The Peaceable Kingdom...NOT

Don't mind me, I'm just here to vent.

Leapin' lizards, what a day. This was the kind of day that makes me glad I don't own a gun. Cuz I'd kill someone. In fact, there were a couple of people today that I might have killed twice just for the sweet pleasure of their no longer existing.

I quit drinking booze for this?

I swear, dealing with these other people made me feel like the only sane person on the planet.

Started out with MySpouse getting up at his usual time, 4:30 AM. He had today off from work and he was looking forward to spending time with his computer. Except that his computer wouldn't cooperate. All he could get were sites that were on Google servers. My computer wouldn't cooperate either (no Scrabble site) but I wasn't as upset about it as he was.

He tried some things and no go. Called the ISP and found out they weren't open until 2:00 PM. then he proceeded to obsess and fuss. He wouldn't listen to me, basically ignored me.

Let me tell you, hell hath no fury like a woman ignored. First I was angry, then I was hurt, and finally PISSED OFF.

He realized he was tired by 9:30 AM and went up to bed for a nap. I think he'd been in bed maybe 20 minutes when I decided that I was peeved. I went upstairs and sat on the bed and asked him "So, do I look like chopped liver to you?"

Guys, there is no right answer when a woman asks you that. Just go ahead and apologize. At some point she'll tell you what you're apologizing for...

We talked. I explained. He apologized. Even though we love each other, we are two different people. We have different viewpoints and different priorities sometimes. Truthfully, we seldom fight and when we do it's usually becuz one of us is tired.

Today was going to be a busy day and I didn't want to start it out in such a negative way. I hate when that happens. We each have an Advertiser route that we do on Wednesday. For me, Avon delivery every other Wednesday, Lions Club two Wednesday evenings a month. This Wednesday was the one in which all three things landed. In between the paper route and Lions Club we were going to take time to cut up a fallen tree branch.

We did our paper routes. Cooked a frozen pizza for dinner. Went outside and cut up the tree branch. Busy morning, but with a couple hours available for a nap in the afternoon. MySpouse laid down for a nap and I told him I would lay down after I bathed.

I didn't want to go to bed until my hair was partially dry, so I came downstairs to work on a sign-up sheet for the Lions Club fundraiser. Take about 20 minutes, I figured. Time enough for my hair to dry a bit. I don't like that Bride-of-Frankenstein look that I get from sleeping on wet hair.

I'm typing away, wearing only a bathrobe and a frown, when the dogs start barking. I thought 'Please don't let it be the young gal from down the street stopping by. I'm too tired to be social'
And hey, whadda ya know, it wasn't the young gal from down the street.

It was my rapscallion BrotherTwo followed by five other people. One of the people, a young man, walked in carrying a cigarette in his hand. I told the young man with the cigarette "If you light that up in my house I'll shove it up your nose." I think all six of them smoke, but I don't, and they're in my house. I really was too tired to be social, and frankly, too tired to be nice.

My brother took it upon himself to make coffee. I hunted up some pop and snacks for the other members of his party. BrotherTwo has worked in construction for 20-odd years now. He may do some roofing for us. Toward that end, and to smoke, we went outside to look at the house. I'm willing to let him know all about construction, but when he mentioned landscaping, I cut him off straightaway.

He's talking about landscaping, I said very firmly "I'll take care of the landscaping. Don't say another word." He made a sound of protest, kind of shuffled around a bit and I took him by the elbow "Now get your size 10's out of my iris bed. Stand by your friend on the sidewalk and stop killing my plants."

He may not lecture me about landscaping. I have always been interested in growing plants and gardening. I had the opportunity to attend a community college for two years and I chose the Commercial Horticulture curriculum. I kept all my textbooks. When MySpouse isn't on the Internet he is also interested in gardening and plants.

Both MySpouse and I really like rocks. Spring of 2006 we built ourselves a little rock wall out front. It won't win any prizes for landscaping but we like it.

By the time BrotherTwo and his entourage departed it was too late for a nap. I finished the sign-up sheet.

Then off to the Lions Club meeting. The president of the club this year is a guy who is old enough to be my father. He treats me like a 1950's bimbo cheerleader. I'm overweight, opinionated, outgoing, outspoken...but I have never been a cheerleader.

President Twit has no experience with retail sales, promotion, or running a business . He gives me no credit for my experience in those areas, which results in my feeling really frustrated. When I go to area businesses and solicit donations on behalf of Lions Club I know what I'm asking of them.

At the board meeting on March 5th the organizing of a fundraiser to be held March 18th was given to me. It's a fundraiser that the club has done for many years so having less than two weeks to put it together isn't a huge deal. Really.

One of the things I've done for the fundraiser was to go and order sausage from a local business.
I've known the receptionist casually for years. That helps with communication. She asked at least three times if the business was donating the sausage to Lions Club. I told her no, in the past we had paid for it. I know; I wrote the check for it last year when I was treasurer. I told her the club would pay for it this year, but I would get an opinion from club members about accepting a donation next year.

If I had kept my yap shut at Wednesday's meeting President Twit wouldn't have insulted me in front of everyone present. He started out by asking the man who was no longer in charge of the fundraiser for a status report. At least the former organizer had the grace to be embarrassed. He referred President Twit to me.

I gave a report. Began passing the sign-up sheet around. Then my big mistake, I asked for input about accepting a donation next year. President Twit said to me, "That's a no-brainer. Take the donation. Go back and tell them we want a donation." Does he realize that representing the club does not give me blanket authority? It was not my decision to make. It's something that the members need to know about, discuss, and decide.

He has no idea how stupid that would make his Lions Club look. I told him no. I'd made a deal with them on behalf of the club and we needed to stick to it. For next year we can make a different deal with them.

I'd like the local businesses to have a good opinion of Lions Club.
Toward that end, I wait impatiently for President Twit's term to be finished.

Just Sitting

Uffda. I'm glad that's over. We can all draw a deep breath now. I can't believe how tired and sore I am when all I did was sit most of the day.

SisOne had her surgery today and it went well. The 'sentinel' lymph node had no cancer present. Of course there is still a bit of danger in recovery, but, hey, not dying on the operating table is a positive thing.

After SisOne was installed in a semi-private room the whole throng of visitors was allowed in...six of us. Every one else whispered to her, but I spoke right up and told her a funny story. I was granted a tiny bit of a smile. Pretty good for a gal who just had five hours of surgery.

The story I told her was about my second husband's grandmother. Gramma O had abdominal surgery. To keep abdominal muscles from stiffening the nurses want a patient to cough. Coughing is painful, to say the least. Gramma O had worked in that hospital as a nurse's aide for years so she knew very well what they wanted. She played possum. One of the nurses told us outside the room that Gramma O wouldn't cough for them, so could we tell her a joke and get her to laugh? Because laughing uses the same abdominal muscles that coughing does...

A quandary for us: What jokes did we know that we could tell an elderly lady? Finally grandson decides he can tell her the 'Frayed Knot' joke cuz it doesn't have any dirty words in it.

As soon as the nurse was gone Gramma O opened her eyes and I scolded her for being so unhelpful. She just smiled at me. I told her she still had to listen to the joke. Grandson told it well, and she did laugh. And it did hurt. But probably not as much as coughing.

It's good that the story about Gramma O made SisOne smile. It was twenty years ago that I heard the 'Frayed Knot' joke and I don't remember the punchline.

Reality Live

I'm not much troubled by reality. We don't watch television, subscribe to a newspaper or magazines, or listen to radio. So do you think I'm out of touch?

Most of the news we get comes from the stuff we read on the Internet. Okay, MySpouse reads things to me while I play Scrabble or Tetris. He's a blog-o-holic. At least he's cut down on the number of political blogs he reads. Mostly he reads to me the items that make him laugh.

Last Sunday MySpouse got a free newspaper when he gassed up his pick-up. I read the comics, looked thru the Target flyer, and read an article about how some news organization had NO items about Paris Hilton for a week. The news organization found out that no one really missed Miss Hilton.

Okay, she's rich and skinny. Is that it? Is that all? I'd say she's young, also, but that's not true. At 26 she's closer to 30 than she probably wants to be.

And what, precisely, does she do?

I come from a long line of doers. I don't waste my time like I did when I was 20-something.
He drives, I crochet. I have an appointment with a doctor, dentist, or lawyer - I take
my knitting to work on. My daughter calls to rant and I play Free Cell while she natters
about her shit of a husband.

I do things that are productive and creative. I'm sure Miss Hilton could hire someone to knit or crochet an item, but it's not about paying someone to do something. It's about learning a skill and using it in a positive way. I'm hoping some day to crochet as well as my mother does.

So maybe I am out of touch. If a Paris Hilton sighting was the high point of my day, I might be better off.

Robin: Harbinger of Spring

I saw a robin today. Right up front, on the sidewalk. That is semi-exciting as a harbinger of spring. I'll be a bit more excited when I see a dandelion bloom. Dandelions aren't so prone to misjudging the timing of spring in Iowa.

Tomorrow I can expect to see five robins now that the first one has appeared. In about a week we'll have snow again and I can expect to see dozens of robins. All walking around looking pissy.

It's as if they've gone on vacation thinking the weather will be nice, only to arrive in the Arctic. As if they lived in Maine and went south... to New Hampshire, expecting it to be warmer there. Too much hassle to fly back to where they came from so they stay and gut it out.
But they don't like it. If you've seen the photo of 'The Mad Bluebird' you know how peeved a bird can look.

The birdie body language of these too-early robins makes it clear what their birdie thoughts are: "Eeeewwww! Ick! What's a nice bird like me doing in this frozen hell called Iowa?"
They're probably hungry, which doesn't improve anyone's mood. There might be some box elder bugs available for snacks, but I've never seen a worm crawling around in the snow.

So they probably are entitled to their bad mood. The weather sucks, food is hard to find, they're not smarter than the food (happens to me all the time), all the nesting material is covered with snow, just a crappy deal all the way around.

Eventually the snow will melt and they will stop looking so peevish. Dandelions and violets will bloom and I will know it is truly, finally spring in this part of Iowa.

Yard Work

Our back yard is enclosed with a fence. The fence looked okay when it was new. Of course, when it was new we had different dogs. We added two feet of height to the fence because my young male dog, Jackson, could jump over the original 4-foot fence any time he wanted to. He would wander around the neighborhood and eventually return by jumping over the fence into the yard.

Not a good thing becuz we live on a busy street.

Then we found out that Jackson would climb over the 6-foot fence. Any time a strange dog should wander by, invading his territory, don't you know. So we lined the inside of our fence with an electric fence. That worked, but the first victim was Lilac, his sister. All she wanted to do was bark at the neighbor's dogs. Lilac is about as likely to jump as oh, say, a dump truck.
We raised the electric fence to a height of about five feet.

Finally Jackson got a taste of electro-shock treatment. He got bit by it twice and we have had no further problems with his jumping or climbing out.

Jackson and Lilac are true to their heritage, tho. They are half-Lab and half-mutt. People use the abbreviation 'Lab' without thinking about it overly much. 'Lab' is however, the short form of 'Labrador retriever' and that's the tradition that Jackson and Lilac maintain. They retrieve.

Lilac more so than Jackson. She's as persistent with her retrieving as someone who says "you know" in every sentence. As soon as she wakes up in the morning she picks something up and carries it around in her mouth. Usually one of my dirty socks. I've resigned myself to her sock fetish. It's either the socks or something more valuable; books, eyeglasses, shoes, undies.
The socks will survive a trip to the yard, not so other items.

Another favorite thing to be retrieved is the empty cores of toilet paper. I've been trained to set them on the floor near the toilet to be retrieved at a later date. Jackson and Lilac will tussle over the toilet paper cores. Makes for some interesting expeditions to the bathroom.

If we have company both dogs will retrieve...something. Usually something paper-ish since the dirty laundry is confined to the bedroom and bathroom upstairs. A wrapper, a bit of newspaper, to greet new arrivals. And of course all the normal dog gyrations of greeting.

If we are outdoors with our company many people make the mistake of thinking that retrieving is the same thing as fetching. It isn't, is it? At least, not here. Lilac didn't pick up that cheese wrapper and greet you with it just to have you pull it out of her mouth and throw it across the yard. She won't go and 'fetch' what you've thrown. Why should she when there's a perfectly fine piece of a Ruffles bag right here by your feet?

The yard work part of this is that many items that have been retrieved are abandoned in the back yard. I patrol regularly for socks but other items tend to accumulate. Wrappers of various kinds, Ruffles bags, toilet paper cores, ice cream boxes that MySpouse gives them. A colorful mess now that the snow is melting. A mess that I'm going to clean up in the next day or so.
Most of the project will consist of taking things away from Lilac and depositing them in a garbage bag, never to be retrieved again.

Yard work, yes. Any excuse to be outdoors on a 50-degree day.

The C-word

I wasn't sure I could write about this.
And firstly, it's not my C-word, but someone close to me.
It's frightening and it's not even happening to me.
Somehow that seems worse to me; to have to stand by, helpless, powerless, fearful.

Probably not as fearful as the person to whom it is happening.

I had the good fortune to marry a nice man on my third try at matrimony.
MySpouse also happens to come from a nice family. A fairly large family of six siblings.
MySpouse and his five younger sisters.
His sibs think I lack, umm, polish, but they accept me as I am.
Becuz they care for me, I have come to care for them.

MySpouse's oldest sister, SisOne, had a mammogram with less than wonderful results.
Not cancer yet. Could that be less terrifying than 'cancer now' ?
I'm thinking probably not much.
So she has had, as we say in Iowa, a shitload of fear to deal with the last three weeks.

'Not cancer yet' would be enough to send anyone else running for the Jim Beam.

Besides the fear that any other woman would feel at the thought of cancer followed by a mastectomy, these sibs are still coping with the loss of their youngest sister.
SisFive was ill and died within four days.

She was hospitalized with chest pains.
At first, the chest pains seemed to be a heart attack.
But heart attacks come and go fairly quickly; they don't linger for two days.
More tests, another diagnosis, a move to a larger hospital in a larger city for surgery.
Only then did a doctor know the source of her chest pains.
And when the surgeon knew what caused her illness there was no treatment
that could save her.
The inner lining of her aorta had come loose and was blocking the flow of blood.
The surgeon could not repair it.

Something I never want to see again is a piece of someone's aorta.

The surgeon showed us how the inner lining had come loose on a piece of SisFive's aorta.
Among us, her 12-year-old son.
I hope he didn't have nightmares.
"Like a hose de-laminating", MySpouse said. I thought it was an apt,
albeit macho, description of what happened to SisFive to cause her death.

Her life ended so suddenly that somehow it didn't seem real.

I can still hear her voice in my mind and I only knew her for 8 years.
I can't begin to imagine what MySpouse and the remaining four sisters hear.
But I know they still hear her voice becuz it's only been 20 months since she passed away.

Now with SisOne having major surgery the demons are frolicking. SisOne is dealing with insult added to injury, fear upon fear.

Some of the siblings were at the hospital when SisFive died on the operating table.
Some were not. I know tho, that all of them will be at the hospital
when SisOne has surgery.

None of us want another loved one to slip away without a chance to say goodbye.
Please keep these nice people in your prayers.

Trite March, Lion or Lamb?

Weather. The human species is addicted to it.

The Internet is a wonderful thing(even if Al Gore did invent it). Internet access allows people from Iowa, US to chat with people in New South Wales, Australia about the weather.
Weather is a popular topic becuz it's safe. Neutral; much more so than religion,
politics, and in some cases, sports.

Since I have no interest in religion, politics, or sports, I'm quite happy
to chat about the weather. It's refreshing to talk to an Australian about weather
becuz their seasons are opposite the US's. When it's bitterly cold here in Iowa, it's torridly hot in Queensland, Australia. We're wearing parkas and snow-pacs, they're
on the beach in bikinis and huaraches.
In Iowa we'll be eating turkey and mashed potatoes for Christmas dinner.
An Australian will be "having a banana daiquiri while the kids eat watermelon" is what one woman told me.

Any Iowan at the end of February would admit that is refreshing.

March here in Iowa started off with a couple of major storms. The first storm (actually in February) was truly debilitating, providing an example of every type of precipitation possible in Iowa. Let me name the ways in which it precipitated: snow, rain, hail, ice pellets, freezing rain...

Freezing rain. The words bring fear to my heart, and I'm no coward.

I've lived in Iowa all my life; experience tells me that any winter storm that
combines ice and snow is going to be frightening.
People being people and all, some people went out and got dead.
As far as I'm concerned they got what they deserved for being prideful and stupid.
Whatever it is that seems so important, it's not worth getting dead about.

Make emergency workers' jobs easier.
If you're not on the county road crew, STAY HOME.

My daughter called on Saturday, February 24th and said she would be
spending the night at her place of employment.
I told her good idea. She had a reliable caretaker for her 2-year-old.
I reminded her that getting home ain't worth getting dead about.