the characters says, “I’m a novelist. I’m never going to finish the book.”

Hope you’re all having a good Tuesday and being kind to yourselves.