Buy and Buy

As the recipient of the 2013 Bloggie, the international award for excellence in blog posting, I have been inundated with endorsement requests.  Inundated I tell ya, inundated!

My beautiful wife asked me to weigh in about an outfit she wanted to wear and my daughter wondered what I thought of a song she was writing.

The requests don't end.

So here are some endorsements that I wish to make in light of my new found, and possibly fleeting, celebrity.

I wish to endorse candy.  Candy of all shapes and sizes but more specifically chocolate.  And in particular the toffee candy that is covered with chocolate and then sprinkled with nuts.  I wholeheartedly endorse that candy.

I stand up for the beach!  I was at the beach the other day and was reminded of how healing a place it can be.  There is something about the effect of negative ions or something but I don't know anything about that.  I just love the beach, regardless of the season...obviously the warmer weather is better but any time is a great time at the beach.  And palm trees are not a pre-requisite.  The small scruffy trees that are windblown onto land are very cool too.

Let's hear it for a cozy fire.  Imagine a cold snow or a chilly rain and a crossword and a cup of Earl Grey and a fireplace full of burning logs with more at the ready. It's heaven. (is it "Earl", like the late, great Earl Scruggs or "Earl", like Duke or Prince...not John Wayne or the guy from Minneapolis...but like the Prince Charles type of "Earl"...?)

Finally I would like to endorse perspective.  Perspective is a critical part of everyday life.  Just when you think your life has reached its' nadir you read about some poor guy who has lost his job or his house or his child.

Life is wonderful if you see the wonderful stuff.  It may be snowing today in some parts of the country, and that's too bad for those affected, but they can look forward to the fact that, in very short order, a few weeks maybe, the flowers will be out, the skies will be blue and the weather will be warm again.

It's all about how you see it.  If your glass is half empty then you will always be thirsty.  If your day is partly cloudy you will never see the sun.

But if you have a partly sunny, half full point of view then everything is possible and nothing is as bad as it seems.

Now just add a plate of chocolate covered, nut sprinkled toffee and you've got it made.

Until next fall when winter's just around the corner and you begin shoveling again.

And bringing in kindling and logs for the fire and searching for 14 down...a five letter word, starting with an "H" and ending with a "Y", meaning "gay."

Keep thinking.  You'll get it.