Happy Monday morn, my friends! Come on in out of the cold … just toss your coats over there … Jolly is the coat keeper for the day! This is always a weird week, I think. Christmas is over, all except the cleaning up, putting away, etc., and it’s a short week, with New Year’s Eve on Thursday. When I laboured outside the home, I always hated this week … trying to catch up from the previous week, but not really being able to because most people took a vacation week, and I couldn’t get the answers I needed. I’m very much a creature of routine, and when my routine is wrecked two weeks in a row, I tend to get rather dark ‘n grumpy. This year, however, I’m trying to be laid back … with everything else happening in the world, the small stuff really just doesn’t much matter.
So, did you all have a nice holiday? I know many of you, especially in the UK where very strict lockdown regulations are in place, missed spending the holiday with your families or friends, but hopefully by next holiday season things will be vastly improved.
So, if it’s Monday it must be time for some humour to start the week out, right? Grab a snack – Joyful wouldn’t let me in the kitchen, so I have no idea what she’s cooked up this morning – and we’ll go in search of a few chuckles.
The secret to a longer life? Math!
I found this both interesting and the last bit highly humorous.
The world’s oldest person, Kane Tanaka, turns 118 on Saturday. She was born in 1903, and lives in a nursing home in Japan, where she wakes up at 6 a.m and enjoys playing board games. Her secrets to longevity: eating good food and practicing math.
Practicing math??? Whoa … I better stop using the calculator on my phone to add 2+2 and start using my noggin a bit more, yes?
Uh-oh Santa … should’a stuck with the reindeer!
An unidentified Northern California man thought it would be cool to dress as Santa Claus and deliver candy canes to children in his community … via a motorized parachute. Neighbors say he flies around the neighborhood often in his vehicle, but this time there was a bit of a hitch … ol’ Santa got entangled in a set of electrical wires!
He flew into a maze of power lines and wound up suspended in them, according to a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman.
The man, who wasn’t identified, was not injured. Video from the rescue shows the red-white-and-blue aircraft dangling overhead as Santa sat fastened to the pilot seat. Neighbors watched from the ground as crews worked.
Power was shut off during the rescue to about 200 customers in the Rio Linda area, according to Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District spokesman Chris Vestal.
“It’s unfortunate, but we all need to remember that there’s still a lot of good out in the world, there are people doing good things and to look at the brightness of the holiday season.”
“W/o a scratch & full of good cheer we made sure Old St. Nick will use his reindeer when he sees you later this year,” the fire department said in a tweet after the incident.
So, how about some New Year’s themed ‘toons?
And, I have a few cute pictures to share with you …
The highlight of my life the past month or so has been a pair of grey squirrels that appear every morning outside my ‘office’ (kitchen table where I write this blog) window. After a couple of days watching their antics, I started putting a handful of unsalted, unshelled peanuts out every morning for them, which they take great joy in. Then, wanting to give them a more nutritious diet, I did some research and ordered a bag of “Critter Crunch” from the Audubon Society, which they also enjoy, but they still prefer the peanuts. They hop all around the patio, jump from the wrought iron rocking chair to the top of the grill, to the handlebars of Miss Goose’s bicycle! They are beginning to trust me a bit more, I think, and I smile every time I see them through my ‘window on the world’. Their latest antic is teasing one of our cats, Pandi. If she is sitting in the windowsill, they jump up on the outside window ledge and … I swear I think they laugh at her! Her tail twitches, then quivers, she bats at the window, and the squirrels just sit there. It is, truly, the highlight of my day. So, I went in search of a cute squirrel video for this week’s Jolly Monday …
Well, my friends, it’s that time … time for us all to be about our appointed chores. But take heart … it’s a short week! Meanwhile, as you go about your week, please take time to lend a helping hand wherever you can, and share those gorgeous smiles with people who look like they need one. Have a safe and happy week. Love ‘n hugs from Filosofa, Jolly and Joyful!
“Let our New Year’s resolution be this: We will be there for one another as fellow members of humanity, in the finest sense of the word.” – Göran Persson
Wishing every day of the new year to be filled with success, happiness, and prosperity for you. Happy New Year.
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That is the perfect resolution. Thank you, and a Safe, Happy and Peaceful New Year to you, as well!
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Happy New Year, Jill. Here’s to 2021 – its gotta be better.
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Let us hope, my friend. I stop short of saying it couldn’t be any worse, for fate will do its best to prove me wrong.
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🙂
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yup..the calvin and hobbes cartoon is so ME! Loved the squirrels!
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I’m glad you found something to bring about a bit of a smile, dear Suze!
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Fun post, Jill.Happy New Year.
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And to you as well, John!
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😊
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Those kitty resolutions are definitely on my list for 2021. Happy last Monday of 2020!!
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And to you as well, dear Emily!
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An enjoyable post, Jill. I especially enjoyed the cat nursing the baby squirrels. Happy New Year 2021 🙂 — Suzanne
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I’m very glad you enjoyed the post, Suzanne! We need a bit of humour to start the week, I think. Yes, I thought that was so sweet …
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Jill, the longevity recommendation makes you want to break out the Sudoku puzzles. Actually, having seen my mother and mother-in-law die from complications due to Alzheimer’s, I do word/ math puzzles every day. I hope they help. Keith
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I do a bunch of sudoku puzzles each day.
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I do several per week … perhaps I need to step that up, for some days I cannot remember why I went into the kitchen!
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Jill, Neil, excellent. I do a daily one in my paper along with the crossword and the other word puzzles. I knew when my mother started failing to complete her crosswords, something was amiss. Keith
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I have a Sudoku app, and the NYT crossword app on my phone, and when I can’t sleep at night, that is what I do!
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I know! I do a few Sudoku puzzles a week, a couple of crosswords, but I think I need to pick up speed on them! I was just thinking the other day … um … never mind, for I have already forgotten. 😉
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Belated Merry Christmas 🙂 and a happy Jolly Monday 🙂
We had a very quiet Christmas, just me and the three men of various sizes … (although middle-sized man has become tallest man in the meantime, and smallest man is close to catching up with me….). The Netherlands are in lockdown too: they closed all shops (except for food, drinks & co.) on the 15th, which sent everyone in a crazy run to get the last presents (so even more was ordered online, poor mailmen) and the schools on 16th, just a few days before the holidays. So my boys were doing online school for three days and now are enjoying their free time. It will be two more weeks of online school & closed shops in January, hopefully not longer. I don’t mind so much about the shops, but my kids want to go back so school to be with their friends.
Not sure if I will try to make resolutions for the New Year … we will see. BUT: I think there is someone who definitely needs some GOOD resolution: the YEAR itself! 😉
Take care, Jill! Not sure if I told you already, but in Austria, one traditionally wishes one other a “good slide” into the New Year (“guten Rutsch” in German).. not sure if that comes from the typical weather conditions this time of the year (then, in the Netherlands, we should wish one another a “good drench” I guess… it has been very wet and grey the last week!). So, may you have a good slide into 2021, and may it be a happy, healthy and optimistic one for you!
HUGS & CHEERS from over the Atlantic!
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Thank you for such a fun start to the week.
Cwtch
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If I gave you a bit of a smile, then it was all worth it! Glad you enjoyed it!
Cwtch
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Happy Jolly Monday, Jill! As i just have heard the bill now is signed! God for sake! Michael
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Thanks, Michael! Yes, he signed the bill late last night, after many of his Republican cohorts urged him to because they were getting a lot of complaints from their own constituents.
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Sometimes pressure is the only way.
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