Mornin, Mornin... I'm not talking to Paul and haven't since Sunday night... It is my way of dealing with him and his issues - maybe it is not the right way, but when you have two people so dynamically different in dealing with issues, it is the only way I can do it...
He's been a grouch since last week, flying off the handle without advance warning or reason (for the most part)... My nature is to deal with him, ignoring it for the most part... And then he 'fills up the patience slot' with enough and that's it... PERIOD... If I'm in a weak spot myself, I can take no more and let him know in loud terms I've had enough!... I probably ignore 8 or 9 out of every 10 of these incidences, but when they do eventually happen, it's always hell around here!
The sad part about all of this is even after 12 years, Paul still does not recognize when he gets like this, nor the harm it does to me when he strikes out at the closest person around him (usually me)... He professes to dislike hollering strongly, but fails to use the same rules for his own self!
I got a tetanus shot on August 4th and for the first week, I felt no ill effects from it - nothing like they told me about at my doctor's office... About week two, I started getting more extreme pain levels (particularly in my hips and back, then it moved onto my knee joints)... Not two weeks into having the shot, I could barely walk... Each step was like getting socked in the back of my brain at the base of my neck!
Eventually I gave in and called my doctor who has been seeing me for 12 years now... The next day after the tetanus shot he was hospitalized and isn't expected to be back to his practice until at least the end of November... I don't have another doctor to see or know, so I'm stuck trying to deal with this now...
But life goes on around here - there is no one else to pick up my slack when I go down, so I kept pushing through it... Last week (I think it was Wednesday), I could no longer put off a few errands that I had to get done, so I fed the dogs early in the morning, gathered my list and off I went... By 2:30PM, each and EVERY step was painful - like a number 8 or 9 on a scale of 10 - and I called it quits for the day...
I sat in my truck underneath the breezeway and cried... I'm not normally a crybaby about pain, but just the thought of trying to get all those groceries into the house by myself was simply overwhelming... After a 15-minute period of feeling sorry for myself and debating about how soft the ice cream had now become, I thought about the small collapsible dolly we have and that I could probably get most of the cold stuff into the house with that...
I sorted out the groceries and managed to get all into the house, leaving the non perishable items in my truck for someone else to bring in... Then step, by painful step, it took me almost an hour to get the dogs out, the doggie door put back in, everything put away inside the house I'd purchased that day, get the dog dishes picked up and finish putting the kitchen back of some kind of order...
Paul came into the house shortly thereafter - he is always a man of fixed habits - reached up to the cigarette box to get a pack for his briefcase before he set it up for the night... OMG... Dependable and reliable Linda had not magically refilled the cigarette box!!!... I committed a crime and his body language plus the look skyward to the ceiling along with the grimace and comment that I hadn't gone to the cigarette store??? was like stepping on my last nerve!
Open a dictionary and look up "jerk" and you'll see my husband's face that day!
I consider it a major accomplishment to have gone and done all those errands, plus feeding the dogs, getting their meds, the house picked up, the normal chores done... Shame on me for not making 8 stops instead of 7 that day~~!!!.. And in no short terms, I told him so when he got back... Not politely either!
It's that old 80/20 principle, ya know? 20% of the people do 80% of the work, and 80% of the people get irritated when the remaining 20% of the work isn't done like they expect it to be!... Things just 'magically' get refilled around here... No one notices them when this house operates as status quo - only when it doesn't...
I don't like whiners and complainers and absolutely do my best to not be one, but that day? If any day? I certainly was entitled to be grouchy and should have been tended to by my family members instead of getting that rude behavior... I can put both of my family's pain levels together and mine will still exceed their combined total! (and to my own detriment as well)...
Fast forward to Sunday afternoon (after a MISERABLE adoption day on Saturday with my body's aches and pains)... Paul snaps that he NEVER gets a day off and is tired... Ya know that nerve he stepped on Wednesday?... He tore the scab right off of it all over again!... GRRRRRRRRRRRR...
He doesn't get a day off from life?... Well, no one gets a day off from life...
You buy a house?... You have things that need to be tended to, repaired, maintained, fixed, whatever - if you don't want to do this, you don't buy a house and continue to rent so someone else has the responsibilities...
You get married?... You have a relationship that needs to be nurtured, respected, tended to, etc. - or stay single and don't have the responsibilities.. You have children?... You have to fed, clothe, cuddle, love, interact, etc. or just don't have kids (or pets, same difference)...
This is life and when you get 'time off', you've stepped into your coffin... Then you have an infinite number of days off... I wish I'd gotten a day off somewhere in my life and still been able to live the rest of it... I've always been a wife, mother, friend, employee, partner or something that required me to show up for life each and every day of life!... There has ALWAYS been something that needs doing or tending to, fed, cleaned up or whatever!
Heck, I still have a kitchen cabinet that needs installation from when I redid the entire kitchen in the summer of 2008~!!!... If I could install it by myself, it would have already been done!...
And remember when Desiree plowed my truck into the brick flower bed three years ago???... It's still in disrepair and I don't know how to do brickwork... If I did, it would have been fixed already and whenever I use my truck, it wouldn't annoy me like it does...
Every year, twice a year, I 'balance the tightrope' and cut the vines back alongside of the pool, walking along the edge of the brick... How wide is a brick? 4"?... And it is 50' long as you bend over, cut and drag the vines to the other end... I haven't fallen into the pool yet, but then again, I'm not dead yet either, so I'm sure I will before it is all said and done...
Get a day off?.... PLEAZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
As Always,
The Lady
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
From the email bag: "I want a divorce!"
AUTHORED BY A YOUNG PERSON ... A STUDENT!
American liberals, leftists, social progressives, socialists, Marxists and Obama supporters, et al:
We have stuck together since the late 1950's, but the whole of this latest election process has made me realize that I want a divorce. I know we tolerated each other for many years for the sake of future generations, but sadly, this relationship has run its course. Our two ideological sides of America cannot and will not ever agree on what is right so let's just end it on friendly terms. We can smile and chalk it up to irreconcilable differences and go our own way.
Here is a model separation agreement:
Our two groups can equitably divide up the country by landmass each taking a portion. That will be the difficult part, but I am sure our two sides can come to a friendly agreement. After that, it should be relatively easy! Our respective representatives can effortlessly divide other assets since both sides have such distinct and disparate tastes.
We don't like re distributive taxes so you can keep them. You are welcome to the liberal judges and the ACLU. Since you hate guns and war, we'll take our firearms, the cops, the NRA and the military.
You can keep Oprah, Michael Moore and Rosie O'Donnell (you are, however, responsible for finding a bio-diesel vehicle big enough to move all three of them at one time).
We'll keep the capitalism, greedy corporations, pharmaceutical companies, Wal-Mart and Wall Street. You can have your beloved homeless, home boys, hippies and illegal aliens. We'll keep the hot Alaskan hockey moms, greedy CEO's and rednecks. We'll keep the Bibles and give you NBC and Hollywood ..
You can make nice with Iran and Palestine and we'll retain the right to invade and hammer places that threaten us.. You can have the peaceniks and war protesters. When our allies or our way of life are under assault, we'll help provide them security.
We'll keep our Judeo-Christian values.. You are welcome to Islam, Scientology, Humanism and Shirley McClain. You can also have the U.N. ... but we will no longer be paying the bill.
We'll keep the SUV's, pickup trucks and oversize luxury cars. You can take every Subaru station wagon you can find.
You can give everyone health care if you can find any practicing doctors. We'll continue to believe health care is a luxury and not a right. We'll keep The Battle Hymn of the Republic and the National Anthem. I'm sure you'll be happy to substitute Imagine, I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing, Kum Ba Ya or We Are the World.
We'll practice trickle down economics and you can give trickle up poverty your best shot. Since it often so offends you, we'll keep our history, our name and our flag.
Would you agree to this? If so, please pass it along to other like minded liberal and conservative patriots and if you do not agree, just hit delete. In the spirit of friendly parting, I'll bet you answer which one of us will need whose help in 15 years.
P.S. Also, please take Ted Turner, Sean Penn, Martin Sheehan, Barbara Streisand, and Jane Fonda with you.
P.S.S. And we won't have to press 1 for English.
American liberals, leftists, social progressives, socialists, Marxists and Obama supporters, et al:
We have stuck together since the late 1950's, but the whole of this latest election process has made me realize that I want a divorce. I know we tolerated each other for many years for the sake of future generations, but sadly, this relationship has run its course. Our two ideological sides of America cannot and will not ever agree on what is right so let's just end it on friendly terms. We can smile and chalk it up to irreconcilable differences and go our own way.
Here is a model separation agreement:
Our two groups can equitably divide up the country by landmass each taking a portion. That will be the difficult part, but I am sure our two sides can come to a friendly agreement. After that, it should be relatively easy! Our respective representatives can effortlessly divide other assets since both sides have such distinct and disparate tastes.
We don't like re distributive taxes so you can keep them. You are welcome to the liberal judges and the ACLU. Since you hate guns and war, we'll take our firearms, the cops, the NRA and the military.
You can keep Oprah, Michael Moore and Rosie O'Donnell (you are, however, responsible for finding a bio-diesel vehicle big enough to move all three of them at one time).
We'll keep the capitalism, greedy corporations, pharmaceutical companies, Wal-Mart and Wall Street. You can have your beloved homeless, home boys, hippies and illegal aliens. We'll keep the hot Alaskan hockey moms, greedy CEO's and rednecks. We'll keep the Bibles and give you NBC and Hollywood ..
You can make nice with Iran and Palestine and we'll retain the right to invade and hammer places that threaten us.. You can have the peaceniks and war protesters. When our allies or our way of life are under assault, we'll help provide them security.
We'll keep our Judeo-Christian values.. You are welcome to Islam, Scientology, Humanism and Shirley McClain. You can also have the U.N. ... but we will no longer be paying the bill.
We'll keep the SUV's, pickup trucks and oversize luxury cars. You can take every Subaru station wagon you can find.
You can give everyone health care if you can find any practicing doctors. We'll continue to believe health care is a luxury and not a right. We'll keep The Battle Hymn of the Republic and the National Anthem. I'm sure you'll be happy to substitute Imagine, I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing, Kum Ba Ya or We Are the World.
We'll practice trickle down economics and you can give trickle up poverty your best shot. Since it often so offends you, we'll keep our history, our name and our flag.
Would you agree to this? If so, please pass it along to other like minded liberal and conservative patriots and if you do not agree, just hit delete. In the spirit of friendly parting, I'll bet you answer which one of us will need whose help in 15 years.
P.S. Also, please take Ted Turner, Sean Penn, Martin Sheehan, Barbara Streisand, and Jane Fonda with you.
P.S.S. And we won't have to press 1 for English.
Monday, August 24, 2009
RFP - 8/24/09
I read this today and it really made me think:
How many of us have had dreams, but hesitated for whatever reason, and later down the road, seriously regretted our lack of decision and/or attempting to try and realize our dreams?
I have fallen on my face many times with some of my decisions in life, but I can't tell you today that I've regretted ever trying to make them come true... Most of my ideas never materialized, or weren't good ones to start out with, but if you would have told me to stop dreaming, I might as well have laid down in my coffin and died earlier than God intended it to happen...
And while I don't consider myself a success story, I certainly don't consider myself as a failure --- and having lots of dreams and ideas is really a crucial part of me, Linda, The Lady, whichever aspect of me that you know...
We take a few of the Chihuahuas and do pet therapy with them at a convalescence home... If I ever were to get ill and needed this kind of environment, this would be the place I'd go... As many times as I have been there, not once have I seen something that turns me off... The staff and volunteers have always been kind and loving towards the patients... Always...
When we arrive, it is like a combination of Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy all rolled up in one... The residents particularly love Frito because he's so outgoing and friendly; Nacho has been taking his cues from Frito and Nacho is also a favorite because of his lush, silky hair... For many of the residents, it is a tactile thing that I myself can relate to...
Probably 50% of the residents are no longer really functioning mentally or physically... We chit-chat and do small talk, ask them how their day is going, discuss what is for lunch, etc. and for those that want a dog on their lap to pet, some can no longer completely open up their hands, but will still rub with their closed fist... Frito has learned it is OK to accept whatever they are physically able to do (and that he gets LOTS of cookies whenever he comes with us! smile)...
Frito has series of days (weeks) when he really feels punk, so he doesn't go all the time... Last trip, I took Princess with me and she watched Frito consistently to get the lay of the land about the whole experience... I'd like to get Ginger and maybe even Scudderbutts into this program if I can (or as long as I'm fostering Scudderbutts)... Both are friendly and outgoing - Scudderbutts is a major talker and Ginger is a gorgeous longhaired Chihuahua who has a very silky coat... BeeGee's done it many times too...
Especially with the girls, the residents love their little dresses and small size... Some residents tell me every trip that they once had a dog, what size and breed it was, etc... Almost all of the residents 'connect' in some way with the dogs and although I have had a trip or two when I left feeling a bit down about my own health and mortality issues, for the most part I feel good when I leave... Glad that yet again I could do this for another human being... And hope when I get that old (or sick), someone makes a point of coming in to visit me too...
Eventually, I'd like to certify a few in the AKC CGC program, and then onto certifying them as Delta pet therapy dogs... Several times a week, I work with the few that go on a regular basis... And although I might never realize this dream of certification with any of them, it's just so nice to have a dream you believe will come true, ya know?... It gives you something to look forward to and work towards... That's the whole point of dreams and aspirations - not the realization of them but the journey along the way!
As Always,
The Lady
Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now.
~~~~~~~~~~~~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
How many of us have had dreams, but hesitated for whatever reason, and later down the road, seriously regretted our lack of decision and/or attempting to try and realize our dreams?
I have fallen on my face many times with some of my decisions in life, but I can't tell you today that I've regretted ever trying to make them come true... Most of my ideas never materialized, or weren't good ones to start out with, but if you would have told me to stop dreaming, I might as well have laid down in my coffin and died earlier than God intended it to happen...
And while I don't consider myself a success story, I certainly don't consider myself as a failure --- and having lots of dreams and ideas is really a crucial part of me, Linda, The Lady, whichever aspect of me that you know...
We take a few of the Chihuahuas and do pet therapy with them at a convalescence home... If I ever were to get ill and needed this kind of environment, this would be the place I'd go... As many times as I have been there, not once have I seen something that turns me off... The staff and volunteers have always been kind and loving towards the patients... Always...
When we arrive, it is like a combination of Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy all rolled up in one... The residents particularly love Frito because he's so outgoing and friendly; Nacho has been taking his cues from Frito and Nacho is also a favorite because of his lush, silky hair... For many of the residents, it is a tactile thing that I myself can relate to...
Probably 50% of the residents are no longer really functioning mentally or physically... We chit-chat and do small talk, ask them how their day is going, discuss what is for lunch, etc. and for those that want a dog on their lap to pet, some can no longer completely open up their hands, but will still rub with their closed fist... Frito has learned it is OK to accept whatever they are physically able to do (and that he gets LOTS of cookies whenever he comes with us! smile)...
Frito has series of days (weeks) when he really feels punk, so he doesn't go all the time... Last trip, I took Princess with me and she watched Frito consistently to get the lay of the land about the whole experience... I'd like to get Ginger and maybe even Scudderbutts into this program if I can (or as long as I'm fostering Scudderbutts)... Both are friendly and outgoing - Scudderbutts is a major talker and Ginger is a gorgeous longhaired Chihuahua who has a very silky coat... BeeGee's done it many times too...
Especially with the girls, the residents love their little dresses and small size... Some residents tell me every trip that they once had a dog, what size and breed it was, etc... Almost all of the residents 'connect' in some way with the dogs and although I have had a trip or two when I left feeling a bit down about my own health and mortality issues, for the most part I feel good when I leave... Glad that yet again I could do this for another human being... And hope when I get that old (or sick), someone makes a point of coming in to visit me too...
Eventually, I'd like to certify a few in the AKC CGC program, and then onto certifying them as Delta pet therapy dogs... Several times a week, I work with the few that go on a regular basis... And although I might never realize this dream of certification with any of them, it's just so nice to have a dream you believe will come true, ya know?... It gives you something to look forward to and work towards... That's the whole point of dreams and aspirations - not the realization of them but the journey along the way!
As Always,
The Lady
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
RFP - 08/19/09
I'm pretty disgusted with the reinstatement of Michael Vicks by the NFL commissioner and then the Eagles signing him for a year at $1.6 million... Must EVERYTHING in this country ALWAYS be driven and/or motivated by money?...
Seems to me Pete Ross is still banned for life from baseball if I'm not mistaken...
But oh, I forgot... Gambling didn't generate revenue to the government or any big corporations, did it?...
Why wasn't Vicks banned from football for life?... Anyone that can electrocute a dog, engage in the dog fighting industry and all the rest of the horrendous acts he did while enjoying his 'hobby' should certainly have paid an equitable price, if not worse, than Rose did IMHO... Or am I the only person that is questioning why such different degrees of punishment between the two sports figures? Why is the person who took life so brutally not getting a worse punishment than someone who bet on the outcomes of games?
I don't get it, I truly don't...
Oh, I understand football is BIG bucks, but why are some more accountable for their actions than others? And have you watched the video on ESPN?... Talk about 'scripted'... I'm wondering if there was a teleprompter behind the cameras because Vicks sounds that insincere to me!
Vick said he cried in prison about "what I did, being away from my family, letting so many people down, letting myself down, not being out on the football field, being in a prison bed, in a prison bunk, writing letters home. That wasn't my life. That wasn't the way that things were supposed to be."... Sorry, I didn't hear any remorse in his statements... And BTW - it wasn't the way things were supposed to be?... That's EXACTLY how things were supposed to be once he was convicted of dogfighting! Or did I miss something???
GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR... Once again MONEY triumphs over what is right in this country... Football and the almighty billion$ of dollar$ it generates won out over what is the right, ethical and moral thing...
Seems to me Pete Ross is still banned for life from baseball if I'm not mistaken...
But oh, I forgot... Gambling didn't generate revenue to the government or any big corporations, did it?...
Why wasn't Vicks banned from football for life?... Anyone that can electrocute a dog, engage in the dog fighting industry and all the rest of the horrendous acts he did while enjoying his 'hobby' should certainly have paid an equitable price, if not worse, than Rose did IMHO... Or am I the only person that is questioning why such different degrees of punishment between the two sports figures? Why is the person who took life so brutally not getting a worse punishment than someone who bet on the outcomes of games?
I don't get it, I truly don't...
Oh, I understand football is BIG bucks, but why are some more accountable for their actions than others? And have you watched the video on ESPN?... Talk about 'scripted'... I'm wondering if there was a teleprompter behind the cameras because Vicks sounds that insincere to me!
Vick said he cried in prison about "what I did, being away from my family, letting so many people down, letting myself down, not being out on the football field, being in a prison bed, in a prison bunk, writing letters home. That wasn't my life. That wasn't the way that things were supposed to be."... Sorry, I didn't hear any remorse in his statements... And BTW - it wasn't the way things were supposed to be?... That's EXACTLY how things were supposed to be once he was convicted of dogfighting! Or did I miss something???
GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR... Once again MONEY triumphs over what is right in this country... Football and the almighty billion$ of dollar$ it generates won out over what is the right, ethical and moral thing...
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Real Family Press - 8/18/09
Mornin, Mornin... I keep trying to get the Press done online and previous attempts failed, but I'll try one more time and hopefully people will follow it to the blog to read it... It is the easiest way for me to do this and maybe one day I'll find the time to go back and load up all the past years of Presses here... Who knows, because my day is seldom the way I plan it!...
Last week I heard of an acquaintance of mine in dog rescue who had passed away... She and I were the 'oddballs' in the group because we both were crafty-type people and consistently were using our talents and hands to come up with new things and ways of fund-raising to help save the dogs from dying in the shelters...
Paula's talent was extreme in that she'd found the money, time and patience to purchase an embroidery machine... Not the hand-held ones, but the full mulligan version which sits in its own table, requires computer software and special threads, etc... She did some absolutely BEAUTIFUL work with that machine - I have a towel hanger on my oven door handle on which she embroidered a full view Chihuahua and it made me tear up when she presented it to me...
Paula was an intensely passionate dog rescuer and she too specialized in one breed (Keeshonds)... Amazingly quick-witted and always thinking, it was a major tragedy that she contract Mad Cow's Disease and this was the cause of her death... There's a memorial service this Sunday for her at their home and her husband, Jack, has barely managed to make it through this horrible period in his life, for Paula's passing has left a tremendous hole in his life and their two little Keeshonds... sigh...
Sometimes you never know what you've got until it is gone, ya know?... We tend to take people for granted who 'embroider' our life with their charm, good humor and give us a reason to live, prosper and be fruitful...
Which brings me to another thought... Most of you all are also subscribers to Julia's list (CraftE1Ldy@aol.com)... They discovered a small brain tumor during a fall she had while out here in California, visiting with her family recently... For those that hadn't heard about this, you probably have missed her mailings in your email box recently - this is why...
Let's send some positive wishes and warm thoughts that it can be surgically removed without harm and Julia can make a fast and speedy recovery from it...
Again, until life gives you bumps in the road, you never appreciate how smooth the ride is... I think about this a lot myself... And try to remind myself even on the bad days that it could be MUCH worse... The other day Paul said he knew I was in pain because of the frequent sighs... And I wondered about that for quite some time, because I go out of my way to not be a whiner and complainer...
Yesterday, Desiree gave me the clue that allowed me to put the pieces together about this, asking me why I was sighing, so I knew she'd been the one to notice it - I just couldn't imagine Paul REALLY noticed the number of sighs I did, nor the frequency! I mean - he is a retired detective, but ask him dialogue from old movies and he can quote it, scripture and verse... Ask him trivial things or that you need him to fix something, and it is in one ear and out the other most of the time!... Sighs?... LOL... That's at the bottom of almost everybody's list of things we notice...
And it's not really a sigh either - it's more of holding myself and my body until the sharp pain passes, so I guess I tend to not breathe while I'm doing this and then when the pain is bearable, I breath again? Everyone's tragedies and health issues are SO much greater than mine - even my own family's - that I hate to complain about my aches and pains, ya know?...
When I find myself sliding downwards and complaining a lot, I pull out that purple bracelet and force myself to wear it (it does make my wrist sweat, so that's a fact and not a complaint!)... A few of us got these a few years ago, so if you're a newbie to the Press, you might have missed it... There is a website for the movement and if you read through the faqs, you will see you have to move the bracelet to the other wrist when you catch yourself gossiping or complaining about something, then start all over again for it is believed it takes 21 days to change bad habits...
I'm not sure if I ever will totally make this happen, but if nothing else, it does remind me or make me mentally aware of complaining about things... I guess the real crux of it is that you replace complaints with positive things you see, want to do, make happen, etc. instead of focusing on the negative...
And I think for the most part, I do this... I know I do it with the dogs... Without a doubt, there are times I must say "QUIET" at least 100 times a day some days... I know tomorrow I will probably say it 101 times, and maybe the next day 102 times... But if I keep with it, respond in a consistent tone and not lose my patience, eventually the number of times I have to say it will start decreasing to replace a yappy Chihuahua with a great one... Saying it with a frustrated tone does nothing at all but increase the number of times you're going to say it...
We have a dog baiter here right now... Kelly has had her upper and lower canines surgically removed so that she could inflict no harm to a dog they were baiting with her... Initially she could not eat nicely with any of the other dogs - there are times she still gets antsy and I have to separate her, so I usually judge her mood before meal times... A few weeks after her arrival here and her coat had grown back in (she'd lost half of it, plus had spent 6 weeks in isolation at the shelter), I noticed a change in Kelly... Once she realized she no longer had to fight for her food, she almost went into a chaotic state of mind... From one extreme of behaviors to the opposite extreme, and I spent a LOT of time correcting the behavior...
You almost have to anticipate it in advance... I can't explain it correctly, but it is signs you know it is coming and you don't always catch it... The first few adoptions I took her to were stressful, for she'd do nothing else but bark, bark, bark... Big dogs passing by would immediately set her off (and I have seen her lose her bowels when in the presence of pitbulls too)... Negative behaviors by her would get our attention, and it dawned on me one day that our responses were actually encouraging her instead of what it should be doing... DUH~!!!
Sometimes I need a pile of mental bricks to hit me in the head before I get something... I know I know it, but I need that visual impact to break through the daily rote and routine of my thoughts!... Since then, I have been making a major effort to acknowledge Kelly when she's quiet and this is really positive reinforcement training (yes, I know about it and subscribe to it faithfully, but it took this extreme demonstration to remind me of what I already know!!! LOL)...
As I look over now, Kelly is sleeping in a doggie bed - YES, with two other dogs, butt to head and side to side... Even the hair on the back of her ears has grown back in and she's put back on the weight she'd lost through her stint in the shelter... There are times she slips (don't we all), but for the most part, she is now a well-mannered Chihuahua that is attentive (she favors Paul over me), has canine manners and I hope soon will find her own furever home...
Sometimes we forget to see the small improvements in our lives along the way and do concentrate on only the bad things that happen or are a part of our lives... It is a challenge every day for me to re-set myself mentally and do this... But I know if I fail today, tomorrow I can start again... And (LOL), if I have to switch over that purple bracelet today, God be willing, he'll give me another 21 days to correct the error of my ways!
As Always,
The Lady
Last week I heard of an acquaintance of mine in dog rescue who had passed away... She and I were the 'oddballs' in the group because we both were crafty-type people and consistently were using our talents and hands to come up with new things and ways of fund-raising to help save the dogs from dying in the shelters...
Paula's talent was extreme in that she'd found the money, time and patience to purchase an embroidery machine... Not the hand-held ones, but the full mulligan version which sits in its own table, requires computer software and special threads, etc... She did some absolutely BEAUTIFUL work with that machine - I have a towel hanger on my oven door handle on which she embroidered a full view Chihuahua and it made me tear up when she presented it to me...
Paula was an intensely passionate dog rescuer and she too specialized in one breed (Keeshonds)... Amazingly quick-witted and always thinking, it was a major tragedy that she contract Mad Cow's Disease and this was the cause of her death... There's a memorial service this Sunday for her at their home and her husband, Jack, has barely managed to make it through this horrible period in his life, for Paula's passing has left a tremendous hole in his life and their two little Keeshonds... sigh...
Sometimes you never know what you've got until it is gone, ya know?... We tend to take people for granted who 'embroider' our life with their charm, good humor and give us a reason to live, prosper and be fruitful...
Which brings me to another thought... Most of you all are also subscribers to Julia's list (CraftE1Ldy@aol.com)... They discovered a small brain tumor during a fall she had while out here in California, visiting with her family recently... For those that hadn't heard about this, you probably have missed her mailings in your email box recently - this is why...
Let's send some positive wishes and warm thoughts that it can be surgically removed without harm and Julia can make a fast and speedy recovery from it...
Again, until life gives you bumps in the road, you never appreciate how smooth the ride is... I think about this a lot myself... And try to remind myself even on the bad days that it could be MUCH worse... The other day Paul said he knew I was in pain because of the frequent sighs... And I wondered about that for quite some time, because I go out of my way to not be a whiner and complainer...
Yesterday, Desiree gave me the clue that allowed me to put the pieces together about this, asking me why I was sighing, so I knew she'd been the one to notice it - I just couldn't imagine Paul REALLY noticed the number of sighs I did, nor the frequency! I mean - he is a retired detective, but ask him dialogue from old movies and he can quote it, scripture and verse... Ask him trivial things or that you need him to fix something, and it is in one ear and out the other most of the time!... Sighs?... LOL... That's at the bottom of almost everybody's list of things we notice...
And it's not really a sigh either - it's more of holding myself and my body until the sharp pain passes, so I guess I tend to not breathe while I'm doing this and then when the pain is bearable, I breath again? Everyone's tragedies and health issues are SO much greater than mine - even my own family's - that I hate to complain about my aches and pains, ya know?...
When I find myself sliding downwards and complaining a lot, I pull out that purple bracelet and force myself to wear it (it does make my wrist sweat, so that's a fact and not a complaint!)... A few of us got these a few years ago, so if you're a newbie to the Press, you might have missed it... There is a website for the movement and if you read through the faqs, you will see you have to move the bracelet to the other wrist when you catch yourself gossiping or complaining about something, then start all over again for it is believed it takes 21 days to change bad habits...
I'm not sure if I ever will totally make this happen, but if nothing else, it does remind me or make me mentally aware of complaining about things... I guess the real crux of it is that you replace complaints with positive things you see, want to do, make happen, etc. instead of focusing on the negative...
And I think for the most part, I do this... I know I do it with the dogs... Without a doubt, there are times I must say "QUIET" at least 100 times a day some days... I know tomorrow I will probably say it 101 times, and maybe the next day 102 times... But if I keep with it, respond in a consistent tone and not lose my patience, eventually the number of times I have to say it will start decreasing to replace a yappy Chihuahua with a great one... Saying it with a frustrated tone does nothing at all but increase the number of times you're going to say it...
We have a dog baiter here right now... Kelly has had her upper and lower canines surgically removed so that she could inflict no harm to a dog they were baiting with her... Initially she could not eat nicely with any of the other dogs - there are times she still gets antsy and I have to separate her, so I usually judge her mood before meal times... A few weeks after her arrival here and her coat had grown back in (she'd lost half of it, plus had spent 6 weeks in isolation at the shelter), I noticed a change in Kelly... Once she realized she no longer had to fight for her food, she almost went into a chaotic state of mind... From one extreme of behaviors to the opposite extreme, and I spent a LOT of time correcting the behavior...
You almost have to anticipate it in advance... I can't explain it correctly, but it is signs you know it is coming and you don't always catch it... The first few adoptions I took her to were stressful, for she'd do nothing else but bark, bark, bark... Big dogs passing by would immediately set her off (and I have seen her lose her bowels when in the presence of pitbulls too)... Negative behaviors by her would get our attention, and it dawned on me one day that our responses were actually encouraging her instead of what it should be doing... DUH~!!!
Sometimes I need a pile of mental bricks to hit me in the head before I get something... I know I know it, but I need that visual impact to break through the daily rote and routine of my thoughts!... Since then, I have been making a major effort to acknowledge Kelly when she's quiet and this is really positive reinforcement training (yes, I know about it and subscribe to it faithfully, but it took this extreme demonstration to remind me of what I already know!!! LOL)...
As I look over now, Kelly is sleeping in a doggie bed - YES, with two other dogs, butt to head and side to side... Even the hair on the back of her ears has grown back in and she's put back on the weight she'd lost through her stint in the shelter... There are times she slips (don't we all), but for the most part, she is now a well-mannered Chihuahua that is attentive (she favors Paul over me), has canine manners and I hope soon will find her own furever home...
Sometimes we forget to see the small improvements in our lives along the way and do concentrate on only the bad things that happen or are a part of our lives... It is a challenge every day for me to re-set myself mentally and do this... But I know if I fail today, tomorrow I can start again... And (LOL), if I have to switch over that purple bracelet today, God be willing, he'll give me another 21 days to correct the error of my ways!
As Always,
The Lady
Monday, January 5, 2009
Ut oh... I'm one of 'those'.... LOL
| I took the 43 Things Personality Quiz and found out I'm a Tree Hugging Self-Knowing Self-Improver   |
Thursday, January 1, 2009
REAL Family Press - 1/1/09 - Happy New Year!
HAPPY, HAPPY 2009 EVERYONE~!!!
Us old folks are still up and we have just watched the ball come down in Times Square... It is hard to believe ‘America’s Oldest Teenager’ turned 80 on November 30th, but Dick Clark still looks great~!!!
Whew~!!! I’ve had an unbelievable 24 hours or more… Started on Tuesday when my cell phone would dial but come back with the message of ‘No Response’… I had gone a distance to pick up meds for one of my fosters and another and needed to call someone to make sure they were home to drop them off… Couldn’t call, tried calling Desiree and still got that same message…
I stopped at Walmart’s for something we needed and asked for change to use the outside payphone to call --- to be told they didn’t have any… I’m trying to convert various bits of change into quarters and even their inside McDonald’s wasn’t a lot of help~!!! Eventually I was able to convert a various collection of nickels and dimes into the four quarters I needed just to make the two phone calls – one to Des to have her call Paul and tell him what was going on with my cell phone!
That sorta/kinda started it all… Several ‘mole-hole’ instances kept coming up – just enough to let you know you’d stepped in one and stubbed your toe, but today just became incredible with things that could go wrong --- AND DID~!!!... LOL…
I needed to take one of the other fosters into the vets for a thyroid test this morning, stop by the AT&T store and pick up my meds at Costco’s today – three things… Simple, right?... LOL…
I got several phone calls as I’m headed out the door, and then the last one went much longer than I expected… I’m hustling to get to the vets for the appointment and pulling into their parking lot, there isn’t one space available… It is also a SMALL and badly designed parking lot with a blind entrance so I’m doing at least 15 “K-turns” just to get ‘The Beast’ around in such a small, tight area…
Finally I got this done, drove out of the parking lot and decided to do a U-turn and park across the street… Halfway across the street on median strip, Bandit decides to do his new trick – the belly-crawl… I had started across the second half of the busy street and he decides to show me his newest… OMG
Inside my vet’s office, there are 11 dogs and their owners – the lobby is not that big… I was told I’d just be dropping him off for a vet tech appointment, so had planned on doing that, then heading off to Costco’s and planned on doubling back (hopefully) to pick him up, thinking that would be enough time… Instead they asked me to stay and wait because they had so many dogs and cats there… OK, I’ll push the stop at Costco’s back after I’ve gone home and dropped Bandit off…
They bring him out and then tell me they couldn’t get the fecal sample from him – could I drop one off later?... Oh brother… OK, I can adjust… LOL…
On the way home I stop at the AT&T store to find out what’s wrong with my cell phone… I walked in, apologized to the guy for being ignorant of this all ahead of time and handed him the phone… He looked at it, tried to fix it, pulled out the SIM card - basically it just died… No real answer why, despite I’m the one who takes SUPER care of mine… Des has dropped hers I don’t know how many times, she’s chewed on the antennae; she’s even thrown hers in anger… Mine is the one that dies without warning and for no reason!
Now we’ve opened a Pandora’s box as I’m trying to figure out the right decision to make simply to replace mine… We have three on a family plan, and none are Blue-toothed, so for me the only reason to have a cell phone is when I need it to call while on the road… In CA you can no longer be on a cell phone unless it is hands free while driving… And our phones were not blue-tooth compatible…
Desiree has been after me for months about our phones because she’s a heavy text-messenger… Were it my choice, I’d have a Jitterbug phone – I don’t need all that extra stuff… I don’t want all that stuff… But if I got one of those ‘free phones’ and tried to get it Blue-toothed ready, it ended up being too expensive and not smart financially…
BTW, I have Bandit with me on a leash all this time… I couldn’t leave him in the truck and he’s just enjoying each and every person that comes into the AT&T store!... And ‘belly-crawling’ on their rug~!!! I’m also still battling this cold, so my nose is running and I’m trying not to cough on anyone either…
An hour later, I finally have my new cell phone and gotten Desiree’s new one squared away for her to pick up later and have her information transferred over once she gets off work… I head home, call Paul to see if he was going to have a short day, thinking he’d stop and get my meds on the way home… He’s not having a better day than me, so as we’re discussing this, I see Bandit ‘depositing’ out back and run out with the fecal sample bottle…
I’m telling myself I’m still adaptable – it’ll be just one more stop… The vet’s again and Costco’s… Then I learn that I have a few extra stops with Paul not getting off early as planned… I head back to the vets, no parking spots again, this time I’m not going through all of this, so I park at the entrance, take the fecal sample in and as I’m going through the 15 ‘K-turns’ again, one of the staff members rushes back into the parking lot to tell me the lab has a 11AM cutoff time because of the holiday…
It is 11:05AM… Figures… So it’ll have to be done again on Friday… Just the way my day has been going… LOL…
Pulled into Costcos and the parking lot is a zoo… Everyone and their mother plus assorted other extended family members must be in there shopping…… I wait my turn, and was rewarded with a spot close to the door… My day is looking up!... LOL…
I usually pass through their furniture section as a matter of habit… I’ve talked about this before… I’ve been wanting a specific couch they have and twice they’ve gotten it in and by the time we reached a decision or had the money to buy it, I’ve gone back and they’ve been sold out… It has to be this one specific couch because I need both ends to recline, it has to be a certain size and I won’t buy fabric furniture again – it just doesn’t last at our house for some reason… I’ve been watching this couch for almost a year now and on sale, it’s between $999 and $1299… Because it is replacing two separate recliners and another chair in the family room, this is the one we have to get… period…
I’m walking through like I usually do and see the couch on sale for $699… There is one on display and two in boxes… I call Desiree (not easy to do with a new phone I’ve never used before) and she tells me I can’t not get it… As I’m hanging up, this Asian couple asks me if it is a good price, and stupid me, I say yes… At least $500 cheaper than it normally is…
I headed up to the registers to find out how to buy it and they tell me to go outside and get a flatbed doily, in the meantime they’ll send someone back to get it loaded… The 5-10 minutes it took me to do this was enough for me to arrive there and see both couches in boxes loaded up and being bought by this Asian couple… SERIOUSLY~!!!
They must have seen the look on my face, because they immediately start telling me there are 2 more in stock… They’re doing this nervous laugh and I’m not exactly feeling very funny right about now… Eventually I find someone to help me and he tells me he doesn’t think they do have two more in stock and in boxes… The nervous laugh of theirs becomes more pronounced – that’s the only way I can accurately describe their response, but they take the two and leave…
Now I’m stuck… I call Desiree and I’m disappointed… I really didn’t want to buy the one on display, figuring by the time I got it home and moved without a box, the leather would be torn somehow… I attempted to call Paul to get his input, but I couldn’t hear him well and he couldn’t hear me either… The guy eventually comes back, says he’ll go search the inventory and there I stand, flatbed doily and all… Finally I sit down on it, waiting for him to come back…
Then a few more people come by, look at the display couch, and when the third person stopped, sat down on it and then wrote down the SKU number, I decided I’d had enough… I took the sign down and sat in the middle of the couch, determined that this one was NOT going to be sold out from underneath me too… LOL…
Ever seen the craziness at the warehouse basement bargain sales in New York when the women go crazy trying to buy those cheap wedding dresses?... That’s about the mindset and attitude I’d started developing! After about 30 minutes, the guy comes back and the only one left in the store is the one I am sitting on~!!!
It’s decided that they will take it to the back and shrink wrap it for me… I’m to head up to the cash registers and pay for it… On the way I stop at the pharmacy for my meds (the original reason for my stop at Costcos)… Of course – the way my day was going – my two meds were not filled but if I can wait 15 minutes, they can be… OK (still adapting here), I went to the check-outs with the book I was buying in hand and the sign for the couch… Two items… I’m standing at least 6 to 7 people back in line and EVERYONE has full shopping carts loaded to the gills~!!!
Once I get to the cash register, there’s some confusion because there are three of these couches waiting on the other side, but all three are in boxes… Initially I thought they found the other one, but after a lot of back and forth, none of the three were mine… Eventually we get this all resolved and then I double-back to the pharmacy… Then back to the checkouts to attempt to find someone who can get it from there, out the door and into the back of The Beast…
The line to go out of Costcos is at least 15-20 shopping carts long… A staff person is pushing the couch on the doily but there’s no way I can get that couch up into the truck with just his help and he can’t locate any other staff people either… Eventually we get through the line and door, but inside my head I’m telling myself unless I make it through the door, something else will occur and I would still have not gotten this couch… I was at the point where I was asking myself if it was my destiny to never ever get this couch and the family room finally finished, let alone the last step of the house renovation started October 2005… Seriously!
I’ll spare you the rest of the details, but it went just about the same – cars were blocking my truck and there wasn’t enough room to put the tail gate down, let alone manipulate the couch to lift it in – not enough staff, too many people who wouldn’t inch their cars in any fashion for fear they’d lose the parking spot they were determined to get… What a mess~!!
Eventually I got the couch into the back of the truck and out of the Costco parking lot… I called Paul and told him ahead of time he could not come home and tell me what a bad day he’d been having again because mine was beating his worse ones!... I had two more stops to make (one to find fresh refrigerated sauerkraut for tomorrow’s dinner) and the grocery store was as much chaos as Costcos had been… I’m standing in line to check out and I have this horrible thought I am going to come out of the grocery store and find the couch has been stolen off the back of my truck… Relieved when I saw the couch still in my truck, some lady went to grab my grocery cart too fast, bumping my arm and one of the bags ripped I had been lifting out at the same time… I had visions of those two glass jars of sauerkraut breaking right there on the parking lot… That’s the kind of day I’ve had! I kept telling myself it couldn’t get worse and it just kept doing it anyway~!!!...
On the short drive home, I couldn’t get there faster… I just wanted to be off of the roads and back in my home before some other major ‘mole-hole’ incident occurred to me~!!… Desiree got off work, headed over to the AT&T store and got in about 10 minutes after me… One look at my face (which apparently showed what kind of a day I’d been having) and even she felt sorry for me, despite having been punched in the stomach by one of her kids!
What is it? A full moon or something?... LOL…
Unbelievable, Paul wanted to get the couch into the house once we got home (which meant we had to move furniture out of the family room and onto the patio)… The three of us managed to get this done (don’t ask me how because all three of us had had a really rough day!) and although it is not quite right and I’ll have to do some rearranging tomorrow, the couch is in the family room~!!!... Without being torn or damaged~!!!
After the way the day has been going, Paul and I both asked Desiree to have Serge come and pick her up and then drive her car instead of his to their event tonight… Desiree doesn’t see as well at night, his car is not as reliable as hers and with all the drunks on the road tonight, the idea of anything else was more than either one of us could stand… Thankfully he agreed and I’m sitting up now, waiting for her to come home… Then my day can finally end and 2008 can be finally put to bed… LOL…
What a day to end this year with… Next year has GOT to be better~!!!... LOL… I won’t say it’s been a bad year for our family, but it sure has been a long one and a tough one… Especially (physically) for me…
As always, I hope the incoming year is better for everyone… And all stay (and travel safe) over this holiday… HAPPY 2009 TO ALL!
As Always,
The Lady
P.S. Paul and I ‘christened’ the new couch as we both fell asleep in it on our respective sides of the recliners about 10:30PM, trying to wait up for the ball to come down… So much for us old folks, huh? Thankfully we woke up and stayed awake to see the ball drop~!!!... But boy, is that couch comfortable!
Us old folks are still up and we have just watched the ball come down in Times Square... It is hard to believe ‘America’s Oldest Teenager’ turned 80 on November 30th, but Dick Clark still looks great~!!!
Whew~!!! I’ve had an unbelievable 24 hours or more… Started on Tuesday when my cell phone would dial but come back with the message of ‘No Response’… I had gone a distance to pick up meds for one of my fosters and another and needed to call someone to make sure they were home to drop them off… Couldn’t call, tried calling Desiree and still got that same message…
I stopped at Walmart’s for something we needed and asked for change to use the outside payphone to call --- to be told they didn’t have any… I’m trying to convert various bits of change into quarters and even their inside McDonald’s wasn’t a lot of help~!!! Eventually I was able to convert a various collection of nickels and dimes into the four quarters I needed just to make the two phone calls – one to Des to have her call Paul and tell him what was going on with my cell phone!
That sorta/kinda started it all… Several ‘mole-hole’ instances kept coming up – just enough to let you know you’d stepped in one and stubbed your toe, but today just became incredible with things that could go wrong --- AND DID~!!!... LOL…
I needed to take one of the other fosters into the vets for a thyroid test this morning, stop by the AT&T store and pick up my meds at Costco’s today – three things… Simple, right?... LOL…
I got several phone calls as I’m headed out the door, and then the last one went much longer than I expected… I’m hustling to get to the vets for the appointment and pulling into their parking lot, there isn’t one space available… It is also a SMALL and badly designed parking lot with a blind entrance so I’m doing at least 15 “K-turns” just to get ‘The Beast’ around in such a small, tight area…
Finally I got this done, drove out of the parking lot and decided to do a U-turn and park across the street… Halfway across the street on median strip, Bandit decides to do his new trick – the belly-crawl… I had started across the second half of the busy street and he decides to show me his newest… OMG
Inside my vet’s office, there are 11 dogs and their owners – the lobby is not that big… I was told I’d just be dropping him off for a vet tech appointment, so had planned on doing that, then heading off to Costco’s and planned on doubling back (hopefully) to pick him up, thinking that would be enough time… Instead they asked me to stay and wait because they had so many dogs and cats there… OK, I’ll push the stop at Costco’s back after I’ve gone home and dropped Bandit off…
They bring him out and then tell me they couldn’t get the fecal sample from him – could I drop one off later?... Oh brother… OK, I can adjust… LOL…
On the way home I stop at the AT&T store to find out what’s wrong with my cell phone… I walked in, apologized to the guy for being ignorant of this all ahead of time and handed him the phone… He looked at it, tried to fix it, pulled out the SIM card - basically it just died… No real answer why, despite I’m the one who takes SUPER care of mine… Des has dropped hers I don’t know how many times, she’s chewed on the antennae; she’s even thrown hers in anger… Mine is the one that dies without warning and for no reason!
Now we’ve opened a Pandora’s box as I’m trying to figure out the right decision to make simply to replace mine… We have three on a family plan, and none are Blue-toothed, so for me the only reason to have a cell phone is when I need it to call while on the road… In CA you can no longer be on a cell phone unless it is hands free while driving… And our phones were not blue-tooth compatible…
Desiree has been after me for months about our phones because she’s a heavy text-messenger… Were it my choice, I’d have a Jitterbug phone – I don’t need all that extra stuff… I don’t want all that stuff… But if I got one of those ‘free phones’ and tried to get it Blue-toothed ready, it ended up being too expensive and not smart financially…
BTW, I have Bandit with me on a leash all this time… I couldn’t leave him in the truck and he’s just enjoying each and every person that comes into the AT&T store!... And ‘belly-crawling’ on their rug~!!! I’m also still battling this cold, so my nose is running and I’m trying not to cough on anyone either…
An hour later, I finally have my new cell phone and gotten Desiree’s new one squared away for her to pick up later and have her information transferred over once she gets off work… I head home, call Paul to see if he was going to have a short day, thinking he’d stop and get my meds on the way home… He’s not having a better day than me, so as we’re discussing this, I see Bandit ‘depositing’ out back and run out with the fecal sample bottle…
I’m telling myself I’m still adaptable – it’ll be just one more stop… The vet’s again and Costco’s… Then I learn that I have a few extra stops with Paul not getting off early as planned… I head back to the vets, no parking spots again, this time I’m not going through all of this, so I park at the entrance, take the fecal sample in and as I’m going through the 15 ‘K-turns’ again, one of the staff members rushes back into the parking lot to tell me the lab has a 11AM cutoff time because of the holiday…
It is 11:05AM… Figures… So it’ll have to be done again on Friday… Just the way my day has been going… LOL…
Pulled into Costcos and the parking lot is a zoo… Everyone and their mother plus assorted other extended family members must be in there shopping…
I usually pass through their furniture section as a matter of habit… I’ve talked about this before… I’ve been wanting a specific couch they have and twice they’ve gotten it in and by the time we reached a decision or had the money to buy it, I’ve gone back and they’ve been sold out… It has to be this one specific couch because I need both ends to recline, it has to be a certain size and I won’t buy fabric furniture again – it just doesn’t last at our house for some reason… I’ve been watching this couch for almost a year now and on sale, it’s between $999 and $1299… Because it is replacing two separate recliners and another chair in the family room, this is the one we have to get… period…
I’m walking through like I usually do and see the couch on sale for $699… There is one on display and two in boxes… I call Desiree (not easy to do with a new phone I’ve never used before) and she tells me I can’t not get it… As I’m hanging up, this Asian couple asks me if it is a good price, and stupid me, I say yes… At least $500 cheaper than it normally is…
I headed up to the registers to find out how to buy it and they tell me to go outside and get a flatbed doily, in the meantime they’ll send someone back to get it loaded… The 5-10 minutes it took me to do this was enough for me to arrive there and see both couches in boxes loaded up and being bought by this Asian couple… SERIOUSLY~!!!
They must have seen the look on my face, because they immediately start telling me there are 2 more in stock… They’re doing this nervous laugh and I’m not exactly feeling very funny right about now… Eventually I find someone to help me and he tells me he doesn’t think they do have two more in stock and in boxes… The nervous laugh of theirs becomes more pronounced – that’s the only way I can accurately describe their response, but they take the two and leave…
Now I’m stuck… I call Desiree and I’m disappointed… I really didn’t want to buy the one on display, figuring by the time I got it home and moved without a box, the leather would be torn somehow… I attempted to call Paul to get his input, but I couldn’t hear him well and he couldn’t hear me either… The guy eventually comes back, says he’ll go search the inventory and there I stand, flatbed doily and all… Finally I sit down on it, waiting for him to come back…
Then a few more people come by, look at the display couch, and when the third person stopped, sat down on it and then wrote down the SKU number, I decided I’d had enough… I took the sign down and sat in the middle of the couch, determined that this one was NOT going to be sold out from underneath me too… LOL…
Ever seen the craziness at the warehouse basement bargain sales in New York when the women go crazy trying to buy those cheap wedding dresses?... That’s about the mindset and attitude I’d started developing! After about 30 minutes, the guy comes back and the only one left in the store is the one I am sitting on~!!!
It’s decided that they will take it to the back and shrink wrap it for me… I’m to head up to the cash registers and pay for it… On the way I stop at the pharmacy for my meds (the original reason for my stop at Costcos)… Of course – the way my day was going – my two meds were not filled but if I can wait 15 minutes, they can be… OK (still adapting here), I went to the check-outs with the book I was buying in hand and the sign for the couch… Two items… I’m standing at least 6 to 7 people back in line and EVERYONE has full shopping carts loaded to the gills~!!!
Once I get to the cash register, there’s some confusion because there are three of these couches waiting on the other side, but all three are in boxes… Initially I thought they found the other one, but after a lot of back and forth, none of the three were mine… Eventually we get this all resolved and then I double-back to the pharmacy… Then back to the checkouts to attempt to find someone who can get it from there, out the door and into the back of The Beast…
The line to go out of Costcos is at least 15-20 shopping carts long… A staff person is pushing the couch on the doily but there’s no way I can get that couch up into the truck with just his help and he can’t locate any other staff people either… Eventually we get through the line and door, but inside my head I’m telling myself unless I make it through the door, something else will occur and I would still have not gotten this couch… I was at the point where I was asking myself if it was my destiny to never ever get this couch and the family room finally finished, let alone the last step of the house renovation started October 2005… Seriously!
I’ll spare you the rest of the details, but it went just about the same – cars were blocking my truck and there wasn’t enough room to put the tail gate down, let alone manipulate the couch to lift it in – not enough staff, too many people who wouldn’t inch their cars in any fashion for fear they’d lose the parking spot they were determined to get… What a mess~!!
Eventually I got the couch into the back of the truck and out of the Costco parking lot… I called Paul and told him ahead of time he could not come home and tell me what a bad day he’d been having again because mine was beating his worse ones!... I had two more stops to make (one to find fresh refrigerated sauerkraut for tomorrow’s dinner) and the grocery store was as much chaos as Costcos had been… I’m standing in line to check out and I have this horrible thought I am going to come out of the grocery store and find the couch has been stolen off the back of my truck… Relieved when I saw the couch still in my truck, some lady went to grab my grocery cart too fast, bumping my arm and one of the bags ripped I had been lifting out at the same time… I had visions of those two glass jars of sauerkraut breaking right there on the parking lot… That’s the kind of day I’ve had! I kept telling myself it couldn’t get worse and it just kept doing it anyway~!!!...
On the short drive home, I couldn’t get there faster… I just wanted to be off of the roads and back in my home before some other major ‘mole-hole’ incident occurred to me~!!… Desiree got off work, headed over to the AT&T store and got in about 10 minutes after me… One look at my face (which apparently showed what kind of a day I’d been having) and even she felt sorry for me, despite having been punched in the stomach by one of her kids!
What is it? A full moon or something?... LOL…
Unbelievable, Paul wanted to get the couch into the house once we got home (which meant we had to move furniture out of the family room and onto the patio)… The three of us managed to get this done (don’t ask me how because all three of us had had a really rough day!) and although it is not quite right and I’ll have to do some rearranging tomorrow, the couch is in the family room~!!!... Without being torn or damaged~!!!
After the way the day has been going, Paul and I both asked Desiree to have Serge come and pick her up and then drive her car instead of his to their event tonight… Desiree doesn’t see as well at night, his car is not as reliable as hers and with all the drunks on the road tonight, the idea of anything else was more than either one of us could stand… Thankfully he agreed and I’m sitting up now, waiting for her to come home… Then my day can finally end and 2008 can be finally put to bed… LOL…
What a day to end this year with… Next year has GOT to be better~!!!... LOL… I won’t say it’s been a bad year for our family, but it sure has been a long one and a tough one… Especially (physically) for me…
As always, I hope the incoming year is better for everyone… And all stay (and travel safe) over this holiday… HAPPY 2009 TO ALL!
As Always,
The Lady
P.S. Paul and I ‘christened’ the new couch as we both fell asleep in it on our respective sides of the recliners about 10:30PM, trying to wait up for the ball to come down… So much for us old folks, huh? Thankfully we woke up and stayed awake to see the ball drop~!!!... But boy, is that couch comfortable!
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