Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Things I Learned in September

Did I ever get an education in September. I had the privilege of spending a third of the month in Italy! I have so much to tell you that I'm hoping to spend the annual “31 Days” challenge this October recapping our trip. Starting tomorrow, if I can get it together before I leave for yet another weekend out of town (just me this time--speaking at a women's retreat, so fun!) I’ll be posting all kinds of fun stuff: our favorite activities and restaurants and accommodations; the weird things we ate; the best gelato places (I miss my daily gelato!!); tips and tricks for travel and planning; and stories like The Great Taxi Disaster. And of course pictures…I may or may not have taken in the neighborhood of 1,800..

I chose not to post about the trip at all while we were gone, for several reasons: One, I didn’t want to broadcast publicly the fact that we were out of the country. Two, I wanted to be fully present in the moment, enjoying time with Steve and enjoying Italy rather than being buried in my phone. And three, I didn’t think the entire world needed to experience our anniversary vacation with us in real time. :) The break from social media was so refreshing—but now that I’m back, I’m excited to share my stories and photos!

In the meantime, I do have a few other of the usual random tidbits to share from September:

1. Set up your Medical ID on iPhone. 
You know how, from your lock screen, you can touch "Emergency" in the lower left corner and be able to dial 911 without unlocking the phone? Well, if you open up the Health app and touch the "Medical ID" icon in the lower right corner, you can enter all kinds of information: medications you're on, two emergency contacts, blood type, whether you want to be an organ donor, etc. Then when you get to that Emergency screen with the keypad, the lower left says "Medical ID"--and clicking on it takes you to a screen where medical professionals can quickly and easily access all that critical information, without your phone being unlocked. (Credit goes to a health professional named Katherine Jarmy who shared this info on Facebook.)


2. These flowers are called lantana - and apparently Instagram thinks "meta" is a bad word.
photo :: jennifergfreeman//Instagram
This photo popped up on the #itssimplytuesday hashtag a few weeks ago, and the photographer thus taught me the name of a flower I've seen and admired many times, but didn't know what it was. I thought it was kind of funny that I learned something from Emily P. Freeman's hashtag to share on Emily P. Freeman's monthly blog roundup, so I tried to comment to the effect of "that's so meta"--but Instagram gave me some sort of ominous warning message and didn't publish the comment. Baffled, I tried again two more times and never could get a comment to post. Weird. But the more I think about it, the more I think maybe it really wasn't an appropriate use of the term "meta" anyway...so maybe IG was trying to help me not sound dumb??

3. If you clean the house before you leave for vacation, your future self will love you. 
Usually when we head out of town, I am so frazzled trying to get everything ready to leave that cleaning the house is the last thing on my mind. I try not to leave a pile of dirty dishes in the sink, but the dishwasher might have some in it. The dining room table is often littered with papers, the bathroom is whatever it is, and I don't give a thought to the floors. This time, in an unusual burst of diligence and planning ahead, I managed to get my house clean before we left town: shower scrubbed, dining room table emptied and wiped down, kitchen tidied up and floors vacuumed. Even clean sheets on the beds. Coming home to that late on a Sunday night after 16 days away was GLORIOUS. I thanked my two-weeks-ago self at least four times.

What did you learn this month? Check out the roundup at Chatting at the Sky for more What We Learned posts...and stay tuned for a slew of Italy posts coming up here!

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I went to do number 2 and guess I'd already taken care of my medical ID information (or at least I'm hoping that I did) and absolutely to the cleaning before traveling. I'd rather be stressed getting that done than walking into a messy home when returning. Great seeing you in the What I Learned group!