Right now, if I could expand anything, right this moment, it would be the heat inside my house. Or rather I would increase (that’s a type of expansion, right?) the heat. My heater is on the fritz. It has been giving me trouble off and on since I had to first turn it on this year, which was much earlier than usual because we’ve had a cold year. It does this thing where it doesn’t do anything. I thought it was the thermostat and I reprogrammed it, which is a headache in itself, but that didn’t help. I took the batteries out and replaced them but that didn’t help. Then, when I least expected it, poof! It was on. It did that off and on since September. Then it would take longer between the time it went off and decided to go back on, like days. Last week it went off and was off from the 26th until the 30th then it came back on. Then off again for another twelve to fifteen hours. This time it has been off for about thirty hours, which might not be too bad except that we’re cold up here and very windy. We’ve been colder. It’s just mid 30’s right now so not horrible but it is very windy and although I have double pane window, there’s a lot of cold coming in. Tonight I pulled out the brand new space heater that I found at the back of the closet even though I hate using those things. I’m scare of fires. But it was either that or turn into a popsicle so I pulled it out but I couldn’t figure out how to attach the base to the bottom of the heater so it will stand up and I can use it. I think my brain was frozen. And my fingers didn’t work right, either. I put it in the car and drove to my daughter’s house where Chris was able to attach it for me and Tina gave me back another heater that I had loaned to her. So now my fingers are no longer in danger of snapping off. Whew! I was worried for awhile there!
I actually had something else to share with you but that was the intro. I know, long intro. In any case, some of you might remember my author friend Larry Brill, whom I featured on here a couple of years ago. He has started writing a monthly newsletter that I enjoy reading. On Monday I got the latest one and it was funny and snarky but more importantly, Larry wrote about something he intends to do this year and challenged readers to do the same. I would have done it even if I hadn’t been challenged because I see it as a really neat thing to do. So I am accepting his challenge and making it one of my “18 for 18” items that I wrote about here.
Here’s a bit of what he wrote:
“So I am going to commit to getting to know at least one person better—not necessarily a stranger, but someone on the fringe of my awareness. We all have them by the dozens, or hundreds. You know them. They are the friend of a friend who is the sister of a friend—or a high school classmate you barely remember—who friended you on Facebook. She’s #160 of your five hundred Facebook friends. You’ve “liked” a few of her posts, maybe even commented on one or two. I’m going to reach out to her/him in a private message, explain in my best non-threatening way the purity of my intentions and suggest a virtual cup of coffee to get to know each other better.”
Doesn’t that sound like a neat thing to do? This way we expand our circle from the inner circle to the fringes. We might make new friends or we might want to keep them on the fringes. In either case, we are stretchy our hand in friendship. I’m doing it. In fact, I am going to commit to reaching out to at least eighteen “fringe people” during the year but I think it might be more. YOU might be one of them. If you’ve commented on my blog, I might just send you an email and propose a virtual “let’s go for coffee and chat” so we might get to know a little about each other. It might be someone on Face Book or Instagram or any number of places. I would also be honored if you reached out to me and made me one of your outside circle outreaches (or is that outreachees?).
I’ve linked you to Larry’s newsletter up above, at least to the current issue. I think you’ll find info there on how to sign up for the newsletter should you choose to. And he’s got a deal where if you sign up for the newsletter he’ll send you a link to download his ebook, Ten Lessons I Learned From Gilligan, Mr. Ed, And Prime Time TV.
Okay, back to babysitting the space heaters so I don’t set anything on fire!
Wasted Days And Wasted Nights 