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I probably don’t have the details right but the concept was something like: A contest. Each contestant was given two empty shopping bags and told to go home and fill them. When they returned they would participate in a fashion show. The winner would win a month long cruise.

One woman returned with only one bag of clothes: tops, slacks, skirts, shorts, swim suits, etc. The other bag was filled with accessories: shoes, purses, belts, jewelry, and scarves.

Long after the other contestants had displayed all their outfits this woman just kept right on making more combinations. She won, of course.

How many shirts do you see in the pictures below?

One. How much room would those scarves take compared to seven more shirts? Can you imagine the variety if those scarves were tied differently? Maybe some as a belt? And how much more variety there would be if you added different combinations of  necklaces, broaches, bracelets, earrings, belts, shoes, and purses with only three different bottoms? Maybe a pair of slacks, a pair of palazzo pants, and a pencil skirt? Or wore a swim top with each of those bottoms?

You really don’t need a lot of clothes to have a widely varied wardrobe. Do you?

TTYL,

Linda

ps. You do need a place to do laundry, though.

One of the things I love about a new Lego set is seeing what details the designer came up with. This efficiency apartment offers many things that appeal to me.

A sofa bed that actually opens out.

A kitchenette with a stove, sink, shelves and a microwave oven.

A tiny bathroom that looks like it actually has water in the toilet.

And a model railroad. This is the type of railroad a lot of first time builders make. A circle of track that goes through a tunnel in a hillside in one corner. Extra cars stand ready on a nearby shelf.

We outgrew that type of track plan many years ago but the fact of this tiny railroad being included in a Lego-sized efficiency apartment makes my heart sing.

TTYL,

Linda

Today is a day for remembering all those who died in service to our country, those who gave their all in purchase of our freedom.

A veteran – whether active duty, retired, National Guard or Reserve is someone who, at one point in his/her life, wrote a blank check made payable to “The United States of America,” for an amount of “up to and including my life.”

Thank every soldier, sailor, airman, or other service personnel you see today and every day for their service.

TTYL,

Linda

Sitting at my desk yesterday I heard the snowplows scraping across the asphalt in our parking lot.

Wait!

Snowplows?!

In May?

So I went to the window to check and, yup, the front end loaders they use to remove snow here were scraping away.

Collecting scraps of sod from a landscaping project and dumping them into a trailer to be hauled away.

Sorry about the lousy photo. That’s what happens when you are trying to take a quick one through a window screen before they finish the work.

At least it wasn’t snow they were scraping up.

TTYL,

Linda

I read that word, decoct, recently and had no idea what it meant. So I looked it up. It means to boil away the excess to get down to the essence of something.

That’s what Lego kits seem to do now. With just a few bricks they make you see something complicated. Your mind does its best to make sense of those few things with what I consider remarkable results.

A few days ago I got they urge to make something from scratch with the the odds and ends of Lego bricks from my latest constructions. I decided to make a diner.

We’ve all been to diners, right? We know what they look like. But figuring out how to get the most detail from the fewest bricks was a challenge I enjoyed.

On the left we have two barstools at the counter, the cook at the stove and sink with upper and lower cabinets and a clock above his head to tell him when to switch from the breakfast to the lunch menu, mugs hanging on the wall by the coffee maker, and the trash bin by the door as the server brings out a sandwich passing by the cash register and condiments on her way.

Not as much detail on the right but we do have a couple booths for customers who prefer not to sit at the counter.

How do you think I did? Did I get the essence of a diner with just a few bricks?

TTYL,

Linda