and then my mind went, 'wheee, whee, wheeee' all the way home

sometimes, dealing with service-oriented (snarky alert) folks tests my mad social skillz; cuz i'm proud of my ability to quash that urge to scream, "pull your head out and listen to me" while simultaneously restraining my desire to lunge forward, grabbing their ears and stretching them toward me. yeah, i'm that much fun. i could cite many examples, but one of two recent conversations with doctors' offices fit the bill, as does an extremely trying live-chat with my ISP representative {hazel, lying is never a good idea...particularly to a client who could go elsewhere, taking others with them; something ya might wanna keep in mind, esp since the chat was transcribed and sent to my eMail. i'm just saying.}

several years ago when i chose my gp {yep, i interviewed her for the position of being my doc. i figure, she's providing me with a service, working for and with me; i get to ask her a few questions prior to making the switch and filling out all that paperwork that no one looks at anyway}, i had to have blood drawn every four to six weeks so that we could regulate one of the meds i was taking and also so we could check to make sure my liver &/or kidneys weren't failing {no one likes to fail, no one}. this meant that the staff and i got quite chummy. it was to the point that i'd call, they'd recognize my voice at "hello". it also meant that i'd walk in the office, and the staff would have me processed before the door even shut {of course, those hydraulic hinges sllllllllllllllllllllllllllloooooooooooooooow things down lots; but still}. even the pharmacist in-house would greet me by name (and i didn't even get my drugs there).

all that was quite handy when i would not be making much sense, due to medication interactions; or cuz i was in the throes of a panic attack {my gp and my therapist are on close terms now, yea me}. i also try to make sure that i don't take undue advantage of any of this, and do not expect preferential treatment. most of the time, that is. there was that once about two months ago when i received jury-summons, again. but i think i told that story then.

and everyone calls jaynie ____, "jaynie"; that's the way she likes it. she doesn't really get all hung up on titles like, "doctor" or "md" or the like. it's one of the many reasons i like her, she isn't self-important.

i digress.

since my prescriptions only have one refill left, i figured it was time for me to make an appt to get blood drawn (i only have to do that about twice per year now, meds changed and so i'm good; my blown veins thanked the docs very much) and another round of meds w/refills good to go for another few months. so i called the doc's office.

receptionist: {mumble.mumble.mumble} ken ah hep ya?
me: yes, i'd like to make an appt for june, with jaynie.

rec: there's no june here.
me: i'd like to make an appt for sometime within the month of june. with jaynie.

rec: oh, juuuuuuune. ok. i have an appt tomorrow available.
me: yes. i'd like to have the appt sometime in the month of june.

rec: ooooooooooookay. with which doctor?
me: with jaynie please.

rec: there is no doctor jaynie here.
me: k, is this the ___ family clinic?

rec: yes.
me: k, does jaynie ___ still practice with this clinic?

rec: ooooooooooooooooooooh, jaynie...yes.
me: k, i'd like to schedule an appt with her.

rec: have you been seen here before?
me: yes, i'm jaynie's patient and my name is debra ____; that's spelled ______.

rec: are you sure you've been seen here before? i can't find you in the computer.
me: yes. i'm in there. for several years now, i'm in there. perhaps you might want to try again, my last name is spelled _ _ _ _ _ _.

rec: uhm yes, no. i'm not seeing you.
me: hm. k. in this area, the common spelling of my last name is with "a g and an h". my last name is not spelled with a 'g h'; it's spelled _ _ _ _ _ _.

rec: {pause} uhm {longer pause} aha! k, that's spelled ______.
me: yes.

rec: ok. and your first name?
me: debra d.e.b.r.a {knowing i'm the only one with that last name for counties and counties around, but hey, routine is routine, don't rock the boat}

rec: ok. so tomorrow at...
me: no. i need it for june. like next week or later.

rec: oh! why didn't you say so? {mumble mumble mumble}
me: { }

rec: k, so that will be june blah blah blah blah blah...wait! what's the problem?
me: excuse me?

rec: sigh. what is the problem?
me: check up and med refill, probably a blood draw and some lab work.

rec: i'm not sure i can make that appt.
me: { }

rec: wait, no, i can. i can do this. yes, so then that'd be june blah blah blah. with doctor xyz.
me: no. i am jaynie's patient. i don't see doctor xyz.

rec: oh. hang on. mumble mumble mumble. k, then. we'll see ya then.
me: on june blah blah blah? at blah blah? with jaynie?

rec: yes.
me: k, thanks.

rec: sure, no problem. glad i could help.

dude, i shoulda just showed up, waited til i one of the more familiar peeps was free, and made the appt with her. i'd've actually saved time even with the driving to the office than i'd spent on the phone with this person. and saved a few neurons too. that's me. alllllllllllllllllll about the neurons.

mow, mow, mow yer moat

lightly lest you stick...

jert mows a huge amount of yardage, several acres. and since all the land he lives on usta be a working farm, grazing land, farming fields, and such; well, the grass is not so much as grass as it is weeds and hay. so he has a riding mower that tackles most of the area; tho there is a bit of landscaping to mow around and weed-eat. any way, the job takes most of a day, hours and hours and more hours galore. and the grass grows fast. thick and fast.

there's another element that makes it even more challenging. the land here doesn't drain properly. so there is lots of standing water, vast swampy marshy areas and lawnmowers don't mix. so not only do we need to watch for no rain, but we also need to have plenty of dry days prior to even thinking about mowing, let alone doing it. but jert doesn't want to wait tooooo long between mowings, cuz the grass grows fast and cuz it is so dense, it means that the dew never really burns off.

his front yard not only doesn't drain well, it seems to not drain at all. there are crawdad mounds throughout the property (i'd never seen them just dotting people's yards before) and a fast majority seems to be right in the front area. so there looks like a partial moat just in front of the huge front porch.

there used to be some children's toys out front, in that moated area. one was a thick plastic slide that sat only two and a half feet or so off the ground (for lil kids, mind). so when it would rain, no matter how lightly or how little, the front yard would look like a water park for toddlers. complete with a water slide for tykes.

thing is, the mud never has a chance to completely dry and so there is all manner of fecund growth out there. ooooooooooOOOooooo can'tcha smell that smell...? we've got the funk. again, the damn head-track plays apropos choruses repeatedly. ackAckACK!!!

the whirlwinds

how the hell did it get to be this late in the year already?!?! dudes, it's soon to be june. that means almost half the year is {POOF!} gone. my mental soundtrack is stuck on 'floyd's "...and you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking..." as i scurry about like a frenzied rodent, wringing my hands and muttering, "things to do, people to see, places to go"~~well, ok, sometimes i do get that all jumbled too and it ends up being "things to see, people to do, places {clap.clap} PLACES! every one!!"

another semester is done. another school year for the kids is finished. soon there will be vacation bible schools popping up everywhere and parents will be looking for some relief from their young'uns.

we put the last of the camping gear up, dried out and waterproofed the tent and tarps, refolded the air mattress and the sleeping bags, and repacked the poles and such. that was a huge step that i'm glad we are thru with for the time being. i really need to focus on some other things, stuff that i've been letting slip for months now. uhm, like wedding invitations, cringe, i know, i know. sigh. i thought i'd've had them sent out months ago, but nope. 's-ok tho, most folks know all the details anyway!

i've begun crocheting yet another blanket tonight. it'll be one big ole granny square done in rounds of five. the center is a variegated pastels~~pink/blue/green/yellow/white shot thru with silverish threads. i'm also using a lemon custard, an iced mint, and a soft bumply pink. it'll be big enough to get all snuggly and cozy in, ya know, in those cooler climes. so i do have some time to do it, and don't have to devote every single waking moment to it.

thankfully.

oh.wow.{sigh}aaaahmmmmmmmmnnnnniiiice

this past weekend was just amazing. we'd been planning and preparing for this moondance camping trip for about four or five months, with monday being the mid-point between my first writing to jerry and our upcoming wedding. so we were very psych'ed!

also, we needed this weekend. love my mom, and so very glad she was able to stay for as long as she did, and are looking forward to her return visit; love the fact that we've gotten as much done as we have~~however, we really needed to be able to focus on just us as a couple and each of us as individuals. this weekend was the perfect way to do that.

yes, we did deal with some other outside issues. life continues and we are not automatons with toggle switches that allow us to flip between ON & Off. actually, being away allowed us to focus on some difficult areas with a certain amount of objectivity and dispatch that was sorely needed. so yea, for us!!

there were a few downers, namely dairy queen deserves to die...we ate there just prior to setting up camp and both of us got sicker than damn dogs gorging grass. thankfully, that episode was short-lived. and it rained for the majority of our trip.

since we were tent-camping, and employing LNT/MOOP {leave no trace/matter out of place} ethics, we had loaded and taken the truck rather than riding the bike. we pitched the tent and canopy in light mist and were able to ride out the worst of the downpours in either the tent, or under cover {the barn, or kitchen, or vendors' tents}. however, i adjusted my attitude toward the rain...no point in letting the weather rain on my parade!

the great thing about the rain was that the temperatures did not bake us. things stayed cooler for the most part. also, since we were honoring the elements of life, there really was a certain cleansing aspect that appealed to all involved.

without going into specific details, i'd like to give a huge shout out to the many wonderful people we'd had the honor of meeting and being with. also, i'd like to give mad props to jert; he really made this possible and was very receptive to a whole slew of new experiences and ideas. i feel calmer than i have in awhile and much more peaceful and happy.

we still have a ton of things to do in the next few months, yes. so this was extra rejuvenating and just what the doctor ordered! big huge grins and spins!

whatta wonderful night for a moondance

wahoo! tomorrow, well, in just a few hours really; jert and i are leaving for the moondance fest, held in dragonhills, over in georgia. it'll be about a six hour drive for us, and we'll pick a site, probably up in the quiet area. that way, we have the option of joining other folks for a bit of rowdiness, but then can spend some quiet time away from others and enjoy some time for ourselves. we're really Really REALLY looking forward to that. sigh. rillee.

we're stocked on books, my cotton yarns to crochet potholders, casserole pads, and such. since we're taking the truck, we've got plenty of wood and our mexican fireplace, lots of water, lots of food, plenty of snacks, plenty of clothes, towels, my swim suitees and his too, and all sorta other things that ought to make it fun, Fun, FUN!! and relaxing and all too.

there are some seminars, workshops, and classes that we want to go to. a huge feast saturday night, and lots of downtime too so that we can be lazy and lax out and nap and read and all that other good stuff. wink.

and! our doggies will be receiving primo care and company whilst we are away for five whole days. yea!!! and! when we come home, it'll be to a nice neat place {albeit there'll be doggie furrballs to greet us}. so everyone have a great weekend, enjoy your cookouts, picnics, and other get-togethers. toodles! grins, me

gooood morning, missAHsippEE

ya know how ya get something stuck in your head and then you start humming or even singing it without realizing it? and then, when you do notice, it's like you're powerless to stop the insane looping of one or two lines of song, or maybe even the entire chorus, or the first two lines but you can't remember the rest so you just keep singing the snippet over and over again, ad nauseum. the folks around you start grinding their teeth and throwing daggers at your stupid lil head.

for days now, i've had American Dad's opening sequence stuck in my head. particularly, 'oh boy it's swell to saaaaaaaaaaay, goodmorning usaaaaaaaaaaa'; ya know, the part where stan is driving with his palms up, and roger joins in from the passenger's seat and stan ends up shoving him down outta sight. ugh.

sigh.

well, that leads to me singing 'it'sa beautiful day in the neighborhood, a beautiful day in the neighborhood, a beauTIFul day in the naaaaaaaaaaayborhood...' and because i cannot remember the end of that, i finish with a gusto, "...that nobody can deny" {i'm thinking that the mr. rodger's greeting is sung to the tune of 'for he's a jolly good fellow', whacha think?}. that's quickly followed with "on the gahOOOod SHIP lolleePOP!". by now, i'm actually moving in shirleytemplesque palms out swinging arms, and foolishly wide grins.

it's like a part of me is absolutely horrified and egad'ing all over the place, as my feet begin to step high and fast in the jitterbug shuffle. does hugh laurie make house calls? he isn't a doctor, but he does play one on tv. well, crap, sigh. i did it again.

bizzzzzzzzzzeee beeeee bizzzzzzzzzee

whew!

well, after almost four weeks of scrubbing/painting/waxing, mom had to return home. so we got most of the living area completed. well, mostly complete. we left the ceilings for another time. there's only so much you can do at any one time.

jert and i still have a few things we'd like to do, but not right this minute. yesterday, i set up my larger dining room table, cleaned it, waxed it and then covered it with a freshly laundered cotton green/white checked tablecloth. i set the chairs around it and hung all the window blinds and replaced all the switch plates and outlet covers.

there is a large corner cabinet that is simply huge, bulky, and needs to be taken apart in order to remove it from the house. it's that large. we've been working on it in stages, cuz most of the screws are two or three inches long and it's a fairly solid piece. so today, i removed the doors and most of the plates on it. there is one that is actually not accessable cuz there is another verticle board covering most of one side of it. that's sitting in front of the way from the breakfast nook into the living area which means that we need to remove that in order to move the large entertainment unit from our bedroom into the living room.

for the time being, tho, things are cozy, clean, and soothing. there is time enough to do some of the other things another time. tonight is an evening of minimal movement.

my mother had given me some black cherry wine just before we went our separate ways at the ark/miss border yesterday. so i've uncorked it to let it breathe and jert just got home from work (he's checking the mail), and we are gonna sit, relax, watch some season finales, crochet, read, drink wine, and be merry!

toodles, 'taterz!

third wind {& then some}

well, after i spent a few hours doing rather light stuff {mostly wiping down some walls and removing some vent covers and cleaning them}, i didn't feel quite so spacey and woowoowoozee. i started to move some other things and clean behind them, and then, well...i pulled out the tv/dvd player/direct tv box and started to trace all the wires and hook-ups and cables and things and discovered five different cables and phone lines that went no where and were so tightly ensnarled with the other lines that it took awhile to get it all detangled. it was like i was one of those weirdass kewl dudes that you see doing very technical things. 'cepting i'm not. weirdass kewl, i mean. nor very technologically minded. nopee, don't got those there mad skilZ.

so i took my second shower of the day and got dressed in clean clothes and mom and jert and i went over to his youngest's for a great dinner. she's a really good cook, and everything was very good. she made meatloaf, mashed, rolls, peas, pasta salad, and mom's favorite dinner is meatloaf so it was extra special. and then, we found out that we were her first dinner guests and that was extra extra special. she's just finished rearranging things after having painted quite a bit of her home, and it looked really nice and i was glad to see how she has her tv and stuff set up cuz sometimes it's hard to find enough space for everything when you live in a smaller place {my place on the farm is very little, think an aisle at walmart lil} and i know how important it is to fit things just so.

after we left, and came back to jert's, my second wind continued and we cleared the porch of lots of the garage/yard sale stuff. then, we came back for another truckload of stuff that had been in the living room, cuz the porch was too cramped cuz of the rain. i was starting to wind down, but then got busy doing some other stuff and before i knew it, i was frantically tearing apart the one guest bath's dysfunctional sliding tub doors and the other guest bath's shelving units. i hate just stopping with a job half done, so after i removed the metal tracking for the glass doors (the doors are good, but the tracking was bent, pried open, torqued and twisted); i started to pry up all the old caulk and gunk that had accumulated under the tracking. ewwww.

while i was waiting for the solvent to losen up some of the caked caulk, i started in on the room the deep freeze is in. so, i actually got quite a bit done before i knocked off just before midnight. i would've kept going, but we've plans for tomorrow, so i peeled off my cruddy duds and took my third shower of the day. i feel soOOooo much better and am really looking forward to spending the day away from the house and all its projects that keep screaming, "do me! do me!" like some sorta warped porno {do me, debra, do me}. snicker.

so, tomorrow, we plan to stop to see the mom's and then to take my mom up to tupelo and go to the gumtree fest. it's really kewl and mom's never been. there are quite a few artisans and crafters on the square and altho i can't afford their stuff, it's very beautiful to see. there are some that actually do their work while you watch. one year, i watched a blacksmithy in action, which was a real treat and another year, i watched a lady glaze some of her stained glass windows.

oh! i'm off to start the new sookie stackhouse...later!

{gasp} how shocking {gasp}

several years back, i'd received the shock of a lifetime. literally. i was working at a clinic in alabama. the entire staff was the doctor, the nurse, and me. we would usually see between 60 and 70 people a day. that was if there was no flu or other infectious disease being passed around the general population of the second poorest county in alabama (which was the second poorest state~most of our patients were very, very poor and in need of medical care way before they would make it to the clinic, which meant that most of them were very sick by the time they got to us).

there was a new clinic being built just behind the old single wide trailer that was the clinic at that time. for the time being, we were using the old x-ray room as a sort of storage room, since the x-ray machine was not in use. it's important to know this to get an idea of what the circumstances were like at the time, sorta setting the scene, if ya will.

for some reason, we were closed for the day, i'm thinking it was cuz the doctor had a conference to attend. the nurse and i were sorting and packing some things that needed to be moved over to the new building, and shredding things that needed to be destroyed, or placing them into haz-mat bags if needed. loads of fun, it was.

since i'd stood in as the x-ray patient so the other folks from the county's other clinic and the doctor from our clinic learned how to take x-rays and develop them, i was explaining to our nurse (who'd not been there the day of x-ray instruction) about the charts and settings and positions and how to store the film and what to do and all that other happy crappy sorta stuff that we did with limited resources and no radiologist. since i knew where the book with all the charts/settings/positions was, and since we had actually gone to the other clinic to use their x-ray machine, and since our x-ray machine was not operational at the time...i went to get the book, which was actually sitting on the controls in the x-ray room.

the nurse is now one of my dearly fabulous friends (hello lovely freaky ferah!!), and at the time, we'd only been known/worked together for less than a month. so she was standing in the doorway of the room, cuz the room was jammed packed with stuff and there was barely room for me, let alone another person. i was precariously balanced, leaning over a stack of stuff, and reaching for the needed book when several things happened simultaneously.

the back of my leg touched an exposed live cable {the main feed for the x-ray which had not been properly capped or wrapped when disconnected from the machine, nor was the breaker flipped off; well, until that moment}.

there was a zzzzzzzz-POP! all the lights in the building surged and then all the circuits blew and i had not only knocked the entire building off the grid, but none of our emergency lights, or phones worked cuz i short circuited those too.

a horrible smell issued forth.

my mouth flooded with the taste of bright copper and my head arched back on my neck til it seemed i was looking at an upside down ferah in the doorway from between my shoulder blades {an impossibility, but still frigging weird all the same}.

a ball of white light ran up one leg, gained in size, crossed over my back, and split into two balls, one running down my other leg, and one running down my arm.

the top of ferah's head hit the door-jamb as she screamed from the sight of me contorting, the deep darkness, and the hellish white balls flying on my body.

when sound finally turned up the volume enough to reach my ears and brain, ferah was in the midst of chanting my name as one big long horrible repitition, "...anciancianciancianci..." {anci had been my name for about six years at that time} with some "omigawd"s thrown in for good effect. she was severely rattled, so much so that her nurse's training was not kicking in and i had to do some quick thinking under limited circumstances.

i didn't just sustain a shock, but it was the cable for the main portion of the x-ray machine, which in part must be able to use a surge of power in order to perform properly and capture images. my leg, the back of my head, my brain, my heart, and other internal systems such as most of my nerves and my brain's ability to process those nerve-sensations became overloaded in a very brief amount of time, and i was aware that i hadn't much time. as i walked toward ferah, she backed away, cuz the glow surrounding me was throbbing some and it scared the crap outta her. however, we both got outta the building and i got her to use her cell phone to call the ER directly; they told her to drive me down, as it would take them too long to get an emergency crew to me. fortunately our clinic was right next to the police station and they gave us an escort to the ER, some twenty miles away. i'm not sure why the police just didn't take me, but at the time, it seemed i was the only person thinking clearly and i was quickly losing my ability to do so.

by the time we got to the ER, i was not only having chest pains, with shallow faint breathing; but my legs and arms weren't cooperating with me, and were in constant state of seizure like activity. my brain was feeling like it was being bathed in a charged saline solution with eels swimming around in endless loops of infinity. and most thought was no longer an option.

i don't remember much after that, for the most part. i do remember that the hospital's staff were talking among themselves and the general consensus was bewilderment as to how i was still alive and not more severely injured. there was a nice neat tidy hole burnt thru my jeans, as clean as you please, and there was some general discussion about how the electrical impulses may affect my heart and other systems in the future.

not much is understood about electricity's effects on the body/brain in more detail than generalities. i was told that what i'd experienced was like several sets of jumper-paddles being used on me simultaneously. the long-term consequences were unknown and i was cautioned to be extremely careful not to sustain any shocks, no matter how minor in the future as the tissue of my heart might not be able to continue to function properly.

so imagine whatta total idiot i was earlier today, and how very lucky i feel; when i'd been moving an aluminum step-ladder, which overturned a bucket of grimy water, which sloshed across the floor, perhaps connecting with a slight tear in the fan's cord, or splashing up the wall and into the exposed 110 outlet...at any rate, i did experience a slight shock. i think i completed the circuitry by having both hands on the ladder. i also think that the rubber in my shoes saved my ass from a worse electrical surge.

my mother cleaned up the horrible mess, and i sat down for awhile, breathing and sweating and trying to determine the difference between a galloping pulse due to surprise of shock and whether the shock was having a more serious impact on me and my heart. i think i'm alright. i'm pretty sure that going to the ER is not neccessary at this point. and i've been monitoring myself while writing this to make sure my mental accuity is not lapsing. i've had to retype some words, as i accessed the wrong words from time to time {they were close, but not exactly what i was thinking and meant to type}. my mom keeps checking in with me, to make sure i don't fade away or seize {esp as seizing would be particularly bad for me due to some of the medications i take and paramedics administering treatment to me need to know exactly what i take and when i take it so that they don't do the wrong thing and cause me to worsen}.

whew. i'm alright, dudes. i think.

the lil man who came to dinner and the fools we became

my mom was never the sort of woman who despaired of ever having grandkids, she never nagged me by saying things like, "when are ya gonna get married, and give me some grandbabies?" while tapping her toe impatiently. still, it's super sweet to see her with babies. especially since i don't plan to have my own.

this evening, jert's eldest son and his wife came for supper and had a good visit. their lil boy is only four months old and provides a fair share of the entertainment. after we'd eaten, but were still sitting around the table and all, mom asked to hold the lil guy before he gave up the ghost and went to sleep. i always get a real big kick outta watching her interact with babies and small children, cuz she doesn't force herself on them and encourages their curiosity and creativity.

i'm gonna miss my mom when she leaves to return home. for all sorts of reasons, chief among them is that a lengthy visit like this allows me to observe her in situations that i don't normally get to see her in. like holding a lil guy who was intent on cramming all eight fingers into his mouth while staring at her's. you could almost see him thinking, "wow, wonder if she can squeeze all eight of her fingers in there?'

we're all starting to lose our momentum a bit. we know we want to get more and more done, but we also know we don't have a lot of time left and so we are trying to prioritize some. but it'd be unrealistic to think we are gonna get it all done this visit. we got a lot more done than any of us had expected tho!

wake up, sleepee mee {oh what can it mean...}

somehow the entire day passed without me once thinking, "oh, hey, it's cinco de mayo". today, mom finished up the paint job on the breakfast nook, and we began to sort and wash dishes and place them into their new homes. the rest of the pots/pans, flatware, and other utensils will be washed and put away tomorrow.

there is a nice china cabinet that i think had been in the family for some time that is sorta darker so after we lined the shelves, i propped up jert's grandparents' china, with roses and gold trim. also in that cabinet are two lil bowls that jert had used as a child, one is a clear golden brown mother goose bowl with all sorts of lines from the characters' rhymes. the other is my favorite, a china pattern with acorns and fall oak leaves of green, darker brown, a lighter yellowish brown~ya know, autumn colors. it makes me smile to think of lil jert spooning his grits out of one of these bowls while visiting his grandmother.

another larger cabinet includes some cut glass bowls in a variety of colors, from a vibrant green, to a smoky gray, a lovely violet, some beautiful rose pink platters, and a large fruit bowl that has a bluish tinge. both those cabinets are in the breakfast nook, along with a few other pieces of furniture, like my small round oak table~just the size for a couple couples for a cozy supper, or a leisurely breakfast. tomorrow morning, we'll scrub and wax the floor in there, cuz i'd forgotten to do the final scrubbing before i set up the table and a few other things. oohps. sigh.

in the kitchen, we've a fair number of sets of glasses and dishes that are nicely displayed as well as all sorts of bowls, bakeware, and the like. i like things to be practical and yet appreciate beautiful things as well, so it took a bit of pondering before i put the first set away and then the rest fell into place. i love the pint jars with handles as everyday drinking glasses and the coca~cola pebbly glass pitchers. but my absolute favorites have to be the heavy china featuring a woodbine pattern that jert's parents used from the early 60s. to me, they're simple and lovely. they're a basic soft white with bluish green and tan leaves intertwined with vines of lil white and yellow flowers.

i'm really excited cuz this stage is almost done, soon the kitchen things will be taken care of and it will be time to move on to the next project. mom is leaving next week, and i'm not sure when she'll be able to return. we've got so much done, more than i'd thought we'd be able to do; but then again, she was able to stay longer than originally thought. however, there will be lots to do, after she goes. and some stuff will just have to wait til she comes back to help us do more.

yesterday evening, my mom and jert's mom met and spent some time chatting. we hope that one day before mom leaves, jert's mom can come over for a few hours and see the place and what's been done and also visit some more. jert's mom is looking forward to spending a few hours here and i hope she'll feel comfortable.

tomorrow night, jert's oldest son and his wife and their young baby will come for dinner. both of them are thru with the spring semester of school and have some time that is not quite as hectic with projects, assignments, assessments, papers, and the like. i think both are planning to take courses this summer, so now is a great time to come out! they've not yet met mom, and this will be a good time to do so.

friday night, jert's youngest is having us for dinner at her place. she's recently painted the place and has mentioned a few times that she'd like for us to come see. so, that'd be way cool!

saturday, we'll all ride up to tupelo's gumtree fest. there are all sorts of artisans and i love walking thru the square. i've wanted to take mom for a few years now, but since she lives eight hours away, i don't usually get to see her often. this entire cleaning/painting is part of her wedding present to jert and me. it's so very much appreciated too!

well, i'm about to fall asleep on my keyboard. n'nite!

yippittee skippittee

i'm getting all excited cuz the kitchen, breakfast nook, and dining room are all coming together and will soon be finished so that we can move on to the rest of the guest rooms. the largest job at this point is putting the kitchen and related areas to rights. most shelves and drawers have been scrubbed and is ready for the shelf paper to line the flat surfaces. finishing the kitchen area also includes sorting and washing all the dishes, pots/pans, glasses, utensils, etc and arranging them. also we need to find homes for all the food items and such. once that is done, we can focus on the other rooms.

one of the larger room's ceiling and walls are ready for paint, then we can rip up the carpet and paint that floor too. lots of stuff that we have stacked other places can be set up in there, including three shelving units and cabinets that are currently in the living room. we intend that future room to be jert's and my office/study, with my tv/vcr and his vhs tapes, the sewing machines, yarns, his sports card collections, and the like. when that space where the three units currently are in the living room is cleared, we can move the h.u.g.e multipurpose/entertainment unit that is currently sitting empty in the master bedroom to the living room.

getting the study arranged and finished will then free up another guest room and the toy room. they can then be painted and arranged. there is a third guest bedroom that is ready for paint as well. that leaves the fourth guest room, the laundry room, and the room just off the kitchen where the deep freeze is. i think that the laundry room will actually only need to be cleaned and not painted. the room the deep freeze is in now holds stacks of pots and pans but after the kitchen is arranged, that room will be relatively easy to do, as i'm not thinking it will need paint either.

the fourth guest room actually is currently filled with items that will be placed in other rooms as they are finished so that that room will be easier to clean and paint when it is time to do so. at the moment, it is the only room that has not been decluttered cuz there is no where to go with most of the items we plan to keep, as they are waiting for us to finish other rooms so we've somewhere to go with them.

the front porch is looking sorta cramped at the moment, as it's been raining and things that we would have put elsewhere are piled there til the ground is dry enough for us to move some stuff to the outbuildings or til we can load the yardsale stuff into the truck and move it up to the garage. what's really cool is that we can see things coming together and everything is falling into place. i'm not sure how much we can finish before my mom leaves, but we've already done lots and know what we've to do yet.

this evening, we were sitting on the front porch eating supper and talking about how this is all coming along. it's just amazing, and i think everyone is pretty excited about it; i know jert is happy with all the changes and that makes me even happier.

one big ole happy fest going on over here! grins, squeals, giddy delight!

changes, turn and face the strange

as bowie said; how apropos.

i know at times, my writing tends to focus intently on one aspect of my life, current events, and the like; to the exclusion of other topics and other sorts of writing. i miss my witty lil stories and such, in part cuz so much of my day to day existence right now is more of the same {sorting, scrubbing, prepping, painting, etc} while there are huge differences in the actual environment. i've been enjoying my mother's presence as much as i can, and trying to eek out every single minute of every day cuz i don't know when i'll be seeing her again and also, when she goes, the momentum we've established for these last few weeks and which will continue for the next couple...well that momentum will evaporate the minute she is gone. in part cuz we'll be so damn exhausted and in part cuz she's the master painter and i will do everything but. i'm well aware that i am so not a passable painter let alone a good one, so i know enough not to even try cuz i'll end up getting frustrated and the job will be ugly and the paint will be wasted.

so tomorrow, we place the china cabinet and the other shelving unit into place and we can begin the task of washing and sorting and placing all the dishes, glasses, pots/pans, and other kitchen utensils into drawers, on shelves, etc. that will free up some other areas that i can then begin to clean in preparation for mom's wild-ass mad painting skilZ {cuz she gots them}. we all feel that there are some vast changes occuring and we all have different reactions, most extremely positive, and too we are all aware of just how much this is signifying major changes for jert and me both. i'm glad mom is here to help me transition and i'm also finding this visit with her to be liberating for me in major ways cuz i feel like i'm really coming into my own.

part of the whole individuation process is having your own feelings, thoughts, reactions, preferences, opinions, and the like. it's knowing that you are able to love that person, and be loyal and respectful; and still know that you can dislike certain aspects of them. i'm secure in the knowledge that my mother respects me, loves me, and is proud of me; enough so that even when we have vast differences, it's quite alright, cuz we are still able to be quite loving, while being our own persons.

thanks so very much, mom; you let me be me, encourage me to be my own person, and embrace me even when i choose paths wildly divergent from your own.

happy mother's day, a bit early.

sleepee mee

i'm exhausted. t.a.r.d~tired. i think i'll go back to bed and snoozzzzzzzzzz

hippee humpernickle day

progress report, day 42: my brain leaped out of my head today and ran away to cower in a cluttered corner, behind some boxes, under a metal thing that no one knows why it was there or what it was for. as i went to retrieve it, i got distracted and swept another unrelated area cuz my head was missing its brain and then i thought, "hey, while i'm here, why don't i..." and "oh! just one more thing!" and so forth.

in short, i think i'm in desperate need of a clutter-free day with no dust, no dirt, no caked on crud, and no tasks vying for my attention. thing is, ignoring those tasks for even a minute so i can finish this task means that those other tasks ratchet up their clamoring and that's why i end up doing five things at one time, in different stages. and also explains why i had to go find my brain and bath it in saline this afternoon.

but! as memommamia says (and jert too), "we be chipping away, darlin, chipping away". and tomorrow? scarlette says that it's another day.

too much effort to blink

i woke this morning hacking and coughing and feeling cruddy. yesterday evening, i noticed a few times when breathing was not as easy as it should be. so this morning was sorta rough, but i got moving and mom and i started cleaning the kitchen. she cleaned the stove and the fridge {awesome} while i went thru some of the utensils and scrubbed out drawers. i kept getting distracted and ended up doing other jobs and before ya knew it, i was looking at the clock, thinking, "damn, it's only 3?!?!" i'm tuckered and after i shower, i'm gonna loaf around in my jammies. maybe i'll work on crocheting this baby blanket i've been wanting to do, but haven't cuz after cleaning and stuff, my hands are usually in the claw position and that's not the best position to crochet, doncha know.

mom is ready to call it a day too. she's cooking tonight. jert spent the day doing all sorts of rough, tough, and manly things like pouring concrete and hauling cabinets and sawing wood and stuff that exhausts me just to think of.

it's been a day. and tho this weekend was great, i'm beat. and i think we all are needing to take a day off soonish.

yea!!

today was a very good day. the vet school hosted a huge crayfish boil (crawdad) and it was so good that my tummy was happy, my face was happy, my brain was happy...i was a happy gal! so after i got to jert's, i changed clothes and started to get back into work. it was a lovely break and couldn't have happened at a better time.

we'd stopped and picked up a five gallon bucket of "peppermint tea" shaded paint. it's a cool color, very soothing. it's a mint green, with a touch of pale blue. we're planning to use that for the walls of the kitchen/dining/living/open areas. it's so cool and everyone that's seen it, loves it!

we'd also set up the first finished room. it's freshly painted (ceilings/walls) and the floor is waxed. the bedroom furniture was jert's grandparents' and so we were careful to oil the wood lightly and evenly. i took pix, and i was gonna post one here, but one of the grandbabies was laying in the middle of the bed and the bed is in every picture. and i'm too damn lazy to go take another one sans grandson. perhaps tomorrow.

so now, we're gonna kick back with some white grape wine that my mother made. watch a few tv shows. and i may even have a piece of cherry pie. what a great way to end a lovely day!

butterfly milk and other ponderables

this evening, the weather was so wonderful that jert and i rode the bike to see his grandson's play {the rather apropos lorax, by suess~~good job, kid, good job!}. mom and i took most of the day at ease and plan to do the same tomorrow. jert took me to get sno-balls at a favored stand prior to the play, so it was a great way to end the exhausting week and begin a good weekend.

and today was jert's middle child's birthday. so in her honor, ahem, we shall all sing a song we all know and love...

hapPEE birthDAY to you
happy BIRTHday to you
happy birthday dear youUUuu
happeebirthdaytoyou

i'll be sending ya some crawfish, keep an eye out for it!! {*smirk~*}

ah the dirty dog

with all the activity and the cleaning/painting/primer fumes, mom and i've been propping open the front door and closing the gate on the porch to keep shaddow from roaming the neighborhood and dashing into traffic. despite our best intentions, she made a break for it. now, she's a big dog and could easily clear the railing on the porch with no problem (in fact, she could clear the fence on the side yard with ease, i'm sure); but she usually is a good girl and stays within her boundaries. but this afternoon, she pushed mom aside and charged out the gate into the wild! free! oh! the smells! the flowers! the plants! the other dogs! the animals! the trees! the frogs! the ev.ree.thing! oh!

thing is, if i chase her, it's like a big ole game to her and she takes off with no regard for where she is going, just wanting to play tag. so i don't move too quickly. i usually talk with her and move toward where she is heading slowly and steadily. sometimes, i can lull her and WHUMP! catch her but sometimes i cannot.

today was a cannot day. but since she was hanging toward the back part of the property and staying well away from the road, i wasn't too worried. i did follow her for awhile, but then i gave up and headed back to the house after i realized that we were heading away from the highway.

all thru the rest of the afternoon, she'd creep up and lurk by the front porch but then dash off if i even looked in her direction. she was so funny that it was hard not to snicker at her, as she loped off with her head turned to look at me over her shoulder. at one point, i thought she was gonna take a header right into the sheet metal side of the barn.

well, i got busy. mom got busy. and after awhile, shaddow decided it was time to come up on the porch again. but i wouldn't let her into the house cuz she had discovered the two ponds and oh! joy! freedom! swimming! my FAVorite!! yea!!! and then she found some mud and rolled around. oh! more fun! yea!! and then! she ran thru some weeds which left little pellet-like green buds all over her wet muddy coat! yes! smelly swampiness! oh! yes! the joy!!

a few hours later, i ventured out on the porch with her. she was dry by then, caked with mud and her fur was rather spikey. i brushed her out as much as i could and eventually let her come in for a bit. after all, since we're scrubbing everything else, whyn't give her a bath too?

whatta dirty dogg!

he's a pisser, he is

saturday night, we all had a few chucks. the lil two and a half year old boy was just as rambunctious as he usually is and just a yammering away a constant steady stream of consciousness. if he thought it, he said it.

sound familiar?

anyway, sometimes it takes a minute for what he says to actually register and so all three of us adults ended up doing a double-take...or triple take, as it were. he was telling us about the toy cars and then about real cars and about jert's truck and his motorcylce is cool, pop-pop, it's cool. and then i heard jert say, "what, wait, what?" and i clued in a bit closer, and then i looked at mom, and both of us were nodding solemnly.

he'd said, "i go pissing, poppop, i go pissing". {what? wait! what?} then he jumped up and ran over to jert, holding up his arms and doing deep knee squats of impatience, crowing, "PISSING! poppop! i go pissing!!" so jert, took his hand and they headed toward the bathroom cuz his mother had mentioned that she was potty-training him. in just a few minutes, jert popped his head out of the bathroom and informed us that he'd most likely been actually in the act when he told us. well, timing, ya know, it's everything.

at least he's getting the actual idea. when it's time to go, it's time to go.

the days, they are a changin'

can't believe that it's the end of another day. mom's been prepping the room for paint, and tomorrow, she'll've applied two coats of primer (kilZ) and so thursday, we shall begin to paint. that room will be jert's choice, a medium blue with a touch of green. aqua-something (i can't recall the actual name, and i'm too damn lazy to walk out in the other room and check).

so while she prep'd away, i worked a lil on the kitchen and continued to sort thru things and all. when jert came home, we loaded the boxes i've packed over the past few days into the truck and he put them with the yard-sale items. we're gonna try the yard-sale again in mid-may (since we got rained out on saturday). he joined me in clearing a few piles of things and i came across his first wife's journal.

the very first entry is about the first phone call with jerry over thirty years ago. she writes about being nervous on their first date and holding hands and their wedding and how very much she loves him and gets lonely without him (he was in the coast guard and so was out on the ship often). she wrote relatively rarely, so the diary was rather short, altho it spanned several years. she wrote of her first child, a lil girl who looked like her daddy with brown hair and brown button eyes. she wrote of her first lil boy and his wonderful smile.

it was so very sweet and made her all that much more real for me. my favorite part was that the last entry she wrote; along the lines that it was three years since she'd married jerry and that she loved him more 'now' than she had when they first married. to me, that's wonderful. that's what good relationships do, they grow stronger with the passage of time. finding her diary was balm to my soul. it made me love him all the more, tenderly.

this evening, jert's son-in-law came over and helped move quite a few things that are large and heavy and awkward. as the men heaved and ho'ed, my mom and i scurried about with the dust pan and whisk broom. and then, i discovered a dead bloated mouse that most likely was the source of the stench i'd been smelling all day yesterday and today. shudder.

when i let shaddow in, she ran around, smelling and checking out everything. i'd moved the feeding/water bowls and so she nosed around the kitchen til she located them, slurped once to reassure herself that ok, that's where they are and then zoomed off to check out the other changes. harley and pearl have been in and out all day, so they sorta supervised everything and kept up with all the changes as they occured. i didn't let shaddow in the house earlier, cuz i'd had the front door open and was airing out a few things. shaddow was in the side yard, which is fenced and is a lot safer for her since she isn't used to being around a highway and is used to running around a five hundred acre farm. perhaps eventually i can trust her not to get distracted and do something dumb, like dodge into traffic cuz euw it all just smells too interesting not to check out. ya know how dogs are...love the smell of decaying pee'd-on tires and exhaust of cars zooming down the highway.

well, tomorrow brings yet another phase. hopefully, mom will be finishing up the primer in the side bedroom toward the front of the house. and i'll be sorting thru some other cupboards in the kitchen as well as doing some preliminary cleaning of the floor and part of the walls in the kitchen where a very large cabinet unit sat. whew.

thank you, my jerry

oh, where to start? where to start? lessee...

over the weekend, i received yet another jury summons. last time, my GP wrote an affidavit for the circuit clerk's office and the receptionist at the county court house assured me that i would be removed from the pool, permanently. obviously, that was not the case.

so, this morning, i went by the circuit clerk's office and they told me the same thing, with the same instructions, and i did the same thing (visited my gp's office, got the affidavit, returned immediately to the clerk's office), and yet again, she assured me that i would be removed from the jury selection pool. permanently. til next summons, i'm sure.

mom and i stopped by walmart and picked up a few cleaning/painting things and some bagels and such. we had a nice visit while making lunch (egg salad on wonderful wheat bread, fresh and moist, mmmmm). the day was warm without being too hot, and we sat on the front porch and chatted; neither of us really wanting to get started for the day, resuming our tasks indoors.

then, my brother called to say that the daughter of an old friend of my mom's faxed a very odd message to mom; and oh, yeah, no phone number, but here's the email address. long story, a tad shorter; a flurry of phone calls later, mom had some sobering news. this lady, who worked with mom for years; visited with her often, going on long rambling walks about town when we all still lived in pennsylvania...and came to visit mom in tennessee...is dying. her health was never good, arthritis and diabetes, but within the last year, she'd had several heart attacks and suffered a few strokes, and was diagnosed with breast cancer earlier this year. she's currently medicated very heavily and is receiving morphine. hospice visits twice per week, and so the prognosis is that there are only a few months at best left. mom will be making arrangements to return to pennsylvania if possible in june so that she can visit with her friend.

so this afternoon was solemn in many ways, as friends dying is never pleasant, but it tends to remind you of your own age, your own mortality. and i was reminded that mom is in actuality a bit older than i usually think of her. in my mind, i see mom as a mid-40s kinda gal, but that'd be a real trick as i am 38 myself. in reality, mom will be 62 this year. she's very active in lots of ways, but i've watched her age more in the past couple of years than i'd noticed her getting older ever.

mom and i decided to go to lowe's and pick up kilZ since it seals and acts as a primer for paint. on the drive home, we turned to other, more life affirming topics of conversation and we both began to clean, scrub, etc. after jert arrived home (monday was monday, allllllllllllll day), he carried in the 5 gallon bucket of kilZ (a gallon of water weighs about eight pounds, kilZ is much heavier than water; so that 5 gallon bucket? way more than i wanted to be toting into the house). and mom began to kilZ the ceiling and the walls in the room she'd been working in yesterday and today (after bleaching the walls). i got side-tracked and started to go thru the kitchen cupboards. so when jert came in from fixing his motorcylce, i was grimey and outta sorts.

ya know, i've been making the best i can of this entire situation. and most days, most times, the best means that i stay focused on why i'm doing this. cuz this? not exactly a joyously fun task. there is no point in being morose and miserable, so it may seem to others that i'm being callous as i go about the difficult job of sorting, deciding, packing, moving, etc. others' belongings. it's not fun. i don't wail and carry on, being miserable and beating my chest and oh poor pitiful me, sniff.sniff. but neither am i singing a joyful song as i flit about clearing and cleaning. my mother is helping me, cuz i need it and she cares...not because she is taking a huge delight in scrubbing, cleaning, painting, packing, moving, etc.

and all that? not my stuff. we have not even begun to consider my belongings and transferring my things...no, the packing and moving is mostly jert's late wife's and some of the things that his adult children have left here over the years (most of which, they've no interest in anymore; some of which, i'm saving for them, as i'd rather they have the option of owning/destroying letters and other personal memorabilia rather than me making that judgment call for them). it's difficult to go thru someone else's stuff for them, either cuz they are not able to do so, or because they choose not to. it's not easy to take on a task this large, and yet, i've kept in mind the reason i'm doing so.

jert and i want to make this into our home. and we are. to a large extent that means obvious changes for him, as this is his place. this is an old theme, by now, but one that surfaces from time to time and is worth restating...reaffirming for myself (and quite possibly others)...so here goes, yet again.

today, i was reminded that being mindful of others and being understanding of their situations and feelings does not and should not mean that i ought to ignore my own self. it's a bit tedious to be doing this, altho it can be exciting on one hand to create a new home, it can be exhausting to constantly be considering the changes for the other people. so this evening, the enormity of this settled on me and i longed for the tranquil comfort of my own home, on the farm. i miss not being constantly aware of what essentially is several lifetimes of stuff/events for many folks, those who used to live here and those who continue to do so.

i'm having difficulties expressing exactly what i mean, but i was thinking of my mother and her friend. i was thinking of my mom and her mom. and i was thinking of me and my mom. i feel like going thru all these belongings, sorting, packing, moving, etc all of these things, these things that are not mine, these things which are mostly jert's late wife's...well, i feel odd to be performing the same tasks my mother performed when her mother died. going thru a deceased woman's life is draining.

on one hand, there is so much to be gained...you learn so much about a person by the things that person leaves behind. there is an excitement about starting and building this new life with this new person, this man with whom i am spending the rest of my life. there is a great amount of compassion for this man as he copes with so many different emotions, so many changes, some are wonderful, some are sad, some are exciting, some are thrilling, some are regretful, some are ...well, a mixed bag at the very least.

even the most positive changes can still be stressful. stressful for everyone. not just for the man whose place is. not just for the adult children who view this as their last childhood home, and by extension, a home for them still. not just for those who called this and continue to call this home.

but for me too. and not just cuz i'm making a change from my home to our home here. not just cuz i'm moving from "me" to "us". but also cuz i'm adjusting to a presence of someone i'd never known in life, yet will always know in death. and just as anyone you get to know inspires laughter, tears, compassion, and a whole plethora of feelings...no one is entirely one thing or another, we are all multifacetted...so too, am i experiencing a range of emotions and thoughts that span pleasant and joyous to troubling and sorrowful.

so, yes, this is exhausting. it's not horrible. it's not wonderful. it's not any one thing all the time. it's all things, at various times.

and today, it was almost too much.

almost.

and then, my jerry's here for me. and it was ok, i can go on. and on. and tomorrow will see me continuing in the same vein as i've been, engaged in the same activities; sorting, wading, immersing myself in yet more. again. still.

sometimes, i need to be able to just be with me, and to not be so outwardly focused. to be just as loving and caring for my own self as i am for others, including people i've never known, including people who've expressed their loathing, hatred, and fear of me. and i think, it's only healthy to care for myself at least as much as for those; don't you think?

and i've needed that love and understanding, and my jerry's taken some time out tonight to be loving and take care of my own need to be cared for instead of caring for everyone else. so thanks for reading this jumbled mass of thoughts, hope it all makes sense. i feel better having expressed not only how exciting this is, but also how very exhausting it is. i feel better having sought and received the loving nurturing care that i wanted and needed to continue to take on this entire task.

and i'll get by with a lil help from my friends and loved ones. to you, my heartfelt gratitude. you make all the difference. thanks so very much.

my turn to feel puny

jert and i've been running non-stop for awhile now and both of us are getting a tad puny. yesterday, he wasn't feeling so hot. tho, after the kids showed up {remember my quick departure on the last post?}, he perked up some and he and my mom pretty much engaged with the kids with me performing small lil tasks til they punked out after watching scads of popeye.

this morning, we all got up and were moving a tad sluggishly. knowing my mom'd like some coffee and there were a few other things that i'd wanted to retrieve from the farm for her stay here at jert's whilst we worked on the place, she and i headed over to the farm. it was raining to beat the band, mom's headache from the mold in the room was making her feel pretty poorly, and i was running a slight fever. after we got back to jert's, i settled in the living room chair and fell asleep some. the rain cleared up and mom and jert had a two hour conversation about me, my past loves, and some other things that rounded out the picture some. after i woke up, i felt some better and we set to the task at hand which for today was to clean the front room mom was staying in (since any of the room's would have needed similar cleaning, we just tackled that one cuz it was the one the most ready~meaning i'd already cleared most stuff, sorted thru things, etc). mom scrubbed the windows, air-conditioner, window blinds, etc; while i moved furniture, sorted thru file cabinets (i forgot to go thru them before) and jert took down the wooden shelves that ran around the room. after pizza and a break, we tore apart the bed, scrubbed and fixed the bed-frame, and re-mopped the floor. prior to mom's visit, i heavily bleached all the bedding, so she was able to remake the bed with the same sheets and quilt (very beautiful, made by jert's late wife).

so, that room isn't quite ready for paint, but getting closer! i scrapped the walls of stickers, glue, putty, tape, etc. and pulled out all nails, picture-hangers, and the like. but the walls need wiping down and then we need to prep them with tack so the paint will take. after we tack them, we need to coat them with base or kilZ and then paint them with a few coats of a lighter blue color that jert picked out.

the walls will highlight the floor's tiny lil blue flowers. the set of antique furniture that jert's grandparent's used will be set up in there. the bedroom suite is a beautiful deep brown that will really look nice against the fresh blue walls.

it's so cool to see things starting to come together! we've been having a blast, and jert is enjoying mom's company muchly. he says that i can be witty, and with mom and i playing off each other, he ends up snickering lots.

jert's not feeling so hot

yesterday, jert and i had a great drive over to the ark/ms border to pick up memommamia. we chatted all the way, the time flew and so did the miles. in fact, i was planning to crochet all the way, but didn't even take my hook out!

after we met my folks for a chicken lunch, and visited some, we drove home. it was a good drive, on the return as well. mom and we got all caught up and she told us some about the storm damage and all.

she and i took a walk around the house and i showed her some of the things we've already done, some of the things we plan to do and some of the things that she and i can get started on. this is part of her wedding gift to us, helping us to get the house in order and all. instead of waiting til october tho, she is coming a few times to help out, in more manageable time-frames.

so jert and i went over to set up for the yard sale this morning and my friend {{nekita}} came to help. we got everything out. and then it started to rain. so we put everything up. and then after drinking some hot, sweet, minty tea and changing in to dry clothes, i took a nap cuz i'd lost my voice entirely and was in need of some solid sleep.

oh! and mom showed nekita and me my dress! yea!! sooooOOooo pretty!! i want to wait til i'm all squeaky clean to try it on. but gorgeous, my, yes!

after we went to lunch, we stopped at walmart and picked up a few things, like paint (white, for the ceilings) and scrub brushes, rubber gloves, pinesol, and other cleaning paraphernelia. and post-easter candy at 75% off. mmmm and peanut butter ice-cream chocolate sandwiches cuz i'm such a friggen spaz about ice cream, chocolate, and peanut butter.

mom started cleaning, scrubbing, scouring, et al. one of the guest bathrooms. and i swept the hallway and went thru all the toys that had been in the hallway and scrubbed a few of them up cuz jert's youngest daughter's chilluns gonna be with us for a few hours tonight. and then i did some other stuff (mostly preparing the one room for us to be able to paint it). and before ya know it, four hours have flown by. mom's still not done with the bathroom, but just about and then she's calling it a day and taking a shower in the freshly cleaned tub!

jert is cooking us some of his wonderful soup and afterwards, i plan to shower the sweat and sticky dirt off myself. ohhh, i hear car doors and kids! later taters.

true spring cleaning

i'm really, Really, REALLY excited! in the morning, we are driving over to the ark/ms border to meet with my folks and then memommamia is coming back with us {squeal}. i've not seen my dad since christmas '06, so i'm really looking forward to visiting for a bit. we'll all have lunch and then jert, mom, and i will drive back to starkville. she's gonna visit for perhaps a week, or so. yea!!

we've all sorts of cleaning, painting, rearranging, and the like planned. i know we won't get it all done, but i'm thinking we'll get a good sized dent put into the task! we've got the master suite ready, along with three other bedrooms, both other baths...they're ready to be painted, scrubbed, etc as necessary. at some point, the master bath's floor needs to come up, kilZ'ed, and then press tile laid into place. whether that will be soon remains to be seen. i would really like mom's help with the kitchen, but there again, it might need to wait til a later date. but, if we can get one room done, then we can move the furniture in and move on to the next room and so forth. right now, we have a stack of things in the master bedroom that will go into one of the other rooms, but i don't want to move it til that room is ready. we'll tear up the carpet and kilZ and paint the floors, paint the walls after making a few repairs, and paint the ceilings too (hey, if you're gonna do it, do it right!). then move in the furniture and arrange things the way we'd like. that way, jert can display some of his sports memorabilia and the like; i can organize my yarns and things; and we can hang pictures of his kids and their kids and other sketches and certificates and things. that'll free up some other space that can be cleaned, repaired, painted, etc. and so forth.

it'll all fall into place as we move along and get various parts completed. i think that there will be a huge change in things even in the brief time my mom is here to help. so saturday, jert will be tending to the yardsale, while mom and i get started! yahoo!

posts might be kinda sparse for the next week or so, but not to worry! this is phase one of memommamia's gift for jert and me. {giddy grins}

she wore a lil itty bitty teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini

sometimes, i'm a ditzy blonde. after scrunging around, moving things, kicking up dust, i ended the evening with a coughing fit {it's hard to quit my five pack a day habit when you've been chewing for as long as i have...not} and a kinda cool shower {cuz i was also running a last minute load thru the wash...heavy on the bleach}...with my bra on. i was so scatter-brained that i got my face all soaped up and then went around the ears, down the neck, and oh! hey, where'd these straps come from?!?

i've not forgotten to take articles of clothing off prior to bathing since...since...well, since i was a lil kid and climbed into a tub of water with my cable knit knee high white socks pulled snuggly up my scabby bruised shins {i was a klutzy kid}. that makes the feet feel weird. at least with a bra left on, you kinda feel like you're wearing a bathing suit. but who swims with their socks on?

wait! i usta do that too. swim with my socks on. tho it was more like wading with my sneakers. you venture into a cold creek on a sunny day in pennsylvania, ya never know for sure what critters may be crawling over, under rocks and such.

ah, memories...

*warning* {not for the tenderhearted}

i gotta tell ya this. ya know how ya do something dumb, and you're alone so really no one has to know about it? but if you're like me, ya gotta tell someone anyway, cuz it was so dumb it was kinda funny, even tho it hurt?

yeah, so yesterday while i was starting to load the truck for the yardsale, the very very first thing i loaded was a tub (one of those huge rubbermaid tubs filled with porcelain dolls), it was really heavy and i had gotten it out to the truck but the tailgate was just a lil too high for the way i was carrying the tub so i heaved up and leaned forward cuz i was thinking that'd get it there.

which it did. but i caught the corner of the tailgate right...in a very tender place...if i was a guy, i'da been incapacitated for the rest of the day. hell, the rest of the week. or month. as it was, i hissed and bent over and did the whole clutching thing and a string of very colorful language issued forth, followed by oh-fuck-me-son-of-a-bitch-god-that-hurts-uhhhhhgh.

now i have a plum sized, plum shaped, plum shaded area that is very very tender and makes for the whole heave-ho'ing of boxes/tubs a sorta delicate and deliberate maneuvering. funny now, yeah, and i saw the humor then, but damned if i could even snicker at that moment.

the moral of the story: don't fuck with the tailgate.

hand me that desk

yea!!! memommamia is gonna be here tomorrow!! yea!!! actually, i was thinking i'd put her up at my place on the farm, and had started to do some deep cleaning in preparation of her stay. but then, it turns out that she isn't gonna have her own vehicle and so i think i'll prepare a room at jert's so that there is less mileage accumulated on his truck and it'll just make things that much simplier.

so with that and other things in mind {namely, huh-UGE yard sale saturday morning}, i started to give some thought to which bedroom to put her into for the time being (at least on the first night). once i got started clearing and cleaning, i couldn't stop. there was just so much screaming and vying for my attention {pick me, debRAH; no, no pick ME; no, No, NO i'm next}. after jert got home last night, we moved some things and i realized that my arm muscles are getting to be nicely developed, along with my thigh muscles, and my back, and my tummy...oh! and my ears...in short, i feel like a full body workout has consumed my every waking minute for days even tho i only did stuff for awhile yesterday.

i finally showered and got in my jammies and finished up a baby blanket to go with the burping cloth and baby mat for the newest grandchild. but! then i thought of OOOONE more thing, and that led to something else, oh! and that too, don't forget that...and before i realized it, jert was eyeing me with concern and then voiced it, "doncha need to take a break?" which became "i'm getting worried, stop, sit down, it'll be there tomorrow". to which i replied, "just one more thing, i promise" which of course led to others and then i said, "hand me that desk".

it's time for me to go don my super woman cape and tights now...oooooooh, and goggles!! {squeals of delight} and some kick-ass boots!!!

what's the latest, ya say?

well, lookitchu! here it is, time's flown by, yet again. friday, jert had the day off, and the mowing was long overdue but the ground has been too wet. funny how that works, the very rain that makes things grow, also makes the ground swampy and marshy. jert rode his mower around for hours and hours and hours. and then he trimmed, weed-whacked, and got himself all mired down in muck. that evening, after a good refreshing shower, we went to eat. it was a lovely evening and couldn't have been any better.

saturday, we loaded up the weedwhacker and gas can and went out to my place on the farm. he couldn't get my mower started, so he fired up the weedwhacker and did my entire yard adn then some. i did some cleaning, and rearranging, and packing of some stuff, and more cleaning. then i called memommamia and we chatted for quite some time.

see, she was planning to drive over here tomorrow and teach a few basket weaving classes and then stay to help me do a few things at jert's {like, painting, cleaning, rug removal, rearranging, sorting, etc.}. but thursday night, a mile wide twister struck the ouchita mountains and split into three smaller ones. the largest of which, touched down in mena, arkansas and plowed thru fourteen miles before it picked up again. my folks are fine, their property is fine, their vehicles are fine, their pets are fine.

they were without electricity for 36 hours, but that was not a terrible hardship. the phones were spotty as one of the towers was demolished. because they were without power, they couldn't use the well's pump, so no water. not a problem, cuz they usually have plenty of water on hand.

however, 600+ homes, business, and county buildings were damaged. three people were killed, and many others were injured. the highschool is gone, the library is gone, the county courthouse and city hall are gone. many are shocked, devastated, and in need of assistance. the national guard was on the scene as was the governor and other key peoples who were able to provide some relief, medical assistance, and such. red cross and salvation army set up several shelters offering food and water. the local walmart was hit and took out the emergency generators as well as the back warehouse. so, any refridgerated unit, freezer, or perishable produce had to be destroyed and considered contaminated {milk, meats, etc}, rather than risk it.

because of all this, mom was unsure whether she could make it cuz the vehicle she was going to drive would have left the guys without a reliable vehicle. so after much deliberation, including speaking with the basket weaving folks...she decided not to come. but then, i offered to go pick her up. so that deserved more consideration and so my folks are gonna meet with jert and me on the arkansas/mississippi border. that way all the guys can meet and then mom will come back with jert and me. she is not teaching any of the basket weaving classes right now, there is too much upheaval right now.

so mom is gonna hang out with me, yea!! i'm really happy and jert is looking forward to her visit. altho we will be very busy working, painting, cleaning, rearranging, etc; we will be able to visit and catch up and chit chat. she is bringing my dress {ya know, the wedding dress} and that'll be sweet!

so back to saturday, after i spoke with memommamia, jert and i loaded up and headed back to his place where a group of adults, toddlers, and lil babies were waiting for us. jert's daughter and her friend hid a gazillion plastic easter eggs with candies and jert hid the prized larger egg filled with so much candy it'd make children hyper for weeks. after the egg hunt was over and all the folks left, jert and i hopped on the bike and rode down to forest, ms.

one of jert's best childhood friends is officiating at our wedding. i'dn't met him yet, so since saturday was so lovely, we rode down to visit with them. he was so very nice and his wife is lovely and they have a great marriage that has lasted and lasted and lasted. they met in first grade, him and his wife, and dated all thru highschool. they married shortly afterwards and have two great daughters, and two grandsons.

after we visited for a few hours, jert and i rode home. oh my. it being a saturday of a holiday weekend, a weekend of family get-togethers and easter reunions adn things...we rode thru two check-points. they waved us thru both without making us dig out our id and all. by the time we got home, jert was stiffening up (and not in a good way) and i was freezing. our eyes were bloodshot and irritated from dust, pollens, and tiredness. we were stumbling around like the lil old people we'll be. some day.

sunday, jert had roasted a turkey and we sat in our jammies all day, eating and drinking tea and watching tv and i crocheted him a very sooooooft fuzzy hat so that his head won't be so cold when he sleeps. momma in her gown and i in my cap, had just settled down for a looooong winter's nap, when what should...

k, so then today...monday is a busy day for jert at work. and today was monday allllllll day long. i decided to clean out his truck, a job i've been intending to do for quite some time. it took me three plus hours and four buckets of water and numerous cleaners, my whisk broom, dust-vac, and other items with which to gird my loins when entering into a cleaning battle. the inside of his truck is now as clean as i can make it. there are still some stains on the seats that i just couldn't get out and some sticky stuff in the cup holders that i couldn't quite get up and all. but! it's lots cleaner.

why is it that when you clean, you remove all that mess and place it on your person? i felt so scuzzy that i stripped off my grody duds and popped into the shower. jert brought me some post-easter chocolate peanut butter eggs and i way over indulged in them. consuming, nay inhaling, an entire bag in one sitting. i'd be ashamed, but i'm so not.

mmmm, happy tastebuds, full belly, buzzed brain....mmmmm

losing pete

LOSING A FRIEND: THIS IS A VERY TOUCHING STORY ABOUT LIFE & DEATH, AND THE FRIENDS THAT WE HAVE. IT'S CERTAIN TO STIR UP YOUR HEART, TOUCH YOUR SOUL. THIS EMAIL IS ONE I COULD NOT AFFORD NOT TO SHARE WITH MY FRIENDS. I'M STILL CHOKED UP OVER IT!

"shit, pete! is that you?!?!"

my jert & me

on my jerry's birthday, friday 3 april, we had our first couple's picture taken at walmart's "picture me" portrait studio. the date that we had for pick-up was next wednesday, but i received a call today to let me know that they were already in. so i picked them up and

POOF!

here we are. we want to keep the 8x10 for ourselves, frame and give the 5x7s to memommamia and hismomma, smaller ones for his kids, and then we were talking about maybe including some with the invitations for the wedding.

worth 1000

a few years ago, i used to log on daily to view the photoshop contests at worth1000.

some stuff was way too kewl not to be used in ad campaigns while other attempts were so pathetic that it'd have been merciful to simply not post those chopped and cropped juxtaposed shots.

so earlier today, while i was waiting for an eMail to arrive, i visited a few worthy sites and found this luscious lovely.

and i also gawked at whatnottocrochet and cakewrecks.

oh lawdy be, the things people spend time, effort, and money on.

shudder.

aw, tis jest nother yarn

well, lookitchu! where has the time gone?!? yesterday, it was cold. last night, it was freezing. but oh! tomorrow will be about forty degrees warmer, making it into the seventies.

i was tuckered out this morning and was very sluggish, but people needed seeing, things needed done, and places needing visiting. bills needed paying. errands needed running. all those things surpassed my needing rest.


and i got a shitload done. i really did. i paid all my bills {except one, which i did get the money order for, but haven't the address to send it to at the moment; tis on my need-to list}. and cuz our walmartZ is making the change over to the new format {hate it, rillee ah do}, there are all sortsa items on clearance, or discounted, or overstocked, and the like. this translates to me getting all giddy cuz ooooh lookit all the yarn {squeals} that i can buy for way less than normal.

since i tend to use yarn constantly, this is very good for me, and all the other folks that benefit from my yarns. i'm not a yarn-snobb, tho there are some types i prefer for certain projects. i use red heart super saver jumbo acrylic skeins for most throws, afghans, hats, scarves, etc. caron's simply soft is a great yarn to work with and feels great for shawls and other wearables. and bernats, lion's brand, and some of the vanna's choice make for good baby items.


so after visiting with my jerry's mom, and after unloaded all the stuffs from the truck, i sorted thru things and filled up the doggie-treat jar, put up my meds, and then...then i took stock of all the yarn piled on the bed. i had already stopped by my place on the farm and grabbed a tub of yarn before i stopped by walmartZ and bought most skeins for a buck, some for a buck and a half, and four for $1.80 {bernat baby yarns}. my jerry and i sorted and got it all organized. he had some great suggestions so i now have some easy to access bins of red heart and caron.

usually, i only buy yarn for a certain project. that way i don't have an incredible stash that never gets used, despite best intentions. but i made an exception for most of the skeins i bought today, cuz i can use most of them in most any project, yes. and also because a dollar a skein is a really good price. and not likely to occur again any time soon.

the dept manager and i had quite a visit cuz i was literally loading my cart as she was marking the skeins down. what luck, eh? she'd said that she was gonna be putting more out, marked down, tomorrow. and that she really wants to clear out what they currently have in stock cuz she's ready to set things up the new way and wants to make the transition to stocking only those items they will continue to carry. regrettably, i doubt i'll get any more of the yarn right now cuz available disposable funds are pretty much depleted for the moment.

and i am enjoying all the yarns i now have. sigh. blink.blink.

chewing the oysters

the other day, my mom called to let me know that my dress came in and she will bring it with her when she comes this way in a week or so. while we were on the phone, we both wondered why folks say, 'in my heart of hearts'...do you think cows moo to each other in their need to convince the other of their sincerity, 'elsie, i'm telling ya, i just knew it in my fourth stomach...'. by the way, mom said the dress was beautiful and i asked if she tried it on. she was shocked that i would even ask. of course she didn't.

so friday was my jerry's birthday and we did a few things over this weekend to celebrate. we did have our first couple's pix taken at walmart. we pick them up in a week or so, and i think they turned out pretty good. course, i'm biased. i will say tho that when mom was here back in february, she'd said that jerry and i looked good together. i cannot remember when my mom has ever said that about the significant other in my life. so it was a very nice thrill to know she thinks that.

jerry's youngest daughter made a sugar-free cake for him and brought it over with her family. his oldest daughter and her family were already here and it was a very nice evening. the soon to be seven month old grandson surprised both jerry and i by rolling over and scooting himself along. you'd've thought i'd never seen a child do that, the way i carried on. whatta ninny. the two year old grandson and five year old granddaughter got to running around and it was cool to see such exuberant happiness. it's a bit different for me to follow what a small child is telling me, but i try to pay attention and respond appropriately. so when the lil boy plopped himself down in my lap to tell me about the stinky monster, i tried to keep up. he did lean over and see his reflection in the glass against the darkness outside and then solemnly said that the stinky monster was out there, waiting to get him. he didn't seem scared, just informative. the lil girl was telling me about her zebra earlier and i'm glad that her mother told me that it's a plastic toy; it made it easier to know how to respond...cuz sometimes kids have really great imaginations and i wouldn't want to have asked her about riding the zebra when that wouldn't've done at all.

the next day, my jerry and i rode the bike over to tuscaloosa to the first black river story teller fest. it was a beautiful day and there was also an air show, so traffic was a bit congested going in and coming out. on our way over, we stopped in columbus to visit the flea market held at the farmers' market's ground. we saw some neat things, including these collapsed melted glass bottles that formed these sorta shallow troughs. some were meant for cutting boards, or cheese trays, and i thought that they'd be good for putting on the stove for when you have messing spoons and spatulas when cooking and stirring pots. thing is, lots of times when i admire something, i don't want it for my own. i just think it's cool. where it is, without me owning it. like some dresses i see; they're nice on that person...i don't want it on me. ya know?

the day progressed beautifully, including going to wintzell's oyster bar. my jerry's been a fan of the original one on the coast, so we popped in to the new one in tuscaloosa. our waiter {hi, todd!} was an extremely cool young man on his way to seattle in the next year or so. i love meeting and talking with folks like that; which is yet another reason why going to fests, esp story tellers, is so great.

on our way home, we stopped in columbus again. this time to visit my friend's church. she'd told me about a marriage seminar that was starting at 6:30 and would probably be 2 hrs on the outside. my jerry was a bit reluctant, but he didn't say anything so i knew he'd go. well, we actually got there around 6 and it went til almost 10. but it was really good and we didn't realize that four hours zoomed by. my jerry and i were both glad to have gone and i got one of the best books ever...the five languages of love. we all had fun, cuz it was very informal, and we did all sorts of lil exercises with various folks.

thing is, i had a bit too much sun during the day. we sat in the shade; actually, i hid in the shade at all times. but i'm fair skinned and tend to burn easily. and then some of my meds make me even more sensitive to the sun. i could feel my face getting tight and warm, but i thought i'd sunscreen with me. when i went to find it, uhm...no. so we stopped at walmart and picked some up. a bit like too lil way too late.

so that evening, during the marriage workshop...my sunburn came to full fruition and i could feel the heat radiating out from me in waves. finally, my friend leaned over to whisper that she was worried about me. she said that either i was breaking out in a rash or blistering along the side of my face and by my mouth. i told her with a very straight face in all seriousness {from my fourth stomach} that when i crossed the threshold into the church, i began to fester with boils and my flesh began to blister. since she knows me extremely well, and since i've attended bible studies with her for over five years...she burst into laughter. and then snickered every time she looked at me.

seriously tho, the best stuff evah for skin needing nourishing is ocean potion skincare. it's a bit on the pricey side, but not prohibitively so; i get it at walmart for about $4+ (even tho online, i found it for twice that). i get the moisturizing with aloe lotion. it's made of entirely good stuffs with no alcohol (unlike most lotion) so there is no stinging. and it isn't greasy (unlike most lotion that is alcohol-free). and it smells so good that i want to consume it...yummy! i think it kinda smells a bit like baby-aspirin, that orange-cream like scent. but that's probably just my weird association with stuff. cuz yeah, i'm that much fun.

hey, i just got this tip in eMail today: if you ever get the sudden urge to run around naked, you should sniff some Windex first. It'll keep you from streaking.

my jerry's birthday

hapPEE birthDAY to you
HAPpy Birthday to YOU
HappEE BIRTHDAY my jerREEE
HAAAHPpybirthdaytoyouUUuuu

darryl and the drive-thru

a few months back, a buncha folks were sitting around playing trivial pursuit when a very interesting fact arose {as often they do when these games are played} and that tidbit stuck with me all this time. so today, i finally looked it up, and wouldn't you? congruity, pennsylvania is home to the one and only drive-thru strip-joint.





"wtf?!?" you say.

yeah, that's what i said.

so i looked up some info on it. here's the skinny. "climax" is a gentleman's club near alexandria, which is near pittsburg, pennsylvania; that actually went up on auction listed on eBay in 2005. read the article here. when you get to climax {the club}, ya can go one way or the other. if ya go the one way, you park and go inside to enjoy the show.


but if ya choose the other way, you pull into a covered port area. once there, you run your credit card thru the machine and settle in for the show at the drive-thru window. the curtain at this diamond portal parts and you can catch an eyeful.

i'm thinking it must be the novelty of the idea. but, then i never really understood the appeal of strip-joints in general. you can just imagine immaculate me being unable to touch any surface, even to perch on the edge of a chair. in that way, i can sorta see the appeal of the drive-thru window. then again, i'd be the one squirting windex on the glass and using an entire roll of paper towels while wearing latex gloves.

and i don't even have a latex fetish.

*shudder*

tidbits

Friday, my Jerry and I zipped on up to Shiloh, Tennessee to visit some friends of mine. He's heard lots about Greta over the past few months, and now he finally got a chance to meet her! and her husband and his daughter. And he got to see how insanely goofy Greta and I can be together. We just tend to draw that out in each other and then there is the comfy-zone.

The ride up was very sweet. It spritzed for about five minutes total and was nothing to sweat. We found their place with no problem, even tho we had to work out a system of hand-signals and nudges from the backseat driver. Their log home sits at the end of a long gravel drive, that entails a few curves and one or two ups and downs. Gravel is not a biker's best friend, but this was not a problem as it wasn't too loose or too much...juuUUuuust right.

In addition to an awesome visit with the folks, we also got to see a baker's dozen newborn pups with another waddling mother waiting to drop (i'm sure she has by now). We went riding Saturday and saw an awesome eagle's nest. It was huuuUUuuuge.

Chef Jenny whipped up a few wonderful meals that had all of us drooling. And she whipped our butts with her mad SceneIt skillz. I think she could have taken on all four of the rest of us and still dashed her way around the board, leaving us in the proverbial dust. Altho, I was pleased to spring a few surprising correct answers on the unsuspecting, thus contributing to the coup we females staged.

The ride home was cool. Correction: the ride home was friggen cold and my face froze into a permenant half-smile. We bundled up and stopped to take a warm-up/coffee break along the way, so the ride was actually pleasant. We now know what we'd do differently; including getting me a pair of heavier gloves and maybe a full-face helmet &/or a lower-face leather wrap to guard against the worst wind-chill. Jerry let me wear his jacket, which was great, but I kept worrying that he was freezing. But he seemed to be alright, even wearing the lighter weight jacket he'd worn.

In other news, I finished the lil librarian lady's late birthday present {a crocheted throw in soft white and claret} and have started a soft baby's blanket made in this variagated easter basket color schematic that can be appropriate for a lil boy. MeMom's coming for a visit, just after easter. She's teaching a few more basket weaving classes, this time for the county school system. Afterwards, she will stay on for a bit; help me scrub, paint, and such. I'm looking forward to her visit and so is Jerry {memommamia}. And, sigh, I broke the two month old partial...i know, i know...dammit. but! hopefully it's on the mend as we speak and tomorrow i will once again have a pleasant smile. Which is good, cuz Friday my Jerry and I are gonna have our pix made.

Friday is his birthday. He went ahead and bought a digital cam the other day. He's been wanting one for the longest time. While we were visiting Greta, he checked out the one she was using and loved the fact it had a flash for those indoor shots. So he took a few pix last night of the pups and we got a cute shot of one of his grandbabies. Well, I think that catches us all up. Sorry it's not the witty words, but I knew that I wanted to write before it got too far past this weekend.

happy spring!!

*gasp*

my jerry has been recalled. so the wedding is off. we won't even have time to do it before he has to report to the state capitol. here's his entry today:

Recalled to Active Duty

Went home for lunch and in my mailbox I received a missive from Uncle Sam that started, "Greetings, as per your previous enlistment contract, it has been determined that you served in a rating that is now considered critical to the service of your country. You have until 2400, 1 April 2009, to arrange your affairs and present yourself to the U.S. Coast Guard recruiter in Jackson, MS". Needless to say I was much surprised and pissed. I called the recruiter and was informed that after processing I was to be sent to the U.S. Coast Guard Port Security Unit in Umm Quasr, Iraq. All I could think was "Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit." But, I do believe (for better or worse) in this country, so I will soon be winging my way to the sandy shores of the Middle East. It won't be too awful bad though, since I found out that my youngest son has also been assigned to the same unit (as a mechanic) and will be reporting a couple of weeks after I arrive. At least I will outrank him, at least for a little while, plus I'll be working in an air-conditioned office. Last time I was in the middle east was in 1983. I was part of an oil spill response team that went to Bahrain at the request of their government. Wasn't really much we could do. The entire beach had gotten so many oil spills over the years it looked like a black-topped parking lot.

Everyone have a great day!
Oh - & you do realize what today is don't you?