What's klutz got to do with it?

Ok, I admit it.  I am not and never will be a ballerina.

 I took a class once when I was in college, and the teacher's words are indelibly etched in my head:  "PLIE' DIANE, PLIE'!  

I know, you are wondering "how hard can that be"?  I was a failure in every sense of the word, including the definition:
Bent, bending. A bending of the knee or knees. This is an exercise to render the joints and muscles soft and pliable and the tendons flexible andelastic, and to develop a sense of balance. 


You see, I have no sense of balance.  Or, in other words, I am a bit of a klutz.  My friends and family just understand this about me.  I move fast, I don't always look before I turn or walk backwards, I drop stuff, I trip over things and fall more than anyone should.  Generally I'm a bit of a nuisance to be around.

This past week showed my true klutz colors.



First of all, we were walking downtown with friends on a beautiful Friday evening, and I ran into a parking sign.  Why it was in the middle of the sidewalk I'll never know. Generally they are right next to the curb, but Noooooooo. Not when I'm innocently walking down this sidewalk watching the sights around me.  This sign was just about waist high, and so I now have a nice vertical bruise right above my belly button.

And Gilbert had the audacity to chomp off a blossom

And lately I've had a bit of Spring Fever, meaning I want to change up the furniture and decorations around the house.  So, I added some beautiful flowers to an old crock and was placing this in front of the fireplace.  As I arranged the flowers, I would then step back to look at them.


Well, I forgot Mike's backpack was right in the middle of the floor, and I stepped on it while walking backwards.  Next thing I know, I'm falling backwards onto the floor, flat on my back.  Good thing I was by myself given the choice words that came out of my mouth.  After moving around a bit to make sure nothing was broken, I pulled myself off the floor and promptly moved (maybe threw?) that backpack to a safer place.  So far I've only developed a bruise on my hand from that fall.







And you may have heard me talk about my new iPhone.  On Saturday after lunch we were getting into the car, and I heard some words from my iPhone inside my purse.  Possibly I had pushed the SIRI button, but here's what I saw on the screen:


Now really, I did not tell SIRI "I love you".  Maybe I said "I love my iPhone", or "I love you sweetie", but I did not use those words with SIRI.  But we laughed long and hard at the answer "I value you".  Who programs this stuff anyway?  Fortunately no bruises came with this klutzy move...



So as a word of warning... if you are anywhere near me, you may want to watch your step.

Diane

Learning my new iPhone

Selfie. What can I say?

I will admit that we've been slow adopters of phone technology.  Two years ago we had flip phones.  Until last week we both had "smart phones" that we didn't allow to be smart, i.e. we didn't enable the Internet.  And then Mike got me an iPhone for Valentine's Day, and I suddenly jumped into the 21st century.

And I absolutely love it!  For a person who doesn't like to read manuals, I've been reading the online manual on my iPad while holding my new phone and checking out the features.  I know, go ahead and say it.  TOTAL GEEK!

Here's what I love, and where I've been struggling...

Love these new features...
1. The camera is awesome!  I'm not sure I've got the hang of it yet, but I'll get there.  Ok, it may have taken us several hours to figure out how to get pictures moved to my computer.  But after waiting forever on hold with Verizon, we found it embarrassingly easy once we did a Google search.  As Mike tells his students "Google is your friend".

2. SIRI is an interesting feature that usually has me laughing as she interprets my questions.  But I love that I can ask her about a location, and her answer includes a map.  However she can't tell us who was a lead singer in a band.  I know, get your priorities straight.

3. You can see who called your voicemail if they are in your contacts, and you don't need to enter a password to retrieve the voicemail. Saves a lot of time even though most people don't leave voicemail these days.

4. The display of texts back and forth with another person is awesome.  I love that the dialogue appears on a single screen.

5. We currently use the CalenGoo (Google calendar) app on our iPads, and after downloading it to the phone, I could easily view all of our appointments.

6. I love that I can easily check email on the phone.  It was easy to set up my email, and after a bit of fumbling I also set up Mike's email so we can check them both if we're out and about.

7.  We are very familiar with the App Store from our iPads, and so it is second nature to download apps.  Ok, Scrabble was the first thing I downloaded.  It's a bit of a challenge to play a game on such a small device, but I'll get there.

Not so sure about these features...
1. It's hard to type text messages since I'm used to the pull out keyboard on my old phone.  Once I turned off the auto correct feature it was much easier.

2. It's challenging to read news articles on such a small screen, but I think I'll get used to this over time.  I did make the text size larger which really helps.

3. I have to charge the phone more frequently than I ever did on my previous phone.  I read about this before getting the phone so I wasn't surprised.  If this is a problem, I may consider one of the cases that can power the phone.

4. There are so many features, that it may take me a long time to learn everything the phone can do.  Not a bad problem to have I guess.


Here is a photo montage of Indy taken with my new phone:

Canal in Broad Ripple

Cemetery

Downtown Indy at dusk

Lucas Oil Stadium

White River

Eagle Creek Reservoir

The Pyramids

Of course there's more to life than a new phone...

We enjoyed a great dinner with friends Chuck and Melanie at Napolese in downtown Indy.  Very delicious salads and unusual pizza (we tried a pizza with roast beef), not to mention strange drinks. Mike tried one called "10 bullets".   Not sure why that name, but he loved the drink which included bourbon and a type of Italian bitters that his grandpa used to drink. And  he really had "20 bullets" by the end of dinner.

Chuck and Melanie

And I've been busy with a few crafts during these last (hopefully) days of winter...

Coin pouch

And we enjoyed a brief trip to mom's so Mike could finish some plumbing work he started a couple of weeks ago. And the most famous line of the trip was from Mike:  "Doesn't everyone have a propane torch?" And maybe the answer from my brother Gary sums it up for most people: "If it involves fire, I call in the professionals".

Hope you are enjoying a great week.
Diane