I don’t want to forget these random thoughts that have been floating around in my head, so I’ve written them down in the notes section of my iPhone. I’m sharing them with you because I suspect they may be something that you can relate to as well.
If you’re here for the first time, welcome! You’ll be able to find the other parts of this series here.
1- I heard something on XM Radio’s 1st Wave that I’m not sure if it’s true, but if it is, I think it’s pretty cool: Tears for Fears played Madison Square Garden for the first time in 2023.
2- I discovered a brilliant cream cheese softening hack a few weeks ago and thought this post would be perfect for sharing it. Fill a large bowl with hot (but not boiling) water. Put the wrapped cream cheese in the bowl for 5-10 minutes. I might be behind on this. Did any of you already know this?
3- The average person has 17,000 thoughts a day.

4- What if the outdoors is a giant terrarium for humans? What if we looked at it that way? Like our own personal diorama. How fortunate are we to get to go inside it every single day.
5- Speaking of which, I’m a little disappointed that my flowers aren’t doing as well as they did last year. It could be the drought we had at the start of the summer. It could also be due to the fact that I planted my seeds a week earlier.
But then I had another thought.
Last year, we had bird feeders in our backyard. We moved them into our front yard in the fall because they were attracting skunks, and the dogs were sprayed twice. Is it possible that not having the birds/feeders has something to do with why my backyard flowers aren’t doing as well this year?
6- I want more salad restaurants. Let’s make that happen, Universe. (That’s manifesting)

7- My best ideas come to me when I’m not near a pen or my phone. (For example, while I’m driving or taking a shower)
8- Embarrassing children isn’t the flex that some parents think it is. It takes a lot of courage (and trust) for a child/teenager to say to a parent, “Please do not embarrass me in public,” at a vulnerable age. Even if they sound like jerks when saying it. 🤣
9- This song was sampled by Eminem for his song My Name Is. I really like the original. Not better. Just different.
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I’m with you on the salad restaurants. And no I didn’t know about the cream cheese hack. I’ve been buying whipped cream cheese, but had a heart attack when I saw it was $8.50 for a regular sized tub.
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I never thought of using the tub of cream cheese in a recipe. That’s a game changer. But 8.50?? How much do they normally cost by you??
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I use it on toast with leftover salmon for breakfast. Or on a bagel. I think it was $3 or $4!
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Anna loves it for bagels.
That is a huge price increase!
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It’s crazy.
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Very.
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👍🏼
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“6- I want more salad restaurants. Let’s make that happen, Universe. (That’s manifesting)”
I agree, Kari! I am a BIGTIME salad maker/eater. In fact, I just had a huge salad for lunch today (arugula, alfalfa spouts, avocado, walnuts, fresh strawberries, cucumber, basil, carrots, feta cheese, and balsamic dressing). YUM-MY!
“7- My best ideas come to me when I’m not near a pen or my phone. (For example, while I’m driving or taking a shower)”
Me too! And also while I’m shaving my face in the morning.
LOVE your thoughts on the outdoors being a giant terrarium. YES!
Great random thoughts, my friend! Have a spectacular week! X
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I knew you’d back me up on the salad restaurant! Maybe we could open one ourselves…
Maybe we need a dry erase marker in the bathroom to write on the mirror? I told Rita I didn’t want one in the shower, but now I’m reconsidering. A mirror marker could be useful.
Have a wonderful week, friend! 😘❤️
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These are all so good, but the one that got me the most is that we DO need more salad restaurants!! In fact, I’m craving a salad right now! Pre-Covid, there was a restaurant I loved with a big salad bar, soups, various breads, and an ice cream machine! But it closed and I don’t know of any restaurant like it now.
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THANK YOU. Well, I just put it into the Universe. Let’s see what happens!
Oh no! That sounded like the perfect restaurant! I’m sorry it closed. 😒
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I’d love a restaurant devoted to salads… that way I won’t be tempted to have the bacon cheeseburger for lunch.
😉
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I do love a cheeseburger too.
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I love the idea that we’re living in a giant terrarium. We kinda are. 17,000 thoughts a day. I’m not sure if I thought it would be more or less…interesting. And yes to more salad restaurants! Thanks, Kari.🥰
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When I read about the 17,000 I thought…that checks out. 🤣
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If my calculations are correct, and assuming we sleep eight hours a night and so not counting those hours having thoughts, we have 17.71 thoughts per minute. Seriously, that’s why I’m always so tired! lol!
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WOW. See, this is why we all need to practice mindfulness! 🤣
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Exactly! I thought the same thing.
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Great minds…😘
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I didn’t know about the cream cheese warming technique. I wonder if the 17,000 thoughts per day are all different thoughts, or a few of the same ones running in a loop in your brain? My flowers haven’t done well this summer, too. We had to much rain then too much humidity. I’m bummed, but there’s always next year.
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I think that 17,000 has a lot of the same ones looping. 🤣
Okay, I’m feeling a lot better about my flowers now. It isn’t just mine. In our terrariums, we’re all having a bad flowering season.
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I just bought a cookbook from a famous salad restaurant in Montreal; I was so excited for it to arrive and wow, is it a COMPLICATED cookbook. Like, a recipe will seem simple but then it will refer to one or two things on another page (1/2 cup of goddess dressing page whatever, with 1 serving spicy tofu, page whatever.) Then you get to page whatever and THAT recipe refers to ANOTHER recipe (goddess dressing contains basic vinaigrette dressing page whatever). It’s like one of those pictures in a picture that goes on forever. Long story short, I’d like to go to this restaurant but also HAVE A SIMPLER COOKBOOK, JEEZ.
I love, love, love the idea of the world as a terrarium.
I never want to embarrass my kids in public. I’m sure it’s happened, but I sure don’t try to do it on purpose. I feel the same way about public embarrassment as I do with physical pranks, and that is that they are really distasteful and sometimes mean. I think laughing at someone else’s expense is mean, and I sound like I don’t have a sense of humour but I DO, I swear. Mind you, my SIL and her friend were talking about this incident in which her friend slipped on ice and landed on her bum, and then her dog came up to her and started humping her, and she couldn’t get up because of the ice and also because of the humping dog, and it was a very funny story. I don’t know if I would have laughed if I saw it happen though…but the retelling was gold.
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I HATE videos that are supposed to be “funny” but it’s clear that the person in them was physically hurt. Could never watch America’s Funniest Home Videos because it seemed like all of them were that. That said, pretty sure I’d have laughed at the humping dog on ice scene. :-)
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Pet videos are my favorite. Also, farting videos.
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THIS is why we need more salad restaurants. There is a really good TikTok account that shows and deconstructs famous salads. I think her name is Salad Lab?
I love that idea too.🖤
I’m sure I’ve unintentionally embarrassed both of my children, but it was humbling recently when my youngest talked to me about not embarrassing her at an event. I saw the humanity in her and that moment as well. Old me would have reacted completely differently, but this me completely understood how she felt.
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That is too many thoughts to have every day. No one we’re all exhausted all the time.
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Exactly.
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I can’t believe I’ve never thought of that cream cheese softening hack! We do something just like that with thawing sandwich meat that I buy in bulk and freeze in small packages.
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I had never thought of it either! I had always just left it out on the counter!
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I’ve not heard of the cream cheese hack. But here’s what I do with butter that needs to be softened after I forgot to set it out – I fill a glass pyrex measuring cup with hot (not boiling) water and lay the wrapped stick across the top; rotating it occasionally, until it is softened. It works pretty well.
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That’s a great idea!
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I like the idea of us being in a gigantic terrarium. :-)
My flowers aren’t doing as well as they did last year either, so I don’t think it has anything to do with the birds or feeders. Must be the weather.
Ha ha, my good ideas come to me as I’m driving or taking a shower, too. I’ve read about that before. It’s because that’s when we’re the most relaxed…our thoughts are more free-flowing because we’re not really DOING anything.
Salad restaurants…there was this amazing salad bar restaurant in Skokie when Brian and I were dating. We used to go there once in awhile to eat. It was a restaurant way ahead of its time with the huge variety of vegetables and even tofu, which hardly anybody ate back then. Or if they did, it wasn’t talked about. lol
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Isn’t that a wonderful idea?
My zinnias in the front (where the birds are) are doing great, but my zinnias in the back are not. Hmmm.
That’s interesting. While doing soul homework, I also come up with ideas. That usually tells me it’s time to stop. 🤣
Mellody Farm is getting a salad restaurant. We should go when it opens.
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YES! Petition the world for more salad restaurants! I cannot count the number of times I am too tired/lazy to cook and I just want a big salad and the options for procuring said salad are so limited.
My best ideas happen in the shower or while I’m out walking. Easy enough to record my thoughts on my phone when I’m walking, but not as easy to do so in the shower! Sometimes, I will get out of the shower, desperate to towel off enough and get the words out of my head onto the page and my husband or child will want to TALK TO ME. Egads!
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YES. This is how I feel exactly. About salads and ideas in showers. 🤣
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Best ideas are always in the shower. Or right as I’m drifting to sleep. Sometimes driving.
I know I should like the idea of a salad restaurant, but I’m not gonna kid myself (or you): I’d never go to it. Even though I like salad and sometimes crave it.
And about embarrassing teenagers: My grandma and her sister loved to do this–first with my mom’s generation, and then with mine. On purpose, ridiculously. I didn’t like it much at the time, but I also didn’t hate it, and now I look back on it fondly. Mine was a family of teasers, and it was always good-natured, never mean. They would crack themselves up, say things like, “Oh, why is that boy looking at Rita?” (loudly, so said boy was sure to hear) and then laugh their heads off. My mom told me that they used to cruise the teen hangout drive in, and she’d crouch down on the floor of the car so no one would see her in it. She laughs when telling that now. But I never embarrassed my kids on purpose, even when I didn’t understand why something would be SO embarrassing!
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I read that I should keep a dry erase marker in the shower, but that seems too intrusive.
I just found out a new salad/protein bowl restaurant is opening nearby. Look at me manifesting!
You’ve just brought back a vivid memory for me. My last day of sophomore year? One of my friends got her license early and was driving her father’s STATION WAGON, which had about ten of us in it. They were all aware that I had a crush on these two boys who lived next door to each other, so they drove down their street in the station wagon and began yelling their names as they walked home from school. I was sitting on the floor of the station wagon, plotting the demise of each of my friends. 🤣
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Yes, that was the spirit of my Grandma and her sister Marie! I love that you had a crush on not one boy, but two. That sounds like a scene from a John Hughes movie. :-)
Can you manifest me something good, too?
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It does! 🤣
I will manifest anything you want me to. Let me know what you want, and I’ll do my best to make it happen. 😘
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I had no idea about the cream cheese hack. I love it, but will I remember it? Probably not, because I have at least 17,000 thoughts a day.
Embarrassing anyone on purpose is not cool, kids or adults.
My terrarium is very hot right now. Can you point a fan in my direction?
I was waiting for the Eminem sample to appear in that song, and Voila!
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Tell thought number 16,999 that it needs to remind thought number 17,000 about the cream cheese hack. Pass it on…
Amen, friend.
I have a feeling that your terrarium has become foggy. Take away the lid, and the problem should be solved.
It takes some time, but it is well worth it. 🖤
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😂❤️❤️
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First of all, good for Tears For Fears!! That’s wonderful. I do hope they tour again because I’m going to make it a priority to see them. And I LOVE terrariums. Do you remember when a mini terrarium came in cereal boxes? It was just a little plastic
disc with a dome and came with a thin sponge and some seeds. I was obsessed.
It’s ironic that you mentioned salad restaurants because yesterday on the Cleveland subreddit, someone asked what Cleveland lacked and a number of people said salad restaurants!! We ate at one in Louisville last summer. It was similar to a Chipotle, where you went down a line and pointed out what you wanted on your salad. I LOVED it!
That is absolutely crazy about the Eminem sampling of that song. How cool! Do you know what year the song came out?
Hope you’re having a beautiful day, my friend! XO
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We saw them live when they opened for Hall and Oates in 2017, and they were way better than the headliner. We didn’t expect to enjoy them so much, and I loved TFF as a teenager, but that performance alone made me a huge fan. So I’m glad they’re having so much success now.
I think I remember this! The sponge and seeds brought back a long-forgotten memory!
Was it Crisp and Green? I’m hoping it’s the new local salad restaurant that’s opening here soon. 🤣
When I looked it up, it said 1975. The music nerd in me enjoyed learning about it, and I now I really like the song.
I hope you’re having a lovely day as well, my friend! 😘
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I just looked up the salad place. It’s called In Season. So good!
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I would travel to Louisville to eat there, which is ironic because my Migraine doctor moved there, and I told Mike that I was asking the Universe for a sign if I should follow him there. (Not to relocate, but for telehealth) 🤣
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I’m not a gardener, so I have no help to offer on the flowers. I usually plant some flowers but this year I planted nothing. NOTHING. What on earth?
My microwave has a cream cheese softening setting/button and I am grateful for it.
I do love a good salad menu. A whole restaurant dedicated to salads might be a hard sell to most of the men in my life. They be EATERS. ;)
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Ernie, I’m not a gardener either. So this could be the Universe telling me that I should just buy flowers next year.
I’m envious of your microwave.
If I owned a salad restaurant, I would serve both meat and dessert salads.
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I’m not sure if you’ve ever been to Sweet Tomatoes, but they were a salad restaurant chain that, sadly, went out of business when COVID hit. Which is understandable, but still a shame. We had one across the street from our apartment complex in Vancouver, WA, and would frequently walk over there for a fresh, healthy(ish), and inexpensive meal. I haven’t seen anything similar to that around here…maybe it’s a West Coast thing, because in California, we used to go to a similar salad restaurant called Fresh Choice. Which I just googled, and sadly, they went out of business in 2012.
Maybe there’s a reason we don’t see more salad restaurants…
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I’d heard of Sweet Tomatoes but never had the opportunity to visit! I think keeping salads fresh and safe is a difficult task that does not go hand in hand with fast food. Wait, did we just solve the salad restaurant mystery? 🤣
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Yeah, that’s got to be a challenge. I never thought of that before.
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Instead of creating a strategy for our demise, I hope AI can develop sanitizing features that make salad restaurants a thing.
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It would finally be useful for something!
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Amen.
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