Friday, January 26, 2018

7 Quick Takes about Alternative Uses for Musical Instruments, Common Reasons for Moving to a New House, and the Solar System Reimagined

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?

1


I took my two oldest kids to see an orchestra concert last weekend. They played works by Mozart and had a violin/viola duet that was just amazing.

My kids were impressed, too, but just to make sure I didn't get any big ideas about how cultured they were getting, they spent the ride home ranking the instruments in order of how effective they'd be as weapons.

(For the record, they put 'trombone' at #1, but I personally lean toward the viola because you can thrust with the bow and block with the viola, and it's a decent heft unlike the violin but not so unwieldy as a cello.)

2


Last week our van door suddenly jammed, so this week Phillip took it apart to work on it. He's no car mechanic, but between his engineering mind and the fine people of YouTube, he actually does almost all our car repair and maintenance.

At one point the door was off, the tail light was in the driveway, and this was sitting on our counter:

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
What the automatic door mechanism for a Kia Sedona looks like, if you're curious.

While he was working on the car, I opened the dishwasher and the top rack fell off the track. He happened to come in for a tool at the very moment I was standing there holding it in my hands and ordered, "Stop breaking stuff!"

It just flew right off, I swear.

3


You know those online tutorials on how to untangle doll hair?

LIES.

My younger daughter wanted to practice styling her American Girl doll's hair (actually a Target knock-off, but close enough,) which meant we first had to get rid of her current hairstyle: 'dreadlocks with a few raisins stuck in them.'

So like an idiot, I wasted 30 minutes of my time trying to comb a stupid doll's hair with fabric softener because some person on the Internet told me it could be done. It looked a little better afterward but still wasn't even close to being something you could comb, part, or style.

Luckily, my oldest has long hair and agreed to let me use her head to teach her little sister the basics of braiding. The doll can keep her dreadlocks.

4


In my church, there's a program called "visiting teaching" where every woman is assigned two other women from the congregation to visit her once a month, be her friend, and offer general help and support.

As I was getting ready to go visiting teaching on Monday morning I gave my 3-year-old the rundown of what to expect:

"Do you remember Sister Boyer?" I asked.

"Yes."

"We're going to visit her in a little bit, but she moved and lives a different house now."

Without skipping a beat he asked, "Because her old house blew up?"

I really can't say which was more amusing, the fact that a spontaneous house explosion was the first thing that came to his mind or that he was so utterly nonchalant about one happening.

5


In other exciting news, I got called for jury duty in May.

I was called one other time when I was 18 or so, but they settled outside of court so I didn't end up having to go.

It's funny, I was just talking to someone about his jury duty service and the cushy $10-a-day salary.

Can't. Wait.

6


The solar system, according to my 6-year-old:


It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}
Bonus points if you correctly identified "Pluto" (PLOODO) and "Jupiter" (a.k.a: LOOPDR.)

Instead of being concerned that this clearly geocentric model of the solar system is missing a bunch of planets, I'm going to focus on how much I enjoy the shooting comets and the phonetic spelling of 'Sadrn.'

Before I found this drawing, I wasn't aware my 6-year-old was so interested in space. I'll have to ask her opinion on whether she thinks there was ever life on 'Mors.'

7


Because of freezing rain and our steep driveway, I was super-late to my dental appointment. I mean, I was going to be late anyway, but because I got stuck in the driveway I was even later.

Then when I got to the dentist, all anyone wanted to talk to me about was the Patriots getting to be in the Superbowl.

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?  {posted @ Unremarkable Files}


I get that this is New England and I'm sorry, but I'm 0% interested in sports. And probably the time I'm least likely to be chatty about it is when someone is digging around in my mouth with a metal hook. I hope everyone understands.

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6 comments:

Jenny said...

I agree on the doll hair. LIES LIES!!!!! ;)

Kelly M. said...

YouTube is also how we keep repair bills to a minimum on appliances and our vehicles. (Though that pesky wheelchair lift has to require "special parts"-BAH!)
And we have a ton of leftover fabric softener from that same failed experiment.

AnneMarie said...

Oh man, I like what your kids did after the orchestra! That's a pretty great idea, what a neat way to keep the conversation going ;) Haha, I also think it's hilarious how your toddler thought the obvious reason for someone moving to a new house was an explosion!

Rachel said...

Angel's been called up for jury duty several times, but never has actually had to do it. The last time, he got called up in Texas about a year after he'd changed his legal residence to MI so we're not even sure how that happened. Having someone who can fix broken stuff and not needing to go to the professionals is the BEST!

Jenny Evans said...

Naturally. You know, because it happens all the time.

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