Usual

Today was somewhat back to the old grind of what we consider usual.
There’s a word for a little more scrutiny, huh?
Since in reality it means what is common for you, which could be way unusual for the rest of us, huh?

Let’s play with this for a minute.
If every morning I usually get up at seven A.M. and exercise and then go into the shower to get ready to go work, have breakfast and then leave for work that would be my usual, right?
But if the next day I awake at ten A.M. and then go to the fridge look inside decide there is nothing I want in it and then think I will go out for breakfast and get one of those grand slam thingy’s because I can go to the gym later since I am not working that would not be my usual, correct?

Hmmm, we all have rituals that we follow and some days more than others.
But deviating from them makes us… what?
More interesting or NOT boring, huh?

OK, so today I suppose was NOT my usual, here’s my true confession…I awoke at eight thirty, wow I slept half the day away! So unlike me! LOL!
But to be fair I did stay up to watch the Sound of Music until after eleven.
How many of you saw it when it first came out? (Maybe again last night for the millionth time that it has since been on the TV, but to be honest I don’t think we watched it on the TV since the boys have been on their own…)
Anyway I did and boy did Hubby when it originally came out!
Why you ask?
My dear Hubby was an assistant manager of the Fox Theater in Hackensack New Jersey and so he got to see it every night for months since it was held over then! Way back in 1965 when we were both teenagers.

We did not know each other then.
Interestingly though I went to see it at that same theater with my cousin who was more like a brother at the time and I do believe there were adults with us probably my aunt and uncle his parents and perhaps my own parents but for some reason I can’t seem to remember that.
We all remember the movie though, us alive ones, he and I and wow it was something!
I think it was the first movie that had an intermission like at the live Broadway shows.
And it was just as great as going to see the Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall or any Broadway show, which we had done often if you recall my childhood neighborhood… and growing up fifteen minutes from the George Washington Bridge into Manhattan.
And many of my neighbors either being actors, singers or dancers, techs or producers and directors on Broadway or in TV during those years of growing up in Paramus New Jersey! A great youth to remember, don’t you all think?

Any-who, usual was never ever in those days, many were unique.
You know I do believe remembering all that made it easier for me to conform to the quiet lifestyle that I have most days now.

Moving on...
Who knows… we are going to have a Florida freeze tonight here in southwest Florida will you believe?
Gosh Hubby had to go out and bring in our baby tomato plants and our potted pineapple that I started from the top of one, it’s really easy and I am sure many of you have done it yourselves. Ours is enormous now but nothing compared to my avocado seed that has to be about fifteen feet now with a trunk of nearly a foot wide! PS it was planted in the ground years ago!
As you can tell I am a proud Momma of my plants!
Well, what else have I got, no youngins anymore or grands.

On that beating an old repetitive horse sing song once again, my usual form of wishful self pity.
I will say instead that I want you all to have a very happy good night and to all count those blessings and share those overages and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, OK?

PS the story was fictional for the Sound of Music and if you Google it you will know what I said is true, but made for a great movie!

Another

Yes, we do have another year of holidays nearly done; let’s not forget we still have New Year’s Eve to contend with…
But for us that is a no brainer.
You see we stopped going out on New Year’s Eve too!
Boy, are we boring or what?
Well, to be honest it is dangerous for us oldies but goodies with all those youngsters on roads drinking too much!
And we fall asleep early anyway.
In fact the last two years we didn’t even make it to midnight! Sad but true.
Not good I hear you all saying!
LOL!
We don’t mind really!
The New Year comes in with or without our observing that process.
Hopefully you are not feeling that ‘after it all’ let down?
Sadly, so many do after the rushing around type holidays.

Oh in the day we did go out even to fancy places, but then when we had our sons we used to just have a party at the neighbors and put the boys to bed with their kids or in their empty bedrooms or the same thing was done at our home with their children.
And it was a neighborhood when we lived in our first home, our townhouse condo and so there was no driving involved only walking from here to there and back again on sidewalks and sober.

Although, when Hubby was a Fire chief in NJ and we were in our bi-level home that we had built. We did have those firehouse parties, and one year we even won the basket of cheer, which was ridiculous because we were not drinkers at that time. Actually we only started with the wine thing after 9/11, with our eldest son being twenty-nine and the younger one being twenty-five and so by then our sons were well on their own, plus we were a few years into our fifties and it was common knowledge that wine is good for older hearts!
So after they were grown we used to go out with my cousins or have a party at our home or with them at theirs, but even that stopped when we had our health issues to deal with.
Before I told them my true concerns and feeling with what they did about lying to us and all… so that ‘friend’ ship sailed a while ago before my honesty mouth unrestrained went wild!

I used to enjoy getting all the food prepared and everything, but with my current weight and health issue that is something I shouldn’t look forward to so much anymore in truth, my own truth this time.

Any-who, I do know that by this time next year that will not be that big of an issue or at least it will be a lesser one; that’s the plan anyway!

Everyone has their reasons to do whatever they do, do during the ‘holidays’ and to all of us that could be their tradition.
So the best thing we can do is support those choices by acceptance.
And encourage individuality in whatever they may decide.
Dear friends who celebrate Kwanzaa, which begun tonight for the next six I do believe, please accept my wishes for a very happy holiday for you too!

On that note of acceptance for all of us to live a more cheerful coexistence I would like to wish you all a very happy good night and to all count those blessings and ask you to please share those overages and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, OK?

T'is

T’is the BIG DAY!
(PS: T’is’s definition is: ‘it is’, in the poetic form, now we all know, ok? But many of you probably knew that.)

Any-who…
I hope that you are all extremely happy with whatever you received!

We no longer give each other gifts and gosh I don’t know when that stopped but it did years ago.
Our decorations are bleak too.
Just a wreath on the front door, but that one I do know why we went understated instead of tastefully gaudy it was around the time Hubby injured his back, about five years ago. Climbing ladders and reaching became difficult and for me… let’s put it this way… FORGET IT!
I am no longer a ladder climber but that goes way back since I primarily was a faller offer, clumsy was my middle name in my twenties, but little did we know then that it was a precursor to MS as one of the first signs and symptoms.
There were many but it wasn’t in our personal vocabulary then so I took the brunt of jokes about being uncoordinated, which was baffling since I had ice figure-skated for years from the age of four and let us not forget my years as a ballet dance student.
And so none of us picked up on it then or thought it was a serious problem to bear further investigation.

Moving on…
We had a quiet morning and heard from number one son by phone as usual the one who does not forget his old parents even when he has to work, which he is today since he works at Busch Gardens that is open!
He is a lead mechanic for all those rides you enjoy when you go there, and so he is there when they tell him to be to keep all of them safe for everyone!

After watching the parades from the two US Disney’s which was quite entertaining and on for a few hours with top entertainment including Mariah Carey and Jackie Evancho we went out to eat.

I did do my exercises folks and I am proud to say I am now up to a count of fifteen per exercise! I do lying flat on my back leg lifts, tummy crunches with bent knees, side leg lifts with bottom leg slight bent and lastly my free weights with elbows on the mat and arms extended from there! A nice beginning for a couch potato for the last few years; I can’t say five since I was walking up until about three years ago.
If any of you recall those were my cane days, and what happened due to my Ataxia I had to keep switching sides with my cane which caused shoulder problems too, and then oddly enough my osteoarthritis in my hips started to cause me to lose sleep due to pain and since my stomach can’t take any pain meds and so the doctor basically told me to stop walking altogether!
TA DA!
So here I am all those years later with fear of doing counter productive exercising, got that?
And that is why I am so happy to have finally figured out a way to help myself, and you know something?
THAT IS MY HUNUKAH/CHRISTMAS PRESENT TO ME!
I even probably mentioned a while ago how many gyms were afraid to take me on due to the fall issue.
Ataxia is a symptom of the MS that oddly enough not everyone gets so I have been told just like the optic neuritis not everyone gets that either.
Unfortunately I did get both.

Oh the present thing, well, Hubby and I decided that we didn’t actually need anything because we have everything we could possibly want or need.
Besides if we do need anything we don’t wait until the holidays we save up and buy it when we need it hopefully! Another TA DA! I thought that was in order.
We did send our eldest a gift since he is in our life.
But our younger son sadly has been known to return what we have sent in the past and as sad as that is, no, that is heartbreaking and so we don’t anymore…
And all our other long distance relatives, we as a family decided that it was a bit much so we stopped years ago!
Even cards are now done just online.
Streamlined and cost effective, huh?

On that rather weird concept of our way of celebrating to most of you I bet, but it works for us anyway I do want to wish you all a very happy good night and to all please do not forget to count all those blessings and share those overages and we will too!

And next time I expect to see you here or you will be square, OK?
LOL, I am still trying to figure out how I will see you? LOL, LOL, I break myself up!
And yea, Merry Christmas PEEPS!

Eve

Tonight is the night for all the little ones to try hard to stay up to see the BIG GUY!
Yep, I know since we celebrate everything also because Hubby is of the Christmas persuasion peeps and yes our sons did enjoy all that that goes with the holidays.
And they had the eyes wide open and were hard to get to bed on the night of this particular holiday!

When they were very, very small and I still bathed them we used to hear Santa’s Ho, Ho, Ho from the bathroom Christmas Eve delivering their presents.
And that was my clue to get them both out of the tub and get them into their PJs for we knew Santa had delivered their fondest wishes.
When they got older it was difficult even just with helping the old chubby guy with all his gifts since we had to find real creative places to help him hide it all!
We even had surf boards in our shower the first Christmas we spent here in Florida!
Santa requested our aid and so we of course did.

I have to admit being a Jew I did enjoy those days too, and was truly engulfed in the whole deal.
At Hanukah we always lit the Menorah but having big bucks for eight presents for that and to celebrate Christmas too was quite a bit to think about and a really big expense so we told them about Hanukah and actually bought Christmas presents.
Sadly I feel badly about that now, but what can you do?
You can’t go back.
One thing I do remember about those days the most is how we definitely tried our hardest to fulfill all their wants on that list that they both had, and I do believe we did accomplish it yearly!
So fond memories are what we have and who can complain about any of that?
And I want to wish to my readership here in the US and all over the world please have a terrific Christmas Eve and day (if you celebrate it) and don’t forget the photographs but if you do I predict that your memories will be right where you stow them in your brain as I have!
Its scary sometimes it’s almost like they, our sons were just peanuts yesterday, and how I miss that!
Thankfully they grew into fine independent healthy men, but any Mom knows what I mean.
If you’re lucky enough to have grandbabies to continue the traditions with you have it all, and I too hope we can say the same someday; but not yet.
Below my gift once again to you all is the poem: T’was the Night Before Christmas…

Night Before Christmas
by Major Henry Livingston Jr. (1748-1828)



'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;
And mamma in her 'kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled down for a long winter's nap,

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below,
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer,

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;

'Now, DASHER! now, DANCER! now, PRANCER and VIXEN!
On, COMET! on CUPID! on, DONDER and BLITZEN!
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!'

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of toys, and St. Nicholas too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As I drew in my hand, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bundle of toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack.

His eyes -- how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;

The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook, when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.

He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself;
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings; then turned with a jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose;

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
"HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD-NIGHT!"

And so on the remembrance of the season I will wish you a very happy good night to all and to all please count those blessings and share those overages and we will too!
MERRY CHRISTMAS!

And next time please be here or be square, OK?

PS here’s your Santa tracker too, just copy and paste: http://www.noradsanta.org/

Steps

“A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step,” which is a quote from Lao Tzu, Laozi an old master or old one, a Chinese philosopher who supposedly lived during the sixth century BC, but he was mythological and he is generally considered honorific.
An East Asian philosopher of the school of Taoism, notable ideas of Wu wei which translates to taking action.
How interesting, huh?

Well I thought the quote was relevant since I have begun my journey that may even be more than a thousand steps. Yes, probably two hundred thousand or more like a million more, lol.
Today was day two of this undertaking one that is purely selfish and well worth the effort!
Odd and perhaps not so nice of me being that way at this time of the year but I do think being good to ones self is important too.
I have been unjustly mean or bad to myself with my self-defeprecating attitude with me.

And today I did step up the program with adding a count of fifteen for my arms. I did have a nasty leg cramp and I will from now on have to remember to take my Baclofen, my anti-spasmodic, before beginning, because once I am down on the mat, I am down on that mat!

I have such high hopes and I do know that I am capable of sticking to this self improvement project of mine; since it is literally a matter of life and death!
Like anything these days it is not a temporary situation; it is a lifestyle change.
I am also watching my salt intake too.
It seems that I was hooked too much on pickles and olives, not chips like most of the obese.
But to my good I do love salads of the fresh vegetable kind and I do love to make homemade soup. Today I made my own asparagus soup and had a salad topped with canned salmon, about two ounces, and a light homemade dressing of our own lemons from our tree juice and a bit of olive oil with a wee bit of sea salt and ground black pepper with a dash of ground garlic. Breakfast was an over the counter canned diet drink of 190 calories, mid morning snack was a fresh peach, dinner was chicken, white meat a few slices and one wing, half of a sweet potato and another dose of my salad this time with fat free sour cream, approximately a teaspoon full; hummm. I did mention that I am a Jew, but never a kosher one…LOL! Because if I were I would never mix milk and meat!

Any-who, moving on…
Last night our internet provider did not come back online until after ten P.M., and so I was sound asleep for hours by then thus why my post was delayed.
I was for some strange reason exhausted.
And I hit the hay, as the expression goes…which means for my foreign readers, went to sleep and it was early like before eight o’clock.
But I suppose that was good since they, here we go again, who is, ‘they’?
The theory is by 'they' that lack of sleep also helps with weight gain, and so therefore sleeping has the opposite effect, correct?
I did sleep except for a few bathroom runs until after seven in the morning!
Wow!
If this trend continues I could be my old self in no time at all!
All the puzzle pieces could be falling into place.
Dear out of America friends again this expression just means going to work out with my work outs, got that?
LOL!

Our weather here has also been fairly nice enough to leave the windows open the last two days, fresh air, how wonderful!
But we are going to be getting a few colder nights starting next Tuesday but only another aberration of our norms, and we have been promised that all will return to the right stuff that we are so proud of and brag about once again after only a couple of colder nights, but with days in the sixties and back to the mid-seventies after that! Christmas will be a beautiful sunny mid seventies day!

On that short weather report from this novice reporter of such I will wish you all a very happy good night and to all count those blessings and share those overages and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, OK?

Exercise

I told you a few nights ago I had a plan to start my own exercise program, and today was the day!
In reality I should take some before pictures of me so I can prove when I am gorgeous again from where I came from and how great I am at self help! LOL!

But honestly I should know what I am doing since I was also in physical therapy as well as occupational and neuromuscular therapy a total of fourteen times.
I know you remember I mentioned my dance background that’s twelve years strong not to mention those four years working out at the gym, and also those four years I was race walking!

And so this should be a piece a cake… not good to mention that when you’re trying to get back into shape! Kidding, but not myself this is serious and very necessary.
Even more so now, since that diabetes scare has returned.
For the heck of it I wasn’t feeling too well yesterday and since I still do have the kit to test my glucose I did. The first test two hours after a meal was 141, not good but not too bad, the second before bed I felt was necessary due to that number and it went down to 121.
To try to reassure myself this morning I tested one more time with a complete fast from the dinner meal of last evening and this morning my glucose was at 125, which is bad for overnight and fasting. Morning numbers should be under 100 to be normal.

As if I needed more motivation than my own full length mirror; this other health issue is looming large once again, and I hate that!
Who needs this anytime anywhere?

Any-who the exercises consisted of my wonderful Yoga mat that I have owned for years and my three pound free weights; I do have two pound and five as well.
I really thought that the three’s were light enough after all my hands are bad but not all that weak yet, and hopefully my plan is to make them stronger too.
Getting up and down off the mat is the only slight glitch of my whole project, but I locked the handles of my walker alongside the mat and utilized it for that purpose and it worked! I even had a cute little pillow I made years ago from a T-shirt that I didn’t want to get rid of; the one with the Native American’s face on it saying the 'Great American Clean Up'. It is small and the perfect size for my head support on the mat.

I start with slow leg lifts together, since my tummy looks as if I were pregnant, and my hips look as if I were that wide bodied woman in the funny but weird Super Bowl commercial of a few years ago.
Sadly at the time that came out my hips were tiny, only thirty inches around!
Heaven knows what they are now, but it must be at least twice that.
I am too scared to know that truth.
All I do know is this body of mine is in a very serious health problem and so I had to intervene with myself and do what I enjoy or I should say used to… working out!
Then I rolled on to my side to do some leg lifts from that position ten on each side, and a ten count for all my beginning programs start including the raising of the three pound free weights in each hand. Good thing about already being on the floor your balance is not compromised and there is no where to fall, because you are already there!
It’s hard to believe I used to do 200 crunches with my very cute 20 inched waistline and washboard abdomen, and oh those fifteen inch thighs, were so oh wonderfully able to get into any pair of pants or slacks I desired! This was only a little over five years ago, not twenty friends!
I can do it I know I can with my own logical caution and knowledge of my own body I will… as I said before I am so sick and tired of being sick and tired!

On that note of doing something positive I would like to wish you all a very happy good night and to all count those blessings and share those overages and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ok?

PS If you are receiving this late it is not my fault my provider was down sorry!

Reference

We all need to reference material on occasion, correct?
Be it to check on our own works accuracy or on people as in recommendations.
Referring to items or persons in our world is an everyday occurrence, right?
But unless we have a method to make sure we get it right then most of these items would be suppositions.

I enjoy researching information on numerous topics and I just go bonkers for the immediate access that we all get with utilizing the internet!
Gosh, nothing wrong with these information highways as they are called.
Amazing is an understatement with the quickness that we have of everything right here at our fingertips literally!

Disagreements and discussions can be tamed with a few clicks of the wrist plain and simple. Searching for the answer to any question is basically without delay; only as quick as you can type.
Who besides me doesn't gawk daily at this wonderful invention and all of its abilities that can cause us all to be so much better informed than in our wildest dreams of decades ago?
It’s like so many other things that we take for granted in life.
This generation would all be jaded as ours was with the TV and telephones… although, you must admit that the evolution of those two in particular was and still are astonishing; since to this day they are always changing!

Have you ever had the desire to know why something is?
Or who someone is?
From apples to zebras the internet has taken the place of dictionaries, thesauruses, encyclopedias, newspaper, books you name the materials and medium it covers beyond our imaginations.
We are able to talk to people all over the world just by pushing or touching a few keys and some by only using their voices, which to me is mind-blowing!
You can zero in on your own home, know where your children are or your car too!
Depending on what type of programs you install, and yes due to programs like Skype people can have face to face chats no matter where they are!

Yes, I know I am gushing, but seriously we all should be.
Technology is something the nay-Sayers I truly believe cannot grasp the newness of these things.
Now if I wanted to know how many people actually use computers and the internet I can just put that question up on one of the many search engines available for free to all of us, and sure enough: Answers.com came up with the answer of 365 million use computers and 1,733,993,741 use the internet! How about that for instantaneous information, wow! Huh? Those numbers don’t jive. I bet it’s because of all those internet connected phones, cars etc., gotta be? I’ll get back to you on that.
Are you impressed? I still am and will be for many years to come.

I suspect clarifications of stats is all in how you ask your questions and that is only human. Mistakes can be made and often if not properly asked when trying to get that information we can get the wrong stuff without realizing it, correct?
Fact checking then should be duplicated and even done in triplicate I would suspect when needing it for sensitive work related situations.
But we hacks of the writing for our own interests and concerns type should just find sites that we know we can trust for whatever we need to float our boatloads of information we disseminate daily to give some worthwhile facts to our readerships nightly.
What we do is not earth shattering but still should have a smattering of accuracy!

And so the reference I made to referencing is of our ultimate choice to be better people with the ability to gather facts in actuality at the drop of a hat! And if that doesn’t send chills down your spine when you think that only fifty years ago we had dial up phones and black and white TV pictures and no cable or internet!
Wow what a time to be living in, huh?
HA we have so much and rarely realize that significance, but we all should…

On that thought to ponder I will wish you all a very happy good night and I will also ask you all to count those blessings and share those overages and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, OK?