Oh great!

Oh this is just great. Wonderful.

Blogger hasn't been letting me into post, or to edit, or to delete any comments that I leave on your site that don't turn out the way I meant.

NOW, I have absolutely nuttin' to say, and the darn thing is cooperating. Lettin' me in. Darn blogging thing.

Ha! Well, let's just see what it does when I try to add a picture. That'll get it. It will blow me off or something that that.

Wait, maybe I should try to think of something to say! Quick! Think girl.

No. Sorry. I can't do it. Arrrggggggh. Also *sigh*.

Ya wasted your time here, huh? Well, if you sneak off and don't comment, no one will ever know. Save yourself some embarrassment. And as Hoss would say, I always vote for saving myself embarrassment. Or, would he? Say that I mean. Why would anyone save embarrassment? What would you do with it? And how much of it would you need, if you thought up something to do with it? Ol' Hoss is purdy darn smart, so I guess he wouldn't say that.

So I take that back. In fact, I'll just delete that part. I'll leave it in for now, of course. Then I'll try to get back into edit. So, if it's still there when you read this -- but you'll be savin' yourself embarrassment and not commenting, remember? -- then you will know that I couldn't get back in. Actually you're probably not reading this, so you'll never know. Kinda makes me sad -- your not knowin' and all. Too bad.

People always want to ask other folks, "What's your most embarrassing moment?" Like you would tell the truth about that. Like a person would confess to the true most embarrassing moment. (Look at how many times I'm getting to type 'ass' without it being noticed. heheheh.)

Mark Twain said that compliments embarrassed him. Said, "There is nothing you can say in answer to a compliment. I have been complimented myself a great many times, and they always embarrass me. I always feel that they have not said enough." That Twain.

Andy Warhol said that, "Dying is the most embarrassing thing that can ever happen to you, because someone's got to take care of all your details." Sorry Andy, I'm not buying that. Bet you had some embarrassing moments that you didn't share with us. I'm thinkin' that painting Campbell's Soup cans and pretending that it's art is a tad embarrassing.

Did you hear Michael Jackson say, "I embarrass easily" or "Me and Janet really are two different people."? How embarrassing.

And folks speak of an embarrassment of riches. What the heck is that? When it comes to riches, I don't think you could embarrass me enough.

You know, this got long, didn't it? Don't answer, you're just lurking here, remember? Funny. I started out with nothing to say, and I've still got most of what I didn't have to say left. Seems as if a person never runs out of nothing to say. But most say it anyway.
Some people.

Grrrr...

I think that maybe I'm in the prime of my senility. I wrote a post a little bit ago in "Word." (It's below this one.) Copied it and pasted it into "Hello." Published it. I knew that it would have question marks everywhere that I had used a quote mark or a ' mark. No problem. Publish, go into edit and correct them.

BUT NOooooooooo. Damn thing won't let me back in. Thinkin' about throwing the PC out the window. Ya know? Like in the cartoons?

EDIT: Okay. All is well. Sort of. Damn thing.
Double Edit: Or maybe it's Edit P.S. What's the etiquette on that?
Anyhoo, maybe Pentamento? Spell check ain't liking that.
I forgot where I was. Senile alright.
Double Dog Dare EDIT: Finally realized that of course, a double edit, or a second edit, is so obviously a Double Dog Dare Edit. I tell ya, this gettin' old is for the birds.
Now, if I could only remember what the heck I was going to say in the second edit....

 

Nothing exciting

Havin' a bit of a bad-hair day here. Nothing special or amazing. Amazing? Ha! I should be so lucky. Lucky Lucy. That has a nice ring. But no. Nothing amazing going on.

Day started out with the Pest Control guy ringing the doorbell at 7:30 AM. Every three months I have the house sprayed for any kinda bug. Don't like bugs. Or spiders. Or millipedes. Nope, nothin' like that. More than two legs? Dead. No if's, and's, or but's. Butts of any nekked kind are not really allowed. 'Cept in the bathroom. Well, maybe the bedroom. Nowhere else.

Unless it's me in the laundry room. 'Cause if you are about to start the washing machine and you realize that what you are wearing could stand washing, well then, it's only natural to peel it all off and toss it in the machine. But that's only if it's me. In my laundry room. No other butts. Or bugs.

Of course, then you do have to dash up stairs to get dressed. So, in that case, there can be nekked butts in the laundry room, and the rooms you have to dash through, plus the staircase. And the halls involved. But nowhere else.

So. That's the laundry room, the kitchen, the dinette, the entry hall (dangerous and daring that), the stairs, the hall, and then the bedroom. But that's all. Nowhere else.

Where was I? I mean, where was I in my tale? Not where was my tail. I know where that was.
On the john.

It always sounds like a good idea to tell Terminix to come at 7:30 AM. That way it doesn't interfere with the rest of my day. Then, when you're still on the potty when the doorbell rings, you remember why it's not the best idea. My daughters and granddaughters are now rolling their eyes and yelling: "TOO MUCH INFORMATION." True. I'll take that part out before I hit enter.

Hope I didn't just make somebody choke on an ice cube or something. If you do ever choke on an ice cube, just pour a cup of boiling water down your throat. Presto. Just like that, the blockage will be just about instantly removed. No big deal.

Come to think of it, I know some other really pretty good home remedies. Things like, avoiding cutting yourself while slicing vegetables. Just get someone else to hold them while you chop. You'll never cut yourself again.

And you guys out there. Avoid arguments with your wife or mother about lifting the toilet seat. This can be achieved by simply using the sink. Never get yelled at again. About the seat, I'm sayin'. Some women will complain about the sink. Can't please everyone, all the time. Just do the best you can.

Are you one of those people who hit the snooze button and falls back to sleep? Makes you late for work. Put a mousetrap on top of the alarm clock. When you hit that snooze button, you will NOT go back to sleep. Works. Honest. Would I lie?

Now, I haven't tried this trick, but I think it will work: If you have high blood pressure and you hate putting chemicals in your body for that, just cut yourself and bleed for a few minutes. That should reduce the pressure in your veins. It's probably good to use a timer on this. Don't tell the paramedics where you got this idea. Might 'cause jealousy. Some people. You know?

I do know for sure that if you have a bad toothache, that smashing your thumb with a hammer will help you forget about the tooth. I helped a friend once using this trick. I should call her. Haven't heard from her in a while. We used to be close. Mmmm....

 

Kidspeak

Dddragon was not that quick to talk. Said her first word at about twelve months. Said, "See? " That's "see" with a question mark. She was sitting in her walker – they call those things "walkers" but they're really "roller-arounders" if you ask me. Which you didn't. Just sayin'. Anyway. Where was I before I was so rudely interrupted? Oh, yeah. Dddragon was sitting in her walker, and she rolled (see what I'm sayin' about the rolling around part?) her little baby self right up to the television, pointed her little baby finger at something on the screen, and said, "See? "

Guess I'd overdone the "see? " on our little walks around the neighborhood. I would point at a flower, and say, "See? Flower." And " See? Doggie. " Trying to teach her things like flower and doggie, but instead she picked up on the "See? " part. You see what I had to work with.

By the time she was four, she was talking. A lot. A whole lot.

Once just the two of us were driving down the street from L.A. to a place in the San Gabriel Valley – actually I was driving, ddd was just riding – she was yakking away non-stop. This was a trip that was going to take about an hour. It wasn’t a trip that should have taken an hour, but it was a trip that was going to take an hour because my brother-in-law Gene was the one who told me how to make this trip, and he never used the freeway. Afterwards when I used the freeway it was a twenty-minute trip.
But I digress.
As usual.
Sidetracked again.

Anyhoo. Ddd is hanging half out the window – yeah, yeah, she was in the front seat, and we didn’t use seatbelts in those days either. Guess I was a neglectful mother. Ddd is talking, talking, talking, and I’m half listening, and she says, "Where are those letters ? "

"What letters? "

"Those letters on the street." What the…what is this kid talking about?

"There aren’t any letters on streets. Do you mean the words that tell you that people can walk across the street? Ped Xing? "

"No. Those letters. Those letters that are on the map and the globe."

Ah. She has seen us reading maps and had noticed that there are words on the lines that represent the streets. That kid. Had to laugh at that. She talked so much on that hour's trip that I remarked to Mama, "I thought she’d never talk. Now I’m afraid she’ll never shut up."

Not so far. Shut up, I mean. That’s why I learned to use the freeway system.

She had no clue that there was anything that normal folks didn’t shout right out loud either. Not sayin’ she was abnormal. A touch unusual maybe. Friendly. Like that.

About two years later a neighbor told me about seeing ddd walking to school. Emma, the neighbor, called out to ddd, saying, "How’s the new baby brother? "

Ddd shouts back, “He’s fine! He had some trouble with his penis, but it’s okay now."
Some kid, huh?.

Nivek’s circumcision had apparently made an impression. Emma 'bout fainted apparently. It’s possible that she herself had never said the word “penis” out loud. Her problem. Not ddd’s. Not mine either. As far as I was concerned ddd could tell the world. Actually she just might have done that. Talked a lot. Seriously. She was so cute.

Not sayin' she's not cute now of course. Just sayin' not as cute...

Howdy Stranger

Met my friend Chris for coffee this morning at Borders Books. We like to meet there because no one seems to care that we sit for hours and just talk. We usually end up buying books before we leave anyway.

Today we got our coffee and had just sat down to start our visit, when an old guy walked up. He asked us if we wanted a free ticket. "Sure!" Chris said. Then she cocked her head and said, "A free ticket to what?"

He handed her the ticket. It said (well, it didn't say anything you had to read it)
Free Ticket. It's not good for anything. It's just free.

We laughed, which encouraged the old gentleman to stand and talk to us a little. He said, "I'm Bill."

Chris said, "I'm Chris."

I said, "I'm TLP." ('Course I didn't say TLP, but you get the idea.)

Bill said, "My parents named me Bill because I came at the end of the month." It was all downhill from there. Bill was wearing a baseball-style cap with "U.S.S. Miami" written on it. He had served on this ship in 1943 and recently attended a reunion of the men who served with him in WWII. We heard all about that, plus a recently family reunion. Like that. Bill pulled up a chair. Uh oh.

Bill grew up in the soft coal regions of Clearfield County. Soft coal is bituminous coal. The hard coal is anthracite. He lived in Morris Township, and worked in Philipsburg. Philipsburg with one "L." There's a Phillipsburg VA, which has two "L's" according to Bill. You see the kind of interesting stuff we learned from Bill.

He had a car in the 1940's. Not so many folks had cars then. Gave rides to the girls who lived in Morris and also worked in Philipsburg. One girl that he called Willa - he called her Willa on accounta that was her name - one day Willa said to him, "Bill, there's three kinds of turds in this world. There's musturd, there's custurd, and there's you, ya dumb shit!" That Bill.

After an hour, yes, damnitall, an hour, of this, Chris and I both felt we had done our good deed for the day by letting this lonely 80-year-old man have someone to talk at. We're exchanging eye-rolls and meaningful face-twitches, trying to send each other telepathic messages as to how to get rid of this guy. Not to be unfriendly about it or anything. Tryin' to be nice. Tryin' to get the heck outta listenin' to more of sweet ol' Bill. It's a balancing act to be sure.

Chris spots a man bringing coffee to a table a ways behind me. Her face gets brighter. She gets a big shit-eatin' grin.

"I bet that fellow over there would like a 'Free Ticket,' Bill." Sure enough, Bill gets up and trots over to give this poor soul a free ticket. Tagged him! Chris moves faster than Chris can actually move and picks up Bill's coffee cup and bag of books and takes them over to where Bill is now standing. She smiles sweetly and says, "You don't want your coffee to get cold while you're over here talking to this gentleman!" That Chris.

Chris had told me on the phone that she had brought a bazillion jigsaw puzzles for me to distribute to the various places where I do volunteer work. The low-income senior center, etc. Like that. I'm going to confess to you that I never knew precisely what a bazillion is. Turns out to be exactly 72.

Seventy-two big jigsaw puzzles take up more room than you might think. My Honda is full. Didn't want to bother bringing them into the house just to take them back out to the car tomorrow, so I left them in there for tonight. Everything will be fine unless the husband has a heart attack or something like that during the night. Then he'll just have to call a cab. No room for him in the car. Or he could drive himself.

I'm flexible.

 

My son, my son

August 1991. Hot. Very hot. It's been very hot for it seems like forever.

Son Kevin seems to have had a bad day at work. Had a fight with his supervisor.

After graduating from college he returned home to live. He could have lived on his own, but he liked things. He seems to want to start out where his father and I are leaving off financially. He expects to be able to afford stuff. Wants to be able to afford a nice place in a nice area. He has a little red Porsche in the driveway, a Gucci watch on his wrist, two-hundred-dollar shoes on his feet, but it's never enough.

I hear him argue on the phone with his girlfriend of seven years. Arguing about what they will do this coming weekend. It's only Tuesday, but he likes things nailed down. He's organized. Besides, she's living in Washington D.C. now and weekends take planning. Who's going where? He's going down? She's coming up? They argue a lot; it's nothing new.

My husband Niks leaves to go over to baby-sit dddragon's twin daughters, who have just turned one. Kevin is complaining to me about work, nothing new. He's frequently unhappy about the world in general. I'm in a hurry because I have to go to church to a Finance Committee meeting. He's still talking to me as I go out the kitchen door into the garage, leaning out the door to tell me one last thing. It's just another day.

Later, nine-fifteen, nine-thirty, something like that, Niks and I arrive back home at just about the same time. We enter the house together. Kevin comes down the stairs to greet us. He's tall and thin but comes bouncing down the steps like the little kid he still sometimes is. Niks is hungry and makes himself some little snack to eat. He asks Kevin if he had supper. Kevin is 26, but his father is still concerned about what the boy has for supper when we haven't all eaten together. I've always said that Kevin is an air-fern. You know, those little ferns that aren't even in soil, and you never have to water, yet they live anyway. Like that. The boy is a picky eater.

Kevin tells him what he had to eat. Must have gone out to a restaurant, because it sounded like a real meal. Niks said, "Was it any good?"

"Yeah. It was pretty good." High praise from the boy.

We all chatted about something. Can't remember now what. This and that. Kevin seems to be in a pretty good mood now. He goes up to his room. It's been his room since he was seven years old. It still is his room, for that matter.

We were watching TV. My husband Niks and I. POP. It sounded like a pop to me.

"What was that?" we asked each other. Both of us suspected. I suspected. Niks said later he knew. But we pretended for a second that we didn't.

"Kevin?" We called. But he usually had on headphones and wouldn't hear us calling.

He did have on headphones, and he didn't hear us calling. He was dead.

Well, not dead. His lungs breathed and his heart beat. But he was dead.

His father ran up the stairs to his room. I called 911 and my mouth went dry. Completely dry. I was telling someone on the phone that my son had shot himself, and I was aware that my mouth went dry. I marveled at that at the time. Not marveled that my mouth was dry. Marveled that I was aware of it. How could I think of it at a time like this? But I was doing all of those things at once. Giving my address, Kevin's age, my name, being aware of my dry mouth, and shocked that I noticed my dry mouth. It was so dry that it stuck to my teeth.

The paramedics arrive while I am still on the phone. Small town. The police keep my husband and me downstairs. Niks had already gone up while I was calling. He doesn't want me to see. I'm torn. But they're not letting me go.

They work on him for what seems like a long time. "Stabilizing" him. He's alive!
They have arranged for the Penn State Medical School hospital to send a helicopter for him. They bring him down on a stretcher and take him away in an ambulance to the park nearby, where the helicopter is waiting for them.

Niks and I follow in our car. Of course we can't keep up. The helicopter is probably in Hershey at the hospital before we've crossed the river only two miles away.

On the way to the hospital I convince myself that our son will be okay. He's alive. I tell my husband, "He's going to be okay. He'll be mad as hell when he wakes up tomorrow, but he's going to be okay!"

The boy's father says nothing. He's been in Kevin's room with him. He knows.

At the hospital they put us in a separate, private, waiting room in the emergency room area. I didn't know they had those. A chaplain comes and talks to us. Says that he's seen our son. "He's handsome. Athletic looking," he says. It doesn't occur to me to wonder why the chaplain has been in to see our son. I should have wondered why he would be in the room where they were trying to save a person's life.

We wait and wait. Seems like a very long time. Finally an entire group of doctors come in to see us. They explain that Kevin has had "no brain activity" since he entered the hospital. They aren't treating him. There is no treatment. His heart and lungs are strong, and continue on, but soon his brain will swell and those functions will stop. He is brain dead.

We aren't crying. Yet. We agree to donate his organs, but we, me really, want to see him. They stall me. They are pleased, excited even, but trying to hide their excitement, about the organ donation. A healthy twenty-six year old man. Man! He's only a boy. They want the organs. They need time to hook him up to lots of machines so that they can save the organs. I don't blame them; I just want to see him.

It suddenly hits me that maybe I don't want him on machines. Maybe that will cause him to be in pain. I ask. "No." they tell me. "He can't feel anything. The pain is all yours now." And so is was. And so it is.

It's past midnight by now. He is declared dead on August 7, 1991. My son, my son.

It's Acton Bell's Day

Happy Birthday Acton Bell!

You know the drill: After the usual Happy Birthday, we all break into the Volga (Maybe vulgar) Boat Song tune, " Oh happy birth day, oh happy birth day,(Shout out) PAIN, MISERY, AND DISPAIR, PEOPLE DYING EVERYWHERE,...BUT, ...Oh, happy birth day, happy birth day..


 

The girls

This is a photo of just the adult females in the family. I didn't ask any one of them for her permission. Oh, well, I can delete the post if someone objects.

Acton Bell is in front, in black. I'm the white-haired one on the right. Duh.

Dddragon is to the left, and Aral 3P is in the back, also mostly in black. This was taken two or three years ago, so if you ran into us on the street, you'd still recognize us. But please don't run into us on the street. There's a law against running into pedestrians in this state. I'm guessin' probably lots of places have a law like that.

I'm thinking a lot about family. Some milestones coming up. Tomorrow, for example, is Acton Bell's birthday. She's at the shore. I'm taking care of her cat. I'd rather be at the shore. But there you go.

'scuse me now. Gotta go inoculatte myself. I'm late for something.

Inoculatte (v): To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

 

Me and my teeth. Still together

This is me with my big white smile.

Okay, it's not me. But it looks just like me.

Except that I'm white. And, I'm a woman. And I'm not wearing sunglasses.

Maybe my smile doesn't look quite as white. But that's just because dark skin makes your teeth look whiter. Mine are just as white. Almost.

Anyway. Other than that, it's just like me. Well, I have more hair.

But other than those things - just like me. Uh, my hair is a little curly.

Looks a lot like me besides that.

And I don't have to see the dentist again until February 2006. Ray will never have to see the dentist again. But other than that we're just alike.

Except I don't sing so good.

 

Pez Pity Party

I have to go to the dentist this afternoon. It's just a cleaning, for gosh sakes. No big deal. But I hate going to the dentist. Just hate it. I have good teeth. Can't remember the last time I had to have something done other than cleaning. Still hate going. Sigh.

Poor, poor, pitiful me. Emphasis on pitiful.