Trouble

These two can wreak havoc in your life. Proceed with caution.

The past is the past. I fear them but I am still not even remotely interested in them anymore. And that is a good thing. I can put them on a shelf and never think about them. Today, anyway.

I have been having trouble sleeping. For some weird reason. I am not drinking caffeine late in the day. I just feel I have to explain because I. Fell. Asleep. During. TSO! I am so ashamed. I found the show very boring. I am sorry. I did. Just snatches where my head fell forward and woke me up. I had maybe 4 hours of sleep the night before the show. I forgot my camera. Maybe I would have stayed awake if I had it. I did bring binoculars but they were the tinted kind for outside daylight. Rats.

The laser show was a disaster to my eyes, yet I left with no trace of a headache. I would not recommend it for migraine sufferers, though. At times it was a constant strobe light display.

I have a lot of work to do, so Happy New Year to all ! Time is marching on and getting old is not for sissies. I have to buck up, endure the aches and pains and get some work done. Our doctor thinks that my daughter may have an allergy to our live tree. The cats, too. She said a lot of live trees cause allergy symptoms during the holidays and they mysteriously go away after the holiday. Huh. Figures.

Too Tall

My angel had to lean way over the front of our tree this year in order to fit. I was too lazy to take the tree back out of the stand and cut more off. The needles are starting to fall off and it has stopped drinking water. Won't be long, now. I will probably take it down this week-end.

I made my daughter a doctor appointment this morning. Stiff neck on and off for over two weeks. Prior to Christmas it seems like all other things get put on hold. The event itself is so demanding I can hardly think of anything else. While at work yesterday I felt that I should get her in to have her checked out.

The cats' eyes have all cleared up. Four of them are sneezing. I am not real happy about that. I am trying different arrangements for Moose. She won't go downstairs to use the litter box anymore. At this time I am unsure as to why. I am reading about some ideas and reasons on-line and while I am off from work the next few days we are trying them out. I took her to the vet's office once a couple of months ago. The reason at the time was because she was fighting with all the other cats. This was before her litter problem. It could be stress. The vet didn't offer much help in this area.

I will pick up my daughter's senior pictures on Friday. We go to see the orchestra today. I get to drive in Cleveland. This is why I chose the afternoon show. Sara should help, though. She is my new GPS. I wasn't expecting her. She was a very nice surprise.

I have a lot of stress in deciding what car to purchase for my daughter. I want safety and reliable. She wants sporty and fun. I suppose this is completely normal. I want a good used Honda Accord, she wants a little sporty Toytota Celica. I have checked. Celica's are reliable. I don't know about how safe they are. I really just need to get it done and over with. So I can stop fretting on the decision and start fretting when she isn't at home and I hear sirens in the distance. You know you do it. Every time you hear a siren you think of your loved one. Well, maybe not so much anymore since I live very close to a hospital. I hear a lot of sirens. I've become quite used to them. I have to say that I don't hear them all that much.

Well, said daughter has just made a request for cinnamon toast. I am off to the kitchen. My coffee cup is empty, anyway.

Sooo-prize!

This tyke was in his glory last night. It was his grandparent's 40th anniversary. My sister watches him about 3 times a week and they adore one another. He didn't spend much time with her, though. She was visiting. We were placed in the Gentleman's lounge of a country club. Pool table, bar, appetizers, desserts. He ran all over the place having a blast.

My daughter is 17 and she says she can't stand kids. This little fellow adores her and follows her everywhere. He calls her a variation of her name that he has made up for himself and it is funny. For some strange reason he calls her Pem-G. Nothing near her name. It is actually a combination of my name and the P is what he hears from her name, I am guessing. He is very verbose.

My nieces/nephews (children of the honored guests) supplied the entire shin dig. Free bar and food. Nobody abused the bar. In fact the poor bar tenders sat and watched the football game for lack of people drinking.

I was able to visit with folks from upper state New York who turned out to be a sheer delight.

My sister said she was surprised. She said there were a few strange details that she picked up on. One was her daughter asked her for her address book weeks before the event. That piqued her curiosity. Another was when she was visiting my house, she noticed my calendar on my refrigerator had marked on it "40th Anniversary" for the 27th, and on Christmas day she was speaking of their anniversary and I asked "Oh, what year is this for you?" She said she thought that was strange I asked since she had seen it marked on my calendar as the 40th. Ooops. I went overboard playing dumb.

Even so, it was all good.

Eeeek-zaaaww-sted

My sister has a frozen pond right in front of her house. If you believe that I have some ocean front property in Ohio I'd like to sell ya. LOL! I took this picture from atop my car trying to keep the shaking to a minimum. My camera is a handheld, I didn't bring my tripod and I was freezing.

Like the title of my post says, I am exhausted. Depleted. I have an event tonight, then I can rest tomorrow. Work on Monday. TSO on Tuesday and then 5 days of beautiful rest! The days of rest are a joke. My house is in shambles. Complete and utter shambles. I have already mentioned that I am a complete failure at housekeeping. Big deal. It is long past the tolerance level even for me. I have been able to keep up with the kitchen, though. That is a relief. I fixed a turkey dinner yesterday for the family that stays with me over the holidays.They pulled out last night for the northwest part of the state, hopefully with full tummies.

I took some time last evening to watch a movie. I chose The Savages. I like both Linney and Hoffman. I first noticed him in Twister and Linney in Primal Fear. Both movies were from 1996. That's interesting. Though I have to mention I did see Linney in Dave. That was always one of my favorite movies. I wasn't overly impressed with the movie, so-so. I did like the acting, though.

The holidays were a blessed event for me. I was able to visit with most of my family. One brother could not make it, he was sick. Ended up going to the ER Christmas day and is diagnosed with bronchitis. I am going to give him a call today and check in on him. Of course my sister is indisposed. She is usually out of the picture around the holidays. It was encouraging last year to see her sober through Christmas and New Years. That was a positive sign. She was trying to straighten up for her son who had open heart surgery in March. They delayed putting her away until after the surgery, but there was that huge mistake made by the anesthesiologist and the surgery got pushed back a few weeks and the judge wouldn't budge any more. You can read more about it from my March 5, 2008 post titled "Detours and Bumps."

The event tonight is a 40th anniversary. I was 8 years old when my oldest sister married. It was a huge event for my family. She said years later "Don't ever plan a wedding around a major holiday!" Her stress level must have been through the roof. She was more or less supporting the family along with my older brother. My dad was indisposed for most of his life. I'll never forget the time I asked my Mom "Why did you marry him if he was a drunk?" She laughed and said he wasn't like that in the early years. Of course I was the last child (youngest of 8) so I only saw the drunk dad. I never observed him working or driving or taking care of the family. That wasn't to say he was a bad person. He was wonderful to me and some of the children. He had his favorites. He worked a wonderful garden, could fry up a wonderful country meal and many other things. He did some very wonderful things for me.

The holidays can be very stressful for the alcoholic. They are always feeling like they don't measure up. They observe folks around them buying, wrapping, planning and laughing and are wondering how it is that they don't feel or act the same. They may have spare time on their hands with days off from work. That is disastrous for the alcoholic. Spare time. Something in their upbringing or childhood or in their genetic make-up made it so that they really don't know what to do with themselves if they find time on their hands. Or, they choose to neglect things they should be doing for imbibing. They feel lost. Drinking has a goal. To obliterate the feelings. Whether they be painful memories of love or feelings of inadequacy.

Whoa, I am going a little deeper here than I had planned. It is rainy but warmer here in my neck of Ohio. I had loved ones travelling, so I'll take the rain. I scored a GPS this holiday so finding my way around Cleveland on Tuesday and to the party tonight should be easier. I'll use map quest for the timing and to get a general idea of where I am going, but I think everyone should have a navigation device in their vehicle. I hate that I don't need glasses to drive, but need them to read. That makes it difficult to see the device sometimes, but text to speech is a must-have.

Merry Christmas

Here's hoping you get everything you wished for this holiday season!

I flipped my skirt

After observing this feline activity, I flipped my tree skirt over. Somebody, I won't name names Mr. Tibbs, was found chewing on the buttons. I could not have him swallowing any so the skirt was flipped over and will be discarded after this year. My cats are a pain sometimes, but I wish them no harm. Now my daughter on the other hand...

I had an 'almost' super time with family last evening. We had 17 show up for a family holiday get together. My evening was dampened by the fact that I gave the bar tender (we believe is the owner of the establishment) a fifty dollar bill for my mixed drink, my nephew's soda pop and my daughter's hot chocolate. The bartender mumbled "Out of twenty" when he took my fifty. I kept calling after him "That was a fifty!" until he finally snapped at me, "I know!" Feeling that I offended him I dropped it.

As soon as he took the money, my great niece came running across the restaurant for me to hold her. I am her favorite for now. I picked her up and was gushing over her when the bartender laid my change on the bar. My family filled up the horse shoe bar so I was not concerned about the money and I was wrapped up with family arriving and when I scooped up my change to go and sit at our reserved table, I notice that he had given me change for a twenty. I called him on it. He shrugged it off and snapped "I put your change right there."

To make a long story short I will analyze his conduct about the issue. If he were on the up and up he would have come over and gone over my drink order and explained to me what change he had given me. He would have said something to the effect that if his drawer came up over $30 or so he would call me. He did not. He avoided me like the plague.

This put a little bit of a damper on the meal. I was not going to ruin it for the other 16 people in my family and make a scene or leave. The food was awful. Just awful. I was glad to get out of that establishment and I have an entire year to decide if I am going to grace them with my presence next year. Since I make the arrangements I am going to look elsewhere for our get together next year. We chose this restaurant because of a more central location for all of us to drive to.

It is the season for love and peace and I am forgiving him and moving on.

We had a distant relative pass away and the calling hours are today. It is a 200 mile journey and the eldest children are going to the calling hours. They are the ones who remember them the most. I considered going, but I am just too far behind this holiday season. I was really looking forward to today and hopefully playing catch up. Cleaning and baking.

I have perhaps three more gifts to buy before the big day. I think I can do it.

Now that my daughter has her drivers license I can stay home more often instead of taxiing her here and there. I find that I can clean house better when she is not here. I have not had this opportunity much, or maybe I just notice it more with her being independently mobile now. It wasn't like she didn't go anywhere without me before. Heavens no. I just seem to appreciate it more now that she can go when SHE wants to go. We are already arguing over the use of the car. 24 hours after she got her license she was calling me and snapping "I need the car in half an hour!" I have to laugh. Teenagers.

I also told her I want a dollar for each time she says "Get me my own car!" when we spat about using the car. I'll be rich, I tell you. Rich!

No holes

Our tree has no holes in it. It is very full and very tall. My daughter must be a minimalist. I would expect it would happen sooner or later. My Mom was a pack rat. I am a pack rat. My daughter is determined to break the habit. She did much better on the lights than I do. My work tends to look like a kindergartner's finger painting. She put about six ornaments on the tree. Me? I'd put every single one I could find on the tree. We don't put ice sickles on because of the cats. We are not big on tinsel.

At least it is done. I was having one of those super bad days on Thursday. I got to a school to update them to fiber. I call a couple of weeks in advance. I ask the school technician to pick a day that is good for them. For the school. What day can I take the Internet down? It may go smoothly, sometimes there is a glitch and it take a bit longer. You never can tell with technology. Like traffic.

I arrive at 8:30 to set up and take the network down at nine a.m. He asks "Can this be done by 10:30?" I'm thinking to myself. 'No. He didn't just say that!' Yes, he did. He jinxed it. I sighed. The last time I switched a school over was probably August or September. I had not touched the fiber switches in four months. One problem after another cropped up. If something could go wrong, something did go wrong. Ugh!

At eleven a.m. one of the elementary buildings were scheduled to visit with Santa. Didn't happen. Nope. I was traumatized. People kept calling the technician. "Are we doing this thing or what?" "Is it back up, yet?" Groan. To make matters worse my home office won't answer their phones. They want everything submitted in a help desk ticket. Well, when you don't have the Internet that's kind of hard to do. It was embarrassing to say the least when I couldn't even reach my own people for help. Yeah, that went over well.

Thirteen years. Same old, same old. Issues with communication. Two problems were their end and one was my end. We finally got things rolling at noon. Just in time for the Santa video session to end. The children had to settle for an elf video at two o'clock later that afternoon.

Me? I got a major migraine headache. I went home and took the rest of the day off sick. It was six p.m. before I felt human again.

My co-workers keep telling me "This isn't major surgery. No body is going to die if we don't get the Internet back up." But, still. I care. I want the customer inconvenienced the least amount of time as possible. I feel responsible. I take my work seriously even if it isn't major surgery, it is important to me.

Sigh. I have (had) a box of chocolate covered cherries. Why do I bring them into the house? They have to be the clear liquid ones. I almost make myself sick on them. You would think with my migraine problem I would avoid them. I will have them bought and half eaten before it even occurs to me "Oh, yeah. These could exacerbate your headaches." Idiot.

How we display our cards

Well, this year anyway. Sometimes I tape them around the door or around the archway between the living room and the kitchen. I have placed them high enough so that the guys in the family don't hit their heads on them. One year I put them too low. Hopefully the cats will leave them alone.

Celestial bodies

Using the night mode trick in black and white this time. I found some interesting shapes emerged from my tree lights. Some are even a little suggestive? And, I will stop right there.

Neat

It was neat to see what the picture would come out when I did this. I put my camera into night mode where the shutter stays open longer and took a picture of my tree. I think my camera takes this picture with the shutter open for 10 seconds. I move the camera in slow circles while it is in that 10 second phase of shooting the photo.

Tree and tacky and a rock star

The tree is finally up. It is done being my garage air freshener. It is a monster. If I had to do over again, I would trim the scraggly branches off the bottom and cut it off more at the stump. It was a chore to get it up and in the stand, so this will do. It will be rough getting the lights on all the way at the top. It tickles the ceiling. I was gone all day yesterday, but my daughter was home. I was hoping she would decorate it, but she cleaned instead. That is okay by me. I must dig out the lights and decorations today. This is the tree part.

Now, for the tacky. I am still shaking my head. Never in my 48 years. My sister (1944) couldn't believe the tackiness either. She and I went to a luncheon yesterday. Out of town. We had sent in our reservation weeks ago. We paid $12.50 at the door. We sat with a group of folks my sister went to school with. The lunch group totaled 40 in all.

Most of the folks here are my sister's age. I started to go with her to the meetings because it has to do with genealogy and to help with the technical parts of the workshops. Digital photography for example.

One couple came from the north, just to meet up with my sister and a few of her school mates. They had not seen one another in 46 years since graduation. This is where the rock star part comes in, and I will get back to that.

Our table was the last to get up and get into the food line. There were about nine people behind me in line when I looked at the food. 3 chicken breasts left and one steak floating in gravy. Hmmm. The two folks ahead of me passed the meat up. I did also. I was getting my salad when the president of the group found out the meat ran out.

Get this.

She put her chicken back into the pan. She said "I didn't touch it. You can trust me." She then gathered chickens and steaks from folks who had not "touched" theirs yet. Prior to the meal, the group was instructed that they could take one chicken and one steak each . I guess they took that to mean it was required to take one of each, I don't know.

Is that just unreal?

I booked it out of the line and muttered to myself "I am NOT taking food off of other people's plate." I was shaking my head in disbelief. I sat down and ate my vegetarian lunch. The rest of the meal consisted of salad, green beans, noodles, corn pudding and a roll. My sister was so wrapped up into talking with her friends she was totally unaware of what went on around her. She had passed the meat up also. I told her on the drive home what had transpired.

She was in complete shock. They took food off of people's plates and put it back? I nodded. She had been talking to the people in line with her and was oblivious.

Never in my life have I witnessed such vulgarity at a luncheon. The proper thing to do would have been to give a refund to the folks at my table and apologize. This is the society where I won a membership for a year. The next meeting is in March. I have until then to get over this and decide if I want to continue to meet with this group. It is over a 50 mile drive for me to attend. It has to do with the genealogy from the county I grew up in. I don't know. I was doing it for my sister and to get more involved in things that interest me. I'll have to think about it.

I have six lunch/dinner functions to attend this month for the holidays. I am certainly not going to miss one piece of chicken. It is a story to tell and laugh about at future functions, so I guess it makes for good fodder. That will make it all worthwhile.

Now, back to the rock star. The fellow that my sister went to school with is a Presbyterian preacher. The entire family is musical. One of his two sons is a member of the rock music group Isis. I didn't know this until the drive home. I am not familiar with the group but I have heard of them.

Wee one

What does a person with five tiny yorkies get? A tinier dog, of course. A tiny teacup chihuahua dog. I think I spelled that right. This is my brother's dog.

My daughter had a blast playing with this wee one back in March 2006. She didn't grow much. The dog, that is. My daughter grew and her hair got shorter.

This makes post number 1,400 for me. Woot! I'd celebrate, but I am going to bed. This Ohio weather today is flippin' nuts and I have half a headache. I haven't taken any medicine and I don't want to so I am banking on sleep to take care of it. Hope, hope, hope. I hate waking up with a headache.

Some winter days

In Ohio, in early December, when there was no snow.

This was taken last week on a drive to a school many miles away from home. I have no idea whose home it is. Just something I see on the ride. It was the middle of deer hunting and I saw lots of hunters out and about that day.

I don't know about you, but the Christmas specials and movies just don't seem the same since cable plays the same ones over and over again and videos and DVDs let you watch them any time you want. They have lost that "special" significance. Yawn.

This reminds me of a childhood trauma. Small trauma. But, to an eight year old it was pretty significant. Picture it. The year is 1968. It would be almost 10 years before VHS tapes were available to the public and another five before most homes were able to afford units to play them. Cable stations that currently play holiday movies over and over were also unheard of.

My oldest sister (1944) was getting married on the 27th of December. A friend of the family held her wedding shower on a cold winter night in early December. I was in the wedding and I was to attend the shower. The friend's children were grown and gone. The television sat in the corner of the room that held the crowd of ladies from around town. We ate little cucumber sandwiches and my sister unwrapped her gifts.

It just happened to be the one, the only night in a long year of 365 days that the one little television station would play the favorite classic "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer." I looked longingly at that dark television screen many times during that shower knowing it would be another 365.. no, make that 366 days (1968 was a leap year!) before I would be able to watch my beloved Rudolph again! Horrors! That is a long time to an 8 year old.

I see that the movie only came out in 1964. Given the circumstances, I may have watched it once or twice before the year I didn't get to watch it. It was something I looked forward to. Sigh. I wonder how many times I have actually watched the movie. My daughter never got excited about the movie because we could watch it on Halloween or Thanksgiving 100 times over because we had it on video tape. It just isn't the same. Kids these days have no idea.

Window dressing

The curtains have been washed and re-hung. The lights are on. They are just waiting for the tree. We moved the furniture around yesterday. Before we went to get the tree. It used to be that my daughter and I would walk the few blocks to purchase the tree and carry it home through the snow. You know, like families do up on Walton Mountain or something like that.

Last year my brother happened to be there and drove my tree to my porch. This year I really thought I could do it. Forgetting that moving the furniture around gave my lower back a good thumping over. I would have made it, but we got stupid and decided to take the dog. She was so excited by all the people she was almost unmanageable.

Walking home we were freezing. My daughter had the top of the tree and I had the trunk and the dog. It was cold. We must have looked pathetic because my neighbor stopped with his bright and shiny new red truck and put the tree in the back and drove it to my back porch. We were halfway home. I thanked him and put the tree in the garage for safe keeping overnight. My Mom had a tree stolen right off her porch before.

We will cut the trunk today and get it into water. We may get it decorated by tonight, I don't know. My daughter wants to practice backing into the orange cones today so that she can be ready to take her driving test. Ugh. It's going to be cold. Then she is meeting some new guy at the mall. She is so excited about this, she is over at her computer dancing to her hip hop. She said she wants music today, but not Christmas. I've been playing the holiday music for a few days, now.

I've got a real cat problem. Not poor Titten who got both eyes infected. We took her to the doctor and they gave us drops to put in three times a day. She is getting better and fortunately no other cat seems to be affected yet. No, this is a more serious problem.

Moose has always been picked on by the other cats. I try to let them work it out for themselves. My big male cat, Casper won't let her go downstairs. So, she ends up going to the bathroom upstairs. This is not acceptable. I tried taking her downstairs myself but she ran back upstairs as soon as I put her down. She is always scared. She has the long fur but barely weighs five pounds. She is so light when I pick her up. She is the one that vomits, too. Not very often, though.

Sigh. I don't want to get rid of any of them. I will not get rid of Casper. He is my baby. I am torn. This bathroom problem started happening this week. She is using my nice pink area rug in the bathroom. This last time there was blood in her stool.

I may get a litter box, food and water dish and begin putting Moose in the back bedroom by herself during the night. We do pick Casper up and put him in the backroom for some "time out" when he picks on her. He chases her. The other cats have started to pick on her too. What to do, what to do. I've talked to the vet when this happened before. We talked about shaving her to get ride of the mats still embedded in her coat. Maybe she is in pain. Maybe there is something wrong with her that the other cats sense and they don't want to be infected. Maybe animals know this stuff.

The paper is full of "free kittens" for Christmas. We have a cat shelter. The last time I was there it smelled so bad I couldn't stay for more than 10 minutes. They have dozens of cats. I don't want it to come to that. I will try the separation technique until the first of the year and then deal with it. This may be the reason she was put out by the people who owned her before. She was already fixed when she came to our back door. My daughter snuck her into the basement without my knowledge.

Well, it's time to go and get that tree up.

Kind of scary

If I were a kid, I think this would just scare me.

Taken from Tis the Season 2 years ago.

Last Year's stash

A display from the museum in 2007.

22 years

Way back in 1986. The picture on the wall behind the group is my grandmother holding my father and his twin brother dated 1915. The lady on the left is my father's sister (born 1901). The lady on the right is my sister (1954) and her son.

Summer drive

A drive from July 2007. Warmer days are just around the bend. Given six months or so.

Poor baby

She goes to the doctor tomorrow. I have to go and clean it, now. She doesn't like that. Not one bit.