So apparently…
…I have changed my blog theme around 72 times since I started blogging last year. And each time I’ve noticed something odd–I keep choosing text that is significantly bigger on the screen. This means I am either losing my eyesight at a much faster rate than I thought, or I need to invest in glasses that don’t cost 12 bucks at Target. Eventually, I fear my posts will be have to be read one giant word at a time. I apologize in advance.
…I have to post more on this blog so I can generate more “hits” and possibly more comments. If I don’t post something, anything, for a few weeks, I may risk losing readers. I had a total of 7 hits on my blog yesterday. In a strange coincidence, I looked up She’s a Maineiac 7 times on the display iPhone at Target until the clerk asked me to leave when I started crying.
…I need to do some more research on the proper use of colons and semicolons: I’m not sure if I’m doing it right; I’m not sure if I use them too much; I’m sure it’s getting distracting for you readers out there: Am I right? I’ll try to stop; but: I can’t promise anything.
…I’ve been sucked into the Twitter madness. I’ve received lots of requests to follow me lately. (Wait, that makes no sense) Anyway, following myself is going to be hard. But I keep getting these emails for twitter. Do I accept this person as my cult member/follower or blatantly disregard them and toss them aside, thereby cementing the fact that I hate twitter but will be forever behind in this technological age?
Well, after I got over the initial shock that I even have a twitter account (I think I signed up one night in the midst of some moderate wine-drinking) I’ve decided to take the tweety plunge. Now if I could just figure out how to put twitter on my blog’s sidebar with the widget doohicky whazzitdoodle—I’ll be cranking out twitty tweets in no time. It’s quite the challenge bringing my inane thoughts to you in 140 characters or less. I may have to employ my husband as he’s a man of few words, and usually they are: Yes, Dear. I know, Dear. You’re so right, Dear. Why don’t you go blog about it instead of telling me, Dear?
…I am a pathetic slave to technology. What is almost as bad as having no heat and electricity? Having no cable TV, internet or phone. This past weekend, during the “Holla!Surprise, it’s Me, Winter!Oh, Snap! ween” storm, our electricity flickered once then came right back on. We were lucky. (I know how lucky as I survived the Ice Storm of ’98 when I had no heat or running water for 2 weeks and my toilet cracked right around the same time I did.)
But when my husband clicked the TV on, only to be met with some digital snow, (that was his joke) all hell broke loose. It was Sunday, people. No football. Not to mention the fact that it was quiet in our house. Dead calm. The kind of unnerving quiet that gets under your skin and slowly drives you insane. The kind of mind-numbing hush they must have endured all winter in the Little House until Pa broke out his fiddle. The kind of silence where you can only hear the soft swish of your blood as it pulses through your veins. The kind of noiselessness you get after you’ve been at a heavy metal rock concert for a few hours, then go home and your ears are buzzing so loud they start to bleed.
The first few hours we were okay. We talked to each other. We even had back and forth conversations with some occasional eye contact. Then the withdrawal began. I simply told them, no, they couldn’t watch Phineas and Ferb and no, they couldn’t watch Netflix and no, they couldn’t play Dora on the computer and no, they—are you sensing my irritation yet? Finally, the kids gave up and went outside in their shorts to go sledding (Al Gore was so right). After plugging and unplugging the modem several hundred times, my husband gave up and sat down to read a book. I grabbed my latest Oprah magazine and my glasses, and tried to read, but I kept getting distracted by all the noise of us breathing. At one point I could hear the universe humming. I think it sounded like the C note on the piano.
After two days of this, the cable line was repaired and it finally came back on. I rushed to the computer to see what I had missed and I was astonished to realize that nothing had happened. It was almost as if my existence on the internet didn’t matter.
…my kids have trained me well. Why is it that my kids can sense the split second I sit down, so they can then ask me to get them something? I could be in the kitchen, holding the milk, asking them if they want any, waving the carton in their faces, hovering the milk over their glasses in mid-drip– then later on, the nanosecond my butt hits a chair they ask for milk? Is this something they teach them at school? How to Drive Your Poor Mom Crazy–Lesson One: Hey, kids! Be sure to tell her you need something only after she sits down! Then after she gets if for you and sits down again, ask her for something else! Repeat all day long until you see steam coming out of her ears! Reminds me of the movie A Christmas Story, “My mother had not had a hot meal for herself in fifteen years.”
_________________________________________________________________
Well, lucky for you dear readers, that’s all I’ve got for this random Fritter Friday post. (Whenever I see the word “fritter” I get hungry, so I’m off to go eat.) Happy weekend, my friends!
She's A Maineiac 
Darla i have not read this post of yours completely. But the moment I saw a new post from you, i thought it must be “Why men can’t cry in front of other men”. But it was not that one. Thank god men escaped this time…. but for sure we are waiting for that one 🙂
Ha! Well, I have to tell you, it may be awhile. I still don’t have the answer. I will have to interview my husband later this weekend to get some ideas!
Love the pumpkin and snow photo! Keep writing and posting and you’ll get your hits. It’s also wise to comment on other blogs should you read them. Happy blogging.
Thanks, Jennifer–that was a photo I just had to snap. I can’t remember a time when we got this much snow before Halloween.
You should enter my fancy dress competition. Its just for fun 🙂
http://laughteriscatching.com/2011/11/03/fancy-dress-update/
Well I love fancy dresses and fun, I’ll be sure to check it out, tinkerbelle!
I can address your first problem: the eyes. You have presbyopia — a sucky problem that I wrote about in my blog when I first started and nobody ever read it: http://fiftyfourandahalf.com/2011/06/20/corrective-packaging/. So I guess I am helping with your other questions — you are not alone in the “watching the hits club.”
And go with those semi-colons; people who don’t use/understand them are wimps!
Elyse, I just read your post and I’m in shock–you described me perfectly! It was hilarious. Either I need better glasses or they need to enlarge the print on everything. Could be a dangerous situation in the bathroom.
I have a love/hate relationship with semicolons; colons I love, but semicolons are trickier for me.
Ah, but you used that one perfectly! Punctuation wonks — UNITE!
Whew, good to know! Sometimes I really have to wonder if I’m even spelling words correctly. It’s an ongoing learning process for me.
I adore your blog. Don’t fret about the hits. Keep going, people will gather around eventually, like moths to the light. Not that you’re a moth.
I’m going to follow you on Twitter. Most of my twitter followers are really not very interesting – well, they probably are, but they don’t seem to be speaking to me most of the time.
On a more serious note: one thing I’ve found that works to get followers is to comment on others’ blogs. That’s how I find great bloggers – it’s how I found you. And I’m very glad I did.
Hi Snoring Dog,
I visited your blog but did not see a comments section so I am sending you a message through here. I love your illustrations and art. It is so inspiring!
Cheers,
Louise
I agree, Louise–her art is just beautiful!
SDS, that was so nice of you to say, thank you. I am very glad I’ve found you, it’s always a treat to read your posts and see your artwork.
I shouldn’t give two (ahem) hoots about my stats but I still check them. I have a slight addiction problem I think…I do love to read everyone else’s blogs and comment when I can. I would rather do that than write in my own blog, it’s more fun.
I would love to follow you on Twitter as well. I think I have around five followers right now, so it’s a small cozy tight-knit group.
Write and they will come. I do not look for regular posts from my favorite bloggers, in fact I really don’t notice how often you post. But when you do, I read. And Twitter? Yes, I have Twitter but usually all that tweets are my latest posts. It’s nice that it automatically generates; kind of takes off the pressure of dreaming up stuff. Press on, SAM.
That’s it, Georgette–I have to keep writing! Simply make the time to sit down and do it, that’s all it takes. I would like to tweet my latest posts automatically, I just don’t know how to do it yet. It’s all a mystery to me this twitter stuff.
🙂
😀 right back ‘atcha, Lisa!
Hi Miracle Mama!
I read your stuff and I really enjoy what I read. I know I am a newbie at blogging so I can’t really give advice on how to get more hits. I can say we are in the same boat with that!
What you can find comfort in is that you are not alone!
Cheers,
Louise
I do like knowing I’m not alone with this blogging stuff. And to think over a year ago I had no clue what a blog was about or why people did it! Thanks, Louise, you are always so positive and bring a smile to my face.
Fritter. I’ve been fat-girl slobbering throughout the whole post!
I know. And here I was trying to make it sound like “fritter” as in, “I’m frittering the day away.” But all I can think of is deep fried corn fritters!
Okay girl I have a hard time believing 7 look/sees and they were all http://redriverpak.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/baby_walker.jpg you my dear are fantastic. Suggestion for power outages-have a rainy day box. Put every thing in it then make everyone take part in the fun. Ya know forced fun. They will thank you for it … If you live through it.
Your comment made my day AND I love the baby walker, very cute! hehe! I don’t mind if the Idiot pops into your comments, the guy is hilarious!
I am typing from my phone. Some how my auto correct put a different blog address on my POST. I am sorry. I love the Idiot but not when he sneaks into my comments.
I like the photo, Darla. I think it would look nice in a frame and hanging on a wall.
Your entire post was entertaining. I laughed out loud when I read, “The kind of mind-numbing hush they must have endured all winter in the Little House until Pa broke out his fiddle.”
We are still in the midst of a non-weather related phone/internet outage. Three and a half more days left, so they say. I’m glad it is Friday. Working two jobs remotely is hard – working two jobs remotely when the remotes are down is even harder.
Thanks, Lenore, happy it made you laugh. We did turn on the radio in the kitchen for a bit to break the silence. I have to admit, I loved the quiet for the most part. I kind of got used to it. It was everyone else that seemed to come undone from it. The only thing I missed was checking out everyone’s blog posts for a few days.
And three and a half more days left for you?! I sure hope it goes by super fast. Don’t work too hard, give yourself some ice cream breaks here and there…I just picked up a Ben and Jerry’s pint which was a tribute to John Lennon–I had never seen it before and just HAD to have it! I’ll let you know how good it is later….
The part where you looked up your blog on the display iPhone at Target until the clerk asked you to leave, had me laughing out loud, for real! Love the fritter Friday- funny stuff.
The picture you have up now reminds me of Damariscove Island, right outside of Boothbay. Anyway, like the theme you have. In fact, I don’t know why every time you change your theme, I really like it and think that I, too, should use the same theme. And then I think that it would be copycatting. And then before I know it, I’ve forgotten about it and moved on to the next thing I’m doing. (I must have a touch of ADD).
Ha! Well, none of that Target story is true…okay, some of it. I was checking out the iPhone. And I did only have 7 hits that day. And probably some of them were me.
You should use the same theme, Sue. I love this one (for now) because it’s less cluttered, easy on the eyes. The header was taken at Popham beach last summer. It was the only picture I could upload because the rest came out looking all pixilated and I have no clue how to fix that…I love Boothbay Harbor. My husband and I had our second date there!
What? You lied?? I guess artistic license is permitted. LOL.
I haven’t been to Popham in waaaaaay too long. I’m thinking that’s Pond Island Light? I neeeeed to get back to Maine. I have a feeling we’ll be back there next summer. My Little Man was more than bummed that we didn’t get back this past summer. He really misses driving Grandpa’s boat. (It’s so funny though, when he gets within a 1/2 mile of an island, he gets all worried that he’s going to hit it and makes me drive.)
Sometimes, as a writer I may or may not stretch the truth a little for entertainment purposes. Is that wrong? I gotta go for the laugh though, can’t help it!
Come back to Maine! Summer is the best time…. 😀
I missed you, Darla. In fact, I just called “Al’s Bayou Bloodhounds” to recall the pack I rented to try to find you. Glad you all survived the first snow without anybody being eaten.
hee hee! Sorry bout that, Peg. Next time, try and send me a truck-sized bottle of Advil and some Godiva chocolate and maybe I’ll be able to get through another weekend with no noise– except for all the whining (mostly from my husband)
Glad to have found you here, Darla. I never imagined there could be so many talented writers all in one place and please add another person to your list of people-who’re-in-love-with-me-and-my-blog. Looking forward to reading your older posts to see what other amazing stuff I’ve missed. Take care and keep writing.
And yes: once you find out the proper use of semicolons and colons; please be sure to tell me. I can’t ever get them right.
SanaVd, I am thankful to have you here. Thanks for your comments, I appreciate them. There are so many amazing writers and I am incredibly lucky to have met them through this blogging community. Without them, I wouldn’t be writing as much as I am.
That pumpkin picture is really stunning. I hope it’s yours, so you can bask in my complimentary comment. Are you tagging your posts? Certain tags bring in the readers. My tagging feature is broken (along with capacity for links) and so, for the past 2 months, my posts generate no traffic at all; semicolon; only the older ones.
Glad to hear you somehow managed to survive this sucky snowstorm. Did you see the pics posted by JM Randolph at accidentalstepmom? Her property was just covered in downed tree branches, one which pierced right through her porch cieling! And I like your new theme. Bloggy love!
That pumpkin picture is one I snapped, thank you, Spectra! I am basking away in your comment…
Y’know tagging is a good idea. I don’t spend nearly enough thought when I tag and usually give up after I come up with two or three. That is a great idea.
I did see JM’s pictures! Crazy the one that pierced through the ceiling. I can’t believe how much damage people faced just a bit south of us. We were so lucky! We only had maybe five inches here, but it was heavy wet snow. About 200,000 people were without power in Maine. We were one of the lucky few that never lost it (helps we live in an old cow pasture with hardly any trees)
You know what’s scary? I won’t be here on WordPress.com next week. I brought over my email subscriptions because I can manually put those in but I can’t manually force the wordpress subscribers to follow me because I don’t have THOSE email addresses. So I have 32 followers (including me) starting next week just because I wanted to use plug-ins and have more control over my blog and stuff.
I’m about to have a sad and lonely life. I don’t even know when it’s happening for sure. One day my blog will be here and then it’ll be gone. Will anyone even notice I’m not there anymore? Will they go searching for me?
I feel insecure.
Can I have a hug?
Where are you going, Kim? And how do I get there?!
Here ya go, girlfriend!
Does this mean you are leaving wordpress? Where ever will you go???
G’bye –
Ah, again you write a post that could have come from my own head. Except you write it funnier. I joined Twitter a few months back and spent a couple of days in complete denial. To this day, I still can’t bring myself to use the word “tweet” unless I’m discussing bird communication. I’m going to go follow you and freak you out a little more. Yup, I’m like that.
I know, I cringe with the word “tweet”. I’m not even sure I’ll be able to tweet (gah!) much, but I’ll give it a shot. I will probably enjoy it for awhile, then it will become one other thing I have to do, so I’ll stop…then I’ll become obsessed about it and start up again. It’s a vicious cycle, this social media crap. But I’ll follow you!
Lucky for me?
I want more!
Now?
No?
How about now?
I loved reading this. I loved it as much as I’m loving not writing blog entries this week, although I’m generating plenty of words over on Facebook.
Happy weekend 🙂
I am just about to head over to your blog and see what’s what and check out the FTIAT Friday post! 😀 happy weekend to you, Deb!
Hi,
Love the photo of the pumpkin and the snow, it’s unreal the amount of snow some people got, there was a story about it all,in some of our newspapers. The snow storm certainly caused a bit of damage in some places.
You had be laughing about your visit to Target, good one. 🙂
Mags, it really wa a shocking storm, even for us seasoned Maineiacs. I have never seen this much snow and wind so early in the season in my entire life. To go trick-or-treating and having to walk over snowdrifts and ice patches? That was just surreal.
Now I read it completely. I can’t stop laughing. You mentioned that, You had a total of 7 hits on your blog yesterday. So I do not know who are the other 6 visitors, but i was one of them. 🙂 For me last part of this post was best. My mom had always same problem with us just like you.
And how can I forget to mention that image of pumpkin, survivor of the snow storm. Today only i posted photos of that snowstorm in my blog. But never thought someone could click such an image during that. Wonderful post Darla. This post is a perfect alternate to “Why men cant cry in Front of other men”
Oh, so you know about making your poor old tired mother get up every five seconds to get you something? Well, I have to admit, my brothers and I probably did the same thing to my mom. I guess it’s payback! 😀
I was wondering how you were doing “up there” and I’m glad to know that you are all surviving…and yet not. 😦
I loved the bit about the semicolon; I, too, have little understanding of what that thing is all about. I also have a horrible addiction to hyphenating every-other-word in a sentence. I don’t know what I’d do without Google word searches. Latchkey kid. Who knew it wasn’t hyphenated?
No way did you only get 7 hits in a day. I’m not buying it.
See, Angie, once again you and I must have been separated at birth. I love punctuation…maybe a little too much. I tend to overuse it because I’m not sure what’s appropriate or not. I keep learning. Hyphenating is another thing I do. Also, I tend to put my words in (these) I also would have hypenated latch-key. It just looks better that way, dammit. I did get 7 hits. My stats have quieted down so much, I could see tumbleweeds blowing by my blog.
That overuse-thing-y is so me; really it is (I mean it). Okay, I’ll stop now; seriously. (Last time.)
I feel so much love on here for you (nice comments and such)! I think WordPress is not reading your hits correctly 🙂
Yes, Angie! (you are so right); WordPress is behind my bad stats: I think they must have forgotten-to-add-a-few-extra-zeroes…? Or maybe it’s because no one is reading my blog anymore because I’m getting obnoxious with the punctuation “thingies”…hmm…
Glad I found you, I was looking for someone trapped in the snow and talking about it. if you figure out the tweets…tell me. I keep thinking to myself…who cares when another person’s eating pizza or going to bed (a lot of tweets say goodnight????)
Barb, I am glad you found me too–did ya bring me any chocolate? I have figured out how to write a tweet, but I don’t know how to respond to anyone else’s tweets yet. Maybe I can pick up a book, Twitty Tweeting for Dummies.
It’s too early for all that snow! I’d be whining the loudest at our house if the internet went out, but hubby would miss his cable tv. It would be a very sad day.
Patti, it was tragic for my husband especially. For a time, we all just shuffled around the house in circles, not knowing what to do. Pathetic. This told me that we all need to take more breaks from the computer and TV.
Listen, in my world, you are a superstar, a well-deserved superstar.
Renee, and that is enough for me–thank you!
I got sucked into Twitter, too! But I can’t keep up so I use it more for spreading blog love. (That sounds questionable. I like it.) What’s your Twitter name?
And for what it’s worth, I’ve never noticed any misuse of colons or semi-colons on your blog. Then again, I just started my ten millionth sentence with ‘and’. 😉
So glad you didn’t have to go TOO long without power!
Speading blog love–hehe, love it. Twitter name? uh…it is MiracleMama70 or MaineMama70, I can’t remember which…
And I also start too many sentences with “and”–can’t stop myself.
Good grief, woman, try it out here where you can’t get ANY stations, TV or FM, through the air, and only one noisy AM country music station. No power and no TV makes John a VERY crazy person! (Well, more so than usual.)
Get yourself a couple $20 kerosene lanterns from Wal-Mart, and a gallon of the ultra-pure lamp oil. Heat AND light in one easy package. One of the 12-volt “jumper packs” for starting a dead car battery work great too, as most have a 12-volt “cigarette lighter” type plug which can charge your cellphone and/or laptop.
And next time hubby wigs out, tell ’em he can stay busy by cleaning out the attic/basement/garage. THAT should get him to go off somewhere and be quiet! 😀
Thanks for all the advice, John. Where the heck do you live again? I wish you had a blog (hint, hint) so I could read more about you and your life and all of your shenanigans…But yes, I will tell my husband about getting a 12-volt cigarette plug so I can get on the internet to check my blog out in a freezing cold car (and you know, I would do that!) I have this feeling you’ve spent many a powerless day holed up in your garage? Your wife is a smart woman.
Love the post. Take it from a mom of two teens…they will continue the same ‘trick’ of asking for things once you are sitting, it just gets later at night.
We were enjoying (in a black humor way) living in Canada and knowing we had no snow and it was hitting many areas south of us.
Fritter on girl.
So many of my friends who have teens have told me the same thing. So apparently…it doesn’t get better, just worse. Fabulous. I guess I have to hold out until they move out? So I have something like…um….20 years or so? Great.
I bet you guys up there in Canada were feeling all good and snow-free. I have to admit up here we were feeling like we escaped a lot considering people in Conn. still have no power.
I don’t believe you only got 7 hits yesterday, when I see you have 61 comments ahead of me and 19 like the post… Congratulations on a very funny read. 🙂 You said what a lot of us feel.
I love the pumpkin in the snow photo. I think you should enter it in a competition.
I can barely keep up with everything one has to do with blogging so I’m not going the Twitter route.
LOL that the storm of the century (or whatever they called it) didn’t go north of the border, eh?
Thanks, Rosie. I love that little pumpkin pic too.
My little stat chart was pretty sad all week. I had to squint to see the little bars on the graph. I had averaged about 5 hits a day. Which isn’t bad if most of them weren’t me and my cousin. It’s weird, I need to take breaks from blogging, but when I do, I get all paranoid my readers will vanish and my blog will be sucked into some internet vortex never to be read again. I suppose I am a very insecure blogger. I am going to try not to care about the numbers anymore and enjoy my lovely readers and thoughtful/hilarious commenters instead..
As for Twitter–I tweeted twice (whoa, that’s a lot of TW words…) Now I’m not sure what to do with it now. Eh.
Oh Darla. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I have 1 1/2 hits on an average once the post is cold. It is a relief to know that I have only 5 1/2 notches to go up to reach my very favourite blogger’s status. YooHoo!
About the pumpkin picture: Ditto. I like it a lot! In fact, I am going to try to see now if it is wallpaper size and steal it for my wallpaper. If snow can come this deliciously, I am game!
It is! Stolen!
You are too funny, Priya. 😀 Please, take that picture–you’re welcome to it! The good thing is all that snow is completely gone now. It will be 60 degrees and sunny this week. And they say global warming is a myth.
As for the cold stats: We should just keep going to each other’s blogs all day today and click up those stats so they’ll nudge up past 10 or so. Or I could just stop looking at the damn stats altogether and stop being so neurotic (but I’m afraid that would involve heavy medication of some kind).
I think checking the stats is part of bloggers disease. My husband can’t understand why it’s important. It would take a thesis to explain it to him. It’s a lot easier to come back and give you an extra hit on a cold post…
We are ALL pathetic slaves to technology which is why we write comments on our virtual chums blogs. I also have a Twitter which is underused and rarely visited. Some day I may find the time to actually LOOK at my Twitter account.
Nice pumpkin in snow snap you have there. Glad it’s in your garden and not mine!
I hope to someday have loads of time to fritter away with Twitter.
The great thing about that pumpkin is now the snow is gone and it’s warm and sunny this week. I’m hoping that freak snowstorm we had was our entire winter and now we can move right on to spring.
Love the milk image. It happens here all the time. I think it’s a genetic thing.
As for the Twitter, it is interesting sometimes. You should try a twitter party. 100 tweets a second and absolutely no idea what is going on. The 140 character limit is a great editing and vocab exercise. And it gives you an excuse to disregard punctuation altogether.
I’m sure, considering you have many more kids than me, you never get to even sit down!
Twitter party? That sounds hilarious. It is a great exercise trying to limit my words. And no punctuation sounds like a dream to me.
I love the new look. My blog is desperate for some polish, but I’m afraid I’ll screw something up and lose everything.
I can’t help you with colons and semicolons. I’m horrible with punctuation and I’m sure it’s obvious. I’m certain there’s more than a few that would love to take a red pen to my writing and have a field day.
Twitter is so confusing. I tweet because some smart people suggested it…I’m a rule follower. I have no idea how to use a hashtag. Twitter makes me feel like the kid in middle school who gets picked last for dodge ball even though he’s had his hand up the whole time and is shouting, “Pick me! Pick me!”
I feel that way, too–I want to change things up with my blog, but I feel like I’m going to mess it up too much. I would love to change my URL to She’s a Maineiac instead of miraclemama…but then I’d lose all my posts (I think, I don’t know really…)
About twitter–what IS a hashtag? Oh, man. I am clueless! I’m right there with you yelling “Pick me! Pick me!”
Love the new theme!! And this post. So glad you had power. My sister-in-law in Connecticut was without power for like 7 days or something crazy–with four kids! She said it was 52 degrees in their house! Luckily she got to stay with friends for a few nights. Crazy stuff.
We were so lucky we didn’t get hit as hard as those just south of us! Not having heat or power while taking care of kids is scary.
Every paragraph in this post has at least one sentence I was going to copy and paste and describe as my favorite line. Here’s the one I finally settled on:
“I grabbed my latest Oprah magazine and my glasses, and tried to read, but I kept getting distracted by all the noise of us breathing.”
But what’s this about stats and comments? Every one of your posts gets a flood of feedback. I think you’re delirious. Drop the magazine, grab your blankie, and go take a nap.
Delirious? Could be. But if I don’t post for awhile it sure does get eerily quiet around here. I’ve toyed with taking an entire month off from blogging, but I’m afraid everyone will disappear. But you’re right…I just need my blankie and a good long ten hour nap and everything will be alright again.