Hats, Boots, & Chocolate

    I've always hated Hallmark movies.  Not all of them, to be fair; there are a few legitimately good stories among the lot. But 99% of the time, Hallmark movies are a collection of the same four or five plots, retold in about a thousand barely-different ways. Their one redeeming quality is that, for people like my mom who can't handle much suspense in a movie, they are excellent because once you've watched one, you've basically watched them all, so you know exactly how it ends.      Add to that the fact that, over the years, I've seen far too many Hallmark movies for my own good as a result of my parents' movie-watching preferences (which, due to the reason stated above, are usually dictated by my mom), and so can walk into the room in the middle of any Hallmark movie, watch for approximately 30 seconds, and tell you who each character is and the role they fill in the story, and it's little wonder that I hate them. After all, I have ADHD, and I need some ...

     I tried/have been trying an experiment lately where I used ChatGPT during my brainstorming process for a completely new project, just to see how well it would do. It's terrible for coming up with a coherent plot--it forgets a lot of the things it just wrote out and starts to contradict itself--but for the story seed I used, it was perfect, because I've been doing research on that idea to figure out how it might work in a story for years, and never found anything that gave me a decent starting point for it. (It's a music-based magic system, but every previous attempt at designing it I'd tried, it became far too complex for me to write into a story, at least with my abilities as a novelist. ChatGPT gave me the best idea of what something like that could look like without being too complex for me to write, which was a perfect jumping-off point for me to then have the AI take me through a couple possible plot-threads, which I then unraveled and wove into my own plot-st...

    "Play is the highest form of research." -- often attributed to Albert Einstein, but this is apparently incorrect ; N. V. Scarfe appears to be the person who said this first.     Regardless, this is one of the primary quotes in use by my professors this semester, because I have been studying early childhood education, and, at least in the UVU community of early childhood professionals, play is considered one of the most important elements of a quality early childhood program, which is often left behind in favor of greater academics both in preschool and during the elementary and high school years.     I kind of already knew this.     Because of my job at Thanksgiving Point, I have seen firsthand how play-based learning can work. Kids beg their parents to go to Thanksgiving Point, whether it's to go see the butterflies, to go ride the ponies and the train, or to climb the giant playground (each different elements of a few of the venues at Thanks...

    Where I'm from, it's traditional to recite our nation's "Pledge of Allegiance" at or near the start of every school day. Being home-schooled, I actually didn't know about this tradition until I started taking Concurrent Enrollment classes at my local high school, and I have since decided that I don't like it very much.     Don't get me wrong, I'm all for pride in and loyalty to one's country--but I don't think America's current Pledge does a very good job.     In case you're unfamiliar, here's how our Pledge goes:     'I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.'     This is a nice, one-sentence declaration of loyalty--but to what? I feel like this Pledge is really esoteric, and the way we say it every day at school doesn't fit what I think it's actually saying. I don't think ...

    If you're one of the very, very few people who have been here since the beginning of this blog, you may wonder why I decided on the name Hats, Boots, & Chocolate  for it.     Honestly, I've been wondering the same thing for a long time.     The most obvious answer is, of course, that I love hats, boots, and chocolate! I love wearing beanies and my cowgirl hat, and my cowgirl boots are some of the most comfortable shoes I've ever owned. Chocolate is also a staple favorite around here; the very first blog post I ever wrote was a recipe for home-made hot chocolate lumps that store in the freezer and come in very nice, pre-portioned serving sizes perfect for making a rich, creamy cup of hot chocolate.     But I think that's not all--and I think God knew it wouldn't be all from the start. Sure, I initially chose this name because I couldn't think of anything that described me better--I'm a person who likes hats, boots, and chocolate a lot!...

    English grammar is a funny thing, especially on the Internet. While you may have noticed that I, and many bloggers like myself, use extremely good grammar as much as we can, comments on blog posts, YouTube videos, and Internet forums often have entertaining grammar slips. Furthermore, at least in Utah, there are even more hilarious mispronunciations of commonly-used words.     Here is a very old blog post on this topic, which is part of the inspiration for the blog post I am writing today--and it's hilarious to boot!     All right. When talking with me, please do not axe any questions. Such treatment is not very good for them, and they usually don't survive. Asking  is a much better way to use questions, as that way you will actually get an answer instead of a sad jumble of broken words. So long as you don't reverse the 's' and 'k' sounds in the word ask,  you'll be fine. ;)     Furthermore, fellow Utahns (I hear this isn't as much o...

    I know! Two  Bonus Posts in five days! I must have a lot to say this week or something.     Well, sort of. I'm around... seven weeks ahead on blog posts right now, and I didn't want this coming out in February. There's too much interesting stuff happening in my life January-March this year that I know I'll want to talk about, so no point getting any farther ahead.     So, this is my Christmas gift to all of you folk out there who are always late, no matter how hard you try to be on time, and to all you folk out there who like to honk at me on the road because you're in a hurry to Get There On Time and I'm not.     I'll start with a story, of how I think I got the way that I am. Then I'm going to go through and analyze as many of my behaviors as I can, to hopefully give you a bit of insight on how to be early to all those wonderful Christmas things you have going on this weekend. Ready?     Here we go. The Journey     I...

    The idea for this blog post came from a conversation I was having with imaginary people about the terms our society uses for things, specifically things relating to people. Also, if you think it's weird that I was having a conversation with imaginary people, go look at the 'About The Author' page; I think I specified on there that I do this. :)     The gist of this imaginary conversation was that I think the terms we use for "disabled" or "differently-abled" people are stupid. Those two terms imply that these people are somehow different from "the rest of us", when in reality, the only difference is in how they go about the daily processes of life. A blind person isn't 'disabled'; they merely can't see, and from what I've read, this doesn't have to diminish the quality of their life. The only thing it does is change the way they operate, such as using a cane or a guide dog. And, frankly, we all do things differently ...