Woman in the Middle

Blackie is back home. I can’t say he feels better quite yet as he was forced to have his neither regions bathed when we got home. He smelled awful! But, according to the vet, the constipation was there but she has seen worse. She thinks it is out now and we have a new plan to prevent it is the future. Fingers crossed and here is hoping!

Blackie is having another attack of serious constipation, poor guy. So Hubby took to the internet once again to try to figure out how to prevent it in the future, after we take Blackie back to the vet for a, ahem, clean out. We sat down so he could tell me his findings and give me questions I should ask the vet today. In the middle of the conversation I suddenly made a rather nasty looking face, making Hubby wonder what it was he said that deserved that! But it wasn’t Hubby at all that caused my facial muscles to contort.

I have been out of allergy medicine for a few days, waiting for it to come in again at the pharmacy. That means I sniff a lot. As we were talking, I sniffed and something tickled the inside of my nose. When I breathed out a tiny moth came fluttering out!!!   That poor moth was in just the right place at just the wrong time when I sniffed.

Hubby felt much better when I explained the situation. I felt much better knowing the moth was out of my nose. Blackie will feel much better one he goes to the vet. I assume the moth feels better, too!

I joined a group on Facebook that is all about what is going on in my city. People post things like “Avoid the intersection at First and Main because it is blocked by an accident” or “Help me find my lost dog” or “Why is the police helicopter flying over my neighborhood?” But every once and awhile, you get an interesting post like this one: “445pm and hookers are already out on mission… smdh.” (BTW, smdh means “shake my damn head.” I had to ask Eldest Daughter.)

Needless to say, that got the conversation rolling! Everything from “Was that Mona?” (It apparently was) to “What?!? We have HOOKERS?” (Yes, we do!)

But it gets even better! Somehow, some way, the conversation on that post evolved from “we have hookers” to a whole discussion on the Native American meaning of our city’s name. How the heck did that happen? In real conversation, leaps can happen and you don’t really know how they occur. But on Facebook, you can actually trace the evolution of a conversation. But even though I was able to do that, I am still scratching my head as to how we got from hookers to the definitions for Native American terms.

Seriously, this could only happen on Facebook!!!

It warmed up yesterday in these here parts, and it will be staying that way through the weekend. The temperature is hovering right around 90 degrees. In March. Oh boy! It caused our local newspaper to print a headline this monring that read, “We skipped spring!?!”

So my family is in full on shorts and tank tops mode. The warm weather is partially due to a weather pattern that leads to high winds. We had those winds yesterday and they gave me quite the headache. I am happy to report that the wind has died down and the headache is over.

I think, heat, headaches and all, I would still rather not have to live someplace else and deal with the snow. But that is just me….

I hope, where ever you are, that you have a wonderful weekend! You can think of me trying to stay cool.

I heard it again last night. “I heard you retired a while back.”

While I wish I was independently wealthy and could retire in my early 50s, I am not. I mean, I am not either retired or independently wealthy.

You see, I was driving a far distance so I could earn half of what I should have been earning and was dealing with a dysfunctional work place that was driving me insane. Meanwhile, on the home front,, there were things that needed to be dealt with. Someone needed to deal with them, and me, the underpaid commuter who was beginning to loathe her work place, that someone would be me.

In the last year, I have not gotten done nearly all I should have, but I finished the first draft of a new book, I researched and wrote 24 columns on local history for our area’s newspaper, and even more columns for our local weekly paper. I became involved in two more organizations in my community and somehow irritated three city council people enough that they voted to kick me off the planning commission. Gosh, I have been busy!

The stuff on the home front is coming along, although never as fast as it should.  I have just started, as of yesterday, to look for more gainful employment, because I sure am not making big bucks off this here blog.  (I am not making anything, FYI.)  The last year has not been a retirement, it has been a pause. I guess it is time to hit the pause button once again and get on with the rest of life, or should I say the rest of the working life. Our check book would be forever grateful!

During a recent exercise class, when I was trying to distract myself from the pain, I began to think about what I would buy if money were no object. Here is what I came up with:

1. A Hydromassage bed like they have a the gym. Those things are amazing. I would use it all the time!. Kids annoy me? Get a massage. Too many phone calls from people trying to get me to install a solar system on my roof? Get a massage. Trouble sleeping? Get a massage.

2. First class seats on a plane, or business class, or anything but those cattle car, I mean economy class seats. I would prefer not to sit in a seat, touching a stranger sitting next to me from my ankles to my shoulders, for many hours.

3. Any book, any time, whenever I want it, even if it just came out in hardback and is full price.

4. Someone to come fix all those little things around the house that need to be fixed but never quite get to the top of the priority list. A little peeling paint here, a little dry rot there….

What would you buy if money was no object?

Hubby got home from work early today. I suggested that instead of going to Mom in laws house, for a change of pace we work on our storage unit garage. We still have stuff we need to bring home from Mom in laws and we need someplace to put it. Right now there isn’t much of any place to put more stuff. Sigh.

The girls also want to have a garage sale soon, so this was a good opportunity to find all the stuff that needs to go to the sale. Oh my, so much stuff. We had a big blue tub from Bother Dear that we thought was full of car stuff. Turns out what we thought was a car cover was a sleeping bag!  Happily, we are finding quite a bit of stuff like that that can go.

Unfortunately the garage is a bit of a hoarder’s paradise right now. Girl stuff, Mom in law stuff, Brother Dear stuff, and just plain STUFF. But, at least we did accomplish something today. After the garage sale, what ever is left of that stuff will go. And then we will have room for the stuff we still have to bring to our house, Yay, I guess…..

I apologize for using the word “stuff” so much in this post.

Since we live in one of the 47 states that practices Daylight Savings Time, the clock magically leapt ahead Sunday morning. Normally, that is a “whatever” around here. But this year, we were all eagerly looking forward to daylight savings time.

About three weeks ago, after getting up no earlier than 7 am , but usually sleeping in until eight or so, Honey the dog decided 6:15 am was the latest she was going to stay in bed every single morning. Sometimes it is 6 a.m. or even 5:45. Given that none of us needs to get up at that early hour, this has been really annoying. It doesn’t help that as soon as Blackie the cat sees us moving he expects food to be put in his bowl. If not, he does his best to harass us to death with an incessant and irritating “meow.”

Miraculously, this morning, the first of daylight savings time, Honey got up at exactly 7:15. Thank you, time change!!! We are forever grateful that Honey never learned how to read a clock!

Me, a pain? Not at all! I am just a dog who has decided I want to get an early start!

Here it is, Friday already! What exciting things do you have planned? Here is what I will be doing:

Tonight is the baked potato bar dinner at our local VFW. I have been looking forward to that ever since I heard about it last Friday! Lots of people I know are going to it as well, so it should be a fun night. I won’t be singing karaoke, however. That is for braver souls than me!

Saturday is the Riverside County History Symposium, spearheaded by our friend Steve. I get to spend the day with all of my local history nerd people and meet some new folks in this catagory as well. It is being held at the historic Highland Springs Resort in Cherry Valley. We get a tour of that facility as well. I can’t wait!

Sunday it is back to Mom in laws house, but that is OK. We are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel there so progess seems to be happening much quicker. Yay!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!

We all could have a bit of that hippie style in our homes back in the 1960s and 70s with beaded curtains! They were perfect in a window that didn’t need a full covering to keep out light and prying eyes, like the frosted windows in a bathroom in Mom in Law’s house. I always liked her bead curtains.

Plastic beads such as these catch the light and made a sparkly and colorful addition to any room. Sometimes they were used on windows, even sliding glass doors. Other times they were used in doorways. They were so popular that they are still available today, if a beaded doorway is what you really want!

Did you have any bead curtains back in the day?