Order Restored

After spending two nights on the living room sofa hide-away bed, which was not a fun adventure as that thing was like sleeping on a bed of rocks, we returned the house to a semblance of normal yesterday.

Last night we slept in our own bed! Hurrah!

The bathroom looks great, except for one thing. We ordered a new vanity top some time ago because the old one had cracked in the sink bowl. Despite my query of "shouldn't you call and see if the new one has arrived?" my husband removed the old vanity top and then hopped in his truck and went to get the new one.

Of course the new one hasn't arrived yet and won't for another 10 days or so. So we have no sink in the bathroom at the moment. We do have a piece of plywood over the vanity to use a place to lay things like the hairdryer.

A minor inconvenience, to be sure.

I was amazed how such a seemingly small project disrupted the entire house. You'd have thought we were tearing out walls or something if you guessed by the state of disarray.

Books: The Mists of Avalon

The Mists of Avalon
by Marion Zimmer Bradley
Read by Natasha Ricahrdson
Abridged
Copyright 1995

This book has long sat on my shelf unread. It is a very fat book so I feel certain that the two cassettes I listened to left much to be desired in terms of the entire novel.

Still, it was interesting enough. It focused on Morgaine, King Arthur's sister, and how she had his child, and how she went on to live in the mists of Avalon.

In 2001 someone made a movie of the book; I watched it but I don't recall much about it. It must not have made much of an impression.

3 stars (for this audio version only).

Camping in the Living Room

A year ago, I noticed a patch of mildew on the wallpaper in the bathroom. It was up high where I could not reach it without climbing on something, and at the time I was experiencing a bout of vertigo.

I asked my husband to wipe it away for me.

Instead, he ripped all the wallpaper off the bathroom wall. Then he got out the spackling/drywall compound and created a lot of messy white marks all over the remaining pink paint.

He purchased paint, semi-gloss enamel, which I could not use because I am allergic to it.

Then he left everything as it was, including the paint cans sitting in the garage.

I called my new decor "Cloud Pink" in order to remain lighthearted about this situation. I mentioned putting wallpaper back up (I can handle wallpaper) and he expressly said he never wanted wallpaper in the house again. Wallpaper *is* a problem on drywall, which is what we have, not plaster, so I acquiesced.

In August when he was away for a week, I took a pencil and drew all over the walls. "I love you" and little hearts with arrows became the new decor.

My hope was he would not like this enough to do something.

Finally, yesterday, he decided it was time he cleaned up his mess. He got through the "prime the walls" phase before calling it a day.

Unfortunately, the odors wafting from the paint were pretty bad, and this is the bathroom off the bedroom. I could not spend the night in the bedroom.

We don't have a spare bedroom.

So we unfolded the hide-away bed in the sofa, and slept there. It was like sleeping on a cot with springs poking you in the back, but better than waking up with your lips and eyes swollen from paint fumes.

He will finish up today with the final coat, and we will likely camp out again tonight in the living room. But hopefully by Saturday night the fumes will have dissipated enough that we can get back to life as it was.

Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen things you hear while the husband remodels the bathroom:

1. Damn! How long has it been since you cleaned out the exhaust fan, woman? (Translation: I know you can't climb on chairs and things because you have vertigo and I haven't been much help lately.)

2. Damn! The pea trap in the sink broke! (Translation: you will now need to go to Lowe's, wife.)

3. Damn! I smashed my finger. Get me a band aid. (Translation: the sander just jumped off the wall and attacked me!)

4. Damn! I need the vacuum. (Translation: I made a helluva mess with the sander.)

5. Damn! Can you come help me a minute? (Translation: I didn't really want to do this anyway!)

6. Damn! Here's the source of the mold you've been smelling. (Translation: I ripped off the wallpaper in October 2006, which you asked me not to do, woman, and some of it fell in behind the vanity where you couldn't reach it and it got wet.)

7. Damn! This vanity top is heavy and no I will not use the dolly to haul it to the garage. (Translation: I am He-Man, I lift stuff.)

8. Damn! I dropped the medicine cabinet and broke a shelf. (Translation: another trip to Lowe's.)

9. Damn! I need the extension to the vacuum cleaner! (Translation: I'm making a bigger mess than I intended.)

10. Damn! I'm going to have to find a way to mix this paint. (Translation: I purchased it a year ago despite knowing you, wife, are allergic to it and couldn't do this chore yourself, and I'm just now getting around to it.)

11. Damn! It's hot in here. (Translation: It's 80 degrees outside, what do you expect?)

12. Damn! That sure is pink paint. (Translation: I know I said a little color would be nice, but this?)

13. Damn! It's not going to be finished today. (Translation: Prepare for a long weekend.)

Where the deer and turkeys roam

Me? Postmodernist?

Whilst browsing blogs today I ran across a test at Separation Anxiety and decided to take it. It had to do with religion.

I was very surprised when it came up that I am "postmodernist" because I have never considered myself to be in that category.

I apparently am in my thought processes, but I am not sure I live my life according to those principles. I wonder what that means, if I am at such odds with myself?

Of course, that is not all I am - I am part Existentialist, part Materialist, part Modernist, etc. Not sure how this website is defining all of those terms, though.



What is Your World View?
created with QuizFarm.com

Where I'm From

I am from the green banks of Ireland,
from kettles filled with 'taters
and Celtic blues sung softly to the stars.

I am from the cabins of Virginia settlers,
folks who ventured to a new world
with only a Bible and a banjo.

I am from mothers with fey dreams
who know you're dying long before you do,
and from fathers who drink first,
fight later, and leave bloody prints
on the shores of their wives' beaches.

I am from a reverend who owned
whore houses and from grandparents
who set the West Virginia woods afire
while they made love.

I am from Mother Mary and the Mother Goddess
and Jesus Christ on a stick. I'm from the Shenandoah,
the slow-moving creek, oak trees and blackberries,
peaches and wine.

I am from the fires of World Wars and from spindles
that made thread, and needles that wheedled
thread into cloth that shone like gold.

From all this and more, am I; I am from black dresses,
red hair, cancers and heartache, from tombstones
and graves and moonshine whiskey
made from copper pipes.

My line stops with me; my womb yawns
like an empty cavern, barren and fruitless,
nothing will come forth to let another know
the necessity of the past,
to make it her own, to say to her,
"This is where you're from."


The template for this poem can be found here; the original poem that inspired the template can be found here. I read a poem on someone's blog from the template some time ago, but it's been such a while the blog has been removed and I don't know where that person got it from originally.

The Gun Show

We made an unexpected trip to the gun show at the Salem Civic Center this morning.

My husband I think expected to go; he just forgot to tell me until the last minute.

Gun shows are ... different. I have been to three now, all since 9/11/2001. They are not places one would expect to find me, and they are not places I would go on my own.

The first show after 9/11 was very intense. People were grim and angry, downright hostile. Lots of stuff on display about "protecting our own" and similar sentiments.

The show today was more relaxed. It is still a right-wing rednecked party, but I didn't feel like the entire place was hunting for bear.

At gun shows you see lots of guns. Guns can be pretty, if you forget that they kill stuff. The stocks especially can be very beautiful. My husband prefers the wood stocks, and they are indeed very lovely pieces of wood.

You also see a lot of Dixie items - Confederate flags, for example. Also I saw swords of various sizes, which always fascinate me. A great sword is *incredibly* heavy. Even a short sword has a lot of heft to it. My wrists certainly wouldn't hold up long if I had to carry one.

Additionally, there are aisles of mace and pepper spray, tasers, camouflage clothing, coins, bullets, vests, pistols, pistol carriers for concealed weapons, things like that.

The crowd consisted of mostly (white) men, and they looked like a sea of baseball caps spread out among the show floor. A few very burly men with tattoos (they were rather scary-looking) paced up and down the aisles. Maybe they were some kind of security but they looked like bikers.

The one thing that caught my attention was the stereotype the gun show pushed. Many of the items sold seemed to be targeted at the kind of folks who epitomize Jeff Foxworthy's humor.

Not much room at a gun show for someone who reads poetry, I must say. Although I think there is a sort of poetry in gun shows ...

The Gun Show

The Civil War, fought 100 years ago
lives strong and the Rebel Flag flies
at the gun show.

Men with chew in their jaws pace the aisles
eyes intent on their target.
A Remington, a Winchester, a Marlin.

The guns, sleek and smooth, barrels straight
await a proper aim
and a touch on the trigger.

Money changes hands and guns march off
with hunters, bandits, police officers,
women, mothers, children.

The hum of the mechanics of capitalism,
the sounds of doing business,
the death exchange.

Needs work, that poem. Ah well.

Books: Revenge of the Middle-Aged Woman

Revenge of the Middle-Aged Woman
By Elizabeth Buchan
Copyright 2002
Unabridged Audiobook
Read by Jean Gilpin

Rose has everything - two lovely grown adult children, a nice husband, a good job as a book editor at the same newspaper her husband works for.

Then bam. Nathan falls in love with Minty, Rose's assistant. He has to leave her and go sow his oats.

Poor Rose. Two days later, she loses her job because, well, it's the good ol' boy network and all that.

After a long struggle, she lands on her feet, life not the same but basically intact.

This book is set in Britain and I always enjoy listening to the British accents.

A nice way to pass the time whilst driving.

3 stars

The Smoking Toilet

Unfortunately for me on a recent evening, my husband ate something that disagreed with him. When he finished taking care of business, the bathroom smelled less like a petunia and more like some demon from hell died in there.

I sprayed Lysol. I proceeded to spray it on and all around the toilet bowl, including on the lid and the rim.

I left the room, but didn't get very far. "Maybe I should just clean the toilet," I thought.

I grabbed a bottle of The Works toilet bowl cleaner. I squished the middle of the bottle, sending the stuff cascading under the rim and down into the water.

Within seconds smoke began to rise from the rim of the toilet and from the water, everywhere there was Lysol and The Works running together.

I immediately realized I had mixed chemicals. This is a dangerous (and very stupid) thing to do. I grabbed the toilet brush and began flushing, using water to dilute things. I also tried not to breathe the fumes, although I am sure I did.

These are pretty volatile chemicals, and I sheepishly went to my husband to tell him what I'd done.

This is because we have a septic tank and I was afraid the thing might blow up from the mixture.

However, nothing like that happened, so no harm, I guess.

But everyone should be very careful with chemicals. Even cleaning the toilet can be hazardous to your health!

Jailed

Earlier this week, I took a tour of a new jail that it is under construction in our county.

It is a massive structure. It will hold 214 prisoners.

I have never been in jail. I am no angel,but I haven't done anything jail-worthy.



The cells are very small and designed to hold two people. Each cell has its own toilet, which is not private in any way.

There is no sunshine. The day rooms, which have tables bolted to the floor, have a frosted window.

The prisoners will never go outside. They won't see birds, dogs or clouds. They won't feel rain or wind.

My grandmother told me once when she was in the assisted living facility that she felt like she was in prison.

She was not. She was in a sanctuary compared to this place.

Even though the structure was huge, I felt claustrophobic and sick to my stomach when my time there was done.

I am very sad to see that we have this jail.

As a nation, we jail everyone regardless of what you do. I think we imprison a lot of people that need not be jailed. Drug users, for instances. (Not pushers). So long as they're not using and driving, who cares? If they want to kill themselves on drugs, let them, don't lock them up.

Better yet, get them into counseling and rehabilitation and turn them back into useful, productive citizens.

But nope, we toss people into the darkness and take away their humanity, caging them like animals. Maybe some of them are animals and deserve such treatment, but I honestly don't believe every criminal should be behind bars.

After we've done all that, we wonder why so many go on to commit more crimes.

We're too quick to lock people up in this country. We are the number one nation for incarceration, and it's not a statistic to crow about. You'd think that would be one of those other countries, those that we're always being told are the boggy-man. But nope, it's us.

We're the boggy-man. And I really think it's going to get worse before it gets better.

Thursday Thirteen

1. Autumn comes.

2. The heat will break like a wave on the sand, and the sizzle will subside.

3. The call of the lark will dwindle as the days grow short.

4. The rollicking color of flowers will fade.

5. Leaves will bring a new kind of paintbrush to the landscape, flinging orange and red across the Blue Ridge.

6. Deer will forage for acorns; bucks will clash horns vying for the finest doe.

7. The mountain's hue will change to white as their tops glisten with the first snowfall.

8. Butternut squash and pumpkins will be on the menu.

9. Fires will crackle merrily as we huddle for warmth.

10. Popcorn and candied apples will be the new sweets.

11. The sky will glow purple with the early setting sun.

12. Water from the well will grow cold crisp.

13. Summer is done.

Done with the Doctors

For this week, anyway, the doctor visits are finished.

The chiropractor last night hammered my pelvis back into place; I felt it pop in what I hope is a good way. However, she began messing with my knee and I had to put a stop to that. My knee has given me fits over the years and its best left alone.

Of course her several little movements of "I'm not manipulating it, I'm letting the body take its course" before I stopped her have left it a little painful.

Like the foot pain isn't enough.

The oral surgeon this morning said the mucocel could go or stay, but if I chew on it I'm liable to cut it and introduce bacteria, etc. He doesn't believe it will go away on its on. After learning that he will only use a local numbing agent and not force anything else on me, I agreed to have the surgery in early October.

I liked this doctor; he was very kind. I also liked the fact that he didn't force me to make any kind of decision right away and left it up to me.

Then I saw the dentist and had a cleaning. That went fine, except the hygienist was a little loopy.

The shot in my foot seems to have helped a bit. I walked for 10 minutes on the treadmill this morning. I was delighted to get back to my walking routine. I've been riding a stationary bicycle every morning but much prefer walking. I decided to ease into it with a half-mile today and then move up in increments every day until I get back to the three miles I was walking.

I think it might be better if I were not doing all of this on the treadmill, though, so I need to see about finding someplace else to walk. The fields would be nice but they're full of cow doodies and who wants to walk in those?

Books: The Sugar Addict's Total Recovery Program

The Sugar Addict's Total Recovery Program
By Kathleen DesMaisons, Ph.D.
Copyright 2000

This book says sugar is addictive and if you eat too much of it, it's because you've got the sugar habit.

The book outlines in great detail a 7-step program to beat your addiction to sugar. Here are the steps:

1. Eat breakfast with protein.
2. Journal about your food and body.
3. Eat three meals a day with protein. (I think you're supposed to skip the snacks in here but the book doesn't come right and say "DON'T HAVE SNACKS"; however, I think it is greatly implied).
4. Take specific vitamins and eat a potato every night (yeah, every night...)
5. Stop eating white food (like white rice) and eat brown food (like brown rice). Potatoes, by the way, are classified as a brown food because the skin is brown... yeah, I know, it's a logic stretch.
6. Stop eating stuff with sugar in it and
7. Get a life.

I honestly don't know that I could ever *not* have a piece of birthday cake, or a piece of fudge. The key, of course, is to only have one piece and not the entire cake.

That said, I have determined to embark upon this as a major effort in my life, because I do think I can eliminate a lot of sugar, if not all of it. I guess the idea is that, like alcoholism, if you have a little bit you slide and have a lot. Plus the book advocates taking months to do this; this is why eliminate sugar is not the first step.

Apparently if you eat enough protein with meals, you don't have those crash times when you desperately need a Coke. Or at least they aren't so bad.

The potato at night is rather odd but apparently this author believes that potatoes, which is a slow-release carbohydrate, helps your body make tryptophan, which is necessary for mood enhancement.

There was a lot of stuff about tryptophan and serotonin and beta-endorphins, much of which I recognized from the time I was in therapy and read many books about such things.

However, I bought a couple of other "diet" books to read, too, so I may change my mind about this. Really this seems like a slow way to get on the Atkins diet, or a way to make the Atkins diet a bit more livable. And the Atkins diet does work, but it is difficult to stay on.

So wish me luck as I break my "sugar" habit. Here's to losing the flab ...

If Google Were Evil...

I ran across this short story called "Scroogled" which is a fictionalized account of what life may well already be like only we don't know it.... What if Google took over ... where would it all end?

Or check out this fact-filled article on Parade.com:

Is Anything Private Anymore?

Very scary. I am not a fan of cameras and instant information and the government's ability to spy on everyone. I don't think I need my face on a camera because I'm ... being a good law abiding citizen and doing what I'm supposed to do. Whether I do it in Target or in Walmart really isn't anyone's business but my own.

This is so "1984" that I can hardly stand it, and yet, here we are. Nearly there.

I know there are people who think, oh, if you're obeying the law, what difference does it make who is watching... but the problem is you just never know how the person behind the camera is going to construe things.

Scary scary scary. Scroogled indeed.

The Podiatrist

The podiatrist took X-rays and informed me I had a heel spur; hence the pain.

She gave me a cortisone shot, a new set of arch inserts for my shoes, and a booty to wear at night.



The booty next to my sneaker.


My toes are about two inches from the top of the thing.

The booty is not fun to wear. It is huge - about three times the size of my foot, it seems - and sleeping in it makes my hips, back and knee ache. I am not sure trading in all of those aches to get my foot to stop hurting is beneficial.

My husband and I also had to switch sides of the bed so my left foot could stick out from under the covers.

The bed this morning looks like something mauled it, as I tossed and turned. I was not able to get comfortable with that thing on my foot. I did keep it on all night but I woke up a lot.

I know this is going to be a problem because I bought a similar device (not this exact one) in early August and attempted to use it for two weeks. Just as this new booty did last night, the other made my other body parts ache.

Growing old is a pain in the ... well, everything!

Books: Rhapsody

Rhapsody
By Elizabeth Haydon
Copyright 1999
656 pages

This is the first in a high fantasy series.

Rhapsody is a Namer, which is a person with powers over the names of things. If she sings the right names and words to plants, for example, they grow big and strong.

She gets into trouble and meets up with Grunthor, who is some kind of giant-kind person, and Achmed, an assassin. They all run away because Achmed and Grunthor are in trouble, too. They end up underground and 1400 years later, after traveling through fire in the center of the earth, rise up to discover a new world.

Achmed decides to become a king in a forgotten land while Rhapsody adopts a lot of motherless children and attempts to find her place. Grunthor follows Achmed.

There are bad guys, flashbacks, gods playing with time, magic, myth, etc. etc. Amazon has a long review of the book and so I shan't go into the plot any more.

I will recommend it, though, to fantsy readers who want a long read on a cold night. I have the next book in the series here to read, but I will not be delving into it until I have the time to savor it.

4 stars

A Week of Doctors

My calendar is full this week with doctor's visits.

This afternoon I am finally seeing a podiatrist about my feet. I haven't been able to walk without limping and hurting for months. I hold little hope that the thing I probably need - a cortisone shot - will actually happen, but we'll see.

Tomorrow I see the chiropractor.

Wednesday I see an oral surgeon AND my dentist.

Hopefully the last days of the week will pass much more uneventfully. That is way too many doctors for my comfort level.

A New Dishwasher

I wrote last month about the problem I was having with the dishwasher and how I hate to hand wash dishes.

Efforts to eliminate the problem were to no avail, and Monday my husband came home with a new Kitchen Aid dishwasher.

It had a stainless steel interior, whereas the old one was plastic.

However, by the third load, it wasn't rinsing well, either. I haven't told my husband as he will, undoubtedly, go out in the yard and give birth to a cow.

What I did do was buy some new detergent, a completely different brand. I was using Cascade Complete. I have used Cascade in some form or the other for 24 years without problem, but maybe they changed the formula. The dishwasher came with a sample of Electrosol so I will try that.

The other thing that may be the problem is the water heater, because this not-rinsing-well issue started right after we had to replace the water heater in August. I thought the water temperature set to low but my husband has adjusted that and now it should not be a factor. I don't know why the hot water heater would keep the dishwasher from rinsing the dishes well, though.

I washed the dishes last night with the new soap powder and it seems to have helped. My fingers are crossed.

Housekeeping

I made change to the links on the sides where I list other blogs I look at. I deleted some that hadn't been updated in months and added new ones that's I've visited from time to time.

This was prompted by the fact that postsecret suddenly vanished and gave me a broken link, and so I decided to check the rest of my links.

If you find a bad link, please let me know. If you'd like me to add your blog to my list and would like to trade links, let me know that too.