3351 Mites

Monday, September 5, 2011

"Friendship is being there when someone's feeling low and not being afraid to kick them."
-- Randy K. Milholland --

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I had three beautiful huge rose-pink impatiens pots on the porch. They were attacked and devastated by spider mites.

When it came time to put the porch plants in the garage to protect them from Irene, I dumped those pots down the bank in the back, so they wouldn't infect the other plants.

I wondered where they got the mites. Those things are tiny. They don't exactly walk around looking for good plants. Usually they arrive on a new plant, infected in the crowded environment of a nursery and will spread to any plant within a few inches of the infected plant. The impatiens were clean all summer. Where did the sudden infestation of spider mites come from?

I have replaced the impatiens with mums, better for the fall anyway. Today I was sitting on the porch, and saw a bee land on a geranium blossom, and a light bulb went off.

I'll bet the mites hitchhiked in on bees!

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I mowed the lawn today, and when I mowed past the bank, I saw a splash of rose-pink a few feet down the slope.

The impatiens.

They actually look healthier now than they did on the porch.

I wished them happiness.
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3350 Enterprise

Saturday, September 3, 2011

Even a minor event in the life of a child is an event of that child's world and thus a world event.
-- Gaston Bachelard, scientist and philosopher --

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The Mid-Hudson Valley suffered more damage to electrical wires than New Jersey, I think. Probably because there are more trees there, and the mountains channeled and increased the force of the winds.

Central Hudson, the electric company up there, has been faced with a head-shaking problem. They arrive to repair downed wires and transformers, and the wires and transformers are gone!

People are stealing the dead wires!
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3349 Frustration

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

The two rules for success: 1) Figure out exactly what you want to do. 2) Do it.
-- Mario Cuomo's mother --

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The mid-Hudson Valley seems to have had it worse than here from Irene. Lots of flooding, trees down, bridges out. The Hairless Hunk says my old house is fine, some branches down but no major tree loss, and so on, but --- he can see only the exterior. I'm anxious to get up there.

But things keep popping up, keeping me here! I can't even get the stuff I need to do here done. I'm getting very upset.

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Two years ago I flunked the bone density test (mildly) and my GP told me to increase my calcium. Last February I had high blood calcium, so my GP told me increase vitamin D.

Two years ago my blood sugar was fluctuating wildly (and I wanted to lose weight), so the nutritionist taught me how to balance carbs and protein. Too much meat is not good, I hate beans, nuts are fine but too high in fat to use too much, so she told me to up my no-fat/low-fat dairy.

Saw the urologist yesterday. He says that my 24-hour (actually 48, but who's counting) urine collection shows I'm passing a lot of calcium, and since the stones are calcium oxalate, I should reduce dairy products in my diet, and reduce the vitamin D.

Hmmmm.

So, what do I do now?

Three years ago my THS (thyroid stimulating hormone) was high, so my GP put me on thyroid supplements. Last February the THS was fine, so they took the thyroid supplements away from me.

The parathyroid regulates calcium.

One of the results of parathyroid disfunction is --- I forget now what it's called --- but nodules form in the lungs, heart, other organs. The nodules in the lungs cause rales (the rattling/bubbling in the lungs like with pneumonia). Two weeks ago, my new GP heard rales. I've always had rales to some degree because of the structure of my lungs, but not enough that anyone worried about them. She was worried.

Hmmm. Maybe I should get my parathyroid checked.

Why has no doctor suggested that?

Probably for the same reason that my signs of raging kidney infection were ignored. Nobody really thinks any more.
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3348 Serger!

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Me: To define a career goal is to define your limits.

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I just bought this:

Singer Perfect Finish LCD Sewing Machine & Serger
(http://www.singerco.com/products/2162/perfect-finish-combo)
$349.99 + $5 Shipping (everything from Woot is $5 shipping, even anvils)
Condition: New

from Woot.com.

I have a New Home zig-zag sewing machine that I'd bought used 45 years ago, and it's still working fine. But I've wanted a serger for a long time now. I wear a lot of knits, and being so short I have to alter everything, and have to do the stretchy seams by hand, so a serger would be very handy. But sergers are horribly expensive and notoriously finicky, and I didn't want to spend so much for something I might want to throw out the window. I also don't need a zillion functions. So this seems ideal.

This opinion, from a commenter:

This package is not a mistake - it's a mistake to pass it up.

There's been a lot said about Singers in the comments above, and both opinions of the brand are true - Singers held absolute dominance in quality from the founding of the company in 1860, until the mid-1960's A good 100-year run. They designed and marketed arguably the best home machine ever, the 500A Slant-O-Matic Rocketeer, released in 1960, and then suddenly in the mid 60's made the curious decision to change from all-metal to mucho plastic in their moving parts fabrication. At the time, little was known about the long term wear on plastic parts, and after a few years' use, some of the machines started falling apart. Thus Singer suffered a deserved rap on its reputation, and most Singers made from 1968 through the mid 1980s are junk.

Enter new management for Singer, and a new era of pride in what they produce, and today's Singers are again at the top of their game and have been for the last decade.

This Singer package is an extremely good deal on a high-quality product. Gentlemen (unless you are Tim Gunn), the value of this Singer package is equivalent to a Vizio 42" TV for $99.95. Or an iPad for the same 100 smackeroos.

The "little sister" to this exact machine, the "Stylist" was a Consumer Digest Best Buy, at $400, and with only 100 decorative and utility stitches. This upgraded model of the Stylist has 400 stitches, and comes with a decent serger, to boot.

Is it a machine for beginners? More importantly, it is a machine easy enough for beginners to use, although it will keep a more experienced sewing enthusiast or tailor (Seamstress is a synonym for prostitute in 16 languages, so kindly don't call me or your mother that...) happy for years. The decorative stitches are also fun for scrapbooking, and, yes, it will sew and embroider beautifully on paper.

About the only thing I wouldn't use this machine for is repeated use on denim, upholstery or marine vinyl. The occasional hobby slipcover or pair of jeans, yes. But over and over with the heavyweight fabric - no. But then, if you sew a lot of marine vinyl, it's likely you know you need a commercial heavy-duty power machine for that work.

(This is such a good deal that I'm even getting a set, and I have a 20x20 studio full of sergers and sewing machines already!)

On to the serger: If you are completely new to sergers, think of the serger as the microwave to your conventional oven. It's very possible to live without a microwave in your kitchen, but it's damn nice to have. And most home tailors would never want to relinquish their serger once they have had one.

A serger can sew strong finished seams especially stretch seams, can finish seams on tailored garments, this serger can flatlock (activewear seams), and do rolled hems (those tiny hems on scarves and napkins.) You can also make interesting decorative ribbons for the serious crafter or scrapbooker.

This is an excellent home serger, that will sew a 2, 3, or 3/4 thread seam, but not a 2/4 seam. The 2/4 configuration is one of the heavier duty configurations you see in ready to wear and is not available on this serger. This machine will sew and finish seams on stretch fabrics, and will finish seams on woven fabrics, although I would still recommend reinforcement with a straight stitch from the sewing machine on stress areas when using a 3/4 as a seaming stitch on wovens (as opposed to a finishing stitch.)

This is a good serger for a beginner to an intermediate home sewing enthusiast. Again, it is not a professional weight, and not ideal to run in a 16-hour a day environment. But, if your shop is serging 16 hours a day, you know this.

All in all, this is an excellent gifting package for the home sewing fan in your life (and you will look like you spent $1000 at a dealer or $700 at HSN).

Yeah, I checked, HSN has it for about $700, without some of the optional stuff Woot includes.

(Damn! I was finally getting close to paying off the credit cards.)

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

Later: I got curious about my old sewing machine. I haven't seen the "New Home" brand in 50 years. Just how old is my machine? I bought it used in perhaps 1966.

Well, Janome bought the New Home brand in 1960. The few places I can find it online, my model SS 2015 is listed as "Janome New Home SS 2015", which would seem to indicate that Janome probably used the "New Home" name for product loyalty purposes and eventually dropped it. So my machine probably dates from soon before or after 1960.

It has been heavily used, and has never needed service (that I couldn't do myself). Janome is a very well regarded brand. I know when I bought my machine, New Home was near top-of-the-line.
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3347 Becs and her feline family are fine...

Sunday, August 28, 2011

[T]he interaction between students and teachers has become one of "intellectual hide and seek." The students try to match what they think the teacher wants to hear. If you can do that, you can be "successful" in school.
-- Ron Beghetto, an education psychologist at the University of Oregon --

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Just talked with Becs by phone. She and her entire feline family are alive and coping. She's been getting requests for assurances, but can't respond to all of them, so she asked me to let y'all know. (It's nice so many are concerned. I'm impressed with you all.)

Her electricity is out, which means no sump pump, so the water in her basement is about 18 inches deep. She's afraid her furnace, washer and dryer are kaput, and she's sadly lost some things, like journals and yarns.

The fire department arrived while we were talking - they'll pump out her basement for her.

Estimate for return of her electricity is this evening, so by tomorrow she may be back in the blogosphere.
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3346 Still standing

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Act now. Pray later.

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Daughter called a neighbor. He says flooding is minimal, just inadequate storm drain and overwhelmed sump pump kind of stuff, they still have electricity, and no trees in the immediate neighborhood are down. He's got 2 inches of water in his basement. He's not sure of conditions outside the neighborhood, and there's still wind, but so far so good.

(Actually, there's still a potential for flood. The little stream behind my house carries street runoff, and that can take time to build. But it's no longer a major worry.)
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3345 Which is worse?

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?
-- Epicurus, 3rd century BC --

(Epicurus makes the mistake of attributing human qualities to God.
Perhaps God is simply watching his Great Experiment, tweaking occasionally to keep it interesting.)
-- Silk --

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I seem to have traded hurricane wind-blown projectiles for tornadoes. I've been looking out the hotel window at horizontal torrents, wind-whipped trees, swaying lamp posts, and hearing tornado tracking on the TV station out of Philadelphia. I forgot that tornadoes are spawned all around the edges of hurricanes.

I dunno which is worse. In a hurricane, you've got projectiles thrown at you. In a tornado, you ARE the projectile.
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3344 In hiding

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Sometimes the squeaky wheel gets the axe.
-- RockyCat --

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I'm now in a hotel in Reading, Pa. It's funny - the parking lot is full of cars with NJ plates. Huh? It's not like Reading is an obvious place to run to. Weird.

Irene is 500 miles wide, and I'm now about 180 miles from the projected eye, so I'm not completely beyond the effects, but at least they'll be less.

Before I left the house, I filled two bathtubs and a few gallon jugs with water, took up the downstairs rugs, put all the outside flower pots in the garage, gathered important papers and good jewelry, and parked Fred on the lawn across the front of the house. Maybe he'll protect the front windows a little. At least I'm sure my auto insurance will cover him, where I'm not sure how much the homeowner's insurance will cover. Turns out I don't have flood insurance. If a window is blown out, and the house fills with rain, is that "flood"? I hope I don't have to find out.

I tried to put Fred in the garage, but he didn't fit. His rear end hung out a good foot.

I feel bad that Jasper is alone to ride out the storm. He'll hide under the bed, I think. I had to leave him because even a big storm at home would be a lot less trauma for him than a long car ride, or boarding. Jasper's the one who has seizures in the car. It really freaks him out, even with sedation.

I was careful to ensure that no matter what happens, he won't be closed out of "his" rooms. In case you ever have to do it, the way to ensure a door stays open is not to jam something under the door. If the door is worked back and forth, a doorstop can eventually be dislodged. Instead, a surer method is to squeeze a paperback book upright between the edge of the door and the door jamb on the hinge side, below the bottom hinge, resting on the floor. It isn't going to move, and in filling that space, will prevent the door from closing. In fact, if the door is "worked", the book just gets tighter.

I have this room until Monday morning. Daughter, Hercules, and the Nugget are at Hercules' father's house, just down the road. The plan is to return Monday, but there's no guarantee we'd be able to get home Monday. Depends on whether roads are open and so on. Daughter has people she can call to find out.
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3343 Missiles

Friday, August 26, 2011

When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
-- RockyCat --

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I just realized that the old house is going to get hit by Irene, too, and I have had no opportunity to batten down the hatches there. That worries me a bit.

At first I wasn't too worried about wind damage here, but walking around the neighborhood, I am now worried.

What makes people think that turning a patio table upside down is going to save it from 100 mph winds? Then there's the guy two houses down who has taken his enormous rowboat off the trailer, and turned it upside down on the front lawn. It's curved, so upside down makes it MORE likely to catch the wind.

And then there's the immediate neighbors, right over the fence to the north. Their back yard is so full of stuff, toys, benches, awnings, that when I first saw it, I thought they were running a daycare center. It's all still there. I'm afraid all their crap is going to end up in my dining room.

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

Post #3341 has been updated with current status. We are evacuating.
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3342 I think, therefore I say

Friday, August 26, 2011

Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it's thinking of yourself less.

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I was just reading a book review, some guy's book (James Pennybaker, The Secret Life of Pronouns), about how one's use of pronouns and sentence structure reveals what one is actually thinking.

Yeah, ok.

The comments kicked off some memories.

When I first started working for The Company, in 1968, I was a rare female in a male-dominated area.

I noticed that I often seemed to turn the guys off, offend them, when it came to technical discussions. No matter how much sense I was making, they would turn away and stop listening, until I was talking to a wall. I finally asked a friend what I was doing wrong.

He explained that I make definite statements, and that's not allowed for females. Males can say "This is blah blah." Women, especially small women like me, must say "I think this may be blah blah", or "It seems to me that..." or "Do you think that..." For a female to make a definite statement is seen by males as challenging their authority. A woman should appeal to that authority, not challenge it.

He was serious. This was 1968. Before women's liberation was in full swing.

His analysis infuriated me. "If I say it, it's obvious I think it, that it seems so to me, so why should I have to say I think it or it seems so to me? And especially if I know that it IS, if this is my area of expertise, why should I say it may be? That's stupid!" Especially when the guys don't have to weaken statements of fact.

Infuriating. Even worse was when guys would later take my analysis, when they rejected it coming from me, and present it as their own conclusion.

Young women don't know what it used to be like. The subtleties. How difficult is was to get past that. I'm afraid that young women now are backsliding, wagging their tails to appease men, not knowing the dangers and what it can lead to.
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3341 Hurricane, Omnipotence

Thursday, August 25, 2011

"Isn't it interesting that the same people who laugh at science fiction
listen to weather forecasts and economists?"
-- Kevin Throop III --

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

Hurricane.

According to the latest TV maps, Irene's eye is going to pass directly over us. Sunday promises to be interesting. They are predicting a 12-15 foot storm surge, on top of an astrologically high tide. I'm a half block from the bay. Neighbor George says we are 30 feet above sea level. I can't decide whether to stay here, or get Hal, Daughter, and the Nugget to someplace safer. I don't mind wind damage, as long as the house doesn't collapse wind damage is manageable, but I absolutely don't want to be stuck in a floating garbage cesspool for days, with flooded cars and no way out.

I don't know where that safer place might be.

Daughter, Nugget, and I had planned to head upriver for the weekend, she to a commitment in Poughkeepsie on Saturday, and dropping me off at the garage where Suzie the Susuki has been vacationing for the past six weeks, thence to a Mensa dinner on Saturday in New Paltz, and then I'd bring Suzie down here. Daughter and I would be driving back separately on Saturday night or Sunday morning.

Yeah, sure.

According to the maps, the eye will be tracking right up the highways to the mid-Hudson valley, right over Poughkeepsie and New Paltz, and I absolutely don't want us on the roads in that mess.

Governor Crispy-Creme is urging people to leave the shore areas, but has not yet ordered evacuations. Note the "yet".

Are they kidding? The roads around here on ordinary summer weekends are impassable. The Garden State Parkway is a creeping parking lot, full of people headed to or returning from the shore. The locals speak of "shore traffic", and they're not kidding about how bad it is. And that's just people headed for the beaches. The governor is on TV assuring everyone that they can get half a million residents out on short notice, via "marked routes". Uh huh. Sure.

Sigh.

Maybe I should buy an inflatable life raft.

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Back in the mid-70s, Dr. K. said that one of my problems involved feelings of omnipotence, that I felt I was personally responsible for everything bad that happened. No wonder, given that my father blamed me for everything.

Anyhow, it's awfully hard not to fall back into that.

I mean, there's a lot of circumstantial evidence. People have been convicted of murder on less.

Let's examine:
I bought the house last fall.
This past winter was the coldest and snowiest here in decades.
This summer had the worst heat wave in decades.
Last week we felt seismic activity for the first time ever here.
Now we're to get a hurricane, and the last time an eye passed directly over this area was in the 19th century!

I rest my case.

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

I'll be updating this post as conditions change.

Thursday 8/25 5 PM - NJ has declared mandatory evacuation of the most southern parts of the state, Cape May area.

Friday 8/26 10:45 AM - Heading north is no good. Irene will just follow us. West (inland) is best, so I went to Google maps to find out what's the best route west and what's a good place to head for. Reading, Pa., is directly west, and by marvelous coincidence, Hercules' father, brother, and grandmother live in Reading. There's a fair chance I can talk Daughter and Hercules to go to Reading. Hercules is currently in a training class just northwest of Philadelphia, planning to come home tonight. It would make more sense for him to go directly to Reading. Daughter talked to him on the phone last night, and in typical young proud homeowner / new father fashion he wants her and the baby to go to Reading, while he comes home and HAND PUMPS the basement to keep it from flooding. We have to convince him that's not feasible. His father had already invited him to ride out the storm in Reading, so maybe....

Friday 8/26 5:55 PM - I have reservations at a hotel in Reading, Pa., for Saturday and Sunday night. Daughter will be leaving this evening, joining Hercules at his father's home in Reading.
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3340 Earthquake!

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Education does not produce intelligence; knowledge does not convey the means to use it intelligently.

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I just felt my first earthquake. I've been in places where the news folks said we'd had earthquakes, but they must have been small because I never noticed. This time, my house moved a good half inch, and creaked a lot. Luckily I was leaning against the kitchen counter or I might have fallen.

It felt like a tractor trailer had hit the house, but there was no sound other than the creaking. I went outside, thinking there was something wrong with the house, like the roof fell off? Or a very big bird had hit it? Neighbors were outside up and down the street saying "Did you feel that?" and that's when I figured it out.

There must have been some very small movement or something for several minutes because even standing on the porch I felt a little dizzy.

Jasper is totally freaked. His fur is bushed, eyes are wild, and he won't let me anywhere near him.

Which reminds me, aren't dogs supposed to howl and stuff? Or is that just near the epicenter (which was between Charlotte and Richmond, Va., 5.8). If Jasper were a dog, I bet he'd be howling.

Whoa. It's a lot later now (about 25 minutes from quake) and I just felt another wave of nausea. Didn't feel any movement, though. Just a wave of dizzy.
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3339 Stuff

Friday, August 19, 2011

A lot of people you hire with good paper education can't actually do the work you hire them for.
They learn while doing the job or they don't learn at all.

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I want to see the movie "The Help" when it appears locally. When a movie is based on a book, I like to read the book first. Movies tell you what happened; books tell you why it happened. Anyway, I was a bit startled when I saw the color ads for the movie on TV. Startled because when I read the book, I "saw" the movie in my mind in black and white.

I don't know why I did that, but it is somehow appropriate.

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

I heard this on the radio, and it's SO true! "Government exists for the benefit of those in the government."

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

A friend recently said that her doctor says she's bipolar. Ya know, I suspect that's so, and I also suspect the friend already knew that. It fits. When she's up, time with her is a gigglefest. When she's up, she does get a bit impulsive, but she controls it well. When she's down, she beats herself up a bit, but it doesn't seem to last long, and she's still pleasant to others. External happenings don't seem to "bring on" either state. It's random. I think the diagnosis fits, and it's nice to have a name for it, and a starting place for leveling things out, or at least understanding what's happening. I say congratulations, and where do we go from here.

It reminded me of a close acquaintance of a few years back who made the same announcement, that her doctor finally came up with a diagnosis, that she's bipolar. I didn't have the same reaction then at all. Nope. There was no indication of any depression with her. She'd go along just fine for a little while, and then something would happen that annoyed her, usually problems with the job or boyfriend, and she'd go into a multi-month rage. She'd attack anyone who said anything to her that she interpreted as disrespectful, and when she was in that state, she saw EVERYTHING as disrespectful. She'd have major paranoia. Most people around her eventually learned to fear her, because her rage seemed to have no limits, no controls.

I'm not a psychiatrist, but even I know that's not a bipolar thing. But the doctors know only what she chooses to tell them, and she keeps her appointments only when she's not raging. And since her rages are, in her mind, completely justified, I suspect the doctors don't know.

So she was all happy because now with a label maybe they'd get her meds right. But she was a heavy (really heavy) marijuana user, and she never told any of her doctors about it. I'm sure that has to be taken into consideration when you're talking about dosages and stuff.

I wasn't happy about her announcement. I didn't see it as forward movement. Just another misdirection.

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

My furniture and "good" jewelry is almost entirely auction finds. Here's a photo catalog for an upcoming auction at the auction house where I got most of my stuff: http://www.auctionzip.com/cgi-bin/photopanel.cgi?listingid=1198164&category=0&zip=&kwd=. That's not all of it. George usually just lists a small taste. Note the Thunderbird at the end. I suspect it will go for less than 8K.
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3338 We know where our priorities are

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

You can chill with the owls at night, or you can fly with the eagles in the morning,
but likely not both.

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

Read this article from the Miami Herald:

True cost of Afghan, Iraq wars is anyone’s guess

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/08/15/v-fullstory/2360960/true-cost-of-afghan-iraq-wars.html#ixzz1VIMQsJSX


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

The averaged-out cost per service member in Bush's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq is now approaching $700,000 per year, while school districts are cutting budgets and firing teachers. One month's war budget could launch six space shuttles.

And in the meantime, Gramma eats Ken-L Ration and Grampa can't afford his blood pressure pills, Mom and Pop can't make the house payments, and Junior can't find a job, and Congress has voted to make that a lot worse.

But don't worry - the jet setters, corporations, and CEOs are doing fine, and they'll take care of us.
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3337 Ironing

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Science is neither a method nor a body of knowledge.
It is a body of changing, learned opinion, aspiring to be true.
There are certain facts about nature and history; our grasp of those facts
is constantly changing.
-- George Santayana --

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If something comes out of the dryer needing ironing, it's a very long time before that item gets worn again. I hate ironing! Some people find it satisfying or relaxing. Not me.

Goes back to my youth, I guess. In the fifties, almost everything got ironed. I can't think of anything right off that didn't. Well, socks. And stockings. My father wore knit undershirts and boxer shorts, and they got ironed. Bras got ironed. Bedsheets got ironed. Dishtowels got ironed. Hankies. If the bath towels were badly scrunched, they got ironed.

There was no such thing as permanent press. No blends. Almost everything was cotton. Clothes came out of a dryer wadded into balls, or off the clothesline stiff as a board with vertical creases and folds where the clothespins had been. Heavier cotton items could stand by themselves. Sheets were often starched so they would stay cleaner longer, and they were often so hard they could cut your skin. They'd go into the ironing basket, and the morning of ironing day you'd sprinkle them.

Wow, that's an old term - "sprinkle the clothes".

We didn't have steam irons (well, maybe rich folks did, but we didn't), so you'd dampen the clothes for ironing with a coke bottle with a sprinkler head cork in the top. Then you'd roll each item tightly and stack the rolls so the moisture could permeate. If it was going to be more than a few hours, you'd put them in the refrigerator so they wouldn't get a mildew odor.

Being the eldest of five kids, ironing the flat items fell to me as soon as I could reach the top of the ironing board. I got pretty good. I can iron a man's shirt on a flat board so that there is no crease down the sleeve. There's a correct order for ironing a shirt: collar and cuffs, back yoke, front yoke, sleeves, body, retouch collar and cuffs. You do the collar and cuffs first and last because they are dampest. And have to be sharpest. Or something. Never quite understood the logic.

Anyway, it was a never-ending task. I hated it.

Just before I left for college, there was an incident that made me swear I would never iron anything that wasn't my own personal property ever again.

My father was rushing to go to an important meeting. He took off his uniform pants (Air Force), handed them to me, and said to sharpen the creases.

I do that well. You lay them out, carefully lining up the seams top and bottom and inside the legs, fold the upper leg over the top, dampen the crease with a moist sponge to remove the old crease, iron up the inside of the bottom leg, front and back, turn the pants over, and do the same to the outside, then repeat for the other leg.

The crease doesn't go all the way up on uniform pants. It stops a few inches below the waistband. He had handed me the pants with the belt still on, and I had left the belt on, since I wouldn't be working on that part. When he walked out to the kitchen and saw me lift the pants off the board with the belt still on them, he was furious and knocked me across the room.

Hey! I thought he was in a hurry! There was no reason to take the belt off!

I realized later, of course, that there was no winning. If I had taken it off, I'd have been hit because it would have cost him time to put it back on. He just wanted to hit someone because he was nervous about the meeting.

So, it is now three husbands later, and I have managed to iron very little. You don't like wrinkled sheets? Fine. Iron them yourself. Permanent press arrived, and I got to be an expert at removing things from the dryer and hanging them before they got wrinkled.

99% of my closet doesn't need ironing, ever. Some things I have to pull out of the dryer before they're completely dry, smooth them with my hands and let them hang, and some things I know to keep to a very small load.

But something has gone kerflooey.

A lot of things that have always behaved are now coming out of my new dryer a rumpled mess.

The new house has a gas dryer. I've never had a gas dryer before. It has five levels of heat, and I'm using the middle one, and sometimes the seams are still damp when I pull the clothes out, but the body of the blouse is wrinkled anyway. Never had that problem with my electric dryers.

I don't understand. And after two hours of ironing blouses, slacks, and caftans this morning, I'm very unhappy about it.

(My iron is more than 30 years old, the spray and steam spit spitefully. I had to sprinkle the clothes! I'll have to buy a new iron. Many bad words being muttered.)
.

3336 Buying votes already.

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

“When love and skill are combined, expect a masterpiece.”
-- Demetri Martin’s fortune cookie --

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The next election is more than a year away and I'm already getting steamed.

Read this - http://www.unelected.org/how-michele-bachmann-bought-the-ames-straw-poll - for a good laugh. What's sad is that a lot of people, most, really, will think "Oh, she won. She must be good." without knowing how she won. It's amusing that many of the people she bought didn't vote for her.

(Incidentally, this article says she bought about $180,000 worth of tickets, 6,000. Other sources say $150,000, or 5,000 tickets. Perhaps the higher numbers include the singer.)
.

3335 Trickle

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Preserve wildlife - pickle a squirrel.

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

Have they figured out yet that the Trickle Down theory isn't working? There's stuff trickling down all right, but it looks and smells suspiciously like urine.

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

The Republiclowns are making sure you know that Obama's Gallup approval rating is down to an all-time low of 39%. What they're not telling you is that according to a recent CBS News/New York Times poll, Congress has a disapproval rating of 82%, and a new Rasmussen survey has found that 85 percent of Americans believe that members of Congress “are more interested in helping their own careers than in helping other people.”

Wow. Let's give corporations and fat cats another tax break. Maybe that'll fix it.
.

3334 Yogurt and Rice Pudding

Monday, August 15, 2011

"The greater the lie, the more enthusiastically it is believed and greedily swallowed.”
-- William Hazlitt --

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

I made yogurt using the recipe from a previous post. It's a bit thin, but good, and it was easy. The instructions said the first batch should "mull" for seven hours, and then you should adjust the time up or down for subsequent batches, so I guess if I want it thicker, I should go for eight hours next time. You have to experiment to find the balance you like between thickness and tartness.

Yesterday I made rice pudding. I used almond milk instead of mammal milk so Daughter could eat it, and I used Splenda instead of sugar (at 1/3 the sugar rate) so I could eat it. It's a bit bland, but good.

I'm surprised at how good the almond milk tastes. It's sweetish. Probably good on cereal.
.

3333 How?

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Rudeness is the weak person’s imitation of strength.
-- Eric Hoffer --

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

Visit Boston.com. Look at the photos. Read the captions. Then write a check to Doctors Without Borders.
.

3332 Exercise

Sunday, August 14, 2011

News for a long time hasn't been about information dissemination,
it's all been about telling us how to think and act.

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

[http://triggur.org/lj/teaparty.jpg"]

3331 Color

Saturday, August 13, 2011

“In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded.”
-- Terry Pratchett --

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

I'm reading a book now wherein the events take place in the early '60s in the south. I had forgotten how it was then. Weird.

It was a tradition in my tiny Pennsylvania mountain high school that the senior class took a trip (after the graduation ceremony but before the diplomas were given out, to ensure that no one got too wild on the trip), a ten day bus tour of Philadelphia, Washington, Raleigh, Richmond, and points south, which included a tour of a cigarette factory, Luray Caverns, Skyline Drive, Natural Bridge, and some dead presidents' homes (Washington and Jefferson).

I'm not sure who paid for it. I know that few of the families of the kids in my class could have ponied up the money, and I remember only one class money-raising scheme wherein we sold light bulbs until the local shopkeeper objected that we were taking away his business. But back then, who paid for what was not something I thought about a lot.

Those kids, being mountain folk, behaved well on the trip. The only chaperone for the 30 of us was our homeroom teacher and his (or her) spouse, also traditional. Even our "hoods" were good. The only time anyone got out of line was when we stayed one night at a motel with a decent pool, and we all broke curfew for a midnight swim.

Anyway, back to "how it was then".

The graduating class before us, Obie's class, 1961, had the only African-American kid in the school, Rosetta, the daughter of a sergeant on the base. When they found out that on the traditional tour, Rosetta would not be allowed to eat at the same counters or dining rooms, or stay in the same lodgings, let alone share a room with other girls in the class, the class voted to change the itinerary. Instead of Virginia and North Carolina, they'd go to Philadelphia, New York City, Boston, and points between, and they were all excited about it.

Only one catch. Rosetta was not excited about it. She wanted the southern tour, and refused to go if they were going northeast. I don't know what she was thinking. That she wanted to make this her personal Freedom Riders bus, or that she didn't understand that it would be much more difficult to coordinate and much more expensive? With Rosetta, either was possible. Anyway, with that Catch-22, the class ended up going north-east, without Rosetta. There were a lot of people who were very angry about it.

So, the next year, it's our turn.

I don't think anyone other than me in my class of 30 had ever been out of the county, let alone stayed in a hotel. Of the 30 of us, I think there were maybe four or five who had indoor bathrooms, and three who had a real furnace. Most had woodstoves for heat and cooking, and bathed once a week in a steel tub in the kitchen. They ate a lot of game.

I know now that we stayed in some of the rattiest hotels and motels ever. Green scum on the pools (if they had one), paper peeling off the walls, mold in the bathrooms. And we ate in places with cracked and curling linoleum floors. But back then, for most of those kids, it was luxury.

One place we stayed somewhere in southern Virginia was billed as a resort. It was perched on the edge of a cliff. Coming up the drive it looked beautiful, three stories, with a two-story portico with tall fluted columns and spreading curving steps, and leaded glass doors. The bus driver went around the back, and parked at a two-story wing with peeling paint, and rickety stairs up to a tilting balcony. That's where our rooms were. The dining room was on the ground floor, cafeteria steam tables, peeling linoleum floor, Formica tables with napkins under the feet to keep them level. I think we stayed there two nights.

At one point, the boys decided to explore. There was a door at the end of the upstairs hall. We opened it, onto a hallway papered in white and gold flocking, with a double curved staircase with marble treads, and gilded banisters, and a crystal chandelier hanging down the middle. Below was a lobby with a marble fountain.

The door had opened in, so we were able to read the sign on it.

Colored

I suspect now that everywhere we stayed, everywhere we ate, we were in the colored accommodations. Oddly, there were never any other guests wherever we went. We always had the whole place to ourselves.

I don't know if that was true of every trip every year, or if it was just the reaction of the tour company to the previous year's fiasco. "Ok, you want to play that game? We'll fix you."

Interesting to think about it now.

About the differences.

Interesting to think about traveling with The Man. Then or now.

He does get nervous in Virginia, oddly more nervous than when we were in Florida or the Carolinas.

Interesting how we forget. Some of us, anyhow. Some of us don't.

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

I found out what the "whoop whoop" sound is that I hear so often at random times. It sounded so much like a ship that I thought maybe it had something to do with a drawbridge. Turns out it's the emergency "siren", for the fire department and EMS folks. The number and pattern of whoops indicates which area is being alerted.
.

3330 Nuts

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

The trouble with political jokes is that they get elected.

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

After a long walk with Daughter and the Nugget, and after the shadow of the house covered the front yard, I weeded the lawn. I don't bend or crouch or kneel. I lay on my stomach, and crawl like a commando going under barbed wire. It's the only way.

I have solved the mystery of what's going on in Andrew Weith's "Christina's World". She's pulling nutgrass from the lawn.
.

3329 Ripoff

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Interviewee I-missed-the-name, Kingston Freeman: “If prayer is out of the public schools, it is simply because those in attendance have chosen not to pray. Individual freedom to pray is still intact. What is rightfully missing is the authority to force prayer on those who do not wish to participate.”

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

I now have a Kindle. I decide to purchase a certain book. I go to Amazon.com. The paperback version of the book is $7.15. The Kindle version, taking up no warehouse space, needing no human packing, downloaded wirelessly, pure profit after the first x copies, is $9.99!

I don't understand.
.

3328 Catching up

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

A totalitarian government tolerates free speech only as long as
it does not offend those in power.
A free society tolerates speech even when it offends.

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

I bought a double boiler, a candy thermometer, and a container of plain yogurt with nothing but milk and culture in it. So I'm all ready to make yogurt --- except --- I forgot to buy milk. Story of my life.

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

Finally got together with The Man. Yeah, he's working out of state (several states) and traveling a lot. And I have concluded that he definitely is Aspie. He told me he was way back in the beginning, but I said no, that he can converse with strangers without boring them. But yeah, now I think he simply learned how to do that. The other Aspberger Syndrome stuff is there. Among other things, it doesn't seem to occur to him that someone else would want to know what's going on.

He'd also told me back in the beginning that almost every woman he'd had a relationship with eventually broke it off because she felt neglected.

Uh, yeah. Aspie.

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

The Nugget is teething, and rolling over. And she's got the right arm and leg motions to crawl, but she arches her back so she ends up just rocking on her stomach. "Gotta get your tummy off the floor, kid."

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

I hear Dick Cheney has invited his stock broker to go hunting.
.

3327 Yogurt

Sunday, August 7, 2011

Faith is fear.
The fear of what might happen if you don't have faith.

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

I got an interesting comment from a Chobani rep on my earlier post about yogurt, #3325. She explained that Chobani doesn't contain preservatives, and that the company doesn't have control over conditions once the product leaves their hands. Yeah, ok, I understand that, about not having control, BUT my old favorite yogurts didn't have preservatives either (ingredients list: milk, cultures, nothing else) and I've NEVER found mold or alcohol in my yogurt before, even when I had taken containers on three-day unrefrigerated hotel stays. Because I was unhappy, she has offered me coupons.

Thank you, Chobani folks, but I won't be collecting my coupons. Actually, I'd rather just get my money back. Or coupons for Dannon, who has earned my trust. (Or used to have my trust, before they started adding junk to their yogurt. Sigh.)

This morning I looked into making my own yogurt. It's easy, just takes time and attention, and some equipment. First you get a double boiler and thermometer and heat milk over water to 185 F to break down the proteins, then chill it quickly to 110 F. Mix in your starter (a few tablespoons of a purchased live culture yogurt), and keep it warm (a heating pad will do) for seven hours or so while the cultures grow, then stir to smooth it out, and decant into whatever you want to store it in. There are excellent "hold-your-hand" directions at http://www.makeyourownyogurt.com/print/how-to-make-your-own-yogurt.pdf.

Well, I don't have a decent thermometer, or any large pots (not here - they're at the old house), and my attention span is famously absent, so I thought I'd look at yogurt maker appliances.

They're certainly not expensive, BUT! All they do is that last step - keep warm - the easiest and least precise step. You still have to heat the milk and cool it to the specified temperatures before putting it in the "maker". Sheesh. The last step is the only one I'm sure I can do. If I screw that one up, the yogurt just gets thicker and more tart, and I like it thick and tart. Far as I'm concerned, yogurt makers are useless. Why can't they make one that heats the milk, cools it down (maybe a separate cooling unit?), goes "bing" when you have to add the culture, and then sits there warm for a few hours. Is that so difficult?

So. I'm going to make my own yogurt. Without a "maker". As soon as I get a thermometer I trust. And two pots that will fit one inside the other. And a bag of ice. And some purchased yogurt that doesn't have anything in it but milk and culture. Good luck with that last item, getting very hard to find anything that hasn't been competitively fancied up.

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

Oh, almost forgot. The Chobani rep found my post through a search for "Chobani mold". Hmmm. Can't help wondering if they're aware they have a problem. One doesn't pick search arguments out of the air.
.

3326 What's wrong?

Friday, August 5, 2011

"I could end the deficit in 5 minutes. You just pass a law that says that
any time there's a deficit of more than 3% of GDP, all sitting members of Congress
are ineligible for re-election."
-- Warren Buffett --

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

Many people have many theories as to what's wrong with the economy, why we're in such a mess.

Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich told MoveOn.org he could explain the problems with the economy in less than 2 minutes, 15 seconds. So they gave him a shot, and he did it (with illustrations to boot).

Watch Reich Connect The Dots:


[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTzMqm2TwgE&feature=player_embedded]
.

3325 Collection, Chobani, Sister

Monday, August 1, 2011

"Who understands does not preach;
Who preaches does not understand."
-- Tao Te Ching --

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

Baby Sister, I know you read this. I missed your birthday! I'm so sorry. I say missed instead of forgot, because I didn't forget, but when the time came, I missed it! Blew right on by.

Well, I hope your day was great, and that your offspring were more attentive than I, and that the next year goes well for you. Happy birthday, Baby.

(She's baby sister because she's younger, but I can't call her Little Sister because she got the long legs, and can run faster and beat me up.)

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

I'm not buying Chobani Greek low-fat yogurt any more. I'm done. Two containers in the past week went to alcohol, and one of those two absolutely didn't get warm - it went from the store refrigerator to my refrigerator within a half hour - and the container I opened yesterday had a spot of mold in it. The foil lid was tight - no open spots - but there was mold along the edge. I don't trust the crap anymore. And that stuff's expensive!

I used to pay about $.80 for the old 8-ounce Dannon. Then they went to 6-ounce containers, and the price went to like $.68. It's been creeping up since then, of course, but was never over $.89. Well, this stupid Chobani is something like $1.39 for 6 ounces. That's ridiculous!

Dannon has become too sweet-tasting, and the local stores don't seem to stock the fat-free Dannon in the right flavors (I don't want fruit-on-the-bottom). I need to find a new good clean live-culture low-fat or fat-free yogurt. I haven't had a yeast infection in nigh on 30 years, and I don't intend to, and I credit my once a day live yogurt for that.

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

In other news, the urine collection has not gone well. I had TOLD them that one 3-litre container par day wasn't going to be enough. They patted me on the head and told me I was silly.

Well, Friday I started collecting in the acid-treated container. By 2 pm, it was already 2/3 full, and I knew the overnight collection would be most important because I take my vitamins and minerals in the evening, so I didn't drink anything from 2 pm until 8 pm. This is NOT my usual pattern. I filled the container to the top with the morning's deposit, and took it to the lab Saturday morning.

Then I started the plain container with the next piddle on Saturday. I curtailed my usual intake so it would all fit.

Don't know if you've ever done this, but they give you what is sometimes called a top hat. It looks like a plastic hat, with a brim around 3/4 of the top, and you set it in the toilet with the hat brim holding it in place in the front of the bowl, under the seat ring.

Well, when I went to bed Saturday night, I put the hat in the toilet upstairs. During the night, maybe about 2 am, I got up and filled the hat. Literally. It slightly passed the 30 ounce mark on the markings in the hat.

Sheesh! How big is my bladder? Anyway, note that that's 2 lbs of urine in the hat. I lifted the toilet seat ring to remove the hat, and the brim of the hat collapsed from the weight, dumping half the urine into the bowl, and splashing water into the hat.

I can't use that.

Now what?

I could dump out what I'd already collected from Saturday and start over on Sunday. Or I could shrug, keep what I've got so far up to 10 pm Saturday, and then start collecting Sunday night at 10 pm.

So that's what I did. Middle-of-the-night again, Sunday night, I exceeded even the previous night's. I not only passed the 30 ounce mark, but I passed the top of the hat and it overflowed into the toilet bowl. Sheesh! (Just for the heck of it, I measured how much it takes to overflow the hat. It was at least 45 ounces, not counting what got lost when it overflowed.) I tried to pour what was in the hat into the collection container, but it wouldn't all fit.

So the first deposit of the morning and the remainder of the night's had to go into a 1-quart Melamine storage container.

This is getting ridiculous. I spent much of Sunday out with Daughter and a friend, and then with Daughter until after 7 pm. They saw how much I drank during the day. From about 11 am until maybe 8 pm I had one large glass of restaurant water, no ice, and one large glass of iced coffee, half of which was ice and discarded. And then in the evening, maybe two or three 10-12 ounce glasses of water.

Where is this stuff coming from?!

Just how big IS my bladder? Actually, I suspect a lot of the overnight stuff was coming from the collection chambers in the kidneys.

Incidentally, I never used to get up in the night to piddle. That crap started in April when I had the stent. I'm not too happy with this new habit, but apparently the kidneys and bladder like it. And the doctors always tell you to piddle after sex, so if I ever have sex again (snork!), it might come in handy. (A little more TMI - I never could do it for two reasons - I get so congested and puffy there that it shuts off piddling, and, as I used to tell the doctors, "I can't piddle that many times in one night.")

So, anyhoo, I took the regular container and my storage container with the excess to the lab this morning. They were a little upset and told me that I should have asked for TWO collection bottles.

Then *I* got upset, and informed them that I DID request additional, and was refused since they were SURE I wouldn't need it. Regardless of the fact that I was sure I did.

I am so pissed.

...pun...

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

Oh, hey, something else stupid. They didn't want to give me my storage container back, because it had had urine in it. Duh? It isn't soft plastic. It's 30 years old, and solid, and can be washed on the sani cycle in the dishwasher! Also, it was MY urine! I touch it all the time.
.

3324 Collecting

Saturday, July 30, 2011

Anything that says "healthy" I stay away from.
Giving up butter, for instance, means that in about two years
you will be covered in dandruff.
-- Julia Child --

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

It's been a hair over six weeks since I had the stent removed, and it's time to do the 24-hour urine collection. (Why wait six weeks? I have no idea. Perhaps because my bladder was so torn up the urologist wanted to give it time to heal? That still doesn't explain six weeks. Maybe that was the longest he figured he could put off having to see me again.)

I picked up the collection bottles at the lab earlier in the week. Yeah, bottleS. Turns out the doctor wants a bunch of things (chemicals in the urine) tested for, some of which require acid in the urine in the bottle, and others which require pure urine, so I have to do TWO 24-hour collections. So I needed two days that I wasn't going to be going out much.

I had intended to head upriver on Wednesday evening and return yesterday, but I blew it. I got involved in something Wednesday, and time had gotten away from me and it was late and I was very tired. So I decided to leave very early Thursday morning. I've been waking automatically at 6:30 lately, so I figured I could be on the road by 7.

Wednesday night I had great difficulty sleeping. Thousands of thoughts. Tossing and turning. I even got up and came downstairs for a few minutes at 2 am. By 5 am I was still not sleeping. Then I fell asleep and didn't wake until 9:30. That would put me at the old house at the hottest time of the afternoon, I'd have lost control of the heat in the house, wouldn't be able to get it cooled down, and then I'd just have to leave again the next morning. So I didn't go. I'll go Monday.

So I've been collecting urine yesterday and today.

When the woman at the lab gave me the containers, I said, "3000 ml? I'll need an additional container for each day, these aren't large enough."

I am so sick and tired of medical folks patting me on the head and assuring me I don't know what I'm talking about.

"Oh, no, these will be plenty large enough. If you fill it this far (pointing about two inches from the top) you'll be doing really good." I told her I regularly drink a minimum of three liters a day, not including whatever fluid is in my food. She said, "Oh, not everything that goes in comes out. This will be ok."

I didn't argue further.

So yesterday, when the container was more than half full by 2 pm, I curtailed my usual intake for the rest of the day, because I knew the next morning's piddle would be especially important because that's where all the vitamins and minerals I take would show up, and that would be about 12-16 ounces, so I'd have to leave at least that much room. Which royally pissed me off, because I figure if we want to find out what's causing the stones, it's important to eat and drink as close to my usual as possible.

I took that container to the lab this morning, and it was full to within a half inch of the top.

It's NOT thirst that makes me drink so much. It's habit. I don't usually carry bottles of water with me, for example. I can be out running around all day with nothing to drink, and I'll feel no thirst. One odd thing I've noticed is that when I don't get the usual three quarts of water a day, my stomach sticks out. It's like my body pulls a reserve of fluid into the fat pad on my tummy. Camel mode. The better regularly hydrated I am, the flatter the tummy. (And the better my face looks. Wrinkles and grooves get filled in.)

"They" say that when you are adequately hydrated, your urine should be very pale, almost clear.

I never see clear, even at 3+ quarts a day. It's rarely even pale. It's usually bright yellow crayon yellow. When I've gone a day with little to drink, it's a bright intense flashing neon yellow. (When it gets dark yellow, that's infection.)

My liver's fine, by the way. And the whites of my eyes are white.

Maybe it's the vitamins and minerals? Excess getting piddled away? I don't think so, because a.) although I'm taking a large variety, it's not large quantities, nowhere near megadoses on any of them, they're just to "fill in" the holes, so to speak, and b.) I have often skipped the supplements when traveling or "just because", and there's no difference.

I'm hoping this test might answer that question.
.

3323 Maybe this will work?

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

A man who goes to the bottom of things usually winds up on top.
-- Salada Tea tag line --

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

Yesterday I went to the NY DMV website, opened an account, and changed my address for my driver's license and registrations. I think, well, hope, that's what they consider my "address of record". (Note that they never do define what they mean by "address of record".) That procedure doesn't change the address on the title, because they say that "the title is valid no matter what address is on it". (So, um, which "record" are we using the address of?)

Today I filled out the forms for replacement of the titles, using the NJ address as the "current address", and mailed them.

Now I wait six to eight weeks to find out whether it worked or not.
.

3322 Getting weird

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Alimony: Bounty on the mutiny.
-- Salada Tea tag line --

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

I'm beginning to think someone is playing games with me. The "cars" folder, which is supposed to contain titles and service records (and I know I have put service records in there!) is empty.

Now I can't find the registration cards or insurance cards. They are supposed to be in the clove compartments. I always put them in the glove compartments within a day or two of their arrival. Always! In fact, Hal and Fred have plastic cases for them. If I hadn't put the new ones in the cases, then the old ones should still be there.

The cases are empty.

It would make more sense if the cases were missing.

I don't understand.
.

3321 Kill me now!

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Honest men are slaves to their conscience, and there's no predicting 'em.
But you can always trust a dishonest man to stay that way.
-- Pirate "Jack Sparrow" --

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

I need to get my cars registered here. The local gendarme has been slowing down at the end of the driveway and peering at Fred's NY plates. One of these days he's going to ask.

In order to register them here, I need the titles. I can't find the titles. They MUST be in the old house somewhere, but I've sorted through every stack of paper, and they are nowhere. Naturally, the folder in the file cabinet marked "cars" has nothing in it.

So, "all I have to do" is apply to the NYS DMV for new copies. I have the forms. I have the $20 each. What I don't have is a way to receive them.

NYS will send the new titles only to the address of record. Period. The address of record is the old address. Even if I change the address of record (and I'd have to change it to a NY address, not a NJ address) they will send the new titles with the new address on them only to the old address.

No, you cannot pick them up in person. Impossible. Mail to address of record only.

Duh? This has to happen a lot. Why don't they have a better process?

I'm having the USPS forward mail going to the old house to the new address (there's very little by now that doesn't have the new address). The old house is no longer getting mail. HOWEVER, the USPS will not forward ANY official government mail, state or federal. It will be returned to sender, the DMV.

The two women at the information desk at the DMV office in Kingston, NY, told me that there will be a USPS sticker on the envelope telling them the new address, but they don't know if that will result in them being resent to the new address. (They, employees of the DMV, actually looked at each other ruefully and said, "After all, it's the DMV we're talking about.") So they gave me a phone number in Albany to call and ask what to do.

I have called that number - early morning, late afternoon, lunchtime, over and over - and all I'm getting is a recorded message saying that the call volume is too high and they are not taking calls, that I should go to the website. The website just says they'll mail new titles to the address of record. Sigh.

They have divided the state into area code blocks, and ask that you call different numbers for different area codes. I've tried the number for the old area code, and for out of state, and I get the same "high volume, go to website" message. Click. Crickets.

Hey folks! It's not high call volume causing the problem! It's low phone answerer volume! Put more people on the damn phones!

I don't know what to do.

The only thing I can think of is to stop the USPS forwarding, and instead have the mail held at the post office, and then pick it up on trips upriver until the titles arrive, then reinstate forwarding. BUT, it was a permanent (one year) forward, and I don't know if they'll let me do that.

Kill me now.

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

AHAH! I'll write them a letter asking what I should do! I'll even include a SASE.

(What are the chances that IF there's a response, it will be coherent?)

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

I checked the DMV website. I can change my address online for the driver's license and registrations, but not for the titles. "Your title is still valid with the old address on it."

Duh?
.

3320 A cure for poverty?

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.
-- Archilochus --

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

Low income families eat high fat, high sugar foods because they're cheaper than fresh, more healthy foods. A lot cheaper.

So some lawmakers have come up with a solution - a way to wean people off the bad stuff and force people to eat healthier foods. They want to tax the hell out of fast foods, sodas, junk food. Make them so expensive that poor people can't afford to eat bad stuff, can't take that choice as the easy way to save money. Save the state lots of money in health care costs. One guy on the news this morning was actually comparing it to the war on tobacco - that ridiculous taxes got people to quit when they couldn't afford it any more.

Uh, I don't understand.

Isn't the theory that they can't afford the healthy stuff, so that's why they eat the bad stuff? No to mention that when you have two jobs, there isn't a lot of time for shopping, chopping, and cooking. So the solution is to ensure that they can't afford any food? If it works like the tobacco thing, will they quit eating?

Actually, I suspect the lawmakers don't understand.

(Although if all the low income families starve to death, yeah, I guess that would save on medical costs.... Maybe this is the new "War on Poverty".)
.

3319 I give up

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Garrison Keillor says he speaks Danish well enough to get into trouble,
but not well enough to get out of it.

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

This is longish, but do read it.
It may be important to you or someone you know.

I saw this notice when I went to Blogger today:

Do more with your photos
Your blog's photos have their
own album in Picasa Web Albums.
Take a look.

So I went to Picasa to look.

I was faced with the usual "gotta check the box that you read the Terms and Conditions". I've worked with lawyers long enough to know that you DO read the legal stuff or suffer the consequences, but Picasa didn't make it easy. The terms and conditions were in a small unexpandable box, and each paragraph was one very long line, so you had to scroll right and left forever, as well as down.

Most people would shrug, skip it, and check the box. I copied the damn thing to the notepad, and read it, because with that extreme format, I figure they're hiding something.

I found this little gem:

11.1 You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the Services and may be revoked for certain Services as defined in the Additional Terms of those Services. [Emphasis mine.]

11.2 You agree that this license includes a right for Google to make such Content available to other companies, organizations or individuals with whom Google has relationships for the provision of syndicated services, and to use such Content in connection with the provision of those services.

That's the bit that got me banned from Facebook for life when I objected to Facebook's retaining my photos for their own use even after I had deleted them from my account. That word "irrevocable" means that once posting the photos, you can never regain control of them. Note, by the way, that paragraph 11.2 directly contradicts the last sentence of paragraph 11.1. That means that advertisers with relationships with Google can use your photos on ads offering, say, STD cures, and you have no say.

Sigh.

Oh, yeah, every photo that ever appeared on my blog is out there. I know that putting them on my blog I "gave" them to the internet, but I didn't give up my rights to control them if I so chose. I still retained the right to control --- until Google/Blogger/Picasa took it away.

I can't make the albums out there private. I did check the box to not give out the link, but I don't know what that means. Let me know if you suddenly can't see photos on entries. *I* can still see them, but I don't know if anyone else can. Please check out the immediately preceding post. Is the shirt dress still there?
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3318 Shirt Dress

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

I apologize for all my shortcomings.
-- Rhett Butler --

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I used to do this with Jay's older shirts on those lazy at-home days. He loved it.
This doesn't show it, but you cross the sleeves in back before bringing them forward.
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3317 What happened to tuna?

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Most men ... were competent in groups that mimicked the playground,
incompetent in groups that mimicked the family;
that was why all-male committees ran the most smoothly.
-- Jane Smiley, Moo --

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I've always bought solid white tuna in water. I've noticed over the past twenty years that it has been gradually changing - getting darker and less solid. It used to be white and came out of the can solid, like a tuna steak. You practically had to slice it to break it up. Now it looks a lot more like chunk light used to.

If this is what solid white looks like now, I'd hate to see what the stuff labeled chunk light looks like - cat food?

Has the tuna changed?

Or are we consumers now getting second best, they just moved the labels down the line, and the good stuff is going somewhere else?
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3316 I am my own person

Sunday, July 24, 2011

The essence of charity ... [is] not deciding what others needed and giving
it to them, but giving them what they wanted.
-- Jane Smiley, Moo --

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The biggest disadvantage of having skimpy eyebrows is that sweat runs straight down into my eyes, carrying sunscreen with it. That means red burning eyes, blurred vision, and no makeup. Heat itself doesn't bother me much, I'm otherwise perfectly willing to go out when it's hitting 100 and above. But my eyes, my eyes! The only thing anything near a solution is no sunscreen above my cheeks, and a hat.

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Got my hair trimmed last Friday. I may go back and get the back trimmed a bit closer in a week or two. They always leave the back too long and it wants to stick out.

The hairdresser was very jealous that I didn't want blowing out or mousse - "I'll just scrunch it with my hands until it dries." She said she envied my hair's body and wave. I said it was just a good cut. She raved about my color, "and it's entirely natural!" Hmmm. I'd been seriously contemplating a temporary light blonde coloring.

The main problem is that I don't know what color it is. When it was long I could pull it in front and look at it, and when I trimmed it I had some length to look at. But back then I was coloring it. Now it's natural, and the old dye is all grown out, but I can't see it.

No, mirrors don't reflect true color. And when I look at the bits of trimming on the salon floor, they look dull gray to me. When I ask people, they wrinkle their noses and say "No, not white. Not gray. Sorta blondish, I guess. But not really." Main trouble is that I think it's different colors in different light.

I think maybe in natural light, sunlight, it's a pale platinum blonde. In artificial light I suspect it's a yellowed gray, like an old linen tablecloth.

I think I'll color it.

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I've been thinking about what I said in an earlier post about women changing their names when they marry, that it's like there's been a change of ownership, changing the title so to speak.

I have come down strongly and firmly on the side of NOT changing names. I see no reason whatsoever for a woman to change her last name. When I was married to Jay I didn't change my name because I owned so much in my own name and both he and I could see no reason to go to all that bother. If anyone got fussy about it, like in the hospitals when they wanted to be sure that I was really his wife before they'd let me stay past visiting hours, I'd just say "My name is [my name], and my social title is Mrs. [his name]. There's a difference." Oddly, they all simply accepted that.

Note that although it is perfectly legal for a man to change to his wife's name on marriage, almost none ever do. Ask a man why not sometime. The answer will be illuminating.

I also think that hyphenating is downright silly. Why bother? Does a woman really have to add his name? No.

As for children, most people don't know this, but you can give a child any surname you want. You don't have to use the parent's last name(s). Just agree on something you like, and that's it. No, it doesn't cause problems. Look at all the blended families, where stepparent and stepchildren don't have the same surname, or a natural mother who changed her name on remarriage and has children of a previous marriage, or step-siblings. No big deal.

I just strongly object to the assumption (or male insistence) that a woman has to take her husband's surname. It's too much like changing title on property. (It's also unique to western Europe. Most eastern countries don't have that custom.)

The custom makes it nearly impossible to locate old female friends from high school and college. I have to know who their new owners are.
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3315 Black Metal Pad Thai

Friday, July 22, 2011

Leave the stage while the audience is still clapping.

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Like Pad Thai? Here's how to make it. This is the Vegan Black Metal Chef. He's a riot. A Kiss escapee with the most wonderful knives. The contrast between what he is - and what he's doing - and how he's doing it - and what he's doing it with - is a riot.

[http://www.youtube.com/user/VeganBlackMetalChef#p/a/u/2/CeZlih4DDNg]
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3314 Ugly stuff - avert your eyes and skip this one.

Friday, July 22, 2011

Definition: Punker - Rebel without a clue, with a high school art project hairdo.

(I suspect there's a more current term than "punker" for them,
but the effect is still the same. You know, like the guys with the rainbow Mohawks?)

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I'd mentioned that I can't wear tight jeans, that I get "bumps" on my bottom from them. Well, I also get bumps in front on the mons, around the anus, or in the creases of the groin if I wear anything that is both tight and that rubs there. (But not on the labia.)

The ones on my bottom seem to resolve quickly without getting nasty. The bump comes, complains, then goes away. The others don't.

The bad ones start out as a hard pea under the skin. The bump gets bigger. Then it gets red over the bump, and it gets sensitive. Then it gets dark gray over the bump. Then a black dot appears. The lump continues to grow until the skin seems very tight, there's no more room for it, and it hurts like hell. Then two or three weeks or so since it first started, it either forms a head under or next to the black dot, which eventually bursts and drains, or it drains through the black dot without forming a head, or, and these are the worst, it forms a tunnel deep under the skin, to the outside, and drains an inch or more from the center of the bump. The latter take forever to resolve. The drainage is almost all dark blood, with a little white pus. After two days of draining, there will be a hard plug of white cheesy stuff, and then it's done. They all usually leave a black scar spot when they're gone.

Many doctors, GPs and GYNs, and one dermatologist, have seen them. I've had many diagnoses, been told they are ingrown hairs, infected sweat glands, infected oil glands, rectal tears, my cleanliness and sexual habits have been called into question, everything. Two doctors have cultured the contents, looking for the right antibiotic, and surprise, there IS *NO* BACTERIA involved. It seems to be an immunological overreaction to something, but no one was sure what. In those few cases I had gone to the doctor when it was so painful I couldn't stand it, and about when the doctor decided to lance it after taking it down with antibiotics, by then it had resolved itself and gone away.

History:
First one. Never mind how I ended up on a horse with flopping stirrups at 24, long story, anyway the horse ran away with me and the bouncing tore up my bottom pretty well. I got a bump the size of a softball between the nether cheeks, so large and hard I couldn't close my legs. The doctor called it a perirectal abscess, and put me on antibiotics, planning to lance it once the infection was taken down a bit. But it soon burst on its own, and immediately healed.

Over the next ten years I had small ones all around that area, about one a year, painful for two to ten days, then burst and/or cleared up. (I had one smack between the vagina and anus when I gave birth to Daughter. That's probably how I avoided the "prophylactic" episiotomy everyone automatically got in those days. Doctor was afraid to cut into it.) I blamed them on leftover tears from that damned horse.

Then they moved. In my late 30s and 40s I got them mostly in the crease at the top of the leg. Smaller ones, not so painful, about one every two years.

In my 50s they moved again. Now I get them on the mons, the fluffy part, right in front, maybe one every ten months or so. The bumps get about the size of a large marble (what we used to call a shooter). They aren't very nasty, but they look bad. Try entertaining a man with a bandaid on your mons. I still get told "ingrown hair", "big pimple", and "sweat gland".

On "The Doctors" today, they had a woman who had a similar thing going on in her armpits. They said the name of the condition, but I wasn't really watching and missed it. It took me a while of roundabout searches on the internet, but I found it.

Hidradenitis Suppurativa.

It's a real thing, and the descriptions match mine perfectly! There's a lot out there on it, and as with so much, not all accounts agree. I think some sites are mixing these things up with ordinary boils (caused by a strep bacteria), lumping them altogether in the same pot. This stuff is NOT the same as a boil. It acts differently. And it's not a bacteria thing.

It's described almost everywhere as rare. HA! I'll bet it's not so rare - just that nobody recognizes it! So cases don't get reported or counted.

A few sites mention a theory that high androgens contribute. I am high androgen. High enough that back in the 60s, birth control pills not only didn't work on me, they leveled me out so that I was more likely to get pregnant.

Gee, it's nice to have a name for it, even if there's no cure. Now I can say to a man, "oh, that? That's nothing. Just hidradenitis suppurativa. Not even contageous."
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3313 Compendium

Thursday, July 21, 2011

There are no stupid questions, just stupid people.
-- South Park --

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I have decided not to go upriver today. 100 degrees is the prediction there for today and tomorrow, and there's an ozone alert. The A/C in the old house is totally inadequate. Bleck.

Here's a bunch of stuff I found wandering around and want to save:

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Someday I absolutely want to try this:
The pages are just folded, no tears or cuts.

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I'd like to try this, too. I have a dremel....

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The Orlando police have been arresting people for feeding the hungry. This guy is the lone police supporter at a protest rally. It's very good.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pJuedzzLXE&feature=player_embedded]

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This is not exactly what I want to do with the stairs in my new house - I want to paint sort of like Moroccan mosaic tile designs on the risers and varnish (poly) the treads. But this is inspiration:
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This is why I didn't change my name (for the third time!) when I married Jay:

Why do men think it's so easy for women to change their name when they marry? And why should she, anyway? It smacks of a transfer of ownership, literally a title transfer.

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And finally:
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