Blog - Page 78 of 90 - Karen Shanley

Argue for Your Limitations and They’re Yours

April 13, 2007 / Cait and Me, Life / By Karen Shanley / 13 Comments

As I was listening to a visiting friend talk about her life over lunch, I was reminded yet again of how she’s painted herself into a comfy corner of “I can’t.”

I’ve known this friend for 25 years. What attracted me to her originally was her adventurous spirit. When she wasn’t home hobnobbing with famous authors, international journalists, and heads of state, she was traveling the world. She was politically active and spiritually seeking. In other words, she was full … Read More

The Piano Concerto

April 12, 2007 / Finnegan the Coon Cat, Funnies, My Dogs and Me / By Karen Shanley / 13 Comments

It is both brilliant and amiable,

especially in the slow movement;

a clear second theme contrasts with the first theme and a brief closing theme,

and is so completely easy to understand

that even the commoners looked on with appreciation…

Lessons Learned from Solitaire

April 9, 2007 / Life / By Karen Shanley / 4 Comments

It’s the middle of the night. I’m tending to a sick child. Cait’s sleeping peacefully at the moment. I know that won’t be the case for long. So I do what I always do when it’s the wee hours and I know I won’t be getting much sleep. I play solitaire.

It’s a game that suits me on so many levels.

My dad taught me how to play long before there were such things as home computers, never mind computer … Read More

Growing Older Together

April 6, 2007 / Cait and Me, My Dogs and Me / By Karen Shanley / 2 Comments

Cait’s sitting on her favorite seat in the house — me. As she’s done since she was a baby, she brushes the hair back from my face with both her hands so she can see my whole face.

“Mom!”

“What?”

“You’re getting white hairs!”

Cait has announced this with some alarm. As though, for the first time, she’s realizing the clock’s not standing still.

“You can’t get old,” she adds with a hint of worry in her voice.

I joke, … Read More

Bedtime for Bonzo

April 5, 2007 / My Dogs and Me / By Karen Shanley / 1 Comment

If you’d just rub my tummy… And maybe one bedtime story. I promise, I’ll be a good boy and sleep through the whole night!… Read More

A Review of My Canon Powershot SD600

March 30, 2007 / Life / By Karen Shanley / 10 Comments

Have you noticed there’ve been more photos recently? That’s because I finally got a new camera. I’d been using Cait’s Polaroid Izone 300. While it’s a fine kid’s first camera, it just wasn’t getting the job done for me. I am now the mostly thrilled owner of a Canon Powershot SD600 Digital Elph.

After doing some research and narrowing it down to the Sony Cybershots, and the Canon SD600, I went with the Canon. The price fit my budget (you … Read More

Stowaway

March 29, 2007 / Finnegan the Coon Cat / By Karen Shanley / 6 Comments

The Morning Routine

March 26, 2007 / Cait and Me / By Karen Shanley / 9 Comments

Cait’s and my morning routine goes something like this:

I get up around 4:30 a.m., go downstairs, get the coffee going, let the dogs out, go back upstairs with coffee and dogs, and write for a few hours. Then I wake up Cait, get her breakfast, sit and chat with her while she eats, wait for the first bus to go by (which means there’s exactly five minutes until her bus will arrive), double-check that she has everything she needs … Read More