About a week ago, Jon and I were working downstairs in the basement. He was hanging dry wall and I was reorganizing some things I had stored down there and was bringing them up to the storage room in the loft. This means I lugged box after box up two flights of stairs. On my way back down after one load I stopped to let the dogs outside. Lucy immediately bolted off the deck chasing something, which she cornered at the edge of the deck. It would soon be all to clear that she had cornered and was quite possibly hurting an innocent bunny when I heard that familiar bunny cry. It had been almost 4 years since I had heard that sound, but I remember it very well. Jon does too I'm sure. I woke him up at 4:00 a.m. asking him to go out and check out this awful sound I kept hearing. It sounded like a baby cry or animal or something, but there was this rattling sound as well. It turned out to be a bunny who had been chased by the dogs and had run through our recently erected fence and gotten his leg caught by one of the links at the bottom of the fence. Of course, Jon would have liked to have taken care of the critter his way, but he knew that if he wanted to get back to sleep any time soon he had better do it my way. So he got his gloves on and while I held the flash light he actually took apart the links at the bottom and freed the poor, tired and injured bunny. The dogs waited patiently (not really) inside the house.
Now here were are again that same sound only this time without the fence rattle. Lucy seemed quite intent on staying right there with her new and unwilling playmate.....as I called her name frantically she wasn't budging. She was not going anywhere, even when I screamed at her.....nothing! I then turned around in the doorway and screamed for Jon, then turned back and screamed at Lucy again. I suppose I could have gone out there, but I was frozen in the doorway. I wanted the critter to be freed from her beagle captor, but I couldn't stand the thought of seeing what she might have done to the poor thing. Jon reached the top of the stairs and quickly came over to where I was standing asking what was wrong. I told him Lucy has a rabbit trapped at the fence again. He looked at me as if I had lost my mind. I told him what I had heard and seen as I kept looking back and forth toward Lucy who was still standing there guarding her prisoner. I said to him; "Well.....the poor things was crying and and Lucy wouldn't let go......and I tried to get her come and....Oh....never mind it just got through the fence and hopped off into the neighbors yard!" He shook his head and said; "I thought someone was dying!" I told him, "I did too!" The look he gave me told me that if I ever did that again, someone would be dying and it wouldn't be the rabbit!!! What can I say?? I know, I know the circle of life, but I don't want my yard or my dogs to be involved in it. They do not need to hunt for food; furthermore they do not need to cheat and use an unsuspecting fence to aid them in said hunt! I do have to say that only the beagle was involved in this incident. Of course, she as also the one who chased the ducks that landed in the yard; they flew off and she never took her eyes off of them while she chased them.....until the ran into the fence that is. Come to think of it, she also got through the fence once herself and gave the neighbor's dog her standard "bite in the butt" greeting.
I'm fairly certain that some of our neighbors think we are strange and they probably feel their suspicions are justified more than ever since now when I open the door to let the dogs out I turn on the light first then I open the door a crack and before turning the dogs loose I yell, "Run bunnies run!"
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Monday, August 24, 2009
If you're trying to drive me insane, don't use mapquest for your directions!
Have you ever had that nagging feeling of dread? I did a couple of days before we left for Madison, IN for a KCBS State BBQ Competition. I have always looked forward to this competition, but for some reason it felt as if there was a cloud of dread over it. I couldn't put my finger on it, but I just felt like I didn't really want to go, and the closer it got the stronger the feeling. Well, judging by the events that unfolded I was justified in feeling the way I did.
We have been to the this competition for four years now. The first year we went to check things out and see how it's done and the last three we have competed. In 2006 we were traveling home and were just outside Carmel when I received a phone call from my son Josh, who was on tour out east with his band. I had spoken with him earlier that day and he was telling me that they were on their way to Virginia and were going through the mountains. I told him they had better be careful to take care of the band van, which was also Tim Burkey's personal vehicle, because it had to last them awhile yet. He told me he was fully aware of that and assured me they were being careful. When the phone call came in as we were traveling I answered with my usual Hello, and then What's up? Then Josh's response; "Oh nothing.....we just watched our van burn to the ground!" Not something a mom wants to hear at any time let alone when she is also traveling, is still about 3 hours from home yet and knows that her son is also traveling and is 14 hours from home. My first response was "oh No!" I was convinced we had to rescue them....my husband thought otherwise and as it turned out someone else was available to do so.
The second year (2007) we went to this competition we had the whole family there as team members. It was great. Well, Jason didn't seem to think so and I don't think it was exciting enough for some of the others either, but I thought it was great as son Josh and his friend Josh Drake did the running for us. They became aquainted with a couple of the golf cart drivers who also helped in bringing the competitors and their entries to turn in their stuff. They have a stiff deadline and if you are too far away from the drop off table you might not make it if you misjudge your time. Josh and Josh had a pretty good time. The others looked like they were too as they began to chat with people who were there to sample the competitor's cuisine. Josh and Lisa's car had been totalled in an accident not too many days before the competition and they were driving a nice rental Pacifica. Josh and Lisa and Josh Drake and Jason rode back in that and left us behind as they wanted to travel a little faster than we were since we had the grills, cooker etc. Crystal and Brandon drove Crystal's car and decided that we were too slow for them also. They drove around us and left us pretty much in their dust. Then came the phone call......From Crystal this time....her car had just stopped running.....they were driving along and it just stopped. The coasted to the side of the road and we stopped when we caught up with them. As it turned out Brandon had AAA and we able to get the car towed to Peru and then Jon and Brandon went to get it the next day. In the meantime we all stopped at the Texas Roadhouse in Kokomo....no one got BBQ. Hopefully they didn't notice that we all smelled like smoke....however, were still wearing our "Port-A-Jon's BBQ" Shirts. I think it was a dead give away that we were a BBQ competition team. It was a rather late night since we lost about 2 hours trying to get the car towed and waiting for the truck to arrive. It turned out that her timing belt had broken and as luck would hav it....bad luck that is....it did some damage to her engine. The head had to be rebuilt. It was an expensive repair.
In 2008 we turned things around a bit, not only did we not have any car issues, we managed to take 2nd place in chicken with around 60 teams competing. We were so excited! But this year.....there was that looming feeling that I just didn't want to go.....but I couldn't back out....I had things in my car that Jon and Larry needed and Chris was making a dessert. We had to go! We got a late start as usual, but it would end up being later than we have ever been before. Chris and I stopped at Sonic between Kokomo and Carmel to eat supper. Upon getting back into the car it began to sprinkle a bit. We commented that it was perfect timing, but we didn't realize just how perfect until moments later as we pulled out onto US 31 the sky opened up and it was pouring down rain. It poured for quite awhile. We drove in and out of rain the entire remainder of the trip. We got onto Interstate 465 where our directions said we would stay on for 41 miles. Our mistake was watching the miles tick away instead of watching the signs. We missed our exit by 21 miles. Once we caught the mistake we were already about half way back around and had no choice but to pick it up on the other side.....(for those of you who are not aware of it I465 goes in a complete circle around Indy). We got back around determined not to miss our exit again....but the rain, confusing signs and a big semi truck managed to prove otherwise. At least this time we noticed it right away and only had to go to the next exit to get off and then back on the right path. During that stint on 465 we did see a police helicopter with a search light shining down on the interstate as they were searching for something or someone. That was a first for us! Now having finally made it onto Interstate 74 the directions said we would be on that 1.6 miles....and to take exit 134.....wrong again. We got on at mile marker 96...so that tells you how far off those directions were. I think someone was having an off day and decided to mess with us when they entered those directions into the database! While on 74 I tapped the brakes in a panic once because the lights from the cars and the rain cast a shadow that looked like a person walking across the road. Great..now I am seeing things. It would have been nice if I had been that observant where our exit off of 465 had been concerned.
We were on I74 for what seemed like an eternity and we still weren't convinced we were on the right road....till we found our exit and the town that was listed on the directions. We still had quite a few miles to go, but now it would all be rural. Goodie! It was getting late and we were getting so tired....and every time the rain would quit Chris would say something like, "well at least its not raining anymore!" and every time it would start to rain again.....so I would reply..."Well...it wasn't!" Larry called Chris somewhere on that road to ask our whereabouts and I head Chris say..."I don't know!" Which was true.....we still weren't convinced this road would even get us there. Then I saw a familar landmark and a sign for a town I recognized and it was evident that we were still indeed on earth! I heard Chris ask if it was raininig in Madison and repeat that it was not....I said..."Well...it will be when we get there!" Since it seemed that it was always raining where ever we were! After she hung up we realized that rain had stopped for a moment yet again....and then just as Chris leaned forward to take a closer look at the windshield to check for signs of rain again.....I saw this little black fir ball waddling across the road.....thinking it would go on across I only slowed down, but then realized that it had now stopped in my lane and right in front of me....so I slammed on the brakes and swerved hoping it wouldn't turn back and run into me or my path.....this happened a lot more quickly than it took to describe and Chris had no clue why I did it...so she thought we were going to crash and closed her eyes. Then after it was over she asked if I had seen another person/shadow....! I then said.."You mean you didn't it?" That was when she told me she was studying the windshield for rain....not trying to find out what the little black shadow was....I laughed and said..."It was a skunk!" Actually she did see it before the whole incident was over, but she hadn't seen it when I hit the brakes. So....we began to laugh about that.! She did say something like "poor thing..it was scared!" Yeah...like neither of us were? She was scared I was about to hit something (which I was) and I was scared it was going to spray us.....our presence in Madison would be well known for sure! It wasn't long after that we arrived in Madison....right around midnight. Then after a brief visit with the guys....and a midnight stroll to check out the competitions rigs....we left for the hotel....only to miss our road and drive who knows how many miles out of the way. Then we ended up having to ask for directions because the road we were looking for didn't seem to be there....that was because on the way back through the sign was missing. I am sure that was done just for us!
We managed to get to the hotel and finally get some sleep. Then the next morning....my car began to give us problems. The transmission was no longer healthy.....so I had to baby it the rest of the week end.....if only the issues had stopped there, but it was not so! The competition didn't go well.....we didn't even place in anything....after placing second in chicken the year before, we got nothing. Then the fella next to us was a friend of ours and had borrowed our tent canopies......unforunately, his water pan fell into his hot charcoal and caused a bit of an explosion of hot steam, smoke and ash....it looked like a volcano had erupted. Brownish gray smoke and ash went all over him (he got a steam burn), the underside of our tents, all over the cook site....ours included.....I did mange to save Chris' dessert by quickly tucking it under the table which ws covered by plastic. To say the least there was a nice mess. Ash all over everything....!
After the competition was over we all headed back to the hotel....We had to check in again because we had reserved two rooms for the second night since the guys would be joining us....that's when things went south again. They had gotten the reservations wrong...and gave us smoking rooms instead of non smoking ones....I realize that we smelled like BBQ smoke.....but that's no reason to give us a smoking room! At any rate.....there was nothing else to be had...so we went and checked one of the rooms out. It met with our approval so Chris and Larry took that one and we took the other one.....which turned out to be less than adequate....! It reaked of cigarette smoke and was stuffy too....! The air was on and I was rather cold so I immediately turned on the heat...On high! Not a good thing to do! The dust in the unit began to burn off and it smelled terrible.....the smoke alarm thought so too and went off. I hurried and turned the temperature to cool and that shut off the heat and then ran over and fanned the alarm with my pillow...that shut it down as well. I am not sure what Jon was doing during all of this! Probably watching and shaking his head. It must have been quite a sight....Oh wait, I think that was when he was trying to turn on more lights realizing that we had some burned out bulbs! It was quite a scene none the less. I then decided to go to the front desk and inquire as to whether there was a double non smoking room since our room was really and truly a smoking room now! She said she had nothing non smoking.....great....but I did get a can of odor remover which she told me to keep. I didn't take it literally and left the can for housekeeping....which I think did most of the smoking in the rooms...judging by the way they were puffing away outside the hotel in the morning. When I got back Jon had turned the heat on low and the smoke alarm was not sounding so things were relatively calm! Dan and Deb's room was no different....they had a double...and it had one bed not cleaned...the power button for the tv was missing and so was the remote...(they probably skipped town with another guest)....and they had a light bulb burned out as well.
We went down to the lobby to find out if there was something to do in this little town, but every time my brother-in-law, Denny called a place listed on the internet their phones were either no longer in service or they just didn't answer. Great...nothing to do! We did get some directions for a place in town that supposedly did Karaoke, but it was the gal at the front desk who gave them and she wasn't even sure what color the big blue bridge in town was....(it was blue but it was so long since she had been over it she said they could have painted it by now) and we were going to trust her directions.....??? Well....as you might have guessed...they were wrong..but we had enough sense not to trust them and turned earlier anyway....only to have to stop and ask a couple teenagers how to get there and they informed us that the place was closed down too! We ended up driving back into Madison and looking for a place to eat and something to do there in the newer section of town.....we ended up at Bob Evans!!! Well....it was the only place we all agreed on and it was open!! We left there and went back to the hotel....and to bed! The next morning we got up and headed for Clifty Falls State Park to have a breakfast buffet at the Inn. It was delicious! My car didn't like the hills though and was getting worse. I tried not to notice in hopes that denial might actually work in this case; it didn't. We babied it all the way home and I took it in to have it serviced today....only to find out that the transmission needs to be rebuilt! We are three out of four on cars...even though Tim's van wasn't on our trip...it happpened during our trip to Madison! Coincidence or omen?! I think next year I will rent a vehicle....it may cost a few bucks to do that....but a $2200.00 repair may be avoided!!
We have been to the this competition for four years now. The first year we went to check things out and see how it's done and the last three we have competed. In 2006 we were traveling home and were just outside Carmel when I received a phone call from my son Josh, who was on tour out east with his band. I had spoken with him earlier that day and he was telling me that they were on their way to Virginia and were going through the mountains. I told him they had better be careful to take care of the band van, which was also Tim Burkey's personal vehicle, because it had to last them awhile yet. He told me he was fully aware of that and assured me they were being careful. When the phone call came in as we were traveling I answered with my usual Hello, and then What's up? Then Josh's response; "Oh nothing.....we just watched our van burn to the ground!" Not something a mom wants to hear at any time let alone when she is also traveling, is still about 3 hours from home yet and knows that her son is also traveling and is 14 hours from home. My first response was "oh No!" I was convinced we had to rescue them....my husband thought otherwise and as it turned out someone else was available to do so.
The second year (2007) we went to this competition we had the whole family there as team members. It was great. Well, Jason didn't seem to think so and I don't think it was exciting enough for some of the others either, but I thought it was great as son Josh and his friend Josh Drake did the running for us. They became aquainted with a couple of the golf cart drivers who also helped in bringing the competitors and their entries to turn in their stuff. They have a stiff deadline and if you are too far away from the drop off table you might not make it if you misjudge your time. Josh and Josh had a pretty good time. The others looked like they were too as they began to chat with people who were there to sample the competitor's cuisine. Josh and Lisa's car had been totalled in an accident not too many days before the competition and they were driving a nice rental Pacifica. Josh and Lisa and Josh Drake and Jason rode back in that and left us behind as they wanted to travel a little faster than we were since we had the grills, cooker etc. Crystal and Brandon drove Crystal's car and decided that we were too slow for them also. They drove around us and left us pretty much in their dust. Then came the phone call......From Crystal this time....her car had just stopped running.....they were driving along and it just stopped. The coasted to the side of the road and we stopped when we caught up with them. As it turned out Brandon had AAA and we able to get the car towed to Peru and then Jon and Brandon went to get it the next day. In the meantime we all stopped at the Texas Roadhouse in Kokomo....no one got BBQ. Hopefully they didn't notice that we all smelled like smoke....however, were still wearing our "Port-A-Jon's BBQ" Shirts. I think it was a dead give away that we were a BBQ competition team. It was a rather late night since we lost about 2 hours trying to get the car towed and waiting for the truck to arrive. It turned out that her timing belt had broken and as luck would hav it....bad luck that is....it did some damage to her engine. The head had to be rebuilt. It was an expensive repair.
In 2008 we turned things around a bit, not only did we not have any car issues, we managed to take 2nd place in chicken with around 60 teams competing. We were so excited! But this year.....there was that looming feeling that I just didn't want to go.....but I couldn't back out....I had things in my car that Jon and Larry needed and Chris was making a dessert. We had to go! We got a late start as usual, but it would end up being later than we have ever been before. Chris and I stopped at Sonic between Kokomo and Carmel to eat supper. Upon getting back into the car it began to sprinkle a bit. We commented that it was perfect timing, but we didn't realize just how perfect until moments later as we pulled out onto US 31 the sky opened up and it was pouring down rain. It poured for quite awhile. We drove in and out of rain the entire remainder of the trip. We got onto Interstate 465 where our directions said we would stay on for 41 miles. Our mistake was watching the miles tick away instead of watching the signs. We missed our exit by 21 miles. Once we caught the mistake we were already about half way back around and had no choice but to pick it up on the other side.....(for those of you who are not aware of it I465 goes in a complete circle around Indy). We got back around determined not to miss our exit again....but the rain, confusing signs and a big semi truck managed to prove otherwise. At least this time we noticed it right away and only had to go to the next exit to get off and then back on the right path. During that stint on 465 we did see a police helicopter with a search light shining down on the interstate as they were searching for something or someone. That was a first for us! Now having finally made it onto Interstate 74 the directions said we would be on that 1.6 miles....and to take exit 134.....wrong again. We got on at mile marker 96...so that tells you how far off those directions were. I think someone was having an off day and decided to mess with us when they entered those directions into the database! While on 74 I tapped the brakes in a panic once because the lights from the cars and the rain cast a shadow that looked like a person walking across the road. Great..now I am seeing things. It would have been nice if I had been that observant where our exit off of 465 had been concerned.
We were on I74 for what seemed like an eternity and we still weren't convinced we were on the right road....till we found our exit and the town that was listed on the directions. We still had quite a few miles to go, but now it would all be rural. Goodie! It was getting late and we were getting so tired....and every time the rain would quit Chris would say something like, "well at least its not raining anymore!" and every time it would start to rain again.....so I would reply..."Well...it wasn't!" Larry called Chris somewhere on that road to ask our whereabouts and I head Chris say..."I don't know!" Which was true.....we still weren't convinced this road would even get us there. Then I saw a familar landmark and a sign for a town I recognized and it was evident that we were still indeed on earth! I heard Chris ask if it was raininig in Madison and repeat that it was not....I said..."Well...it will be when we get there!" Since it seemed that it was always raining where ever we were! After she hung up we realized that rain had stopped for a moment yet again....and then just as Chris leaned forward to take a closer look at the windshield to check for signs of rain again.....I saw this little black fir ball waddling across the road.....thinking it would go on across I only slowed down, but then realized that it had now stopped in my lane and right in front of me....so I slammed on the brakes and swerved hoping it wouldn't turn back and run into me or my path.....this happened a lot more quickly than it took to describe and Chris had no clue why I did it...so she thought we were going to crash and closed her eyes. Then after it was over she asked if I had seen another person/shadow....! I then said.."You mean you didn't it?" That was when she told me she was studying the windshield for rain....not trying to find out what the little black shadow was....I laughed and said..."It was a skunk!" Actually she did see it before the whole incident was over, but she hadn't seen it when I hit the brakes. So....we began to laugh about that.! She did say something like "poor thing..it was scared!" Yeah...like neither of us were? She was scared I was about to hit something (which I was) and I was scared it was going to spray us.....our presence in Madison would be well known for sure! It wasn't long after that we arrived in Madison....right around midnight. Then after a brief visit with the guys....and a midnight stroll to check out the competitions rigs....we left for the hotel....only to miss our road and drive who knows how many miles out of the way. Then we ended up having to ask for directions because the road we were looking for didn't seem to be there....that was because on the way back through the sign was missing. I am sure that was done just for us!
We managed to get to the hotel and finally get some sleep. Then the next morning....my car began to give us problems. The transmission was no longer healthy.....so I had to baby it the rest of the week end.....if only the issues had stopped there, but it was not so! The competition didn't go well.....we didn't even place in anything....after placing second in chicken the year before, we got nothing. Then the fella next to us was a friend of ours and had borrowed our tent canopies......unforunately, his water pan fell into his hot charcoal and caused a bit of an explosion of hot steam, smoke and ash....it looked like a volcano had erupted. Brownish gray smoke and ash went all over him (he got a steam burn), the underside of our tents, all over the cook site....ours included.....I did mange to save Chris' dessert by quickly tucking it under the table which ws covered by plastic. To say the least there was a nice mess. Ash all over everything....!
After the competition was over we all headed back to the hotel....We had to check in again because we had reserved two rooms for the second night since the guys would be joining us....that's when things went south again. They had gotten the reservations wrong...and gave us smoking rooms instead of non smoking ones....I realize that we smelled like BBQ smoke.....but that's no reason to give us a smoking room! At any rate.....there was nothing else to be had...so we went and checked one of the rooms out. It met with our approval so Chris and Larry took that one and we took the other one.....which turned out to be less than adequate....! It reaked of cigarette smoke and was stuffy too....! The air was on and I was rather cold so I immediately turned on the heat...On high! Not a good thing to do! The dust in the unit began to burn off and it smelled terrible.....the smoke alarm thought so too and went off. I hurried and turned the temperature to cool and that shut off the heat and then ran over and fanned the alarm with my pillow...that shut it down as well. I am not sure what Jon was doing during all of this! Probably watching and shaking his head. It must have been quite a sight....Oh wait, I think that was when he was trying to turn on more lights realizing that we had some burned out bulbs! It was quite a scene none the less. I then decided to go to the front desk and inquire as to whether there was a double non smoking room since our room was really and truly a smoking room now! She said she had nothing non smoking.....great....but I did get a can of odor remover which she told me to keep. I didn't take it literally and left the can for housekeeping....which I think did most of the smoking in the rooms...judging by the way they were puffing away outside the hotel in the morning. When I got back Jon had turned the heat on low and the smoke alarm was not sounding so things were relatively calm! Dan and Deb's room was no different....they had a double...and it had one bed not cleaned...the power button for the tv was missing and so was the remote...(they probably skipped town with another guest)....and they had a light bulb burned out as well.
We went down to the lobby to find out if there was something to do in this little town, but every time my brother-in-law, Denny called a place listed on the internet their phones were either no longer in service or they just didn't answer. Great...nothing to do! We did get some directions for a place in town that supposedly did Karaoke, but it was the gal at the front desk who gave them and she wasn't even sure what color the big blue bridge in town was....(it was blue but it was so long since she had been over it she said they could have painted it by now) and we were going to trust her directions.....??? Well....as you might have guessed...they were wrong..but we had enough sense not to trust them and turned earlier anyway....only to have to stop and ask a couple teenagers how to get there and they informed us that the place was closed down too! We ended up driving back into Madison and looking for a place to eat and something to do there in the newer section of town.....we ended up at Bob Evans!!! Well....it was the only place we all agreed on and it was open!! We left there and went back to the hotel....and to bed! The next morning we got up and headed for Clifty Falls State Park to have a breakfast buffet at the Inn. It was delicious! My car didn't like the hills though and was getting worse. I tried not to notice in hopes that denial might actually work in this case; it didn't. We babied it all the way home and I took it in to have it serviced today....only to find out that the transmission needs to be rebuilt! We are three out of four on cars...even though Tim's van wasn't on our trip...it happpened during our trip to Madison! Coincidence or omen?! I think next year I will rent a vehicle....it may cost a few bucks to do that....but a $2200.00 repair may be avoided!!
Friday, July 17, 2009
Should you get married or should you knot!?
So.....I was at the tanning salon the other day and they were playing a radio station on XM radio. Besides the content of the songs, what I could actually figure out between all the profane words being bleeped out, there are the DJ's that get into these controversial discussions. I am sure it's to get listeners to interact with them, and most of the time I just shake my head and ask why..but this particular discussion even made me want to call in and set them straight. The subject was should you get married or not? It all started with a comment by Hulk Hogan made to his daughter Brooke about how she should never get married. He told her it just messes things up. She told him she wanted to get married some day and his response was..."Please don't!" The only married DJ agreed with him that it does mess things up. However, it wasn't things in general he was talking about.....it was actually sex. In his statement of this he had decided that ALL marriages come to a point where the wife begins to ration out sex. This is a man who is not a Christian....at least I heard no evidence of that....and while he said that other things were great, he basically stated that sex was the most important part of marriage and everything else was not worth spending the rest of your life with one person if that wasn't good as well. At this point I am now thinking that it's good I can't call in, because I would have blasted the guy first by telling him he is shallow and selfish.....and that his motives for getting married in the first place were lacking and misguided. Then as I listened to callers backing up his opinion, I was getting even more aggravated. A bright moment was when this gal called in. She sort of backed him up except that she went the other direction....She said yes, marriage changes things...and that her husband had also changed...he no longer bends over backward to please her, he doesn't do the romantic things he did when they were dating and first married....but she learned to accept it as part of life and let it go. She decided that even though he didn't do some of those things, she still loved him and it wasn't as important to have a hopeless romantic catering to her every whim as it was to have a life partner to share things with and grow old with and just plain grow with.
I still had my opinions of course....because now the DJ also stated that women tend to let themselves go....he may have indicated that men do the same, but given that I have already pegged him as selfish and shallow I now wondered why he would even care that they let themselves go if he wasn't getting the amount of intimacy he wanted anyway? Perhaps he had made derogatory comments about his wife's weight and suddenly sex is diminished!! Then I thought had he ever stopped to think of why the sex was 'rationed' out. Maybe he changed too. If he is making these statements on the broadcast, maybe he was indeed the shallow selfish and now insensitive person I had him pegged to be. Obviously, everything in his life revolved around his needs or desires....and it didn't seem to matter to him if people who knew him and his wife heard it. How would his wife take this topic of conversation that she seemed to be involved in by proxy? Well....in his words he stated that he may be headed for divorce court. My question.....would that be before or after this conversation on the airwaves? I find it hard to believe that such a person who found it easy to sum up the value of his marriage as now worthless due to a lack of sexual intimacy based on his own desires and apparently quotas, would be gentle and sensitive at home. He obviously didn't care about her needs or desires. If he were caring for her the way he should be, then maybe sexual intimacy wouldn't be so elusive for him! If he didn't place that in such high value and demand maybe he would be satisfied with what he had!!!
Obviously this guy married for the wrong reason. There is a difference between sex and love. I once read that marriage isn't just finding the right person, it's being the right person. Something this guy and many others (women included) need to understand and strive for. Someone else once said, "you don't have to taste hamburger to know you have steak!" If more people would stop building up unrealistic expectations based on their own needs and desires and strive to meet those of their mate, there would be less divorces and less unhappily married people. It's hard to be selfish when you place your mate higher than yourself!! I am not saying that things won't change. I'm just saying that changes come about for a reason.....it's called life and if anyone expects marriage to be one long orgy then he had better re-examine his reasons for getting married in the first place....because he is obviously not thinking with his heart!!
I still had my opinions of course....because now the DJ also stated that women tend to let themselves go....he may have indicated that men do the same, but given that I have already pegged him as selfish and shallow I now wondered why he would even care that they let themselves go if he wasn't getting the amount of intimacy he wanted anyway? Perhaps he had made derogatory comments about his wife's weight and suddenly sex is diminished!! Then I thought had he ever stopped to think of why the sex was 'rationed' out. Maybe he changed too. If he is making these statements on the broadcast, maybe he was indeed the shallow selfish and now insensitive person I had him pegged to be. Obviously, everything in his life revolved around his needs or desires....and it didn't seem to matter to him if people who knew him and his wife heard it. How would his wife take this topic of conversation that she seemed to be involved in by proxy? Well....in his words he stated that he may be headed for divorce court. My question.....would that be before or after this conversation on the airwaves? I find it hard to believe that such a person who found it easy to sum up the value of his marriage as now worthless due to a lack of sexual intimacy based on his own desires and apparently quotas, would be gentle and sensitive at home. He obviously didn't care about her needs or desires. If he were caring for her the way he should be, then maybe sexual intimacy wouldn't be so elusive for him! If he didn't place that in such high value and demand maybe he would be satisfied with what he had!!!
Obviously this guy married for the wrong reason. There is a difference between sex and love. I once read that marriage isn't just finding the right person, it's being the right person. Something this guy and many others (women included) need to understand and strive for. Someone else once said, "you don't have to taste hamburger to know you have steak!" If more people would stop building up unrealistic expectations based on their own needs and desires and strive to meet those of their mate, there would be less divorces and less unhappily married people. It's hard to be selfish when you place your mate higher than yourself!! I am not saying that things won't change. I'm just saying that changes come about for a reason.....it's called life and if anyone expects marriage to be one long orgy then he had better re-examine his reasons for getting married in the first place....because he is obviously not thinking with his heart!!
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
So......I finally got all of my flowers planted...well almost. I still have one Hydrangea that needs a spot...but I have to decide where and also wait till I am sure all the weed killer Jon put on the yard has dissipated. I don't have a green thumb, I do not need any help in killing plants real or fake!! Anyway, I got the ones in the front planted Sunday evening and asked Jon to dig a hole for the Hydrangea that I wanted in front of the porch. I showed him where I wanted it and he asked why I couldn't just dig a hole with my little hand spade. I was quick to point out that the ground is rather hard and there are still plenty of roots running through it as well. So he got out the shovel and began to dig. It became obvious rather quickly that I was indeed right about the hardness of the ground when I looked over to see him chipping away at a root. He was chopping pretty hard and mumbling something about it being a rather stubborn root...and then he stopped....looked down and then said...."Oh, it wasn't a root!" He had just broken the pvc conduit that contained the wire from the yard light. He not only broke it...like chipped it....he BROKE it...as in pieces and no longer existing! The wire inside had slits in spots, but we decided to see if the light would still work. Unfortunately, he didn't tell me that until after I had already planted the Hydrangea.
Well...the light does work, at least for the moment. One can only hope it continues. I really do not want to dig a trench in the front yard to replace the pipe. Perhaps if we do end up having to replace it, I should just use my little hand spade. Who knows what he will demolish next!
Well...the light does work, at least for the moment. One can only hope it continues. I really do not want to dig a trench in the front yard to replace the pipe. Perhaps if we do end up having to replace it, I should just use my little hand spade. Who knows what he will demolish next!
Monday, June 1, 2009
Salvation Opinions or just plain ramblings
On several recent, but separate occasions I have found myself in conversation concerning salvation. During one such conversation it was determined by one person that the Missionary Church believes that one can lose his/her salvation. The Baptists of course, believe that once saved always saved, but the missionary church takes a different opinion on that, stating that you can’t just ask Jesus to save you and that be it. I know the Bible says “Faith without works is dead” and in another place it speaks of a church that was “spit out” because it was “luke warm.” Yet, it also says that Jesus said, “No one comes to the Father except through Me” as well as in John 3:16……”Whosoever believes in me shall have ever lasting life.” One particular faith believes you must work out your salvation, which clearly isn’t true, because there is nothing a person can do that can get him into heaven if he hasn’t first received the gift of eternal life through the One who died for him by believing that He, Jesus is truly the Son of God.
The subject of Salvation is one that has been debated or maybe just misunderstood for well, probably since Jesus died on the cross. The average American can probably tell you that Jesus died on the cross, but many; maybe most of them probably can’t tell you why. If you were to ask the person on the street if they were going to heaven when they died, their answer would most likely be “I hope so!” followed by, “I think I’m a good person.” Most feel like they have been ‘good enough’ to get into heaven, yet most don’t really understand that they could never be good enough on their own. They could spend their entire lives giving to the poor, working with unprivileged people, donating to charities that support research to cure some horrible disease or maybe even doing the research personally, foster parenting, even adopting children yet none of these ‘good deeds’ would get them into heaven if they don’t know Jesus as their personal savior. The bottom line is that no one can be good enough to get into heaven on their own because no one is perfect. There is only one perfect lamb and that was Jesus Christ. Hollywood would have you believe that Jesus stumbled and became a little too much a normal man, but the truth is Jesus is God’s Son. God sent Him to be the light of the world; to show the world the way to heaven by allowing that awful sinful world to put Him to death, a brutal death on a cross for having done nothing; absolutely nothing wrong. Well..nothing except make the authorities of the day nervous that they would not be in control if the opinions of Jesus were to be followed instead of their own. They acted out of their own fear and condemned an innocent man to death because of their own greed and their own opinions on how one should follow God. Jesus didn’t agree with them and in order to keep Him from gaining more support for His teachings, they crucified Him in public on a cross. They used fear to keep the crowd at bay, to keep them from even acknowledging that they even knew Jesus, let alone believe His teachings.
Having said all of that I would not want to give anyone the impression that I don’t think one should be involved in furthering the Kingdom of God. I don’t for one second believe that once a person accepts Jesus Christ as their personal Savior they can just sit around and be complacent till the day they die, however, I do not believe that God calls everyone into service immediately. In many cases there has to be healing in one’s life. If a person has been through something horrendous and finds Jesus though the process, he isn’t necessarily going to jump right in and start working in the church or volunteering in any given area if/when there is healing that needs to take place. We always speak of God’s timing, yet the first thing we do when someone gets saved is expect them to be a completely different person. Many people, yes Christians, think that if a person is saved then they ought to show it ‘immediately!’ Really? So if person is ill and they happen to find Jesus during an illness we should expect them get up, be healed and start working in some area of the church? And what if God hasn’t called that person to work in a certain area, do you really want them to be there? If a person is trying to work out their salvation by volunteering in the church, is that acceptable as long as the job gets done? I know there are many people who do work in the church who are not true Christians and they do a wonderful job, it is probably their calling so to speak, but shouldn’t our first priority here be to get this person saved and not be content with just having a good person to do a good job? Shouldn’t we be concerned more with “Where God wants them” instead of where we want them? Shouldn’t we be concerned more with their spiritual needs instead of our positional needs? We may not know there are people in those positions who aren’t saved because they are so good at what they do, many have grown up in the church and have simply taken on the positions that were expected of them as one who was raised in the church. You might not see a major life adjustment when those people get saved because they have always lived the life of the Christian without ever having officially been saved! All I am saying is give a person a chance when they get saved. Don’t expect this major life change depending on where they are or what they need to give up. God will use them as He sees fit and that will benefit them and those in their lives much more and in a much bigger way than we could ever expect. I once read a church sign that read something like; “Be fishers of men, you catch them, God will clean them!” Isn’t that the way it should be? Our job is to present the message of salvation to them, not to stand in judgment of them and certainly not to expect them to be everything we think they ought to be once they do get saved! That’s God’s job and personally I think he’s much better equipped for it than anyone else I know!
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Ah...last full week of school. I am not sure if I am glad that school is going to be out.....as much as I am just ready for a break from the same old, same old. At any rate, I know that just about everyone in our building is ready to be done with this year. There have been many challenges this year, not that other years don't present us with challenges, it just seems that this year has been more challenging than others.
I have been working at the school for 13 years and one thing I have concluded is that there is no normal. Normal is anything can happen and just when you think you have everything under control chaos has a way of sneaking up on you and knocking you down. Once you have lost control.....you can't regain it, at least not completely. You have to expect the unexpected at any time. Anyone who works with kids knows that. However, having said all of that I do feel that kids and parents have changed over the years and not always for the better. I don't know when it happened, but somewhere along the course of time, it became the school's responsibility to raise the recent generation of children. Unfortunately, what they learn in school doesn't always stay "learned" after they get home. Many of today's children are rude and disrespectful. They have no respect for authority. To them adults are just obstacles preventing them from doing want they want to do. Often times it ends up that our presence and rules only challenges them to be a little more subtle in their behavior in order to obtain their goal. I am not blaming the children entirely for this.....their parents are enablers and actually encourage their behavior. Oh they may not intend to be, but they are.
When I was a child/teen if I got into trouble and ended up grounded, I was grounded for the duration. There was no trade offs because there was some event I wanted to attend. That's the whole point of being grounded. Once you trade off the time the punishment is over! Children do not learn that their behavior comes with consequences because there aren't any if the punishment is lifted to accommodate their busy social calendar. They need to learn that they are indeed in control of their own lives....and it's the choices they make that will enable to succeed or cause them to fail. It's no ones fault but their own. Mom and Dad are not the bad guy if the child makes a bad choice and ends up being punished for it. School...even lunch...is all about making choices. Once you make a choice that is it. You live with the choices you made...like it or not! We joke around about when we were kids how lunch had two choices...Take it OR Leave it! The same could be said about any choice a child is about to make that he knows may not end with a postive result. He can choose to "take it or leave it." Once the choice is made he lives with the results....good or bad.
Imagine the child's reaction when upon becoming an adult, he makes the choice to speed and gets a ticket for it or makes a disrepectful comment to a police officer. If they never learn to respect authority and the rules they may end up with more than a week or two of grounding that never stuck in the first place. The excuse "because I wanted to" won't sit too well in court when asked why he/she committed the infraction. They might get off with a slap on the wrist, but it will cost them in attorney fees...there will be some form of payment either with their time or their money for going against the rules and authority.
I would urge all parents to teach their children well. The school can teach them history and math, but it's the parents that should teach them about life and the respect for others and the best way to do this is to teach by example. Parents...if you don't live it.....don't expect your children to either. I won't say that parents who do everything right won't have children who still choose to go the wrong way, that obviously happens. However it is usually the parent who has consistently made excuses for their child or fought against the people who were trying to make a positive difference in their child's life who end up asking why their child would do something that comes with serious repercussions....just take a look in the mirror at your child's real teacher, the biggest example is staring right back at you!
I have been working at the school for 13 years and one thing I have concluded is that there is no normal. Normal is anything can happen and just when you think you have everything under control chaos has a way of sneaking up on you and knocking you down. Once you have lost control.....you can't regain it, at least not completely. You have to expect the unexpected at any time. Anyone who works with kids knows that. However, having said all of that I do feel that kids and parents have changed over the years and not always for the better. I don't know when it happened, but somewhere along the course of time, it became the school's responsibility to raise the recent generation of children. Unfortunately, what they learn in school doesn't always stay "learned" after they get home. Many of today's children are rude and disrespectful. They have no respect for authority. To them adults are just obstacles preventing them from doing want they want to do. Often times it ends up that our presence and rules only challenges them to be a little more subtle in their behavior in order to obtain their goal. I am not blaming the children entirely for this.....their parents are enablers and actually encourage their behavior. Oh they may not intend to be, but they are.
When I was a child/teen if I got into trouble and ended up grounded, I was grounded for the duration. There was no trade offs because there was some event I wanted to attend. That's the whole point of being grounded. Once you trade off the time the punishment is over! Children do not learn that their behavior comes with consequences because there aren't any if the punishment is lifted to accommodate their busy social calendar. They need to learn that they are indeed in control of their own lives....and it's the choices they make that will enable to succeed or cause them to fail. It's no ones fault but their own. Mom and Dad are not the bad guy if the child makes a bad choice and ends up being punished for it. School...even lunch...is all about making choices. Once you make a choice that is it. You live with the choices you made...like it or not! We joke around about when we were kids how lunch had two choices...Take it OR Leave it! The same could be said about any choice a child is about to make that he knows may not end with a postive result. He can choose to "take it or leave it." Once the choice is made he lives with the results....good or bad.
Imagine the child's reaction when upon becoming an adult, he makes the choice to speed and gets a ticket for it or makes a disrepectful comment to a police officer. If they never learn to respect authority and the rules they may end up with more than a week or two of grounding that never stuck in the first place. The excuse "because I wanted to" won't sit too well in court when asked why he/she committed the infraction. They might get off with a slap on the wrist, but it will cost them in attorney fees...there will be some form of payment either with their time or their money for going against the rules and authority.
I would urge all parents to teach their children well. The school can teach them history and math, but it's the parents that should teach them about life and the respect for others and the best way to do this is to teach by example. Parents...if you don't live it.....don't expect your children to either. I won't say that parents who do everything right won't have children who still choose to go the wrong way, that obviously happens. However it is usually the parent who has consistently made excuses for their child or fought against the people who were trying to make a positive difference in their child's life who end up asking why their child would do something that comes with serious repercussions....just take a look in the mirror at your child's real teacher, the biggest example is staring right back at you!
Monday, April 27, 2009
So.....after reading Crystal's blog about her not so monumental achievement at softball practice, it reminded me of the reason I don't play softball. I use to keep score for the GMC softball team back in the day.....I won't say which day or year, but it was mostly before kids! I was pretty good at score keeping, even kept the official score on occasion as well as our own book, and carry on a conversation with all the other spectators on our side and never miss a play. That was my contribution to softball. I would never have dreamed of playing, nor did I have any desire to. Softball was for those who could actually play. I do not have much depth perception so I can't tell when the ball is close enough to hit with a bat and when it's close enough to hit me! I can't field a ball at all....again..that depth perception thing...or it could be that when I was in 5th grade I was hit with a line drive right in the middle of the forehead. It wasn't the type that would knock me out, after all we were only in 5th grade, but it didn't exactly tickle. I have had a fear of baseballs/softballs ever since. I tried once to practice with Jon and kids when they were playing little league and I really thought I had the licked until I ran to catch the ball, got it in my sights...waited till was on its way down and then fear kicked and I ran the opposite direction. That probably explains why Crystal decided that running away from first base when they threw the ball in that direction was a good idea. It may not do much for the team, but it's certainly safer...unless the team decides to lynch you...then you have a whole other problem.
No..I know my limitations....and I certainly know that when it comes to sports my only atheletic prowess is in the game of volleyball. I will run toward the ball, make contact and even take one in the face (mostly accidents because I thought it was farther up than it was), and still come back for more!
The only times I have ever had to play for the church team was when they were short on players and very desperate...and I do mean desperate..we are talking, either I play or they forfiet. I was made (oddly enough) Catcher every time and told when it comes to batting to just stand there and let them pitch to me. I tried to swing once and missed so they told me again to just stand there and let them pitch to me....I guess they really meant just stand there!!
I will stick to being a spectator and score keeping when needed and let Crystal do the actual playing of the sport, becuase it is blatently obvious that I am only an asset to the opposing team!
No..I know my limitations....and I certainly know that when it comes to sports my only atheletic prowess is in the game of volleyball. I will run toward the ball, make contact and even take one in the face (mostly accidents because I thought it was farther up than it was), and still come back for more!
The only times I have ever had to play for the church team was when they were short on players and very desperate...and I do mean desperate..we are talking, either I play or they forfiet. I was made (oddly enough) Catcher every time and told when it comes to batting to just stand there and let them pitch to me. I tried to swing once and missed so they told me again to just stand there and let them pitch to me....I guess they really meant just stand there!!
I will stick to being a spectator and score keeping when needed and let Crystal do the actual playing of the sport, becuase it is blatently obvious that I am only an asset to the opposing team!
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Dream the Imppossumble Dream!
Anyone who knows me knows I like to do a little writing on occasion. The trouble is I don't not know how to write fiction so everything I write has to be in first person; good for me, not so good for my family. I stumbled upon this hidden interest while I was doing the editing for the church newsletter. I needed a filler for a page and it was close to our 25th wedding anniversary and I decided to write about our wedding....the misadventures of our wedding. As I was writing the story I realized that our life together has never been dull and it all began while we were dating.
While I published the story of our wedding in the church newsletter I started it out with a paragraph from how it started which I never got around to publishing. So, I will tell that story here and now!
What do you do with a guy who terrorizes you with a bag of newspapers claiming it to be the carcass of a dead Oppossum? What else....you marry him. This horrifying incident took place one night when several of the youth group members were over at Jon's parents house decorating their barn for a Halloween party. While doing so they disrupted an animal which turned out to be an oppossum. After getting rid of the animal...(I won't say how) they began to throw a bag of rolled up newspapers around and it would make a thud noise on whatever they banged it against. The lead us to believe it was the animal inside. After discovering how exciting it was to terrorize 4 girls with this bag of harmless newspapers (which hardly ended up being harmless), they sent us running to my car to seek refuge from them. While enduring this so called form of entertainment for them, the time came for me to be home. Since it was my car we had to get the 2 girls in the back seat out, it was a two door car so that meant we had to open the door and risk being attacked by the animal in the bag! I was in the passenger seat, which meant I had to change places with the gal in the driver seat. It was decided that I would climb over her and she would slide over. After she was in place she opened the door at the first sign of a safe opportunity and the other 2 girls jumped out and ran to the house. As we were leaving I checked to make sure I had everything. My purse was there right beside me and everything was fine....until about a 1/2 mile from my home the police pulled me over. I wasn't speeding, I knew that, but I panicked none the less. I pulled over and the officar approached the car and promptly asked for my license. This would be a good place to mention that I had just gotten my license that afternoon not even 8 hours earlier. I reached for my purse ony to discover that it wasn't mine, but my passenger's instead. You see cordouroy and suade feel the same in the dark. I began to frantically look for my purse. I had turned on the lights inside the car and was now hanging over the back seat looking for it on the floor back there, hoping it had gotten shoved to the back somehow throughout the confusion with the so called dead animal in the bag, but it hadn't! I was sure I was going to lose my license, my newly obtained license that I had waited 16 years to get and probably would never see again license! I was a mess by then. When the officer asked me where I had been, I told him at a friends house decorating their barn for a Halloween party. He then asked where they lived and I said, "oh just down the road a bit." Which was true, but it was closer to 5 miles down the road. Seeing how frantic I was the officer and his partner suggested I go home and call them or go back and look for it. I was in no shape to drive the 1/2 mile to my home, let alone 5 miles back to their house and another 5 miles back home, plus..I would be past my curfew if I had gone back. I told them I was closer to home so I would go there and call. Now one thing you have to know about this is that this was 1975 in Edwardsburg, Micigan. No one just goes home without having endured at least a hard time by the police back then. But they did....they didn't even follow me. Oh...but they did reveal the reason they had pulled me over.....the light on the license plate wasn't working! I had just been terrorized by a dead animal in a bag by a 17 year old and his brothers and he was worried about my license plate light???? Argh! Anyway, I made it home, God only knows how with all the hysterics I now had going on and tears and all the trama of the whole evening. The first thing my parents said when I got home??? "Is the car alright?" I managed to calm down enough to tell them that the car was fine...I on the other hand had been tramatized way too much for one day. I told them the story and that trigger my dad's memory and he immediately wen to the kitchen table where he had put all the papers from the BMV that afternoon. Amongst those papers was the registration for the car. Yep, I not only did not have my own license, I didn't have the registration for the car either! Angels watching over me??? You bet! Still being a little upset, my mom phoned over to Jon's house to inquire as to whether my purse was there. It was; in the driveway where it fell out when the door was opened to allow the other 2 victims, I mean girls to escape. When I climbed over the other gal into the driver seat, she slide over and unknowingly pushed my purse in between the door and the seat, allowing it to fall out when the door was opened. We made a trip over there to pick it up and I vowed I would get even with Jon some how; some way....so on November 26, 1977 I married him! 31+ years and 3 kids later we are still together. It has not been dull, believe me, and I have many stories to write to prove that. Our wedding alone was not to be incident free.....ice storms, squirrels and me hitting a tree the day before are just a few of the things that happened, but that will be for another time!
While I published the story of our wedding in the church newsletter I started it out with a paragraph from how it started which I never got around to publishing. So, I will tell that story here and now!
What do you do with a guy who terrorizes you with a bag of newspapers claiming it to be the carcass of a dead Oppossum? What else....you marry him. This horrifying incident took place one night when several of the youth group members were over at Jon's parents house decorating their barn for a Halloween party. While doing so they disrupted an animal which turned out to be an oppossum. After getting rid of the animal...(I won't say how) they began to throw a bag of rolled up newspapers around and it would make a thud noise on whatever they banged it against. The lead us to believe it was the animal inside. After discovering how exciting it was to terrorize 4 girls with this bag of harmless newspapers (which hardly ended up being harmless), they sent us running to my car to seek refuge from them. While enduring this so called form of entertainment for them, the time came for me to be home. Since it was my car we had to get the 2 girls in the back seat out, it was a two door car so that meant we had to open the door and risk being attacked by the animal in the bag! I was in the passenger seat, which meant I had to change places with the gal in the driver seat. It was decided that I would climb over her and she would slide over. After she was in place she opened the door at the first sign of a safe opportunity and the other 2 girls jumped out and ran to the house. As we were leaving I checked to make sure I had everything. My purse was there right beside me and everything was fine....until about a 1/2 mile from my home the police pulled me over. I wasn't speeding, I knew that, but I panicked none the less. I pulled over and the officar approached the car and promptly asked for my license. This would be a good place to mention that I had just gotten my license that afternoon not even 8 hours earlier. I reached for my purse ony to discover that it wasn't mine, but my passenger's instead. You see cordouroy and suade feel the same in the dark. I began to frantically look for my purse. I had turned on the lights inside the car and was now hanging over the back seat looking for it on the floor back there, hoping it had gotten shoved to the back somehow throughout the confusion with the so called dead animal in the bag, but it hadn't! I was sure I was going to lose my license, my newly obtained license that I had waited 16 years to get and probably would never see again license! I was a mess by then. When the officer asked me where I had been, I told him at a friends house decorating their barn for a Halloween party. He then asked where they lived and I said, "oh just down the road a bit." Which was true, but it was closer to 5 miles down the road. Seeing how frantic I was the officer and his partner suggested I go home and call them or go back and look for it. I was in no shape to drive the 1/2 mile to my home, let alone 5 miles back to their house and another 5 miles back home, plus..I would be past my curfew if I had gone back. I told them I was closer to home so I would go there and call. Now one thing you have to know about this is that this was 1975 in Edwardsburg, Micigan. No one just goes home without having endured at least a hard time by the police back then. But they did....they didn't even follow me. Oh...but they did reveal the reason they had pulled me over.....the light on the license plate wasn't working! I had just been terrorized by a dead animal in a bag by a 17 year old and his brothers and he was worried about my license plate light???? Argh! Anyway, I made it home, God only knows how with all the hysterics I now had going on and tears and all the trama of the whole evening. The first thing my parents said when I got home??? "Is the car alright?" I managed to calm down enough to tell them that the car was fine...I on the other hand had been tramatized way too much for one day. I told them the story and that trigger my dad's memory and he immediately wen to the kitchen table where he had put all the papers from the BMV that afternoon. Amongst those papers was the registration for the car. Yep, I not only did not have my own license, I didn't have the registration for the car either! Angels watching over me??? You bet! Still being a little upset, my mom phoned over to Jon's house to inquire as to whether my purse was there. It was; in the driveway where it fell out when the door was opened to allow the other 2 victims, I mean girls to escape. When I climbed over the other gal into the driver seat, she slide over and unknowingly pushed my purse in between the door and the seat, allowing it to fall out when the door was opened. We made a trip over there to pick it up and I vowed I would get even with Jon some how; some way....so on November 26, 1977 I married him! 31+ years and 3 kids later we are still together. It has not been dull, believe me, and I have many stories to write to prove that. Our wedding alone was not to be incident free.....ice storms, squirrels and me hitting a tree the day before are just a few of the things that happened, but that will be for another time!
Sunday, March 15, 2009
So....a friend of mine loaned me a disk of HGTV software to experiment with. I thought it would be great to be able to plug in the dimensions of my rooms and play with the colors and arrangement of furniture and fixtures. What I didn't count on was the need to have an Architectural degree to be able to not only use the software, but to understand the manual as well. I quickly learned that no amount of patience on my part was going to get me to the place where I could actually learn to use this software. I couldn't get it to use the actual dimensions of my house, which is probably okay since Jon and I disagree on what those are anyway, however I came pretty close to them but only after many tries and deletions of walls and eventually the entire house. I found that even though I was pretty close to the actual size per scale....according to the software I didn't have enough room to even house a bathtub in the bathroom....which I found rather disturbing since I know the last time I looked in there....there was indeed a bathtub/shower combination. I also learned that my kitchen couldn't possibly house the stove and refrigerator with the cupboards that I know exist in there at this very moment. I have come to the conclusion that either I have the most oddly sized house with fixtures to match or I am incapable of using this software because I do not posses the patience to learn a new language (architecturese) that will help me understand it. Tomorrow the manual goes back to its owner and I will remind myself the next time I see those designers on HGTV work their magic with the computer that they did not do the work themselves, they most certainly must have an architect on the payroll doing all the work for them and they just hit a button and take the credit.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)