Tink's Birthday

Tink had been on a countdown to her birthday for quite a while. As the amount of days until her birthday dropped under a week, she started getting a bit stressed about it; she wasn't seeing preparations for it, I guess. She had spotted a CD that was supposed to be for her birthday about 2 weeks before but she hadn't seen anything else. The day before her birthday, Sunday, I wrapped her presents and put them in a visible, but out of the way and hard to reach, place. She calmed down. And she didn't touch the presents that day.

So, Happy Tinker's birthday. She told both me and her dad "Happy Birthday," I assume she told Morg that too. We did our morning chores and where having a little sit-down time before I got up to make her a no-bake cheesecake, which is the only kind of "cake" she will eat. The next thing I know, Morg is saying, "Did you know Tink has some of her presents open?" That is what we get for turning our back for a minute. She had 3 out of 4 DVDs opened. She decided it was her birthday and she wanted her presents. I had to go get the remaining gifts and protect them while we got everything else ready.

I got the cheesecake ready and we sand "Happy Birthday" which Tink can't stand. She blew out her candles and then opened her last DVD. She wasn't as interested in the other 3 packages because they were not the right shape for a CD or DVD but we coaxed her into opening them. They were shirts, one with Alice in Wonderland, one with Pocahontas, and one with Scooby Doo. She did like them and even held them up in front of her to "model" them of sorts.

A little while later we headed into town for a movie. We still owed Morg a movie for her birthday but a chance for us to go did not correspond with a movie we/she wanted. But there is a movie playing right now that Morg did want to see and not one Tink has mentioned but she does like going to the movies. So we all went to see the Thor movie. It was entertaining and Tink did real good. There is a movie coming out very soon she does want to see, "Frozen" is the name. But this time we are hitting the matinee like we usually do. I could believe the cost for the 4 of us, and it isn't a pricey place.

We got home after the movie and Tink immediately started her Christmas countdown figuring her birthday was over.

Today has been a hard day for her but I am not real sure why. She seems angry. We have had some internet issues today, very slow connections and at least twice it just stopped working but came back before I could call about it. That might be the cause of the mood.

Oh, and the cow is recovering nicely.

A.W.O.L.

The milk cow we have had for years, the matriarch if you will, had her calf on Friday the 15th, in the mid-afternoon. This was unusual because she has always caved on a holiday of some sort. I was really expecting the calf on Veteran's Day. And as it turns out the calf was a little over-cooked--it really should have been born a few days before--right about Veteran's Day. It is a bull calf and we decided to call it A.W.O.L. because it didn't "report for duty" on time. And he had to be retrieved, he wasn't coming on his own. He was a bit big with a big head and his front feet were not in the right position. He got stuck and we had to pull him. It wasn't easy, between the cow and Ron both giving everything they had, that calf still almost didn't make it out. It was taking so long we both thought the calf was probably dead. Ron is not a little guy. We only managed to get one foot forward of the nose so the rope was only on that one leg, and he was using all his weight and strength pulling. I wouldn't have made a dent, I am half his size and am still coming back from a few years of malnutrition. Ron was pulling so hard I thought he was going to pull the calf's leg off, but at this point we didn't have hope for the calf. And then the little guy, with just his head and one foot sticking out, opened up his eyes and looked right at me. So the calf was still alive but still stuck and now we were afraid of killing it but the cow was the primary concern. I really do not know how to explain all this well, a stuck calf is something that kind of needs to be experienced first hand to really understand, it goes beyond just the standard "cow needs a little help so we gotta pull the calf." This guy was *stuck.* Sometimes when it is this bad, in order to try to save the cow, someone goes in and cuts the calf up to take it out in pieces. Either that or the cow will most certainly be lost. But that did not prove to be necessary. And since I already told you we named it I am sure you deduced that calf is still alive. He was a bit slow coming to his feet but that was a very traumatic birth soo…

But now the cow. Even once the calf is out, the trauma of the birth is still an issue for the cow. A pinched nerve during birth is common anytime a calf needs pulled, let alone one this stuck; heck every once in a while it happens on an normal birth. The pinched nerve issue will put a cow down because she can't feel one or both back legs. If they stay down, they will get worse because their own weight will start shutting off blood flow to the legs and you loose them. If you can keep them up, sometimes the feeling returns and everything is fine. Getting an animal that weighs roughly 1000 lbs. from a laying to a standing position is not really something that a person can do without the help of machines. And sometimes it injures the cow.

But Lily, though unsteady, stayed on her feet after the birth. Heck, she is a tough Irish gal. Everything seemed fine until Saturday midday when she was laying down more and not getting up easy when coaxed. Then a few hours later she lay down by the fence next to the creek bed and after getting a little time to rest was coaxed to get up, she tried and couldn't. This is a problem. A bit later her rump started to slide under the fence. Ron started calling around for help, we had to get her out from under the fence and we had to get her up. While this was going on she managed to get herself out from under the fence. What a good girl she is. She was in stage 2 of milk fever, we should have noticed the signs in stage 1, she drug it out longer than that stage usually lasts, she was dragging out stage 2 pretty long too, thankfully. By the time a cow hits stage 3 the chance of saving them drops significantly. Ron found someone with the stuff we needed but it was most of the way to town to go get the stuff, treatment for milk fever and these things called hip huggers that are used with a tractor to lift a down cow. We also had a neighbor at ready with a tractor to use. But since lifting an animal that size often does damage in itself the best thing to do is give the med for milk fever and hope they get up on their own. We were ready to cut the fence but we couldn't let her slide down the slope into the creek. She made that unnecessary; she never was good at respecting fences anyway. It did take two doses of the med but about 45 -50 min. after the first dose she could be coaxed up. She looked around for just a moment and didn't see her calf so she headed right to the calf pen, which she knew had to be where he was if she couldn't see him, unsteady but with purpose she made her way there. Of course he was there, she knows that where the calves are put for safety at night, and by this time it was night. She started nosing the hay and started eating. A bit later when Ron went out he gave her some grain in the calf pen but she followed him out, took a big drink of water and walked right into the milking stall -- where she believes she should eat.

Today she is a little off her feed but is standing. We will give her another dose of the treatment today if Ron can find a place on Sunday that sells it. If not I guess a another special trip to town tomorrow and we will hope some molasses on her feed, both making it more palatable and adding calcium, will get her going.

She is 12, we have had her since she was under 6 months old. For the last 9 or 10 years this gal has been giving us milk and meat (by way of offspring), she really does a lot for our family, is part of it, and her loss would be horrible.

On another note, hunting season, firearm, started this weekend (one of the reasons the cow wasn't up on the hill when she went into labor and would have made the situation deadly). But it is almost 70 degrees out, not good for hunting deer. I am in a t-shirt. And good golly is it windy today. When I let the chickens out this morning a gust hit that actually blew some of them up against the fence. Sitting way down here in the holler means we don't usually get much wind at all so to have gusts like that is incredible. I am glad I don't live on the ridge.

Some Things About My Tinker

Just some little things that probably seem like nothing to most people. Tink is soon to be 17 and she has been counting down to her birthday for, gosh, over two months now. We had been wondering if she could keep more than one countdown at a time; earlier this year we found out she could, at least she could do a long and short count. A short count is under a week, a long count is, obviously, longer. We found out just this last month she can keep two long counts as we approached Halloween and she had her birthday countdown. So that is pretty cool. I wonder how many counts she can keep.

Today there was something that stood out that really put me to writing this. She has had a DVD, for quite a few years, of "An American Tail." If you don't know the movie it doesn't matter, it is an animated kids movie. There is an "Extra" on the DVD that is a counting game that is about the level of a 5 - 6 year old. A bunch of coins drop that are different colors and have different symbols on them and then it asks for  "How many  ______?" and list the numbers 1 - 10, or something, and the kid has to choose the right amount to move on. Tink always did great with the first two levels, well, once we actually got her to listen to what was being asked for, but the third level asked for combinations; instead of "How many hearts?" or, "How many blue ones?" it would be "How many blue hearts?" Tink was not real keen on the combo questions. Today she is wearing a Halloween t-shirt with a big owl on it along with a few ghosts and a handful of bats. I asked her what was on her shirt, she told me "owl." I asked her what "that" was as I pointed to a ghost and she said "ghost." I asked her how many ghosts and she counted them for me, (there are three). Then I asked about the bats; she told me what they were and I asked how many and she told me six, there are six. I then asked how many black bats and she counted them and said four. I am standing ther just amazed but don't want to get too excited and freak her out. I asked "How many orange bats?" And she counted the two orange ones. Pretty durn good for a kid diagnosed as so low functioning we were never supposed to be able to potty train her.

And not to be indelicate, but she is able to handle her monthly period herself with the use of adult diapers instead of pads or tampons; and she does not potty in the diapers, they are for her period and she knows it.

I mentioned a couple weeks ago that our internet went out for for a little bit and how Tink did. The day after I wrote that our power was knocked out. The power Co. said someone knocked a tree down on the line. It was out for a few hours. That was not as easy for her as just the internet, there was no movies she could play or anything. Ron pulled out an old Littlest Pet Shop game that hasn't seen the light of day in eight years and three of us played, Morg was too busy being a teen. It took one game for us to remember how to play, a second game went pretty weel, and you have to understand the whole time Tink is playing she is angry and crying. Towards the end of the second game every time she moves her piece she kind of grinds it into the space it landed on. By the third game she is in quite a state and between her turns is running into the other room and throwing herself on the floor, amongst other things. About halfway through this third game the power comes back on. Tink starts crying differently and saying, "I missed you" and "I love You" and started hugging me. It wasn't me she was talking to though, it was electricity that she loves and missed. That is okay, she tells me she loves me all the time. Okay, so the power is back on and she runs around the house turning on all the TVs and setting up the movies, and gets her computer up and running --- then she sits back down to finish the game, happy as could be. Ron and I were both surprised to no end; we didn't expect her back to finish the game.

She has been getting very good at answering yes or no, or similar, questions without being prompted for an answer. That is good because now we are sure if it is one or the other and not that she is just repeating the last word we say: "yes or no?" "no," or "no or yes" "yes." Aside from being much easier on us it shows a new level of understanding for her.

She knows the days of the week, maybe by name, maybe not, I used to make her say them but haven't in a while, but she gets dressed herself on every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday now. That means she is going to town for french fries in her head. I am not sure why she got the Tuesday and Sunday but I do know where Thursday came from. On any other day she chooses "home" over "town." if asked, she will get dressed to go to town on an off day if she has to.

She can also find November, her birth month on a calendar.

She absolutly will not allow me to sing, hum, dance, or anything of the like, nor will she tolerate whistling; I think the whistling hurts her ears but that doesn't account for the other stuff, not that I am the only one she doesn't want to sing.

Children are raised, and disciplined, very different now than they used to be. I was sort of in the mid-transition period, now we are sort of in the latter-transition period. Right now even yelling at a child is easily construed as abuse. When Tink goes into a full-blown meltdown -- otherwise unreachable -- If I get into her face and yell her name, she will focus on me and I have a chance, right then, to reach her. I have shocked many a person, even Ron initially because of the force of my voice, to the point of where I could see in their faces that it might be abuse. But if I can catch it, her attention for a split second, I can then talk to her and start calming her. If a good meaning person who is so sure I am doing the wrong thing interferes, and it has happened, the chance is lost. And it is usually the person tells me a child tunes out yelling but will listen to a whisper. Yeah, she can't hear the flippin' whisper while she is in meltdown. I am not totally against spanking, obviously there is an "age out" time and Tink doesn't fit anymore but that isn't why I brought this up. Before we left Colorado, Ron had some appt. in a hospital, Tink was right around 3 years, Morg was under 6 months. Ron was in with the doc, or tech, or whoever, and Tink was starting to stress. She laid down on the floor and started making swimming motions. I thought that was very cool and resourceful of her to come up with such a mild stress release compared to some of the other things she had done or could do. Two elderly women were sitting in the chairs that backed the ones I was in with tiny Morg, unaware that I was the mother of the girl swimming on the floor. One said to the other something about how a good spanking would make that child behave more appropriately in public. I turned my head and politely asked the woman, me with a new babe in arms, if she was spanked as a child. She proudly stated she was. I told her, "In that case, it doesn't work, because what you just said was one of the most inappropriate things I had ever heard." I did take a moment to tell her about Tink being autistic and how people always seem to know how to raise other people's children. Then, speaking about fears of false abuse reports, just a few minutes later, Ron comes back and we have to walk a little ways to a different area of the hospital, Tink walking with us easily until she realizes we are not leaving yet, she stops in the hall, people all around us. I have Morg in my arms and gently give a directional push to Tink's shoulder--she would not hold hands at that time, and calling on every scrap of theatrics she had, and it was a good amount, she threw herself into the air and onto the ground 4 foot away from where she had been, slowly picks her head up and turns it to look at me with a confused and scared expression. As I said, the hallway had many people and I am now standing there looking very much like I just threw my child, forcibly, to the ground.  I heaved a big sigh, stuck my hand down to help her up and calmly asked her not to do that anymore as people do not realize that she is pretending. It worked, for both her (for that visit) and the people in the hospital.

I am not sure she would technically qualify as autistic anymore. If the diagnosis is anything like it was when she was first diagnosed, four things from three separate categories of symptoms, she might not. She would still be what is commonly called PDD-NOS, which is pervasive developmental disorder - not otherwise specified, and is an "almost autism;" three things from three categories or seven things from only two categories instead of the four from three. She is mid-functioning, instead of the low-functioning she was initially diagnosed; still a long ways from self-responsible but not as hard for a care-taker. Aside from food issues, understanding the spoken word has always been Tink's biggest problem. That is getting better and in a way almost contrary to what "studies" say about learning languages. It is almost like her language learning is in slow motion and given another 50 years, or so, she might have the spoken language skills of a 10 year old. Thank goodness other things go quicker. The kid is far from stupid. And her "acting" is not autistic in nature. Repeating lines from movies, over and over, is very autistic; to understand the interplay of acting is not; she has always done her acting.

I used to read to her all the time. I can't remember when, specifically, she decided I was not going to do that anymore but she was quite adamant about it. Years went by and we would occasionally try to read to her to no avail. Then, one time, she let Ron read to her to get her ready for bed, he kept it up. Then he kind of needed a break so I tried, nope, had to be dad. So for a bout 3 1/2  to 4 years Ron has read a story to her, first time he really could not, I don't recall why, she got mad and would not let me. The next time she put up with me doing it, now if he can’t I have to (I have no problem with it) but if he can, I cannot.

And she handled Ron being gone okay but she is glad he is back. He didn't get to see Lake Erie but he did get to add two more states, Indiana and Ohio. I have travelled more in one year, more than once, than he has in his life. I wonder sometimes if we should have opted for the RV life instead of homestead life; it was an option at the time.    

All Hallow's Day aka The Day after Halloween

Everyone is a little burnt out from yesterday but poor Ron agreed to go with the neighbor to Ohio tomorrow and had to run to town and do some other last min ute things. The neighbor bought a half-built two-seater airplane he wants to go pick up. He had been asking Ron for days to take a trip hear or there for him to go look at a plane he wanted to buy; I don't remember all the places but one was Florida. Then he called Ron up yesterday morning to ask if he would go to Ohio with him today (Friday). Ron said he couldn't do it today but probably could arrange going tomorrow (Saturday). The guy told him he would think about postponing it for a day but he would probably just go alone; he would call back by evening with his decision. I guess his wife put her foot down and said if he didn't have another person he wasn't going. We got a call last night from her thanking Ron for going, I guess he was a little too embarrassed to call. Ron has mixed feelings about going, and I really don't want him to go, but he hasn't traveled as much as I have and it'll be good for him. He will be just shy of an hour from Lake Erie and I told him to make sure they take the time to go see it; that will be his second Great Lake. He has never seen an ocean. So, he will be gone a few days.

Tink dressed as a witch yesterday, and Morg was sort of zombie-ish. Both to old for trick or treating but Tink was insistent we do something for Halloween. So we piled in the car and stopped at the country store at the curve in the highway and they had candy and hot dogs to roast and marshmallows too, and people we knew. We hung out there for about 45 min. and piled n the car again to stop at the little store just a ways up the highway, just to show the girls off to the owner as she didn't have anything Halloweeny going on, and got some homemade cookies. Back in the car to stop at a church at the highway intersection that had a "trunk or treat" thing. Then we stopped at some friends house that we traditionally stop at every Halloween even if we do nothing else; they are the folks we bought this place from. I don't understand why we stopped there before doing the stuff in town we planned but Ron had pulled in and they had already seen us before I realized he was stopping. We were there for a little while--really should have done it last thing like usual. When we got back in the car it was already too late to do a couple of the other trunk or treats in town but we went to the radio station which was one open a little later and  Tink was totally ignoring this clown that was trying to engage her until I told her to follow him "right over there" and he was going to show the girls a trick She followed him and took his candy offering and giggled when he said something--completely appropriate giggling. Then his trick was grabbing this pig heart out of bloodyish looking water claiming it was his heart and then he made it "beat." Tink screamed, she was smiling but she screamed like Fay Wray. The clown guy got a little concerned he flipped her out, the look on his face… I started laughing, Tink stopped screaming, giggled a bit, then screamed again, then the clown laughed realizing she was just playing along. Then we went to the one house in town that is always massively Halloweened out where Tink practiced her acting skills again. Then to McDonald's fro some fries. Which if we had done the town thing first, we would have had a couple more stops and then could have done the fries and then our yearly Halloween visit, Tink would have been happy to be there instead of throwing a tantrum almost the whole time we were there. Oh well.

The pumpkin carving was funny. Morg didn't want to but Brianna did, untill she found out she had to stick her hand in the pumpkin to clean it. Ron couldn't get her to stick her hand in that mess for anything; he did try. She wound up grabbing a spoon on her own and doing a little but then just bolted from the room and wouldn't come back in until the pumpkin was empty.

There is this guy, we have known for about 7 or 8 years, who bow hunts and it is bow season right now. He is a single guy with a bit of land; that land allows him to take quite a few deer every year, way more than he can use but he like to bowhunt. A few months ago, Ron was talking to a neighbor (not the one he is going on the road trip with) about a mutual friend who died a few years back that always gave us his extra venison and he mentioned this in the conversation. This bow hunter guy was there at the time. All of the sudden, in the last week, this guy has stopped by with the meaty parts of 3 deer he has killed. Nice. Even nicer is this guy field cleans and de-bones the meat, the other guy gave us the critter and we cleaned it. Most of the meat is from older animals and is only good for grinding or jerky, but that is fine. Regular firearm season will be starting soon and we usually get a nice critter for letting the deer camp folks hang their meat in our feed room. Most people won't hang carcasses by their cattle, especially milkers, because it makes them act uh, stupid is what most people say, I call it angry. It does not seem to phase our milk cow and in turn it doesn't phase her daughter, our other milker. So we go ahead and hang them, right there next to the milking stall to the disbelief of most folks.

No Mushrooms, No Internet

10/21/2013

So I went mushroom hunting today. It seemed like a good time, the weather has been cool and we have had enough moisture. However, that was not the case; there were almost no mushrooms let alone the kind I was looking for. I was looking for Blewits, not that I would turn my nose up at Oysters or Puffballs, Not even Coral mushrooms. But I saw almost no mushrooms at all. There were a few of a type I am unsure of and they looked like they had been picked over by turkeys. There were a handful of a kind that are not edibles. I did find a couple of bunches of white Coral, they looked good but when I picked them the bottom was all purpley and the stems were hollow--never seen it and not gonna eat it. We are supposed to be getting a frost tomorrow night, maybe that will bring on the Blewits.

I got back from the failed mushroom hunt to find our internet out. I reset the modem and this, that, and the other thing that are always the first steps tech support has one do all to no avail and so I called tech support. After about an hour on the phone I get informed the problem is on their side and the problem has been "escalated," meaning a rush order to fix I assume, and I should have the internet back within 24 - 48 hours. Cool. So, this will be posted/sent when my internet comes back. Tink does not handle internet outages very well.

We have been wondering if Tink can handle two countdowns. She can. She is counting down until her birthday and she added a countdown to Halloween; she is keeping track of both. I still have no clue what she expects out of Halloween. We get no trick or treaters, the kids are too old to trick or treat themselves--not that it was very good the last couple of years they did; one house on this block, go a couple blocks, oh, there's a house, another block or so…

We went to the Decedents of the Pioneers Days the first weekend of October. It is a local celebration that has been going on for about the same length of time we have lived here. It has gotten bigger each year except the 2012 one really had a low turn out. This year we planned on going Saturday and probably Sunday but that Saturday was rainy and cold and somebody didn't feel good so we didn't go. We did go Sunday and it was nice; sunny and warm with long sleeves or a light jacket. And because of the rain the day before, the long drive in on the dirt 'n chert road that some people have the nerve to call gravel, they aren't gravel, anyway, the dirt 'n chert road is usually extremely dusty when we go down it and the rain made it not dusty. That was nice. We saw the usual stuff at the festival, molasses and soap making, a blacksmith and knife maker, people spinning and weaving, lots of little handcrafts for sale and some antique stuff. And they have free wagon rides around the grounds. We didn't see many locals there this year but we are starting to know some of the vendors and they recognize us from previous years. Come to think of it there were two vendors not there this year that usually are. One of the vendors there is always at the Renaissance Festival too.

10/22/13

Well the internet came back on late last night. And we are supposed to frost tonight so I have to go see if there is anything worth bringing in from the garden.

Fall Forecast: Snakey With Chance of Rodents

Tuesday evening:

I have seen some snakes this year, no surprise, look at where I live. But the last couple weeks they have been attempting to come inside the house--well, at least one succeeded making it into the den. We are not sure if it was a small Black or a medium Cottonmouth; we are hoping it is a Black snake; either will kill rodents but the Black is not poisonous. Unfortunately, we both think we saw markings that a Black snake does not have. I never got a good look at its head but after the mild confusion of trying to get it back outside (we failed) Ron said he thought it was a young Copperhead. I told him it wasn't, it was too dark, he mentioned the markings he saw and he thought Copperheads were darker when young. Nope. I mentioned that if it had markings it was probably a Cottonmouth. He had a sick look so I dropped it and haven't mentioned it again. He has issues with snakes, they scare him. He has gotten much better since we moved here, doesn't totally freak out, just a little freaked out and so instead of running from them he will actually go toward them--to attempt to kill, but not always by the best method or with clear head. He was going to break my nest box all to pieces to get that one big Black in the coop a couple months ago. This one that got into the den he went to stomp it, did stomp it. Oh good, piss it off and scare it. It started back behind some things near the door and I grabbed its tail, pulled it out but the door wasn't opened far enough so I had to let go so as not to gget bit, reached for the door and He pulled me back almost hard enough to land on my butt and started stomping again. There went the snake into the mess of tool boxes, folding chairs, air compressor, garden stuff, essentially into a place that we have no chance of finding it. Ron swore he didn't freak out, sure he didn't. To be fair, a few hours later he did admit to being a little freaked. That was about 5 days ago. Last evening, Mac, my cat alerted me to a snake at the door, this time it was a Copperhead, no doubt about it. The door was only opened about 6 inches when Mac pointed out I needed to look out the door. We have a beaded curtain covering that door too so we can leave the door open without hummingbirds coming in; when I pulled the door open it made the bead curtain move and the Copperhead struck at it. This put me in an awkward position of having a mad snake between me and a good tool to get it. There was a big sledge hammer right in the doorway so I grabbed it and whacked that snake as it was making a second draw. I broke its back about 8 inches behind its head. It tried to go away at that point but couldn't get its back part to help propel it. Since it was now faced away from me I could step past it and get a shovel. I separated its head from body at that point and took it to the fire pit (after waking Ron from his nap to brag a bit).

Time to close the coop and take care of that huge walkingstick that has just come in…

I'm back. The walkingstick is on the oak tree and I saw no snakes in the coop, need to check nightly at this time of year. I bet there are a lot of mice about this year and they will all be headed for the indoors for what feels like is going to be a cold winter for here. But the weather has been a bit whacky so there is no telling. The amount of water we got in August was incredible--no one has seen an August like this in memory. Now Colorado has been getting hit bad; some places have had a years worth of water in a matter of a week. The Ozarks are capable of handling a lot more water than the Rockies. Their years worth is only a few months worth here. I think I heard today New Mexico has flooding also. When our rain stopped, it stopped. We had rain on Aug. 10th and then yesterday we finally got a little, 36 days with no rain. That is as odd as a bunch in August.

The garden is not great but not horrid either. I am just happy we have something as with my surgery happening at planting time and the floods taking out some of it.

I have rediscovered a band from my youth, The Scorpions. And it is not just listening to their old music, they have been putting out albums all along, I just let life get in the way of listening to new music. Well, it is not like we get radio reception her very well, a couple stations and neither are good in my opinion. Ron used to talk about hooking the stereo to the TV antenna but we have not yet gotten around to it. Anyway, Morg has been experimenting with music some and a couple of her favorites claimed inspiration from some of the groups I listened to at her age, such as The Boomtown Rats, and The Beatles, of course, but she has been listening to Beatles her whole life. For last Christmas I got her a few CDs I used to have as vinyl. She loved them. I had to make her promise not to let her dad hear her playing one of them as he wouldn't understand it; it was The Dead Kennedys if you have interest in knowing. A couple months later he busted me playing it in the car, he didn't understand it. Morg got a good laugh. But, now she has complete faith in music I say is good. I had her listen to one of the newer Scorpions albums, from 2007, that I had just found on YouTube. It is called Humanity: Hour 1. She fell in love with it. She is a little rebel at heart. There is another album they had done a few years before that one, it has a song on it called Priscilla. I was listening to it for the first time, headphones on. Ron asks me "What's the matter?" I guess I had a funny expression on my face. I told him that I had listened to over two decades of Scorpions music ('72-'95), I grew up listening to them. For all there very heavy metal sound The Scorpions never sang in favor of violence; it was always a message of love, universal love of humanity and the world -- (okay, their music had a lot of sex, drugs and rock 'n roll themes too but that was the times) -- and the guy just was singing to Priscilla that tonight he was going to kill her. I found that a little confusing and listened to the rest of it. Toward the end he tells us that Priscilla is a cockroach. It put a whole new light on the song. I can't ever remember laughing at a  Scorpions song before, they are not generally funny. That one is. I can just see a handful of half-drunk middle aged men trying to kill a big fat cockroach in the kitchen.

Ron came in a few minutes ago and said there is a big ol' pile of snake poop on the front step. I don't know what to say. It is a snakey autumn. I can't say it has been this bad before.

I took another break from writing a bit ago to play our night game of dice. You didn't even notice I bet, it was during the Priscilla story. But now it is getting late and I have to go, probably rambled too much anyway.

The Trip to Chicagoland

Today is Wednesday. Late last Friday I got an email from my sister, who lives a bit south of me, telling me she decided to make a whirlwind trip to go see our dad and asked if I wanted to go. She wanted to leave on Sunday and come back Tuesday. I declined. I have had an issue with this sister that is not a resolvable one. Also, traveling in a car might be do-able now but it is hardly heaven. Not to mention, with my current intestinal design requires I do not wander too far from "facilities." My father called early Saturday morning requesting I come. What was I supposed to do?  I went. It was probably a good thing too, I am not sure my sister would have arrived alive.

My sister showed up on Sunday and we headed out with me driving because I am much more familiar with my local roads and highways and, admittedly, they are a trial if one is not familiar with them. She said she could drive when we got to Illinois. I cannot recall exactly where or when she did drive but it was about a half an hour before she said she was getting drowsy so we switched again. She did not do anymore driving. It was a good thing I was driving when the tire threw it's tread on the interstate between Sullivan and St. Clair MO. It was a very scary situation when it happened, 75-80 MPH on a busy/crowded interstate, chunks of rubber and other things flying at the windshield and hitting the bottom of the vehicle, steering wheel trying to pull me into the left lane. At the time I thought the tire had blown, thankfully, for the rim, it was just the tread that blew. I got the rig pulled over to the side, I honestly do not think my sister could have managed this without an accident. (I have been known to be a good driver even if I have hardly gotten into a vehicle in the last couple years and a bit longer doing any driving.) The mud flap had gotten twisted around and was rubbing on the rim causing the sound that made me think we were on the rim; that was a relief and I was able to pull the rig even further off the road so we stood less of a chance of dying from all the high-speed traffic. Aside from the damage to the tire and the mud-flap, the entire lens assembly for the turn signal/running light on the driver side was shattered and just gone, the drivers side of the grill was a bit broken and had pieces of tread in it, the front of the driver's side running board got messed up, and one of the oddest things--somehow the tread had caught the cable for popping the hood open and pulled it out from where it connects to the inside of the where a person pulls it to pop the hood; the plastic puller lever broke and had hit me in the leg when it all happened and I thought something was coming up through the floorboard--it happens and it can kill, but it didn't this time. Now, I can change a tire, done it hundreds of times, not an exaggeration, I really have; they were not all mine. But with my somewhat recent surgery and my seeming refusal to let it heal completely from the last time I did something stupid before I do something stupid again, I was a bit concerned with heaving the large tire around. A couple of guys stopped and were willing to help but then it turned out my sister did not have the crank handle to get the tire lowered from under the vehicle (I hate that design of spare carrier.) But, we discovered her spare was not in fact any good anyway. They didn't want to leave us on the side of the road even thought we did, by now, have a tow truck coming. Very nice guys. We did manage to send them on their way and waited by the side of the road  for about 45 more minutes when the tow guy showed up.

The trip continues with four new tires and a spare tire that is actually a spare tire and not a hunk of bad rubber. The episode set us back about 2 hours.

Oh, I forgot to mention she did not have an atlas, or even a simple map, with her and I did not find out until a half hour after we had left when she asked if I knew how to get there. Crap! I can get us to Chicago but I didn't know how to get to the house (our other sister's house, whom Dad lives with). She said she could get us to the house if we were in the area. I lived up to my half she had to call the sister to when we got to the neighborhood. But, we are not there yet.

We cross the Mississippi and I'll tell you, no matter how much I have driven and been driven and places where I have lived and visited that bridges are an everyday, multiple times daily, occurrence, I hate crossing bridges, and so does my sister. We were both born along the Mississippi; bridge accidents are the worst. At least I knew our tires were good, hoped everyone else's were.

We stop for gas about a half hour into Illinois and I go in the store while she gasses up. They were playing a song from the 80's. So when my sister walks in I say loud enough for the guy behind the counter to hear, "You know, I haven't been to Illinois in years and I thought all sorts of things would have changed, but they haven't even changed the record." I got a good chuckle out of both of them. But then the next few places we stopped were all playing 80's rock too.

This might have been when she took over driving. She was driving kind of slow, especially considering we already were going to be getting to our destination kind of late before the tire issue, let alone after the tire. She was driving within the legal limits, not below the minimum, but not always the posted limit either, and on I-55 most people do 10 to 15 above said upper limit. I took over driving again at the next stop which I asked for to go potty even though it was not a true necessity. By the time we got to Springfield it was obvious that we would not get to the Chicago area until probably 1:00 in the morning and that is way late for my Chicagoland sister's family so we opted for a motel rather than disturb them in the middle of their night. So we drove around in a town both of us knew very well, at a different point in our lives, looking for a motel, totally lost because of the changes. The odd thing is I noticed that Springfield IL had not grown all that much since I last lived there based on the population figure posted on the city sign but it sure did sprawl out. When I finally found an intersection I knew (it would have been easier to find myself if we had gone downtown but the motels there are not anyplace we would want to stay and the hotels there are way out of price range) I decided we needed to stop and ask someone because the last time I had been at that intersection is was corn fields on 3 sides and a large vacant lot on the forth; now it was in the middle of a small city. We got the directions to a inexpensive hotel and a grocery store and settled in for the night.

The next day, we are on the road and it is starting to get hot already even though it is just around 9 am. I switch lanes and as I am signaling the lane change the turn signal stops working. The driver's side only worked in the back since the tire incident but now there was nothing. At the same time my sister is noticing that the AC blower is not working--then we discovered that the GDMF power windows would not go down. I have always hated having power windows--ALWAYS hated them. Why? Because if they do not have electricity going to them they will not work. I have over the years come up with gobs of scenarios that one would need to get their window down and yet there is no power to do that. I like crank windows. I might have mentioned this in a previous blog when I got my last vehicle-it has power windows and good luck finding a non-antique car with a window crank. So anyway, we are in the middle of nowhere with no AC and not able to get the windows down, it is already 90 degrees out and I was stupid enough to wear a black t-shirt that day. The next couple of exits had no services, a nice way of saying the little town that the exit led to had a grain elevator and a couple of residences. A bit later we got to Bloomington and pulled into a parts store. I start to check the fuses and could not get them out, my hands were too wet from being soaked in sweat. I decide I am just going to go in the store and play dumb female. The guy hem-hawed a bit and told me they are not supposed to pull fuses--which seemed strange to me for a place that advertises on the window that it will check electrical systems, and I have seen employees of the same company doing just that for customers elsewhere even though I think technically they mean the battery, alternator, and regulator. He does however give me a pair of needle-nose pliers to pull the fuses. All of the associated fuses to the things that had failed were fine. I pulled a couple relays that might have been the problem and my sister took them in to be tested, they were fine. The only thing the part store guys were helpful on was suggesting a place that did electrical work and gave us directions to find it. We get there and the place is closed, no one there. She starts calling around to find another place to keep me from breaking out her windows out--seriously, people and animals die in closed up cars in that kind of heat. But just as she finds another place the guy shows up. He is a bit slow about getting his test light but when he does he finds the problem almost immediately. It was the fuse for the brake lights according to the fuse legend. The brake lights were working, we checked, the legend on the fuse box was wrong. He replaced that fuse with one of my sisters fuses and everything worked fine. The phone in his office rang, he left us in the driveway with his nice Snap-On test light still on the floorboard for 15 minutes--he sure was trusting. When he came back out he said we were good to go. I commented that he sure was nice to give us his Snap-On test light. "Oh no! I better get that" he said. He didn't charge any money because it only took him 20 seconds to find it and it wasn't even his fuse that fixed it. He also had four rescued cats at his shop. My sister gave him $10 for him and the cats she said. And we were on our way again.

We finally made it to the Chicagoland twn we needed but she could not remember how to get to the house so we pulled into the library and called other sister. I told the one to tell the other to give us directions from the library but instead she gave the streets, she got instructions that made no sense because of a misunderstanding of where on said streets we were; we were to cross over/go past the street we were driving and go a couple more blocks--meaning I had to turn off that street obviously but didn't know which direction--we did find the right street eventually.

We had a short but pleasant visit with Dad and sister and sister's kids but bro-in-law was out of town. I was assigned my neice's bed which is about 8 to 10 inches higher than mine. I was afraid I would forget in the middle of the night and fall out of it when I get up to go to the bathroom. I only had to get up once and I remembered. The next morning however I almost landed on my face because I forgot. We visited with Dad and sister a bit more and left.

The trip home for me was a lot less eventful. About 20-25 minutes before getting to the Mississippi, just as I was thinking of asking her to drive because I feeling a tad dozy, she tells me she is going to kick her seat back and nap. Okay, I would be fine until the other side of St. Louis where we would gas up. Then I missed the 270 by-pass around the city and wound up going through downtown St. Louis. I didn't want to do that. I have done that, there used to be no choice but to do that. Driving around St. Louis is bad enough, driving through if you don't have to is crazy. I have driven in a few big cities, St. Louis has been the worst. I have not driven in NY, NY it is probably similar but I have heard other drivers bemoan St. Louis over other cities. I do not know how my sister slept through it but she did. I had such a burst of adrenaline I was no longer anywhere close to dozy. So, even after stopping I continued to drive since she wanted to get home before dark and by the time I would get dropped off she would barely be making it and she drives slower. Uneventful for me from here on out. But after checking her directions home and pulling out of my driveway she got lost. About an hour and a half later, just about the time she should be getting home, she calls and has no clue where she is and wants me to find her and direct her home. By asking a few questions she didn't understand why I was asking her, she was a bit stressed, I did indeed find where she was and gave her new directions to get home. She called again an hour or so later and thanked me, she had stopped at the store but was in her neighborhood and almost home.

One of my step-daughters called me once to find her once after her GPS got her totally lost. I don't remember what state she was in but I found her and got her back on track. She told me that she called me because she knew if anyone could do it it was me. Gosh. Maps are my friends.

I am exhausted, a little sore, behind in chores, and have had digestive tract upset since Sunday. But I did get to see my dad one last time. He is not dying per se but he will not last much longer. But then the last 5 times I saw him I figured it would be the last time. Especially the last time when I thanked my aunt for bringing him to see me because I figured I wouldn't see him again. She hugged me and told me it wouldn't be the last time, she would bring him back; but then she died a few months later. Didn't expect that. And I should have had this finished hours ago but kept getting interrupted. Oh well, it is done now.

What's Up Now

Well the rains finally stopped. Now we most likely won't see any until October. We got just shy of 12 inches in 9 days and we were the lucky ones; we were always outside of the brunt of the storms. Our usual August total is about 3 inches. The mosquitoes are loving it. The driveway looks horrible but it is drive-able with what we have and makes everyone else have to stop on the other side.

I can barely find my garden with all the weeds that have grown up. It would most likely be a complete loss if we didn't plant in the mineral tubs (about the size of a half a whiskey barrel). Ten or eleven of them actually had water flow in and over them, one of them had half the soil washed out. And we have had water flow into the fenced garden before but never like it did this time. My asparagus should recover but I have some debris to remove from the bed. We have a line of six or seven of the mineral tubs in the garden with an old fence stretched along them to let things grow up it, like last year we did melons in that spot, this year is tomatoes. One of the tubs in the line got hit head on with rushing water and the water pushed the tub a little over a foot, I think the tomato clinging to the fencing stopped it from going further, but it was far enough so that a lot of water washed around it. Any more and it would have just torn free. Those tubs are hard to move when full and more so if they have been in place for a while, and this one had been. Now it has so much sand and rocks and sticks and every other thing that flows in flood water that I am not sure about getting back in place. Unfortunately, the mower was sitting right next to that line of tubs and got buried in sand and other debris; we do not yet know if it is savable. There are flood marks on the garden fence, the driveway side where water would exit, that are 3 feet high. We are slowly getting it all cleaned up.

My silly soap, Days of Our Lives, is on and Ron has a doc appt. we need to leave for right after it is over so I need to get ready during the commercials and put the rest of this off until later.

I'm back.

The roads close by have had lots of damage. They dropped a bunch of boulders down in the spots where they got washed out; not for driving on but to keep folks from falling in the big hole. No telling when our roads will be tended to better as there is a lot of work on the paved roads and they get done first.

I noticed a couple days ago that some of my regular hummingbirds are not around but a couple of my "regular" transients have made an appearance accompanied by some I do not recognize at all. This means their migration has started. It seems early but I have never noted when it seems to start so maybe it is not early. Heck it took me a few years to really recognize most of the regulars so figuring when they are starting to leave isn't that easy. The very first that became recognized was because he had a shorter and stouter build than the others so was easy to spot. He had been coming here for seven years but I did not see him this year. I have seen his offspring, quite a few actually; one looks almost identical but is obviously a younger guy. And we had a female this year that had to be his--she is short and fat comparatively. I hope to see her again next year. I like being on the migratory route south and it is neat to see the ones that go further north stop back by here for a short fattening break before going on further south. The ones that have been here behave different than the ones that have not. It makes sense.

Update on Previous Post

Oh gosh, we spent quite some time on the driveway yesterday. We got it to where if there was an emergency we would be able to get out (it would have been rough but doable); chances are there would be no getting back in but …I hurt today. I should not have done as much as I did but though I hurt, I do not think I hurt myself, it is just unused muscles that hurt mostly.

A neighbor dropped by last night and said he would bring his tractor over today. He was later than we expected but he did show up--with a bale of hay to boot! Now we just need to find the two cows and their calves. They will show up, they know where they live.

The S. Dakota folk did retrieve their tin horns before they got washed away.

I hear that quite a bit of the road next to the big creek is torn up too, with some spots barely wide enough for the standard vehicle. I know I have seen county trucks taking loads of rock down the way today.

Years ago we had a problem with the water in the stream flash flooding the front yard. We put up a flood fence in the bad spot about 10 or 11 years ago and it quit doing that. Yesterday afternoon we realized it had overflowed there and we did have a wash through; that was the very first time since we put that fence in. The fence still helped incredibly though, it kept the rocks and logs out of the front yard. We also found out, this morning, that it took out a good part of the fence along the creek. The cows wouldn't go into rushing water and now they are where ever they are  at the neighbors so it is no big deal. The water in the creek was flowing longer than the water in the stream yesterday, which is uncommon. When I got up this morning we had gotten another 3/4 inch of rain, (it hadn't washed out our driveway work thank goodness) and our stream was flowing but not the creek. While helping distribute driveway fill I noticed that the creek was flowing again yet there had been no more rain. That is really odd. But water does what water does.

Lots of Rain Last Night

My gosh did we get rain last night, well it was actually early this morning but still time to be in bed. We had our driveway wash out badly for the first time in years; there is a chasm about 2 1/2 feet deep and 3 feet wide where the stream bed crosses it. The water is still flowing in the big creek that is usually dry. We needed to get hay today and that is not gonna happen. Our neighbors from South Dakota put in a couple of metal culverts (called tin horns exclusively around here) across that creek to "improve" the drive up to their "south 80" a few months ago. I know Ron told them they won't stay there when the water gets up. And I know that at least one other person told them too, before they put them in. I would not be surprised to find out that numerous people told them they won't be there long. Those folks have been her at least 8 years now and one would think they would have started listening to locals about the way things are. Most of us around here were figuring they would last about a year, until next spring when we usually get high water. Surprisingly, however, the tin horns did not wash out last night; they washed out two nights ago when we had about 2 inches of rain. They were on the next property over. Unfortunately, I do not think they had yet retrieved them when we got hit last night. Those tin horns are probably in the next county now.

These are the same folks that called up the electric company, after they went through replacing poles, to come get the "garbage" off his property. The garbage was the old poles which the power company leaves behind for the farmers as a favor because they can be used for all sorts of things, such as corner posts for fences. The electric company guy asked us if we wanted them. Yep, sure do. Two weeks later, the folks from S. Dakota went out and spent a couple hundred dollars on wood corner posts. Pretty much the same thing they threw the hissy fit about getting the "garbage" off their property. I just don't know about some folks.

A little over a month ago our internet speed was increased. We are finally able to "stream" videos. I didn't really know why it sped up and so I didn't say anything to anybody because I thought it would go away again as it showed up. But it is still here so I feel like we have finally caught up to the end of the 20th century. We do seem to be having more trouble with our phone lines since then. Actually I am surprised we have phone or internet today. We are lucky we have power. It went out in the storm a couple nights ago. I wound up spending a few hours staying up with Tink and a flashlight. Back to the internet speed…Since we can stream videos now I have been watching a lot of documentaries on YouTube. I mean a lot of them. I didn't realize how much I missed them. PBS almost never shows documentaries anymore because there are cable stations devoted to them. There are still so many more I want to watch but I think I am going a bit loopy and need to watch something else for a break. Right before I realized there were real documentaries on YouTube I had watched some old Match Game episodes from the 70's. That was a great game show; I love it. Maybe I'll watch a few more of those.  

Ron went up the hill to open the gate between our property and a neighbors so the cattle can have some graze since we have no hay--with permission of the neighbor, it was said neighbors idea. That is nice. When he comes back down we need to start work on the driveway.

Good and Bad News

The good news: I got a vacuum.

The bad news: All the turkey poults died.

I don't really know why they died, t was after a slightly chilled night but I didn't think that it would be too chilly. The next morning one did not look so good and I thought it might have been on the bottom of the pile and got a bit squished; sometimes they survive that, sometimes they don't. The day rapidly was warming so I knew they were not at all chilled by then. All others were chipper. I go back an hour later to check on the one and it was dead as well as four others with the last one not looking good at all. I am not terribly upset, I didn't want to have to take care of them anyway. But I am sad over it as well as a bit confused.

The vacuum is not the one I wanted but it wasn't the cheapest one either, in the range of second cheapest as there were two or three that were within a few dollars of each other. Got it today and it is not put together yet since very shortly after returning home from town some neighbors came over. When they left I tried calling my dad, it is his birthday, no one answered, and then I had to water a section of garden and another neighbor came by as soon as I started that. It is getting dark and I do not like vacuuming after dark (it can make winter vacuuming a little difficult) so it sits in its box in the living room.

I wasn't sure I would get a vacuum this month, not even a cheap one, because the mortgage inadvertently got paid twice. We were a tad scared there for a few days because we really cannot afford a double payment and would have suffered toward the end of the moth, but it did get refunded pretty quickly.

I hve a toothache. Arg!

It has been hot but not as bad as some parts of the country. We are a little low in rain now.

I was feeling a bit poorly the last few days but better now. I have been feeling much more myself recently, the last few days were nothing compared to the last few years. I have discovered hunger pains again; it is an interesting sensation that I almost failed to recognize. The first one was like, "What the hell is that? Oh, great, a new pain. Why does it feel vaguely familiar? Oh! I know what that is!" I can eat more than one meal the size of a snack a day now. The portions are close to normal and I put something in my stomach at least twice a day. I have more stamina and can actually do things. Not bad.

Fourth of July, the Fifth, and So On

For the 4th we set off our own fireworks in the driveway. It used to be that town set them off on the 4th but when they switched from the golf course/industrial park location to the fairgrounds a few years ago, they set them off on the Friday closest to the 4th. And last year they didn't set them off at all because of the bad dryness; that is understandable but they could have cancelled them earlier in the day instead of waiting until dusk to cancel. Anyway… we had a a nice show for ourselves. Some years a lot of people come over, some years a few, this year was just us; it hasn't been that way in years.

So we went to town for their fireworks the next day. The show was alright, as good or even better than most small towns around here put on, but it was not as good as it usually is. So it was a bit of a disappointment--especially since they should have had last years and some new this year to shoot off. Oh well, still better than a lot of the local shows. Usually my town of address, which is not a town at all, does fireworks during the community picnic but we heard today they are not going to do it this year. We don't know why yet.

 Oh yeah, my Tinker threw up on the way home from town Friday night. We don't know why on that either. She was feeling a bit down Saturday, a little less on Sunday but by today seems back to normal. The reason I bring this up is because she threw up in a cup instead of all over the backseat or her sister or me--which is how I used to find out she was nauseated, she would throw up in my face the first time. And while I am speaking of her, I have absolute proof she is grasping the concept of "tomorrow" and there is a good chance she is understanding the days of the week. Which is not an easy task at this house even for those of us that are not autistic. If she wants to go to town and is told tomorrow, she might still be "irritable" about not going on that day, it is the next morning when she gets up she gets dressed herself. And she is always the first up so we wake with her dressed (and irritated we are not ready to leave yet). If she doesn't know it is a  town day, she does not get herself dressed without being told.

Sunday we had a hatch of turkey poults. I hate doing that to a hen but Ron set the eggs under a gal when he was still taking care of the birds. Turkey babies act different than chicken babies and they talk a foreign language. Nine poults hatched.

At 10:30 this morning all 9 were in the nest with mom still. At ten 'till 1:00 this afternoon mom was dead and there were only 3 poults in the nest. I found 2 more poults running around and knew there was one I couldn't seem to catch. There were 2 other active setting nests that all of the proper eggs were in but the moms-to-be were running around scared. I could figure out what happened. About 20 after 1:00, Ron went out back with me to try to catch that last one out running around. While I was trying to catch one that had already been caught and escaped again, Ron noticed a huge blacksnake in one of the nests that had had 5 eggs in it 15 minutes before but there was only one left now. The way the mom-hen looked makes sense now, she was protecting the babies and he got her head and neck in as far as he could and then disgorged it. We killed the snake; nothing else to do once they find a coop. And this explains the uneven egg days--snake got 'em. I did manage to catch that loose poult a couple hours later. That plus a few other more mundane irritants, like the vacuum biting the dust, was making this out to be a not so great day. And I still had a town trip to do. For some reason, I forgot to take my pain pill before leaving. I usually take it right before changing clothes so  it has time to start working before we hit the road. I carry a few emergency ones in my purse but there was nothing to drink in the car and I can't take pills without fluid, it is hard enough with something to drink. I never could make it as a pill popper--"Hey baby, want some reds?" "Do they come in gummy bear form?" Ha ha ha. So I could get something to drink as soon as we get to town, or sooner if the flag is up at the country store, but I decided not to unless I HAD to. While I did have some pain, if was laughable compared to what that ride felt like before my last surgery. I made the whole trip without my usual mental litany of "take me back home, no never mind just let me out and I'll walk oh no I can't walk that far and it's getting farther just take me home no just let me out…"  About halfway to town I pointed at a spot on my belly and said, "It hurts right there." and I really did start laughing. Ron couldn't figure out what he was supposed to do. So while the day was not going great I did find out I do not have to fear a car ride. And I had feared them, for a few years it was torture.

I need to get a new vacuum. Our fireworks would have been less if it would have busted a few days ago but I don't think we can get one until next month now. I suppose it depends on the one I choose. The one I want I have to wait, one that will do we might be able to skinny through the month. I hated this last one we got when the one I wanted was $20 more than it is now plus shipping cost and the wait time of getting it. Now it is cheaper and at the store. I don't know what to do. I guess the hair build up will make the decision for me.

Fathers Day

Today we went to the semi-local Renaissance Faire; it takes an hour and a half to two hours to get there. It is the first time we have been in a few years. I think it has gotten smaller. I hope that does not mean it will be going away like the old one, that was closer to us, did after a few years. There were not many people there when we got there, about two hours after it opened, but it was pouring rain. After a couple hours more people had shown up and it had stopped raining.

Right after we got there we were in one of the booths that sells costuming. Right before we got there the folks that ran that booth had to poke a hole in the roof because it had been collecting water and starting to bow down in the middle. So water was pouring into the center of the little shop in a stream about the size of a half dollar. My Tinker walks up to it with her mouth open to catch the water. I put my hand on her shoulder to stop her and told her not to do that. She gave me such a look of pure Irish stubbornness, stuck her hand in the water stream and started using it as a cup to drink the water. This kid does NOT drink water, really. I am very glad the water was clean, relatively clean, because she got about five handfuls before we got her to stop (only by leaving that booth). I couldn't help laughing at the look she gave me. The people there were a bit confused at the whole interaction. I saw an opal necklace that really struck my eye. I really don't wear jewelry and didn't want to spend $20 bucks (very reasonable actually) for something I wasn't going to wear so I did not get it. It still calls to me though, odd.

Oh, and they had something this time I had not seen before. I saw him at a distance at first and thought he was the Grim Reaper. But then he was closer and turned toward me and I saw the ridiculous bird mask--A plague doctor! If I were not absurdly interested in history and on top of it being interested in plague and leprosy in history, I would not have a clue to what he was dressed as but if one walked up to him he handed out a little pamphlet telling people about plague doctors. It also gave me the idea to dress up as someone with plague for the fair next time; it could be fun.

We foolishly did not get anything to eat while we were out, except fries for Tink. Both Ron and I were tired and didn't feel like cooking. Morg and he had frozen pizza and I open a can of clam chowder.

Speaking of rain, Springfield got nine inches in a couple hours yesterday, we didn't get any; I sure do not mind not getting nine inches. We did get some today here, about a quarter inch, less than the Ren Faire got. We did get a light and sound show that was awesome. It is nice to be getting rain, this time last year we were in a drought. There has already been more hay cut this year than all of last year. The big sigh of relief of everybody is audible--echoing in the hills. There should be blackberries this year too!

Rainy Day and Killer Cat

I saw one of the oddest things I have ever seen today, and I have seen some odd things in my life. One of the cats, a really good hunter, made a kill of a large rat late this morning; that is not so odd, he does that, kills big rats. What was odd about it is that it was a two-in-one kill. I was working in the garden a little, trying to get something done before it started raining. I heard a noise over by the trash pile and looked up to see my little cat with something in his mouth that was almost as big as he is. As I try to focus on it to see what he had, I see either a rat or squirrel depending on which of the things was its tail. It had what appeared to be a fuzzy tail and a thin mostly hairless one. Meanwhile the cat is walking at a quick clip to a better place to torture his prey.  He stopped just outside of the garden and so I walked over to clarify to myself what I was seeing. It was a rat, a big rat, and hanging off its rear-end was a smaller rat, fully furred but only about 1/5th the size of the big one. The little one hung on to the big one through quite a bit of abuse before it finally got knocked off. It was still alive but barely moved, maybe injury, maybe just plain fear. The cat walked a little ways away to finish off the big one and by this time he had collected a bit of an audience, me, Ron (and his eldest daughter via phone), three dogs, and two other cats. One of the cats tends to wait until "the hunter" is done and cleans up most of the remains, not that he doesn't hunt himself, it is just he gets more this way. I took a stick and flung the small rat his way, he got it. At this point it is starting to sprinkle and the odd spectacle of the double rat catch was over--I still don't get the little one hanging off the big one through the grabbing, the 5o or so yard fast-paced walk to the killing ground, and then the five or so minutes of abuse; it was not a baby, they are hairless, it was too small to consider mating with the big one and that is not the way it was hanging anyway. Just really odd.

Speaking of my little hunter, he has a funny thing he does. If it is dark or the weather really bad, he wants to bring his kills inside, many cats really try to do that, but I, of course, do not let him/them do this. But I discovered one stormy summer evening when I could not keep him out of the den, he would accept a box for it. I got a box big enough for him to move around but not too big, about the size of a case of bottled beer or soda. I put him with critter in mouth in the box, he jumped out at irst but I put him in again and he got it. Now he comes in and verbally demands a box instead of asking to go inside or letting it loose in the den where it could get lost. One time, not that long ago, we didn't have a box and he showed his disfavor by using a laundry basket, that was nasty to clean up. Now we make his boxes live longer by putting newspaper in the bottom and they can usually be reused.

The rain has stopped and I really ought to go see if there is any gardening I can get done. Because of my surgery the garden is way behind. We are going to have almost nothing this year. We do have some seedlings that need planted out and I do want to start some beans even if it is late, but the garden isn't ready for them yet. It is a really good thing we do not have to depend on it to eat (just to eat really good food) because last year we had a lot of stuff planted but so much got that weird curling and didn't produce well and now this year we just couldn't get done. It has been cooler than usual also, some things that enjoy heat are just stuck in limbo waiting for it to warm up. This is the only year I can think of that, when we have had an A/C, we did not turn it on in May. I can only think of two days I even considered it but it was already getting late and the sun would be down soon cooling everything, so it just never happened; here it is more than a week into June and still haven't used A/C. As a matter of fact, it is not supposed to get out of the mid-70's today. The first day of June we didn't make it out of the 60's. It is supposed to get into the 90's this week though so we will probably close the windows and turn the A/C on.

I am really starting to see why the surgeon kept saying about my hernia being big. I was loosing a lot weight prior to the surgery because I was having such trouble eating. I lost any fat I had and my muscle was disappearing, I was getting real skinny yet when I would sit, my belly would be in my lap; I didn't understand that but… Now, even though there is still a hint of swelling from being cut on, my belly is not in my lap. It is not flat, never will be again after two kids and the surgeries, but there is a significant difference. And I had an appointment, my last, with the surgeon last week, it is the first car ride I have taken in years that has not been an experiment in torture. I won't say it didn't hurt but the difference in pain is significant; the difference in an uncomfortable ride and living in fear of having to get into the car. And, yes and, I have not felt the eels in my guts since the surgery. Eels is the only thing that really describes the feelings, not worms, not snakes, it was eels and they are not there anymore. No wonder I was having so many problems, half of my guts were on the wrong side of the muscle wall.  

Gallbladder and Computer: Casualties of April

I guess the surgery went well. The gallbladder was toast and had apparently been bad for some time and was in the process of giving me another bad attack (blocking the bile duct of the liver with a stone) on the day of surgery. And the hernia of the small intestine turned out to be "quite a bit bigger than originally thought," according to the doc, who mentioned this quite a few times to stress the point. I have pictures but I am not going to post them--gross. I left the hospital "against medical advice" because I felt like I was no longer improving and was gong to get worse if I stayed. My blood oxygen level was dropping little by little and I was having trouble breathing. As well as the stress of being there was keeping my intestines locked up (in other words, I wasn't pooing yet) and the doc was monitoring all output so I was not supposed to flush but after the first day no one seemed to check on the little toilet hat thing until I would complain it was about to overflow. Problem was is that my potassium was *very* low. The doc prescribed me supplemental potassium and wanted me to come back in two days for a check. The pharmacy didn't have the right stuff until the next day so I put off the appointment for another day -- from my POV I was supposed to have a full day on the potassium before having blood labs -- and got yelled at by the doc for not coming in when she said. The potassium prescription didn't really work, probably because I would just throw it back up. I was having a horrid problem with that, throwing up that is. They couldn't figure out why I was throwing up all the time, I think it was because of multiple reasons and that it why it was so difficult to track down. Anyway, she pretty much convinced Ron that I should go back into the hospital, I didn't agree but he was the one driving and the doc threatened to fire me as a patient… so back into the hospital. By this time though, my bowels were moving a little and there was still a no flush order. Same as before, well monitored the first day but by the second day the bathroom smelled a bit like an outhouse in summer. I hate hospitals. I won't even begin about the stuff I was being served to ingest. I was released after two days but I think I would have been better off if I would have stayed home where I was less stressed and a lot more comfortable as well as food that I could eat. I had to quit taking the potassium because it was the last thing left making me throw up. I couldn't take it as prescribed anyway because it had to be taken with food and I couldn't eat three times a day and when I did take it I would just loose it and the food I ate. My potassium did recover anyway; I think it was because I was able to eat, finally. That and eating lots of creamy tomato soup.

It has been just shy of six weeks now. I guess I am doing okay. Things are hardly normal as far as my body goes, if I stand or walk for any length of time it feels like my guts are going to fall out. I guess that is not too surprising considering how much my belly has been cut into but I really hope it goes away. Eating is much easier than it has been in a couple of years, honestly, but it makes my belly hurt for about half an hour to 45 minutes. I am still achy and slow but I guess that is normal at this point as I am still not supposed to lift anything plus I was a bit malnourished to begin with. I am starting to get anxious though.

In between my hospital stays, I used my computer to pay bills. When I came out after the second stay Ron said the computer wouldn't turn on. This happened before, late last year, where I couldn't get tit to turn on for days; one light would come on and that would be it. After a few days it came back on. So we waited and hoped, it didn't come back on. Since it was getting close to bill time again it was decided to find someone to look at it--not a promising endeavor in this area. The person we took it to didn't know why it wasn't getting full power and since it was so old (five years) he probably couldn't find parts. This was better than claiming he could fix it and screwing it up (as the last computer person we took it too did when it needed a new fan). He said he could transfer the info from it to another computer though. Fine. I had some money left over from a gift from my dad months ago in prep for this or another sudden need so I got another computer. The guy said he would have it ready by the next morning. He didn't answer his phone all the next day. Finally at about 5:30 pm he finally "finished" it. None of the music file were transferred and there are a couple other files I haven't found that had been on my desktop. Other than that I guess it was worth the $40 we paid him, at least he didn't try to steal the old computer (that happened at another computer repair place around here). I do not like Windows 8 operating system. It is too focused on social networking, videos, games and other such. We do not have the internet speed for games or streaming videos and I do not do social networking and it is hard to get to programs installed after the computer comes home. It has tablet computers and smartphones in mind, not to mention fast internet speed. In the time without the computer and getting used to the new one, I have gotten even less into sitting in front of it. A lot of it is also, probably, is that I have been pretty much an invalid and tend to avoid people and news and other things when I am not feeling good. For instance, I started this blog almost a week ago and got interrupted then just couldn't manage to get back to it until I forced myself today. 

Catching Up

Yesterday, Thursday, we had wet snow and a lot of it. Most places measured 4 inches but everything was, and had been, so warm when it started a bunch melted. On the backyard glass table I got a 7 inch measurement and still think more than that fell because it was almost 40 F when the snow started. Too much for the rain gauge to keep up with so I don't have a clue to the rain equivalent. A lot melted today so now it will be slick tonight and expecting more rain/snow tomorrow. Making up for the drought of last season.

My new glasses are great but I do not like the bifocal line; I have yet to decide if it will cause any real problem as there have been other things going on but it has been nice to be able to see clearly again even if I do have to look around a line. It does bother my neck a bit because I have to use it more where I would just move my eyes but now get the line or the wrong lens. Funny, I did not realize how much I do that.

I do not recall, nor am I going to look back in my blogs, how much I have mentioned my eating problems of late. I love food plus am the main food preparer for a household that has no microwave and uses almost no pre-processed foods. So, I think about food in one way or another for the majority of my waking day. It has been making me sick. Yes, even thinking about food in most cases nauseates me anymore. If I can get past that, I have really bad teeth since my cancer treatments and it can hurt to chew. Then it goes to the stomach that really doesn't want it but cares less which way it sends it. If it sends the food further down, my small intestine seems to like things to hang around until it builds up enough to force it through my ileum which has seemed to have turned into some kind of goalie and tries to keep stuff from passing through without giving it it's painful all. If I don't eat enough food to force more through it starts to ferment, I assume, and develop a bit of gas which will push the last bits out if I do not eat more; this can take days. There really is already "too much information" and what happens when food gets to the remnants of my large intestine gets graphic but, trust me, it is not comfortable in any way, nor slow like the small intestine. So from start to finish, eating has mostly been not worth it. Enough to stay alive is pretty much all I have been eating; I can't ever remember being weaker in my life.

Then on Saturday March 9th I couldn't even keep down water. It was time to do something, I went to the ER in Mountain View. It is a  nice place, small hospital, they told me it would be kind of a long wait. It wasn't that long after  they realized I could not sit up for long. I got a saline drip for dehydration, they discovered I had bottomed out on my potassium so they gave me some of that.  And they gave me something that made my tummy stop turning; that was heaven. The blood work also showed something rather humorous if it hadn't meant I had to go to the West Plains ER to have an ultrasound for something I told them from the start was NOT the problem. I had a possible positive pregnancy test. They would do nothing else, and no one else would either, until it was proven, by visuals, that I was not pregnant. There was no way I could have been, for three reasons, shy of parthenogenesis and I do not believe it is  possible in humans.  Okay, so shy of walking out against medical advice, which certainly would not help my case, I was stuck going to West Plains (I won't get into West Plains hospital but it is scary). Rather than go by ambulance, I had Ron come to get me, I had sent him and the kids home hours before. On the way to get me some idiot dumps a dog on the highway right as Ron is coming over a hill. They pull off, the dog tries to follow them but… Ron stops, opens the door, he said the dog looked after the other car as it pulled over the  hill and then jumped in. He is about 7 months and just got neutered today. Morrigan named him Fire Cloud. He is going to be a big dog. I curse those people with nightmares. Ron is a sucker and I told him so; he also knows I would have done the exact same thing he did. So We travel with the dog to West Plains where it was supposed to take less than two hours but actually took about five to find out that indeed I was not PG. Finally, home again and with enough anti nausea stuff that I can drink and try solids in a few days. Follow up with regular physician.

 I saw a doc on Monday, not my regular but at regular clinic. He took blood. He also mentioned that two of my liver enzymes were way out of whack in the blood draw at the ER. He prescribed some potassium and more stuff for my upset tummy and then called in a couple days to tell me that my liver enzymes were even further out of whack. By this time I was able too see the test results myself and out of whack was putting it mildly. It was scary. Since I am sending this to my brother, like I usually do my dad, I will put in the numbers because my BIL is a doctor.

ALT: norm 15-37, 1st draw 197, 2nd draw 252;

AST: norm 30-65, 1st draw 251, 2nd draw 447

Anyone can see this is a little scary. So they wanted me to have another ultrasound but this time of some other organs besides my uterus. They saw something and didn't tell me. I think they should have. In interest of knowing oneself, I should have been told about this thing they saw--apparently I should have been told in 2008 when they first found it then told again when they saw it in the ultrasound and I could have put their fears to rest. I was told about it today after a CT scan, even though the ultrasound was close to a week ago. I can't remember what she called it, hema-something, which by the sound of it sounded like Latin for blood-filled-sack, and the doc told me I was almost spot on. I have a blood-filled-bubble? attached to my liver, doc says from birth, that straddles the two lobes of my liver. It is under two inches and they seldom do anything with them unless they get to be bigger than four inches. I should have known about this and they should have looked deeper into my gut files but…this thing has nothing to do with the liver enzymes. My last blood draw, Monday, showed My ALT at 126 and my AST at 74; not normal but way more normal than it had been. So, since the "tumor" they thought they had turned out to not be my rectal cancer spreading to my liver, they figure I must have passed a gallstone into my liver that blocked things up but then passed out of the liver by the time they saw it in the ultrasound and CT. I am on for dealing with the gallstones they also found in the second ultrasound. That seems to be a major part of the problems I have been having for the last few years that had just been passed off as remnants of my cancer treatments. On top of that, I have a hernia at my belly button that is affecting my small intestine and I have been complaining about pain there for a while now. I am scheduled for surgery on April 1st; it seems fitting. I could have gotten it done this next week but we just shot the bull and he is hanging. Next week we need to be cutting and wrapping. I can't lift but I can cut and wrap.

Well, that is about it. 

The Eye Doctor Appointment

I made that eye appointment I needed; it was today.

As I glanced back at my blog, to verify that I had in fact written about the eye thing, I noticed that I had mis-written the numbers. My latest numbers (before today) was 39 not 29 and a previous high number in one eye was 29 not 39. So I need to change that online, it has been changed in my private copy and since I have been emailing a copy of my blog to my dad, I am clarifying here that I had made a couple typos.

I took the new glasses back a few weeks ago and told them they were not working well. I could not see distance stuff clearly and while I could find a clear focus point for the "reader" part, it was 8 to 10 inches from my face. I can't read a magazine that close without hitting my nose with the page, spending anytime reading that close gives me a headache because my eyes are being forced to cross to see and I spent much time training that right one NOT to do that, filling out forms or doing a checkbook is impossible at that distance because one's face gets in the way of the pen. You know, that doc told me *he* could read that close. Cool, I can't. So, he decided that my distance lenses were fine and he would change my reader part "back" to 1.5. I asked what he meant by that. He said he would put them back to what I had before, down to 1.5 from the 1.75 that he had raised it to. I told him these were the first bifocals I had ever had. I was wondering how he had missed that. He said he wrote a Rx for a bifocal the time before if I had wanted it he just never bothered to check my glasses or ask about it when I came in this time I guess.  But fine, whatever, change the magnification to 1.5, if it works, great, sorry you missed the obvious and have to change the glasses. But it still is/was not rectifying the fact that looking at anything is out of focus. He checked my eyes and said the Rx was right and was not changed much from my glasses of two years ago. I told him that was a problem because that was why I came in, I was not seeing well with the glasses. He said there was nothing he could do and did I want them to re-order the glasses with the different reader part. No, I got my money for the glasses back. To bad one can't get the money back on a shoddy appointment. I never did hear anything back on the referral to the glaucoma people either. And as it turns out, they have a partner office in town and I did not have to go all the way to the city like that doc had told me; probably because it is in another optometrist's office close by and surprisingly competitively priced to Walmart. And I finally called.

I went to the new eye doctor that was concerned enough about my eye pressure that I got an afternoon appointment on a day they don't do afternoons. As it turned out,  it probably was a good deal for them because we are expecting a nasty weather day tomorrow and so they had called their Thursday appointments and had some come in this afternoon and scheduled others for other dates. But it was kind of a busy office for initially being told I would be the only one there. and it was getting busier. I had to miss my soap opera (pity me) because they would tag me onto the end of the day but people were still coming end after left. I hold no hard feelings, I understand. Anyway…My eye pressures were 14 and 18; normal is 14 to 16. That is what happened the last time an eye doc freaked because  of high pressure. No sign of it by the time a …um…more experienced, yeah, that works, more experienced doc sees me. So I got a class on Glaucoma 101. No real answer on why the variable pressures but it is not unheard of for pressure to fluctuate, just not usually that much. I had already gave myself that class over the last few years though. He was also very informative with how an eye was put together and worked and what happened with lazy ey and whatnot, but I have been dealing with this my whole life and took various biology classes in college (even got to dissect an eye). I was polite and smiled and listened without letting drag out too far any of his "lessons" by letting him know I knew by asking a question from a point beyond what he was talking about. It was the first time I had talked about the patch therapy in many years. That is where one with a lazy eye where a patch on the strong eye to force the weaker  one to make connection with the brain. It works well if started young enough. And it worked very well for me; though my right eye has always been a wimpy little brother to the left, it works well enough that if I lost the use of my left I can do  utilitarian reading and could watch TV, and generally get around; I would not be close to blind. We talked for a while about the occasional visuals I thought was high pressure, it is not. By description he suggested what it was. I am choosing to tentatively believe him, need more research. I had a gynecological surgeon suggest the same thing to me back in '94. When she suggested it I had never heard of it and doubted it and I have never heard of it again until today when the eye doc said it. That is good enough to look into it. So, what the heck is "it"? A certain type of migraine that is considered "painless." Considered painless because it is not a typical migraine with extreme pain but  it has some mild pain or often a lot of pressure  involved. Maybe. I'll look into it; some of those visuals could be scary if I weren't used to them.

Okay, so after the talk/lesson on the biology of the eye and glaucoma he takes a look at my eyes. He told me that my optic nerve, the thing damaged with glaucoma, was boring; there was no damage no anything that looked to be the slightest worry of even developing glaucoma at this point. I had no sign of cataracts, nor macular degeneration. I should just have the pressures checked every time I go for new glasses. This has been a bit of an emotional roller coaster over the last ten years, albeit not constant, and certainly a back burner during the cancer treatments and stuff, but the concern of  the high eye pressure and possible blindness has been there. Now…I guess don't worry about it until further notice.

I did have more confidence in this guy after the first few minutes than I have had with the last few eye docs even after a few visits. I talked to him about the problems with the current glasses and the ones that were supposed to replace them. He told, and showed, me that the doc Rxed my readers at 2.75 not 1.75 in order for my focal point to be that close. Wow, glad I got out of that place with little damage. I am really hoping that my new glasses will be good. One and a half weeks...

Petitions and POV: Mostly Guns and Bullying

I wind up signing  a lot of online petitions; I do not remember when or why I signed the first one, chances are it was a gay rights petition over ten years ago. Once one signs one they send, via email, other petitions that they think one might sign and in quite a few cases the petitions are something of interest. I still sign a lot of LGBT petitions, an occasional unjustly jailed one, lots of anti-GMO food ones, some environmental ones, etc. All of the sudden, in the last few weeks, I have been getting all sorts of gun control/anti-gun petitions sent to me. Man, they are hitting up on the wrong person here. So I think that a gay person has rights, I think that BP should have to clean up the spill, I think that food should be real and honest without genetic manipulation, gobs of pesticides and other poisons, or without unneeded antibiotics and hormones---where does that give the idea I think guns are a bad thing? Venison is healthier and more natural than most beef. And, personally, I do not want to have to devise a way to kill our beef humanely without a gun, bovine heads do not usually succumb to a baseball bat, a shot is quicker and cleaner. Now, let us also consider the occasional sick wild animal that walks into the yard. There have been sick skunks and raccoons that have walked into our yard, or down the road, in the pasture, whatever, critters that have had distemper or quite possibly even rabies. Using a gun to dispatch the poor thing seems a lot safer and more humane than any other option. It puts the critter out of its misery and helps keep the disease from spreading to both wild and domesticated animals.

I am a strong believer in gun control, anyone that owns a gun should be able to control it.

I also believe that if more people were armed then there would be less crime. If someone walks into a convenience store to rob it right now he or she is pretty confident that the only gun will be in his or her possession. If one in five people were armed, that would take away that "confidence" and make the robbery a lot less likely.

If guns are illegal, only the criminals will own them (leaving the rest of the people to their so-called mercy.)

An armed society is a polite society. That is an older saying, it is true to a point, somewhat considering what one thinks of as polite. Some people have equated that politeness to fear of the armed but I do not. A gun, whether a handgun or rifle or shotgun, for that matter, a howitzer or cannon, is a tool. I am no more afraid a "normal" person holding a gun that I am of one holding a hammer--hammers are often used in deadly crimes too, don't forget, but no one is trying to make them illegal. Wouldn't it have been neat if some of the people in the Aurora CO theater shooting would have been armed? Good chance that one of them would have had a clear shot and could have stopped some of the killings? And the Columbine high school shooting--everyone seems to forget they had been working on bombs in the garage before they got guns; they had taken their bombs to the school but the bombs failed. If they had not gotten the guns they probably would have perfected the bombs and a lot more people would be dead. And what if there had been armed teachers there?  I am for arming teachers if they are willing; I won't force a gun on anyone that doesn't feel comfortable. I am one of those people that are not particularly comfortable with firearms. I do know gun safety. I do know how to use them and am not the worst shot even though I never practice. I just am not comfortable using them and let others that are comfortable take care of issues when needed if someone like that is around when the need arises. I still am thankful there are guns around, all around, my neighborhood.

In actuality, I really dislike guns; they are loud, they smell bad, can be dangerous, and I am sure with a few moments I can come up with other things I don't like about them but it doesn't matter. They were invented long ago and have numerous uses and are not intrinsically bad. I can change the word guns to cars in that first sentence and it would still be pretty much true. But cars are newer and while transportation might not be a bad thing, I think they need a lot more work than guns do.

I also think that stopping bullying in schools would go a lot further toward ending school shootings and other violence than making guns illegal.

School bullying is one of the biggest ignored crimes in this country. I went to a lot of different schools growing up. I was often a victim, at first, I would fight back and it would stop, until I went to a new school and then I had another fight or two…  I was very often a witness of bullying; it saddens me. Sometimes, I stopped someone from bullying of others; I really regret not doing more of that. I really should have interfered more. Part of me was just happy it wasn't me, part of me was tired of fighting, it hurts even when one wins and causes problems with the school faculty. But some was that I thought maybe they would learn to fight back like I did. What I know now is that if the ability to fight back physically and or psychologically is there it generally manifests early, as mine did. Some poor folks just have to take it if they have no champion, as I should have been. Then there are the others that snap, maybe it is that they learn to fight back too late to know how to do it right and take a whole lot of people with them that might or might not have deserved it.

Yeah, I do believe bullying is the cause; it fits every one of them. And I understand the fantasy of taking out your bully and the other peoples bullies and the ones that let the bullying happen, even egged it on in some cases. Yes, I have seen teachers do that, egg it on. I never had a teacher encourage my bullying right in front of me but I have had the next best thing. Seventh grade math class. An important and timed test. The guy behind me started kicking my chair. I asked him to stop. It got worse. I told him to stop. It got worse. My chair was being kicked hard enough to move it inches at a time. I kept telling him to stop it. I had my hand raised, and was practically waving it like I saw a ship from a deserted island, trying to get the teacher to pay attention which he was blatantly not doing. My chair was now moving around quite a bit as the guy now had his foot hooked into my chair and was giving my a ride back and forth, to and fro. I finally stood up and yelled at the kid to STOP KICKING AND DRAGGING MY CHAIR AROUND since the teacher was purposely ignoring the situation. Do you know what happened then? The teacher finally decided his attention was needed. He yelled at me to stop disrupting the class, then he said (not yelled) the talking was bad enough but me standing up and yelling was the last straw and I had to take the rest of my test in the hallway. Unfortunately, at that age I was way too embarrassed to take advantage of the nice quiet school hallway to finish my test with a decent state of mind. The fact is I felt, and had been, betrayed by my teacher. And he had, up until that time, been one of the few teacher I had had that I thought was really good and worthy of true respect not just that "polite respect" we  all use to get along. I sat in that hallway seething with anger, burning with embarrassment, shattered by betrayal, and very alone. I had already seen teachers, and other faculty, lying to my parents about things I had been reprimanded for and it probably happened more often than I saw. A short digression here:

Second grade, teacher mispronounced my name and I politely corrected her. She didn't believe me, even told me that there was no such name. When I told her that it was the right way to say it she called me a liar, told me that was the end of it right now I had to miss recess and she called my mom with the charge of me lying. I guess that right at the beginning of the call my mom corrected her on how to pronounce my name and my charge of  lying turned into a charge of talking back to the teacher without my mom ever finding out the whole story. (We talked about that incident many, many years later.)

So back to seventh grade…This really wasn't a good year for me in general. Honestly, I am not sure seventh grade is a good year for 99% of the people in the US but it was a very bad year for me and I was at that point very close to doing something drastic. I do not know why I did not. Maybe it was just the small thing that I knew how to get back at the guy that was messing with my chair--and I did but I won't tell anyone how, and if he is dead it isn't my doing. But I still felt total impotence because of the teacher and I never trusted another one again (until I started back in college in my 30's).

I started doing drugs in eighth grade. It was kind of funny because I was such a nerd in seventh grade and this was one of the few times I switched grades without moving. Even though it was a different school it was the same people. I enjoyed the smoking of pot and it was hard for quite a few of the "burnouts" to accept at first. I was still going to school but hanging in the alley during breaks. Soon all the burnouts were getting me to help them with homework (I would not do someone's homework but would help them understand it). Eighth grade was also the first time since kindergarten I can not recall getting into a fight with a bully--I was not picked on and I had friends even if they were usually stoned. I did not give my teachers crap unless they gave it to me. I only really had trouble with the vice principal of that school and my constant detentions were one of the things that got me in tight with many people. What a legacy, huh?

About a month or so into my freshman year in high school my algebra teacher was explaining something and the people behind me were talking to loud  for me to hear him. I asked him to repeat it. He said, "Repeat it? What? Are you stupid?" That was my last straw for public school. I told him in no uncertain terms that I was not stupid, he was for not realizing what was happening in his classroom, I couldn't hear him but now realize that he was not worth listening to, that teachers shouldn't call their students stupid even if they are. He told me to go to the office, he wouldn't even let me collect the books from my desk which were for not only that class but two others.  I understood the first part but not leaving the books part. It bit me in the butt for not taking them anyway. By the time I had gotten to the office the bell had rung and classes switched. I had to talk to a councilor and there went most f the next class. When that class ended I was supposed to collect my books and go to the  next class. My books were no longer in the desk. The teacher claimed to have no idea as to their whereabouts. So, I got in trouble for losing my books. I was not allowed back into that algebra class and was going to fail it--the first class I  would have ever failed even with all the other trouble I had had dealing with school I still never failed. I gave up on school the very next day after being berated by one of the teachers for still not having my book. I kind of gave up on mainstream society because it supported such an institution.

Actually, there was one more shot at public school in a different town. I was  betrayed by the school again. Big surprise. But even my sister and brother-in-law thought the school was screwed up. Too bad it was really too late for me.

I never stopped learning, even was introduced too a school that worked well. But it was unaccredited and even if the school hadn't closed with me one or two credits shy of graduation, the diploma was worth nothing. Oddly, with two days cramming after years of not being in school, I got a way better score on my GED than the average high school graduate.

I could have gone the other way, and guns were very easy to get when I was a kid in school, but I had a defense from the bullying both mental and physical (that I had the ability to fight back with fists and self-worth mentality and that smoking pot got me friends that would actually stand up for me). Bullying is much more the cause of violence than guns are, those poor people are at their wits end with no defense, and no champions. Some teachers are as much to blame.

Gosh, I do go on once I start.