Friday night grateful moment

This week I'm grateful for:

* My iPod touch, which, at the urging of young Seth, I finally use for more than just music. I downloaded a number of apps, but the ones I'm most excited about are the grattitude journal and the food calorie counter. Oh yeah. This train is turning around, choo-choo, baby.

* Sunshine. We saw a bit more of it this week, enough to tease me into thinking spring just might be here. More bulbs blooming! Grass tufts sprouting! Time to weed! (That last one I just threw in there to cheerlead myself toward actually wanting to weed...)

* The beauty of lists. Love them. Need them. While I didn't actually invent them (!), I do want to pass this gift on to my son, and he's receptive... sort of. We're working on it. But lists make the world go 'round. I do love them so. But you already knew that, didn't you?

* The power of laughter. Every time I have a real gut-bust, it reminds me I need to do that more often. Should I schedule my laughter? Maybe... a half-hour session, morning and evening!

* Granola. I love this stuff, and yet this little recipe eludes me. I experiment, and keep trying to make small batches so I don't have to eat something I don't like for weeks on end... this week's batch was good in that I learned a little more. Notice I haven't posted on it... it's not good enough to share (yet). But eating some of Corinne's amazing granola when I was in California inspired me to keep going.

* Motivators. I am amazed by drive, the desire to pursue and push and move and grow. I admire it too. Some days I want more of it, other days not so much. But mostly I am just intrigued by what specific thing drives me, you and everyone we know. Aside from Mr. Maslow's insights, there are a wide variety of motivating factors out there, and understanding what makes another person tick is just fascinating to me. (I might not always "get it," and it might even mightily annoy me at times, but when I stop to think about it, I'm always intrigued, regardless...)

* Hope. Had a good friend confide some hope in me this week. I was surprised to find myself hopeful as well, for her. Yeah for hope!

* Good dentists. I think I found one! How great is that? A really good crown experience Monday morning. Other than the fact that I get weirdly loopy with the numbing stuff, I was good to go.

* Just the best husband ever. Period.

* Twitter. Twitter got a ton of press this week when Ashton Kutcher woke up and realized he had more than 800,000 followers, and CNN had maybe 50,000 more. He decided to try and race CNN to a million followers... turned out a little wild and crazy, and then AK went on Oprah to discuss the whole thing. Regardless of what you think about Twitter (or Ashton, for that matter), it is a simply amazing tool for sharing information. Where it goes from here and how it drives information remains to be seen. But the studies that came out this week with the thought that Twitter will stunt our moral growth. Um. I suppose that might depend on who you follow... nothing new about that concept.

Anyway, and now you can turn your favorite tweets into Tshirts. That would have to be SOME special somethin'.

* I'm very grateful as well for our ability to be surprised by each other, and moved by music. It's one of the things I like best about being human. By now I am sure everyone has seen that Britain's Got Talent YouTube video of Susan Boyle. You can check it out on Jen's blog if you haven't already seen it. Susan Boyle reminds me of Paul Potts, who shocked them all with his Nessun Dorma a few years back. When will these judges realize that the most amazing voices can come in unlikely packages? I did like how Simon couched it this year with, "I just knew when you walked out here we were going to hear something amazing." Right, Simon. But it was also kind of refreshing to see Simon's face when she's singing--he actually looks like a "real person" who has been moved by her singing. Pretty touching.

Here's a little Paul Potts for your weekend, to go along with your Susan Boyle:



How beautiful is this room? Completely inspires me from an organizational standpoint, as well as a visual and colorful perspective as well. How fun. Check out this really cool website.

Happy weekend, everyone!