tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4853028414329069612024-02-19T04:41:27.625-08:00Life is Just a Bowel of CherriesOrdie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.comBlogger40125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-64876803307767291922010-11-13T10:58:00.000-08:002010-11-13T12:43:42.653-08:00Home<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEr0zCwSa6KU-BzKRI1gmhR4HfO15Dmz_STFbNQgmTwlZvk8UkiT5x11dMnpO_YFGFhUeakzO8mu5C-5c5oMa0pNmyEkTV9PEtl8u23V_3yJ_-050NhqPDFfUmJfa00DxkwGIfUVYU-wk/s1600/IMG_1061.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEr0zCwSa6KU-BzKRI1gmhR4HfO15Dmz_STFbNQgmTwlZvk8UkiT5x11dMnpO_YFGFhUeakzO8mu5C-5c5oMa0pNmyEkTV9PEtl8u23V_3yJ_-050NhqPDFfUmJfa00DxkwGIfUVYU-wk/s320/IMG_1061.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539132583121320258" border="0" /></a><br />We went to Nebraska last week for my Aunt Maggi's 90th birthday party. All my cousins came in from Illinois and my sisters were both there from out of state. It was good to see everybody.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhclhcBsM_nStmrZ8BYGCaX9sHv0ZOCqcTfBABdNQGitU-Ahg8j0FHsr-hgWcROuSUKQvHJxWj2gWB0S0E1gRjhCNvlBs1RXgz4CX13JSkrRvhC3MYveM66Ic-p7Ah1Wjk7GCH5a0HyxmA/s1600/IMG_0971.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhclhcBsM_nStmrZ8BYGCaX9sHv0ZOCqcTfBABdNQGitU-Ahg8j0FHsr-hgWcROuSUKQvHJxWj2gWB0S0E1gRjhCNvlBs1RXgz4CX13JSkrRvhC3MYveM66Ic-p7Ah1Wjk7GCH5a0HyxmA/s320/IMG_0971.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539128804206386690" border="0" /></a><br /><br />On the way up, I listened to a lot of Eckhart Tolle's <span style="font-style: italic;">A New Earth</span> and was feeling all Zenned up by the time I got to Lincoln.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4PN0KNlJzjfmKIr_I__X1jkBYmIl41ziBpKBYRBLB6bPEzj71MpPzi9Ru2IrQRdbFpmkEVQCezVrlM0MckafcV0gSujhGYd_MxVQIxQIt80O-d27zexHEllW_iSRTw0RoF7JHZXPMoZ0/s1600/IMG_0965.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4PN0KNlJzjfmKIr_I__X1jkBYmIl41ziBpKBYRBLB6bPEzj71MpPzi9Ru2IrQRdbFpmkEVQCezVrlM0MckafcV0gSujhGYd_MxVQIxQIt80O-d27zexHEllW_iSRTw0RoF7JHZXPMoZ0/s320/IMG_0965.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539128794222998946" border="0" /></a><br />It took about 2 hours to be catapulted back into age 10. The older the both of us get, the more capable my mother is of making me feel inappropriate. Maybe I am gaining some enlightenment by virtue of the fact that I can see what's going on, for a change. I dunno but I handed my personal remote control to each of the family members, respectively, to allow them to push however many buttons they desired. And I reacted. Only, not really. I restrained myself.<br /><br />At one point, I looked across the room and Freddy was staring back at me, wide-eyed like he was fixing to see a shanking when my mother hissed an admonishment regarding her "good china". I had simply pointed out that she had, mistakenly I assumed, placed the "good dishes" under the plants she'd brought in off the porch and which now sat on the livingroom floor. Each with a good plate underneath the pot.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBl6haGK_K5cahvuAbszYqWFX78eBTgBcjfYXkBvShCZ5f7m3SPLu3tla8s0W2Nr-jphPW1fhyphenhyphen9VKQ_bnnfdUwudLsWR3BNIslh-Tebi_ktPRRyslM2K84-2QDun7FOw-9wpdif5lulKk/s1600/Milk+Glass+Plates.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBl6haGK_K5cahvuAbszYqWFX78eBTgBcjfYXkBvShCZ5f7m3SPLu3tla8s0W2Nr-jphPW1fhyphenhyphen9VKQ_bnnfdUwudLsWR3BNIslh-Tebi_ktPRRyslM2K84-2QDun7FOw-9wpdif5lulKk/s320/Milk+Glass+Plates.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539136445814788146" border="0" /></a><br /><br />"Those aren't 'good dishes'," she spat. "I'm putting them through the dishwasher as often as I can to get the gold to come off them so I can use them in the microwave." And then, in case I didn't get the point, "I was mad at your Dad when he brought them home in the first place."<br /><br />And you have to know me to understand the effect these words had on me. I adore old things. I can't afford good antiques but I frequent "junk" stores whenever possible. Last year after the tornado hit our town (and our house) I made a trip to Nebraska early that summer, stopping at jillions of antique stores. I know now that I was in a grief reaction, reacting to the loss of so many old houses and huge trees in our town, but I loaded my car with antiques that trip. It started when I went to local junk stores in search of a stained glass window to replace the one destroyed in our bathroom. I discovered I felt safe surrounded by all that old stuff that'd survived for so many years and felt that maybe everything wasn't gone, after all.<br /><br />Interestingly, that summer in Nebraska, I didn't buy just old things but old <span style="font-style: italic;">kitchen</span> things, things that looked like the ones we'd had when I was a kid. The meaning of that isn't lost on me. A tin flour scoop like my Grandma used when baking. A set of brushed aluminum canisters. A pair of heavy kitchen shears like my Grandma's. A pink, metal cake carrier that I took an ass chewing from my mother about even then. The stuff made me feel safe. And like I had some control over my life. Which of course I wasn't and didn't. But it was worth a hundred bucks or so to get some relief for a short time.<br /><br />So to disrespect family glassware to me is to spit in my face. And crazy or not on my part, my mom knows that when she does it. And that's why she does it. And that breaks my heart. I know she's old and I'm lucky to have her around to irritate me but it still hurts.<br /><br />So lots of stuff like that on this trip, old family dysfunction, and I feel a little beat up right now. And not anxious to go back anytime soon. And I think I'm gonna quit inviting my mom to come live with us. I may have to face the fact that she and I are not compatible and leave her to my sister or brother to take care of her. As much as I'd like to be the kind of selfless person who takes care of their aging parents, I may have to throw the flag on having her under my roof.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgu2mlAPK5Ik7GG1cefmYVjYpkS_Vf-QWL7wO9Gvx7ou3oX5kUGsqxkU3CkhbswNSTv-FUhdX3SgW8YpbL2KMNJxPMOs1IqVq7Bsv2whcF318jjskm8AX8WSoetEBGR2Vo7HLEuInmCGjk/s1600/Fall+2010+032.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgu2mlAPK5Ik7GG1cefmYVjYpkS_Vf-QWL7wO9Gvx7ou3oX5kUGsqxkU3CkhbswNSTv-FUhdX3SgW8YpbL2KMNJxPMOs1IqVq7Bsv2whcF318jjskm8AX8WSoetEBGR2Vo7HLEuInmCGjk/s320/Fall+2010+032.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539128780283766962" border="0" /></a><br />Still, it's nice to be back in the midwest where church people go to eat at the taverns in little towns after church on Sundays.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhPhpK1sOW5srq-ZdiiRP34KVurRFlhAMQSx1f9gGBuKaHwnfrQw_YF_6aoSSZ4wXO0sd6pWIsVyEA5qVKTOI7NP98siH3XC1hGehyphenhyphenotAecxN-xcaITFHCxBk-fgW0dhvrW0SDLFkluOs/s1600/IMG_1065.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhPhpK1sOW5srq-ZdiiRP34KVurRFlhAMQSx1f9gGBuKaHwnfrQw_YF_6aoSSZ4wXO0sd6pWIsVyEA5qVKTOI7NP98siH3XC1hGehyphenhyphenotAecxN-xcaITFHCxBk-fgW0dhvrW0SDLFkluOs/s320/IMG_1065.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539132588419095426" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyP_8wjcsyGj6CL5Wbn1pNemFO-nt0rl4u46wK2u6VsWvKptl73cwChTooR7abewrNBWLONT0HKs4O7kPLM-nqGMIGCfjHFileMy4GQqVDH_80ZLzKy3MIQWd2fPX27nLrpj2_Hq1WPps/s1600/Fall+2010+046.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyP_8wjcsyGj6CL5Wbn1pNemFO-nt0rl4u46wK2u6VsWvKptl73cwChTooR7abewrNBWLONT0HKs4O7kPLM-nqGMIGCfjHFileMy4GQqVDH_80ZLzKy3MIQWd2fPX27nLrpj2_Hq1WPps/s320/Fall+2010+046.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5539128788754094450" border="0" /></a>Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-81555209483676602082010-11-01T16:02:00.000-07:002010-11-01T17:55:36.248-07:00Otter MemoriesMy experience with drumming started in 1997 when I attended a retreat at the home of a friend's. She asked myself and another woman to come and do a segment talking about our experience in 12-step groups. I wasn't into what I then referred to as the New Age bullshit my friend was all about but we went and spoke. After we spoke, another woman did a segment on Native American spirituality. She did a guided meditation that she called a "journey" in which we traveled to the top of a mountain and met an animal who brought us a lesson. She told us stories and<br /><br />I can't remember what we did first but at one point we "drummed". They had several handheld drums there for those without a drum of their own. And in the dimly lit livingroom of that big, rough-cut lumber house in the woods in Arkansas, that group of women drummed together. It was just a simple rhythm but all in unison and as I drummed along with them something profound happened to me. I still don't really know what it was. The power of being in rhythm with all of those other women. The same heartbeat, as I later learned the drum beat signifies. I don't know what it was but I was totally hooked. In a time, that woman, Lyn, and a couple other women and myself began to meet once a month at Lyn's house in the woods nearby. But first I gotta tell you about Lyn.<br /><br />Lyn is larger than life. A female John Wayne. She is tall but it's not that that makes her stand out. She has long, thick, beautiful, now gray hair worn in the traditional butt cut so favored by us older gals. Her eyes are a peircing gray-blue color. I'm not sure of her heritage. She claims Irish and Native American though she looks as Irish as Mickey Rooney (he <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> Irish, right?). But she has a presence. Just something that takes your breath away when you see her. Her spirit, I guess it is.<br /><br />She lived, as I said, in the woods in a log house her husband and she built themselves as in, cut the trees down and skidded them out of the woods and skinned the logs, etc. They take off work every year for the entire month of November to hunt and it is during this time that they stock up all the meat they'll use the coming year. On their property, they had a combination art studio and woodworking shop out of which came the most beautiful creations. They could do anything. There wasn't a thing those two couldn't do. One time at another get together, one of the gals in the drumming group asked if anybody had heard from Lyn. Another gal spoke up, "Yeah, I called her today. She was skinning a bear."<br /><br />She was my hero. And I wasn't alone. The group slowly grew. Women were drawn from all different directions and stations in life. And everyone who was suppose to be there, was there. I never missed it except once in October when the moon was full and the sky was incredible and I was on frigging vacation somewhere. I swore I'd never again miss one. Just to know people like that existed was a privelege. I adored them. We'd have a huge potluck before the drummings and she'd always cook something scrumptuous like beans only they weren't like any beans you ever ate before. Or elk or deer or black-eyed pea cornbread that made you wanna slap your mama. We'd all cut up and laugh and tell smart-ass jokes and then we went to the livingroom in front of the fireplace or, and this was my absolute favorite, outside to the fire pit.<br /><br />Someone would smudge us, usually the one who cried so much. "Woman Who Cries", we called her for fun. She would light a bundle of ceremonial white sage and then blow it out, keeping it smoldering and, one by one using a fan of turkey feathers, she fanned the smoke over our bodies from head to toe, back to front to cleanse us and prepare us for communion with God which we called "Grandfather". And once the smudging began, no more fooling around. We fell silent because it was sacred time. Sometimes Lyn would lightly beat a rhythm on her large, Buffalo drum while we waited for the rest to prepare themselves.<br /><br />Then, all smudged and sitting around a circle one by one we voiced our prayers and whose ever turn it was, would begin the drumming. We all used the same rhythm except once in a while a new person would come and do something different. But whatever the rhythm, the rest would join in and drum along with them, carrying our prayers to heaven on the sage smoke. We moved around the circle, continuing until everybody had said all the prayers they had and then we quit. Most times, and again this was my absolutely favorite thing in the world, at some point in the night Lyn would say, "Okay ladies, get comfortable" and that meant to grab a pillow or something to use to lie on the floor with your eyes closed because she was getting ready to do a lesson. It was always an Indian story about the roots of a pine tree versus an oak tree or about the directions or some woodland animal and they all carried lesson. I found out later, despite the fact that the lessons were structured and organized, she rarely knew what she was going to say until the words came out of her mouth.<br /><br />Of course, Lyn had made her own drum beater. The stick was wrapped in leather that was cut into long fringes. At the ends of each fringe she'd attached little hollow metal balls and when she referred to the rain or a storm in a story, she'd rattle those fringes over the drum and it sounded like rain hitting something. It was absolutely magical.<br /><br />Sometimes I'd bring my guitar and sing songs that seemed to me to fall far short of the mark but that everyone at least pretended to enjoy. Woman Who Cries started leaving early when I got my guitar out and I developed a little paranoia about that and quit bringing it but it was nice for me when I did.<br /><br />The evolving group had many different souls and belief systems and all were welcomed. Each month someone could, if they wished, do a presentation to teach about their spiritual beliefs. One gal did a lesson on Buddism explaining what it was and how she applied it to her life, etc. Another did Judism. I shared about AA.<br /><br />Sometimes Lyn had communion. Most nights, we'd ask if anyone wanted to "sit in the middle" which meant to sit in a chair in the middle of the circle and have us pray over them. In my head I called it "laying on of hands" because some of us touched the subject as they sat in the chair. Some nights we'd do two or three women. It was a beautiful time.<br /><br />Every square inch of her home was decorated with something beautifully Lyn. The whole place reeked of she and her husband's talent and respect for the land and for God. Just being on the place felt like going back in time. I honestly felt like I had a glimpse into another place and time. When they killed a deer, she took tobacco out of a leather pouch she carried around her neck and did a blessing and thanked Grandfather and the spirit of the deer, for the sacrifice made for them.<br /><br />Lyn's belief in God was palpable. She was one of those people who don't ever seem to have any doubts. She just lived and breathed belief. And so did I, back then. It was so easy to believe when you looked into those big, blue eyes. The earnestness. The integrity. And somehow, she gave me and all of us hope. Somehow. That's why we all love her so damn much.<br /><br /><br />We patterned ourselves after a group of Native American women Lyn told us about who lived around the turn of the century called The Otter Society. They gathered together to pray for each other and the country and leaders and, like us, anything and everything. And they did healings. So we called ourselves The Otter Sisters.<br /><br />Occasionally, we'd meet somewhere else. Once we met at a nearby falls in a recreation area and drummed. We often met for a sunrise "service" on Easter morning or the day before, and we'd drum in the sunrise together up on some mountain in the cold mist, usually.<br /><br />I don't know what happened. Things changed. The group got really big for a short time and there were lots of new people. Some of them, I didn't like and I don't think I was alone. But when a group gets big like that, it can't be all things to all people.<br /><br />All I can say is that we all went in a little different directions. Or maybe it was just me. And I wish it was different. I miss those times so much.<br /><br />Sometimes in the middle of a drumming, Lyn would walk by and throw a big handful of white sage into the campfire and I can't begin to tell you what that smell does to you. It just shoots you off on a rocket to the 1800s, or something. I still carry a little smudge stick of white sage in my vehicle and often light it while driving in the woods. The smell takes me back to that log house in the woods and that campfire and those women beating those drums under the moon and more stars than you've ever seen in your life.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-31205127667138141552010-10-16T14:33:00.001-07:002010-10-16T15:01:06.231-07:00Sucks to Be MeI'm sort of ambling around, aimlessly today. Yesterday was my last day of work at my job. I was <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">surprised</span> how hard it was to leave. The people I worked with in our local office, as well as our regional supervisor, are phenomenal. I don't think I've ever worked with a better bunch of gals. And nobody irritated me, not one of them.<br /><br />Four weeks of notice is too long. I can change my mind 90 times in four weeks. When I got up yesterday I wasn't sure I wouldn't call my supervisor sometime during the day and tell her I'd changed my mind and wanted to stay. And even now, I get a funny, panicky feeling when I realize I no longer have a key to the office and can't drop in up there to make a copy or fax something anytime I want to. Weird.<br /><br />There seems to be a thing in my brain that makes me focus, not on what is possible in the current situation, but whatever is no longer possible. A glass half empty sort of glitch in my psychic wiring. I've always been like this. So instead of the euphoria I'd anticipated at the ending of the commitment to a full-time job that felt tremendously meaningless while performing it, I now wander around the house wondering what to do with myself.<br /><br />I didn't sleep well last night. I recall waking up once with the image of one of my co-workers in my head, followed by an overwhelming sense of loss at the realization that I won't be working with her, any longer. I won't be walking over to that desk to visit with her on Monday. I wish I was different, I really do. And yet, maybe this is a normal grief reaction. I'm not confused about missing the work I did. Or of being a part of the organization I worked for. But there's a kind of Steel Magnolias-type of commaraderie inherent with a group of women in an office. And I miss that when it's not a part of my life.<br /><br />So, as usual, I have no idea who, what or where I actually want to be in this life. Back in July when planning all of this, I vowed to be ready when October rolled around. I would have a solid business plan backed financially by a sizable savings account. And oddly enough, it's not the money I'm worried about. I'll easily make a living and I do have a little savings. But it's a Catch-22. When I'm in a full-time position, I want to be dead. I honestly start thinking about how nice it might be to be struck down in the street by a FedEx truck (they're bound to have good insurance) rendered disabled and forced to stay home and blog all day. And I know my true path lies in some such vocation. But the second I'm released from this commitment of mainstream employment and free to pursue my "dream life", I turn into a tearful, needy, lost soul, longing for socialization. I didn't expect this, I don't know, depression? I expected euphoria.<br /><br />I've probably picked the wrong day to quit eating sugar.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-2536427177170173102010-09-23T20:32:00.000-07:002010-09-23T20:33:25.751-07:00CountdownI made it through my last supervisor's meeting and board of director's meeting. It's all down hill from here. I have tomorrow and 3 more weeks after that until the divorce is final on me and full-time employment. Tomorrow is casual Friday and I'm off on Monday. I'm gonna rock this.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-5108731570314823402010-09-22T20:03:00.000-07:002010-09-22T20:06:40.777-07:00ArghGod, I'm tired. I'm so tired, I dreaded taking a shower and washing my hair tonight. I had 5 hours of sleep last night and the boss was in the office all day long, today. I do like her, though. She's like me, only smarter. I took 3 Valerian and a Melatonin before my shower and now I need to go to bed. The supervisor's meeting is tomorrow. Just shoot me, fuck it.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-68286657283769507232010-09-22T02:59:00.001-07:002010-09-22T03:30:54.303-07:00Is Anybody Out There?I don't believe in God the way I used to. It wasn't a conscious decision, it just sort of evolved. I used to be very sure what I thought in that area and now I'm not sure, anymore. More on that in a later post but for now, just know that He (She? The Universe?) came through for me, yesterday.<br /><br />As I said before, I quit my job Monday. I put in my 2 weeks notice and then found out I had to give 4 weeks because I'm such a big deal in the office, so that's what I did. I love to quit jobs. It's my favorite thing about work. But I still second guess myself a little, no matter how bad I hate the job I happen to be quitting at the time. <br /><br />So yesterday I'm driving to work and I start praying. I say, "God, please show me if I'm doing the right thing". It's a weird thing about sort of brushing the edge of agnosticism, in my case anyway. I just decide that I can allow myself to consider the fact that I might not believe in God anymore because I have so many doubts and see so many conflicts in that whole arena, and the next thing I know, I'm praying. It should also be mentioned that it's then, that moment I allow myself to consider not believing anymore, that I feel a warm Presence right next to me. I mean really feel it. Not on my skin but a strong sense of it's presence. Like maybe my own having to understand it all is distancing me from Him. So I still pray and I did so yesterday on the way to work.<br /><br />About 10 minutes before noon, my boss calls me and says she's headed down (our corporate office is 85 miles away) and to have Nurse X in the office when she gets there. Nurse X is a model employee. She's been there for 20 years full-time, longer if you count her part-time years. Never a hint of a problem out of her. Builds up huge banks of paid time off and loses it every year rather than take it and go on a vacation. Does anything you ask her to do. Never a write up in 20+ years. Always hands in her paperwork on time without being asked. I couldn't figure out what was going on, and neither could anyone else.<br /><br />My boss arrived at 1pm accompanied by the HR person. They called Nurse X into my office and fired her. They had a "disciplinary action" form with some off-the-wall, straw grabbing bullshit cited on it, made her sign it and walked her out to her desk to pack her belongings. No warning.<br /><br />I have my theories what it was about and none of them have anything to do with her. Corporate bullshit's what it boils down to. Economics. My boss and HR knew it, too. They looked like they were about to throw up. I sat there and cried while they did it. The whole thing took about 30 minutes. When I walked her out to her vehicle I told her to get a lawyer. She asked me what can a lawyer could do. I said, "Just get one. He'll tell you."<br /><br />You can imagine what the office was like the rest of the day. After my boss left, we all sat around in a daze and tried to figure out what to do with it in our heads. Tried to figure out who's going to do her work. Wondering what has happened to fairness and just-ness.<br /><br />Guess that answered <span style="font-style: italic;">that </span>question.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-61487807762466194022010-09-19T10:50:00.000-07:002010-09-20T18:08:25.125-07:00Cephalalgia SentimentsI'm having headaches almost every day. It's gone on for about 2 1/2 months and I'm beginning to decompensate. I've quit taking my hormones in case they were contributing. Then I quit my St. John's Wort. Then the suicidal ideation began. Just a little, I mean. Is it wrong to hope it's a brain tumor?<br /><br />I went to a headache clinic last week. It was sort of my worst nightmare in terms of western medicine in that the doctor was clearly not an advocate of alternative medicine nor a student of nutrition. We're gonna do these tests and give you this medication and you may forget what to call a ballpoint pen but you'll still know what it is, so don't worry.<br /><br />Um, no thanks.<br /><br />I'm gonna quit my job tomorrow, instead. I've been thinking about it for a long time. I had a concrete plan and then tried to talk myself out of it. All these jobs are like my ex-husband. If he had been all bad, it would've been so easy. Same thing here. I'm hoping the headaches will quit when I do.<br /><br />The other day at work I thought about getting my purse and keys and leaving and driving to Walmart and buying a bunch of real basic clothes, jeans, t-shirts, cotton underwear, socks and boots, some drinking water and food and driving out to our cabin, throwing my cell phone(s) out the window on the way and just staying forever. I figured Freddy would eventually find me and when he did I'd tell him I'm staying there and whatever he wanted to do would be fine. Stay, go, sell the house and cars, declare bankruptcy, I don't care, but I wasn't leaving. I have a wringer washer and tubs out there. Mental note: add clothesline to the Walmart list.<br /><br />I get a little excited sometimes when I hear about someone committing suicide because I think, if they had stopped just short of kicking the stool out from under their feet or pulling the trigger or swallowing the pills and had, instead, taken that desperation and applied it to something else, what might have happened? How magical could their lives have turned out? I think we paint ourselves into a corner, thinking we have to be a certain way and when we aren't, we refuse to consider alternatives because they don't fit our idea of what life was suppose to be like. So we redouble our efforts and fight against our inner voice and sometimes, we kill ourselves. Or we drink. Or take Vicodin enemas. Or we have migraine headaches. It's not that I don't know what's going on here.<br /><br />So what is my alternative on the way to climbing up onto the stool with the cord around my neck? What do <span style="font-style: italic;">I </span>do, instead? I guess I quit the best job I've ever had because even it doesn't please me. I'm telling you the truth, if I lived in a big city where nobody knew me, I'd apply for a job as a dishwasher and when I got sick of it I'd go get another one. Or I'd clean houses for a living. I used to do that and I miss it a lot. I was really good at it, like massage therapy. So far, those seem to be my gifts. And what if they are? What if that's it? Would pissing away my nursing license in favor of cleaning houses and doing massages for the rest of my life really be that much worse than working in a good paying, respectable job wondering how much longer I was gonna be able to fight the urge to cut my throat?<br /><br />In 2002 I was working two ER nursing jobs and drowning in credit card debt. I felt like I was running as fast as I could and could still feel myself losing ground. I knew I wasn't going to be able to keep up the pace and I didn't know how I was going to pay off my debts without losing my house as a result. I started waking up in the middle of the night scared to death thinking about it. In the Spring, I got bronchitis and had to be off work for a week. I was very ill sleeping 20 hours a day. It was during that week, finally getting some rest and being able to think for a change, that I figured out what to do: quit my full-time, lowest paying job of the two and increase my hours at the part-time, higher paying one. It was simple but I couldn't figure it out until I was forced out of the game for a week. They call pneumonia the old man's friend. Bronchitis is sorta like that for me.<br /><br />It's a frightening prospect, following your heart. It's not like there's any evidence it's gonna turn out okay. It's more like stepping out of a 6th story window and trusting you'll figure something out on the way down.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-58951618278668666212010-05-17T19:43:00.000-07:002010-05-17T20:27:16.521-07:00Milky WayI spent the entire day yesterday and a lot of Saturday writing in my journal. It's how I process life and when I can't do that, I don't cope so well. <br /><br />I wrote and wrote and wrote just stuff in my head. Stuff I'm thinking about and haven't had the time to assimilate. And I brainstormed on scratch paper various scenerios; jobs, budgets, lifestyles, plans, cabins, gardens. I got it all out. All the stuff that's been building up. I'm like Hazel's rooster.<br /><br />When I first moved to Arkansas and met my friend, Hazel, and once I got a telephone, Hazel and I use to talk on the phone for hours at a time while we crocheted or embroidered or lapquilted together in our respective homes. We'd often talk 4 hours at a time covering all the bases in the process. One such night she told me this story. <br /><br />She had a rooster who stood, she said, by the door to the henhouse at night and as the hens were going in to roost and he'd "screw every one of them" as they passed through the door. She confided, "If I thought I had that shit to look forward to every night I'd kill myself". Clearly not a student of anatomy and physiology, she claimed that before she got the hens, the rooster was so full of "come" that it backed up and turned his eyes all milky-looking. Hazel's from Texas, if that helps at all.<br /><br />Anyhow, my eyes get all metaphorically milky when I can't journal and I cleared that up, to a degree, this weekend. Wrote it all out, cleared the air, wiped the slate clean, purged myself. A mental colon cleanse, if you will. Today, driving to a meeting 80 miles away, I realized what I do, a lot. <br /><br />I know what I want to do. I know the life I want. I don't need to brainstorm or journal or undergo hypnosis to find out what it is. I've known since I was 10. I want to write. It's what I do. It's what I'll do for the rest of my life, whether I ever earn any money at it, or not. I write. But I don't believe down deep that it's possible to make a living doing what I want to do so I figure out other things that seem more possible and I agree to "settle" for those things. Massage school was one of those things. And, like all the other things, massage is a noble pursuit. But it's not my passion. It's something I like a whole lot and enjoyed doing when I did it and still do, sometimes. But it's a job. Like the job I have now. And like organic farming or goat milking or soapmaking would all turn into, eventually.<br /><br />My job pays really well. I get to wear nice clothes and don't have to deal with drug addicts or drunk people or really very many assholes at all. But it's not my passion and I know it and I know what is. And I know I'm not living up to my potential until I follow my heart. I know I'm not gonna be satisfied no matter what until I follow my heart and do what I'm suppose to be doing. <br /><br />There's a back road on the way to the town where the meeting was held today and I frequently take it in favor of the main highway. Today as I drove that road with the bright blue wild flowers in the ditches that I don't remember ever seeing before and all the swallow-tails and blue birds and old barns and cows in the pastures, I thought about what a fucking shame it is that so many people feel like they're in prison because of their jobs. I had the sensation of looking at it all from a place of confinement. Through bars. I was right there but not really. Not able to experience it because I was going from meaningless task to meaningless task in my job today. And my job's not bad, I keep saying that and it's true. It's a damn good job, the best job I ever had, but it's not me. It's not the real me and the older a woman gets, the less willing she is to spend her time in pursuits that are meaningless to her. We don't have the hormones for it. <br /><br />It occurrd to me that I have to let go of all the other bullshit. I have to let go of all the other ideas and cling only to my passion if I'm ever going to do it. If I continue to vacillate between 5 or 6 different directions, directions that are merely substitutions for what I really want, I'll never go anywhere but this same spot. And as I said, it's not a bad spot. It's just not where I belong.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-8104262614661106572010-05-12T19:20:00.000-07:002010-05-12T19:31:27.773-07:00ZzzzzzzzzzI couldn't sleep last night, to save my ass. I tried everything. Hot bath, Valerian, Melatonin, milk. Nothing worked. All that crap at work was swarming around in my head. You know when something gets just stuck in your brain, like right behind your forehead in your frontal lobes and you can't pry it out of there for anything? The only thing that stops it is either sleep, like that's gonna happen, or a shock of some kind or resolution. So, that's pretty much what got rid of it for me today. Resolution. So I'm still in the home health game for another day, at least, and I didn't call in sick, which is a miracle considering I had about 4 1/2 hours of sleep. I'm going to take a bath and go my ass to bed.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-10133187607944030982010-05-11T18:12:00.000-07:002010-05-17T19:43:28.641-07:00Same Circus, Different ClownsYa know, I've put off posting because even I get tired of listening to my bullshit. But the blog muse continued to torment me until I'm back here, signed in, and once more bearing my flawed soul before all of humanity.<br /><br />I think I'll just assign this as my signature: I hate my job at _______ and I wish I could quit and be a writer or an artist or an organic farmer. If it weren't for my nursing job, I'd be so much happier. If I had balls I'd quit this fucking job, etc. <br /><br />So, here's the condensed version. I quit my job in the ER in February, took another job at a home health agency. Desk job. Almost no patient contact, which is best for everybody involved. Big problems in the office but I'm trying to wade through it and most days I don't hate it.<br /><br />Then yesterday, the new secretary we hired a month ago came in and quit. Just when we got her trained and she had started to do some stuff, now she's quit. And I should mention that she is a nurse who took a secretarial position with us precisely for the same reasons I hate nursing. So she took this job in the office and stayed approximately 4 weeks and quit. To go back to nursing. Fucking nurses, I swear to God.<br /><br />Somehow, that made me start thinking (pretending here that I don't think about it every, single day) about following my bliss and how if I had the balls... (see above). And I don't hate this job, most days. This week, yeah, but usually I sorta like it. But it still feels like a fucking cop out. Like I'm taking the coward's way out, and I am. Good money. Damn good money. Way more than I was making before. And it takes about 5 minutes of making more money to have to have that much from now on. And I knew that would happen. I had the big talk with myself when they told me how much they were gonna pay me, about how I wasn't gonna let myself think I had any extra money and how I was gonna pay stuff off with it and get ahead so when I started hating the job I'd be in a better position to quit. Only, you can't pay much off in 3 months, it turns out. Especially when you go to Best Buy and buy a new, digital video camera.<br /><br />And there's another story. Late one brain-dead night, I happened upon this hysterical <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLAxKwwNt20">video </a>on You Tube and it changed my life, ya'll. I mean it. I got all empowered over it because it's like watching a movie of me and my ex-husband and somehow it made me feel all validated, or something and it just lived on in my head. And somehow I got that all mixed up with the idea that if I bought a video camera, me and my BFF Bobbi could make some kinda movies and put them on You Tube or somewhere online and express my creativity and maybe be able to quit my job and live on adsense, or something. No, really. You know, it's just something I do in my head. So anyhow, I charged the camera. Put it on my credit card so now I get to pay that off instead of making an extra house payment.<br /><br />I quit my massage business in October. I've been doing a few, tenacious souls in the meantime but mostly not doing massage, to speak of. Last month, I canceled my website. And today I called the 800 number to try to get my web address back.<br /><br />I had this same thing happen when I was married, once. I thought he was the One. And so did everybody else. They all thought I'd finally found a nice guy. Well, he wasn't. I now refer to him as, "The Nazi". Terrible person, really, but at first he seemed so great and we got married after a short time that I'd prefer not to put a number to in an attempt to preserve a shred of my dignity. But we shouldn't have. Gotten married, I mean. I told myself I wasn't going to get another divorce, no matter what, and that I'd need to figure out a way to make it work and so I tried. That was the year I had my first migraine. There was never a better year to start having migraines than that year, I promise. But I wouldn't let myself admit it wasn't working. The thing is, my mind couldn't be completely repressed and one day I found myself packing my stuff in my car without ever having made a decision to leave. I packed the whole car full and I could pack a car, let me tell you. I could pack a horse trailer full of stuff in a car back then, I'd had so much experience. I packed the car and then I unpacked it because I didn't think I was really leaving. Until I did.<br /><br />It's the same thing, here. I'm trying to tell myself I'm okay. It's not my choice, exactly, but it's a good paying job and it's not in the ER and I can do it and the next thing I know, I'm calling Homestead and asking for my domain name back.<br /><br />Anyway, my husband is going to blow a rag if I tell him, "Oh, you know all that money I made for three months that I was gonna be helping you pay stuff with? Well, that's not working out so well, after all." So I'm not gonna admit it to myself right now. Right now, I'm gonna go take a nice, hot bath and go to bed and hope tomorrow is better. And actually, it probably will be. But if I just had those balls...how much better it could be.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-42971676746641220682010-02-03T21:28:00.000-08:002010-02-03T22:21:41.083-08:00Pinball WizardRemember pinball machines? Glass-lidded wooden boxes in which a silver ball bounces maniacally from side to side before eventually making its way to the hole in the front, dropping forever out of sight? I am that ball. And nursing is my glass-lidded box. And the hole, I suppose then, is death or retirement. Or as I'd like to think, being finally able to quit nursing to pursue a career in writing.<br /><br />I don't relish my role as the silver ball and wouldn't outwardly admit it to people who know me, personally, not wanting anyone to recognize it for what it is, "it" being my behavior. But I know it's the truth. <br /><br />I'm what I refer to as "rapid cycling" right now. There are nurses who stay in the same job for 35 years and then there are those of us who feel the need to move from job to job, "cycling" if you will, in an attempt to avoid inevitable and rapidly-approaching burnout. Fortunately, this particular profession accommodates this method of self-preservation, by virtue of the ever-present nursing shortage, ensuring there will always be another nursing position to which to run. As burnout increases in a nurse not unlike myself, she tends to make the rounds of available nursing positions in ever increasingly rapid succession. Hence the term "rapid cycling". The fact that the term is also used in the categorization of bipolar disorder is not lost on me, I might add.<br /><br />I applied for a job today. It's kind of a biggie. Probably the biggest I ever had, making the most money and with the most responsibility. But it's management, not field nursing or acute care. It's home health. There are no emergencies in home health. None. If there is an emergency, it gets diverted to the Emergency room at the hospital. Where I will no longer be working. That is, if they hire me.<br /><br />A job interview is decidedly different when you're applying for a management position, I noticed.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Can you tell us about a time when you had a bad run in with a supervisor and how you resolved it?<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span>There was this one time, in that exact office (I worked there in the past, a long time ago) when I was pretty angry and tossed around a lot of the "F"-word when addressing my supervisor on particularly hot summer day when I was getting a divorce and some major appliances went out and then I had a flat tire on the way back to the office that I wasn't sure wasn't somehow done intentionally by my soon-to-be-ex-husband. When I got to the office I got some bad news about not being able to do some work I'd been counting on for extra money (now to use to buy tires) and I lost my shit. So today I told the interviewer...<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">I've never really had a bad run in with a supervisor.</span><br /><br />And all of this being said, I really would do a hell of a job in that position, I think. I think I could retire from that job. As I said, I worked there before and it was the best job I ever had in my whole career. I quit after 5 1/2 years to go back to the ER because I was dating an emotionally unavailable predator I met on the internet and it took 10 hours driving time to see him in Texas and I thought that would be easier to do if I worked 3 days a week and not 5. In six months, the bloom now off the rose, I tried to come back and by that time, they were downsizing and, eventually, everybody there got fired or quit. The office is a fraction of the size it was then. And the benefits are not nearly as good, as in most places right now. But it's still good money and it's a desk job and, damn me, I think I'm ready.<br /><br />I don't have to tell you that I came out the hero in every one of those scenarios the interviewer asked me to place myself in and then tell him and the other supervisor about. I can be very creative when when the need arises. And I do have some really good points that are gonna make me a damn good supervisor if they offer me the job but I didn't get the opportunity to tell them about them because I was too busy making up stories to go with the questions they asked me. They were all based in non-fiction but had to be embellished upon in order to make me look competent and effective.<br /><br />I may not get the offer but I think I've made my mind up that I'm going to make a change. Again. I'll probably wait for an opening in the other home health (the one that's putting my old one out of business). I just have such a need to root for the underdog. Give me a good old bleeding lost cause, any old day. I'll go down with the ship. By then I'm sure I'll be ready for another job change, anyway, and that'll keep me from looking so much like that silver ball.<br /><br />I really can't wait to fall through that hole in the front.<br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span>Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-71346910458025981472010-02-01T10:28:00.000-08:002010-02-01T10:55:28.401-08:00Shades of GarboFreddy says he's going to the store in a little while. I've been waiting with bated breath since then for the few minutes he's gone. <br /><br />When I get off my three 12-hour weekend shifts, I got nothing left for the world. I need to be quiet and self-absorbed for at least the next day, or so. I already prostituted myself out by agreeing to do two massages tonight, which I knew was a bad idea when I did it. I knew I'd regret it, wishing instead to just be able to veg out on the bed with my laptop. But okay, just two hours and I get paid for it, they're not gift certificates, so I'll make a little extra money. And not till late in the afternoon. So then my daughter calls this morning and her babysitter is MIA and she needs us to watch the kids tonight. I love my grandsons but those little boys kick my ass. But I said, okay. That's not till 3. <br /><br />So he finally comes and kisses me good-bye, Freddy does, and leaves. I swear to God, it's not 5 minutes later and even though I know it's impossible, I distinctly hear footsteps in the livingroom headed toward the bedroom where I sit, blogging, on the bed with my laptop. <span style="font-style: italic;"><br /><br />Who could that be? </span>I ask myself, incredulously. <span style="font-style: italic;">He just left and I didn't hear the door reopen.</span> When in walks my 25-year-old daughter.<br /><br />"In a week I'm gonna be ghetto rich!" she says.<br /><br />"What? Where did you come from?"<br /><br />"I've been here, you psycho. I'm getting $3400 back on my income tax,"<br /><br />"What?"<br /><br />"I'm getting....."<br /><br />"No. How'd you get in here? I didn't hear the door."<br /><br />"I've been here. I've been in the computer room doing my tax return. I got here about an hour and a half ago."<br /><br />Jesus H. Christ. <br /><br />Is it just me? Out of an entire day, I have maybe 20 minutes of time to be alone without anybody asking me questions or turning on a television or walking through the bedroom to take a pee in the toilet directly in front of me when there's a perfectly good one down the hall, out of my earshot, and my adult daughter shows up, seemingly out of the frigging air doing her tax return. Fuck.<br /><br />And while we're on the subject, does anybody else pretend to be asleep when their spouse is in the room in an attempt to discourage interaction? I mean, just keep their eyes shut, like I do, for just a little longer after they wake up, just until he goes out of the room and shuts the door and then breathe a sigh of relief because they don't have to answer any questions or express any affection? <br /><br />I just want to be alone, sometimes. I don't wanna talk for a few hours after I get up. Is that too much to ask? And maybe 20 minutes alone while my husband goes to the store? I mean, I love the guy, I'm nuts about him and he's older than me and I know he's gonna die before I do and I'm gonna wish to hell he was here up my ass as usual but right now I just wish I could have about 48 hours alone.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-32581990133036487122010-01-17T23:47:00.000-08:002010-01-18T00:33:17.247-08:00short-timer?Who here has ever rushed to the Emergency Room after throwing up one time? If I live to be 100 I will never get this. And I swear on my mother's grave (wherever that ends up being cause she's alive and well, so far) a woman came in today who had pelvic cramps and low back pain. Her period had started. Today. And she came to the ER without even having taken a Motrin. And, not unlike <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBg1BBKZ5go&feature=related">this video</a> I happened across today, she had the same problem in the past. About a month ago.<br /><br />How can this be happening? And yet, it's every single day I work. Every single one. I keep thinking I missed something, like something happened since I was a kid and people had common sense. And every, single day I have more and more trouble not responding in a manner that would lead to my termination.<br /><br />Like today. A young couple brought their 6-month-old baby in. He'd apparently fallen off the couch and hit his head on the floor. It was carpeted and the baby wasn't hurt. But judging by the degree of marijuana smoke on the parent's clothing, I wasn't surprised he rolled off. And when I came to the part of the nurse's note asking about 2nd hand smoke, I almost said, "It's obvious the baby is exposed to 2nd hand smoke because you two smell like a flash fire at an Amsterdam cannabis cafe " And would that have been so bad? Really? I mean, what kind of retaliation could I have possibly expected? Are they going to go to the CEO's office on Monday and tell him the nurse was rude by commenting on the pot smell on their clothing?<br /><br />I'm thinking a lot about taking an ER position in a large teaching hospital ER 130 miles from here. In a big town. You know, where everybody isn't related to everybody else and not so many people wear camoflauge. I put in an online application tonight. It's funny because when I updated my application I discovered I'd applied at that facility at exactly the same time of year in 2008.<br /><br />My boss got fired, that time. I was heartbroken. And really, really mad. But in the end I didn't feel good about bailing out because I was angry. Not a good ending. So I stayed. Another 9 months.<br /><br />The trouble is, I no longer want to be a nurse most of the time.<br /><br />And all of that being said, there I've gone again and focused on precisely what I don't want to attract in my life, thereby ensuring I'll get more of the very same. I so suck at the Law of Attraction for which I hold such high hope.<br /><br />Tomorrow we go away. Back to the cabin in the state park. And first, to a larger town to go shopping for groceries at a particularly gourmet grocery store in that vicinity that one of the ER docs told me about. We'll check into the cabin and unpack and then we'll go on north to the big city and the gourmet food and then, afterward, we'll come back and start a fire and spend the next 4 days reading and hiking and sleeping and soaking in the tub and doing some art, I hope.<br /><br />Oh, and the jigsaw puzzle.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-75506551098124376752010-01-16T20:38:00.000-08:002010-01-16T21:11:56.260-08:00play dayI almost bought a new camera, today. I mean very nearly, as in ordered one and applied for the interest-free credit and got approved and clicked on SUBMIT ORDER. And then I chickened out and canceled it. I hope. Instead of charging $1300 on a new credit card, I downloaded the owner's manual for the camera I got for my birthday 2 1/2 years ago and printed it out. Then I went home and played.<br /><br />This is Calpurnia.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnKdslraPaWuyEepXSNPMYCQgWwSJLitPMZp5HLZNZwKFD7TexqbMpTfPDaZgAg4dw-rydSdYIcouPTsnLWv8T1oUbkx7tv8dZCU706-8bp2o6FIduc8IHAbD_VlYL6OprW69N0m6IZWY/s1600-h/IMG_0026.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnKdslraPaWuyEepXSNPMYCQgWwSJLitPMZp5HLZNZwKFD7TexqbMpTfPDaZgAg4dw-rydSdYIcouPTsnLWv8T1oUbkx7tv8dZCU706-8bp2o6FIduc8IHAbD_VlYL6OprW69N0m6IZWY/s320/IMG_0026.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427566105022880194" border="0" /></a>Although the next two photos are very poor quality, I like them because it makes Maggi appear ghostly.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhe45UIZZyN8JjIjieJSIQ8Pao2aJSydT5povCC5214gOk04V2FrMYMm-XGre-IXAHU2tv5Erpt66KAGa7e2KvkXQtmpopd9P9iLCFp2JL7x3GVTpsd_8ga6Vpyus4-79HA6gZlBFNeqjA/s1600-h/IMG_0027.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhe45UIZZyN8JjIjieJSIQ8Pao2aJSydT5povCC5214gOk04V2FrMYMm-XGre-IXAHU2tv5Erpt66KAGa7e2KvkXQtmpopd9P9iLCFp2JL7x3GVTpsd_8ga6Vpyus4-79HA6gZlBFNeqjA/s320/IMG_0027.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427566114467299522" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL1iItq3xFfv2y-HeFWgB9hV4cN0l32Suo_CAku9OIZpM3tSp8Ee8WegibqK7nJaJhbKUz7nUKBjBiGgbEb45Gm9bvAoliiT0zHoMPGQSqtp0gKjfLN7fdX0KeA2IiKt1M3TWdmx2oe34/s1600-h/IMG_0028.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL1iItq3xFfv2y-HeFWgB9hV4cN0l32Suo_CAku9OIZpM3tSp8Ee8WegibqK7nJaJhbKUz7nUKBjBiGgbEb45Gm9bvAoliiT0zHoMPGQSqtp0gKjfLN7fdX0KeA2IiKt1M3TWdmx2oe34/s320/IMG_0028.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427566116993176322" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV0-Sw8K5ThyphenhyphenwEwQaslgZIE4IJwMZKHf4yV9F8o4w0yMyxD1Kj3m7CtzxH7kegPc7kmALldGmjuZcXlub19aW-8Kd3-4V9y5n1lNY7hN3EcMHBgAXY2vLJC2EVM6DJMw6IoHIAJrK9Vsc/s1600-h/IMG_0042.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgV0-Sw8K5ThyphenhyphenwEwQaslgZIE4IJwMZKHf4yV9F8o4w0yMyxD1Kj3m7CtzxH7kegPc7kmALldGmjuZcXlub19aW-8Kd3-4V9y5n1lNY7hN3EcMHBgAXY2vLJC2EVM6DJMw6IoHIAJrK9Vsc/s320/IMG_0042.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427568200361633538" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV5jQEkvZ9-RYuJpMY70FJ6u6geu2w0LMi4pgsg6pRHpte9FXMiD1LS5C1iuvS8QUZB8uMQ7powwowkO-L9uKnsTww6AClkamPI9EnAeWKG7Vq7i8Az3kSHJG5k6r4NRcxa830kKwAFOc/s1600-h/IMG_0046.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV5jQEkvZ9-RYuJpMY70FJ6u6geu2w0LMi4pgsg6pRHpte9FXMiD1LS5C1iuvS8QUZB8uMQ7powwowkO-L9uKnsTww6AClkamPI9EnAeWKG7Vq7i8Az3kSHJG5k6r4NRcxa830kKwAFOc/s320/IMG_0046.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427568212356350066" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbmN4T6x_1NfumeccH3bZ3QosDJRC-pzwoqrrqIQi7rtRSByNQPF-5cwrKTsgWy8W340AQsH138QrCTooNXXKFFqC-3xPi5VesN0pWRO5kDXrwTAX7I1NdqbxfPUu3cILlBG-ShUiSKRo/s1600-h/IMG_0044.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbmN4T6x_1NfumeccH3bZ3QosDJRC-pzwoqrrqIQi7rtRSByNQPF-5cwrKTsgWy8W340AQsH138QrCTooNXXKFFqC-3xPi5VesN0pWRO5kDXrwTAX7I1NdqbxfPUu3cILlBG-ShUiSKRo/s320/IMG_0044.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427568207899000850" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixvh8ss7egUfQWRiiBzczsA35955CSxDWeW92rWHsFvgpOfQ6ORdDcut2jqs1pZ-jm2uE1eweZq3tblbtSeDUs2I4h7Ui0zIteHta0hoxDONUk09JA9exH0Z_57hbXDdjLGsVnD6hKRBM/s1600-h/IMG_0052.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixvh8ss7egUfQWRiiBzczsA35955CSxDWeW92rWHsFvgpOfQ6ORdDcut2jqs1pZ-jm2uE1eweZq3tblbtSeDUs2I4h7Ui0zIteHta0hoxDONUk09JA9exH0Z_57hbXDdjLGsVnD6hKRBM/s320/IMG_0052.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427569653294826434" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY5wjmEMnRDDO07MHLkvgOHCtKMUP_a4fb_XE-P7OWtL1HzQoDN00ln6TKuQr9_u_2ZK-cxZSFJQgyWsYCoJCz9wKROccbq3g6Yp9naPzIIGLIuJqkmrYM4-vRzgB_A3J9bafwVTl1Cik/s1600-h/IMG_0057.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY5wjmEMnRDDO07MHLkvgOHCtKMUP_a4fb_XE-P7OWtL1HzQoDN00ln6TKuQr9_u_2ZK-cxZSFJQgyWsYCoJCz9wKROccbq3g6Yp9naPzIIGLIuJqkmrYM4-vRzgB_A3J9bafwVTl1Cik/s320/IMG_0057.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427569665172778914" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYBrf_rD5LXuoYYBjXSHUIdMnAS8RoVfKnudyDVXbnFa5tQ1kvgHkfeoBg6tBlueBJgdTa_2ng7WVwWbauz04I7H66SWnmfWiVz20WnyVjtQV0Y4OxBw5UcC2kBVGmjpOMmYUPnvQtDAU/s1600-h/IMG_0071.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYBrf_rD5LXuoYYBjXSHUIdMnAS8RoVfKnudyDVXbnFa5tQ1kvgHkfeoBg6tBlueBJgdTa_2ng7WVwWbauz04I7H66SWnmfWiVz20WnyVjtQV0Y4OxBw5UcC2kBVGmjpOMmYUPnvQtDAU/s320/IMG_0071.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427569675884588290" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6P2MYCcaH9YH8Gc_0z1fTm-hPJu9GPdA3wBYED9UR8lYJ5DVnXLU0K37ZYe7a6okZUhl0xbQHkK_uMaVm8aIUVyVzL4KG_sYHDyplXNeJC0q2-VZDl5IWciwRH6rgN2jdnBQqZBeDv7k/s1600-h/IMG_0072.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6P2MYCcaH9YH8Gc_0z1fTm-hPJu9GPdA3wBYED9UR8lYJ5DVnXLU0K37ZYe7a6okZUhl0xbQHkK_uMaVm8aIUVyVzL4KG_sYHDyplXNeJC0q2-VZDl5IWciwRH6rgN2jdnBQqZBeDv7k/s320/IMG_0072.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427571037008183490" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0bF0SloOZ_URHIy1PudpYfRY7D1zFcdKLLG_Kk1vN6kwyN03r6iccnIRE7aRLF3HQxufEzTS7toEVkavewLNmuIGC1MwHLxz_4ATnHOOr_MFIUxFWAsbG_NCTqeKtr8Z0gW87GM-toEo/s1600-h/IMG_0078.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0bF0SloOZ_URHIy1PudpYfRY7D1zFcdKLLG_Kk1vN6kwyN03r6iccnIRE7aRLF3HQxufEzTS7toEVkavewLNmuIGC1MwHLxz_4ATnHOOr_MFIUxFWAsbG_NCTqeKtr8Z0gW87GM-toEo/s320/IMG_0078.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427571046391953122" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT4TlFbKaHpBkbOk3AZPxuhILULBB1PVlw8_SPHrhzSG-44A6KixYpDcka_xhj1J_FVmsVo86YtGCTgfJYq9fZapXMwtzRyQBVoqc37Im4l_s5NAsT8UwF9ufYYdKtIPgDr8y23Zk7Ok8/s1600-h/IMG_0079.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT4TlFbKaHpBkbOk3AZPxuhILULBB1PVlw8_SPHrhzSG-44A6KixYpDcka_xhj1J_FVmsVo86YtGCTgfJYq9fZapXMwtzRyQBVoqc37Im4l_s5NAsT8UwF9ufYYdKtIPgDr8y23Zk7Ok8/s320/IMG_0079.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427571052072677714" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCWaeTyYcwpghKa3NuOJCH39qJfiZ8LfQwwkLuoyz2WsXEisspROzvGo3ul2fI6UFSjPttXRFihhdb2Dp6T44B3iJF1iSD6MpFczwtNvZi4Kl1ABzMzDOS9pH_s3NWpciyG-E_HwO8ug4/s1600-h/IMG_0081.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCWaeTyYcwpghKa3NuOJCH39qJfiZ8LfQwwkLuoyz2WsXEisspROzvGo3ul2fI6UFSjPttXRFihhdb2Dp6T44B3iJF1iSD6MpFczwtNvZi4Kl1ABzMzDOS9pH_s3NWpciyG-E_HwO8ug4/s320/IMG_0081.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427571054544286338" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfzdEReldfCsXcRAqqt-uVH2kR67bRLqgP8bNoxbulC0SDa4ZXnEO7zo0PHXtY2oa-V1TxFVg0RAl7AijVICLXN6Kj7AjnZrYn5L4Gria0tbc9epGgvcARhPRSpax5hIaueIcGHne03_4/s1600-h/IMG_0084.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfzdEReldfCsXcRAqqt-uVH2kR67bRLqgP8bNoxbulC0SDa4ZXnEO7zo0PHXtY2oa-V1TxFVg0RAl7AijVICLXN6Kj7AjnZrYn5L4Gria0tbc9epGgvcARhPRSpax5hIaueIcGHne03_4/s320/IMG_0084.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5427571060732434658" border="0" /></a><br />Sometimes I really love my life.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-45018267785391387752010-01-14T08:08:00.000-08:002010-01-16T21:15:27.200-08:00Lain Kali Tengok NilaOkay, so I'm randomly going through blogs again this morning to check out what's out there like I said in the previous post and I find <a href="http://singmeahappysong.blogspot.com/2009/10/cibaihang-1825.html">this fucking thing</a>. This is some funny shit. What is it about people who speak foreign languages cursing in English that is so damn funny? Started my day off just right. Protein shake, Tylenol, St John's Wort, Claritin, little Asian girl posting some really awkward swear words. Makes life worth living. Next is coffee. Then a real, live hair appointment and it's on to Hot Springs (me and Bobbi). Just hope we don't run across any barbaric fucktards out there (waves of laughter resuming). "But hey, the honk was a looooooooongg one"! Oh my God, I'm never gonna get out of my seat.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-70858189450263709752010-01-13T17:14:00.000-08:002010-01-13T19:52:56.073-08:00Herpatology and the Domestic Arts<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5BY5fnJl4teKc6FL2vDrFRAfCsi0vmPmz7cSYJVwBw9PygGy3TJYWjYMUx1vZuwK6IyXs-D2MR7n_PAmXMAoL9GJjXdIgsduZINoKrXZKSmggHLEHJrGd7LDYLFEdMK6j82I7Fit-vfA/s1600-h/IMG_4935.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5BY5fnJl4teKc6FL2vDrFRAfCsi0vmPmz7cSYJVwBw9PygGy3TJYWjYMUx1vZuwK6IyXs-D2MR7n_PAmXMAoL9GJjXdIgsduZINoKrXZKSmggHLEHJrGd7LDYLFEdMK6j82I7Fit-vfA/s320/IMG_4935.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426398290405889010" border="0" /></a>Another day pissed away in hedonistic pursuits. Slept till 9:30, which I know isn't late for me but you don't. Got a massage. Ate 4 cupcakes. You know, the usual. Oh, and surfed the net looking for websites I like and might someday wish to emulate.<br /><br />I've been thinking a lot lately about an alternate career. Something involving more sitting on my couch and not so much of this healing the infirm. At this point, it's strickly a fantasy but it will eventually become a necessity.<br /><br />I fantasize about a bed and breakfast. I really love entertaining. The whole thing; cooking, dressing up, decorating. I love it. That's why I usually need to be institutionalized right after Christmas. I overdo it. Too many late nights baking cookies. While we're on the subject, there is little I enjoy more than being up in the kitchen really late at night, everybody else in bed, in preparation for a holiday dinner. I am in heaven those nights. I put Martha Stewart on tv (if she's not on satelite, I plug in my old, homemade VHS tapes from the old Martha Stewart Living show) or just some old movie on TCM, and I cook. With the dinner not until the next day, or maybe the day after that, there's no pressure. Nobody is going to ring the doorbell in a minute wanting to be fed. I still have a good night's (or half a night's) sleep before all of that.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdrt-rLRrWZZdItGODjQiy9J9wmHdppJZB2rd2kZ8lmXc9prDtcsWgWSqwsn1YLuPcHcCLeTSNLj8ybBgwtza_RMYcuCEXvQSWYtTHtwImHGlUn-bBEAH2CaHmfSyBLI9Gn0PVUODyzeY/s1600-h/IMG_2875.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdrt-rLRrWZZdItGODjQiy9J9wmHdppJZB2rd2kZ8lmXc9prDtcsWgWSqwsn1YLuPcHcCLeTSNLj8ybBgwtza_RMYcuCEXvQSWYtTHtwImHGlUn-bBEAH2CaHmfSyBLI9Gn0PVUODyzeY/s320/IMG_2875.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426416700544087218" border="0" /></a><br /><br />But back to the B&B fantasy, there is no real attraction at my house with which to lure the public. Nor is our small town much of an attraction, particularly since the tornado turned the woods across the street, as well as a good part of the whole town, into what looks a lot like Hiroshima. We do have a little-used cabin on 20 acres with which we could do something along those lines. Not a B&B exactly 'cause, don't you have to live there? But some kind of retreat place and I could cook and bring it out there and do massage and spa treatments on the premises. Something like that. And it's pretty<br />out there and, so far, no tornado damage.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADxiCDOpzDrKvBlCsz62pBzAb_opdH7iaZEh0jRUitKLD583MJwhXop2xkowTKpLwdWAM0cS6-I3BvtaqiXKatxCm0wLyzKL2BTJeGVG5Kbar5sfq4tzLSAK0e-wy5SD2rCg1RTJmvzQ/s1600-h/IMG_0835.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADxiCDOpzDrKvBlCsz62pBzAb_opdH7iaZEh0jRUitKLD583MJwhXop2xkowTKpLwdWAM0cS6-I3BvtaqiXKatxCm0wLyzKL2BTJeGVG5Kbar5sfq4tzLSAK0e-wy5SD2rCg1RTJmvzQ/s320/IMG_0835.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426430842306157362" border="0" /></a> <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRwP3yl_K-w3cP92Jt4OX0PPkG9_3Krt9xlJWQoLmbADOfjrSmN6DeA-3j2dHpiV3og1nuGGjIPK_DBIN-FOWKPPy8SSsurG9TFZl7fZ9ASvIJ1YjuiNtpIfK174WMLYiPE6fKOUfO3O8/s1600-h/IMG_0824.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRwP3yl_K-w3cP92Jt4OX0PPkG9_3Krt9xlJWQoLmbADOfjrSmN6DeA-3j2dHpiV3og1nuGGjIPK_DBIN-FOWKPPy8SSsurG9TFZl7fZ9ASvIJ1YjuiNtpIfK174WMLYiPE6fKOUfO3O8/s320/IMG_0824.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426430855058048802" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS_coKLLu0HDZ6jRA2mXpjSP8_MnOJ64W1OgzZoDOcIuNF-xcqmVMv5jZVNioe29grhSHeK2fziV16LOJYnupXMssR44B-Z_zFH2qqZzq9EQ1gUtWKjwkWbkkShvU16-V-ohTNw4uan5w/s1600-h/IMG_1366.JPG"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS_coKLLu0HDZ6jRA2mXpjSP8_MnOJ64W1OgzZoDOcIuNF-xcqmVMv5jZVNioe29grhSHeK2fziV16LOJYnupXMssR44B-Z_zFH2qqZzq9EQ1gUtWKjwkWbkkShvU16-V-ohTNw4uan5w/s320/IMG_1366.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426432757322109794" border="0" /></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwg5HlvaOh8ZvN4c574hrlStvjq29f_WwdvHGEbF7eZpGfJClZZXqScNlAT0pKd6dwmLsms33NAoAzg6RmxzpUASpdtvI9KjMlzh3dMF7YPEmVHLDs48XnqYairgoNtkX7cDSv57Fwscs/s1600-h/Christmas+at+the+Cabin.jpg"><img style="cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwg5HlvaOh8ZvN4c574hrlStvjq29f_WwdvHGEbF7eZpGfJClZZXqScNlAT0pKd6dwmLsms33NAoAzg6RmxzpUASpdtvI9KjMlzh3dMF7YPEmVHLDs48XnqYairgoNtkX7cDSv57Fwscs/s320/Christmas+at+the+Cabin.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5426432746568341794" border="0" /></a><br /><br />There's probably a way to make money out there renting it out on weekends (while I work) if nothing else. It's a cool place, built of strawbales. That's an attention grabber. But then, there is that huge, black snake who sheds his/her skin in the loft. Any snake extermination suggestions? Then again, I did see an article in National Geographic about a high end spa in the west that offered snake massages. Hmmmm.....(tapping chin with forefinger)...Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-18518518709562648672010-01-12T00:09:00.000-08:002010-01-14T07:51:45.858-08:00Is This Heaven or Just Alabama?I'm doing what I've sworn off and here it is after 2am, again. The thing is, it's the only uninterrupted time of the day. The only time nobody is calling or stopping by or when I'm suppose to be doing something else, aside from sleeping. So it's natural that I gravitate toward middle of the night hours. I always have.<br /><br />I watched <span style="font-style: italic;">To Kill a Mockingbird</span> again tonight. I will never tire of it. What an incredible film. And book. My absolute favorite. I've watched it so many times, over so many years that I've become confused about my relationship with Gregory Peck. Is he a family member of mine or simply somebody I've seen on tv? Like Andy Griffith and Aunt Bea, his voice sounds as familiar as my own Father's. And as comforting.<br /><br />In fact, there is something about old movies in general that I adore. Despite the ability to differentiate fact from fiction, I feel as though I'm glimpsing another time, when watching them. Only really seeing into the past and not a movie set, either, but back to a real moment in time, long since lost. As if the children's bedroom in the Finch house, where Jem lie on the bed following his Bob Ewell debacle, were the one in my Grandmother's house on 27th Street in Lincoln, Nebraska when I was a little girl. But it feels that way. It was just off her livingroom. And it's the same with the porch, the big, old trees on the street, the wallpaper behind the panel door where Boo Radley hid in that bedroom. And my hair was cut exactly like Jean Marie Finch (Scout) who I've always had mixed up with my niece, Angie. They are one and the same, Angie and Scout and me, I guess, by virtue of my haircut the first 10 years of my life.<br /><br />If there is a heaven and if by some mix up I get to attend, I will have a seat in that porch swing beside Boo on the front porch of the Finch house on that October night, Bob Ewell lying in the woods across town, a butter knife stuck up under his ribs. Or even Grandma Fricke's house, Lawrence Welk playing in the livingroom and me trying on plastic wigs. I'll take either one.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-7125574035474867572010-01-07T19:34:00.000-08:002012-02-05T13:07:05.202-08:00Janus: God of the Doorway (and possibly closets)January is the most curious of months. I want to sleep and soak in the tub and sip broth from rustic, hand-thrown pottery bowls. And is it just me or does everybody open their refrigerator and, although it looks like this, not be able to find anything to eat?<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDEFI8dlNY_yZ7p3j3_1VnRM-h25kYroI86QieOrEgSBWZTlpES8VHxBDt3t2Sc6kB7GPxYjWIHQhYAhmrC5kiaP5-Cp3ArGw4_IlukwvRBRoZcsuct9uTAvAYbPyAmSxP1eJgJsfcouQ/s1600-h/IMG_4891.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDEFI8dlNY_yZ7p3j3_1VnRM-h25kYroI86QieOrEgSBWZTlpES8VHxBDt3t2Sc6kB7GPxYjWIHQhYAhmrC5kiaP5-Cp3ArGw4_IlukwvRBRoZcsuct9uTAvAYbPyAmSxP1eJgJsfcouQ/s320/IMG_4891.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424211327442871618" border="0" /></a>All that damn food and nothing to eat (except for Cinnamon Roll-flavored Yoplait <span style="font-style: italic;">Light</span> that I just retrieved and am eating after spotting it in the above photo).<br /><br />Freddy likes to leave the Christmas decorations up through January 6th, the second Christmas. Before he came along, decorations were cleaned up, the floor vacuumed and everything put away by 10am on Christmas morning. But I respect his wishes and now I leave them up. The only time it bothers me is when I'm in the living room and then the urge to take things down is almost more than I can stand. The Monday after Christmas I just took a couple Christmas pot holders and a Christmas hand towel into the laundry room and threw them in with another load of clothes. That's all. When we do take the decorations down, which I wasn't doing until the 6th, there's always something that needs to be washed and air dried and that takes time so I thought I'd get that little bit of it out of the way. On Tuesday, the same thing, only this time it was a few of the Santas I had in the cabinet in the livingroom. I just put a few of the Santas in the spare room. And then I put them into a bin. Wednesday, the placemats and a couple of candles. New Year's Eve I went ahead and took the garland off the fence and porch railing, just in the back of the house and only after dark. Well, and in the front, too, eventually. But that was all.<br /><br />Monday, January 4th, I took three ornaments off the tree. Just three. A glittery reindeer and two red balls. That's all. Tuesday the 5th, I gathered every candy cane off the tree and put them in a bowl. But something about removing those candy canes opened a door that I could no longer close and in the course of an hour, every ornament, every icicle, every string of red beads was off that tree and in the bins with the lids clicked into place and stacked in the metal shed in the yard. But I didn't take the tree down and I didn't remove the lights. I made it through the 6th! I kept my resolve to respect my husband's wishes! I mean, right? Didn't I? (Why do I feel like the Grinch?)<br /><br />I should say here that my life occurrs in increments of 4 days, Monday through Thursday, as I work 12-hour shifts Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the hospital and have no energy to do anything but take baths and put on makeup and pack my lunch those days. So the 6th was yesterday, Wednesday, making today Thursday, the last day of my life this week. And I went out of town yesterday (another blog) so I didn't take down the tree. The danger with that is that I have an internal switch. A toggle with two settings: On and Off. That's it. Nothing else. No other options. On or Off. So, by taking the day off from un-decorating yesterday, I inadvertantly flipped my switch to the Off position. And the tree still stands. Just the tree and the lights.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4LR1RHkEhAI_IxxTs9cwaJoR5zh-G2kWtyevgfu9CQGZZK9QYGRsmSzIXFsqzwCCF3oQWgzdCtUoOTd-LdgHBHHE4c9-9cLUQ_Ch_MyB7mblltdWfDgHPVsySZAcRg2kIxrrUi3BCS0w/s1600-h/IMG_4892.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4LR1RHkEhAI_IxxTs9cwaJoR5zh-G2kWtyevgfu9CQGZZK9QYGRsmSzIXFsqzwCCF3oQWgzdCtUoOTd-LdgHBHHE4c9-9cLUQ_Ch_MyB7mblltdWfDgHPVsySZAcRg2kIxrrUi3BCS0w/s320/IMG_4892.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424225098242118754" border="0" /></a>Only God knows how long it will stand there. Last year it was February.<br /><br />And then there's the organizing obsession. I'm not that kind of person any other time but in January, something about putting away Christmas decorations makes me suddenly want to organize the years and years worth of clutter in my house. This year, we had a guy build shelves in the closet. I had Freddy buy lumber in June for me to build those shelves and finally this week we had Chad, a nice guy who helps us (a non-procrastinator), built those shelves. This is what the closet looks like, now.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwJsGfpooNXC9JmIxs2O_f7DlqmqUeSGHB-Ubhy1i1Wgwtscf57Pse_zP_SiJilU4Kp0HjvbMw_1fVqB1vOh6CE0DZbq7k7MWsy2Gees_Bd74o8ccU5nemJHR_Aabo0KOH0qTh6fCsM80/s1600-h/IMG_4928.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwJsGfpooNXC9JmIxs2O_f7DlqmqUeSGHB-Ubhy1i1Wgwtscf57Pse_zP_SiJilU4Kp0HjvbMw_1fVqB1vOh6CE0DZbq7k7MWsy2Gees_Bd74o8ccU5nemJHR_Aabo0KOH0qTh6fCsM80/s320/IMG_4928.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424216462827297810" border="0" /></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix4oD7cg-BVJU7BrHWL6xWxqlIpQ-75t0z8WGg_oLo8q_8HIQ79HlSIz7ANA2cxnOkr9ZZR2YccS-lWycJM-NNJWKdIQGBX-Zt6Gr5EdTiZvuiGiDDxLVicZMFsLk5hUAvjgyAp0nNBaI/s1600-h/IMG_4929.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix4oD7cg-BVJU7BrHWL6xWxqlIpQ-75t0z8WGg_oLo8q_8HIQ79HlSIz7ANA2cxnOkr9ZZR2YccS-lWycJM-NNJWKdIQGBX-Zt6Gr5EdTiZvuiGiDDxLVicZMFsLk5hUAvjgyAp0nNBaI/s320/IMG_4929.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424216459402173378" border="0" /></a>And...are you ready?.....the floor looks like this!<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCwTjm4SuYNaWKubC8ymcA5l3kx2mF-bgXaRvtsr-EmtK5JTbQRSgrko9VCGt3UzOd1A-zFon2mpxqTJO8gEFE2vLXWiySSGdwwz3YnpsQTC6F63ewQvGuUWkUDnr-kdrzvU5ShT_oU0k/s1600-h/IMG_4930.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCwTjm4SuYNaWKubC8ymcA5l3kx2mF-bgXaRvtsr-EmtK5JTbQRSgrko9VCGt3UzOd1A-zFon2mpxqTJO8gEFE2vLXWiySSGdwwz3YnpsQTC6F63ewQvGuUWkUDnr-kdrzvU5ShT_oU0k/s320/IMG_4930.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424216473014241714" border="0" /></a>You'd really have to have seen it before. The closet floor has <span style="font-style: italic;">never </span>looked like this (except briefly, immediately after the tornado when it was covered with about 2 inches of water and there were no walls or ceiling and once when the room was first added to the house). My children will think I photoshopped these images but I swear they're authentic. My closet is organized. Every Mother Earth News, every Martha Stewart Living, every National Geographic, every Country Living magazine is stacked in order of months (okay, just the Country Livings are in monthly order, but still!). The shoes are lined up on a shelf. And the shelves are all painted. Believe me, I'm as shocked as anyone.<br /><br />And the weirdness continues. Earlier this week, I went to Walmart and bought two bookshelves. Those bookshelves were very nearly my undoing, as it turned out. The first casualty was when I loaded them into the cart. Note to self: Always put the lightbulbs into the cart <span style="font-style: italic;">after </span>loading the heavy items. But besides the broken glass (and they were those $8.39 halogen bulbs, too, damnit), I may have bulged a disc lifting the boxes into the cart. When did those things get so heavy? I gotta start doing Pilates, or something. Then I brought them into the house by myself (a nice young man loaded them into the back of my vehicle for me at the store but he wouldn't come home with me). But the kicker was when I was sitting on the floor with the contents of the boxes scattered all around me on the floor and some of the long boards standing up, leaning on the foot stool. As I looked at something to my right, the tallest of the boards to my left fell over, striking me in the left side of my face, right above my eye. I'm pretty tough, though, so once I quit crying I finished putting the shelves together and now we have these (note the empty shelves on the bottom right).<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLeuD-vDP-gk_-Vly7QKTNbK5otJzGjtWvaRzoju7W6HUCWW9buUinZvF2IAVXSaCfMhns_KDewU0CEtMyzRLHgxjbOHrq7Wwz-WZPwHoMsrP7IEF4_fI3GbrWyeexz1TLbaiz9wU2SOY/s1600-h/IMG_4898.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLeuD-vDP-gk_-Vly7QKTNbK5otJzGjtWvaRzoju7W6HUCWW9buUinZvF2IAVXSaCfMhns_KDewU0CEtMyzRLHgxjbOHrq7Wwz-WZPwHoMsrP7IEF4_fI3GbrWyeexz1TLbaiz9wU2SOY/s320/IMG_4898.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5424230428695850146" border="0" /></a>Every single book we own has a home. No more sideways stuffed books and double stacked books that have to be moved to gain access to those in the back. One book at a time so all the titles are clearly visible at all times. They're not organized by subject, yet, but that's another week.<br /><br />Tomorrow it's back to the ER. My work here is done.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-37094266440489073692009-10-15T10:25:00.000-07:002010-09-22T20:21:48.417-07:00Tale of Two Cities<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzwfF0Q_Cdraqks72ILqHnXM9C3yX3A73xszZqEC56hS8yKGgRcdUSGF81rHGaEzXWhnvs2D3EIsZ1k0T2OAB2gZyQuH9C49GFO8Z5cEzbzm366m48o7CISNm2sE3-wTcITnw2Vz33x6Q/s1600-h/December+2007+005.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzwfF0Q_Cdraqks72ILqHnXM9C3yX3A73xszZqEC56hS8yKGgRcdUSGF81rHGaEzXWhnvs2D3EIsZ1k0T2OAB2gZyQuH9C49GFO8Z5cEzbzm366m48o7CISNm2sE3-wTcITnw2Vz33x6Q/s320/December+2007+005.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392919336128818338" border="0" /></a><br />Okay, I'm reclining on the queen-size bed in the back of this RV in Long Island. It use to be our's, the RV, and now it belongs to Freddy's son and his wife and sits in their yard in East Northport, New York (the above picture is from a previous trip...a gas station in the Pocanos). They took over the payments. We asked to stay in it during this trip...the youngest son, Brooke's wedding is this weekend...and they said we could. So we arrived here, yesterday. Went to their restaurant and had lobster.<br /><br />I'm not gonna do that, again. It was my first actual whole lobster experience and not one bit like what I got in a platter of lobster (something and pasta) at Di Nico's in Little Italy last trip.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1l1Y8TywRqehYVJNaFbgy7DPwoBAZFPqRmId5CEvJIvV45FYpzTfhyyMp_RFkrC9p9Xu3tg8BcNB988iLteLInSxhdS9bh2gl8Ldns03OQ0sUhCYUb55YcSFf97NWzWjyj5qOPLXd6VM/s1600-h/Lobster+Pasta+at+Little+Italy.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1l1Y8TywRqehYVJNaFbgy7DPwoBAZFPqRmId5CEvJIvV45FYpzTfhyyMp_RFkrC9p9Xu3tg8BcNB988iLteLInSxhdS9bh2gl8Ldns03OQ0sUhCYUb55YcSFf97NWzWjyj5qOPLXd6VM/s320/Lobster+Pasta+at+Little+Italy.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392928536592047042" border="0" /></a><br />Those were just unidentifiable peices, some even shelled and mixed with scallops and shrimp and things in cream sauce over angel hair. Only the claws were whole but that doesn't seem like an animal, somehow, nor do tails that aren't connected to bodies with eyes. This last night was different.<span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span><blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">There's not a live lobster back there that they're going to have to kill for this, is there? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">No. No<br /></span></blockquote>I'm sure he was lying.<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span><br /><br />When it came out, I had no idea how to eat it. Freddy turned it over and handed me a little fork and nutcracker and nods at me as if to say, <span style="font-style: italic;">There, go ahead</span>, assuming I had the slightest idea how to proceed.<br /><br />I sat looking down at the spiny underside, little curled-up legs undoubtedly drawn in an attempt to protect the crustacean's beneath parts from the onslaught of boiling water and probably just a few minutes ago, too. I looked away and began applying large quantities of butter and sour cream to my baked potato, a more familiar fare not associated with a violent death. Freddy, whose job it is to make my life perfect, plucked the red shelled monster from my plate and went to work on it.<br /><br />I did eat it and it was good, I suppose. But I won't do it again. I'll have crab cakes or carbonara next time. And I don't want to think about an entire lobster's life sacrificed for a scant few mouths full of meat, again. Shame on me. Damn my very soul to firey hell.<br /><br />I got my hair fixed before I left Arkansas. I never do that. Resistent to change, I. And I never spend money on my hair which would set you into a fit of hysteria to hear me say if you knew what my hair usually looks like.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtv-YGQMImBj9f7woXsr0VWlbmp1HvcwPUCoeiidnpoY58iAOmLkRQBGWHwujw00O0IoZneD1uPjj7sCEQHRJNnRQzfU5XDmWbC7l37IZ_Aw-3_dxjRgUzNCi0J_C795Cxe1fD05KzDiA/s1600-h/016+%282%29.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtv-YGQMImBj9f7woXsr0VWlbmp1HvcwPUCoeiidnpoY58iAOmLkRQBGWHwujw00O0IoZneD1uPjj7sCEQHRJNnRQzfU5XDmWbC7l37IZ_Aw-3_dxjRgUzNCi0J_C795Cxe1fD05KzDiA/s320/016+%282%29.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392924264452332162" border="0" /></a><br />The very thought that I'd have to tell you I don't spend money on my hair. Except once a year, or so, when I get a perm. And then it's a spiral, despite concerned glances from my hairdresser. <span style="font-style: italic;">Just do it and I'll pay you</span>, so she does, but it's not in my best interest. She knows it and I sense it.<br /><br />So I made an appointment and she cut it and colored and highlighted it and then showed me how to blow dry it straight. It was flattering.<br /><br />I looked like Jessica Rabbit and I received lots of complements on it...until it had to be washed again. I simply can't reproduce it. I try but I just can't.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8HSfknKvkgWlJKz5fzQD6hmXSbVbYApB8ZAqOK0ODv3G7w7OSMKX1PCpTh4M0QgCju6S8TnMGx9-QWsnl_zhXvtT04CdnHLzUnQZnArrN-dVKmeDC6jUa-Q5SCg-2VvJLA4sJyBjSqLs/s1600-h/IMG_3958.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8HSfknKvkgWlJKz5fzQD6hmXSbVbYApB8ZAqOK0ODv3G7w7OSMKX1PCpTh4M0QgCju6S8TnMGx9-QWsnl_zhXvtT04CdnHLzUnQZnArrN-dVKmeDC6jUa-Q5SCg-2VvJLA4sJyBjSqLs/s320/IMG_3958.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392926161853257714" border="0" /></a><br />It's okay though because Saturday before the wedding, we're all going to a salon and get our hair done. "We", being my husband's ex-wife, his two daughter's-in-law and their two daughters, my granddaughters I should get used to saying.<br /><br />And tomorrow is nails. I've never done that, either. I've gone to the beauty college for pedicures a couple of times but never an out and out manicure at a regular salon and certainly <span style="font-style: italic;">never, ever</span> in New York. Apparently, I don't have to remove the nail polish before we go. They'll take it off at the salon, according to one of the Carols (approximately 48% of our female friends and relatives are named Carol, for some reason, including Freddy's ex-wife). So I'm going to walk into the hotsy-totsy New York salon with my cheap ass Walmart nail polish, what's left of it, clinging to my raggedy nails and I'm going to have them...well...whatever they do to them, filed I suppose and painted, right?<br /><br />I miss this RV, especially right now still on the bed in the back, listening to the rain hit the metal roof and drinking coffee from a 7-Eleven cup. The payments are $500 a month. Add to that, insurance and taxes and we're looking at around $700 a month BEFORE you buy gas and take off work to go anywhere. That's why it's up in New York in the yard of our son who owns a thriving seafood restaurant instead of in our RV barn being eaten up by the pack rat who destroyed the vacuum lines and something else three times for about $300 per incident. Not practical but I've never been accused of being practical. What I <span style="font-style: italic;">have </span>been accused of is spending more money than I make so the RV stays here unless I get a lucky LOTTO ticket which I'm thinking might be worth doing. Buying a ticket, I mean. Who knows? I could win and if I do, we're going to pay off the RV and buy a trailer for my Mercury and drive this big bitch on back to Arkansas. Word.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-70428395591662740372009-10-14T20:31:00.000-07:002009-10-16T13:44:14.300-07:00Reflections on Intercourse<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU1bUGMARo2yZFmqy-U-1JaDdm5rrrzowYp4b-ZqRBQzuzhoV2Nss05mdDk64AYSE7koTs1qD2MJcuJEKHhauNP-Z8HLj_egbpU8ZnPuRVm9qILLfnmaZXiFWdlsz4aoRLOlruI-0InmQ/s1600-h/IMG_3971.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU1bUGMARo2yZFmqy-U-1JaDdm5rrrzowYp4b-ZqRBQzuzhoV2Nss05mdDk64AYSE7koTs1qD2MJcuJEKHhauNP-Z8HLj_egbpU8ZnPuRVm9qILLfnmaZXiFWdlsz4aoRLOlruI-0InmQ/s320/IMG_3971.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392855982901555458" border="0" /></a><br />We spent the night in Lancaster County Pennsylvania night before last. First we ate at an old farmhouse, turned restaurant (and obligatory gift shop, of course) where they seated several couples or families at large, farm tables together. This was clearly my husband's idea. I lack the people-person gene but I went along. Probably a result of all that submissive female Amish air up there.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlj2NQNwH4Qh_0X5wBDGHl6kXD8SfoLrqWZzeAgjDq7P_TuLmcX2hIY5K56m6_rvjxty8efdIXuFQUkC31ObHjUYe1OQld7eI59b7x3V7WgcNYIaiBeuUoKuYiRMjHFzL-TXMEwUbhLWo/s1600-h/IMG_3965.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlj2NQNwH4Qh_0X5wBDGHl6kXD8SfoLrqWZzeAgjDq7P_TuLmcX2hIY5K56m6_rvjxty8efdIXuFQUkC31ObHjUYe1OQld7eI59b7x3V7WgcNYIaiBeuUoKuYiRMjHFzL-TXMEwUbhLWo/s320/IMG_3965.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392665941783657810" border="0" /></a><br />The food came out in courses and was served family-style in bowls which were passed around amongst the diners. As it turns out, eating with strangers can be added to the list of things my husband knows best about and it was a delightful experience. With lots of food (there are no delightful experiences that don't include lots of food, you know). Meatloaf, fried chicken, ham, mashed potatoes touted as "real", green beans that looked like they just came in from a farm next door, gravy, stuffing (made with white bread and not so great as it turns out), corn with brown butter (?), coleslaw, cottage cheese, chow chow, homemade bread cut in thick slices served with butter and apple butter. There was more but I can't remember it all. And the whole orgy culminated with 5 desserts: Shoo Fly Pie, red jello cut in large cubes which were made by substituting applesauce for water in the recipe, coconut cream pudding, homemade chocolate or vanilla ice cream and orange sherbert. Is there suppose to be an "r" in that word? I mean, I always pronounce it "sherbert" but should I? I'm thinking probably not. But we ate it like hungry, little pigs and then set out into the night for this motel.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLBvc-jX3gg2S_oBqlSKEqFzMX5IFomRVOxP6bUlUZHwAYkbCpP6vQ701xx_mmFGEe5ySVzqwsC8V-m7gCcH9GRxufwnm1X6e5auv1FPmFZ-mrM6u0K1eTm6dbWcV6yt3clYwqArUotQ4/s1600-h/IMG_3966.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLBvc-jX3gg2S_oBqlSKEqFzMX5IFomRVOxP6bUlUZHwAYkbCpP6vQ701xx_mmFGEe5ySVzqwsC8V-m7gCcH9GRxufwnm1X6e5auv1FPmFZ-mrM6u0K1eTm6dbWcV6yt3clYwqArUotQ4/s320/IMG_3966.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392849152851938930" border="0" /></a><br />We stayed here once before when we passed through Intercourse, Pennsylvania and had what I remember to be a restful and rejuvenating stay which included pumpernickle dinner rolls at a nearby German restaurant.<br /><br />In the morning, we headed out and saw this...<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwzwjLkH9BWX98J06sxdJblAQsElvcZruErXyvpDMPup4arPTO36vflSC9odzQ-3PFMWYCNBzoJfW_bsp-V6aB_z_457YzxqvlGUK1NjDzkdFjejCFTrtoLkYLfgkiggNHZjy2pcLoSTc/s1600-h/IMG_3982.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwzwjLkH9BWX98J06sxdJblAQsElvcZruErXyvpDMPup4arPTO36vflSC9odzQ-3PFMWYCNBzoJfW_bsp-V6aB_z_457YzxqvlGUK1NjDzkdFjejCFTrtoLkYLfgkiggNHZjy2pcLoSTc/s320/IMG_3982.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392856508602546770" border="0" /></a><br />and this...<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0c-pvFs081PZSM4Ka50dNrJxrRk-_Jsf7LLW58c0T0-QOBjPN2Ao9KVdOvpY7mUBbX-9vSVF3wsJPDuz0VwfoChiVxD-V5Yn0l3H0Ofpl0ZWXz4rcqJZFUMiznSXddxSUhOwO2aCcwLw/s1600-h/IMG_3992.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0c-pvFs081PZSM4Ka50dNrJxrRk-_Jsf7LLW58c0T0-QOBjPN2Ao9KVdOvpY7mUBbX-9vSVF3wsJPDuz0VwfoChiVxD-V5Yn0l3H0Ofpl0ZWXz4rcqJZFUMiznSXddxSUhOwO2aCcwLw/s320/IMG_3992.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392859195938122402" border="0" /></a><br />and this <span style="font-style: italic;">punkin' </span>field...<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIZ0UwfbKJR1tKx_AvXy42r9KIBSN1jTK6tamgZvZt9bbItPZAW-973BzTgQR7JWDnH22DjhkABC4OPkEnMHRv_7Qk55G8Vn3N6HPEQCIbvPIXaWMxmvzrxAjwU7AHHXW0a-_mIq-R25Y/s1600-h/IMG_3999.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIZ0UwfbKJR1tKx_AvXy42r9KIBSN1jTK6tamgZvZt9bbItPZAW-973BzTgQR7JWDnH22DjhkABC4OPkEnMHRv_7Qk55G8Vn3N6HPEQCIbvPIXaWMxmvzrxAjwU7AHHXW0a-_mIq-R25Y/s320/IMG_3999.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392859204208495058" border="0" /></a><br />and this farm complete with horse dookie in the lane...<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj26KHDwI44Tf1BkyHQ-DTzkZQ1kROHbuqvRkHWHn07M3EEQtkUNC-e5LEUTa5jiSzaC3ZM7d8NOTSe-5mjY_5umidrO3iIrOPap4o1979NNohI3K42DTBVMLpfnMwYMzXTs0r9elhJcA/s1600-h/IMG_3989.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj26KHDwI44Tf1BkyHQ-DTzkZQ1kROHbuqvRkHWHn07M3EEQtkUNC-e5LEUTa5jiSzaC3ZM7d8NOTSe-5mjY_5umidrO3iIrOPap4o1979NNohI3K42DTBVMLpfnMwYMzXTs0r9elhJcA/s320/IMG_3989.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392859187555020482" border="0" /></a><br />It's always refreshing to visit that area. A part of me, and that of a throng of embroidered sweatshirt-wearing old women, rejoices in the knowledge that people actually live like the Amish. No electricity, growing their own food, helping each other in activities of daily living, dressing plain...it's reassuring, somehow. And we think we'd like to do it, but I'm a little too stressed right now to make any life changes because my laptop screen is cracked and I need to wait till it comes back from Dell. But maybe after that.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-90209074313875263862009-10-13T18:15:00.000-07:002009-10-13T19:04:59.086-07:00Visiting VirginiaI've done something for most of my adult life. Whenever I visit somewhere cool, I start planning to move there. And every time I come through Virginia or West Virginia, the area where my father was born, I start making plans. Today I even convinced my husband...almost.<br /><br />We stopped off at Staunton, Virginia for breakfast on our way to New York for my step-son's wedding. My Dad was born about 40 miles from Staunton in the tiny hamlet of Blue Grass. Every summer of my childhood, we visited this area for a two-week vacation. His family still lives here, though those I knew are mostly all dead.<br /><br />So, it was innocent enough. I just said, "Let's stop in Staunton real quick for breakfast" and he took the exit. Soon enough he found the Beverly Restaurant in the historic downtown district and we went in and had a nice breakfast. We'd been there before on a previous trip.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmeWYGktki6LYYZbE26ztN3wfcaPgVmb6G31R7ZTiPNwfyDXXGYmPXCWBghm5V_pwP42wZElUBnrWZnnhET1GjR9vGQnHepUIHyEnzX8QZQ3lB_1FaVD3S6rpHCRQKsbazq5iQbQnX9Mc/s1600-h/IMG_3862.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmeWYGktki6LYYZbE26ztN3wfcaPgVmb6G31R7ZTiPNwfyDXXGYmPXCWBghm5V_pwP42wZElUBnrWZnnhET1GjR9vGQnHepUIHyEnzX8QZQ3lB_1FaVD3S6rpHCRQKsbazq5iQbQnX9Mc/s320/IMG_3862.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392263393807656898" border="0" /></a><br />The cook was a black man, quite funny, who sang and the waitress began dancing which sent the cook into a fit of laughter that he had to go outside to stop. We watched him through the tall front windows.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-iREUc098lQ6o6Gdn-9H4yuFndb8gXIbR7cvteh_fiiiJ10WKSkir9ESqv5S-PIIPegJZISrlx-QptmvP593fsRoJl4z05t2zfBWeMvtCgjyuXV4hOiYzw45iug4vjYC002UtlKOhnzE/s1600-h/IMG_3864.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-iREUc098lQ6o6Gdn-9H4yuFndb8gXIbR7cvteh_fiiiJ10WKSkir9ESqv5S-PIIPegJZISrlx-QptmvP593fsRoJl4z05t2zfBWeMvtCgjyuXV4hOiYzw45iug4vjYC002UtlKOhnzE/s320/IMG_3864.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392268704563949682" border="0" /></a><br />I started noticing some very interesting, characters: People walking down the street who were just obviously open-minded, you know? You can tell. A tall guy with a faded, blue do-rag on his head. Two 30-ish business men who smiled at me through the window as they passed because I happened to be smiling at something Freddy had just said. A mother with three kids dressed in a style I admire (I even took their picture).<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_JEUeNTPHBGz80N4QqmQi0GwFR4a-cyWg0Pd_k-LBpzkO-Y4ZLaPIlV8Il2_mbJGlB6p5pKlziMEvp_CvALHB36t_7gM27P34bBnmprgCnG_eaQHIhZ_I6Az7CzMVUEX271_5sM_eaJs/s1600-h/IMG_3870.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_JEUeNTPHBGz80N4QqmQi0GwFR4a-cyWg0Pd_k-LBpzkO-Y4ZLaPIlV8Il2_mbJGlB6p5pKlziMEvp_CvALHB36t_7gM27P34bBnmprgCnG_eaQHIhZ_I6Az7CzMVUEX271_5sM_eaJs/s320/IMG_3870.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392265150808839842" border="0" /></a><br /><br />You have to understand something, first. I'm stifled. I live in a small-minded little town in Arkansas where everybody loves guns and drives 4-wheelers and hates Obama. And, though I dearly love some of them, and I mean really and truly love them as much as I love my family, I feel like I'm drowning in...conservatism (is that a word? Somehow it looks really weird, right now.)<br /><br />So we leave the restaurant and walk down the street and we see art galleries and a vintage clothing store and Fair Trade Coffee shops and places like this...<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVKxkSJUPVTcxYMGgp7LCGh2dtsAKKplE8K-MyXoXlxtEGXD0VDDeJC2PoU7ZFETmh4gxAD0lSW5Blmof3Lmjv4NxLNPR9iVXpl6SJDbi23S0Gi9T9GfHPXr4QmyPcrdCZrOUpiXu850k/s1600-h/IMG_3875.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVKxkSJUPVTcxYMGgp7LCGh2dtsAKKplE8K-MyXoXlxtEGXD0VDDeJC2PoU7ZFETmh4gxAD0lSW5Blmof3Lmjv4NxLNPR9iVXpl6SJDbi23S0Gi9T9GfHPXr4QmyPcrdCZrOUpiXu850k/s320/IMG_3875.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392266680244828674" border="0" /></a><br />...and this:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsF-u0omh3iqfIVXfYJglKy5yS5aBTMZZs3LyQURSJrJvGzJN4tEWQMY7r_Pt7Eh0KUJ6RW6JUmIqP6UU-Nk75r81m7KfBcwvgIoFzM5sRconfFj23Yszs95XhcoNZsmASW8d27xqVaUg/s1600-h/IMG_3878.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsF-u0omh3iqfIVXfYJglKy5yS5aBTMZZs3LyQURSJrJvGzJN4tEWQMY7r_Pt7Eh0KUJ6RW6JUmIqP6UU-Nk75r81m7KfBcwvgIoFzM5sRconfFj23Yszs95XhcoNZsmASW8d27xqVaUg/s320/IMG_3878.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392267250205671714" border="0" /></a><br />And I stop in a health food store to look for one of those free papers that list the local happenings and which give you a feel for the grassroots of a place and I start talking to the owner, a friendly, red-headed guy with a baby on his shoulder. And then a trio of young people follow me out to the street to tell me where the Shakespeare Center is and other attractions. One girl, rather butchy, had a myriad of tattoos and one huge, quite exquisite one of Jesus on the left side of her neck. You don't see people like that where I live. And you don't see any black people, or not many. And I'm getting older and I'm tired and I've been through a tornado now and I just want to get on with my life. I did this and I'm ready to do some new stuff. Only, that's probably not gonna happen because my husband only stayed convinced to move to Staunton for about 45 minutes, and then he began to crawdad on me. <br /><br />He did say he could live in Eureka Springs, though........Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-70605005397992056172009-09-23T20:10:00.000-07:002009-09-23T21:40:32.963-07:00Tomato Preserves or What To Do on a Cloudy Day in September<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaKs94KLmB5ykrSpEK_A2uqsggAtzPl1Tf8bsFOIai1D-dtBA-nbtIXRVU459SlJoN78kF6pqzRDLYrOCIs4tuj2RCPWQ4H38JwpCS_BY_z633WWv_kpVtLWEYVlGNKNnQvGH_tWuIBE/s1600-h/IMG_3796.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 242px; height: 322px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaKs94KLmB5ykrSpEK_A2uqsggAtzPl1Tf8bsFOIai1D-dtBA-nbtIXRVU459SlJoN78kF6pqzRDLYrOCIs4tuj2RCPWQ4H38JwpCS_BY_z633WWv_kpVtLWEYVlGNKNnQvGH_tWuIBE/s320/IMG_3796.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384872846246508434" border="0" /></a><br />I grew up in the midwest, Nebraska. I didn't realize until later, having moved to the south, that the whole world didn't know about tomato preserves. Most people I know, now, never heard of them. Back in Nebraska, we learned how to make them in home ec just in case our mothers didn't teach us how to make them, which mine probably didn't but I saw the process numerous times in the kitchen of our farmhouse. My parents and my grandmother, who lived with us, raised a large garden and what they didn't raise, my father brought home in bushel baskets from outside the home because, as my mother said, he believed "a busy wife is a happy wife". It wasn't until years later, living in Arkansas, that I remembered tomato preserves even existed and realized that I had no idea how to reproduce them, having forgotten my home ec lesson and the home demonstrations. So I called my Mom and asked her for the recipe. This is how that went:<br /><br />"How do you make tomato preserves?"<br />"Oh...well...cut up a bunch of tomatoes and add a bunch of sugar and cook it for a long time"<br />"How much sugar and how many tomatoes?"<br />"A whole bunch."<br />"A whole bunch of what?"<br />"A whole bunch of both."<br />"How much <span style="font-style: italic;">is </span>that?"<br />"Oh, quite a bit."<br />"Is that all you do?"<br />"Yeah"<br />"Aren't there lemon slices in it?"<br />"Oh yeah. And some lemon."<br />"How much?"<br />"Oh, just some. However much you want."<br />"And then what do I do?"<br />"You cook it for a long time."<br />"How long?"<br />"Til it's gooey."<br />"Til it's gooey?"<br />"Yeah."<br />"How long does <span style="font-style: italic;">that </span>take?"<br />"Hours."<br />"Is that all there is to it? Just mix up a bunch of tomatoes and sugar and some lemon slices and cook it?"<br />"Yeah."<br /><br />So, I finally got up my nerve and tried it last year. And then again today. Here's how you do it:<br /><br /><br />Dig some of these out of your garage or out from under the bed in your spare room and wash them.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8ejBCkB3VW2HUWaQwkWQeSZzELprLV8R2tV7Fqe3qx9qnzkdRT2xF1EjZS9GQJSFrwypxxCo4gW0NPAjHt8lHF3GCnRFD0MxtEae2oyFpcoMAUdSGgjSTc_emGJ1CuK4s-60kSwlaVuo/s1600-h/IMG_3792.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8ejBCkB3VW2HUWaQwkWQeSZzELprLV8R2tV7Fqe3qx9qnzkdRT2xF1EjZS9GQJSFrwypxxCo4gW0NPAjHt8lHF3GCnRFD0MxtEae2oyFpcoMAUdSGgjSTc_emGJ1CuK4s-60kSwlaVuo/s320/IMG_3792.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384874879407300290" border="0" /></a><br /><br />And find some of these. Note the word "find" not "grow". I haven't grown a decent tomato in 5 years. Go to the Farmer's Market or buy them from the guy who parks on the corner across from James' Food Mart. Do whatever you have to do but get some, and as many as you can get your hands on.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEintXJ_ZtVDsWy5prxvVxSbmnV-LyWa5F34-W4GbG12UbRL_vJPQJzKhiGKx8z6C5ck58JGMpBbq1yBY91Uw6fxCTVV7P5L6NbqBYht7f2cRSa0w0qhOqukRbeZ2h2vHX5vK1AKU9QxC1Q/s1600-h/IMG_3789.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEintXJ_ZtVDsWy5prxvVxSbmnV-LyWa5F34-W4GbG12UbRL_vJPQJzKhiGKx8z6C5ck58JGMpBbq1yBY91Uw6fxCTVV7P5L6NbqBYht7f2cRSa0w0qhOqukRbeZ2h2vHX5vK1AKU9QxC1Q/s320/IMG_3789.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384873787580647762" border="0" /></a><br />Buy some of these:<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoez4FSzXmUnE4cVGk8S4QldLTXwBJLQNpIGPrhMx_a2dSpMsibPZTu87Mjf8W6tvNXG70RBxCeXH7m1bBXqhHlUUpvq55iOarPEqBgrEPF0X3Vu8DeUETTj77HRIFctGIdGnyJWZ7Lcs/s1600-h/IMG_3805.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoez4FSzXmUnE4cVGk8S4QldLTXwBJLQNpIGPrhMx_a2dSpMsibPZTu87Mjf8W6tvNXG70RBxCeXH7m1bBXqhHlUUpvq55iOarPEqBgrEPF0X3Vu8DeUETTj77HRIFctGIdGnyJWZ7Lcs/s320/IMG_3805.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384874888811291506" border="0" /></a><br /><br />And do this to them, take out the seeds and put the seeds into the compost:<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPP057gBYLf_d-z0oNXjwV4R-NNbjePHs04UEWn29bvYG4p6xVCs-0j6H25kcxuXWjoSg1alGhSCB1r9nwYaOyP0V3QH3FQZPxBb0GNE6Qo9R5GuF5Yvti68ZBfJz00ofrZsxt393t06I/s1600-h/Copy+%281%29+of+IMG_3808.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPP057gBYLf_d-z0oNXjwV4R-NNbjePHs04UEWn29bvYG4p6xVCs-0j6H25kcxuXWjoSg1alGhSCB1r9nwYaOyP0V3QH3FQZPxBb0GNE6Qo9R5GuF5Yvti68ZBfJz00ofrZsxt393t06I/s320/Copy+%281%29+of+IMG_3808.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384874897424901538" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Blanche the tomatoes and then put them in ice water to loosen the skins.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUhZsi_q9cygZtOlUlai5oYPGCP5OD8G47JNZ6a5oXaqUFXGkw-awnXgA_dI1Ksfy14i67CesIUyIHeaUKJzFzfnOrAuQKZEhLKyfQs7VlpPyVZ6JpPXf6e_U1sPKKH6Za8TqBpgUpWQ4/s1600-h/IMG_3795.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUhZsi_q9cygZtOlUlai5oYPGCP5OD8G47JNZ6a5oXaqUFXGkw-awnXgA_dI1Ksfy14i67CesIUyIHeaUKJzFzfnOrAuQKZEhLKyfQs7VlpPyVZ6JpPXf6e_U1sPKKH6Za8TqBpgUpWQ4/s320/IMG_3795.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384876993746985522" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Remove the skins and core them and cut them up like this:<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvKEqpZNktWHmAB6jUV0wTkUkXvsOu8zPqteYQSjJ6wpeHz8QC1wmB3BMBd7j8GXOy4VLr5bJVnW4cAsHz0m0_8iqLQfpmQz30TVo11skRFG8Lr9Ur2gQuuv4flrOkSLTWlNqzjqI4MMg/s1600-h/IMG_3802.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvKEqpZNktWHmAB6jUV0wTkUkXvsOu8zPqteYQSjJ6wpeHz8QC1wmB3BMBd7j8GXOy4VLr5bJVnW4cAsHz0m0_8iqLQfpmQz30TVo11skRFG8Lr9Ur2gQuuv4flrOkSLTWlNqzjqI4MMg/s320/IMG_3802.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384877000727943010" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Put them together with the lemon slices and start looking for a heavy pot...<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDiY4vz-SUufXKBwVijXxtgzZCxj0rS3GxWVCG1omPbEsNqvMeDvtgB5jbm9VCd3iQuNZ1ZXMJMpXacmupkztu5kqkVFWVpl8-L8TIF3E5ssT5YEKIrP-tJFVYd_0sk8t0_9XjWVKWkpU/s1600-h/Copy+%281%29+of+IMG_3810.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDiY4vz-SUufXKBwVijXxtgzZCxj0rS3GxWVCG1omPbEsNqvMeDvtgB5jbm9VCd3iQuNZ1ZXMJMpXacmupkztu5kqkVFWVpl8-L8TIF3E5ssT5YEKIrP-tJFVYd_0sk8t0_9XjWVKWkpU/s320/Copy+%281%29+of+IMG_3810.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384874905814826002" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Put them all in a pot and add a bunch of this:<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiJVsLXUk-j-Vy3STWNiR98h3nLLIIkjO-47ExXQXHoIHTYhtUqtScegWWWQtv9VU0uydrcsXzq8r-lgI8JRuy5MwIRPC2Bdii6dFvfSWPlj7TCzRd9C7ttPbMBomFKgJ_bme9mbN7ABg/s1600-h/IMG_3813_2.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiJVsLXUk-j-Vy3STWNiR98h3nLLIIkjO-47ExXQXHoIHTYhtUqtScegWWWQtv9VU0uydrcsXzq8r-lgI8JRuy5MwIRPC2Bdii6dFvfSWPlj7TCzRd9C7ttPbMBomFKgJ_bme9mbN7ABg/s320/IMG_3813_2.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384877007988218418" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Cook it all together...<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho0XMyedx5oxKMBJJ-4X7xJTvyonQKNwLikcoyriecJnG9UX7ouXksxQ2685Qt5abLAP9flNI6lSPDEI8Dh_4qP6uAHgcYu75SQmJSxoG0nJMrNPiK74WsuuYFL0cQj_Kdy1NeaFhpr60/s1600-h/IMG_3814_2.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho0XMyedx5oxKMBJJ-4X7xJTvyonQKNwLikcoyriecJnG9UX7ouXksxQ2685Qt5abLAP9flNI6lSPDEI8Dh_4qP6uAHgcYu75SQmJSxoG0nJMrNPiK74WsuuYFL0cQj_Kdy1NeaFhpr60/s320/IMG_3814_2.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384878791703474994" border="0" /></a><br /><br />...til it looks like this:<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh00TMio18Dk9CMQyGhPoOxUBXx7IqT5zshgVNrJGaUoL5AE7PzWTmR15SELa0y1HtC7gPvAocnw_EZHD7B-4VrlY6dMz4f_yjp9JOeOGT05ISds1MY3qnfAIff4nh-OeWTM6cOlrRM0mY/s1600-h/IMG_3827_3.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh00TMio18Dk9CMQyGhPoOxUBXx7IqT5zshgVNrJGaUoL5AE7PzWTmR15SELa0y1HtC7gPvAocnw_EZHD7B-4VrlY6dMz4f_yjp9JOeOGT05ISds1MY3qnfAIff4nh-OeWTM6cOlrRM0mY/s320/IMG_3827_3.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384878801486792642" border="0" /></a><br /><br />This is gonna take hours on low heat and in the meantime you're probably gonna want to go play with this guy, or somebody like him. He's trying out his Halloween costume, here:<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIirEoH3yiWDlnvlqfse2-DJw_CN8KJri1doRDwty1cM6PjOMh1O4EI98DhPU_lqbO81jGNU_TUa477EnYrfTdMuWhMlDLRyxwNCQnVD-5PTKDCs1gCM0We4AbDXWdSmkbXodjpZk1Mvc/s1600-h/IMG_3784.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIirEoH3yiWDlnvlqfse2-DJw_CN8KJri1doRDwty1cM6PjOMh1O4EI98DhPU_lqbO81jGNU_TUa477EnYrfTdMuWhMlDLRyxwNCQnVD-5PTKDCs1gCM0We4AbDXWdSmkbXodjpZk1Mvc/s320/IMG_3784.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384878805047527314" border="0" /></a><br />Later on, after the lion goes home, you'll wanna do this with the preserves and clean up the mess in the kitchen and go somewhere and sit down and watch Wife Swap or Split Ends or post something on Facebook.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR2Ntl3qZNhUE77Z7Em5SddyVN6gVWyem98IcDpQo6lw5kwXiZe4npQjGZIirgkMHHEPosIMYIijvUpypzcsQ9CxoXjrnjuDN3FhxVoXPiKsZD65aUAiCtVwVR011Jt2MEhyuf4RB3FFo/s1600-h/Copy+%281%29+of+IMG_3850.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR2Ntl3qZNhUE77Z7Em5SddyVN6gVWyem98IcDpQo6lw5kwXiZe4npQjGZIirgkMHHEPosIMYIijvUpypzcsQ9CxoXjrnjuDN3FhxVoXPiKsZD65aUAiCtVwVR011Jt2MEhyuf4RB3FFo/s320/Copy+%281%29+of+IMG_3850.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384878814217156738" border="0" /></a><br />In the morning, you can turn the jars right side up and they should be sealed. Use the one that's only half full first. It's the one you didn't have enough to fill all the way up. It never works out that you fill them all up. You're gonna wanna try some on homemade bread, toasted, and buttered with real, salted butter. Forget about your cholesterol. This isn't the time. Maybe you're gonna want to add some peanut butter.<br /><br />And one more thing; don't share these with anybody else or you'll be hassled for the rest of your life by people wanting more. Keep them all for yourself. Don't even share them with your mother.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgt6KPRZ2LWrQBmgGS6tY1xECk13sKyDxYNU-b1MoI6cGpcuUoNQglSc-chAsVF27_KSg1II5BmpDThv5BZwSKUmvEEyvhUJkTro2W1j4Tv3PMwD-MpWZ2VUV6qZH69K1IonKKLkVf_ulo/s1600-h/IMG_2702.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgt6KPRZ2LWrQBmgGS6tY1xECk13sKyDxYNU-b1MoI6cGpcuUoNQglSc-chAsVF27_KSg1II5BmpDThv5BZwSKUmvEEyvhUJkTro2W1j4Tv3PMwD-MpWZ2VUV6qZH69K1IonKKLkVf_ulo/s320/IMG_2702.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5384883546814391202" border="0" /></a><br />She's too old to want to mess with making them herself and she's gonna put a guilt trip on you to share them if she knows you've got them. Take my advise, put them on the back shelf and keep your mouth shut. Remember, she didn't give you one ounce of help in terms of a recipe so don't weaken. The only exception to this rule is if she gave you some of her homegrown tomatoes. If so, maybe you can work out a deal.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-535644209748784272009-09-11T23:17:00.000-07:002012-02-05T13:31:02.176-08:00Of Roaches and Bad ActingJust before I got off work tonight the triage bell went off. That's a doorbell the admission clerks ring that sounds in the main ER alerting us to a patient in the waiting area. I've heard that same bell in other places out in public and it elicits in me a Pavlovian sense of impending doom.<br /><br />It is September 11th, 2009, a Friday night and it was 11:45pm, exactly fifteen minutes before my shift ended. This late in one's shift it is perfectly acceptable to ignore the sound of the triage bell, electing instead to stare blankly at the computer screen at a game of Spider Solitaire, letting the other nurses do the work. You're as good as gone, anyway, and nobody really cares. But, because I'm trying really hard to get my full 12 hours in every day I work spurred on by having balanced my checkbook yesterday, I elected to stay long enough to triage the, for me, last patient of the night. I'm kinda glad I didn't miss this one.<br /><br />I called the patient's name after opening the triage door, prompting a trio of neurologically challenged backwoodsians to stand and begin their painfully slow approach to the triage area among them, an older woman, and a man and younger woman who looked exactly alike. They were like one of those child's games where you take a face and add different hairstyles and glasses, hats, etc to change its appearance but the face never changes. The man carried a metal box which I correctly assumed held the patient's medications. With his other arm, he guided the patient, the younger woman, toward the triage area as if she would collapse and her hand on his arm would somehow prevent that.<br /><br />ER patients think that their level of perceived acuity is directly related to how slow they walk and talk. It's not unusual to have a patient speak in broken sentances which they mistakenly believe convinces medical personnel of the validity of their ailments. These poor actors, when questioned about their conditions, respond with a breathy, "...can't eat....I'm.....weak...." reminding me of the cartoon series I use to watch on tv when I was a kid. Space Ghost, when stripped of the garments from which he gleaned his superhuman powers would gasp, "....can't.....reach....my....power.....bands....."<br /><br />The three eventually made it into the triage room and the patient and her mother were seated in the only two seats and I began a brief triage assessment. When I first speak to a patient who presents as this woman did tonight, it's not uncommon for the patient to look at one of the family members, cueing them to begin answering questions for them further illustrating the degree of debilitation they've experienced as a result of their devastating illness. I've even had women tell me a number when I ask their husbands to rate their pain on a scale of 0 to 10. Tonight I dared that family to start answering questions for this woman and, as if they sensed it, they didn't. When I asked her, the patient told me she'd been sick for two weeks.<br /><br />ER nurses pose seemingly innocent questions to patients which are designed to teach them lessons. My next was one of those questions.<br /><br />"What happened tonight to bring you to the emergency room?" translates to: "Are you out of your fucking mind? This is an EMERGENCY room. It's called that because you're only suppose to be here if you have an EMERGENCY. Being sick for two weeks does not fall into that catagory. What in the name of all things holy was going through your mind to get your family out at nearly midnight and crawl to town in the middle of the night? What about this date made you decide that today was the day you were finally going to seek medical treatment for something you've been experiencing for two weeks? Is it something about the twin towers? What?"<br /><br />Turns out, they'd taken the girl to several different clinics and ERs over the two week course of her illness and "nobody would help her". That was my cue to say something like, "Gee, I wonder why everybody is so mean? It's clear to see you've been terribly mistreated. Here honey, you come in our ER. We can see you're sick. You're sick as hell and we're gonna rush you in here and pamper you for as long as you want us to. And if somebody comes in having a heart attack, well, fuck 'em. They can wait while we fluff your pillow." That's what they expect us to say. Really.<br /><br />I continued my assessment and then did vital signs and documented them and then I looked in the med box. As I was taking one bottle of medication at a time out of the box and writing it on the medication sheet in the chart, I looked down and saw it. A shiny, brown roach crawling amongst the clutter in the bottom of the box. It was about the same time that I decided I had compiled a sufficient list of medications and shut the lid, handing the box back to the male family member, whatever he was; Dad, husband or both.<br /><br />I then left the room and while the doctor was looking over the chart, I formed a plan. I would tell the man to take the medications out and put them in the car, thereby preventing the escape of the roach into the general population of the ER. When I went back in, I handed the chart to the woman and turned to the man who was, once more, holding the box in one hand and had begun to guide the woman back out into the waiting area with the other.<br /><br />"If I were you," I said, looking as somber as I could in an attempt to convey some hidden threat of theives, etc, "I'd take those medications out and lock them up in the car."<br /><br />He remained silent for a second and then said as he turned out the door toward the admissions desk, "I'll just hold onto them. They won't get them away from me."<br /><br />I clocked out and left before they checked in and came back to a treatment room.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-91413091831437926522009-09-09T22:50:00.000-07:002009-09-09T23:37:23.909-07:00Life is SweetWhy do I feel so lazy? How is it possible to feel worked to death one minute and like a lazy piece of shit, the next? I did pretty much nothing, today. I didn't call people back who left messages to book massages. I just ignored the whole thing. I don't want to deal with them. Or it ("it" being the business"). This is typical for me, being completely done with a thing once I decide to ease out of it. Just completely lose interest.<br /><br />I was suppose to go to the doctor in Little Rock today but I canceled my appointment. I just couldn't imagine leaving my house. I'm very tempted to do the same with my annual checkup tomorrow with my local physician but they called to confirm today and I said I'd be there. I probably need to be going to somebody I don't know for this. Pap smear. I need to not go to a doctor I work with in the hospital but I'm too fucking lazy to find somebody out of town. So I'll go tomorrow and then look at the floor whenever I meet him in the hallway at work.<br /><br />I wish I could just allow myself to be lazy when I feel lazy. It's not enough I'll have done five 12-hour shifts in the ER this week? Today and tomorrow off (is it really a day off if you do an hour massage in the afternoon?) and that's it. Every other day I'll work 12 hours. So the one day I sit on my ass I feel guilty. Haven't I been through enough therapy to be over that by now? Feeling guilty, I mean? That's part of the big fascination with going back to a full-time position. Being "on" for three days a week and "off" the other 4. That's why I'm getting out of massage, for the most part. So I don't have to feel so fucking guilty every single day for not being willing to drop whatever I'm doing to go rub somebody else's body. <br /><br />I've been thinking a lot about death, lately. I suppose I'm working through some developmental task that 50-year-old women go through facing their own mortality. I have the sensation of people around me dropping like flies. And I think having lived through a tornado ripping your town a new ass probably has a part in it. The realization that life is fragile and bad things really do happen. And along with all of that, a very clear sense that the label "bad things" may not be so accurate as we think. Maybe the tornado wasn't really bad. Maybe it brought us what we needed on some level. All of us. And maybe death isn't so bad, is what I'm thinking. I don't necessarily want to do it right now but if I do, I figure it won't be so bad. For me, anyway. My kids and family would be devastated and I would regret that, if I was even aware of it from my position in paradise. I suppose the more real life you encounter, the more "paradise" has the potential to offer you. It is attractive. <br /><br />And my life is good. Even <span style="font-style: italic;">I </span>think so. I'm enjoying it, though I suppose I'm really tired. But I've pretty much got the bull by the proverbial dick at this point in my life. Nothing fancy but lots of nice little luxuries and beauty and companionship. Lot's of great people in my life, right now, as it's pretty much always been for me. I've been lucky but that doesn't mean being dead doesn't have it's allure. My daughter recently expressed her feelings on the subject. I suspect her's may be from that deeper sense of disillusionment that naturally follows in one's 30's. That, coupled with some pretty shitty losses she's had to endure. Stuff nobody should have to go through. Doesn't take too many of those to make you maybe a little more willing to cross over than is healthy for you. I haven't commented on it because I suspect I'll sound like my mother did to me once, about 10 years ago.<br /><br />I was in the absolute throes of depression. Situational as hell, though I didn't realize it at the time. I thought it was entirely chemical imbalance. I needed therapy, which I got and it's better now. But I was fucking miserable back then as I was a lot of my adult life. It was Easter time and my Mom and brother came to visit. I remember being so depressed, I couldn't wait for a respectable length of time after eating lunch to ask if they minded me taking a nap. The truth was, I simply couldn't wait another second to curl up in the fetal position and sob. I could pull that off alone, in the bedroom, my sobs muffled by my pillow. <br /><br />My brother had brought his Harley down on a trailer and we rode. My brother offered me a helmet but I grinned and declined. Later, driving up on the mountain in his Suburban, my mother and kids in the back seat, I confided in him that I didn't take the helmet because I'd thought to myself, "I wouldn't kill myself, I'm not going to do that but if I have a wreck and have a chance to have my brain scattered over the pavement and be out of this hell I'm in, I'm not gonna do anything to prevent that." As soon as I said it I mentally chastised myself for sharing such a macabre thought in front of my poor mother who would, of course, be devastated to even imagine me thinking such a thing. We got out of the car at our destination about the same time and my Mom came up to me, smiling. <br /><br />"I know just how you feel," she said, grinning as if we shared a delicious secret. I was sort of surprised but the older I get, the more I understand.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-485302841432906961.post-13502374858520152172009-09-08T21:40:00.000-07:002009-09-09T23:40:11.850-07:00The Next ChapterI'm loving my job, these days. As soon as I started back in the ER I decided to let (most of) my massage business go the way of the wind.<br /><br />I'm tired. Of a lot of things. I'm tired of the sense of impending financial doom I've felt for some time. I'm tired of feeling pressured to be...personable, likable, unobjectionable...in an attempt to stay in a favorable position with the public who I hoped would, in turn, provide me a proper living by booking massages on a regular basis. I'm tired of the crackhead neighbors who live in the "units" surrounding my office space on main street. I'm tired of the fucking twisted metal roofing still hung in the tree in front of my office despite numerous pleading calls to the overworked and underpaid landlord to remove it. I heart you, Orvin, but I'm tired.<br /><br />I'm tired of feeling like I'm not doing enough. Always letting people down. Letting the people at the hospital down by not working many hours. Letting my massage clients down by not being available to them 7 days a week. For going to Nebraska and Little Rock and Hot Springs on a regular basis and not being in the office when they want to book a massage. Letting my husband down by sticking him with the brunt of financial responsibility for our family. Letting my grandchildren down by not having energy for them after nursing and doing massage. Letting myself down by not having time to write or read or vacuum the dead flies off the windowsill. I'm tired.<br /><br />So I let go.<br /><br />I have people calling now for massages and I have to turn them down, or worse. I turn them over to another therapist. And that's really hard. There's another therapist working in my space with me. Or instead of me. She shares the rent. And that's really hard. Not a team player, I. Not a partner.<br /><br />My new "studio" is going up next to my house. I look for completion by November. And I may fold up shop October 1st, leaving a message on my office phone that I'll reopen on a much smaller scale in a new location later in the year and to leave a number if you have a gift certificate. Hell, I'll pay Trisha to do them, if I have to, but I'll honor them.<br /><br />And I'll let go. <br /><br />And while it's hard, it's not really sad. For once, a "letting go" that's not sad to me. Instead, it's a new chapter. It's the "other stuff" I've wanted to do.<br /><br />As soon as I decided to let go of the business, the morning I called and asked Trisha to share my office space, the very next second, I decided to write a book about the tornado. It's a format I've wanted to use for years and as soon as I made space in my life, I knew it was the perfect time to do it. I immediately began making appointments for interviews which I plan to transcribe essentially verbatum into a volume I intend to self-publish and sell, locally, in time for the first anniversary of the tornado. I began interviews a couple weeks ago and after this week I'll go at it full throttle, having my five 12-hour shifts out of the way. <br /><br />There's a lot to the concept of "intention" and attraction but there's also a lot to be said for letting go and allowing the right way to unfold, naturally and as it wishes in its own time.<br /><br />I'm turning over my work in the clinic to Trisha, for the most part and I go now to begin the next chapter.Ordie O.http://www.blogger.com/profile/01453495260747294866noreply@blogger.com0