2581 More blood, well, actually, less

Friday, September 11, 2009

David Gerrold, “The Martian Child“: It's almost always dangerous
to be right too soon.

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

Last night I went to dinner and bar trivia in Warwick. It was the paper trivia, not NTN. You play in teams, have a lot of time to think about the answer, and bet points on your confidence. It was awfully slow, but still fun. Our group had two tables of five people each. One team came in first, and the other came in last. I won't tell you which I was on.

This morning I drank over a quart of water between 8 and 9 am, and then went to the doctor's office for a blood draw. Today's appointment was originally for blood glucose, but when they put me on the thyroid supplement and said the thyroid (TSH) had to be checked in about six weeks, we just added the TSH to the sugar appointment.

I am so glad I asked when I sat down in the torture chair, "Glucose and thyroid, right?" The gal said no, just thyroid. She checked the book and confirmed just thyroid. I freaked slightly, insisted it was both. A nurse practitioner heard me explaining about the two appointments scheduled together, came in, and looked beyond the top page in the book. "Yeah, both. See, two separate orders."

I got stuck only once, but again it was pretty bad. She needed two tubes, but I shut down before she even filled the first one. She decided that rather than stick me again, she'd transfer some blood from the one tube into another. I asked why it's so hard, are my veins too deep, or pressure too low, or what? She said I just have tiny veins.

I tried an experiment. The tourniquet is supposed to slow down return of the arterial blood pumped to the hand, making it pool up in the vein. Hmmmm. It would seem that when I get stuck, I'm not pumping much blood into the hand. This is actually a good reaction, the body being able to slow down blood to an extremity can prevent bleeding to death if it's cut. So I tried concentrating on sending blood to that hand. "Warm. Warm. Make it warm. This "cut" is ok. There is no danger. Send blood down that arm."

It didn't help then, but 15 minutes after leaving the chair I was in the bank and looked at my right hand. It was pinker and plumper. The skin was less drawn. I held my hands to my cheeks and the right one was definitely much warmer.

Next time, I'll have to try warming my hands in the ladies' room sink and concentrating on flow to the hands BEFORE I go in.

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

Tonight I'm going to the movies in Albany. We'll see "9". The organizer keeps changing things. Show time is 8 pm. Originally we were supposed to meet at the tables next to the ticket counter at 7:30. The theater is on the second floor of a large mall. A few days ago he changed to meet at the escalator (top or bottom?) at 7:15. Now he says to meet at the elevator (elevator? there's an elevator?) at 7. For an 8 pm show? I know where the escalator is, but elevator? Obviously there must be one, but where? And which floor will he be at? Ground floor, or the theater floor?

At this point I have reason to believe I'm smarter than the organizer. I'll go a little early. I'll find them. Or I'll just go alone.
.

2580 Ack ack!

Thursday, September 10, 2009

LaVerne on Empty Nest:
“Those who help those who won't help themselves are stupid.”

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

I opened a new quart bottle of Hot V8 about a half hour ago, and poured six ounces into a 12-ounce glass. When I went to put the bottle into the refrigerator, I set it right next to an already-open bottle I'd forgotten was there.

So I took the old one out, peered into it. It looked good, smelled ok, so I poured the remaining three ounces or so into the glass.

Then over the next 20 minutes I sipped at it --- until I got almost to the bottom, and noticed the lump resting on the bottom. A V8-colored fuzzy lump, about two inches across and an inch thick.

If I die this afternoon, it will be from moldy V8.

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

A few comments on Pres. Obama's health care speech last night.

He talked about how insurance companies would not be allowed to deny coverage for preexisting conditions, or to drop coverage during treatment of expensive conditions. Note that nothing was said about insurance companies not being allowed to raise premiums for preexisting or expensive conditions. If I can't afford the coverage, it may as well be denied or dropped, and private insurance companies are run for profit. Period. Their purpose is not to assist me. That's the one advantage of socialized medicine, the nonprofit aspect, but it's a big one.

Second, it was emphasized that illegal aliens would not be eligible for the insurance programs. That doesn't really say anything. Yeah, they can't apply for and get the insurance policy and id and so on, but if an illegal alien shows up at an emergency room with a life-threatening injury or serious illness (or any illness for that matter, or if it's a child, or a pregnant and delivering woman), does that mean he/she/it will be turned away? Doubtful. I'm not sure I'd want to live in a country that would turn them away. So who pays for the care? And isn't that a kind of insurance we all pay for, either through taxes or increased hospital costs? That's another advantage of socialized medicine. Nobody cares who you are, all humans are treated humanely.

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

I'll be going to dinner and bar trivia with some southern Orange county Mensans this evening.
.

2579 Disaster in Russia

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Jef Mallett: "An opinion should be the result of thought,
not a substitute for it."

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

Rather than attempt to net it out, I'll just copy from Boston.com:

"On August 17th, near Sayanogorsk in south central Russia, a catastrophic accident took place in the turbine and transformer rooms of the hydroelectric plant of the Sayano-Shushenskaya dam. The exact cause is still under investigation, but what is known so far is that a tremendous amount of water from the Yenisei River flooded the turbine room, causing at least one transformer explosion and extensive damage to all ten turbines, destroying at least three of them. 74 workers are known to have lost their lives in the accident, while one remains missing. Additionally, 40 tons of transformer oil were spilled into the river, killing an estimated 400 tons of trout in two fisheries. Investigators plan to release findings in two months, as Prime Minister Vladimir Putin called for a nationwide infrastructure inspection. (32 photos total)"

The link at the end of the paragraph will take you to the photos.

This is a huge human and ecological disaster, but until I got the alert for the photos today, I had been completely unaware of it.
.

2578 She does know how to smile!

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Alfred North Whitehead: "There are no whole truths;
all truths are half-truths.
It is trying to treat them as whole truths that plays the devil."

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

I just saw Julianna Margulies on tv, and she smiled! A bunch of times! In one hundred thirty-five episodes of ER, I swear I never saw her smile, not once, no matter what. I thought she didn't know how. Or maybe that "happy" or "amused" were not part of her acting repertoire.
.

2577 Temporarily shortened feeds

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Sir Richard Francis Burton: "The more I study religions
the more I am convinced that man never worshiped anything
but himself."

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

I have temporarily shortened the feeds. If you are reading this on (through?) a feed (as opposed to having had to go to the actual blog to read it) and you can see the whole post, I'd very much appreciate it if you would please go to the blog and leave a comment (anonymous is ok), and tell me what feeds aggregator or reader you are using (Bloglines, Google, etc.). I'm trying to figure out how that works.

Thank you for your assistance. When I get the info I need, I'll go back to full feeds.
.

2576 Bored

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Aldus Huxley (alleged): "An intellectual is a person who's found one thing
that's more interesting than sex."

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

I volunteered at the tourism booth at the Woodstock/New Paltz craft fair yesterday. They had a lot more materials, a better location, and REAL county maps this time. A lot more people stopped by, so even though I'd left my book in the car, I didn't miss it.

One woman asked me how to get to the Mohonk Mountain House. I pulled out one of the maps and showed her the route. Later I realized I'd sent her to the wrong place. I always go up the hairpin turns to the climbing cliffs, and walk to the hotel from there, a few miles of sometimes rough terrain. I should have sent her around the other side of the mountain to the main gates, where she could get a shuttle to the hotel. I felt really bad about that for a long time.

It annoys me that they include "Woodstock" in the advertising for the annual craft fair. It's on the county fair grounds, a few miles outside New Paltz. It's about 30 miles from Woodstock. They can't even claim that most of the exhibitors are from Woodstock. The vast majority are from out of state. I think they use the lure of Woodstock to draw city folk. I consider it false advertising. Bait and switch. I'll bet some people arrive expecting to walk along the Woodstock village streets, looking at all the artistry....

Nothing much else going on.

A nifty link: http://www.mentalfloss.com/, where knowledge junkies get their fix.
.

2575 Photos from the past

Sunday, September 6, 2009

Old Italian saying: If you’re standing with one foot in the past, and one foot in the future, you’re pissing on today.

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

Jay's sister sent me a large box of some of the photographs she found when cleaning out Jay's father's house. I went through them last night. A lot are from Jay's childhood. Some are of him and his ex-wife, and many are of him and me.

When I met him, in his middle thirties, he was a big man, 6'3", 240 pounds, with a very small round potbelly. Judging from these photos, he was always tall, and until his thirties, he was skinny. If it weren't for the dates on the back of the photos, I'd be unable to judge his age. There was also a boy scout uniform shirt in the box. I remember him telling me that he had been a cub scout, but was in the boy scouts for only a few years. The shirt fit me. I wear a 40" chest.

Many of the photos including me were a surprise in more ways than one. Half of them, I have no idea where they were taken. I can tell when by the date on the back, but unless they were in a known house, I have no idea where, or what the occasion was.

I had gained weight after we got married in 1994. During Jay's illness, starting in 1999, I lost a lot of weight and gained a lot of muscle. I looked great, and that's an objective opinion. Then after he died at the end of 2001, I gained a lot of weight. By 2005 I was the heaviest I'd ever been. I knew I was heavy then, because I couldn't find clothes to fit. What I didn't know was how I looked back before he got sick. It was about 10 pounds less than 2005's high, and looking at those photos, I can't believe I didn't know how bad I looked, or that I ever got even bigger.

I guess have a distorted body image. When I look in the mirror, I think I look fine, in the face and figure. But when I see photographs I'm shocked. My face is older than I realize, and my body is, um, wider. My weight has fluctuated wildly over the past fifteen years, a 50 pound difference between the highs and the lows, but except for right now, I never really realized when I was heavy.

I think perhaps I tend to see myself as my romantic interest sees me. Jay thought I looked fine back then. The Man, now, would prefer me a bit heavier, I think. Me, I want my spectacular thirties back.

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

A selection from the box.

Jay's father worked for Kodak, and took a lot of pictures. He viewed the world through a lens. A good portion of the box contents is his kids, frame after frame, pose after pose. He'd set Jay up with a toy - maybe a toy truck - on a side table, and obviously said "play with it", and then took picture after picture. Those kids must have spent some miserable afternoons.

He took a lot of pictures when he visited us, but I'd never seen any of them until this box arrived.

December 1954. Jay would have been 33 months old, and look how tall he is. The older sister would have been about ten years old.
1964. Jay at about 12 years old. The shirt he's wearing, that fits me, was also in the box.August 1984. This was right about the time I first met him.
October 1985. This house under construction. That's Jay, his ex-wife, and his mother on the deck. This is the back wall of the living room. The trees have grown up since, so that view is now available only in the winter when the leaves are gone.
October 1985. Construction, this house, no fireplace mantel yet. That's the dining room around the corner to the left, and I included this photo to show that there's more glass in the dining room. Master bedroom has more.
December 1987. Three years before he left the Ex. Seven years before we married. He's 35 in this shot, and look at all the white starting in his beard already. He and the Ex had been married about four years, and he was unhappy. They had been dating in Texas when he was transferred to NY, so they got married rather quickly. Within months he was sleeping in the guest bedroom, and she had pretty much set up a life separate from him. He had always wanted children. After they were married, she said she didn't want children. She was deliriously happy in the marriage. She was supported, nice house, handsome escort whenever she wanted to go out, major travel twice a year, and she didn't have to do anything in exchange. Before he left the office every day, he'd call her and she'd tell him what takeout to pick up. We, his friends, knew he was not happy, but we didn't know why.
------------------
You'll notice that from here on down, every time you see me, my hair is a different color. It isn't really. I didn't do anything to it. I considered it a dark reddish-brown, like in the 1995 photos, but what color it looks like in photos is rather random. It seems to depend on the lighting, and whether the light shines through it or on it, natural light or flash.
------------------

September 1994. The mini-Schnauzer belonged to Jay's father. That dog hated me. Bit me seriously three times over the next few years, and yet every time his father went to Europe on his annual trip, he insisted on leaving the dog with us. The blond dog, Baby, was left with us when Daughter went to college, and promptly fell madly in love with Jay. The gray Keeshund, Ninja, had a skin problem, so we had to keep him clipped. And here's a "heavy" photo. I look like a walking cracker box.
February 1995.
February 1995.
June 1995. Ninja and me. Jay's father would find a pose he liked, and then insist that everyone do it.
June 1995. Jay, same pose, with father's dog Robin. There are versions of various combinations of animals and people, but none of me with Robin. That dog hated me.
January 1996. Yes, I'm standing.
June 1998. Daughter's cat Scruffy, who also moved in with us when she went to college. Scruffy was a huge mellow Maine 'Coon cat, a Harley biker in a cat suit. I'm sorry his tail isn't in that picture. It was a huge fluffy raccoon tail. And look how light my hair is with the sun shining through it.
Later: When I checked the posting, the song that played was "Where Have All the Flowers Gone". Sniff.
.

2574 Oh, by the way ....

Saturday, September 5, 2009

Henry Ford: "You can't build a reputation on what you are going to do."

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

I ran into Vinnie and Piper in the village yesterday. Vinnie says the driver in the accident Tuesday walked away. No injuries. I still had the photos on my camera and showed Vinnie. Hard to believe, when you see the truck, the pole, the signs, the ditch.

The theory is that he was texting and went straight through the slight curve. I'd worried that it was a heart attack or something.
.

2573 Advertising education required

Saturday, September 5, 2009

Napoleon Bonaparte: “Never interrupt your enemy
when he is making a mistake.”

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

I browse real estate listings when I'm bored. I like looking at houses. There are some beautiful houses relatively cheap in upstate NY, but California is still grossly overpriced.

One thing I will never understand is why some homeowners or realtors take pictures that seem to show nothing more than the furniture. The furniture doesn't come with the house, so why?

Like this one:

What am I supposed to glean about the house from that photograph? I can't tell if it's a breakfast nook or dining room. It gives me no sense of the size or layout of the room or house, of light sources for the room. Nothing. All it tells me is that I hope it's part of an eat-in kitchen, because I don't care for that floor in a dining room. This photo would be appropriate only if one is selling the furniture. The house listing is here. If you go there, note that the living room photo is also furniture-oriented, leaving me wondering where and how large the windows are, and where doorways are.

2572 Flames

Friday, September 4, 2009

Jerald Bevens, in a letter to "Newsweek": “We need our heroes, but soon there will be no more. Our world will not grow men with the credentials necessary to survive scrutiny.”

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

Yesterday I had lunch with Piper and a blogger from NJ, who showed me some of her in-process needlework. She has a great sense of color. She and I then went to Olana, and toured the house, where there was also a great sense of color.

I am color-deprived and color-challenged.

I went clothing shopping locally this afternoon for the first time in ages. I happened to hit a sale, and bought eight tank tops for $24 (yeah, that's $3 each). At that price, I had to get one in every color.

After leaving the store, I was stopped at a light, and noticed a wisp of smoke rising from low shrubs in the median between the entrance and exit of a large grocery store. Within seconds there were flames, and in another few seconds it had spread and was shooting flames 10 feet high.

With as much rain we've had lately, I was surprised live greenery burned so fast.

When the light turned, I pulled into a restaurant parking lot across the street to call 911, but by then I could hear the sirens down the road, and I saw three store employees running across the parking lot with fire extinguishers, so I just sat and watched.

I am always amazed at the number of drivers who don't stop or pull over for emergency vehicles. One woman waiting to exit the lot just as the fire truck arrived actually pulled out when her light changed, right in front of the fire truck, making it wait to pull in until she was through the intersection.

Idiot.

This evening I'm going to dinner in Troy, with a bunch of strangers.
.

2571 Heading out

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Kenneth W. Sollitt: That which one man receives without working for,
another man works for without receiving.

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

I'm going to a movie in Albany tonight. "Adam". Asperger syndrome. Review here: http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/07/29/movies/29adam.html.

Should be interesting. Jay was an Aspie.
.

2570 The Baa-Studs

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Amy Tan, The Hundred Secret Senses:
"When there is great suffering, ... everyone suffers the same.
But when there is peace, no one wants to be the same.
The rich no longer share. The less rich envy and steal. ...
[E]veryone is seeking luxuries, pleasures...."

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

Extreme sheep herding:

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1137883380?bctid=17075685001

-or-

http://video.telegraph.co.uk/services/player/bcpid1137883380?bctid=17075685001

Who in their right mind would have thought of this?
.

2569 Complications

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Marge Simpson: We can't afford to shop at any store that has a philosophy.

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

I was supposed to go to dinner and bar trivia in Albany tonight, but circumstances conspired to prevent it.

I had a few errands to run - take a box of rejected Nutrisystem food to UPS for return, bank to get cash, gas station to fill up, heating oil office to ask about the budget program for this winter, post office to pick up a box of photos of Jay that his sister sent, drop some papers off at Piper's office, grocery store, and a few other things.

While I was in Piper's office, several police cars screamed past heading up the road, followed by the fire department heavy rescue vehicle (that says it's an auto accident) and the ambulance. About an hour later I headed home, after filling the back seat of my car with about $50 worth of frozen food. I had just enough time to wash and dress and make it to Albany.

I found out where the accident was. On the corner of my street and the highway.

The highway and my street were closed. The flagman let me through to park at a farm stand just down from my street, where the car (and frozen food) sat for the next hour and a half. I walked down to check out the damage.

A truck had gone off the road at a slight curve (a VERY slight curve) and took out a telephone pole near the intersection. I mean TOOK OUT. Flat on the ground, cut right at the base. The pole happened to have a transformer, which had exploded. There were downed wires all over the place, and across the intersection.

The red vehicle in the following photo is a tow truck, pulling out the demolished vehicle. It's across the end of my street. You can't see the street until you're right on top of it, and it looks like we lost the "reduced speed" limit sign and the street sign, too, so this could be fun for a while. Note all the wires down, and the pole butt on the right.

By the time I got there, the police and fire department had left, and it was all electric company people, and they didn't know if there had been any injuries. I noticed that there were no skid marks on the road - the guy must have hit the pole at full speed. There was some confusion as to whether the transformer had exploded before or after the accident.

Cutting up the dead pole, and preparing to plant a new one (on the right, on the truck):

The truck that hit the pole:
I was a bit relieved to see so little damage to the windshield and roof of the cab - that bodes well for the driver - but was a bit amused to see all the damage to the rear of the truck. It looked like the pole "vaulted" over the cab, and then landed on the van section in the back, ripping off the roof and flattening the sides.

Of course when I was finally allowed through the intersection, I had no electricity at home for several hours. That also meant no water or land line phone.

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

I haven't mentioned the diet in a while. There's nothing to report. I'm still sitting at 12 pounds down, on less than 900 calories, over six meals a day. My tummy is a little smaller, and my waist is a little better defined, and my bras are emptying (whoa!), and my underpants are drooping, so something's happening. But not much. I still can't comfortably wear 2007's clothes.

As to the returned Nutrisystem food, as I explained to them, when someone orders certain selections on their first order, and then even fewer selections on their second order, it usually means they don't like! the stuff they didn't order, and especially didn't like the stuff they didn't REorder. So it is the height of stupidity to select the 28 bonus meals from items the customer has obviously already rejected! That isn't much of a bonus.
.

2568 The green quotes

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Lewis Grizzard: We ought to keep the rich as rich as possible,
because nobody poor was ever able to afford
to give anybody else a job.

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

A commenter has asked where I get the green quotes I've been including lately (which rarely have anything to do with the subject of the post, by the way).

I've been saving them for probably 40 years or more. Any time I'd hear or see or read something that strikes me as succinct, or oh-so-true, or makes me think, makes me wonder, I'd jot it down or tear it out, and tuck it away.

Sometimes I don't agree with the sentiment at all, but I still admire the way it was phrased, or the way it made me think. Into the box it went.

When computers came along, that was one of my first tasks - to gather up many years of scraps of paper, and put them all in one neat file.

Now I'm pulling them out, one at a time. Randomly.

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

I also get feeds from "Quotes of the Day", but I don't often use any of them. Most of them are too "New Yorker"ish for me to fully appreciate them. They often have a pretentiousness, a false sophistication, that annoys me. (Like "The New Yorker" itself. I can't appreciate a magazine with cartoons that aren't funny or are just too too sneeringly precious. Don't much care for abstract art, either. Or those who pretend to "interpret" it. Pardon my blue collar. I don't like quotes with undercurrents of sneer.)

Many "Quotes of the Day" that I do like I already have. I end up collecting maybe one a month or fewer from that source.

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

The particular quote that the commenter liked is a favorite of mine not as much for its content as its source.

I spent a week in 1980-ish at a retreat with Trudy Bell (editor for Scientific American magazine(1971-78), founding senior editor for Omni magazine (1978-79), a senior editor for IEEE Spectrum magazine (1983-97)), Isadore* Adler (worked in extraterrestrial geosciences, utilizing remote imaging from satellites, played a major role in the Mariner, Viking, and Voyager missions, consultant on the VLA project), and Isaac Asimov (who doesn’t already know Isaac? BTW - science fiction is a minor part of his CV.), and about 19 other people. We worked on a "project for the feds", between fun activities.

Isaac autographed a book for me, “To the top banana with the great pear.” The book is packed away in the basement at the moment, so I can’t check whether he spelled it “pear” or “pair”, but the meaning was unmistakable. That was my Dolly Parton phase, before Mae West moved in.

I got that quote straight from the horse's mouth.

[*I've also seen it spelled "Isidore". Not sure....]
.

2567 Life in Sand

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Jay, on surveys taken on college campuses:
College is not "real world". In fact,
you can't even see it from there.

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

This is Kseniya Simonova, who won with this performance on "Ukraine’s Got Talent", with her "Journey of Man" in sand and light. The video is about 10 minutes long, but it's worth every second. If you don't have time for it now, bookmark it and come back later. (Don't forget to turn the music off - pink box over there on the left.)

Clicking twice on the video or once on the link below it will take you to YouTube, where you'll find more of her work in the "related videos" on the right.


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

(Did you think of fingerpaints?)
.

2566 Perfect Day!

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Jay: I may be wrong, but I am never in doubt.

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

The weather is absolutely perfect today! It rained before dawn (the perfect time for rain every day) so the road is still wet where it's shaded by trees. The sun is bright and warms your face or back. There's an occasional brief soft breeze. The sky is blue with a few puffy white clouds hanging in place. The temperature is 73 F.

I want to find a place where it's like this every day, all year. I'd give up almost all my possessions and live out of a suitcase to move there. Really.

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

Later edit - Asheville, NC. Even has mountains.
.

2565 Cold

Saturday, August 29, 2009

Those who think history repeats itself will be forced to relive it.

(Not what it seems.)
-----------------------------------

I could have taken stuff to the recycle center this morning. I didn't. I could go to the county fair today. I won't. I could go to an auction this evening. I shan't. Instead, I'm holed up here trying to keep warm.

It's cold out there! Low 60s. Right now it's above 70 in the house, but I think I may have to switch from A/C to heat by this evening. I figure what few warm days we'll have from now on can be handled by windows and the attic fan.

After spending Thursday at the hospital with FW, I did absolutely nothing yesterday, except clean out all the stuff that had arrived on the internet. I don't know why, but I didn't feel like doing anything else. It looks like today might be the same.

I've got medical insurance stuff to work on, and the father-in-law's estate is about to be settled, so I've got an 80-page report to review and then I have to call the attorney, and Daughter wants me to locate childhood photos for her, and I'm to the point where if I don't do laundry soon I'll have to buy more underwear, and, and, and .... I probably won't do any of it today.

You know, I think it's just because it's cold. I can't face losing summer.
.

2564 A Day in the Hospital

Friday, August 28, 2009

Me: Divorce is tortious, tortuous, and torturous.

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

FW had been having abdominal pain for several weeks, to the point where she was unable to work. She'd had all kinds of scans and tests, and nothing showed as the cause, so she was scheduled for exploratory laparoscopic surgery yesterday.

She needed a ride to the hospital, and since I am the only person she knows who doesn't work and who also has a car (even though I live a hair over an hour away), I was elected to take her in. I was grateful that she wasn't scheduled for one-a-them early hour arrivals.

We arrived at the hospital a little before noon. She was installed in a room, with a gown and an IV, and we waited about five hours before they finally wheeled her away. We'd have no idea whether she'd be staying the night until it was over, so I had to wait.

During the pre-surgery wait time, we talked a lot. We haven't really associated much in the past year or more, ever since I decided her mood swings were too much for me (and her vicious attacks when I didn't meet her expectations were poisoning me), and I withdrew. So there was a lot of ground to cover.

Naturally, she was worried, and they weren't allowing her any pain killers, so she was in pain. I was trying to think of non-lethal causes for the pain, like pinched nerves in the lower back and so on. Along the way, she mentioned that a few years ago she'd had an enormous (benign) tumor removed from an ovary, and I offered adhesions as the most likely possibility.

Yup. I should be a diagnostician. They freed the adhesions and released her at about 9 pm. She was still a bit weak (but no longer groggy) when I got her home. She has steep stairs in her house, and the only bathroom is upstairs, so we installed her upstairs with water, takeout Chinese, and phone, and orders not to attempt the stairs until morning.

I got home just before 11 pm. Called her this morning. She's fine.

Now I'm in a minor panic. I know she's going to want to renew the old ramming around we used to do, and I can't fall into that trap again, because she WILL turn on me again. The verbal attacks. I can't. This is the woman The Man laughingly refers to as my "psycho ex-girlfriend". I just can't.
.

2563 Yeah, ok.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Deepak Chopra, quoting a Vedic scholar: I am that; you are that;
this is that; that is all there is, and if you understand that,
you understand all.

I don't understand.

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

I'm in love again. The red flags are still flapping in the wind, and I don't care.

It took him six months to use the "L" word, so I gather he doesn't use it lightly. I mentioned to him last night that he'll say "I love you" easily on the phone or in an email, but he'd never yet said it to my face. So he did. And to my ear. And to the top of my head. And he signed this evening's email:

Love you, to your face,
[The Man]

Sigh.

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

Later: After filing this post, I went to the blog to ensure it got posted correctly, and as I was proofreading it, the music started up. It was Tracy Chapman's "Give Me One Reason".

Coincidence?
.

2562 Community gardens feed the community

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

Isaac Asimov: Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.

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Quick note. I'm meeting Piper for lunch on the riverside patio of the Rhinecliff Hotel, and then meeting The Man later this afternoon, so I need to get moving.

I caught the first few minutes of Martha Stewart before I changed the channel. She was talking about feeding your family from vegetable gardens - in your back yard (shot of her enormous garden), patio containers (shot of a lonely tomato plant surrounded by herbs), or a community garden (shot of fenced area with neat raised beds).

Ex#2 and I participated in a community garden effort when Daughter was a toddler and we lived near Gaithersburg, MD. We worked hard, preparing the soil, fertilizing, weeding, picking insects, and although our section was the most healthy and productive, we never got to eat anything from our plants. There were apparently others in the neighborhood who considered it a food bank, and everytime I went to check and hoped to gather, our produce had been stripped.

I don't see how a community garden, the type where each person has a plot and grows and picks their own choice of plants, can possibly work without a 24-hour armed guard, and checking of ids against plots.

When I lived in Highland, I briefly belonged to a garden co-op. Designated people tended the garden, and members could go and pick up a bag every week containing whatever was ready that week. That didn't work for Daughter and me, because it wasn't our choice of produce, and we could eat only so many turnips and pumpkins per week.

I'm trying this. Whether it look right or not will depend on Blogger's formatting, but here goes:
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¸.·´¸.·*´¨) ¸.·*¨)
(¸.·´ (¸.·´ * Silk

Edit: Nah. Blogger removed some of the necessary blanks. Suggestions? What I need is a unprinted character in the bottom line to replace the blanks, or a different font that doesn't close up the spaces. ???