Roomba Always on My Mind

One thing I noticed about this time of year is how a week ago, I was staring at the beautiful treasure at The Chicago Botanic Garden and now I see people tossing out their trees. Life keeps rolling on.  But I digress.

Splendid calm at the Chicago Botanic Garden

I was pretty quiet in 2015 and it was for a good reason because I was making many positive changes – the most impressive being that I am now employed at a place I love and have wanted to work for years.  I really enjoy my job and delight in my 1 mile and 1/2 jaunt to work! Not only do I get to wear purple – it is encouraged!  My quality of life in the last year has increased beyond my wildest expectations.

One of my favorite distractions has been learning how to play the guitar at my weekly guitar lesson down the street. It is quite the joy to be able to leave at 1:57 for a 2:00 lesson.  Over the past year, I have almost lost my prized purple pick more than a few times to which my teacher, Dan, can confirm.  Something happens when I leave my lesson and I think I am putting the pick in my pocket and I can never find it; but then I get home and it somehow finds it way on the floor of my walk-in closet.  While there are many more purple picks that can be purchased to replace that one, I have to have THAT one.  One week, my pick didn’t reappear before my next lesson and I showed up, dejected.  I walked in to see my smiling teacher holding my purple pick!   You would think he had given me a million dollars; it was a relief to be reunited with my pick!

My musical world kept in tune with my purple pick, tuner, and guitar, of course.

We have worked on many songs and although I have been partial to Elvis Presley and Patsy Cline,  I am exploring other artists now because I like to do mash-ups of various songs and improvise some melody mixed in within the chords. Per Dan’s observation, a break-through moment was working on “Always On My Mind“.  It just flows for me, and I can easily connect with the song and not think when I play it. It gives me peace.

When I went to visit my brother and his family for Thanksgiving, I noticed a whirling circular object floating on the floor.  It was the robot-like vacuum cleaner Roomba.  While I had heard of it, I never thought I could afford one.  Sure enough, it was on sale at Costco so I bought it as soon as I got home.  My world has changed with Roomba!  I guess you are supposed to name it, but I haven’t gotten around to it and I digress, once again.

In the beginning, I thought I could get it to clean only if I scheduled it.  So, the next morning, I hear a cheerful beep pattern and it starts checking out the surrounding area and zooms around my place cleaning things up!  It gets into corners that I would never be able to reach and dusts the baseboards and wipes under the doors…When it is finished, it sojourns back to the dock to re-charge. I could literally have a bowl of popcorn and sit on the floor and watch it work.  It is really easy to clean and even has tools to get the hair off the rollers; I am truly enthralled, dazed, and delighted.

A week later, I was recovering from food poisoning  and passed out on my living room sofa.  10am, Roomba makes the happy beep tone to let me know a cleaning episode is about to begin. I was spent so I waited for Roomba to come toward me.  I hit the dock button and it promptly went back to the charger to sleep!

The spot clean option is wonderful because I can get the front foyer cleaned in five minutes every day and not have to babysit the machine. I can be in the living room and Roomba is cleaning my bedroom and because it is so quiet, I sometimes forget it is even running.  If Roomba could clean my bathtub, I would be super-stoked but I hear a butler model is coming out…

My world is cleaner because of you!

At any rate, now you can understand why Roomba is Always On My Mind. Wishing everyone positivity, fabulosity, musicality, levity and love(ity) in 2016!