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Close your eyes when you listen to this video.

It will be well worth it.

1. Internet access.
2. Books.
3. The ability to read this list and others like it.
4. Centralized heat. I’m so glad I don’t have to build a fire every morning to cook breakfast on and to stay warm with.
5. My Canadian and American identities.
6. The right to vote.
7. Funny texts from my family. They always have the greatest stories about what’s going on in their lives!
8. Antibiotics. Many of us might not still be around without them.
9. My funny, kind, and mischievous husband.
10. Lemon meringue pie.
11. Youtube. Who else has found the strangest and most wonderful things there?
12. People who enjoy my writing.
13. The workers who sweep the streets in Toronto. They keep our city looking good.
14. Life in a country where the media doesn’t spend months to years obsessing over every single detail of one upcoming election.*
15. Thanksgiving feasts.
16. Thanksgiving naps.
17. That tired, satisfied feeling you get when all of the food is safely packed away and the dishes and counters are scrubbed clean on a holiday like today.
18. Every Star Trek show in existence.**
19. Toilet paper. I’ve read that some people used to use corn cobs for this purpose, and it makes me shudder.
20. You.

*Canadian elections don’t happen on a strict timetable, and there’s a much shorter time space between when campaigns begin and when the election itself takes place.

** My spouse and I have been slowly working our way through all of them. We’re on season one of The Original Series right now, and it’s make me feel like I’ve travelled back through time. The 60’s were a time of drastic change for society, and it shines through clearly in this show. It will be so much fun to check out the newest one next year and make comparisons!

What are you grateful for today?

Here is this week’s list of poems, shorts stories, essays, comic strips, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Hundred-Year-Old Thanksgiving Poem. Happy Thanksgiving to my Canadian readers!

Snuggle. There’s a lot of truth to this.

Workin’ the Poll via MeghanSaraK‬. This is an important thing to read with the election in the U.S. coming up soon. I hope all of my readers in the States will be going out to vote. I also hope that you won’t have to wait in line too long for it.

6 Horror Movies Perfect for Halloween You May Not Know via ‪K8Tilton‬. I haven’t seen any of these movies yet, but I’m hoping to change that soon. How about you?

The Red Strings of Fate. This is one of the best science fiction short stories I’ve read in ages.

Inventor of the Photobomb via nazmaniatweet‬. These stories about someone the blogger once knew were absolutely hilarious. They made me want to photobomb a picture…although I don’t think I’ll be doing it anytime soon.

What have you been reading?

I wanted to talk about something lighthearted today. With Thanksgiving peeking around the corner, dessert is on my mind.

While I’m not a big fan of sweet potatoes with marshmallows baked on top of them, turkey, or stuffing, I’ve never met a pie that I didn’t like.

The nice thing about Thanksgiving is that there’s normally at least one pie at the end of your meal.

My family usually had pumpkin and/or ground cherry pie for dessert on big holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Most people haven’t heard of ground cherries before, so I’ll try to describe what they taste like to you. They are tart like cranberries, sweet like pineapple, and have a texture that is something like a soft tomato.

People seem to either love them or hate them. I wasn’t a big fan of this dessert the first few times I tried it, but now I really like it.

My grandmother made “pumpkin” pie with what I believe was butternut squash instead of an actual pumpkin. It has a firmer and more flavourful texture that works really well for this pie, although this did mean that I was slightly disappointed when I tasted real pumpkin pie later on in life. The differences between them are subtle but important.
These days I like to have lemon meringue pie on special occasions. The slight tartness of the lemon filling reminds me just a little of ground cherries. That filling is balanced out nicely with the lightly sweet meringue and flaky crust.

What kinds of desserts do you like to eat during the holidays? Whatever they are, I hope you get to have a slice if you’re celebrating Thanksgiving this weekend!

This is the story of a girl who tries to help a tiny pilot find his way home again. That’s all I can tell you about it without giving away spoilers, but I thought it was really well done.

I was especially impressed by how many different emotions the characters shared with the audience without ever speaking a single word. As I’ve mentioned on this blog before, I really love this style of cinematography.

An automated DM (direct message) is a private message that an account sends to you as soon as you follow it.

They are usually used to promote something the account holder is selling like a book or an album. While some DMs don’t follow this rule, all of them are impersonal spam.

Here’s the thing: Twitter is a social media site. People use it to make new friends, share their thoughts, and stay up-to-date on current events. Trying to exploit this to market your product is an excellent way to annoy or even alienate 98% of the people you meet.

As an author, I understand the urge to reach out to potential new readers. I’ve found new readers on Twitter. I’ve also bought multiple books that I first heard about from other tweeps, but it was never due to the author telling me to buy their stuff.

In fact, an automatic DM is one of a handful of things that will prompt me to immediately unfollow someone. It leaves a horrible first impression that is hard to shake off.

Why have I purchased all of those books, then?

Because their authors didn’t make their Twitter streams or their private messages into nonstop commercials. Yes, they shared links when their newest book came out and occasionally mentioned older projects as well.

Most of the time, though, they talked about all of the other things that were going on in their lives. Some of them shared hilarious stories about the  naughty things their pets did, while others talked about more serious subject matters like grief or recovering from child abuse.

They retweeted other people’s links regularly. I can’t count the number of times that I discovered a new author, blog, or Twitter handle to follow because someone chose to share something that they enjoyed.

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Just as importantly, they kept tabs on their followers lives as well. They regularly responded to people who asked them questions or said something they found interesting.

I often saw them cheer for friends who had finally reached a big goal and support others who were going through a hard time.

In short, they were genuine and generous.

So please don’t send out an automatic DM when you gain a new follower any more than you would use pop-ups on your website.

Get to know people as individuals instead.

Build your following one person and one friendly interaction at a time.

Don’t rush it.

Twitter isn’t a race.

It’s more like a party. Slow down, relax, and enjoy the festivities. Nobody is going home anytime soon.

Here is this week’s list of comic strips, essays, and other tidbits from my favourite corners of the web.

Clean Room, Clean Mind. I’ve never done this, but now I want to start. The last panel was my biggest reason for wanting to give this a try.

Free Spirits and Happiness via LisaShambrook. The Swedish tale the author talks about was my favourite part of this post. I’d never heard it before, but it was a good one. The picture above reminds me of this link a little for reasons I can’t fully explain.

Make America Bake Again. Baking is actually one of the ways I’m planning to spend my time this upcoming winter. It’s nice to see that other people are interested in it as well.

How I Found Joy in Negativity via SarahBrentyn‬. What a fantastic and refreshing post.

When I was 16. Who someone is when they’re a teenager isn’t always the same kind of person they are years later. I’m willing to admit that my opinions and ideas have changed a lot since I since graduated from high school. Is anyone else willing to admit the same?

From What A Black Woman Wishes Her Adoptive White Parents Knew:

This is my adoptive family, my kin. A loud, passionate, stubborn mixture of people who don’t look anything alike.

From A Plea for Poetry via guineapig66:

I write this both as a poet and as a lover of poetry. Give it a chance. No one demands any more that you learn a long poem, stanza by stanza, threatening detention or a rap on the knuckles if you fail. You have the option to choose what to read, what to enjoy.

What have you been reading?

Photo by Unsplash.

This is a guest post from Steve Johnson. You can read his previous guest post for my blog here. 

Is Your Work Life Out of Balance?

There can be no question that the workplace admires and looks up to those who work harder. However, there is such a thing as working too hard (and doing so intentionally). A workaholic would be someone who had taken their level of work to a point where it was actually unhealthy and damaging to other aspects of their life. If you are concerned that you might be doing just that then you might want to examine your day-to-day life and see which aspects of your workday are creating imbalance.
A professional had this to say about the matter:

Many of us believe that the best way to get more work done is to work more hours. But the reality is that we’re more productive when we build in intermittent periods of renewal during our day.

-Stephanie Marston, a motivational speaker, best-selling author and a stress and resiliency expert.

How to Tell if Your Work Life is Out of Balance: Signs and Symptoms

There is such a fine line between working hard and being industrious that it can be tricky to expertly mark out exactly when one has taken their work life over the limit. Listed below are a couple signs that you can watch out for. If you see yourself doing several of the following then it’s time to reconsider your day-to-day schedule and just how you prioritize and balance work against the rest of your life:

1.     You keep putting yourself in a position where you are “overbooked.”

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a normal, average work week contains forty work hours. There’s nothing wrong with doing more than that from time to time, but working excessively high hours week after week showcases that your work life is out of balance.

2.     You’ve gotten out of shape.

No job should make a person unhealthy. If you’ve noticed bad eating habits, excessive time sitting at the desk, not enough time devoted to exercise, not enough breaks being taken, then work has likely become too high of a priority for you.

3.     You’re bent on perfection.

Your work life might be out of balance if you are constantly nervous, anxious, or worrying about attaining perfection. You will actually have a higher likelihood of missing your target or flubbing a project if you are too nervous or anxious about it.

4.     You simply work too much.

Some who prioritize work over other life activities do so by simply working too many hours a week. The real key is to make one’s targets and achieve good production in less hours, not just work more hours. According to a Bureau of Labor Statistics report released last year, more than 25 million Americans — 20.5 percent of the total workforce — reported they worked at least 49 hours a week in 1999. Eleven million of those said they worked more than 59 hours a week. This tendency to work too much is especially prevalent in the U.S.

5.     You’re working around the clock.

Leave work at work. If you’re bringing your work home with you then that’s a clear sign that work has overtaken the rest of your life. When you’re home it’s time to concentrate on other activities. When you’re at work then you can concentrate on work with zeal and passion. In order to get through your daily tasks more quickly, seek help from your coworkers. Perhaps you can team up to tackle projects together. That way you can all achieve goals faster, share the responsibility, and engage in rewarding teamwork. You might also find that a coworker has some free time at work and would welcome another easy task or two. When you all work together, you can leave the office feeling good about what you’ve accomplished.

6.     You do not have a social life.

People who work too much also tend to distance themselves from those who they care about the most. Work becomes such an important part of their life that they sacrifice other things that are important so they can work more. If this is occurring for you then this is a sure sign that work has begun to take too high a priority in your life.
There is no doubt that working hard, being productive, and achieving your goals and targets are all good ambitions. However, there are extremes to this as there is with anything else. If you think work has taken over your life, then it is time to double back and reassess your priorities.
This is not a difficult thing to do. All you needs to do is re-organize how you spend your time.  When work is taking over simply spend less time working. Say “No” more often. Don’t spend as much time at the workplace. Don’t take your work home with you. Spend more time with friends, family members, and loved ones. Spend more time on your hobbies. Get more exercise. Create more hobbies. Get out and about in the city or countryside for some rest and relaxation. With a healthier and happier heart and mind you will find that you can achieve everything you want to achieve at work without having to go over the top with it.

Projet de fin d’études – 4e année Animation 3D – Automne from LISAA on Vimeo.

Why do the seasons change? How does it happen?

We know the answers to these questions from a scientific perspective. This short film looks at them from a more imaginative approach.

I once read a children’s story about a supernatural artist who affected the weather every day by drawing beautiful pictures of clouds that then came to life here on Earth. It’s fun to assume that he works at this same shop. Perhaps his desk is off in the corner, just beyond the reach of the camera.

A personal ritual is something you do to release stress or calm yourself down. Let me give you an example of one of mine so that you can better visualize what it looks like.

I’ve talked about my love of rabbits on this blog several times in the past, but I don’t think I’ve ever told you about Bunday in detail.

Bunday happens when I take a few minutes to look at all of the rabbit pictures, gifs, and videos that I’ve stumbled across lately. The name of this ritual, as I’m sure you’ve already guessed, is a combination of the words bunny and day. I wasn’t the person who came up with it, but I like it all the same.

This is something I’ve been doing for several years now. There isn’t any specific day of the week when this ritual happens. It could happen two or three times one week and then maybe not again for a few weeks after that.

Why do I do it? Well, there are a few different answers to that question. One, I love rabbits. Two, it’s incredibly fun. Three, our world is full of ugly, terrible, and frightening things. I think there’s something to be said for occasionally taking a break from the news and focusing on something that uplifts you.

It’s kind of like pausing to rest when you’re carrying a heavy box to somewhere far away. Catching your breath and stretching your sore muscles before picking up that load again can make the difference between injuring yourself and feeling perfectly fine the next day.

Taking long walks outdoors is something else I like to do when I’m feeling overwhelmed or simply want to relax. What I especially like about Bunday, though, is that it can be done on days when the weather is bad, I’m pressed for time, or I’m sick.

I’d say that everyone needs at least one personal ritual in their lives, although how that looks in your life might not be the same as how it is for me.

For example, one of my relatives loves to cook and bake. She is happiest when she’s in the middle of some grand experiment in the kitchen. What is really cool about this is that she’s actually parlayed this into a part-time home business. Not only does she get to release stress, she sometimes gets paid to do it as well!

Someone else I know keeps up with a few dozen different TV shows throughout the year. It’s gotten to the point now where he can predict all of the plot twists for a show that he’s never seen before because he knows so much about how storytelling works on the small screen. He also can tell you about many of the different shows that specific actors worked on decades ago because his memories of their past projects are so strong.

If you already have a personal ritual of some kind that brings joy to your life, I’d love to know what it is, how it started, and how long you’ve been doing it.

If you don’t have one yet, why not give it a try? You might discover that you really like it!