Fandom Friday – Supernatural vs. Super Bowl

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Dean: We’re on the one-yard line here.

Kevin: And, I should have told you this six months ago, but the sports metaphors? You want to motivate me? Magic cards, Skyrim, Aziz Ansari.

Dean: What? Yeah, I don’t know what those words mean.

The definitions so you’re not as clueless as Dean Winchester on this Super Bowl 50 weekend:

Magic cards

Skyrim

Aziz Ansari

Super Bowl Commercials

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For those of us who are not sports fans, or at least not sports fanatics, we watch the game for the camaraderie, the food and, of course, the commercials.

My all time favorite commercial is the Mean Joe Greene Coca-Cola ad. They’re revisiting it with Mean Joe and Tommy Okon, the original kid who catches his jersey. Here’s the original:

Look for the new one on Super Bowl Sunday.

Death Wish Coffee is a local company here in upstate New York who won a Super Bowl commercial slot, sponsored by Intuit Quickbooks. Check them out:

Looking forward to all of the new ones!

Travel – Santa Clara, CA

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Santa Clara lies about forty-five minutes from San Francisco. It’s Levi’s Stadium, ground broken in 2011, and completed in 2014 is the site of this year’s Super Bowl. Super Bowl 50 will be held next Sunday, February 7th between the Denver Broncos and the Carolina Panthers. Having friends in both places, I’m at an impasse as to who to cheer on, although the Panthers are in the lead according to my childhood panther, Harvey whose growling can be heard from the living room sofa. As if there was a question, ha!

Santa Clara was incorporated in 1852 after being founded in 1777. Its patron, St. Clare was honored by naming the eighth mission in the California’s 21 Missions. Santa Clara University was built around it and currently contains the mission house and the gardens. The mission, Mission Santa Clara de Asis is currently the chapel at Santa Clara University, originally formed by the Society of Jesus as Santa Clara College, the first higher learning institution in California.

Visit the Silicon Valley Central Convention Center &
Visitors Bureau for ideas on what to see and where to go while you’re in the Bay Area. If that isn’t enough, check out 50 Things to Do in Santa Clara.

The city is also home to several Silicon Valley businesses as well as the Levi’s Stadium being the home to the San Francisco 49ers, possibly to be joined by the Oakland Raiders in the next football season.

Levi’s Stadium, tagline Field of Jeans (oh, how I love a good pun) is obviously named for the iconic, Levi Strauss Company. Their about page on their company website details their history which fits in with how we think of American ingenuity and innovation.

Candlemas

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If Candlemas Day be fair and bright,
Winter will have another fight;
But if Candlemas Day be clouds and rain,
Winter is gone, and will not come again.
~Old Rhyme

Around New Year’s when my husband wants to take down the tree, I say no, and try to put it off until Twelfth Night.

When Twelfth Night rolls around, and the following weekend arrives, he tries again, but I come up with but we didn’t put the tree up until late, let’s leave it another week.

And then why don’t we just leave it until Martin Luther King Day. Isn’t that what we always do? (We do, but I can’t remember why.)

This year, we got the tree down about a week ago.

Today, however is Candlemas. Or the feast of the presentation of the Lord. Or forty days after His birth when Mary, his mother goes to the temple now that she’s purified after giving birth to Jesus.

The nights are shorter, the days longer. Spring is just around the corner; if we can get through the next few weeks. The sun is bright if not warm. (I need my sunglasses more in the winter than in the summer in fact.)

With more natural light, we use less artificial light. We’re also brightened a bit more. Smiling a bit more. Less aggravated; more tolerant. Even that little bit helps, and it gets more and more as each day passes with its lengthening sunlit afternoons.

I’m thinking that we could have left the tree up another week and it would have been alright.

I’ll have to try that next year now that I’ve put Candlemas on my calendar again.

Travel – Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania

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When my husband and I were dating, I discovered that he disliked and disparaged Valentine’s Day. Very disappointing to a newly dating girlfriend. He did have the odd affection for Groundhog’s Day, and chose to celebrate that instead. We were the only family out to dinner for the groundhog and staying in for the holiday of hearts.

He thought it was pretty cool that one of my closest college friends grew up visiting Punxsutawney often where her grandparents lived. It’s still a big deal in her family, as evidenced by her Facebook now that we’ve reconnected.

One of my favorite movies of all time is Groundhog’s Day with Bill Murray and Andie McDowell.

Pop culturally, one of my favorite episodes of Supernatural is Mystery Spot which plays on the same theme as the movie, relegating Sam Winchester to relive his Tuesday over and over again.

Every year, we wake up early, long before school, and check on Phil’s prediction. Will spring be early or will spring be late?

Tune in tomorrow morning, bright and early to find out!

Next year, think about taking a mid-winter vacation. Check out these websites for more information:

The Punxsutawney Groundhog Club
Visit PA

Blogkeeping, Part 1: Format and Categories

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For starters, there will be is a new static home page (which I need a pithy name for am calling First Look) that will (hopefully) change weekly with prompts, topics/themes, quotation, etc followed by a week’s (M-F) worth of content in the writing space. Each day’s columns are still undecided and may change depending on the season and subjects.

Second, all feedback and suggestions are welcome.

Third, I have way too many tags and categories. I will be whittling my categories down to just a few since I think my writing is not as far-flung as the categories would suggest. Several categories also overlap, and that kind of minutia is really what the tags are for. I use the tags to break down the subject into what drew me to it in the first place. Categories should be a bit broader and cover more than one tiny subject.

At the moment I’ve decided on 12 categories; an even dozen:

Home– includes apartment, garden, decor, buying, surviving buying, etc.

Fandom – includes fan works, propriety and derivative works, pop culture, celebrity, music, cosplay, community

Food – includes drink, recipes, kitchen hints & tips

Kids &School – includes parenting and education, kids say, all ages

Medical – self-explanatory, includes women’s reproduction

Mental Health – I feel that this needs a separate category from medical, although many issues overlap

Money – money related including shopping and saving money

Photos – photo posts or posts that contain my own photos

Social & Political– includes media, LGBT+, gender & race, sex education (but will overlap with medical and kids & school), politics

Spiritual – includes religion, organized or otherwise and atheism plus spirituality

Travel – tips, essay, photos, advice, tour book type posts

Writing – process, business of, resources

There will be a temporary tag of 2016 Sarn for those special writings that I’m determined to concentrate on and refuse to procrastinate on (this year). I posted about this on Friday. I mentioned then that I would explain that odd category name. I should think that 2016 is self-explanatory. Sarn is Welsh for causeway. Or roadway. Since this year is very much a new path, or an extended journey with celebrating (not sure yet?) my 50th birthday year and the year of mercy pilgrimage. Wales has long been my spiritual center place for almost three decades. This happened randomly. When I recently converted to Catholicism, I chose St. Elen of Caernarfon as my patron saint, and took Elen as my confirmation name. There is a place in North Wales called Elen’s Sarn. St. Elen is the protector of travelers and roads.

I’ve combined a few of these things, as you can see, to create my new category for those writings that need that little extra push to get moving and motivated for.

Next up will be my FAQ.

What Am I Working On?

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I sometimes wonder…

Am I a writer or an author?

A blogger or a freelancer?

A memoirist?

A dabbler? Professional?

A nobody?

Sometimes, I don’t know what I am or what I’m doing here and elsewhere. Maybe one day it will come to me or all fall into place or whatever it’s supposed to do.I know that there are things pulling at me, and I have stories and half-written anecdotes and notes since my high school and college days. Fan fiction gave me a language and a society – a camaraderie that is often not found, even in the writing groups I’ve attended. Not belonging because of the subjects or the philosophies or the age difference – I tend to be either the oldest or the youngest. Neither one is preferable. They are both on the outside looking in.

Some of my writings are avoidance; conversely, some of my writings are avoided, each with a labyrinth of excuses and reasons, one more valid than the next.

I recently heard something on one of my favorite television shows. It’s funny to admit or even to say out loud to those who aren’t in the fandom and therefore don’t understand the inspiration that I get from this program and its cast and crew.
This isn’t the first time that their words have helped me move forward with a less than tangible hand to hold and shoulder to lean on.

“You wanna know the secret to living a long and happy life? Follow your heart. You do that, all the rest just figures itself out.”
– Mildred (played by Dee Wallace) to Dean (played by Jensen Ackles)

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