What I Learned This Week

Listen.

Can you hear that?

That’s the sound of the LAST Presidential debate.

Can I get an amen?

I, for one, will be glad when this mess is over. Every four years I look forward to one thing. The Olympics. I do not look forward to the political phone calls. The media. The mud-slinging. The lies. Or the lies. This debate is a whole bunch of bull. My head is pounding and it’s only seven minutes in.

For starters, I learned that it’s hard to concentrate with a huge head-ache and two prattling crazy people on the television.

1. Stevie has a weekly vocabulary test. One of his words this week is CORD. A cord is the amount of wood that, when “ranked and well stowed” (arranged so pieces are aligned, parallel, touching and compact), occupies a volume of 128 cubic feet. This corresponds to a well stacked woodpile 4 feet wide, 4 feet high, and 8 feet long; or any other arrangement of linear measurements that yields the same volume. In my 38 years of life, I have never EVER heard that.

2. Turning out the light in the living room causes the hamster stop running in the wheel. Sometimes I flick the lights on and off before going to bed just to hear that wheel start and stop.

3. Kindergarteners + Money to spend + Book fair = Excitement

4. Finding a hair in a Ziploc bag full of change makes me cringe.

5. If you open up Ziploc bags and some of them are fused together, you can call the company and they will send you some coupons for free products.

6. If your ear salve doesn’t seem to be helping your eczema of the inner ear, it probably expired in 2011. 

7. Yankee Candle’s Pumpkin Pie candle is yummy.

8. I am getting old and forgetful.

9. There has been no change in Alex’s vision since his eye appointment last year.

You ever asked yourself why a camel has a hump?

Here’s what I learned about camels this week.

10. Camels have humps because they are essential for the camels survival in hot, dry weather where food and water is not easily accessed. The hump stores nutrients and water in the form of fat, which is slowly used up as the camel travels through areas where there is nothing to eat. Once all the fat in the hump has been used up, the hump becomes limp and floppy, much like a deflated balloon. When camels are somewhere where there is food and water, they eat and drink large amounts at a time. Thirsty adult camels can drink up to 30 gallons in one sitting! If they have to, camels can survive about two weeks without ever drinking water and up to a month without eating.

Now there’s something you don’t read everyday.

And now it’s your turn. What did YOU learn this week?