FALLEN LEAVES HODGEPODGE!

     It's good to be back participating in the Hodgepodge. SWMBO and I have been occupied and unable to answer Joyce's questions for the past couple of weeks. Hopefully things can get back to normal. Enjoy this week's Hodgepodge. 

1. Do you manage your own money or do you have a financial planner who helps in some way? Do those kinds of conversations stress you out? A lot or a little?

      I manage my own money. I don't have a financial planner. Managing finances is always stressful but not so stressful that it becomes harmful.

2. The second week of October is Pet Peeve Week. Off the top of your head, share TWO of your current pet peeves.

     One of my pet peeves is when I'm driving down the highway and the car in the left lane wants to exit. Instead of changing lanes behind you they speed up, cut you off by passing in front of you. 

     Another pet peeve is telemarketers who call after 8:30 p.m. That is so rude and annoying.

3. What is one thing you'd like to learn right now, this very week if you could?

     How to speak "female" but that would take much longer than a week!

4. How concerned are you about the recent health related news concerning Ebola? How about Enterovirus D68?

     I am not very concerned about either one. The chances of my getting exposed to either one is fairly remote.

5. Garfield, Nemo, or Tigger-your favorite orange cartoon character?

     I have got to go with the lasagna eating feline...Garfield!

6. I'm going to see Gone Girl with my neighborhood book club this week. So often books made into film are disappointing. What's a book turned film you thought was well done, in that the casting was 'like you pictured' when you read the book, and the film plot remained mostly true to the book plot?

     "The Hunt for Red October" by Tom Clancy was represented very well in the movie version. Alec Baldwin did a wonderful job portraying the main character "Jack Ryan."

7. What is one story your family always tells about you?

     When I was about 8 years old some friends and I were building a fort in a wooded area. I was holding a stake while an older boy tried banging it into the ground with a floor board. This boy missed the stake and hit my head, creasing my skull and causing significant amounts of blood to gush from the wound. I was taken to the emergency room where I received a number of stitches. I reportedly asked the doctor if I was going to go crazy as a result of the blow to the head. He said that I would not! He was wrong if some of my current friends and my beloved SWMBO are to be believed!

8. Insert your own random thought here.

     SWMBO and I and our fur babies took a vacation. For five days we were in the State of Maine. We visited Acadia National Park. The weather was spectacular for four of the five days we were there. Of course, we picked the coldest day to trek up to the summit of Cadillac Mountain. Man! It was cold as a well diggers butt!

     We came home for a couple of days and then drove to Lebanon, NH, for a follow up medical appointment. After the appointment we drove to Shelburne, VT, and stayed a couple of nights there.

     We then drove to St. Johnsbury, VT, and visited DOG MOUNTAIN. It boasts the only pet chapel in the world. There is a map of the world with pins stuck in it that shows all the countries where visitors to DOG MOUNTAIN came from. Some came from as far away as Australia and New Zealand.

     All in all it was a wonderful vacation!