How motivated are you today?

I'm motivated to keep exercising.  How do you exercise?  Besides walking, how else are you staying fit?  One possibility is this challenge from SilverSneakers designated the Move Better, Feel Better Challenge.

I'm motivated to practice playing the piano . . . and to teach Debbie as much as she wants to know about it.  Maybe next time, I'll show her these B-notes:  B natural, B flat, B sharp, and B quiet.  Do you read music?  Do you "get" what this joke is about?

B minor, added at 8:30 pm.

Two more books by Joan Uda — plus two others

At the Water's Edge: God's Grace in Everyday Life ~ by Joan Uda, 2012, devotional essays

An inspirational book of short essays with a gentle tone.  It probes deeply into life's important matters, celebrates life through telling real-life stories and hopes to bring readers more in touch with the all-loving force in the universe that the author calls God.  It has broad appeal to religious and spiritual people, providing only the author's own answers to life's great questions while assisting readers to consider their own answers.  Written with simple and compelling honesty, it is easy to read and can provide a basis for personal meditation, group study, and even sermons.

At the Water's Edge: God's Grace in Everyday Life II ~ by Joan Uda, 2012, devotional essays

This is Vol. 2 of At the Water's Edge: God's Grace in Everyday Life, in which Joan Uda offers a new collection of simply-written stories showing how God moves in her life and the lives of people she knows.  Joan's goal is to show how exploring one's own experiences opens the heart to receive God's grace ever more abundantly.  She writes of love-based faith and overcoming fears by learning to trust in God.

I added both of these books to my Kindle last week and have started reading the first one already.

Two more books arrived

I got two copies of this book for Gail and Debbie, who want me to teach them to play the piano. The books were on the delivery table when I went down last night to get my mail and see if any deliveries had arrived.  These came in separate packages, one from Lexington, Kentucky, and one from North Las Vegas, Nevada.  One was supposed to arrive today and one tomorrow, but both showed up today.

I had talked to my friend Ginny, a music teacher, because I was not happy with the book the two had gotten, as I mentioned early last week.  So we'll use these instead.  I'm a lot happier with this version, which does teach the left hand to play the bass clef, as opposed to chords only for the left hand.

Belwin Complete Adult Keyboard Course ~ by Sandy Feldstein, 1991, 1996

A practical, enjoyable approach to learning to play all keyboard instruments.  This exceptional beginning method has sound teaching philosophies, music of all styles, strong visual reinforcements and modern technology components.  Well-suited for either class or individual instruction, the method includes familiar folk songs, well-known classical themes and popular favorites.  It includes theory workbook pages and writing assignments that reinforce student lessons.

Friendship, an owl, piano lessons, and kayaking

National Women's Friendship Day has been observed the third Sunday in September since 1999.  So today, as the name suggests, is our day to express gratitude for all our women friends.  Let's share some names (it's okay to share only first names).  Who is your best friend?  Or which woman has been your friend the longest — and still is?  Ginny is the one I thought of first.  I met Ginny in August 1955, when I started high school by attending marching band practice at City High School (CHS).  Officially, CHS means Chattanooga High School.  Ginny was a year ahead of me in school, and we are only the same age from April until August, when she gains a year.  She has visited me here in St. Louis, and I've visited her in Tallahassee.  Let's see, 1955 to 2021 is ... wow! ... 66 years that we've been friends!  Love ya, Ginny!

A gorgeous owl ~ Someone shared this photo of an owl on NextDoor, our neighborhood group.  Those who chimed in seem to agree that it's a barred owl, after arguing that it is not a barn owl (which is smaller) or a great horned owl (which is larger and "has feather tufts on its head — the so-called horns").  Anyway, I think this is a beautiful picture of an owl, whatever kind it is.

Learn to Play Piano in Six Weeks or Less ~ by Dan Delaney and Bill Chotkowski, 2009, self-help, 111 pages.  

I've made the photo small because I'm not happy with this book.  It is not really a beginner's book, but a fake book.  Do you know what that is?

fake book /fāk bo͝ok/ noun = a book of music containing the basic chord sequences of jazz or other tunes.

The first sentence in the Introduction even admits that it's a fake book:

"Throw away your bass clef and give your left hand a break — melodies in the right hand, chords and rhythms in the left hand."

This looks like a beginner's book, and in one sense it is.  But the women who bought it so I can teach them how to play the piano will be learning only half of what I expected to teach them.  It's something.  It's a beginning of sorts, but I feel like I'll have to either come up with a way to teach them how to play with the left hand or get us "real" piano books that teach fingering for the bass clef.

My daughters have taken up kayaking.

No, I wasn't out on the water with them. 

One of them took this photo of the other.

Deb Nance at Readerbuzz hosts The 

Sunday Salon.  Bloggers gather in the 

Sunday Salon — at separate computers 

in different time zones — to talk about 

our lives, our books, and our reading.