2977 Ramdom Thoughts #459 or so, with indignation

Friday, June 4, 2010

The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words.
If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use them.
--Philip K. Dick--

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There's a story on the news now about a young man who was driving on the Taconic Parkway when his car "went airborne" into the woods, rolled four times, and ended up hidden from the road. He suffered back and internal injuries, tried to crawl to the road, and was out there unfound for 4.5 days. He was located by his cell phone signal, and taken to Albany Med, where he is expected to recover. Altogether unthinkable. Horrible experience.

But, here's what bothers me: He was driving a BMW. Those things grab the road and hold it. The speed limit on the Taconic is 55 mph even though it's four lane divided because it's actually a localish road with many crossing roads and no traffic lights. It is NOT a limited access road, not a throughway. Local folks get very angry at fools who whip down the Taconic like it's some kind of freeway - it's not! Not one news report over the past two days, and there have been many, have mentioned what caused the one-car accident. It could have been a deer, I suppose, which is another reason the speed limit is 55. (Rolled four times, in the woods, after losing control at 55?)

I have my suspicions, and I suspect he may have reaped what he sowed.

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I guess I'm into blaming people for their own screwups today.

I read an article a few days ago about education loan debt. The author of the article seemed to think that it was the fault of the college financial offices that graduates were leaving school saddled with enormous debt, that the schools are not advising them correctly. The example used was a young woman who, with her widowed mother, and no savings for college, and no big academic scholarships, decided that even so she needed to get degrees from the most prestigious of schools to assure her future. The best of the NY state schools (and there are some good ones, including a very good FREE school in NYC) would not do.

She kept borrowing money, and ended up with a masters' degree and $97,000 debt - and she can't find a job that offers more than a hair over minimum wage. Since the loans were from several sources, the payments are concurrent, and she can't afford to pay them. Declaring bankruptcy won't work, because educational loans cannot be discharged by bankruptcy. She's in a bad place.

Now, we're supposed to feel sorry for her, and agree that she got some bad advice, and the fault lies with the school financial office.

Sorry. I don't think so. She made some very bad decisions, and I suspect she ignored some very good advice that wasn't what she and her mother wanted to hear.

The absolute kicker came finally in the last paragraph. It was so bad it made me swear out loud. Can you guess what her super expensive degrees, the degrees that absolutely had to come from prestigious schools and were to assure her a comfortable future in her choice of assured high-paying jobs, are in? Some technical, financial, professional, or scientific discipline, right?

Nope.

The answer is at the butt end of this post. Wait for it. Don't jump ahead. It'll spoil your mood for an hour. You'll want to kick her, and the author of the article, around the block.

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NYS's budget is in deep do-do. The governor wants to add a new tax on sugared carbonated drinks, "juices" with less than something like 10% real juice, and other crap in a bottle.

This proposal has been countered by a barrage of commercials with a young mother unloading grocery bags, and pointing out that the tax will raise her monthly grocery bill by some outrageous amount, and in this economy, she can barely feed her family, so please Governor Patterson, don't take money out of my family's mouths.

The commercials piss me off. Look, lady, if you need money to feed your family, why are you spending so much of that budget on crap in a bottle anyway? The people putting out those commercials don't care about you, your budget, or your kids. They're just worried that you might buy less of their crap.

I guess I really am in a bad mood today....

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Ok. Change of pace. Here's a video. It's 6.5 minutes long, and one of the scariest things I've ever seen. If you have a serious problem with heights or edges, don't watch it. If you do watch it, think about what it must have taken to build that path. (I do, and I did, and I lived. Didn't even throw up once, although I did discover that I can still hold my breath for 2 full minutes.)

From http://www.angelfire.com/ak2/intelligencerreport/scariest_path.html:

"This walkway now serves as an approach to Makinodromo, the famous climbing sector of El Chorro in Spain's Andalucia. And it is the hairiest path. The area of El Chorro situated in the south of Spain is renowned amongst travelers and mountain hikers for its stunning scenery and climbs, yet this is not the main attraction on offer, El Chorro is host to one of the most dangerous walkways in the world, built by workers to transport materials between the Chorro and Gaitanejo Falls."

I always thought climbers had to be a little crazy.

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The answer: The young woman's degrees are in religious and women's studies. Even typing that now, especially when she and the journalist are trying to assign the blame anywhere but on the poor decisions made by her and her mother, pisses me off.
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2976 Oh, about the sick....

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Naturally, the common people don't want war, but after all, it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag people along whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.
--Hermann Goering--

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I feel better today. Whatever it was seems to be over. Of course I still feel a little weak, but that's not surprising.

I went to the deli early this evening to buy some diet tea, soda, juice, anything to encourage me to drink a lot, and I mentioned the horrible sweating and the need to rehydrate to the gal at the counter (she was surprised because I rarely buy anything in bottles), and it turns out she'd had something similar about two weeks ago - severe weakness, fever, heavy sweating, but no other symptoms. Hers lasted about three days. Then Daughter said this evening that she had something similar a month ago, including the fainting. Hers lasted somewhere between one and three days (she's not sure because her back had gone out, and she was in bed with that). Mine was four days, but I'm a good 30 years older than either of those two and I'm not as resilient.

So, whatever it was seems to be going around, and probably is not systemic or metabolic in me, which was my greatest concern.

Daughter and I both had our backs go out shortly before the onset. That's interesting. Next trip to the deli I'll have to ask about the third case. Whether we'd been using a high SPF sunblock would be interesting, too. If poison is in your belly, you purge from either end. Maybe when poison is in your skin, you sweat copiously. Seems reasonable to me.
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2975 Bits bouncing around for the past two weeks

Wednesday, June 2, 2010 (Oh Good Grief! June already?)

Where would Christianity be if Jesus got eight to fifteen years with time off for good behavior?
--New York State Senator James Donovan, speaking in support of capital punishment--

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The Bible, the Mayan calendar, and various philosophers have decided the end of the world occurs in 2012. This has been echoed and reinforced in movies. One person whose intellect I respect firmly believes it. There's a lot to argue there - the simple fact that the references are obscure, and it's fallible humans doing the interpreting, but believers tend to use the recent natural worldwide disasters as proof. Earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes, storms, volcanoes - so very many recent ones.

Well, there really haven't been more than ever before. It's just that now we hear about them. They've been going on for thousands of years. We just weren't aware of what was going on in the rest of the world until recently.

What does worry me is that some religion that teaches that theory will feel a responsibility to take it upon themselves to set it off. It would take a religion to so thoroughly banish common sense.

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The sunscreen the friend recommended arrived today (The Naked Bee). I tried it on my arms, and it was fine, no heavy feeling, no white deposit in creases, didn't paste the hairs down. Then I tried it on my face. My nose did not break out in beads of sweat. We may have a winner.

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Investment advice: The FAA has ruled that all aircraft must have on-board GPS by 2020. That's a lot of devices, and probably not cheap ones. Some GPS manufacturer(s) will make out like bandits, and because they are mandated, there will be no incentive to compete on prices. Unfortunately, who knows which companies will reap the gold?

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Trial lawyers are complaining of the "CSI effect". Jurors expect to see all kinds of swoopy evidence. They don't seem to realize that much (most!) of what they see on the TV show simply does not exist as a technology, and secondly, for what advanced technology does exist, there are very few labs, and third, those labs are very slow and not famous for reliability. Not to mention that most local police departments are not well trained in evidence collection.

So juries are letting otherwise "clearly guilty" defendants off because they didn't see evidence that in their minds, should have been there. They figure that the police must have found it, but it didn't support their theory, so they chose not to present it?

If you expect ever to be on a criminal court jury, you should read http://www.usnews.com/usnews/culture/articles/050425/25csi.htm.

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This is my own theory. Men and women have vastly different concepts of what constitutes a lie.

Men seem to believe that you have to tell something that is no way true, ever, for it to be a lie. However, a statement or answer that is in some way, some special context, true, is true enough, and is not a lie.

Jay and Obie were both the most honest and moral men I've ever known (both lovers, both deceased), but even they seemed to believe this. For example, if I asked Jay, "Did you pay the electric bill?", he'd quite honestly, honest in his mind anyway, answer, "Yes." If I asked, "Did you pay this month's electric bill?", he'd quite honestly answer, "No, not yet. I'll pay it tomorrow." Note the difference in the questions. He has often paid the bill, so "Yes, I paid the bill" is true, where "Yes, I paid this month's bill" is not.

Most men will avoid conflict at all costs, and they figure what you don't know won't hurt you. They seem to feel that if they leave things out, and you believe things that are not literally true, well, that's your own fault, not theirs. They didn't lie.

Women, on the other hand, consider being misled, being allowed to believe untruths without correction, is exactly the same as being lied to. Women have a much lower line. If you know that I think you paid this month's bill based on your statement, and you don't correct that impression, then you have allowed me to believe a lie.

It's the facts not the words that matter, guys.
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2974 Scary Sick

Monday, May 31, 2010

Drugs have taught an entire generation of American kids the metric system.
--P.J. O'Rourke--

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I am sick. Now it's feeling like an ordinary virus, but during Saturday night into Sunday morning, it was very scary. It's odd, but it seems like I have become more susceptible to viruses or whatever since I've been "eating right".

I've already mentioned being weak Saturday at the antiques fair. I went to bed fairly early Saturday night, and dreamed many annoying dreams, aware I was dreaming. At 4 AM I woke very thirsty, so I went to the kitchen for a drink of water. I'd no sooner swallowed the first tepid mouthful when I started sweating, and my legs started weakening. I've never sweat like that before. I headed straight for the bed. It's about 35 feet from the kitchen sink to my bed, and by the time I rounded the corner into the bedroom, the sweat was literally pouring off me in big drops. I remember that my legs were no longer working at all by then, I leaned against the side of the bed, and then nothing.

I came to on the floor. My head was pillowed on a laundry pile, and I was quite comfortable, so much so at first I thought I was in bed. I was still sweating sopping dripping sheets of water. I tried to get up, and passed out again.

I have no idea how much time passed, but when I woke again the sweating had stopped, and I felt, if not ok, at least functional.

Gotta give me credit. I went to the master bath where there are only the little disposable 1-oz cups, and tried sipping an ounce. The sweating immediately started again. It seems to start as soon as water hits my mouth.

I crawled back into bed, thinking about what it could be. Kidney failure? Diabetic coma? (Which? Would I need protein or sugar?) I thought about calling 911, and then either passed out or fell asleep. I'm not sure. I did definitely think about how long it would be before my body was found.

Sunday I sprouted a fever, 101.2 (normal for me is 97.8), and the body aches, both of which continue into today, so I'm pretty sure it's a virus. Today, Monday, I am finally able to think clearly (relatively), and I'm remembering that the last time I got downed by a virus, I had visited the Cunneen Hackett theater, and had to leave because the scent of mold in the old building was overwhelming. The virus hit two days later.

Surprise.

Thursday, I went to a movie at the old theater in Woodstock. Again, the scent of mold was strong, but I stayed, figuring I would leave if I started to cough. Two days later, pow.

I guess I can't handle mold.

Update, Monday 9:30 pm - 102.6, but I don't feel so very bad.
Update two - so much for feeling better. I dated this entry Saturday.

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Comment from "Joey", on an article about women not wanting to work with other women in law offices, in the WSJ law blog:

"Several years ago, I dated a woman who was assistant principal at a junior high school. I’ll always remember her description of the genders: ‘Managing boys is like fighting World War II. You see them coming, they fight, they tell you to f–k off, you lay down the law, and things are fine until the next battle.’

On the other hand: ‘Managing girls is like fighting Al Qaeda. You always know something is coming, but you’re never sure what until it hits. They’ll strike alliances with anyone and then break them when it’s convenient, they are ingenious at finding new ways to hurt their enemies, and when the battle *does* erupt, innocent people can get hurt.’

That always struck me as one of the best insights into human nature, and I think it still resonates in adult, professional settings."

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2973 Sunscreen, back, consignment

Saturday, May 29, 2010

"If we let people see that kind of thing, there would never again be any war."
--senior Pentagon official on reasons why United States military censored footage
showing Iraqi soldiers sliced in two by U.S. helicopter fire--

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A friend left a comment on my earlier post about sunscreens, linking to a site with all kinds of sunscreen info. That site linked to another site rating sunscreens, where you could sort and locate a sunscreen meeting your criteria.

Unfortunately, all the most highly rated sunscreens have ingredients that are not particularly safe, and all have zinc. I suspect it's the zinc that I find most annoying.

So I went to the CVS and bought a few to try. The lower SPFs have less zinc, but it seems to be very difficult to find a 15, which I suspect would work just fine since I'm not swimming or sweating. So far, the one I like best is CVS house brand clear spray-on SPF 30. I spray me in the shower stall before I get dressed, and it's ok, except that it's a tiny bit oily. Not enough to stain clothes, but enough to make the coverup not stay on the nest of blood vessels above my upper lip.

Today the same friend sent an email. She'd found one at the Woodstock flea market I might like. I went to the seller's website and bought it. (Thanks, Gypsy.) It doesn't have zinc or too much oil, but it does have more oxybenzone than the CVS.

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Last week with The Man, an over-exuberant, um, hug, caused a sharp pain in the right side of my chest, under the center of the breast, which immediately went away. The next day it came back. I thought I may have a cracked rib. Now it hurts only when I do a pulling-to-the-center motion with my right arm - you know, like when you have to overcome the resistance to put a standard transmission in reverse? Hm. It doesn't hurt when I press on individual ribs, so maybe it's just a muscle thing?

Anyway, today it has moved to the back, next to my spine, below the shoulder blades. Feels like someone is jabbing me with a knuckle. I'm used to that, happens often, that's where my father kicked me and ruptured a disk which didn't heal well, and all I have to do is sit and stand straight, no slumping or sagging shoulders. So I went to the annual Antiques Fair at the fairgrounds.

Bad idea. There are about 400 dealers' booths, and a bit of a hike (uphill) from the parking lot. I think the back/rib grinch has affected the way I hold my body or something, because I was only a third of the way through touring the booths when the tops of my thighs, the joint where they join the hips, began to ache. Not pain, more like unbelievably tired. Two-thirds of the way and my knees started to feel like they weren't going to support me any more. I skimmed the last third, and wasn't sure I'd make it back to the car.

I've never ever felt like that walking before. Normally I can walk almost forever.

I still feel achy and tired from the waist down. Probably should take a bubble bath.

I accidentally forgot my checkbook, which was probably lucky. I was restricted to cash. I bought some colorful throw pillows, a vintage Lucite bracelet featuring orchids buried in clear Lucite on a black background,

and a pair of tiny pearl earrings. I put the earrings on to wear for the day, and I left the price tag ($10) dangling from one of them. When someone would mention the price tag, I'd say, "Yes. They're Minnie Pearl's (mini pearls)."

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Someone suggested that I consign my too-big closet contents to a resale shop, and I said that there are none in or near the village. Well, guess what? Just in the past month, three have opened nearby. I guess the economy's right for it.

I visited one the other day, and I don't think I want to consign my stuff there. She's selling brand new quite fashionable blouses for $3, and gorgeous dresses for $13 or less. (A consignment shop gets a large bite of that.) I'd do better donating and taking the tax deduction!

I can't go back there. The place is dangerous. I bought a blouse and two very flattering dresses. Not helpful.
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2972 A well-balanced meal

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

I believe every human has a finite number of heartbeats.
I don't intend to waste any of mine running around doing exercises.
--Neil Armstrong--

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I stopped at the diner and picked up a take-out hamburger. It comes with french fries and "salad of the day". I did not intend to eat the fries, but was looking forward to the salad. Three bean salad? Tossed salad? Cucumber salad? Cole slaw? Sauerkraut salad?

When I got home I opened the container. Potato salad!

Odd that the folks at the diner see nothing wrong with french fries and potato salad on the same plate.
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2971 Ouch!

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Some grow with responsibility, others just swell.

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6:15 PM. 97 degrees F.

Windows open, but no breeze.

Too hot to put the top down.

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I have a sunblock question. I am very fair and absolutely need sunblock. (And a hat. My hair is translucent and I don't want to burn the scalp on the top of my head.)

I can use almost anything on my arms, neck, back, chest without breaking out, but creams seem to block my pores or something - it feels very hot and I can't perspire. I can't use anything thicker than moisturizer on my face without breaking out. I don't get pimples. I get huge blocked pores where oil builds up under the skin, like a wen.

I tried an "oil-free" sunblock once. It made what felt like a hot plastic skin on my face, that, once I started sweating, formed a gritty scale that itched and peeled off. No good.

I bought Neutrogena Sensitive Skin lotion, SPF 60+. Again, it feels like I'm wearing a hotpad everywhere it's applied, it makes the hair on my arms stick down, and makes my face sweat so badly that it all sweats off within minutes. I put it on in the bathroom this morning, way before it got hot!, walked to the kitchen, and by the time I got to the kitchen, there were huge beads of sweat on my nose. Caused not by heat, but by the cream. SPF effectively dropped to zero.

Not to mention that it LOOKS like I have white paste on my skin, and it settles in white marks in pits and creases. No, I'm not using too much. It's just very thick.

So, suggestions? SPF 30 or up, that won't block my large pores? Won't make my skin feel gummy?
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2970 Smokey sketch, life phases

Monday, May 24, 2010

A witty saying proves nothing.
--Voltaire--

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In 1966 my cat Smokey, black with a white spot on her chest and a white bar on her belly, was eight years old. She was sitting on a table looking out the window one day, and I happened to be holding a ballpoint pen and notepad. I quickly sketched this:
She died in 1975, aged 18 years. I've had a lot of cats over the past 50 years. At one time I had seven cats (two adults and five kittens), but Smokey remains the most unique and memorable. She was extremely intelligent and sensitive to my emotional needs. It's been 35 years, and I still miss her.

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To niece, who said that the BMW rode hard, and I should get a Mercedes, I now know what you meant. They gave me a 2010 128 loaner (Hal is a 2011 135), and the older car rides hard and handles awkwardly by comparison. I felt every bump in my street and driveway yesterday.

"John" called this morning to tell me Hal was ready (they found and fixed a pinched speaker wire), and I mentioned the difference to him, and he gushed yes, such a difference. They softened the suspension in mid-2010 or somewhen, and the newer cars corner better and feel solidly heavy. The 135i, being a convertible, feels especially heavy, which smooths the ride, but steering and cornering are still dancer nimble.

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The Man turns 50 today. He is embarking on some major and scary changes to his life path. When he's stressed he withdraws, and I know that, but it doesn't make it any easier to be rejected when you want to help.

I sent him a happy birthday email at midnight in which I mentioned that he's starting the second half of the 60-year adult phase, in which one gets to start over, redefine, redirect. He's absolutely doing that, but I'm not sure he understood what I meant and I didn't explain it.

I have a theory that the ideal life has four phases:

1. First 20 years - youth - you get to be silly and childish and experimental.
2. Next 60 years - adulthood, which has two subparts:
• First 30 years of adulthood - you have to be sensible and responsible, building a family, a future, a support structure for later years, perhaps doing what you have to do rather than what you want to do.
• Second thirty years of adulthood - you get to reexamine the first thirty, and restructure your life, redirect your energies to something you really want to do, using different criteria for decisions, perhaps contributing more to society than to the economy.
3. Next twenty years - youth again - you get to be silly and childish and experimental.

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2969 Another Level

Monday, May 24, 2010

The victor will always judge the defeated, and always find him guilty.
--Goering, during the Nuremberg Trials--

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I mentioned I'd been driving tin cans, used cars, and a Dodge wheelchair mini-van for the past 45 years. With the exception of the van (needed for Jay) they were always the cheapest but still dependable thing I could find. Hal is my first brand new luxury car. I am just now finding out what that means.

The van has a lot of fancy do-dads on it, so some of Hal's bells and whistles didn't impress me. The service does. Wow. There's a big difference between the BMW service garage and the local independent garage, or the Ford or Chevy or Dodge service garages. Or even Mazda, for that matter (the BMW dealership is the same complex that used to be Mazda - I bought a Mazda GLC hatchback there in 1983).

There seems to be a loose wire in the driver-side speaker, so Hal had his first service visit today.

I don't have a key for Hal. I have what looks like a remote thingy that locks and unlocks, and allows me to push the button to start the motor. Actually, I have two thingies, meant for two drivers, and each of them remembers the settings for the seats, temperature, mirrors, radio, and so on for the driver who uses that particular thingy.

When I got to the BMW service area, the guy stuck my thingy in a reader box on his PC, and it gave him all kinds of info, including my name, address, phone number, service and warranty info on the car, mileage, and heaven only knows what else.

They also gave me a new BMW (about the same size as Hal) to use until Hal is released.

Every other service garage I'd ever seen had a greasy oily cement floor. This place was paved with sparkling clean foot-square beige ceramic tiles.

About 1 in 6 times I've taken a car in for service, I've got it back with grease on the seat belts from mechanic's hands. I've actually had clothing ruined by it. Today, a mechanic walked into the reception area while I was there, and he was removing his latex surgical gloves.

I'm finding that "the rich" aren't different, but "they" sure get treated differently. I could get used to this. I could even get addicted to it, which might explain the crazy things that people do when they are in danger of losing it. I'm amused that owning a BMW gets you "rich" treatment, even just on the streets, but the interesting thing is that you don't have to be rich or classy or "better" to own one - just very foolish will do.
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2968 Another bug?

Saturday, May 22, 2010

Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than
it ceases to be serious when people laugh.
--George Bernard Shaw--

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I remember when Mr. Potato Head (he was "born" in 1952) was just a box of plastic facial features. Parents had to provide a real potato for the head. It was more fun that way, because you could choose oddly shaped potatoes, and stick the nose on anywhere you wanted. Allowed much more creativity. Especially because it didn't necessarily have to be a potato.

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I've had a slew (for my blog, a slew is about 15) of visits this morning to my post about the strange message that heralded the arrival of a virus. Something nasty must be going around.

I have a bunch of protective stuff on my system, and in the three-plus years I've had the laptop and Vista, I've been hit with a virus/trojan/sniffer three times, and every time it was caught, blocked, and removed by my valiant and ever vigilant protectors before it got entrenched. Only three is remarkable because of the amount of time I'm online and the range of sites I visit (...but significantly, no games sites, no "social" sites, no porn, and I never click on ads).

The last previous virus was acquired when my cursor accidentally crossed over an ad on, of all places, the Wall Street Journal (or maybe it was the New York Times) site. That was enough to release mayhem, and the newspaper later issued a public apology for the problem.

Early last week I got another. I had several windows/tabs open, and wasn't anywhere I hadn't been before, all trusted sites, when suddenly the popup came up asking for permission to open the Adobe PDF reader. Um, I hadn't tried to read any documents, let alone a PDF. I've heard that PDF docs can carry executable code, which can be malware. So I said no, and my sniffers all went crazy.

SpyBot Search and Destroy got rid of it for me. Because I hadn't opened the mysterious document, nothing permanent had been installed. I forget now what it was called, but a little research said it was a keylogger, which gathers passwords and all kinds of id info and ships it to parts unknown. Very dangerous.

My protectors:

• Vista firewall
• Firefox firewall
• Popup blockers
  
• McAfee Antivirus
• SpyBot Search and Destroy
• Ghostery- tells me what trackers are running on a site
• Web of Trust (WOT) - marks all links showing on the screen as safe or unsafe
• There are probably more that I've forgotten

They are all set to automatically update themselves and all either run constantly, or periodically. They probably slow my system down a bit, but a lot less than I'd be slowed down if they didn't.

Piper is constantly plagued by bad stuff. I suspect that young mortgage-handler guy who sometimes uses his office has been being naughty. A lot of porn sites require that you download their special video player, then you get that popup alert that your system has been infected and you must download a special program to get rid of it. If you try to close the popup, it just keeps coming back and you can't do anything else. You're effectively dead. Downloading the program is worse.

I told Piper to get tough with the kid about unsafe browsing, and it hasn't happened since. Really, since MY highly personal financial info is on (protected from the kid and any other human user by a password) and transferred through that computer, Piper should lock it up and allow no one on it. Passwords mean nothing to a virus.

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The Hairless Hunk was working on my yard yesterday, and wanted to talk about what we can do about the flower(weed)bed across the front of the house north of the front door (which is 6'x34'). He wants to just dig it up, and put down a barrier layer topped with stone, with plants through the barrier and directly into the soil. I want to pave it and put huge flowerpots on it, for many reasons, not the least of which is that loose stone is difficult to remove leaves from, and within a year the leaves will support weeds, and weeds and leaves make soil which weeds love, plus weeds will grow up through the barrier holes in the middle of the shrubs, which makes the bigger weeds like volunteer trees, sumacs, and thistles impossible to spray or dig out, and it'll be the same maintenance horror again. I know paving will be expensive, but I refuse to be dissuaded.

I should never go outside when he's working. We should always communicate by email or phone, because every time we start talking, hours go by without notice. We must have talked for three or four hours yesterday and didn't notice the time passing at all. Damn. I admit I find him very attractive, but he's something like 20 years younger and married, with a passel of kids. The other day when I said that in 10 or 15 years my daughter would be trying to take my car keys away from me, he asked how old I was, and was shocked at the answer.

I don't know why. I do look it, especially if I'm tired, or with no makeup, or when my hair is a mess. I have been told I don't move like a crone, or talk or flirt or act like or have the attitudes of an aged hag. For some reason I'm seen as blond, not white-haired, even though it's (almost) white.

Sigh. I don't want to get any older.

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For the last several years, while my weight was up and in constant flux, I was wearing stretch slacks all the time. They were enormously comfortable, and draped nicely over the lumps. Now I'm back into size 6, and it seems to be holding, so when my favorite boutique had a wide selection of non-stretch slacks on super sale, I bought a bunch. They are tighter, hug closer, less forgiving. And I rediscovered the other reason for loving looser stretchy pants.

In non-stretchy pants, I get "bumples" on my bottom. "Bumples" because they're not pimples - nothing so convenient as a head. Just big hard bumps under the skin, right on the sit-down spots. Not ingrown hairs, no hair there. Maybe an angry irritated sweat or oil gland, without infection. I'd forgotten about them.

I've now got a bumple. Blah.
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2967 I'm back from nowhere

Thursday, May 20, 2010

It ain't the parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me,
it is the parts that I do understand.
--Mark Twain--

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Wow. Nothing since last Saturday? I guess it's because I have a new toy, and we've had some sunny top-down-worthy days, which means all the time left over is taken up by ye olde to-do list.

I signed the contract for the house on Monday, so once the seller/builder signs, it's a committed deal.

On Tuesday, I joined The Man for the evening. Wednesday morning he set the pre-select buttons for me on Hal's satellite radio (Sirius) with the stations he thought I'd like. He did an excellent job - I love all his choices.

This evening I went to diner with Roman and his new lady friend. (I've told him over and over he should run ladies past me for approval, since he doesn't know what he wants.) I like her a lot, but I'm not sure whether it will be a good match. He needs to "do for" his lady, he needs for her to need him, it's an aphrodisiac to him, and this lady seems very strong and self-sufficient. On the other hand, she seems smart enough to play damsel in distress when he needs the boost, so maybe....

Otherwise, not much going on.

-------------------------------------------

A pet peeve: Decimate. During a commercial for a blender or chopper or something (I wasn't really watching), to show the power, the demonstrator put chunks of concrete in it, and the machine "decimated it to powder!"

Cringe.

Pulverize, maybe. Decimate means to reduce by one tenth, and that's all it means. So unless the blender shot one of every ten chunks through the lid, it didn't decimate them.
.

2966 Saturday Muse

Saturday, May 15, 2010

It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that
you would lie if you were in his place.
--H.L. Mencken--

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Not much happening. I've been joy riding on back roads. Funny how I become an "attractive blond" in the right car. And the right hat. I can't wait to get on the Thruway.

It's been perhaps 18 to 20 years since I'd driven a car with a manual transmission, and in the four and a half days I've been driving Hal, it's all come back. I clutch and shift automatically already, without even thinking about it. I guess it had become body-knowledge.

Prior to the 1990 Ford Taurus, my first automatic, all my cars had been manual, and I must have been pretty good, because I drove a car an average of 6 to 8 years, and never had to have the clutch adjusted, let alone replaced. Same for the transmission. I also got a higher mpg than expected. Hal might be a little harder to squeeze out mpg, because I can't hear the motor. (According to Hal, I'm getting 25.9 mpg now. I might actually be getting more, but I've been spending a lot of time idling while I read the book and play with all the buttons. This evening I found out how to turn the headlights on! Go me!)

--------------------------------

Piper is a big Frank Sinatra fan (when he gets drunk, he sings Sinatra at me), so to thank him for going to NJ and looking at the house with me and advising me on the purchase, I bought him the complete set of Sinatra movie DVDs, and gave them to him yesterday.

We were talking about the van's woes, and he told me about an excellent mechanic just around the corner from me. Says he's used him for years and has been very satisfied. Weird. It's not an auto shop, it's a painting company, but they have a large fleet of trucks, and a mechanic on staff. So I went there and asked, and they are willing to take a look at the van. They'll tow it away on Wednesday.

All else seems to be holding its breath.
.

2965 Closer to safe

Thursday, May 13, 2010

It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics, though she is still forbidden to resort to physics or chemistry.
--HL Mencken--

-----------------------------------------------------------

Hal now has a 2-inch extender on his clutch pedal, and he's much easier to control. Captain Vantastic charged me only the cost of the aluminum block, no charge for installation. However, he pointed out a problem I suspected and had asked the salesman about - I'm too close to the airbag in the steering wheel.

I had read long ago that short people are in danger of having their necks broken (or spinal cords stretched) by the force of a too-close airbag. The salesman said that shouldn't be a problem because Hal moderates the force of deployment based on the weight in the driver's seat. BUT! New York state requires 13 inches space between the driver's nose and the bag. I've got only 10.

Interesting.

---------------------------------

A simple, cheap, "green" way to sop up oil spills:


[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5SxX2EntEo]

Quoting the comment on the video from "maydayfire":

one reason that oil spill clean up companies do not use this method is that for such a natural and simple solution like this, you cant sell it and you cant patent it. When Money/Capitalism becomes the sole motive for scientific firms and companies, such natural and easy solutions are overlooked.

I've heard that before. If someone can't make scads of money on something, that something doesn't happen.
.

2964 Rolling

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

I don't care who does the electing as long as I get to do the nominating.
--Boss Tweed--

--------------------------------------

I took Hal (that's the new car's name, because it's half computer, rather imperious about it, and I don't completely trust it yet) out for a test ride early this evening with a throw pillow behind my lower back. The pillow worked fine. When I got home, there was a message on the phone from the salesman with the phone number for the place where I can get the clutch block installed, in Kingston. I'm not sure, but I think it may be the same guy who handled my purchase of the wheelchair van and serviced the electric ramp and door, and he's really good at adapting things. That's great. I thought they were going to send me to someplace in Westchester or something.

Things are movin' along.
.

2963 Car sedation

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Poor spelling does not prove poor knowledge, but is fatal to the argument by intimidation.
--Gene Ward Smith--

-------------------------------------------------------

I took Jasper to the vet's today. I wanted to ask if I could sedate him for the 2.5 hour ride to New Jersey, because he throws fits in the carrier. He'd had what appeared to be a seizure during the ride back from the boarding attempt, so he needed to be examined before we could talk about sedation.

The little turd. Toddlers and animals will make a liar of you every time.

Here I am at the vet's talking about how he screams and bloodies his lips and paws on the door and ventilation holes, how he throws his body around and drools, and Jasper? Well, he's nodding off in the carrier. Kind of like when a toddler is running a scorching fever and is unresponsive, and you make the emergency call to the doctor, and when you get there 15 minutes later, the kid is fine and playing happily with toys. Rotten kids and beasties. They make you look like a hysterical parent.

So we now have some tiny pills, and we'll try one once or twice on shorter test-drives before the big trip.

----------------------------------------------

Speaking of driving, I need a block, about two inches of extender, on the clutch in the new car. The salesman was supposed to call me last night with the 800 number to find out where I can have it done, but he didn't call, and time got away from me today, so I didn't call him. But I've decided I really shouldn't drive the new car much until I get the extender. It's really hard on my back. I woke up this morning with my back warning me not to do that again, or else.

Tomorrow I'll try a rolled pillow behind my lower back, but that's only a temporary solution.
.

2962 Car Car!

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Whenever anyone says, "theoretically", they really mean, "not really".
--Dave Parnas--

----------------------------------

Yesterday I went to NJ and the attorney and I worked on the house contract. It needs some changes. Then I visited Daughter at her office, then I drove to Newburgh and had dinner with some Mensans. When I mentioned I needed a way to get to the new car today, Roman volunteered. When I got home, there was a message on my phone from Piper, also volunteering.

So Roman picked me up at noon, and dropped me off at the dealership. The amount of crap that car thinks, does, monitors, and allows me to do is overwhelming. I guess I've got some reading to do.

There is a small problem - when I tried on the 2010 model, it fit me perfectly. However, that was an automatic transmission. I wanted manual. This car fits as far as the gas and brake pedals, just like the 2010, but the clutch is way out there. Even with the seat all the way forward, I have to slide forward and point my toes to fully depress the clutch. The salesman checked, and yes, we can put a block on it (I need about 2 inches), but it has to be done at a special "handicap refitting" shop. I guess having short legs is a valid handicap.

So, I'm driving it with ballerina toes, but I hope not for long. On the way home I stopped by Roman's and gave him a ride, then by Piper's for his ride. And even though it's only 55 degrees F, we had the top down. If you keep the windows up and turn the heat on, it's fine.

The amount of pure power is frightening!

These pictures were taken by Piper:

The white rings around the headlights are the daytime running lights. I don't want to even think about how much replacement "bulbs" must cost.

You can tell how far forward I have the seat by the length of the seat belt. I should be able to move it back a bit once I get the block on the clutch.
.

2961 Wind and Babies

Sunday, May 9, 2010

If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants.
--Isaac Newton--
If I have not seen as far as others, it is because giants were standing on my shoulders.
--Hal Abelson--
In computer science, we stand on each other's feet.
--Brian K. Reed--

----------------------------------------

Whatever happened to the expression "I have a cold in my back"? It used to mean muscle cramps, which usually resulted from a draft on one's back. You don't hear it at all anymore.

-----------------------------

Wind! We had 50 mph gusts yesterday. I went to see "Babies" at the arts theater, and almost couldn't get home. There were trees and large and small branches down on the road everywhere. It was complicated by bridge work. The county has used economic incentive money to replace bridges over the hundreds of streams and creeks and ravines on small roads everywhere, which is good for many reasons, except that they seem to have decided to do them all at once!

The Hairless Hunk cleaned up all the winter-downed branches on my property last week, and the yard looked good. He's going to have to do it all over again. Luckily, nothing has fallen on the house or driveway.

When Jay first moved into this house in the early '80s, his parents gave him a young maple tree as a housewarming gift. They planted it to the side of the house, outside a bathroom window.

Unfortunately, it was planted too close to the woods, and now it's huge and leans toward the house, looming threateningly over the roof. It's unbalanced, with more branch growth on the "open" house side. The Hairless Hunk has recommended that we take it out. I can't cut it down, because it meant a lot to Jay.

Maybe, when I move and sell this house, the new owners will have more sense and less sentimentality.

---------------------------

"Babies", the documentary, was enjoyable. It's perhaps not something you should schedule time for, but if you have some free time and it's showing near you, see it. It is very cute.

I had watched a TV interview with the director last week, and he had said that the movie illustrated that first-world children are over attended, over stimulated, and over scheduled, and it's absolutely not necessary, that children are perfectly happy playing alone with sticks and stones, and a little boredom doesn't hurt them. He said that the Mongolian baby was usually left alone in the yurt for up to eight hours while his mother was working with the herds, and he was perfectly fine.

Well, actually, the film didn't show any of that. You see it, but no point is made. Well, if there is a point, it's that a child must know that they are loved, unconditionally, and that they make their mother smile. Everything else is fluff.

The clearest contrast was the attitude toward dirt. The American and Japanese babies were protected from nature and dirt - the Mongolian and African babies reveled in it, with no harm at all. That's kind of my attitude. Babies should get dirty! The dirtier the better! They should french kiss the dog! I've told Daughter that I intend to sail leaves in the gutters with my grandchild, and dig worms, and make mud pies, and yes, we might even taste them.

(Maybe that's why I have no grandchildren yet.)
.

2960 Car!

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Democracy, n.: A government of the masses. Authority derived through mass meeting or any other form of direct expression. Results in mobocracy. Attitude toward property is communistic... negating property rights. Attitude toward law is that the will of the majority shall regulate, whether it is based upon deliberation or governed by passion, prejudice, and impulse, without restraint or regard to consequences. Result is demagogism, license, agitation, discontent, anarchy.
-- U.S.Army Training Manual No. 2000-25 (1928-1932), since withdrawn. --

-----------------------------------------------------------

My car is in! The salesman called today. It will be two days or so before I can pick it up. I guess they need to "do stuff" to it first.

Monday is filled up with the NJ attorney and an evening dinner. Tuesday I have to take Jasper to the vet (maybe I can change that appointment, since it's not like he's sick or anything).

The dealership is about 40 minutes south, and I need to figure out how to get there without a car. Piper would happily take me, but he'd been in Florida for the past two weeks taking care of his elderly mother while his sister was on vacation, so I know he's buried in work right now, so I don't want to ask him. I checked the county bus routes. They seem to be geared toward getting people to jobs and home again - the latest of two daily buses downriver leaves the village at 7:56 am (! Ack !) and I'd have to change buses in Poughkeepsie. A taxi would cost a zillion dollars. Almost all my friends have jobs, and most of them live way the heck down there, so it's a strain for them.

Gee, sorry. Don't you wish you had my problems?

------------------------------

It snowed last night in the Catskills. Sigh.
.

2959 Candidate

Friday, May 7, 2010

All wars are civil wars, because all men are brothers ... Each one owes infinitely more to the human race than to the particular country in which he was born.
-- Francois Fenelon --

----------------------------------------

An acquaintance is running for governor of New York State as an independent. This is her campaign video. She does make some good points - budget cuts go to the powerless.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMy9CniCGKY]
.

2958 Nothin' Much

Friday, May 7, 2010

Mitchell's Law of Committees: Any simple problem can be made insoluble
if enough meetings are held to discuss it.

-------------------------------

Nothing much happening.

Yesterday the market went crazy. Piper called me to ensure I wasn't freaking out, since I'll be selling stock soon to pay for the new house. He asked how much I thought I'd lost of my private holdings (the stuff he doesn't control), and I told him I hadn't even checked. I figure it was an aberration, and will come back very soon, and today's financial reports seem to be bearing that out. But it's probably just as well that I'm moving a significant amount out of equities and into real estate, at least until Greece, Europe, and the Euro gets sorted out. Which may take a while.

I asked the nurse at the vet's yesterday what they'd advise for Jasper's move to NJ. He freaked so badly the last time he was in the car that I thought he'd had a stroke. She said that it sounded like a seizure - and yeah, now that I think about it, yeah. You'd think I would be able to recognize a seizure.

So anyway, she said that Jasper could be sedated for the trip, but if he did have a seizure, he should be checked out before we attempt that. So, vet appointment next Tuesday. I don't know what the heck they'd be looking at or for....

Nothing else going on.
.

2957 Prediction

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Art is anything you can get away with.
-- Marshall McLuhan --

----------------------------------------------------------

Yesterday I got an email from the company that I buy most of my clothes from. The online outlet was having a clearance sale.

Stuff in the outlet is already 50 to 75% off, and they were offering 40% off the outlet price.

Wow! That means a top that normally sells for $70 is now something like $12. That's cheaper than Wal-Mart!

Naturally, I jumped. When they run sales like that, things go fast, especially in my size. I bought 3 jackets, 2 pairs of pants, 2 knit tops, a turtleneck, and a dress for a total of $110 plus shipping, in the smaller size I'm wearing now.

As I hit the "checkout" key, I thought to myself, "Just watch. I'll get a coupon tomorrow."

Sure enough, in today's mail I got a coupon for $30 off my next purchase over $100. And it has to be used by May 19.

I could spit.

But if I had waited until today to order, they'd have been out of my size in the things I liked.
.

2956 Cleaning out

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought,
but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.
-- Albert Einstein --

----------------------------------------------------------------

Today I cleaned out three clothes closets, sorting into summer keep, winter keep, sell, donate, and throw out. I had a good time.

---------------------------

I missed the miniature horses giving birth, but then I found some video clips at the Pacific Pinto web site [http://www.pacificpintos.com/new.html] of the very births I'd missed. Neat.

---------------------------

Thunder storms last night, more predicted for the wee hours tonight.
.

2955 Contract Review

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

If you explain so clearly that nobody can misunderstand, somebody will.

(Meetup is teaching me the truth of that....)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I spent most of the afternoon reviewing the contract for the new house. I had 19 questions and/or things that needed changing, from the fact that my name was misspelled, to paragraphs that were incomplete, stopping in the middle of a sentence. A few of the things the builder/seller and I had agreed upon were not specified, but there's a paragraph that says that this is complete and anything not specified herein ain't gonna happen, so I want those things added before I'll sign it.

There are bunches of possibly important stuff, like the type of deed is "bargain and sale, covenants against grantors acts", which I don't believe is usual. I'd prefer "bargain and sale, with covenants". And the fact that I have to provide a something-or-other 30 days before closing, or I pay a penalty, and the contract sets a tentative closing date of May 28. I received the contract on April 29 - 29 days before the tentative closing date. Duh?

Daughter recommended the lawyer I'm using, but it looks like he received the contract from the builder's attorney, and sent it to me "If you are in agreement, you may sign the Contract and return" without so much as glancing at it. What am I paying him for? What if I had assumed he'd reviewed and approved it, and I went ahead and signed it? Since when does one have to research and cross-check the legal advice you get from your own lawyer?

Mother is not happy.
.

2954 Moroccan Urn

Monday, May 3, 2010

A jury consists of 12 persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer.
--Robert Frost --
---------------------------------------

Every time I've ever bought anything fragile that had to be shipped, the retailer has told me that I must open the shipping container while the delivery guy is there, or the retailer cannot be responsible for damage.

Whether or not I understand that doesn't matter, because I have never convinced the delivery guy, whether UPS, FedEx, USPS, or the store's own people, to wait.

My urn from Morocco arrived today. I asked the FedEx guy to wait, and he said, and I quote, "No, I can't. There's no external damage. If anything's wrong, call them." Me: "Them who?" He: "The people you bought it from, or FedEx." And he left. He didn't even wait for me to shake it and see if there were any clanks. And that's the way it always goes.

The urn itself is ok. The lid has a finial on top, metal, soldered to a flat cap on the top knob, and the final has broken off. It would be easy enough to glue or solder the finial back on, except that the flat part it attaches to got bent off horizontal by the pressure it took to snap the finial, so glued back on, it would not be straight. Sigh. I'll have to find someone who can figure out how to straighten it out.

Here it is. It's all hand painted, very detailed, and trimmed in silver. I set the final on top for the photo, and turned it so it looks straight. Standing on the floor, it goes up to just past mid-thigh on me. Click on the photo for detail.


Now that I have it in the house, I realize I goofed. I should have chosen something more toward the red, pink, orange, brown, green, or tan color group. I have next to nothing blue in my house. But I loved this at first sight and didn't think of that. Still love it.
.

2953 Weekend

Monday, May 3, 2010

Mythology, n.: The body of a primitive people's beliefs concerning its
origin, early history, heroes, deities and so forth,
as distinguished from the true accounts which it invents later.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary" --

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Another thing I don't understand: Why is the drain in a bathtub always under the spigot? If they sloped the tub away from the spigot and put the drain in the opposite end, it would be sooooo much easier to clean the tub, and doesn't change the function at all. Of course, the dooflinky to open and close the drain would need to be smooth so you could lie comfortably against the drain end when it's closed, but that's a minor design change.

--------------------------------

I had a great weekend. The Man has joined a barbershop chorus, and they competed at a convention in Scranton (where I was born) on Saturday. We left Friday afternoon, checked into a hotel in Moosic (the convention hotel was full), stopped by the convention (the quartets competition was Friday), had dinner at the new hotel in the old Lackawanna Railway Station around the corner (where my grandfather used to work), and then found a bowling alley where he could practice. (He gets two lanes and bowls 20 lines in quick succession. It's pretty impressive.)

I love to watch him bowl. He's so intent. He's incredibly focused and intent no matter what he's doing, and I love to see it. Or feel it. (Yeah, ok, I'm in love again.)

Saturday we returned for the chorus competitions.

Now, The Man doesn't like barbershop style, and he's especially annoyed that the group he's in sings only the old standards, which he finds irrelevant to today. But, the man's gotta sing. It's one of his ways to relax. He was hoping he could get them to sing like Christmas carols at nursing homes and hospitals, and do some a-capella stuff at street festivals, but all but one of the other members are over 70 and stuck in their ways. "We don't sing carols." Huh? But he's their strongest bass, so he decided to stick with it for now, I guess, and if he can't change their minds, I suppose he'll eventually find something more suitable.

A group warming up on the street:

The winning chorus (NYC). To tell the truth, I didn't like their performance. There was so much going on onstage it detracted from their music.

The second-place group (Westchester). I liked they way each of them was a different type, and it was easy to identify who/what they were. "Willy Nelson" was perfect, and the hippie, and the Amish guy ... click on the photo to enlarge and see who else you can identify.

The Man says that the groups come in types - the "top" being the competition groups, like the two above. They spend money on costumes, and spend all their time learning two to four songs for competitions. I forget what the middle type is, but most of the rest are recreational. They get together to sing together for fun. They just need to compete every so often to keep membership in the national group. The Man's group is one of those.

Some other groups:



The competition was over and scored by 1 pm on Saturday, and The Man didn't want to stay for the afternoon's festivities, so we went to North Scranton and I showed him where I spent almost every summer of my childhood, then we headed back to NJ to my car. The original plan was that we'd part then, but he was going to practice again and asked if I'd like to watch, so he bowled another 15 lines and I watched.

I wanted to visit Daughter on Sunday, so I asked him to find me a room near her (he's got a membership that gets nice upgrades, so I let him make the reservation and have the points when I stay anywhere). His hips were aching from all the bowling, so I said that if he found me a room with a Jacuzzi, I'd allow him to soak in it. Neat how I wrangled another night together, eh?

Sunday he went to a small bowling tournament where he did pretty well, and I went to Daughter's. I didn't go into the new house, and now I kick myself because once the contract is signed, I'm not allowed to until just before closing. Apparently that's a standard clause.

I got home in time to watch The Amazing Race.
.

2952 Thoughts

Friday, April 30, 2010

Impartial, adj.: Unable to perceive any promise of personal advantage from espousing either side of a controversy or adopting either of two conflicting opinions.
--Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary --

----------------------------------------------------------------

Where are all those people who were yelling for more offshore drilling? They've been awfully quiet these days.

------------------------

What happened to that bacteria that someone had discovered/developed fifteen years ago or so that "ate" oil? I thought it was used off the shore of Texas when there was a drilling leak sometime in the '90s, and it worked.

------------------------

There's something the psychiatrists call omnipotence, where one thinks their actions and thoughts have widespread influence. I think I may suffer from it. I have to sell some stock to buy the new house, and what I was counting on to get about 20% of the money from is BP stock. It's very hard for me to accept that it's coincidence.

------------------------

My urine has had a very bad odor for several months, so bad that I hate it in the morning. It's hard to describe - sort of like the vitamin-B odor with overtones of iodine, and what your hands smell like when you've been handling copper and zinc. Lately I get whiffs of the odor when I'm just sitting around. I'm beginning to worry that whatever it is, my skin smells of it too.

I don't have a UTI, so I thought maybe I'm dumping one of the many vitamins and supplements I take. While I was in Morocco I didn't take anything but the prescription thyroid supplement (L-Thyroxine), and my urine still stank, so maybe that's it? Internet research doesn't list stinky urine as a side effect.

As an experiment, I stopped the L-Thyroxine three days ago, and my piddle now smells like piddle. I guess the next step is to ask/tell the doctor. I'd been taking the lowest available dose of the thyroid, so unless you can cut the tiny dot-like pills, I can't take less.

(The pills are so small they're hard for me to handle with my fingers. I scoop one up with a fingernail.)

------------------------

Sign on the deli door, carefully hand-lettered in multiple colors and mixed cases:

~~NOTICE ~~

- No ID
- NO CiGERETEs
- No BEER
- No EXEPTioNs

------------------------

In June of 2009 I had crept back up to 150 pounds. Last February I started the "6 meals a day, a bit of protein at every meal, no sugar, low fat" diet. I am now at 126 pounds.

I weighed 135 when I first met The Man in March 2007, and he thought I was underweight then. He likes full-figured women, and I think that was a factor in my gradual weight gain over the next two years, but I didn't like it. I like me better now.

The weird thing is that I STILL have big thighs and a belly pad, and I'm hoping he will be satisfied with the 40" bust and 39" hips. They don't seem to ever go away. I'd like to lose the belly pad. At this point it seems to be just thick loose skin. I've got thinner loose skin everywhere. It hangs in very soft silky drapes that feel wonderful, but look awful. I won't be able to go sleeveless for a while, if ever.

-------------------------

After yesterday's post, one might wonder how I have time this morning to post this. Well, Jasper has actually been sleeping on my bed lately. Last night I found his lost favorite tiny felt mouse, and I put it in the middle of the kitchen floor where he'd find it. This morning, he was tossing and pouncing on the felt mouse on my bed - at 6 am.

I got up early.
.

2951 Crunch

Thursday, April 29, 2010

With capitalism man exploits man. With communism it's the exact opposite.

The only difference is that it's reversed.
------------------------------------------------------------

It is absolutely imperative that I pay bills today. I planned to start at 1 pm, but then I got notice of some critical Mensa business, and the research and subsequent emails took a few hours. So then at 4 pm I figured I'd better get to the bills - but I received an email from my NJ attorney, with the house contract attached, along with a note that if I had any comments or questions, to contact him tomorrow, otherwise I should sign and return it.

Of course I have questions! The estimated closing date is May 28 (ack! too soon!), and in another paragraph it says I have to provide to the seller a something-or-other, a minimum of 30 days before closing, or pay a penalty. Um, May 28 is 30 days from YESTERDAY, so obviously I can't sign this. There are also a few other things the builder/seller and I agreed on verbally but that aren't mentioned in the contract, and since unfinished items are not an acceptable reason to delay closing, I want to see them in the contract. Like sod, and the wider driveway, for example. Otherwise I could end up with seed and a skinny driveway, and I can't safely park the second vehicle on the narrow street. (Yeah, I could park it on the drive in front of the garage door, but that means I'd have to move it every time I wanted to use the other car. Not to mention, um, overnight company who won't want to park on the street.)

Ok, normally, I'd just write up my concerns and email them to the attorney tomorrow morning - except that tomorrow I'm leaving for a short trip with The Man, and I've got a bunch of stuff to do for that, especially since he moved the leaving time to a little earlier.

So, bye now.
.

2950 The Birds

Thursday, April 29, 2010

You can never say anything about another person that’s true.
-- Joe Biden’s father --

Not completely true, anyway. There's always more that you don't know.
People who gossip should keep that in mind.

---------------------------------------------------------------

Last year I wrote this very sad post about the birds who nest on the front porch lights.

The male arrived early again this year, and at first I thought he was going to be alone again, but there's a tail sticking out over the edge of the nest on the left light! He's got a new mate!

I'm very happy for him.
.

2949 Windy

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

One plus one does not equal two. It approaches two as an upper or lower limit.
-- Silk --

-------------------------------------------

It has been windy today, but I didn't realize how windy until I took a quick trip to the deli. There are branches down, some quite large, all over the road. None down in my yard, which is surprising, since most of my trees are black locust, which are quite brittle.

I thought I felt pretty good today, compared to yesterday, but as soon as I got outside, I felt that stuffy feverish feeling again. One more day of sleeping with the heating pad, I guess. I need to feel better by Friday.
.

2948 Fighting a bug

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

No two equals are the same.
-- Malaclypse the Younger --

-------------------------------------------

Found online: (go ahead, google her), a realtor in Memphis named BJ Worthy. Well, I guess potential clients don't forget her name.

-------------------------------------------

I got rained on a lot on Sunday. Yesterday was raw windy cold, and I had dinner with Mensans in a restaurant where the waiter disappeared for an hour at a time, and it was freezing in there. We all wore our jackets to eat. I had a cold draft on my behind. Today was freezing wind - the TV weatherman actually said snow in the mountains. I was supposed to meet someone in Rhinebeck at 4, but we'd had a small spat last week, and I wasn't sure he'd come. I didn't want to email or call to ask, because then I was sure that he WOULD come, and frankly I preferred that he didn't. So I stood on a windy corner from 4 'til 4:30. My body was well covered, but my hands, neck, face, head froze. He didn't show up. Considering that he really should have told me, he'll never get another opportunity, so that's one problem solved.

But...
... my body is rebelling. I have a headache, I'm freezing no matter how high I punch the thermostat, even though I'm wearing long knit cotton underwear under my slacks and turtleneck. Every joint in my body (especially my back, but including my fingers) has taken a turn at screaming. I feel like I have cotton in my lungs. I hurt. This has been growing since Monday morning, but I didn't take care of me. This afternoon I guess it was more important that I be the one in the right (or perhaps that he fall into my trap, leaving me the wronged one) than that I take care of me.

But, there are other people close to me going through Hell right now. It's doesn't lessen my aches, but ... a little perspective, Silk. Go blow your nose.

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I am fully aware that chills don't cause colds. Germs cause colds. However, we are exposed to those beasties constantly, but we don't have colds constantly, because our immune system fights them off. You get sick when either your immune system doesn't recognize the new attacker, or when your immune system is weakened - like by stress, which includes physical stress, like getting too chilled. So there. Stress can result in illness. Physical stress is stress. Stress in the absence of germs will not result in a cold. It takes both.

Actually, three - stress, germs, and not paying attention. You can mentally rev up your immune system.
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2947 The (possible) new house

Monday, April 26, 2010

Common sense is what tells you that the world is flat.
-- Malaclypse the Younger --

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I don't think I've put pictures of the (possible) new house on here.

These photos were taken by Daughter a few weeks ago, when the rooms inside were just stud-outlines. Oddly, I didn't take any pictures when we visited last Friday.

Front. That thing on the left is a construction dumpster. The porch will have a railing when finished, and it is wide enough for wicker or rocking chairs.

Side. As you can see by the red house glimpsed across the street, this is one of the larger houses.

Back. The yellow house next door looks large, but although it's two stories, it's only maybe 15' across the front. Narrow, high, and deep.

Roughed-in master bedroom, large closet at the back. The bedroom and closet are the full depth of the house.
Four bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms. There are two separate furnaces (gas) and two A/Cs for upstairs and for downstairs, two zones. 2300 sq. ft.
.

2946 Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so ....

Monday, April 26, 2010

You will find that the state is the kind of organization which,
though it does big things badly, does small things badly too.
-- John Kenneth Galbraith --

This is significant not so much for what it says as for who said it.
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I'm getting very annoyed about the mares [http://www.marestare.com/fcam.php?alias=pacificpintos]. I watched Blossom until 1:45 am last night, then went to bed. This morning at 9 am the note said she had a little boy foal, seven hours before. Do the math. That makes three out of three that I've missed by minutes.

Maybe I have some kind of power.

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I'm also getting annoyed at the way some groups use words to twist our perceptions, like the current political commercial from Albany that says that "the Obama administration" cut grants to schools, blah blah budget problems blah blah, but "we can still get the money from Washington" by demanding greater accountability and making the schools meet certain standards.

It annoys me greatly that they imply the Obama administration arbitrarily caused the problem, but are careful not to admit that the Obama administration requires higher standards to get the money. Apparently reward for high standards are the province of anonymous "Washington", but arbitrary cuts are "Obama".

Too few people will catch the twist there. They're just left with a distaste for Obama. That pisses me off.

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I was supposed to do two things yesterday - go to Home Depot and pick out the flooring and paint colors for the NJ house, and lead a hike at 2 pm. I thought I'd go to Home Depot first.

At 9 am, it was raining hard and looked like it was going to continue, so I got on the laptop and brought up the broadband connection (Verizon Wireless) to notify people that the hike was canceled. Verizon said it had to update the connection maps, and I clicked "ok". It said it did it successfully --- but thereafter I had no bars. No connection. No nothin'.

Of course, the first thing I did was make sure I had paid the bill. Then I restarted a few times. Then I called Verizon technical service. I was on the phone with "Neal" in Arkansas for 90 minutes. We tried a few things, then reinstalled the software from the original CD, twice. While waiting for loadings and so on we had a nice conversation about the baby he and his wife are expecting in August, about living in mountains rather than flat, about animals, wild and domestic, and finally we realized that the software I have is probably just too downlevel to work anymore. I used to get automatic software updates, but for some reason it never updated to the current level. Too bad I can't get to the internet. I could download the current level.

So then I took the laptop to the Verizon store in Kingston, where a fabulous little lady all alone in the store multitasked beautifully with several customers and me, and she installed the current level of broadband software on my laptop.

By then it was 1:35 pm. Too late to notify people that the hike was off, so I rushed to the trailhead, arriving at 1:58, where I waited in the rain for 20 minutes in case anyone showed up. Nobody did.

Then I went back across the river to Home Depot, where I got thoroughly overwhelmed by paint colors. I know in my head exactly what I want, but those colors don't exist on paint cards/chips.

I brought home a pile of brochures and cards.

By then it was after 5 pm, and I collapsed.
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2945 Meetup Rant

Sunday, April 25, 2010

It is my firm belief that it is a mistake to hold firm beliefs.
-- Malaclypse the Younger --

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It's been about 4 months, and I've about had it with the Meetup groups. Man, some of these people are infants! There are many stories, but the latest has me ready to give it up completely.

Some woman, let's call her "Nell", sent me an email that she had noticed that a particular guy had joined the 50+ singles' group. She is friends with his ex-wife, and the ex-wife says he abused her and she had to get a restraining order against him. So Nell wants me to kick him out of the group, or at least spread the word through the group that he is dangerous and everyone should avoid him.

Duh? As far as I'm concerned, that's third-hand gossip, I don't know the particulars of the case, I certainly don't know the truth, and spreading accusations could be legally actionable. Our members are all adults, and they can make their own judgments. She can do what she wants, but I will not punish someone for something I know nothing about. Besides, if her sees her, Nell, on the membership list, maybe he won't show up anyway. I sent her a note to that effect.

She responded that she was disappointed that I would WANT a violent man in the group! (Huh?) She said that having been in an abusive relationship herself, she knows how hard it is. She said he doesn't know her because she didn't meet the ex-wife until after the divorce. She advised me to ask Meetup for advice.

So I did, and as expected, Meetup says that they don't get involved in the internal workings of a group, will get involved only if the website is used inappropriately. I wrote back to her with that info. I told her that I was offended that she accused me of wanting violent men in the group. I told her that restraining orders are not proof of anything, they're simply a tactic, that I had worked with a family law office in Hyde Park, and the attorneys joke that half of the people in Poughkeepsie had restraining orders against the other half, that I have personally had experience with abuse, but I've also had experience with gossip - where people said to my face that they know I did such-and-such because they were there and they SAW me, when *I* know for a fact that I had not done it, and in fact wasn't even there. I reiterated that our members are adults, and that she can say anything she wants to anyone she wants, but having no direct knowlege, I would not kick the guy out on the basis of third-hand stories.

She deleted her membership.

The woman has a doctorate in physics.

What you wanna bet she is now telling everyone that I want men in the group so badly I am willing to sacrifice the women to them.

I want to back away from all this crap. I didn't merely volunteer for this, I PAID for the privilege. How stupid do I have to be continue to pay to be insulted? (An organizer of a meetup group pays a hefty fee to start a group; members pay nothing.)

This is only the latest of many.

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Organizers of Meetup groups pay to start them, and it isn't cheap. It's something like $75 for six months. Several interest groups have been started by people who have something to sell, and they see Meetup as advertising, but mostly it's just social, like knitting groups, bicycling, book clubs, hiking, movies, dining, and so on. Some of the organizers do ask for a $1 "meetup fee", either at every function, or when it's time to pay the Meetup renewal fee.

Would you believe that there are people who object to paying that? And call the organizers all kinds of names for it? They seem to expect people to think up interesting outings for them, make the arrangements, make reservations, charter the bus, assemble a group for their amusement, and all they have to do is show up?

It's no damn wonder organizers burn out.

2944 Earth Day photos

Saturday, April 24, 2010

Facts do not cease to exist just because they are ignored.

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From Boston.com, 39 photos celebrating Earth Day.

This photo was truncated on the right by Blogger to fit the screen. Click on it to get the whole view.

"The Northern Lights appear above the ash plume of Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano in the evening April 22, 2010. (REUTERS/Lucas Jackson)"

2943 Leaving the nest.

Friday, April 23, 2010

A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.
-- Douglas Adams --

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Piper and I made a quick trip to NJ today, to look at the house being built across the street from Daughter & Hercules, and to talk with the builder. The house has the sheetrock and kitchen cabinets in, doors hung, and so on, but not floors, toilets, bathroom stuff, counter tops and so on. So the builder took us to another house a few miles away that is almost done, using the same plans. Looked good. Piper was impressed.

On the drive home, we talked about it a bit, and halfway up the Garden State Parkway Piper called the builder and made an offer, they dickered a bit, and our offer was accepted.

I just bought a house in NJ. Ack! 2300 sq ft. Small lot. Contract will be drawn up next week. Daughter had given me the name and number of the lawyer she and Hercules had used when they bought their house, so I'll call him on Monday.

The house will be finished in about two months.

Eeek!
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