May 5, 2010 by pam.

Last month I had an opportunity to see the improv comedy group Go Comedy. It was really fun to see them make stuff up on the spot. Like everything, I’m sure it gets better with practice. They impressed me with how quick they were and how funny the stuff was … seemingly made up, right off the top of their heads. They perform in Ferndale, MI and their website is http://www.gocomedy.net Let me know if you check them out.

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March 23, 2010 by pam.

Another sign of spring … free ice cream! It’s free cone day at Ben and Jerry’s. Go to their website to see if there’s one near you. http://www.benjerry.com/

Posted in Around Ann Arbor, Fun Stuff | No Comments »

February 26, 2010 by pam.

It’s been snowy this week here in Ann Arbor … it’s beginning to look (and feel) a lot like Fargo. Monday’s snow was heavy and deep – 10 inches worth. I shoveled a little, took a break, shoveled some more, took a break. Howard, my next door neighbor has a snow blower. He did about 15 feet of my sidewalk for me and quit. Maybe the snow was too heavy for the snow blower … or maybe he ran out of time … even so, I appreciate his kindness and the fact that there’s just that much less for me to have to shovel.

Monday night I made a pan of brownies and put four of them on a plate for Howard and his wife, Jane, and six of them on a plate for Kim, Phil and Jon, the across the street neighbors. I’ve wanted to do this kind of thing since I visited my mom and dad in September. They are always cooking up something (usually baking) and distributing it to the neighbors. Howard answered the door and his face just lit up when I said “I baked some brownies and just wanted to say thanks for being a good neighbor”. After more snow on Wednesday night I tromped out to shovel Thursday morning and found that my ENTIRE sidewalk was clear. Howard got his snowblower out and did the whole thing for me. Now that is the Power or Brownies! I’m going to make Apple Cake (new recipe) this weekend and take him some.

Posted in Around Ann Arbor, Cooking, Fun Stuff | 1 Comment »

February 17, 2010 by pam.

I have been telling my “aphorism story” over and over since my experience at the Penny Stamps Lecture last Thursday. Have also been searching out different aphorisms. Here are a few that I ran across today while looking for something completely different/unrelated! Enjoy!

~Besides the noble art of getting things done, master the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of nonessentials. –Lin Yutang

~For fast-acting relief, try slowing down. — Lily Tomlin

~Don’t confuse your net worth with your self-worth. –Unknown

~The truth is, time flies whether you’re having fun or not. — Unknown

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May 30, 2009 by pam.

Last night I had the good fortune to walk among fortunes embroidered on childrens gowns. Some of the fortunes were quite striking evoking strong emotions - I laughed, was sad and found one I hoped would be mine. I’m not sure I remember them verbatim but here are a few I remember:
You will be attracted to cruel women
You will be attracted to lazy men
You will never recover from the suicide of your parents
You will never be good enough in your parents eyes
You will trust your instincts
You will be a creative visionary
And the one I hope will be my fortune - You will teach people to find peace.

Posted in Art, Around Ann Arbor, Fun Stuff | 1 Comment »

May 30, 2009 by pam.

For a few hours my friends and I drove around Ann Arbor hitting garage sales. Last night I used gsalr.com to organize our route. It’s a great site and did a pretty good job at giving directions. There were a few times where the route wasn’t exactly the most efficient, but only a few times.

The site is easy to use. Enter your zip code and it pulls in garage sale listings (I think from Craig’s list). It also allows you to enter in ‘custom addresses’ and I added sales I saw online and in the classified ads of the local paper. Once the addresses are in, they are displayed on the screen and you can reorder (by clicking and dragging) in an order than makes sense to you. It was fast, easy and made it a lot easier than a map!

We all bought something today. It’s always fun to find a bargain and a treasure.

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May 22, 2009 by pam.

Friday, May 29 Washington Street Gallery (now on Main Street) is hosting an opening of Valerie Mann’s latest art work. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Valerie a couple of times. She’s one of those people I instantly like - she’s friendly, creative, supportive, cute and funny.

“Fortunes” is an installation piece of 50 vintage children’s gowns with ‘fortunes’ embroidered on them. There are certainly other things in the gallery. I think the Main Street space is larger (I haven’t been there since they moved) than the Washington Street space.

The opening is from 7-10 Friday and I’ll be going. If you want to go along, give me a call.

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May 14, 2009 by pam.

The TED talks are great. This short clip from TED is fabulous. See what you think!

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/pattie_maes_demos_the_sixth_sense.html

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April 8, 2009 by pam.

I’m not sure who Clyde Moore is but I liked this quote. Made me smile this week after a snow storm Sunday night.

“There’s one good thing about snow, it makes your lawn look as nice as your neighbor’s.” ~Clyde Moore

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September 21, 2008 by pam.

Michael Moore spoke Thursday at the Michigan Theater in downtown Ann Arbor. Originally part of the Art and Design (A & D) Distinguish Speaker series sponsored by Penny Stamps, it also became the world premiere of his new movie, “Slacker Uprising”.

To see the schedule for this year’s lecture series go here: http://www.art-design.umich.edu/ev_lectures.php

At times, Moore was funny, other times he was angry, and at other times he cracked himself up (and a good number of us missed the joke - either sports related or policically related). His message is definitely to oust Bush from office and to keep McCain from occupying the oval office. He had a lot of negative things to say about Bush/McCain, the US past, and, at least in the first 50 minutes, nothing to say about Obama. I had a commitment that evening and couldn’t stay until the end. Maybe he was getting to that … although, it was unclear what his point was, other than political. He didn’t talk about art, his movies, or even the movie that was to show at 8 PM after his talk.

The crowd is often heavy on the U of M student side at the A&D lectures. I think some of them are required to be there for class credit and others come as part of some sort of art passport project. I was surprised Moore didn’t gear his talk directly to the 20 something crowd - it seems like his movie is geared towards that. Or, again, maybe he did after I left. It seemed like a good number of the students I could see from my vantage point were more interested in the incoming/outgoing text messages on their phones than what was happening right in front of them.

From what little I know about his movie, I think he’s spoken to the college age demographic group before. “Slacker Uprising” looks like (from the trailer) a series of his talks on college campuses or to groups of 20-somethings. You can get a free download of the entire movie at www.slackeruprising.com this coming week. He’s giving it away free. At least check out the trailer and see what you think.

Posted in Around Ann Arbor, Fun Stuff, Movies | No Comments »