Margret Sloan

My favorite way to spend a few minutes on a mental health break is to play online backgammon or some of the free card games on Yahoo or other online game sites. I first discovered online games way back in the early 90’s, when Microsoft launched their “Village of Games.” Now there are dozens of different sites, some with excellent graphics and large numbers of regular players from all over the world.

If I have a full hour to spend on R&R I’ll try to find a good partner and play one or two Spades games. If I only have a few minutes I’ll play something fast, like backgammon or cribbage. Sometimes I like the cutthroat strategies of Hearts to sharpen my mind. These are not time wasters as much as they are mental exercises to keep me alert and sharpen my critical thinking skills.

So many people drive to work as a mindless exercise every day. They back out of their driveway and take the same route to work, sitting in rush hour traffic and stressing until they get to their office. The drive to work is a dull, boring routine.

I can’t do that. I’ll drive to work a different way at least 2 or 3 times each week. I really don’t like to do the same thing over and over. I like variety and I like to enjoy my drive to work - not just endure it. Every morning I see new flowers blooming, new pets in the yards, and new cars sharing the road with me. I love starting each day as a new adventure!

I don’t usually get excited about electronics gadgets, but I found something today that really rocks. This charger runs on solar power and will recharge all your portable electronics - everything from an iPod to a laptop to digital camera to MP3 players. This is so cool - you have to check it out. I found it on a website called EcoGeekLiving because I was looking for some ideas for greening up the house. I refuse to buy regular lightbulbs anymore and I know there are other great ways to save the environment by changing our habits at home.

Anyway, this awesome recharger is solar powered - as in free energy! -  and is called a power monkey explorer. It comes with all the adapters you need to recharge all your electronics using the sun. A fantastic gift for any of the geeks in your life, too. Let me know if you get one - I can’t wait for mine to get here!

I have no idea why I am so fascinated with earthquakes, but I have a morbid curiousity with them. I look at the USGS earthquake maps almost every day. I see patterns and clusters of quakes and it is amazing how Mother Nature can impact our daily lives with such unpredictable occurrences as earthquakes and tsunamis.

The earthquake in China was devastating. The reported number of people killed keeps growing, by practically hundreds by the hours. The last time I looked it was over 12,000 dead and 18,000 missing or trapped in the wreckage of schools, office buildings and apartment homes. My heart goes out to these people and I hope that the rest of the world steps up to help provide aid to these victims.

Every summer we used to get the entire family together at my mother’s lake home, but with all the children and spouses or significant others, the grandchildren and (this year for the first time) great grandchildren, this large a crowd is getting to be too much for Mother to handle. So this year we decided to have each of the children arrange for their own family’s vacation throughout the summer, and each of the children will invite Mother to come as their guest for that weekend.

We’ve always wanted to visit Canada in the summer time, so this is our opportunity to take a vacation at Blueberry Lake, in the Mont Tremblant region of Quebec. We’ll be renting a Quebec-style log home (or what they call a chalet) for the second week of July. The chalet has 4 bedrooms, so Mother can join us for the entire week or just the weekend and have her own bedroom. When she arrives, we’ll arrange for a spa visit and a gourmet dinner, so none of us have to worry about cooking or cleaning up.

This sounds like a picture book getaway for my family and I was thrilled tho be able to book our first choice of available dates for our Tremblant cottage rental. We are going to have a hard time waiting until July for our trip!