Updates

It's been over a month now since I last posted. I can't believe October is half over. I still have remnants of my last pedicure back in August, a flower painted on each of my big toes. The other eight look like crap tho, in various states of peeling of the polish. The sandals have since been packed off into their box on the closet shelf for the long winter.

Dad has been in a nursing home for almost three weeks now, a result of yet another trip to the hospital right before that. I've been visiting every day, twice on weekends, and sometimes leave with tears streaming down my face. On a good day, dad can get up from bed by himself and remembers where he is. Mostly he's had bad days tho, where he needs help to dress, bath, and eat. The big one is going to the bathroom, cause dad is now incontinent and need to "go" sometimes every ten minutes whether the staff can get to him or not. Cleanup in Room 6!!

He has been declining mentally since he's been there, and getting weaker instead of stronger, so I decided to bring him home this week and try to set up outside help to come and care for him and Ma in their house. This has been an uphill battle because Ma doesn't feel it is necessary. In her demented state, she sees nothing wrong with having a dirty house, wet bed, and an open bucket of urine sitting in the living room. She can't smell the odor that has permeated the place for months.

The plan is to bring dad home Thursday, have the state caseworker there in the afternoon to open his case, and get some help in the next day. I badgered my brother to come up from Florida to help, and it so happens that he has business in the area again, so he'll agree to fly up (paid for by the expense account) and give my one full day!! I've asked him to stay an extra one to help out and he hasn't gotten back to me yet. Yes, resentment is simmering, no, let's say boiling beneath the surface.

So to say I've been stressed out is to put it mildly. I got on the scale this morning, but didn't need it to tell me I've gained seven pounds in the last two months. Just trying to find a pair of pants to fit me each morning is enough of an indication. I'd given away all be "bigger" clothes last year and bought a slew of smaller ones, and I refuse to start buying a larger size again. I'm tired of this see-saw weight gain-loss-gain.

So, I found something to help with the stress, Éiriú Eolas, which is an ancient breathing technique that can bring about a calm and relaxed state of mind.

Today, the Mister and I plus a friend are off to Ma and Pa's house to try and get dad's room ready for a hospital bed to be delivered this week, and steam clean the carpets to try and get the smell out of them so a care-giver won't run screaming out the door. I told Ma yesterday we were coming and she said no, we can't work on a Sunday.

I will not listen to her. Bad daughter!!
meditqtion, Blog, health, Life, aging, rants, Rants,

Labor Day musings

Rain, rain. After a beautiful week of blue sky and sunshine, all of which I spent inside a building staring at my cubical walls, blah. At least my car stayed clean for a stretch of time. The peeps I go to lunch with make fun of me cause my car interior doesn't have shit strewn everywhere. Each time one of them drives, we have to stand in the parking lot for five minutes while they move shoes, boxes, bags, food wrappers, etc., out of the way to unearth a space to sit.

Sheesh, I can't live like that. I have two umbrellas and smaller version of The Club under my front seat. That's it. I don't even use The Club, I've had it for over 10 years and just keep moving it from car to car whenever I get a new one. My theory is that I can use it as a weapon to bash somebody if I have to. The second umbrella is in case I left the first one someplace else the last time it rained.

I've figured out that I have to have neatness and order in my personal surroundings to offset the lack of control I have over other aspects of my life. That's why I get so bugged out when the house is dirty, which is the majority of the time. Now, there are variations of "dirty" I realize. So perhaps mine is "dirty lite." Mostly the ubiquitous dust, and pieces of cat litter strewn hither and yon by the mad excavation of the litterbox when Blue is ultra digging mode.

And clutter. When you get two people squeezed into a small, two bedroom townhouse, and one is a musician with all accompanying gear, and the other one a packrat, well, you get the picture. To credit moi, when The Mister painted the garage floor a week ago, I actually threw out some of the stuff I'd had stored from my office at the old building. After a year I've come to grips with the reality that I'll never have an office again (at least with this employer) and got rid of the wall decorations that I've no room for here at the house and was tired of bumping into every time I go in the garage.

So all this doesn't really have anything to do with Labor Day, except I'm off work and had a few minutes to write this.
Blog, Life, Humor,Rants,

Weapons Attack

It's been awhile, hasn't it? I've been consumed with tending to my elderly parents during the last month. I don't want to get into it again here, I could write for days and it just gets me all worked up.

So. I can't believe summer is over. To me, summer ends on September 1, I don't care what the calendar says. The days are getting shorter, the evenings cooler.

Speaking of daylight, read this:

Israeli brutality in broad daylight: A chemical weapon attack on Palestinian school children

These photos, taken a few months ago, record in detail an Israeli attack on a Palestinian school, an attack using white phosphorus: White phosphorous is a colorless to yellow translucent wax-like substance with a pungent, garlic-like smell. The form used by the military is highly energetic (active) and ignites once it is exposed to oxygen. White phosphorus is a pyrophoric material (it is spontaneously flammable). When exposed to air, it spontaneously ignites and rapidly oxidizes to phosphorus pentoxide. Such heat is produced by this reaction that the element bursts into a yellow flame and produces a dense white smoke. This chemical reaction continues until either all the material is consumed or the element is deprived of oxygen. White phosphorus results in painful and deep chemical burn injuries. Rapid dermal penetration occurs once particles are embedded under the skin. Incandescent particles of white phosphorous may produce extensive burns. The particles continue to burn unless deprived of atmospheric oxygen. Weapons containing white phosphorous are particularly nasty because it continues to burn until it disappears, often burning right down to the bone.[...]

Those kids won't be returning to school in September.
News, Blog, Politics, Israel, Humor, chemical weapons, brutality, Media,

Bad food

So once again I'm struggling with food issues. Yeah, that's pretty boring, you may as well stop reading now. There's this book that's been recommended to me, The UltraSimple Diet that I just can't seem to follow. Maybe because there are so very limited things in it that one can eat. Maybe cause I hate to cook. Maybe because I'm addicted to sugar and/or carbs. Maybe cause I eat when I'm bored, stressed, happy, depressed, you name it.

While I'm surely "toxic and inflamed" I am not ready to live on brown rice and veggies. Omit the brown rice if you want to follow some other heath guru's advice and eliminate all grains. Or what about not eating broccoli and cauliflower because they can inhibit your thyroid? Or not eating any kind of peppers 0r mushrooms because they are nightshades and moldy mushrooms contribute to systemic candida?

No eggs, no dairy. There goes breakfast. Nothing out of a box. Nothing prepared commercially. There goes going out to lunch or dinner, which is my main social activity with friends. Some days all I have to look forward to is what I put in my mouth.

So I would not have been able to eat a thing at the surprise 50th birthday party for a friend that we attended yesterday. And I won't be able to eat a thing next week at the picnic my brother-in-law is having for his son who is home from Iraq.

I don't know that I can do this or live this way. My brother has diabetes. He once said that if he has to live his life without eating sweets, it's not worth it. For me, it's not just the sweets. But pizza, pasta, ketchup, cheese, kettle corn, oh geeze.

If I can't eat that stuff, what's the use of living? :-/

Blog, Life, Rants,

My "garden"

Well, I had my hearing in traffic court last week, in regard to the speeding ticket I received over Memorial Day weenend. I took the advice I was given and wore a dress. The judge took away my four points, and reduced the fine a whole $32. I'm grateful for that, I guess, even tho a gal in my department a month earlier had her points removed and entire fine refunded. But hey, she's about 25 years younger and wore spike heels.

Can't believe it's almost August, I think I still have the ice scraper in my backseat. This July has certainly been weird, weather wise. I'm not complaining, I had really great weather on my week off, and I like it cooler. Back in April, I'd started some zinnias from seed in little pots that I had to keep on my coffee table in front of the patio doors for over two months since I don't have any windowsills. To show you how dumb I was, I didn't realize you weren't supposed to take them out of the little egg crate thingies they were growing in when you planted them. I'm amazed they took, let alone grew! But they are kicking ass now! See the pic above left.

The Mister has become the Garden Nazi, after living here eleven years, he's finally decided to take an interest in the outside, and has pruned and trimmed all the bushes, weeded the beds, laid stepping stones, redid the rocks around the border, and spread dirt. All of a sudden, he thinks the outside should look the way he wants it, but I'm the one who planted everything. We live in a townhouse, on the end, so there's only so much space available.

Actually, the Mister is downstairs making breakfast now, the kitchen is so small that only person at a time can move around in it, so I'm better off staying out of the way, but I gotta go make coffee...

Blog, Life,

Recap

Well, back to work on Monday. I spent the last week on a leisurely Staycation. Did some shopping and got some summer clothes on sale cause you know the winter coats are coming out any second now. Went to the movies and did lunch with friends, got a mani-pedi, all pretty low key. By Friday tho, I started getting anxious again, knowing my time off is now over and it's back to work. That soul-sucking, daily endeavor to put a roof over my head and (way too much) food in my belly.

The problem with being off move than just a weekend is that you begin to see what happens in the world on a daily basis while you are staring at the walls of your cubicle day after day, and kinda get to liking it. And just when you get used to not getting up at O'Dark Thirty each day... Bam, it's over and you're back in the Matrix.

Speaking of the Matrix, what's up with Palin?

Is Palin failin' or moving on to bigger and better things?

Independence Day weekend in the US started with fireworks. Political fireworks. Former Republican Vice Presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, was not content to see Michael Jackson's death nor the infidelities of fellow conservative hypocri..er...politicians get all the media attention. On Friday she had to go drop a bombshell about her resignation. Both naysayers and rabid Palin supporters were surprised to hear that she was stepping down as governor of Alaska.

The Conservative supporters seem to have been caught unaware, so much so, that they did not have an immediate talking point at hand, to explain it all away. Initial reactions to her announcement ranged from puzzlement to dismay to applause. The Sarah Palin blog lists a few. However, in the space of a few hours, the usual Conservative pundits managed to come up with those handy talking points.[...]

News, Blog, Politics, Life, Sarah Palin, Current Affairs, Media, Religion,

Ouch!

What's new? Well, my traffic court date is July 15. I managed to drive for 37 years and not get a speeding ticket, now I'm so paranoid I see cops everywhere and look at my speedometer every thirty seconds or so.

Last Saturday I almost put out my left eye. It was the Groundhog's fault. He's hiding under my deck and eating my flowers, along with the bleeping deer. The Mister and I were out measuring to see how much we'd need to put a fence around the flowers, I was standing on one end of the tape measure. See, I have several of these little green metal trellis-y things stuck among the flowers to brace them up and yup, you guessed it. Trellis green, flower stems green, me dunbass didn't see it and bent over and impaled myself on one of the spikes.

Man, it hit me about a half-inch below my eye. *shudder* Now, a week later, I still look like I got beat up, don't know how long it will take for the bruise to go away and I'll probably have a scar. We went out to dinner and a movie with another couple and I didn't even think to explain, they probably thought the Mister had popped me one.

This being Father's Day, we're going to make a visit to Ma and Pa's. Pa isn't doing real well, he can hardly walk now and has to pee every twenty minutes. Since he usually can't make it from the recliner in the living room to the toilet in the bathroom, he's been keeping an old paint can beside the recliner. Ugg. The living room is carpet, and I know it's not all going in the paint can. The house still smells from one of dad's accidents months ago after he took three tablespoons of caster oil for constipation. Since they can't smell anything, they think I'm crazy for wanting to have the carpets ripped up. *sigh*

I could go on and on but I don't want to go there, it just gets me all worked up. So, speaking of getting worked up, have you seen this one?

Oh-oh! Politicians share personality traits with serial killers: Study
Using his law enforcement experience and data drawn from the FBI's behavioral analysis unit, Jim Kouri has collected a series of personality traits common to a couple of professions.
Kouri, who's a vice president of the National Assn. of Chiefs of Police, has assembled traits such as superficial charm, an exaggerated sense of self-worth, glibness, lying, lack of remorse and manipulation of others.

These traits, Kouri points out in his analysis, are common to psychopathic serial killers.

But -- and here's the part that may spark some controversy and defensive discussion -- these traits are also common to American politicians. (Maybe you already suspected.) [...]

News, Blog, Politics, Life, Humor, Current Affairs, Rants, Media, serial killers,