Thursday, November 29, 2012

The Experiment is Over

That's right - CD (Clearly Derby) is done with government. When CD was started 1 year ago our purpose was to test the following hypothesis: If citizens are provided with easier access to local government then they will participate more in local government.

My answer to the above question is NO. Granted CD was small and we only did this for a year but I still failed to see any correlation between availability and interest. There were a few flickers, here and there, but not enough to warrant another year of testing IMO.

However, I do see a lot of interest on the part of Derbyites, and others in the Valley, to socialize and help each other out. I love doing my facebook page, and I've grown very fond of all the peeps, so I am going to convert Clearly Derby, using the same name, into something different. I've looked at everything else out there and feel that there is already plenty of coverage for the news and general social interactions such as charity events and parades. We also have many talented photographers that provide us with beautiful images of our Valley, all the time.

So, I'm picking people! I'm going to model CD after People magazine and I will thoroughly 'examine' the people of Derby - all of them - the good and the bad, old and young, native and newcomer, alive and dead, Italian, Polish, Irish, and Latino.

This will be generally fact-based but I will be throwing in some innuendo and a little gossip here and there too.

Oh, and we'll still have our games and our prizes. In fact, I'm going to be adding some new ones too.

From now until January 1st I'm going to be a slouch. I'll do the contest on Monday and do the occasional post - but not the whole enchilada yet. I need a break!

Love you all!

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Bread and Honey

Emotionally, holidays are a difficult, weird time for people - yet they make us whole.

I really enjoy performing the ritual tasks of getting ready for Thanksgiving and Christmas - shopping, and cleaning, and cooking; they make me feel grounded.

Each year I send my husband out on Thanksgiving morning to buy bread for our big meal. He can never remember which bread to get. So yesterday when I did my shopping I found the bread that I like and I took a picture of it with my iPhone. Voila - it's this bread, dear! That should make the Day go a little smoother.

But just as I'm feeling all perky and ready to kick some housecleaning butt ... I get a call from our doctor's receptionist. She yells into the phone at me ... "Barbara, honey, you have an appointment tomorrow at 9:45!!!!". I swear she sounds just like Wolowitz's mother on Big Bang Theory.

I take a deep breath and explain that I'm not Barbara, I'm definitely not her honey, and I have no appointment tomorrow. This doesn't faze her at all ... "Honey, I have you down for tomorrow". I see that I need to be a little more direct. "NO!!!". Now I get, "Honey, calm down!". I finally am able to get her to check her calendar and see that I'm not Barbara and my husband has an appointment tomorrow, not me.

I'm going to go mop the kitchen floor.