Been too Long Since I wrote Blog

I guess it has been a while since I have written; I was aiming for posts a little closer than the last one to this one but I guess I am not too far past my goal. So, what has been going on?

I got new glasses but they are not right and I need to go back. I tend to have problems with going anywhere anymore so I'll have to work that out. The optometrist is only there on Tuesdays and Thursdays and my body doesn't always agree, not to mention that this last Tuesday was Christmas and even if I felt like going, it wouldn't have helped. When I went in for the eye check-up my inter-ocular pressure was at 29 39 in both eyes. That is high, about twice as high as it is supposed to be. The doc didn't think I was taking it seriously because I probably sounded a little focused on the fact it was the same in both eyes, which seems a little odd to me. Yeah, I do understand my sight is/was in eminent danger based on those readings. Heck, one time they measured at 39 29 in one and I think it was 32 in the other. That doc was having a conniption fit because I was not prepared to just start putting drops in my eyes that I knew nothing about that very day.  Still haven't used the drops even though I do know a little more about them, I still have questions that have not been asked or answered because it never came up again until now. That very high reading was somewhere around 8 years ago, in the autumn--oddly, the autumn part figures heavily in this. Because I was not ready to just start medication without researching it, he insisted I go to an ophthalmologist at least and have my eyes checked again and preferably start on the eye drops. He even found a guy that would  do it mostly pro bono. But every time my pressures were checked by him, three times, once every three months, my pressure was fine. I had my eyes checked for glasses a few more times before this last one, each time it was spring, summer, or winter. Never a problem. Okay, so here comes late autumn and a new eye check, pressures were way high, not at doc throwing a conniption but he was a bit scared nonetheless. He is a bit younger so chances are it was the highest he has ever seen. So he wants me to go to a ophthalmologist, all the way in Springfield. I should go but can't afford it. They sent a referral and the place was supposed to call. The place called because they got a fax and the only legible thing on it was part of my name and my phone number. I told them who sent the fax to them so they could get more info and I have not heard anything back and it has been a couple weeks now. It sounds like they are less concerned than I am.  I am worried, a little. The thing is, it only seems to happen in the autumn, I know the feeling of the eye pressure being high--I didn't realize that is what it was until this last check but it came clear then. I have been having this since I was a little kid, and even complained about my eyes hurting. Not only did no one (mostly meaning medical pros) really seem to pay attention, I was told the eye does not actually feel pain. All I could think of when I heard that is, "I am being lied to."  If one looks up glaucoma, one will find that eye pain is one of the symptoms of high inter-ocular pressure. No wonder I have a distrust of the medical profession. Yeah, that shot won't hurt either, right. It really ticks me off when they lie to my kids too. After they say it won't hurt, I tell them it will. I tell them it will hurt but only a little, that they have had much worse and it will last only a very short time and they can deal with it. THAT is the truth, not that it won't hurt, that is a flippin' lie. Anyway, back the eye pressure. Okay, so the high pressure damages the optic nerve and will kill peripheral vision. Very high pressure can blind one in an evening. If one sees what they call "halos' then one should get to the ER. No one has been very clear on what they mean by "halos" and I see them around all lights at nighttime; but my halos and their halos didn't seem to be the same halos. I think I might have just recently figured out  what they are talking about--I wouldn't call them halos but…it was more like staring at the afterimages of staring at the Las Vegas strip or a carnival midway lights in the dark. You know, stare at the mass of lights them close your eyes and you still sort of see them but they are different colors and act a tad different. And this happens when my eyes are open or closed at times--only in the autumn though that I can recall. So I have had this problem for many years. So far, there is no visible damage to my optic nerve, according to both docs that got the high reading and the specialist that was checking my eyes seven or eight years ago. I have exceptional peripheral vision, it might even be better than my straight on vision but then true focus is not required in peripheral vision. If I stick my thumb in my ear I can see my pinkie when I am looking straight ahead. And that stupid little talent is as strong as ever while my center vision is getting horrid. Gee, could I be medically atypical and the pressure is affecting center vision instead of peripheral? I am not sure if that is possible in glaucoma but if it is, I bet  that is what is happening to me. If not, then I am still medically atypical in the fact that I still have vision by the way these docs are acting. It really irks me that things I want monitored they want to act on and the things I have real issues with (intestinal) I am getting blown off about but that is what is affecting my life in the most negative way. I learned some management techniques for my eyes long ago when I was being blown off on them. I know I need to watch the pressure, the situation could well be getting worse but by golly I am really, really tired of being afraid to eat.

Christmas went well. My youngest wanted a guitar but also knew how much they cost.  Her aunt got her one. I am a nasty mom sometimes. Rather than put it under the tree, I printed out a picture of one and put it in a small box, wrapped it up and stuck it deep under the tree to be one of the last to be opened. She was so great about the fact that the one thing she wanted most was not there. She was happy with the things she got. When she opened the little box and looked at the picture she was a  little confused but when I came walking out of the bedroom carrying her new guitar she almost cried.

I was going to write a little about the elder child too but this is long already and it will take a bit. Hopefully in the next couple days.

The Tuesday Blade

This post about "The Tuesday Blade" by Bob Ottum is prompted by a question I saw on Yahoo! Answers asking if one has read it what does one think about it. When I am done with this I am posting it as an answer but I could not resist saving it for myself. And how appropriate to be posting for a Tuesday.

This book changed my life, really, no kidding.

I read the novel in about 1989 or 1990. I do not remember where the book came from or what caused me to read it. I do remember I started reading it in mid-afternoon and really had trouble putting it down.

I have read reviews of it and most say something like that, "Can't put it down" type stuff. And it is true. I got PO'd when I had to start making dinner or when my then boyfriend tried talking to me. It was a real page turner alright. I was always an avid reader and read pretty quickly, plus it is not a huge novel, I could not put it down to go to sleep, no biggie, I would be a little tired for work the next day, I HAD to keep reading. About 3:30 in the morning I turned the last page, it was only half a page of print, I read it. WHAT? I  double checked to make sure I did not accidentally turn two pages, I hadn't and the text had flowed from the previous page to that one so it wasn't missing anything. I THREW THE BOOK ACROSS THE ROOM!  And almost killed my rubber tree in the process. It also woke up my boyfriend who yelled at me for throwing a book. "Why the hell did you do that?" he yelled/asked. I told him it because of the ending and I couldn't explain it right then picked up the plant and went to bed.

The next day my boy friend started reading it. I caught him and told him he didn't want to do that. But he was insistent and already hooked. Not to mention he wanted to see what I threw a fit about. Fine. Yeah, he was up all night reading it. And you know what?  I was awoken when he threw the book across the room ( not at the plant). I did not yell, I just looked at him. He said, "I see what you mean." And he turned out the light and went to sleep. For all I know that book wound up I the trash even though that seems like sacrilege to me.

It took a bit to process what happened, but this is what I think: The author was churning out one of the best suspense stories of the 20th century and was running a little behind schedule. He needed just another day or two to wrap it all up nice. But he gets a call from his publisher that said "If it is not on my desk by tomorrow you need to pay back the advance we gave you." (Remember this was back before internet or even word processors.) So he quickly jots down a few closing lines and types it up to over-night it to the  publishing company. Due to the preview samples no one bothers to read it to the end and they just printed it up and sent it out to the booksellers.

Some reviewer on Amazon calls it a "twist" at the end.  I don't see the twist. The same reviewer even mentions the reader knows from the beginning who the murderer is. The only twist is from the investigating officers POV; he wasn't expecting it. He sat down on the step and cried. Okay.

How did this book change my life?

It is about 28 years later and I still cannot buy, or for that matter even read, a book of which I have not read the last page. Although, if I have read more that six books by the same author, or three in the same series, I might skip reading the last page until I am actually ready to read the entire book; I shop used book stores now so one gets what one can when it is available. It bothers me not that I know the ending as long as I don't have to go through the "Tuesday Blade ending syndrome" again.

I might wish it on an enemy, it depends on how much I really hate him or her.

The story was riveting and well written until the end--then it was messed up.

I can't believe it consistently gets great ratings. Does no one know what a good ending is? A "twist" or not the ending should be as well written as the rest.

A Halloween Surprise

This summer was miserable for all of us here, human and critter. Both cows had their milk dry up as there was no grass and the hay was poor and the heat was incredible. We had started to dry one of the gals off because we had it on the calendar that she was due to calf in early June but in a couple of days we realized she must have slipped her calf because she was not showing signs  of being PG anymore. We started milking her again but she had dropped the amount and the summer was getting worse and we gave up in about mid-July. We have been without decent milk since then. Not sure at all when we would be seeing more. About a month, month and a half ago we opened a gate to the neighbors field to let the cattle graze it since we got rain and it was turning green (and yes we had permission, it was even suggested by said neighbor) and we have hardly seen them since. Hubby has been driving up there every couple of days just to check on them.  A few days ago, Monday, we woke up to mooing. The eldest cow was in the front yard, her daughter and grandkid were in the paddock; they are not as good at getting out of fences as o' Lil'. Lily was put in the paddock and hubby came back to bed. When I got up and opened the chickens I noticed Lil's bag was getting full--OH! She is going to calve soon. I told hubby what I saw but by the time he went out, which would have been the normal time for him to do so, the cattle had gone up the hill to the field again. He went up the hill the next day, Tuesday, to check on them and came back telling me that Lily's bag was getting full and her teats were getting fat. He thought about two weeks; I gotta say I wondered about that because Lil' is about twelve and her body is well used to giving birth and producing milk and it just wouldn't need as much prep time as a younger gal (production milk cows are usually retired after just two or three lactations). Anyway, we were discussing this yesterday morning, Halloween, and it suddenly occurred to me that it was Halloween and I said (almost yelled) "Oh shit! She is going to have it today!" Hubby looked at me confused like and I could see it dawn on him; he said, "It's Halloween, it's a holiday." You see, Lily *always* calves on a holiday, it doesn't have to be a major one, but it is *always* a holiday. Come 11:00 last night and the cattle were still up the hill so hubby went to find them. Lil' had had her calf around 10:00 to 10:30 pm judging by how wet it was: it is a pretty little bull calf. We will have milk in a few days, real milk.

To put a little frosting on the wonderful Halloween surprise, the chickens, who haven't been laying for about a month and aa half, just started giving me an egg or two every couple days. I have too many young gals that were not old enough to lay before the sun stared its downward track, they won't start now until spring but my older gals we coming back from being broody and I should be starting to get more eggs soon since it started. I need to clean the nest boxes though.

We also need to come up with an appropriate Halloween name for this little guy too.

Freeze, Mushrooms, and a Birthday

We had a certain frost/light freeze the night before last and last night, no doubts about this like the other two weeks ago.

And I never thought I would be so sick of mushrooms as I got last week. Still no Oyster mushrooms but I hit upon a huge patch of Blewits, there where a lot of 'em. Some are in the freezer. A few days ago when food was cooked and being dished up I told everyone, "For a special treat today, no mushrooms!" I received a look of gratitude. And we all pretty much are mushroom lovers here.

We have gotten the furnace vacuumed, wiped down, and blown out, in general ready for another season. It has kicked on a couple times in the last few days but the house is still mostly warm from the summer and it is supposed to warm up a bit again in the next day or so. Hopefully we won't have to use it a lot this year but it would be nice to have a little more winter than we had last year.

My eldest is turning sixteen. For months she has been going around telling us, "Brianna's birthday is November 18th." I have been trying to get her to say "my" instead of her name; I am getting mixed, but poor, results. I'll keep trying. She also has a list of DVDs and CDs with the words "Happy Birthday Brianna" written at the bottom. It is funny, she can write her numbers but if a title has a year in it or she is asking for a specific edition, she brings her list to someone else to write the year down. She tells us what numbers to write but we have to write them. I did get her to start saying the years right; she was saying "one-nine-nine-three" and now she will say "nineteen ninety-three." She is on a day countdown now until "the" day; 20 more days. I don't recall her ever being this excited over her birthday before. We will probably go to the new "Twilight" movie for her birthday. She likes going to the movies, we have been following the series as a family, and it comes to the theaters on the 16th-- seems perfect.

Was it a Frost? And Mushrooms

From late Saturday (Oct. 6th) night to Tuesday (Oct. 9th) morning there have been area-wide freeze and frost warnings; we were destined to get hit with it--so the weather folks said. On Sunday night/Monday morning we MIGHT have gotten a frost. There are three okra plants, in a frost prone spot, that have a few wimpy leaf tips but the tomatillos right next to them are fine. The two okra plants in another spot have no damage, even the eggplant has no damage and if anything is as cold intolerant as the okra, I would think it would be eggplant. What it amounts to is about seven or eight leaves of okra got a little edge damage, it didn't even fully kill the leaf. So, does it qualify as first frost? I am debating with myself over it as I am trying to keep track of things like that in a garden diary. I wish I wouldn't have pulled those green tomatoes.

It is time, here at least, for fall mushrooms. There are lots of different fall mushrooms to hunt; unlike in the spring when it amounts to hunting Morels. Coral, or antler, mushrooms are quite popular around here but there are others that are choice that grow here and if one can identify them, one is in for a delightful treat. Ron and Morg each found a mushroom called Lion's Mane. Lion's Mane is a big mushroom and quite tasty; I have never seen it for sale. We had those and some Coral mushrooms a few days ago. I did some hunting on Sunday and found some small Puffballs and some more Coral; Ron found a good sized Puffball yesterday checking on the cows. (I believe I saw Puffballs for sale in California, at a market, once.) And I went out again yesterday to a different spot and besides more Coral mushrooms, I found some Blewits. I have found a few Blewits before, about seven or so years ago, and these are choice mushrooms. When you can find them for sale, they are pricey. We had a wild mushroom pasta dish this evening and --oh my, was it GOOD--and there are leftovers! I have dried Puffballs before and it turns out well. I would like to find more to do it again. I don't know if Blewits dry well but if I can find more I would try at least one for future reference. I haven't seen any Oyster mushrooms so far this year--another choice mushroom, but I am hoping.

Hummingbirds Are Leaving

All the hummers are transients right now; all my regulars are gone. Here's hoping for a safe trip for them all. It was not a good year for hummingbirds this year; too dry of weather causing almost no flowers and not a great year for the little insects that they also eat. I had very busy feeders this year (not unusual) but there were less individuals visiting and I noticed only one nesting period when we usually seem to have two. I get real tired of making the sugar-water concentrate over the season and having to constantly fill the feeders but I really like the little things and miss them when they go and I am always eager to see the first one in the spring. I hope my troubles of making sure they have sugar-water helps them out. They have helped me since we started attracting them, by eating bugs and whatnot, not to mention entertainment. I have taken a few feeders down so far and am not having to fill the others everyday anymore. I didn't have to fill any today and will probably take another down tomorrow. I had nine up this year and had to fill them all at least once in a day and a half for the less popular ones, and as much as twice a day for the most popular ones. The change happened fast this year, from constant maintenance to almost none in a day. I think it might be because of a lesser number of young this year; they tend to stick around a bit longer than the older ones.

There is one male, in particular, that I look forward to every year but he has got to be getting close to the end of his life. He stands out because he is built a tad different  than the others--he is short and stocky--we call him little fatty.  I have been able to pick out some of his offspring because of the stockiness; he had a real good year about three years ago and a bunch of stocky young ones were born. I kind off have the feeling this was his last year. But some of his offspring come back every year too. We will see next spring who shows up.

The New Rig

First off, I have not tried to put pictures in here yet so this might or might not work the first time around.

So yesterday (Wednesday) we finally found a vehicle. I think it is a good one and so does my husband. He test drove it in the city but I drove it home, then he drove the kid to Ju Jitsu this evening (Thursday--this won't be finished before it turns to Friday so…). He said he liked it better today than he did yesterday.

I am going to start out with what was not so great about it:

1. It has power windows. No matter what anyone else thinks about them, I do not like them, I just don't.

On  the other hand, out of all the vehicles we looked at, only one had crank windows and it otherwise did not fit our needs well.

2. It is white.

On the oter hand, so what. It is not a preferred color to me but it is not my least desired either; which is red. I do not know if it still holds true but it used to be that red was more likely to be pulled over. If the right vehicle otherwise was red, I still would have gotten it.

3. It is older than we were wanting/looking at. It is a 1997.

On the other hand, it has less mileage than all the 2000 and up we were looking at. We were lucky to see 2005s that had less than 150,000 miles, this 1997 had 118,000 miles.

4. It has air bags--driver and front passenger.

What a great feature I DO NOT WANT. Why? Air bags are such great safety features -- unless one is my size; then they are a safety hazard. They tell you if a kid is my size they should be in the back seat until they grow bigger. That ain't gonna happen and I can't drive from the back seat. Not to mention, at this point, no one but hubby is big enough to sit in the front; though Morg stands a good chance of growing big enough the passenger air bag won't do more harm than good--but she is not there yet.

Okay, so far that is it and of the four things I don't care for, one is completely offset and two of the other --oh well, not real biggies. Well, I still don't like power windows but the only real situation is the air bags and that would be a problem with all vehicles but quite old ones

So, now for the rest of it:

It is a 1997 Isuzu Trooper. I was in love with my last Trooper and it was well used and gave its all to us 'till the end. We put well over 350,000 miles on it ourselves.

It is a six cylinder, four-wheel drive, five-speed manual transmission with a limited-slip differential (commonly called posi-traction but that is a brand of sorts, like Jello vs. gelatin). The manual trans was as hard to find as crank windows and, yes, that was something we preferred. I am beginning to wonder if they are even being made anymore.

Here's a goodie, I am the second owner of this Trooper. It is very clean and the interior is beautiful. The seats are not in the slightest broken down. It is missing its back-seat ashtray??? The previous owners were non-smokers, the front one is there but never used(until me). It doesn't look like the back area, the cargo area, has been used even for groceries; it still has the OEM cargo net in there and it is in good shape.

The tires are in good shape.

It has a six month power-train warranty.

It has never been fitted for towing. This is cool because though the vehicle is perfectly capable of towing (we will need that) it has never been put to that stress before; just another clue of gentle use.

The kids, on the way home yesterday, acted like they went from an army cot to a king-size feather bed.

Hubby said this evening it needs shocks, I didn't notice that but we will see in the next few days. It needs a tow package put on. And one of the CV boots needs replaced as well as that CV joint looked at for possible damage. If it needs replaced, that is part of the power train and will be covered by the warranty. Drawback there is that we need to take it to the city or pay the $100 deductable on the warranty to have a local person do it. It was missing a screw holding a plastic cover on the lower part of the drivers seat. Himself fixed that in town this evening when he was there; he didn't have the right one here so he bought a pack at the parts store so we have a few in reserve now. The cargo light is not currently working; it is most likely a bulb and we just are both too pooped to care right now. And the vanity mirror on the passenger side is supposed to light up but doesn't,; also probably a bulb.

The stereo is a cassette deck, a little out of date but the radio plays great, the speakers play clear. It is barely believable this is mine.

These are the dealer photos:

He, he he. I was going to post this about 1:30 AM but it turns out the internet is not working. Its okay, I was surprised I was done by this time anyway. I'll try again at a reasonable time on Friday.

I am wore out

We have been vehicle  shopping recently. It has not been fun. We live in an small town area; meaning that all the towns around us are small, not that we live in anything that could be called a  town. So, there is not much choice locally. Not to mention the fact that most of the things that are available are high-mileage and hard-used. We realized we had to go to the city. It is a long ride, it has been hot, the vehicle we have to use to look for the new one is having problems and may or may not make the trip, and on top of all that there is an autistic teen that really was not happy with the whole procedure of car shopping.

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!

Well, anyway, I believe we have a winner. But I will fill in on that tomorrow, probably, soon anyway. I am just too tired.

We are expecting a bunch of rain from Isacc. I am happy but I don't imagine New Orleans is.

When filling out the paperwork for the rig I had to ask for the date. When the salesman told me, Morg mentioned it was my anniversary. Oh. The salesman looked at us a bit oddly as we laughed about it. I told him, "I don't get mad at him for not buying me a gift and he doesn't get mad at me for forgetting it too."

Oh, yeah. On the way to the "big city" we stopped for cigarettes and I went in. The same woman that carded me last time almost did it again. She was looking at me funny and asked if I was from around her and I told her about 20 miles south, my husband is usually the one that comes in. She then asked me how old I was. I told her I just turned 47, and you carded me last time I was in here. She remembered me then, I had offered to go get my ID but she said no. How silly, 47 and carded for cigarettes.

A Funny Thing Happened

We had to go to town yesterday (Friday). It happens and that isn't what's funny. The local cigarette/tire store is right there on or route in and we stopped to get cigs. It has been a long time since I have been in there and I no longer know the people that work there, hence, they do not know me either. I walked up to the counter and asked the woman there for the cigarettes I wanted she got them and told me how much they were. I pulled out my debit card and then she asked for my ID. I didn't think much of it figuring she was asking because of the debit card--BUT NO. She looked at it and said, "Eighty-five, I knew it was close." I just stood there and blinked for a moment as it was sinking in that she was carding me because she wasn't sure I was 25 and they are required to card anyone that does not appear to be at least 25. I told her, "Bless your heart, you're wrong, look again." She glanced again at my ID then looked at me and didn't understand. I told her that she needed to look closer, it says '65 not '85. She did and then looked back at me and told me that I really look young. It is not like she mistook my shortness for youth either because she was barely and inch taller than me. I don't look bad for my age, especially considering the abuse I have put my body through and the cancer treatments, but 20 years? I didn't think I looked that good.

Good news, I am typing this out while not online and I am not sure when I will actually get to post it because we have a storm going on, lightning *and* rain--the whole shebang. I'll take every drop I can get. There is still a chance to get a cutting of hay for the farmers if we get rain and that will make all the difference in the world to them, especially the smaller operations. Actually, even a bit of green grass that the cattle can eat instead of the hay that was supposed to get them (the cattle) through winter could mean the difference between surviving until next year or not. Maybe Sweetheart sent the rain.

Oh, and on the chance anyone that might be reading this does not understand why the storm means I am not online… It is because lightning often strikes the phone lines around here and I have lost three modems, two telephones, and almost lost a computer that was hooked up to the modem; though it never was quite right after that; it needed a new power supply and motherboard. So if there is a storm the modem gets unplugged from the lines, they seem more susceptible to the power surges, and when the storms are real heavy on top of us the phone gets unplugged too. Our phone isn't plugged in right now. I am unconnected and I don't mind.

Update: I am able to post at a little after 1 AM, about 3 hours after the rest and we have *almost* 3/4 inch rain--still hoping for more.

08/02/2012 RIP Sweetheart

My Sweetheart died today. Sweetheart was a chicken; one that I have had since she was an egg around nine years ago. She was born outside of the coop, inside of the backyard. The coop is now in the backyard but it wasn't then and most "out-nests" did not/do not survive the nighttime monsters, like opossum and raccoons. She and her broodmates survived though. She didn't grow as well as her broodmates though and when she was about 4 or 5 weeks old I noticed her beak was too long and she was having trouble eating. I clipped her beak and she started growing but also became very personable, very pet-like. So her behavior named her, Sweetheart. She was very sweet. She also remained a bit of a runt though her eggs were medium sized just like most of the other hen's eggs. Her offspring are all over the place. She survived all the great chicken catastrophes; last years being the bobcat wiping out 3/4 of the flock (it is really more like a herd), and the horrid time when the 'coons discovered before we did that the back of the old coop had rotten wood, she survived the year of the hawks too. She was not a good mother-hen but she was a good "aunt-hen" to chicks; and her eggs were often raised by other hens. And she was still laying eggs until just shy of three months ago. Between her age and the heat we have been having this year I didn't think much of it but she was apparently getting sick. I am not sure if it was a tumor or an abscess gone too long. About a week ago I went out to open the coop and she was already out--meaning she hadn't gone in--very strange; and strange I had not noticed she wasn't in there, I almost always looked for her as I looked around before closing it up. I guess I wasn't feeling well myself. Anyway, she was obviously not feeling well and she had this "thing" on her back. I put her in a cage with water and food and stated treating her with antibiotics but she just kept getting worse and the heat was horrible and not helping. She was not going to make it. She died early evening in her beloved backyard in a spot that was very close to the place she was laid, brooded, and hatched. She was a good egg.

I got a surprising phone call this morning.

So I am out in the garden picking radishes (those Rat Tail radishes really do put out in the summer heat, record heat and I just canned 14 jars of pickled radishes) when Morg hollers out the door that I have a phone call. I thought "Who the heck would be calling *me* on a Sunday morning?" When I get to the phone and say "Hello." I hear "TJ?" I used to go by TJ but it has been a long time and as I was running though my mind who would be calling me that name, I came up with *one* person just as she identifies herself. Yep it was her. It was quite a surprise and we were on the phone somewhere around two hours talking and still didn't finish catching up but we had to hang up.

I am thrilled she called and I've really needed a friend recently just to talk about the ups and downs of life. The  email "support group" I used to use let me down real bad a few months back. I had been growing away from them for a bit, maybe less growing and more depression had to do with that since my sabbatical, now that I recall, took place during and after cancer treatment. But then I started interacting more and things seemed to be fine with the group. The group owner's wife  had a heart attack and he understandably was away from the list for a short time and people quit posting. I wrote a post that he would not want that and to keep the posts coming so at the time I was being quite active in the group. About 3 weeks later I made a post  and wrote about finding out my favorite aunt was dying. Since the list owner's wife was in the process of dying herself I harbor no ill feeling toward him whatsoever for missing the post, I know he would have said something. (I think he is the only one that reads my blogs and is hearing this stuff for the first time, but he has probably been wondering anyway why I have disappeared from the list.) But not one person made a comment, not one "I'm sorry" or "What a drag" or "Damn that sucks," nothing. I realized I had not really felt "supported" by the group at all since I had been back, it was friendly but…  I sort of have had a hard time even reading the posts anymore and have not posted. A support group isn't any good if there is no support for one anymore. A lot of the people had changed, maybe I was just too odd for an odd bunch.

So, having an old friend look me up was really nice. She and I had been through many things, good and bad, together. We knew each other since I lived in Bailey CO. I don't remember the exact year but it was around 1989 or 1990. We still have more catching up to do.

Trouble Ahead

 For a while now we have had only one vehicle, an extended cab pick-up truck; the kind with a small back seat. That was fine when the kids were small AND we had another vehicle for most trips. The truck is not the best in gas mileage and the main purpose for it was to haul hay and be a second vehicle when needed. There was another vehicle that got better mileage and had more room inside for passengers--it had a good payload too for those big store trips; but that poor vehicle was used heavily and eventually became non-usable. So, we were stuck with the truck as the only transportation. It is hard to go to the store when it is raining (not that it has rained here any time recently this year). The ride is rough (I do not know if I need to take a pain pill just because of the truck ride or if any vehicle ride hurts as I haven't been in any other vehicle since my surgery was kind of fresh). The kids have gotten a lot bigger too. But we have been managing.

Well, Ron was doing some maintenance on the truck on Monday. He discovered that a noise he thought was caused by one of the running boards was, in fact, was being caused by a broken frame. That is bad, very bad.

I have been trying to figure out how to afford the tires we needed for it.

I have no clue as to how to afford a new vehicle all together. I have been trying to figure that one out for over two years because of the whole "truck is too small for us all (etc.)" situation.

Now it is even worse because the new vehicle has to be able to move hay as the current truck is useless for that now. It is not safe to drive, really. We have a neighbor that has heavy-duty welding stuff and will be able to weld the frame to make it safe as a light -duty truck, hopefully today (Tuesday) but we have yet to talk to him.

We were in need of a second vehicle, now what? I am panicking a little..

What a Busy Few Weeks

Oh goodness I am exhausted. My two stepdaughters decided to come out for a visit from Colorado with their kids, as it turned out it was only two out of the three grandkids that came though; it still doubled the house population. The planning stage was confusing, back and forth on when and how long, etc. One of the kids is autistic also. We are no strangers to autism here as my eldest (Ron's third) child, Tink, is autistic. But autism is as individual as each unique person. And he used to have a tendency to dump things out, like shampoo, medicine, cereal, etc. and our house was not set up well for him. We had almost all of our meds and bathroom stuff in boxes in the kitchen because we needed to redo the hallway outside the bathroom. To say it had been going slow is an understatement, I had been waiting for Ron to finish something before moving on to painting and he was apparently waiting for me to paint before he finished doing the door to the tub works. But the hall had to get done before they got here for safety and space reasons. I went ahead and painted but I still think it should have been done the other way around, as it is something didn't get caulked that should have and now I am not sure it can be because we hung a set of shelves in the spot and it leaves that spot with only a fingers width to get to the gap between the wall and the door frame for about half of it. And the other half will really show up when caulked if I don't go back and repaint that area. Anyway, the floor also was needing tiled. We have had the tile for a while, and the paint, so at this point no money was needed to do it. Then I noticed that where the hall floor met the bathroom was not equal, the hall had a dip right there that at its worst point was about a half inch. So we had to get some  floor leveling stuff and it had to go on in a few layers because of the depth of it. The put the whole thing behind a little bit and they final date of them showing up was still not decided. But I got it done and the floor tiled. Oh, and I forgot to mention that the white paint turned out to be a light gray. I was concerned about that because this hallway is dark, it just swallowed light, but luckily it would not clash with the medium gray that I was planning on painting the trim work. The paint was also a semi-gloss (planned) whereas the old paint was a flat, semi-gloss reflects (and cleans) better than flat paint and brightened up the hall more than I expected especially with a darker color than I had wanted. Then adding a light colored tile to the floor--my golly we can see in the hallway now! Now for the fun part. The date had been decided and we still had a few days but the free-standing cabinets we had in the kitchen needed to be emptied of food and other kitchen stuff and moved to the hall and filled with bathroom stuff. Of course this still leaves the kitchen a flippin' mess and after quite a few years of trying to explain to Ron the free-form box shelves I wanted in there I gave up and defaulted to regular shelves--which we didn't have. We bought the shelf brackets and got those hung and Ron fetched some shelving wood from the neighbor and got some shelves put up, not all. We are running out of time before thy get here at this point but we still could get almost all of it done--but the kids left a day early. So, when they got here there was still food in boxes on the floor. Oddly, we still had more kitchen floor than we have had in a while. We got a couple more shelves up on their second or third day here and we are down to just two boxes on the floor but the renovations pretty much came to a standstill as our house population doubled. The hallway looks great though.

So the kids were here for eight days, eight hectic days, from Thursday to Thursday. It was a good visit though. And the one grandkid doesn't dump things so much anymore, thank goodness.  We went into town on Friday evening to watch the annual firework show, the kids were all excited, Tink just *loves* fireworks. We got there a bit early so we could get a good spot and the kids could use the playground, both boys are eleven. About ten  to fifteen minutes before the show was probably going to start it was announced that it was cancelled due to the drought conditions. It made sense but I really think they could have cancelled it earlier in the day, we were not the only ones out there and inconvenienced. We stopped by the fireworks tent in town and bought some of our own to set off to alleviate the kids tension. We did our annual show on Wednesday, the actual holiday and the night before they left. Some neighbors showed up to join the fun. For the first time we accidently set a couple of fires with them. We were prepared, even with no drought we keep a bucket of water to douse used sparklers and Roman Candles, and we have the hose nearby and ready. One of the fires might have happened even in a normal year, the one that set it off had sort of blown up, well, that is a bit strong but misfired would be too mild of a description. Ron got his hand a little burnt, nothing serious. We also went to Baker Creek Seed's Bakersville in Mansfield. It is a old timey village. Ron took Morg and the non-autistic grandson out shooting; Morg has been shooting off and on for a bit now but the grandkid had never fired a gun before. They all had fun but Ron was real happy he got to take the kid out the very first time. I was up until 3-3:30 every morning talking to the girls, they would sleep in and I had to get up for chores.

The heat for the last few weeks has been unbelievable. We have been breaking records left and right, including the hottest day of June since record keeping began. The weird part is that the humidity has been low, very low. The weather folks have been calling it a "saving grace" but I really think we would be better off with a tad higher humidity. When each breath robs one of vital moisture and after ten minutes outside, in the shade even, one needs to drink a pint of water just to replace what you exhaled, it is too damned dry.  This is the Ozarks and we have been real close to single digit humidity. And breezes do no good to help cool because the sweat  dries too fast to get the body wet to catch it. Between a sauna and a dehydrator, I prefer the sauna.

The good news is that we are expecting a cool-down and some rain after today (another record breaker but there is moisture in the air).

I write this in MS OneNote and the paste it to the Blogger site. As I was getting ready to post it I go to the Blogger Dashboard and get a warning that Blogger does not support my browser anymore, I use Firefox, and I should switch to the Google Chrome because not all features will work otherwise. Screw you Google I dislike Chrome and you are getting more and more domineering.

My 'puters return

My computer fan had been struggling and making noise and I knew I needed to replace it--it was too far gone for just a cleaning to be right. We had recently got Morg's back after some work (it had lost its ability to charge) and the guy did the work well for a reasonable price. I am a little uncomfortable getting into this little netbook because my eyes are just not working well and I had/have many other things on my plate to do so I decided to have this same guy do the fan. Ron had been dealing with him so I told him to call the guy and find out how long it will take to replace the fan. I should have been much more specific but it was more of a reminder as we had covered it once before. I have been babying it to keep it from getting too hot for about two months and didn't want to be without it for any length of time--I thought when I was told a couple of days to replace the fan that meant I would have it back in a couple of days. He did not have the fan in and *that* is what I wanted Ron to get the guy to do, order in the fan then have us drop off the 'puter.  I think maybe Ron gave the guy the idea my 'puter was the same as Morg's (he has fans for that model)  but I have an earlier model and it is not the same; he didn't have a fan for mine. But after the phone call, Ron said he was to take it in that evening and it would be a couple days. I asked if he had the fan already and Ron told me had had lots of fans. A couple hours after the 'puter was dropped off, Ron was still in town, the guy calls and tells me that he cleaned the fan up but the bearings were shot. Heck, I knew that without taking the thing apart--it can't run with hair and dust wrapped around it for long without tearing up the bearings and it ran long. He said he had to order in the fan and so it would take a few more days. That was what I was trying to avoid. He offered to let us take the 'puter back and he would call. But I had no way to get hold of Ron in town and it was Thursday so the next time anyone would be heading that way  would be Saturday and then when he got the fan it (on Monday or Tuesday) we would have to just run it right back to him, making a special trip to do so. I was a tad irked because this was the very thing I wanted to avoid, him having the 'puter during fan shipping time, but saw no point in that. Well, a week and a half later, the fan he ordered with a rush shipping never came; he ordered another and it hadn't come in yet. I told Ron get my 'puter. Aside from the internet, I use MS OneNote for a few things including my garden map--and I need that so I am not lost; at this time of year it is too easy to confuse melon with cucumber, some plants are new to me and I am not so familiar with the look of it, and until there is fruit there is no easy way to tell variety; row markers/garden tags always seem to fade. The garden maps, or should I say maps, have been wonderful. We have two fenced gardens plus three unfenced and they spread out a ways. Living in a holler we need to take advantage of full sun where we have it, even if it is only a small spot of it.  And then there *is* the internet part of it. Granted, I have not been overly active but I do have email (I still haven't caught up on)  ad some other things I don't like letting go for more than a couple /few days at a time. And, we use Google voice a lot to save money on long distance. Considering that we can't even call the police or fire dept. as a local call and sometimes a call needs made when the 'puter isn't on, I will not cancel our long distance service but since about the only local calls are pretty much our next door neighbors, the bills can add up. Morg has it  on her computer but it is an imposition to be hitting her up all the time to call up folks. I am glad my 'puter is home, I wish it had a new fan.

I wanted to write about the movie we saw today but I think I ought to let my machine cool a bit first.

A Funny Letter

I first saw this around eight years or so ago, I am thinking one of my sisters sent it to me. My husband just found it again and I have to share (and not lose it again).

Letter from a farm kid

AT SAN DIEGO MARINE CORPS RECRUIT DEPOT

Dear Ma and Pa:

I am well. Hope you are.

Tell Brother Walt and Brother Elmer the Marine Corps beats working for old man Minch by a mile. Tell them to join up quick before maybe all of the places are filled. I was restless at first because you got to stay in bed till nearly 6 a.m., but am getting so I like to sleep late.

Tell Walt and Elmer all you do before breakfast is smooth your cot and shine some things. No hogs to slop, feed to pitch, mash to mix, wood to split, fire to lay. Practically nothing. Men got to shave but it is not so bad, there's warm water.

Breakfast is strong on trimmings like fruit juice, cereal, eggs, bacon, and stuff, but kind of weak on chops, potatoes, ham, steak, fried eggplant, pie and other regular food. But tell Walt and Elmer you can always sit by two city boys that live on coffee. Their food plus yours holds you till noon, when you get fed again.

It's no wonder these city boys can't walk much. We go on "route" marches, which the Platoon Sergeant says are long walks to harden us. If he thinks so, it is not my place to tell him different. A "route march" is about as far as to our mailbox at home. Then the city guys get sore feet and we all ride back in trucks. The country is nice, but awful flat.

The Sergeant is like a schoolteacher. He nags some. The Capt. is like the school board. Majors and Colonels just ride around and frown. They don't bother you none.

This next will kill Walt and Elmer with laughing. I keep getting medals for shooting. I don't know why. The bulls-eye is near as big as a chipmunk head and don't move. And it ain't shooting at you, like the Higgett boys at home. All you got to do is lie there all comfortable and hit it. You don't even load your own cartridges. They come in little metal boxes.

Then we have what they call hand-to-hand combat training. You get to wrestle with them city boys. I have to be real careful though, they break real easy. It ain't like fighting with that ole bull at home.

I'm about the best they got in this except for that Tug Jordan from over in Silver Lake. He joined up the same time as me. But I'm only5'6" and 130 pounds and he's 6'8" and weighs near 300 pounds dry.

Be sure to tell Walt and Elmer to hurry and join before other fellers get onto this setup and come stampeding in.

Your loving daughter,

Gail Ann

Pasted from <http://gobobpipe.com/funniesAndFollies_farmKidLetter.html>

Gee, More About the Weather (and the garden)

We have been short of rain, or any kind of precipitation this year, and I wrote about the 1/9 inch we got last week. Well the night before last we got a 1/2 inch and then last night we got another 1 1/2 inches of rain. AND we are expecting more tonight. Woo Hoo! It has been coming down so most of it is soaking in rather than running off so that is double the good news.

We, like much of the country, have been running on the warm side of normal but we get a couple days here that will be in the upper 60;s. Of course, we just got the pool set up and the kids got in it today for the first time and now we get a couple days too cool to swim. We often have the pool set up by the end of April but it didn’t get done that early this year. Brianna hasn’t been hassling us this year and I was focusing on the garden.

Speaking of the garden, those Rat's Tail radishes are producing like mad now. I have refrigerator pickled some and they are good that way too; which is good because they are prolific enough that we are not eating them all while fresh. They haven't minded the record breaking heat at all that I can tell. These are supposed to have been very popular a couple hundred years ago and are heirloom veggies that I highly recommend. I got seeds at www.rareseeds.com at a place I have been getting seeds from for years called Baker Creek; it is a  great place for open pollinated seeds ( NO GM FOODS!).

The other new things we are trying this year are purple tomatillos, a new cucumber called Dragon's Egg (we have been growing a Lemon Cuke), and a or the Burr Gherkin, a cucumber relative that people buy as little sweet pickles, and a tomato called Violet Jasper. We have a tomato that we love called Fox Cherry but we want to be sure we have the best for here and we can grow two kinds and still keep the seeds true. We can't get big tomatoes to ripen and the Fox Cherry is BIG for a cherry tomato, about the size of most whole peeled tomatoes in cans, and they ripen. The Violet Jasper is supposed to be about the same size so we are trying them.

It was too hot for peas this year.

Besides the radishes, we have had a couple of summer squash--which is new too come to think of it. It is called Table Dainty and is a striped oval thing. It is pretty good but I have yet to decide whether I like it better than the Lemon Squash that we usually do. We have had problems in the past couple/few years with those; the plants not producing well before they die off usually by squash bug infestation of that wilty thing caused by cucumber beetles. They used to do better before we lost them. I wish I could figure out what to do with the squash bug thing, we have been battling them for too long and the problem is not getting better. It is tempting to go for the non-organic methods but  I am still holding out...

Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.

Cyril Connolly

Dark Shadows

My family and I went to see the movie "Dark Shadows" on Sunday. I have been meaning to write about it since but every time I get ready to write my husband starts talking to me and then I get to tired--I am trying to ignore him now (not really). I am not sure how I feel about the movie. If I had no knowledge of the original "Dark Shadows" soap opera I would probably have really liked it. Depp seemed to feel comfortable with the part and was entertaining. I am trying to think of how to describe it without giving away anything….I could start with the year of Barnabas being freed from his chained coffin. The soap started in 1966 and ended in 1971, Barnabas came into the series about six months in, so that would be 1967 that he makes his appearance. The movie takes place in 1972. This is insignificant, really, but I am curious as to why if they were going to change the time that they chose 1972-- just slightly more modern than the soap but not fully modern. And, in the soap the Collins were not as well-to-do as they had been in the past but they were still doing just fine compared to the average townsfolk. In the movie, the Collins were on hard times. And in the movie, Elizabeth, the current family matriarch, is aware right away that Barnabas is a vampire--that does not follow the soap either. Certain main characters were missing in the movie, or combined, two characters into one. Dr. Hoffman wasn't already there when Barnabas comes to stay in the soap like she is in the movie. And the introduction of the werewolf was, um, weird. In the soap that person was not a werewolf. Also, it seemed as though something pertinent to the werewolf situation had been cut out of an earlier part of the movie; I base this on a comment made when the werewolf shows up. But there was little point in having the werewolf in the movie at all. And there was no time travel in the movie. I remember watching "Dark Shadows" as a little kid, it was creepy, this movie was set up to be humorous.

The ending was set up for a sequel; I would watch it.

We have been watching the old soap on DVD, that is why I am sure about how things started in the show. I was way too you young when it started. And while I remember various scenes I do not recall story lines or how it ended.  So watching it this way is kind of fun. It is going a bit slower than I anticipated though; we have to find the money for the DVDs and the time for all of us to sit in front of the TV for a bit.

I mentioned I do not recall how the soap ended, I do remember not being able to watch it in those final months because I was foolish and I remember being chastised by my sister for causing us to not be able to watch it. There was this one scene that scared me and so I left the TV room and told my mom when she asked what was wrong that "Dark Shadows" had scared me. My mom didn't watch it with my sister and I and she knew little about it, I guess, and she didn't know that it usually didn't scare me like that. We couldn't watch it anymore. My sister was pissed. I shouldn't have told Mom about it. Can't go back and undo it though.

I did watch the revival series in the 90's. I do not remember much of it, it didn't last long. I do not recall it being bad though.

Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.

Robert Heinlein

The Weather

So, I guess it is past time for my first post;I have been putting it off and it has not become easier to start--big surprise there. I decided if I am going to blog then I ought to blog and the weather wins out because it did.
We got an 1/8 inch of rain today.and unfortunately that is the only rain we have received since May began. April was rather dry too. I hope the rest of the growing season is not this way; it is hard to garden when it is this dry. Last year was a bit dry, mostly later, during summer, our spring was wetter than this year though. It got so hot and dry that most folks around here gave up on their gardens; we did pretty good in comparison even if it was a bad garden year in general. A couple/few years ago we had a very dry spring but a wet summer. I am hoping for a wet summer since we have no rain this spring.
We have a larger garden this year than anytime previous here (11 years). And we finally found a reliable radish for us. We have poor luck with them forming bulbs and our springs can be short enough that it gets too hot too fast for radishes or peas so we found something called a Rat's Tail radish that forms fat tasty seed pods instead of bulbs. It supposedly does not mind the heat so much also. We have had a taste of a few smaller ones and so far so great. The flavor is really good and we are already close to getting as much radish as all the  "bulb" type we have ever planted.
I suppose I ought to mention that the "we" is, as far as gardening is mostly my husband and I with a little help from one of our two daughters, the youngest, who is emerging into her teen years this year. Our other daughter doesn't help in the garden; she is autistic and it is just not something we have been able to get her into doing. We live in the Missouri Ozarks.