Category: Essay
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Goodreads = Good Reading Habits
I’ve been tracking my reading on Goodreads since August of 2008, so this month marks twelve years of books I’ve read, books I want to read (my “TBR” list), and sometimes, my thoughts on them. I wish I were better at writing reviews of all the books I read, but maybe this is something I…
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What is a weekend?
What is a weekend? In Season 3 of Downton Abbey, the glorious masterpiece of period drama created by genius Julian Fellowes (can you tell how much I love this show?), this question is posed by Dame Maggie Smith’s character. Now, I’m not a countess or a duchess or a princess, but I am at a…
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Don’t Say the “R” Word
Retirement. Like most people who have been working since they finished school, I thought about how glorious retirement would be. No alarm clock for starters. Lots of time to travel, learn new things, read for unlimited periods of time, cook gourmet meals every day, do some volunteer work, maybe even improve my pitiful excuse for…
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Calling Doctor Zatarain …
Have you heard the term “doctored up,” or is that a Southern phrase? It means to add your own twist to something, usually to improve the taste or appearance of something, as in, “She doctored up the punch with a bottle of rum.” (LOL. Sorry, that’s the covid talking.) Yesterday I wrote about buying fresh…
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Teach a man to (cook) fish. . .
The coronavirus pandemic has changed the way many shop for groceries; my family is no exception. At the start of the lockdown, my husband shopped for groceries at our neighborhood Safeway every two or three weeks. He went during the “senior hours” to reduce some of the risk. Our millennial daughter suggested Target’s shop online…
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Year 1 (again)
In the days ahead, social media will be flooded with photos of kids holding signs indicating their new class year at school. There will also be pictures of teachers proudly displaying the same sentiment, “My 5th year teaching!” or “My 14th year teaching” which is what my sign would have said this year. But for…
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No Gobble Gobble for Dinner
Enjoy this short comic piece of mine recently published by The Daily Drunk Literary Magazine! You may enjoy it even more if you knew my father Roy Blanchard! https://thedailydrunk.com/f/no-gobble-gobble-for-dinner
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Shielding our Differences
The summer before my first year of full-time teaching in middle school literature and English, I looked over the textbooks I would be using. As a second-career teacher with no formal education courses behind me, I had no idea how to plan a unit, but I knew how to read and analyze a piece of…
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The “Pan”-Demic Experiments
“Sometimes you feel like a nut / Sometimes you don’t / Almond Joy’s got nuts / Mounds don’t” was the jingle used during the 1970s to advertise two of my favorite candy bars. And, likewise, sometimes, I feel like doing culinary research for several hours, shopping at multiple grocery stores and markets, gathering stand mixer,…
Michelle Blanchard Ardillo 