About Me

I'm a Jersey Girl who ended up in Kansas. I guess most of my peeps are here anymore. But I also have an on-going love affair with Japan, so there's a tumble of influences in my world. Japan, Kansas, New Jersey, Baltimore, Italy.... I've moved 53 times (so far), and jobs? Don't even get me started. More than I can remember, and there probably aren't enough numbers to count them, anyway.

For me, life is one adventure after another! Interested in many things, able to juggle books and blogs and projects, coffee or dinner with friends nicely spaced in between it all.

How I'm finally losing the weight!

This is my story about how, after trying everything that came along to lose weight, I finally discovered what works. My search began when I was only 12 years old, and here I am decades later. Finally! Hint: it's NOT just boring old "diet and exercis...

Living well with ambiguity

Back in college, my German professor used to tell the class, as we struggled with that foreign tongue, that we needed to learn to live with ambiguity. He was talking about German, of course, but over the years, I have often remembered that phrase,...

Google Nemesis is My Friend!

They say it can't be done. Nay sayers. We all know them. But why believe them EVERY time. (Why believe them ever...?) I looked at Google Nemesis every day for about a week, maybe longer. Skeptical, to be sure, I hesitated. How much money have I alre...

Study a Foreign Language!

All over the world, people are studying and learning English as a foreign or second language. When I visit Europe, I am impressed with how many people there speak several languages ~ fluently! English is always among those languages. One complain...

How to help when you feel you've got nothing

Presuming as you read this that you are in the majority who were outside the direct touch of the following, think about how you feel when you hear or read about disasters such as Hurricane Katrina, the tsunami of 2004, 9/11, the Greensburg tornado, m...

More ways to save on gas

How many ways are there to save money on gas? There are thousands of lenses, blogs, and websites out there now, all proposing ways to save you money on gasoline. So why another one? My hope is to add to the discussion, maybe provide some new tips, a...

Handmade Baby Blankets

I've been knitting for years. YEARS! Decades, if I stop and think about it. The proverbial pot-holder, then scarf, then I jumped right into sweaters. They weren't all wearable or usable in the beginning. In fact... they were downright awful. But now...

10 Benefits of Google Nemesis

With all the news about Google Nemesis, it's hard sometimes to sort out the information to get to the meat. What's the big deal, after all? Isn't this just another in a long, long line of SEO, Internet marketing, get-rich-quick scams? No. I believe...

Water4Gas Charity Lens

There are so many ads out there that tell you that it's possible to use water for gas. Everything is sales though, and there are hundreds of scam artists around. Everyone's after a buck, right? So, how can you find the truth? I hope you will trust...

Trees & Cows & Ways to Help

I just ran across this link online that allows me to "plant" a tree on my website, and for every tree I virtually plant, they'll plant a real one. Isn't that cool? Check it out! Every Day is Earth Day But it's not just planting trees ~ it's a whole...

Coming to America

The catalyst for writing this lens struck while I was in the grocery store today. I heard Neil Diamond's amazing song, America, and I was transported back to the first time I heard this song. It is strangely parallel to the state of the world today....

The Making of Fish Tree Tales

When I was just a little girl, my mother asked me, what will you be? Then Daddy asked me, and my Aunt Nellie, Uncle Bob... so much pressure! People ask little kids what they want to be when they grow up, all the time, right? I always answered this w...

Memories of Daddy

Daddy was a simple-living kind of man. He worked hard, being a dairy farmer who was up before the sun every morning, yet who stayed up to watch the news every night. He used to take what are now called "power naps" right after lunch. Twenty minutes e...

Kofu, Japan

I've lived in Japan six times, in five cities. Without any question, my favorite place is Kofu, in Yamanashi Prefecture. There were good times in the other places ~ Fukuoka, Kansai, Tsuchiura, and Hyogo, but Kofu is the place I lived not once, not t...

My Favorite Things about Christmas

As soon as Halloween is over, I turn my thoughts to ... The Holidays. I love the entire season, from November 1st clear through to the first few days of January. There's lots to love ~ the clear cold weather, potential for snow, rosy cheeks, steamy h...

Suexi's Editing Service

How many of you have read a book lately, cover-to-cover, that was both published within the last 10-15 years, and had no typos whatsoever? C'mon, raise your hands. Really? No one? I was afraid of that. It seems to me there are a lot of books, websi...