A day to decompress...only 3 more days...

Today was one of those days that are nothing to brag about, laziness took over big time.
Have you ever felt that you can be just not capable of doing anything?
It's true that I did my usual morning ritual of having my coffee and reading the newspaper, balanced our finances paid us and some bills and then made some breakfast, but other than that the day just happened.
I got stuck on PBS how to shows, and then we decided to watch the John Adams Series from the HBO movies that we have from Blockbuster. A very enlightening long series and in the last few weeks while watching all the true blockbuster type movies like the new Indiana Jones, the Hulk(tonight) etc. we have been watching the series in between, and we just finished part five in that series, one more is on this disc than another last disc to go.
I’m not saying it’s not interesting, because it really is.
Especially, the relationship between Abigail and John Adams, what a woman so ahead of her time; the supermom term must have been coined with her in mind, truly an amazing woman. Having four children and teaching them, holding down the fort while her husband was away, not for a few days or weeks but for years and then continuing to support her husband first as an ambassador’s wife then as the wife of a vice president, next a first lady to our second president, so much more of the type of woman to compare to in our time 232 years later, she was just incredible. And don’t forget that she was also the mother of John Quincy Adams our 6th president of the United States, a big WOW to that.

Tonight, as I mentioned we do have the Hulk planned for our entertainment portion of the evening.
Nothing earth-shattering must have occurred today since my CCN breaking news had nothing to say.

Good night to all and to all our history should on occasion be revisited.

Problems at the polls, and other voting concerns

People have been early voting in numbers that are historic, which in my opinion is momentously great!
But...every night on the news it's one glitch after another on counting those votes.
A few days ago the top story was about some absentee ballots not counting if... you signed your name incorrectly; the example given was signing Mike for Michael! I’m so fortunate; I guess that my name can only be spelled one way.
Crazy and nit picking, don’t you think?

Now another controversial situation was brought up about the mentally challenged living in group homes being registered to vote; the confusion seems to stem from if whether or not they are capable to understand what voting is all about and who the candidates are as well as where they stand on different topics of concern for all Americans.
A mother of two of these special people said that even though they are respectively old enough, at 19 and 32 years old to vote; they can not read or understand the process, and therefore her concern was that the person who registered her children, which she is still the guardian of and did it without her permission, she feels that this person may think that they have the right to tell her children who to vote for.
She definitely has a point.
But as far as the rest goes, do any of us really know?
Honestly, I never thought of this as a problem, but she is absolutely right.
Perhaps, too many group homes registered for the 2000 election that would explain a lot.
Sorry!
Not very politically correct, but being a former volunteer that worked with special people and one who also helped out with Special Olympics… they would actually be laughing at that too!

Another news blip on my radar was the local man in the motorized wheel chair suing over 140 time’s different business in our area for not following the ADA for access into their stores. I really can’t blame him. Being with just a cane, but I too was in a wheel chair for a while about ten years ago… access is everything. Even with my cane so many older businesses in the area have too high thresholds and don’t seem to realize that not giving access to everyone like the law states loses them customers more than likely with money they want to spend. It is wild in the times we live in that these obstacles have not been addressed sooner since the law has been in affect for decades already. He says so far he hasn’t made a penny and that isn’t why he is doing this, it’s to change things for access for all!
I hail him and wish him well and encourage his reasoning that others should take on this fight right behind him; don’t settle for things at the status quo.
Below is my toughing it out cure. Hope it helps us all. If you say it like a mantra, over and over.

"Serenity Prayer
God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference."

Good night to all and to all think just four more days, and all this craziness will be over!

Happy Days Are Here Again? (depression song) And why we don't celebrate Halloween for now

The Market went up again nearly 190 points!
Gas, locally is down to $2.37 a gallon!
Are these small miracles or temporary fixes?
Who knows… all I know for sure is that more people have gone to the unemployment lines over the last few months than ever before; nearly another half million, not good at all.

This might sound like greed too, but believe me it is only me trying hard to practice good healthy measures, and save some money too.
Topic: Halloween, one of my favorite holidays of childhood and young motherhood.
Choosing those costumes and makeup, boy what fun in the 1950's. We always had the best makeup in my neighborhood with half of the Broadway performers living there, and willing to help with the ideas and application of the greasepaint. Candy was great too, diversified, abundant and without any fears of razor blades, glass or even obesity.
Those were the days.
Our sons also had a great Halloween experience with my making of homemade costumes from Peter Pan on my eldest at 15 months old, when he won the prize at our townhouse condos clubhouse his first Halloween. Over the years our boys were scarecrows, robots; you get the idea, all fun to make and they enjoyed it all, and won competitions too.
But this was the 1970's and then soon horrors started with razor blades in the candy, placed there by demented sickos, but then we would have the children hand the candy over to their parents to check, no more snacking as you trick or treated. It was much later that the hospitals got involved with X-raying the candy; how truly sad it had to come to that.
But none of this has anything to do with us not celebrating today.
It all started with our dogs creating havoc every time the doorbell would ring so I wrote a cute little poem about having fun and please will you take just one with a bowl left on a stool at the front door.
I would buy like five large bags of candy a year and we would get about 25 kids, and this is when our sons were grown and gone; this went on for quite a few years.
About two years ago I had filled my bowl as usual and within an hour it was emptied!
We found out that one of our neighbor’s son felt it was a great idea to empty it all, and so he took the joy of the day away.
That and the fact that I put on this ton of weight made me get tough and save money at the same time no longer putting any candy out.
Sadly we used to have great decorations with Styrofoam headstones, all over our lawn; that my husband made with clever sayings.
And so tomorrow night with only one dog who also does create havoc when someone visits there will be no decorations, no light on and no candy, sorry!
That child has since moved, and my weight has escalated so I think sadly it is with a heavy heart and many other heavy body parts I will say goodbye to Halloween for now.
Who knows someday I could be thin again and hopefully a grandma and then I will be hard pressed not to bring that joy back that is a very fond memory.

Good night to all and to all BOO!

Winding down to the last few days...

Tonight at 8 P.M. EST for thirty minutes, on three channels, which includes CBS, NBC, and Fox, Senator Barack Obama will be putting to good use his donated campaign funds to describe how he would handle all the problems of us Americans. I do wonder why no ABC?
He is known for his plain concise speaking ability, and so I will be watching to confirm my opinion of him and his ideas on how our concerns will be taken away and replaced with some relief.

Oddly enough he also requested for our early voting in Florida hours to be extended to go from 7A.M. to 7 P.M., and here in our county it will be going all the way through Saturday with those hours.

At first, our Governor Charlie Crist turned the request down, but changed his mind.
I have no idea why, but if I knew I would tell you.
And now, would you believe, Senator John McCain has said that the extended hours are giving an unfair advantage to Senator Barack Obama, huh?
How could that be?
Do Senator Obama’s voters get up earlier than Senator McCain’s or do they work later than his?
I’m confused don’t all Americans basically have the same options of voting as long as they are a citizen registered to vote and at least 18 years old?
Oh well, I must have missed something somewhere.
People sometimes need excuses to explain why things aren’t going their way.

Cold is how our night was last night, in the 40’s as predicted, and tonight will be the same, but the day did warm up into the 80’s here and so will tomorrow’s weather. I did go for a walk this morning, but after 9 since it was still in the 50’s, would you believe?

My library book: Audition was returned today, since it was due back, but it was unfinished, it is on a waiting list that is for all new books and because of that it was not allowed to be renewed so I asked to be put on the list again, only eleven are ahead of me this time; last time they were 35. Maybe by then my concentration will have improved; I did write down what page I was on, it was #458.

Anyway, I have a few weeks to get my act together.
Over the last few weeks that I have been off kilter I have managed to insult my neighbor by saying her adopted adult/children sons were only her biological son’s half brothers.
Like mine, but let me explain, my half-brother was never allowed to be adopted by my biological father. He tried, but my half brother’s biological father wouldn’t let him, and then he exited my half brother’s life.
I guess, her four adoptees Mom either was cooperative, passed away, or a really bad Mom, who knows, because I never delved further; my bad.
Assuming that she was dead or didn’t really care that would make this neighbor way ahead of my well meaning father who tried to also be that responsible, but unfortunately was sabotaged to fail, consequently confusing his young daughter on how to refer to her sibling that was nineteen years her senior.

Thus my reasoning of a half brother, not a full one, in reality in my mind I was just stating the facts as I saw them.

Then I called my cousin with the broken hip and leg to see how she was, and was wondering why I hadn’t heard from her. (I have been sending Get Well cards weekly, so I felt I was in contact)
Apparently, my cousin her husband never told her about his cousins that passed on, but told me that she was doing so wonderfully that she was walking all over the neighborhood with her walker and was back to playing bridge.
Not true according to his wife she still feels horrid, and can barely move around the house.
Denial is an interesting thing.
And lastly that he said that he would tell my Mom’s side of the family, the one he is on, about the sad news. Now I don’t know if they know, so I have a dilemma.
I suppose I can leave it all alone, but it is weird not knowing what to think and worse why he did this.

Family is an odd thing, and who knows what we will get when we are born, as the saying goes you can chose your friends but not your family.
Too bad I say!
It should be like spouses, where you get to meet all kinds of people over a specific amount of time, go out a few times, kick the tires, talk about worldly views, earth shattering matters that you really care about and then you decide if you want to commit famtrimony, like matrimony but exclusively for choosing family members. You continue on this venture until say like you have 20 to 50 members or so that you can depend on with views and feelings similar to yours, all in great health, brilliant, and beautiful, but to your idea of beauty, that is different for all peoples, and then you are done.
How’s that sound?

Again on that silly note I will leave you.
Good night to all and to all choose your family wisely. LOL

Markets up, way up, but some things have come way down!

The Market went up nearly 900 points today, crazy!
Gas prices have been consistently going down at least for the last two weeks, weird!
So has the thermometer in Florida gone down for the last two nights, and tonight we will be in the 40's on the coastline, where we are, and in the thirties inland, unheard of for this time of the year, wacko!

The news was not good in all other areas.
Employers are laying off more and more people.

In southwest Florida, Fort Myers area, two old friends got into a political argument that actually escalated from emails into a gunfight at a set meeting location. Guess, which was the McCain supporter and which was the Obama supporter and who the victim was and who was the perpetrator of his hot headed gun of wrath?
Well, surprise, surprise the McCain supporter was the shooter, and fortunately his aim was bad enough to only have grazed the Barack Obama man’s head, but causing a bloody need for staples though. Is this lunacy or what?

Anger is a nasty thing and we have all had it at one time or another; most of the time it comes out of our frustration of not being heard or understood.
When we allow ourselves to let it get the best of us; be it by screaming or doing something as extreme as violence then that’s when it’s a control issue not just a benign emotion.
Decent, well brought up people who were once children should have been taught early on that certain behavior is not appropriate in any situation.
Sometimes this educational parental responsibility breaks down or goes unheard by its audience if one is screaming it at the time, like SHUT UP! (When I was a teen this was considered as bad as a curse word to say that, shut up.)
That one never works.
BEHAVE!
Nope no good either.
Example is how our offspring are supposed to learn.
But as a parent myself, and knowing I was growing up with my two sons, and having them in my twenties but still undisciplined with my own controlled behavior I must admit that I did yell, and now I’m so ashamed.
I think it is so cool that I can remember three of my uncles that actually had the power to quiet their children with a simple glaring stare, and poof they would stop in their tracks.
But being me, and slightly bratty as a child, an understatement; I felt they were afraid of their Dads; not being respectful. To this day I am not entirely sure I was not right.
I had one friend, when I was a young mother that used to bribe her normal healthy active three sons to behave in public and then they would get something special if they did.
It worked, so who’s wrong.
Teachers and specialist in the child rearing game say don’t do that.
Her boys grew up just fine and are well adjusted men today.

Some days I wonder if anything I did caused my sons to still be single, but both have had girlfriends, one was even married, the other was engaged, but both are single today.
I did think that the fact that their father and I have been married nearly 38 years was a positive. But now they are saying if you argue at all in front of your children that could cause them to sour on marriage… well we sure have done that!
But that’s one of our best communication lines, we get our points across and we always forgive later.
Oh well, kids are way too sensitive to not get that love is shown in all different ways.
I always think of that song from Fiddler On The Roof: Do you love me?
Find it, play it and then you will know where I am coming from, and maybe some of these youngins will know too.

We are all wound too tight, and we should remember that some people become hard of hearing and refuse to get hearing aids or can’t afford them, and then we have to yell; I LOVE YOU!

And on that silly note good night to all and to all calm down.

Performing our American obligation created by our freedom...

In other words...Our vote was hand delivered to the Supervisor of Elections Office in our district today; the first stop on our errands day. It was fun trying to find it too; the listed, phone book address was an old one and it had moved, but fortunately the new address was posted on the old building door where it initially was. Lesser persons, not as determined, might have given up perhaps, and there goes two votes, welcome to another possible Florida disaster.
The next was to a gas station that actually had gas for only $2.45.9 a gallon, ah like the good old days! About nine months ago?
The sad part was we were only down a quarter of a tank, we don’t go anywhere, remember, total sale $13.50!
By this time it was close to lunch time so we stopped for lunch at Bob Evans, I know I am trying to lose weight. But they have smaller portions now and a great chicken on a salad with cranberries and walnuts with vinaigrette, hmmm so good, had it once before and they even have green tea!
It was best we ate before going to the grocery store; you know the rule never go when hungry.
These days we always have a list, in the old days we did too, but sometimes I forgot it.
(That was before it became a two person deal.
Funny thing about retirement we do things together years ago we would never do, we were always going in two or three different directions.)
So we are somewhat more organized and sale items are usually purchased as well as the necessities missing from our pantry that did make the list.
When we came home I was exhausted so I literally collapsed in my chair.
I had gone for an early morning walk today too; it was cool and dry and rather lovely, so nice that I almost took a little longer one but pooped out.

My body tells me when enough is enough and I do listen, all of our bodies do, if we hear them. On the check out line, I knew I was in trouble, my right leg started going numb and I almost lost my balance and nearly fell.
Thanks to my cane I did not. This is an indicator to take a break.
But it happened again getting out of the car in the driveway when we got home, nerve racking and hasn’t happened in quite some time.
Oh well, guess I’m just tired.

Horrifyingly seven year old Julian King, Jennifer Hudson’s nephew was found dead in a white SUV today.
How awful for her and her remaining family, the child’s mother.
Our hearts and condolences go out to her and her sister.

On that sad note I will say good night to all and to all take care.

Hibiscus, Salmon, Pesto, Ibis and more...

Today we did have a nice cool dry morning start; we even opened the windows to air out the house.
And so we decided to get a little transplanting done.
Months ago when we trimmed back our Hibiscus, a red blossom one, I experimented with rooting hormone, and some very healthy Miracle Grow moisture control soil, and voila, we got additional rooted specimens, three in all.
One had been planted on the side of our home a few weeks ago, it was just what our quiet blank beige stucco wall needed a splash of color, and it does pop!
We took another one this time its location was a mutual choice, against the fence just inside the dirty non grassy yet area where the CC or Crap Corral used to be. One more is left and we have offered it to people we know, but so far it still remains in the infant nursery pot it was planted into root.
We finished all that before lunch and then went on to vote on our absentee ballots in the comfort of our kitchen/dinette table, they are all done too.
My husband and I did consult on some different amendments as well as a couple of candidates, but otherwise we went solo brain on most final decisions.
Until they were sealed we didn’t tell each other that we only canceled each other out, maybe, one or two times voting for opposing candidates
But you have to remember it is only when we are very tired that we combine our brain power, and we weren’t that tired yet for this project.
Tomorrow they will be dropped off if we can find the location.
Oddly enough the envelopes they send you only have P.O. Box numbers on it.

The herbs we are growing and our Key Lime were utilized today too.
I made pesto sauce from our very own Basil, and used some mint and a Key lime for my green tea.

Our dinner tonight definitely made up for last night’s disaster, our menu was: Broiled Salmon with Pesto Sauce, cauliflower steamed, and tossed noodles with the remainder of the pesto, delish! All cooked to perfection and quite tasty too.

After dinner we noticed some action going on outside of our front window, which is floor to ceiling nearly it was just a flutter caught from our peripheral vision; on further investigation we found 25 Ibis were scoping out the lawns for food stuff for their dinner. We are not quite sure what their diet includes, we can only assume lizards, insects and such.
They are quite comical to watch they scurry from yard to yard like a Rockettes dance troop, but occasionally when frightened they fly up and then land within a few feet of where they were, actually quite entertaining.

Sadly Julian King, Jennifer Hudson’s 7 year old nephew has not been found.

Anne Pressly, the TV anchor from Arkansas lost her battle last night shortly after 7 not surviving her attacker’s beating after a six day fight for life, and the previous report was so hopeful. I was definitely shocked to hear that she did in fact die from her wounds.
May that beautiful talented 26 year old woman rest in peace and our hearts go out to her family with condolences; no parent should ever have to bury a child, so very sad.

Now something that has been annoying my husband and myself is that ad for Senator John McCain with the picture that is supposed to be the Oval Office we presume.
The ad states with conviction that Senator Barack Obama has not had any executive experience to sit in that chair and take over in a national emergency or even to be able to handle the daily tasks of a job he has never ever done.
The question both my husband I were wondering is when has Senator John McCain had that experience?
And if he did; where were we?

Good night to all and to all let us know, OK?