What Kind of Accent Do You Have?

Posted on November 28, 2011 by Barbara Frank

My sister, who has spent her adult life in California, likes to tease me about my Midwestern accent. I always deny I have one. But then I took this quiz and I’m thinking maybe I do have an accent after all; as you can see, my result mentions Chicago (I was born there) and Wisconsin (I live there). How about you? Use the link below my results to test your accent.

What American accent do you really have? Your Result: Northern Your accent is Northern, which used to be the media standard in the ’50s and ’60s. Your accent could either be Inland Northern (Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo) or the more broadcasting-friendly Upstate NY/Western New England accent. If you have the Inland North accent, outsiders probably ask you a lot if you’re from Chicago or Wisconsin.
Midland
Northeastern
Mid-Atlantic
North Central
Southern
Western
Northeast New England
What American accent do you really have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Spider Web by Earlene Fowler

Posted on October 18, 2011 by Barbara Frank

One of the things I promised myself I would do after I finished homeschooling is to start reading more fiction again.

I once was an avid fiction reader. In fact, I used to read Gone with the Wind annually. But over the years of homeschooling, time for myself dwindled to the point where I rarely had time to read fiction. (I shouldn’t just blame homeschooling; my discovery of the Internet is equally responsible, I must admit!) When I did make time to read a book, it was usually Earlene Fowler’s latest Benni Harper mystery.

Now that I have the time to read fiction, I’m doing just that. Last night I finished the newest entry in the Benni Harper series, Spider Web, and really enjoyed it. The character of Benni is a woman who is intrigued by mystery and who happens to be married to a handsome police chief. Each book’s theme is related to the name of a quilt pattern; being a quilter, I appreciate that. I especially love that Ms. Fowler includes Benni’s Christian faith in every book.

And now I have yet another reason to love these books. In Spider Web, Ms. Fowler introduces a new character who will apparently turn up in the next book, and she has Down syndrome. How cool is that? I can’t wait for the next book!

The Downsizing Chronicles: I Keep Finding Things I Forgot I Had…..

Posted on October 7, 2011 by Barbara Frank

….Like a few more booklets, which I’ll continue to give away free while they last. And then there are some of the books from the reading list of Life Prep for Homeschooled Teenagers. I don’t need them anymore because my kids are grown, and I hate to give them up because they’re great books, but I just don’t have room for them in our new little home. So stay tuned; I’ll be giving them away soon!

A Cautionary Tale

Posted on June 1, 2011 by Barbara Frank

I am not a morning person. So when I first get up, I tend to do flaky things. But recently I set a new low.

I got in the shower, still half-asleep, and reached for the shampoo. After rubbing some in my hair, I realized it didn’t smell like my shampoo. Turned out I had grabbed the bottle on my left instead of the usual bottle of shampoo on my right. So I found myself trying to wash my hair with Oil of Olay body wash.

The body wash had come free with my purchase of Oil of Olay (around here we call it Oil of Ol’ Lady) facial moisturizer. I had tried the body wash a few times, but didn’t like how it made my washcloth so slimy that I couldn’t rinse it out, so the body wash had been sitting there untouched for weeks because I couldn’t make myself throw out a practically full bottle.

Anyway, once I realized my mistake, I rinsed my hair (only the top of my head had body wash on it) and then shampooed as usual. But when I used the hair dryer on my hair, I couldn’t get the top of my head dry.

Weird. But I had things to do, so I left my hair the way it was. However, after a few hours of feeling like my hair was extremely greasy (and it looked it), I decided to do something about it. I remembered that my grandmother always rinsed her hair with vinegar water “to cut the soap,” as she explained. So I filled the bathroom sink with vinegar water, soaked the top of my head in it, then used my husband’s strong shampoo (Head and Shoulders) to rewash my hair.

When I dried it, it was just as greasy on top as it had been before.

Now I began to get frustrated. How could I get this greasy mess out of my hair? I looked at the body wash bottle label to see what exactly was in this stuff, and discovered that the second ingredient is petroleum jelly. No wonder I couldn’t get my hair to come clean!

I remembered that we had a bottle of Trader Joe’s Tea Tree Oil shampoo in the cupboard. That’s strong stuff, so I figured it was worth a try. After two washes with it, my hair finally began to feel like normal, and I was relieved to be able to go out in public without look like I hadn’t had a shower in a week.

So, the moral of this story is….never use body wash as shampoo, and keep tea tree oil shampoo on hand for people who have a hard time waking up, like me!

DVD Sales are Down? Serves ‘Em Right

Posted on May 6, 2011 by Barbara Frank

I see that Hollywood is worried because DVD sales are down. I’m sure the increased popularity of Netflix and other methods of watching movies (including downloading them illegally) account for some of the decrease. But the quality of the movies we’re seeing these days has to take some blame, especially from those of us who have children.

You just never know what objectionable thing will appear in a modern movie. The plot may be interesting, but the f-word keeps popping up for no good reason at all. Or perhaps a movie has a ridiculous amount of nudity that does nothing to further the plot. It’s enough to make a parent very irritable.

This has been going on for quite a while; it’s one of the many reasons why my husband and I have been watching mostly old movies (pre-1980) for years. Even if our kids weren’t actually watching the movie, we never had to worry about what they saw as they passed through the family room. And though our youngest is now 18, he’s a young man with developmental delays and completely normal male hormones, so it’s a good thing we don’t watch more recent movies with all the female nudity, or we’d never get back the tv remote.

Twenty years ago, when our oldest kids were young, I had hopes that watching old movies would help them develop an appreciation for good stories with strong plots. I held that dream until they hit their early teens, when one of them announced that they thought Adam Sandler movies were the best movies ever. I consoled myself with the fact that my taste in movies was pretty unsophisticated at that age too.

That said, today the jury’s still out on whether the influence of old movies had much effect on my kids. I’ve noticed a definite generational difference of opinion, particularly about what’s funny and what’s not, but also about what constitutes good acting, good plot and especially good endings. Not surprisingly, I prefer an ending that makes clear what happened to the main characters. That’s how most old movies were written. When I watch a modern movie and am left hanging, I’m disappointed. But my kids don’t seem to mind that at all.

Now that our kids are grown, and some are out of the nest, my husband and I continue to enjoy old movies. Below are some we’ve watched recently. Got any favorites to add to the list? Please share in the comments; I’m always up for watching a “new” old movie.