Time Eating App

Daily writing prompt
What app eats up most of your screen time — and do you even feel bad about it?

I had to look up “app” since I wasn’t sure which, if any, of the sites I pay attention to are apps or just websites. While WordPress, does have an app, which I used back in my traveling days, I only use the online website to write, edit, post, and respond to comments. Other than that, there is a hidden object game I play, and apparently, it’s considered an app. I don’t feel bad about playing the game. I used to play a lot, even spent money on game tokens, but I don’t play as much as I used to and don’t spend any money, so I’m okay with whatever I feel like doing. Besides, it’s something interesting to do, gives me a feeling of connection to a few people, and helps keep my focus narrow and away from the world at large.

Which brings me to my other main app. X is considered an app, not a website, at least according to Google AI, so who knows the truth of it. (Google AI is not only terribly biased but I have found it dead wrong on many occasions. As the saying goes, “Garbage in, garbage out.)

The only reason I pay any attention to X once I stopped promoting my books (which, come to think of it was way before Twitter became X), is that a news aggregator I follow is on there. I found him on Facebook originally, but FB has had some issues with the videos the aggregator posts, and considering my own Facebook issues, I followed him over to X.

I don’t feel bad about paying attention to his posts because I like his summaries and commentaries of the videos I don’t have the patience to watch. There is a lot going on in the world today that I am interested in, mostly because the USA is trying to undo generations of globalist control of the country — something I’d been studying for decades. I thought the control was a foregone conclusion, so it’s been great to see the push back. Considering the stakes and how much of the backstory I know and considering how unbelievable the whole thing is (both the long-term, word-wide conspiracy — not a theory, a real conspiracy — as well as what is happening to undo some of that) it’s as if I’m reading a thriller in real time, not just seeing history repeating itself.

JFK also tried to take on the outside controllers of this country. Two and a half years before he was assassinated, he was irate at having been lied to by his own intelligence agencies, and he said, on April 27, 1961, “We are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence — on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice. . . . Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.”

A hundred years before that, Lincoln lamented that he was fighting two wars, the one in front of him and the one behind. The one in front was his attempt to keep the union together so they could together fight the one behind — the globalists who were already trying to take over the USA through control of its money, as they had from the very beginning. And after all that, in 1913 the USA ceded control of its money anyway.

So, it’s been interesting watching new players in this ancient fight, though I do pray for the people of this administration since those who previously fought this same battle were killed or had their reputations destroyed. It’s a harrowing time, more than most people know.

Eventually, I will have to give up paying attention. For every step the USA moves away from the controllers, the controllers (via the leftists, domestic terrorists, the one-sided media, the money people, to name a few in addition to global forces) pull us two steps back, which isn’t exactly good for my peace of mind since there’s nothing I can do about it anyway.

For now, I don’t feel bad about this expenditure of my screen time because it gives me a modicum of hope, but if the battle is ever lost for good, I will turn off the outside world and go back to paying attention only to what is my immediate vicinity as I did for most of my life.

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Pat Bertram is the author of Grief: The Inside Story – A Guide to Surviving the Loss of a Loved One

Taking “X” Things With Gratitude

When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude. ~~ G. K. Chesterton

For the rest of November, I’m going to take with gratitude some of those things I often take for granted — an entire alphabet’s worth! Since today is the twenty-fourth day of this surge of gratitude, I am giving thanks for “X” things.

I am especially grateful for:

XX. There is a single page in my dictionary for X, so there’s not a lot of X things to take with gratitude. I could be grateful for X-ray machines (and I am when I need one, just not today). I could be grateful for xeriscaping, and I am — elder care is hard enough without adding lawn care to the duties. I could be grateful for xylophones, and I will be if ever I get one. So what “X” thing am I taking with gratitude today? Just that — X.

X marks the spot, and this spot — this blog — is something to take with gratitude. I’ve been blogging for more than six years, and daily blogging for more than two years, and still, I find comfort, companionship, caring, and contemplation here. So I am very grateful for this opportunity.

X stands for the unknown, and I am grateful for all the unknowns (unknown to me, that is) who stop by. And I’m grateful to those I have come to know by their comments. You have helped make me feel at home here, made me even feel wise at times.

I’m also grateful for the unknowns who helped prepare today’s meal. Since my 97-year-old father (who I am looking after) eats very little and since his idea of haute cuisine is Ensure, there was no reason to cook a holiday dinner from scratch, so I made it simple — rotisserie chicken, boxed stuffing, canned cranberry sauce, bottled gravy, bakery pumpkin pie, and yams. (Those I did cook — just plain yams, no carmelizing or marshmallowing). It was very good, actually, and the best part was that the whole things — the preparation, the meal, and the cleaning up — took little more than an hour, which leaves me the whole day to do . . . X. (Whatever that might be.)

So what “X” things are you taking with gratitude?

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See also:
Taking “A” Things With Gratitude, Taking “B” Things With Gratitude, Taking “C” Things With Gratitude,Taking “D” Things With Gratitude, Taking “E” Things With Gratitude, Taking “F” Things With Gratitude, Taking “G” Things With Gratitude, Taking “H” Things With Gratitude, Taking “I” Things With Gratitude, Taking “J” Things With Gratitude,Taking “K” Things With Gratitude, Taking “L” Things With Gratitude, Taking “M” Things With Gratitude, Taking “N” Things With Gratitude, Taking “O” Things With Gratitude, Taking “P” Things With Gratitude, Taking “Q” Things With Gratitude, Taking “R” Things With Gratitude, Taking “S” Things With Gratitude, Taking “T” Things With Gratitude, Taking “U” Things With Gratitude, Taking “V” Things With Gratitude, Taking “W” Things With Gratitude

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Pat Bertram is the author of the suspense novels Light Bringer, More Deaths Than One, A Spark of Heavenly Fire, and Daughter Am I. Bertram is also the author of Grief: The Great Yearning, “an exquisite book, wrenching to read, and at the same time full of profound truths.” Connect with Pat on Google+. Like Pat on Facebook.