Last Week's Talk Thursday: Expectations, Reality, Evolution

We are raised with expectations, those of our parents, our teachers, those of our boy  or girl friend, friends, and if you had a dog, his expectations of you too.  We strive, we learn, we fall and get back up, and we dream.  I have gone on ad nauseam about the white knight fairytale that most girls in my age group and possibly before were raised to believe. Gosh it’s your lucky day, I’m not knowingly going there.

When I was a teen and knew everything, I so very much wanted to be a professional dancer…..or a marine biologist.  The expectations I set for myself were full of blinders that didn’t allow me to realize at that point that there is 1) a need for talent, and 2) or eight years of college and Zoology. My reality was that my grades were no-where near the stellar GPA decimal’d (that is totally a real word) numbers required for the much needed scholarships to extend my education.  My counselors never talked to me about it (and take my word for it, I saw my counselors frequently), my parents never talked to me about scholarships and students loans (the reality is in 1973 when we moved to Oregon my parents had $36 left over after bills our first month there – my going to college was probably a fear for them.)  My expectations were blue sky and mindless in truth.

My reality at that age was that I fell in love, had a baby and chose being a mom over chasing elusive butterflies.  I have no regrets.  What have I missed? Not a damn thing. I have been to Europe, twice. I have enjoyed a series of hobbies, sports, and men. I have watched a wonderful daughter turn into a beautiful woman and mother. I have made friends with my parents, learn to see the blessings and gifts that they gave me.   I have tattoos, multi pierced ears, broken my both foot and butt, reveled at the beautiful color of my eyes, and cried over the lumpy cottage cheese that makes up my thighs.  It is what it is.

I am better for the trials and tribulations that lay both behind me and ahead.  I have evolved through the teachings of those who have touched my life.  I have morphed  through the laughter and tears, the joys and pains, the crisis and glories – every heartbeat, breathe, and step has lead me to this moment, to the person I am, and the person I will soon become. I have absorbed the best in essence of those who touch my soul.  I am blessed.

The dreams I once had lay dust at the feet of what my life has been, because the reality is… dreams are just that and we grow to embrace what life and circumstance hands us, and while some will just choose to survive, I choose to thrive beyond.

Sith,

Cele

Talk Thursday: Ten Weird Things About Me – Redux

A great topic popped into my head on Sunday when I was doing my taxes. But I was doing my taxes so I didn’t take the time to write it down. I forgot what it was. So all week long I thought, became frustrated, thought a wee bit more, had a migraine… or three this week (really three migraines, what’s that all about), then I panicked a bit. Voila’ I will do a meme redux. How did I know that not everyone knew what a meme was? I love a good meme, some are dumb, but many are insightful.

So here are ten weird things about me – Weird is as Weird does.

1) My favorite color is more a combination of colors. I despise the color orange, you know like Oregon State / Beaver National - it in your face ORANGE. Yeah that orange, but I love cinnamon or vesuvius (it’s a color by Landrover – yeah the vehicle) or there is this ombre’d yarn that goes from this color to cinnamon to this amazing brick color – love it. But the combination I love the most is purple and green – I always anticipate the Rhody Parade so that I can get purple and green throw beads for my truck’s rear view window.

2) I have this bizarre memory. Usually if I read something three times, say it three times, whatever three times, I will remember it. Not necessarily verbatim, but I will remember it. So what does this mean? A lot of weird things…
A) It makes me fairly good at trivia – I can talk myself through a question to the answer probably five out of six times. And lucky me, if I kick it off with the Mahna Mahna song it becomes a radio show. I will have to tape it for you.
B) I can remember what I was wearing at strange times. Like the time my friend’s father tried to molest me in the sixth grade. Light blue plaid A-line skirt, white sleeveless shell, and keds.
C) I vividly remember things from age 2 or so, but I can’t remember first grade
D) My shopping list, if I write it down and forget the list at home I will remember all but maybe one item on the list. If I stick the list in my pocket but never look at it, all bets are off and I will forget the majority of the items.

3) I don’t do the celebrity crush thing that people do, Okay I know that’s not weird. Until I say, but there is this actor that is hot. I think I’d seen him in several things, but it wasn’t until I saw him in the Keanu Reeves / Charlez Theron movie Sweet November that I thought he was raging hormones hot – As Chaz Cherry. He’s still hot as Detective Brittin, just not quite as much.

4) I get migraines. I know many many people get migraines, but I can see mine before they hit. It’s called an Aural Migraine. Imagine a little flashy light that starts just off center of your vision say at ten o’clock, is slowly grows in a flashly, white light semi circle to about two thirds of full circle before it starts slowly ebbing its way back to nothing. And then the headache and puking start. I’m such a good mother I shared it with my daughter, just like my mother shared them with me; my sister can smell her migraine coming on. It’s because we’re special. What?

5) I lose words. I have this goodly size vocabulary, a passionate love affair that involves painting pictures with words. And then I lose a word – mid sentence, it was right on my tongue, then it’s gone – lose a word. I will focus on the missing word, obsess on the missing word until I get it back. I’m thinking this isn’t that normal.

6) I will clean all the toilets you want, pick up dog poop with a plastic bag, but I hate, let me say that louder, I HATE CLEANING THE BATH TUB. Enough said. Oh and the mildew on the ceiling of my bathroom. Hate it.

7) There should be a frustrated medium in me trying to get out. But instead it is apparently dormant. Huh? Yeah, I thought you’d say that. All of my life I have been told I have a gift. I have Master Numbers, 38/11/2. I have been told by people who give readings that I should be giving readings, but I’ve yet to figure this crap out. If you have ability, shouldn’t you be in touch with it?

8) I can watch trashy housewives that make no sense, singing star wannabe’s who ignore advice until it’s too late (have you been watching Phil Phillips – I want the album), people hunt ghosts, talk to the dearly departed, and jousting hotties, but I hate watching a scripted TV show with holes in the storyline, ill-plausible solutions to a crime, and bad dialogue and acting. BTW, I still don’t like reruns.

9) Every person who means something to me in my life is a song. I will hear that song and they are with me. Some people like Psam have a multitude of songs, but that is logical she’s my daughter. Examples:

A) Ducky – Second Chances
B) My Dad – King of the Road
C) My Sister – Cracklin’ Rosie, or Wild Wild World
D) Burp – Little Red Riding hood / We Will Rock You
E) Don – Istanbul Not Constantinople
F) Different childhood friends –
1) Angel on my Shoulder
2) Natural Man
3) ABC
4) Alone Again Naturally
5) The Chipmunk Song
6) Gads that list could go on and on

10) It drives me crazy if the light switches in the hall way are left up instead of down. Ducky will walk into the hall from the living room, flick up the light switch, take four steps open the bedroom door and flick the light switch at the end of the hall up to turn off the light. It’s a short hall, WTF? Oh, and I want my vacuum cleaner cord wrapped nice and neat in a circular motion not all crazy eighted, nor twisted like your extension cords.

Thank you very much,
Cele



10 Weird Things About She Who Is Know As Cele – or When in doubt refer to number seven (originally posted in July 2007)

How on God’s Green earth do you blog 10 weird things about yourself? I mean isn’t my weird just someone else’s normal? Like my “unreasonable” fear of snakes? There are, like ten people out there who really like snakes. Now that is weird. In fact it’s just unreasonable. So your weirdness is my normal frame of thought…er you don’t like snakes do you? I’m really stuck on what is weird.
1) I don’t like talking on the phone. End of story. Well not really. Ducky is a phone addict. He talks to everyone on the phone, all the time. There are two things about Ducky that are a given, when he walks in the door, gets up or mows the lawn the TV is on. And two, if I am gone for more than ten minutes he will call people.

2) I hate reruns. I remember the plot, the dialogue, and what I can’t remember I will guess. Whereas, I despise watching TV shows over and over, I can watch a movie multiple times (as long as there is enough space in between viewings), and books? I’ve read Lord Of The Ring at least seven times. But not TV shows, and I can’t abide stupid demeaning humor – so that lets out 7 out of 10 shows.

3) I am now in my fifth decade and I still don’t feel like a grown up. When does that happen? I am a mother, a grandmother, and married three times, when does growing up happen?
(And no, that doesn’t explain two divorces.)4) Hobbies burn hot for me and then I burn out, never to go back. I once crocheted twenty five afghans for presents in two years time. That was 14 years ago, I’ve not done one since. I did stained glass at the beginning of marriage number two. Anyone want to buy a grinder, foiler, an assortment of glass cutters, lead came, and soldering irons? How about a box of skeins in various levels of depletion.

5) I love social climate Reality TV. Survivor (except for those friggin’snakes,) Big Brother, even The Surreal Life. It’s watching psychological warfare and strategy. The worst at the games, is the student of the games. Suckas

6) My mother named me Tanglefoot because I can’t walk straight, or remain up right. I fall, trip, slid, you name it I can tangle my feet around it. And I once dreamt of a career as a dancer…a roller derby queen(yes, despite being a tanglefoot I was very adept at skating, and my hipchecks were da bomb - literally, have you seen these hips?)….a marine biologist (no fancy footwork required but 8 years of zoology - I don't think so)… and a cosmetologist (that was a $4100 nightmare. Did you know you can get hair splinters, and the friggin' hurt?)

7) My sister says that she can chart her life by which name I was going by at the time and what new name I gave her.
a. Debbie – no offense, but there were six Debbie’s in my kindergarten class. Who in the heck wants to be part of a six-pack?
b. Debi
c. Debby
d. Deby Everyone wants a six-pack, but of a different ilk.
e. Then I moved to my middle name – at age 16, ah much better.
f. And Cele, is shortened version of
g. Celebrindal, from Tolkien’s Simarillion. So are you now lost? All who wander are not lost. Wrong book, right sentiment.

8) I can’t hold a grudge. Can’t do it. Life is too long to be unhappy, and far too short to not be happy.

9) I frequently know when the phone is going to ring and often who’s on the other end. I either see their face or I think their name. I can often hear the Jeopardy – double jeopardy jingle before it plays.

10) I have many acquaintances, but very few true friends. When I make a friend, it is for life, whether they are talking to me or not. This causes me to get screwed over on occasion, but you can only be hurt if you give your heart. So to me… Heart / Heartless The choice is a no brainer to me.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Caterpillar

Coming home from McDonald’s Friday night I seriously considered writing a blog about the sad part of a caterpillars life and why I should not like to be said bird fodder: A lack of Micky Dee’s fries. Yes, when you’re hungry on a Fast Food Friday and you’ve been striving so very hard to stay on your diet, hot out of the fryer McDonald’s fries with a generous helping of vein hardening salt is to die for. Obviously I had no idea how to approach caterpillar as a topic.

Except for something that happened on Easter Sunday, something I’d been mulling over and rehashing all week long, brought me an epiphany about my mother. The worst part is that I’ve been saying this all along, but I guess the totality hit me. My mother is all about dying. Honest.

As a daughter, she was dutiful, loving, and ardent about paying forward family traditions. As a sister she was the strong one, the sister who was the older, the stronger, the dependable one. As a wife, she left her well appointed home to live with a man for the rest of his life, that at best her mother called “White Trash”. She got my father out of debt, saved her coupon money to build a portfolio, and kept our family solvent. As a mother she gave each of her kids the best of herself – she was a Girl Scout leader, a member of the PTA, she was a Den Mother, worked the snack shack at baseball and softball games, to say the least she was involved in each of her children’s lives.

In the early 1970’s my parents bought a trailer park and moved us to Oregon. My father renovated the business grounds and buildings, my mother made it a full functioning business, giving herself to it twenty four seven three sixty five for more than twenty years. When someone in the park needed help remaining independent, my mother was there to help them – daily. Then they moved, my father’s health finally started declining at a rapid pace (please don’t smoke) and my mother became no only my father’s wife, but his care giver – that same old twenty four seven three sixty five until the day he died, over four years ago.

The only time she left my father alone is when we went to England for three weeks. Traipsing through the English and Scottish country side seemed to thrive in the adventure and history of it all. My father has long gone, and yet my mother has made only two trips to Georgia to see my brother. She loves living by herself for the first time ever. She gives two hours on Wednesday to the area library. The rest of the time my mom builds these amazing quilts (but they are never good enough to show in the local quilt guild events) and takes care of her property (five acres south of town) with Ducky’s help.

As a child I was fascinated with caterpillars, loved learning about its metamorphic journey to chrysalis and then evolving into the beautiful butterfly it was meant to be. As I grew, matured, evolved into who I’ve become I have seen the parallels of human life to the caterpillars’ metamorphous journey through its life.

Someday, I’m sure my daughter will be come concerned about my willingness to live life or lack there of. I hope she knows how to approach her concerns. But in the way of my mother, I have no idea how to get her to live. She is forever conscience about making sure everything is as easy as possible for us “kids” when she passes. She is concerned that she will have enough money to last her life… take my word for it, my mother turned her coupon money into a $300k portfolio and her property is work easily half a mill, even in today’s market. She is concerned that she will be come a burden, I could kick my brother’s ass for that one. She is concerned that her property is too much of a burden on Roger and I, my fabulous brother in law is responsible for that, honestly Cap and Crown guy has no reason to fear, we’re not going to ask him for help.

Why can’t she fulfill her dreams and travel? I want my mom to live. I want the chrysalis to morph into the beautiful butterfly I know that is cocooned deep down in side. Mom, spread your wings and fly, no for me, not for Pinecone, Butch, or Buddy, but for yourself – you so deserve it.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: "Why on earth does anybody live there?"

The Oregon Coast is heaven on earth, no tornados, and no poisonous snakes: snakes yes, poisonous, no. Yes we have rain, the occasional flooding, and once every great while an earthquake.

Now, while you might be more than willing to chance a tornado that will lift your house from Kansas to beyond Oz, but I’m not going there… Oz or Kansas (tornados and nasty ass snakes.) Give me an earthquake any day – and before you ask, yes, I’ve been through several good size quakes: the roller coaster quakes that bob you up and down, hurky jerky quakes that rattle your teeth, and rock and roll quakes that in all truth remind me of interior California’s rolling hills (it’s one of those “you had to be there things.”) I don’t do tornados.

You don’t have to worry that the earthquake alarm is going to go off, then wait for endless growing hours for the quake that may or may not come. Here angry dark clouds just mean buckets of more rain, not anxious hours of nail biting and self -flagellation because I didn’t buy a place with a root cellar (which on the Oregon Coast would more likely resemble an indoor pool.) And if you think I bluff, we had twenty, count them, twenty inches of rain in March.

Oregon’s rainy days and seasons make you appreciate, that much more, the hot days of summer. I know, I know… I live and work on the Oregon Coast where the average temp during summer is 75 degrees, then factor in the average 45mph winds…. Which with my unscientific wind chill calculation averages to an approximate 60 degrees. I’ll take it any day over snakes, deep snow, tornados, snakes, cyclones, hurricanes (scratch that, we have hurricanes), snakes, and swarms of itchy bitey bugs. I love Oregon, earthquakes, rain, and all. Our little snow in mid March did make for a pretty picture or two, made me realize why people on the east coast actually (get this) use the garage for their vehicles, but again, I will take Oregon anyday.
* * * * I ADOREGON * * * *
Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Ack! Life’s A Great Big Fur Ball ala Bill The Cat

This is personal, I’m sooooo not loving 2012. Nope, not even close. There has been nothing but havoc; total chaos; spiritual destruction, and the end of life as I’d like to know it – my quite, unassuming and peaceful life, gone – poof!

On December 28th I got my haircut and the power went out. No really the whole friggin town was pitch black. I had an hour and 45 minutes before we aired a double header basketball game, no power and a head of partially blown dry, freshly cut hair.

A harbinger of things to come. Just as I got the generator running, the power came back on, the games aired as if nothing happened… although the boy’s team got their collective butts handed to them. Hey, it’s basketball. My hair looked like I cut it with a mixer.

What ensued has been unending. January … Power outages, Frozen STLs – High Wind – Rain – Flooding – Rain …. February …. Rain – High Wind – Major Promotions – Flooding – Wind – Computer crashes …. March….Rain – Power Failures – Wind – Generator Failure – Rain – Major Promotion – Winter Storm – Winter Storm – and did I mention winter storms?

I live on the Oregon Coast where we deal with rain, copious amounts of rain, and high winds every day – but after weeks of high winds, endless rain… well no that’s not true a lot of time when it’s really windy, it’s dry. And so much chaos Yes, folks I was screaming….. ACK!!!!! With several unsavory words thrown in for spice and variety.

Now I hate to be whiny, I hate to complain, ACK!!!! I hate the word hate. Hmmm. But sometimes you just, okay I just, have to be up front about the state of my emotional frell. 2012 sucks.

You know those moments after all hell and chaos have broken loose, danced on the flower bed of your soul, wreaked their havoc upon humanity and the world and then waltzed away leaving all calm and seemingly serene in their wake? Yeah, all that calm and serenity - it’s all a front. That if it could be seen written on your forehead would read, “suckka!”

March has been nothing but broken computer equipment, a new piece of equipment, called a Barix Exstreamer 500, that has refused to work properly – and friggin snow. Snow!!!

Again, I live on the Oregon Coast, not North Dakota, not Colorado, nor Wisconsin and Pennsylvania where they deal with snow through a series of tools that blow snow, shovel snow, and deice sidewalks. No, I live on the Oregon Coast I don’t have to shovel snow, I just open my tail gate and let if flow out…. Or we use oars. But shovel, ummmm, no. I am not prepared for snow, I had to shovel the front walk at work with a dust pan… and may I take this moment to reiterate how much I hate working with lazy men? Okay, I won’t, but do you think they could… never mind.

Anyone who has satellite TV knows that snow and a dish are at opposite ends of a working dynamic. You know you’re beating hot red blood through your veins when you stand out in 31 degree weather with a broken hose, trying to wash 6 inches of snow off a 3.8 meter dish. Three times in one morning. Get rained upon, work up at the transmitter site to keep a failing generator and ergo my signal on the air, by mid day I was pulling my hair out by the roots. Along with spitting up a fur ball or four, I not only sound like Bill the Cat, but I look like him too.

2013, where art thou?

Sith,
Cele

Thank you Berke Breathed, you're my hero

Talk Thursday: Turn the Car Around

First off, my husband has a commuter car; I drive a truck. Second, unless a vehicle is under construction or in for repairs why would anyone put it in the garage? A garage is for your crap – part of this might be explained by the fact that my garage is on the opposite end of my property… and house from my front door. But yeah, I park my truck under the wide open Oregon skies.

If I forget to pack something before a trip and I discover it after I turned off my block… I’m fairly certain I’m not going to turn around the car to go back and get it. I will buy it on the road or it just wasn’t that important in the first place. Yes, I will turn around if I’ve forgotten someone’s gift… especially if it’s the sole reason we’re going somewhere… and that’s all I have to say on that.

This of course does not pertain to the time we went to see Diamond Rio, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and Toby Keith. We rented a room on the edge of Eugene and were traveling up I-5 towards the Brownsville exit when I realized I’d forgotten our Oregon Jamboree tickets. Not much good to continue on when the Jamboree had long since been sold out and why buy more tickets when you already have tickets? So we turned the car around at Brownsville and returned to Eugene to retrieve the tickets. Yes, I felt pretty darmn stupid. And this is probably the reason I am anal retentive about checking my pockets and or purse for the important things like… money…. plane tickets… concert tickets… baseball tickets… drivers license…. Passport.

Before finally boarding the plane on our journey to Europe after 9-11, I would have bad dreams about making it to the gate in New York and voila no passport. Of course we didn’t fly out of New York, we didn’t even route through the Big Apple (why do they call it the big apple when they don’t grow much of anything outside of Central Park?) we flew through Seattle, but I still had bad dreams about being without my papers. Kind of like those dreams I have about opening up my mic and discovering I have no newscopy. Panic, scramble, wake up. I’m not sure I even get to punt before I wake up.

I’m notorious for planning my daily activities so as to not have to cross my path of travel, switch back to catch the next stop, or traipse from one end of Florence to the other end… a whole three miles away. This is of course to be time and energy efficient. And after all that careful planning I will fear arriving early so I will turn my truck around and cruise town to take up the time.

Sometimes ya just gotta wonder.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Coffee

When I was in grade school we took a field trip to the Butternut Coffee Factory. I must have been in the fourth grade, early enough to allow for a second field trip there a year or so later. While not so sure of the year I was old enough to be totally seduced by the aroma of roasted coffee. Coffee, a warm, rich, deep brown heavenly scent that I knew should taste just as it smelt. Two problems: First I was, what? Ten? Second I let my mom (the queen of instant Folgers) made the coffee for me. Gagging isn’t the memory I retain from my first sips, disappointment is, disappointment that the flavor wasn’t the heavenly aroma that filled my cup. Regardless of how much milk and sugar I added.

In the third grade, Helms donuts were deliciously yeasty after we toured the bakery, tasting just sweet and yeast as the smell that permeated every inch and molecule of that clean odiferous building where they rose, baked and boxed. Milk - thankfully didn’t taste like Adore Dairy Farms smelt on a cool October morning, and it taste even better than the milk poured from the cold glass bottles delivered twice a week to the back door stoop. It was even better, because it was chocolate – and few second graders – especially back in the early sixties thought anything was better than chocolate milk. But coffee, nope in the four grade coffee sucked.

The aroma of fresh ground coffee, even Folgers, is seductive. First is wafts warmly up from it’s packaging promising a warm, deep full flavor that evokes soothing thoughts. Whether it’s a frosty morning in winter, a wet morning in spring, a warm golden summer morning, or a crisp clear fall morning nothing starts the day off better than a pot or three of rich bold coffee served hot That heavenly hot liquid that caresses my tongue and soothes the morning beast in me. Served best with quiet. Now as an adult good coffee taste just as it smells. The best cup of a pot - is always the first cup from the pot, the cup taken while the grinds are still dripping fresh.

I adore coffee.

But through life I have learned a few things. 1) caffeine is the worst thing (besides a bad relationship) that you can put in a woman’s body. 2) the older I get the less I can consume. My Nurse Practitioner tried hard to limit me to two cups a day, I cut a deal with her… sort of… I can have all the coffee I want before noon. I try hard to stick to that deal… and I take extra calcium to ward off the effects of caffeine on my aging bones. Oh, and I sweetened the deal, although she is still waging war for two cups a day… I have gone to half caf before 9am, when I get to work. Work has Portlands Best Brew, delicious, but not the French Roast I use at home…. But still darn good.

To paraphrase Homer Simpson…..Yummmmmm, coffee…. What it can’t do!

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Poetry And Prose

Don posted a Talk Thursday topic on Poetry and Prose. Poetry makes my heart sing. To craft a poem makes me feel complete, but I play by some sense of poetry rules. When I first hit the internet Psam introduced me to her Friday night poetry group. At the end of each session a topic would be named for the following night, usually a phrase, and the challenge would be on.

Sunday mornings back then were quiet in my house. I would wake up, pour myself a cup of coffee and sneak off to my computer and craft a poem based on the week's topic. I would endlessly read each and every line over and over, knowing that I could not move on to the next line until the former was complete. One of the poems that I crafted back in those early days remains a perfect in my heart, a window to how the wind and nature speaks to my core.

The Elementals

The morning mist sets on the moors,
above the heather wet,
and holds the light close to the ground
the moist, damp air its net.
The churning waves sent from the sea
batter the rocky beach,
the salt spray flies to meet the mist
where moors and ocean reach.
I raise my arms up to the sky
in praise, my morning rite,
drink of the day into my soul,
of salt spray, moor, and light.

The mid day sun rides on the sky
where Gulls and Petrel soar,
fields of blue, are the air and sea,
mauve, heather on the moors.
The foam peaked waves, crash to the sand
below the granite cliffs,
where churning winds, gear up to rage,
a gale wind strong and stiff.
I raise my face up to the sun,
drink in the wind and light
its strength and peace rain over me
I breathe eternal might.

The western sun has gone away,
dusk heralds in the night,
a storm brews strong upon the sea,
waves gather strength and height.
Dark churning clouds are rumbling deep,
and flash with brilliant light.
Tempest winds howl over cliff and land
and blow with all their might.
I stand and breathe the elements,
drink in the raging sight.
its pain and brute force bolsters me
in life's continual fight.

The morning mist lays on the greens,
a bonney day begins,
the birds are winging on the sky,
the bees are buzzing hymns.
The churning ocean will reach the cliffs
and kiss the basaltic rock.
The breeze will freshen on the bay,
and ruffle on the loche.
I stand in awe, in silent peace,
I bow my head to pray,
for the wind and rain, sun and mist,
I thank God, every day.

© 20 July 2000 Calista Cates-Stanturf

Talk Thursday – Time

A commodity of which I have little, crap it’s not a commodity if it were I’d buy more, because honey I need more time. Lot’s of time. Please Sir, More. This was the topic several weeks ago. Did I mention I lack the time commodity thingie. Vana, I’d like to buy time please. I began writing this blog … at least a month ago.

In the last month, Thanksgiving (okay it was a month and a week). Girls day out for Christmas shopping (okay I really went for lunch – which was spendy and questionable.) The Lane County Holiday Market at the fairgrounds was awesome per normal. Always lots of ideas, a few presents, and great, I mean awesome – grapefruit fudge. Awesome I tell you, awesome. Thankfully I only bought a small portion. I continually reminded everyone that I love chocolate moose Peeps ( yes, I was rewarded for my pandering with eight boxes of Chocolate Moose Peeps and four peppermint star peeps – just as I prepare to lose weight.) I made my Kahlua, two cases (48 bottles.) And attempted scones for the first time in my life. Yes, Alex, I like time for $200, please.

Not bad, but now I want to bake gluten free scones. I’ve gathered together the tapioca flour, brown rice flour, white rice flour, the sweet sorghum – I have my recipes. Now I just need…. Yes, Alex – Time for $400, please. Could someone please tell me where to buy xanath and guar gums? Did I mention that Ducky and I are going to try going gluten free. We’re hoping that taking the gluten out of his diet it will help his joints, my feet, and crap who knows what else. Maybe my acid reflux will disappear. It did in the last year as I took refined flour, refined sugars, pasta and potatoes out of my diet. Okay, I still ate a bit of refined sugar and I lost almost 30 pounds.

Wow, that was an accomplishment. Almost lost. Now I want to lose about 60 more including the 9 I gained back in between Misaray’s wedding to the Brit and now. I will never be skinny again, but I really need to be thinner. I did lose a few ounces on Wednesday, I got a drastic hair cut.

I bombed out as a beautician. A got the best grades in the state in 1987. But, damn the bitch of it was that the women would not just "drop off their hair and pick it up" when I was done, but I did lean how to 1) do my own nails, 2) do make up 3) cut hair, perm hair, and color hair. I do my make up, I cut my hair, I do my nails, and Ducky colors my hair. But I decided I wanted something different. Earlier this month Pam Tillis was in the studio, she has lots of skinny hair just like me.

That was the hair cut I wanted. I found a new hairdresser, she was great. Just as she began to style my hair Florence suffered a massive power outage. If you’ve read my blog for any amount of time you know that means I have to go to work. Two hours later, probably about two of the nine and a half inches of rain that has fallen in the last 48 hours poured during that two hours - on top of me - through my new cut, and I returned home looking (somewhat in my mind) like a drown rat. Ducky greeted me with a, “Hey, sexy.”

That man totally makes my day. Now if we can make it to the valley tomorrow night, we’ll have dinner with friends and still be home to watch the ball drop. Of course my new do will be sporting an inch of grow out. But hey, Alex, how about Time for $600?

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Frustration - aka dead air from the big boys

Running a week behind in my topics…. If you haven’t noticed – this week’s topic, Occupy/ied/ing, last week Frustration. This is how far behind I am, the frustrating conversation I’m about to relate happened a week ago this morning. People know I work for a radio station, oh, okay.

“Hi, I’m Calista and I work for a radio station”

See I should never assume. For the past fourteen to sixteen years of my job I’ve been not only the program director, but also the operations manager – that relates into me being responsible for, crap EVERYTHING. Yes, everything, if there is a light bulb out the morning guys will unlock the doors in the pitch black until I have a morning shift and find the light out and change it. If a satellite dish is wonky (an extremely technical term), no I don’t fix it, I coordinate with the engineer(s) until it’s fixed. I have learned all sorts of technical terms, i.e. sparkles, bongs, and the most important one, “Dead air.”

My job is so very technical and important in relation to dead air - that I get 1) paged 2) phoned and 3) did I mention I have two phones, yes they both get called. Five straight beeps in the message and it’s the AM, five alternating bee dee bee dee (think of them as beeps) and it’s the FM. Are you still with me?

The amount of dead air is growing on our AM station. Last Saturday morning, I get awoken with dead air on the AM at 2:12am, by the time I checked the radio we were back on and ten seconds later I was back in bed. Then at 7:56am I get awoken by the AM once again. This time I’m fully awake and as the station leaves dead air for the comfort of ABC news I’m dialing a radio network that sounds something very close to Flear Phannel. The following conversation ensued:

“Engineering, this is Bozo”
“Good morning Bozo, I am Calista with KCFM in Florence, Oregon. We’re a Music affiliate (read- name altered to protect the innocent and my butt) and I’m experiencing dead air.”
“Well there was dead air, but the network is on the air. “
“Could you please tell me where the dead air came from?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, the dead air, did it come from Flear Phannel or Music?”
“Well I can’t say.”
“You can’t say? So it came from Music.”
“No, I can’t say that. The device that suffered the dead air is in our studios.”
“Oh, so the dead air came from Flear Phanhel.”
“No, I can’t say that.”
“Then it came from Music.”
“No, I can’t say that.”
“I don’t understand, the device that the dead air came from is in your studios, but you don’t know that the dead air came from Flear Phannel.”
“Right.”
“So it came from Music.”
“No, I can’t say that.”

At this point I crawl through the phone line all the way to Colorado and strangle him with his wits. And I’m wide awake at 8:05am on a Saturday morning. Too, mean.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Shooting For Happy

There is actually no reason for having not written this blog. Long ago I discovered several truths, yes, they are my truths, but I believe they could hold true for most people.


The first, it is far easier to be happy than to eternally be sad. Being sad takes up too much energy, sucks out too much spirit, and alienates you from people who are happy. I choose to be happy, I choose to smile instead of frown, or even be straight faced (which is sometimes hard, Ducky says my face is like a book.)

Second, yes money makes to world go round, but I prefer to have a job I love that pays less than a high paying job that I hate. Having more money doesn’t mean having a “better”, “happier”, or more meaningful life. It means you have more toys that you don’t use, bills that are bigger, as many headaches, and more house to clean. I prefer cozy, comfy, and hands on. My brother constantly boast of the businesses he owns, the property he owns, and the money he makes – yet he refused to pay a loan back to my parents (and yes my father did come out and bluntly ask for payment), all the while he is complaining about how many hours he has to work, who owes him money, and a myriad of other problems. Is that happiness? Is that quality of life? Are those good priorities? Really, I’m thinking not, I see him bowing to the almighty dollar and "Self-status", all the while he is flipping his family the finger – he still has not come home since my father died (four years ago this Christmas.) I don’t see this as happy and yes I realize this is my perspective.

Third, Happiness for me is about being a better person and making the life I live the life I want. My house is small, I like to think it’s cozy. My family speaks to each other (well okay there is that one brother, but if he called I’d speak to him). While my lawn is dead, my flower garden is a source of pleasure. My job can be stressful, but I love it, strive to be the best I can be at my job, and give as much as my time allows. I have to say the thought of retirement is actually gaining more appeal, I may be eligible for an AARP card (no I’m not going there) I have to take the yearning of more free time a bit slow as I’m still years way from that financial freedom (who am I kidding I will never be financially free) and retirement age.

In other words I am happy where I am. I love, I laugh, I sing, I am…. Happy.

Sith,
Cele

And it doesn't hurt that my Ducks are winning.

Talk Thursday: Masculinity and Testoserone

Living with a man who is recuperating from a “major” surgical procedure is, to say the least, enlightening. It’s been five week (and two days) since Ducky went under the knife, had his spinal stenosis removed and three disks replaced. He also quit smoking on that day – I am very proud of him. In the past month we have been challenged by the temporary paralysis of both his arms, nicotine withdrawals and probably the worse of it all – BOREDOM. It takes a big man to allow his wife to do certain things for him… cut his meat… wash his pits…. Tie his shoe laces – understandable he’s being doing these things for himself for the better part of five decades.

The depression that has battered him off and on over that time what probably the worst side effect to face. How do you deal with depression? Ill-prepared, I am only armed with is optimism and logic – my husband is not a logical man. For the last fifteen years I have been allowed my Tuesday and Thursday nights, he stays at his sister’s house in the valley and I have time to blog, to go out to dinner with my girlfriends, mother, and grandmother. Now he is home on those nights and I have someone to watch TV with, thankfully we pretty much watch the same stuff, and the rest of the stuff he is a sleep for… except now he doesn’t have to leave for work at the butt-crack of dawn, so he has been joining me for Castle and Body of Proof (did I mention at anytime in the past that Dana Delaney is one of the few people Ducky tells me he wouldn’t charge the first time? And yes you just appropriate filled in the blank.)

Today Dude, one of the guys Ducky works with, came to visit while I was at work. Dude’s girlfriend and Ducky talked about the merits of Dancing With The Stars (we quit watching SEVERAL seasons ago.) Dude promptly began teasing Ducky that he was going to tell all the guys that Ducky watches DWTS. After relating the story to me I asked him if he let him know that he was a devotee of So You Think You Can Dance? No, and he didn’t tell him that he watches Dance Moms either.

Seriously, it’s all my fault. Once long ago I had aspirations to be a dancer, professional dancer… did you know you needed to be talented, dedicated, and did I mention talented? … yeah, what’s that all about? So, I’m in radio instead… but as a sideline I edit books (yes, bear with me it’s all related) and one of the writers I edit writes “dance/mystery/cozies – better known as the Jenny T. Partridge Mysteries. Delightful stories about a clumsy dance teacher and her psycho dance moms, so you know I have to watch Abby Lee (who is as crazy as) and her dance moms (thank you Natalie.) Ducky watches with me – to the point where he argues at the TV in support of a dancer, critiques the dances, and harangue both nemesis and judges. Yes, my husband, who (normally) slings 100 pound tires around, watches football five nights a week, and has Dana Delaney on his list of women he’d like to… is a female reality TV aficionado. You doubt me? As him about Theresa Guidice and the Real Housewives of New Jersey, hmm need more? As him what bugs him most about the newest housewife in Beverly Hills, no not Brandi, Dana – he’ll go on for five minutes. Ask him about the blondes of the OC, or about New York Turtle-time and Ramona.

It’s okay, he may know his Real Housewives, but I’m the one he gave chocolates and a thank-you card to. Life is good… all the way around.

Sith,
Cele

PS Except stay off Highway 126 beginning Monday, Ducky says he’s heading back to work.

Talk Thursday: Redo - seemingly a tribute to the letter I

There are so many things in my life I would take a redo on, so many things (in hindsight) I’d do over, do differently, or do slower. So I began with my blog, I’ve been lax lately in blogging, we’ll blame it on two things: 1) a lack of get up and go (or inspiration) 2) No time. We are still in the post surgery throes. Ducky has yet to begin physical therapy, his evaluation with the PT is Wednesday morning, this guy specializes in necks. Ducky has not regained dominance over his arms, either, right nor left. While the burning pain is less a constant, it does still rear its ugly head, and in truth getting a man to be in-charge of his pain meds on my day off is impossible – honestly must I do everything? I know totally rhetorical. Given the chance Ducky says he would not do this again.

Never would I go back and redo my teens, although I love revisiting the friends of my childhood. I would choose to go back and redo Psam’s childhood – pretty much minus any connection with her father. In fact, I’d forego the whole married to Chewbacha thing at all (thankfully I up held a long standing family tradition and was pregnant when I got married. Yes folks, I with full pride and acknowledgement come from a family of frisky women - mean sluts.) What I would have done was slowed down and savored every moment – good and bad, embraced every hug, every chance I could to sing in the car with her, I would have done more tide-pooling, more fishing, more beachcombing, more reading, and more cuddling. I missed so much in my daughter’s childhood and I didn’t even know it. So fucking sad.

If I had the chance I would redo the moments where I was mean to a person. Yes, there are a few, they are moments that I relive in thorough shame. When I have the chance I let people know what they meant to me, to my life, to the person I have become. I like who I became. Who I have yet to face a person who I was unkind to an apologize – except for my school bus driver. They looked kind of confused. Maybe there were too many to remember individuals. Part of what boggles my mind over my behavior is the fact that while I was in grade school – especially grade school, I was the child harassed, I was the child who was beat up in the school line while very one (teachers too) watched. Yes, this I’m sure was in part to my smart ass mouth (and probably why the teachers refused to intervene.) These are moments I would definitely redo.

You might have noticed my new look. I’m not a pink person (that is Psam) but really I couldn’t find anything with lilies or nasturtiums as a theme. What prompted me to change (despite my love of green) was the wasted space when I look at the blog on my laptop – for all the space available all the template took up was about six inches of space smack in the middle of my thirteen inch screen. It was time for a change, so I re did it. Voila. In the morning I did something I’d not done in a long while, I went though my entire blog list. I miss my favorite bloggers. But what I had missed more was the inspiration that reading my bloglist is the inspiration. I like that Blogger sets my list based on the most recent post, but it means my time surfing the blog has shrunk amazingly so. Before the update widget, I would go back and even if there wasn’t a new post I would read the comments, make more comments, or God forbid, write a blog of my own as a result of what I’d read.

I don’t live on Facebook. Yes, I play Farkle to excess – in my defense I’m trying to reach 2 million points (only 350k to go). While everyone else is living in one sentence absentia I am yearning for the fulfilling meaty paragraphs of a good blog. Something that lets me dig my incisors in to the wordy bulk of someone’s though process, existence, experience and then provokes me, compels me, commands me to write my own blog. Thank you Jen and Ang - Mir and Joss you are bloggers who consistently blog and prosper. Will I blog more, I have no clue; will I read more, I hope so I miss the daily blog slog; will I spend more time in Facebook, only playing Farkle, one line epitaphs leave me cold and alone. Please wrap me in your words and send me forth.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Red, White & You

I would say I’m fairly patriotic. Yeah, me, the liberal independent, raised by Republicans, nine years in the Girl Scouts, I cry when I sing America the Beautiful (oh don’t give me that look, I cry when I pray, I cry when I think about the love my husband’s parents had, I cry at Hallmark commercials) and I firmly believe that everyone should read the Constitution so they really know what the fuck isn’t in it and quit saying it is.

Of late, okay it’s been going on for a while, I’ve been frustrated at the state of my country. When the terrorist attacked on September 11th ten years ago I was saddened that extremist hated my country so much they would murder innocent people just to make a statement. I love my country. But what saddened me even more was that we let those terrorist win. Our world stopped turning for weeks, months, for some people even years. Yes, it’s logical that we changed the way we live and do business, but did we allow ourselves to change for the good? I don’t think so.

I don’t get that. I don’t understand why we are wasting the lives of America’s youth on wars where we aren’t wanted in the first place. In wars that have no impact on the existence of our country; In wars that will have no positive lasting impact on the lives that are being disrupted in far away foreign places; did I mention I’m for the most part anti war? Yeah. I’m a Quaker pacifist get over it.

This is a great country, though sadly we have been winding our way down a sad path for years, getting too big for our britches, thinking we are king of the hill, when really we aren’t taking care of ourselves. We have become a nation of bigger is better, my riches are not enough I want yours too, it’s my way or the highway, finish first or be a loser for ever and it’s always greener on the other side. May I please remind my nation that nice guys finish last, bigger throws off feng shui (think about it), rich people just have more expensive headaches and bigger bills, diversity makes the world turn round, and to quote Erma Bombeck the grass is always greener over the septic tank. I love America and Americans can be extremely nice people, I mean I like myself, I like most of my friends one hundred percent of the time. I come from a community that raised over $70 thousand dollars in two weeks to send a woman dying of cancer to a clinic for a laser knife treatments, that came just weeks after raising $30 thousand to outfit the home of a teen who was injured in an ATV accident and is now paralyzed, and weeks before that raised thousands of dollars for something else (honest I can’t remember what.) I come from a giving community of people, they are nice people, and they are all Americans. But most Americans are striving to be the Jones (personally I don’t want to have the newest thing on the block.)

Instead of a country that honors diversity, we are seemingly hell bend on pointing out everyone’s differences. Just tonight on Bill Mahar I heard about (oh you’ll love this, I started writing this blog over three weeks ago) a DHS (Department of Homeland Security) program called “If You See Something, Say Something.” It reminds me of Nazi Germany and if I look hard enough several other regimes. But really I just don’t take what I heard on TV to heart so I Googled it. Crap, where have I been for the last eight years? This is a bill that was passed in 2002 (Ah the Bush years, will we every leave the madness behind?) The current Homeland Security Act (HB 963) is now printed to go before the whole house and is an update of the original 2002 document. If passed a person reporting “suspicious activity” will be give immunity from civil prosecution. Doesn’t that take away the accused’s right to face their accuser? Like I said, I love America, but I do not like the direction America is taking.

Cele

Talk Thursday: Harried

My life is not my own. Point in argument, I have three blogs in various stages of begun and undone. It is sad, reasonable given the current state of my life, but sad. You’ve not seen the pictures of Miseray’s wedding, our trip to the Rogue River with Burp, our new son in law’s first finish at a triathlon, nor pictures of any posies or projects I may have taken - because right now life is harried.

Our vacation, replete with a wedding, trip to the Rogue River, and cake, delicious cake (hey, I’ve been on a diet, I’d do anything – almost – for cake) kicked my ass and I physically crashed. A week later it was one radio promotion after another – prep football, college football (GO DUCKS!) community festivals, programming, programming, and more programming. Then Ducky had surgery.

I know in radio when someone says, “It’ll be a piece of cake? (and, yes, I get pissed when no cake is involved) I should expect all hell is about to break loose. Ducky had surgery, three discectomi and some spinal stenosis rotor rootered, on September 7th. Rarely in my life is something a piece of cake. The surgery went fine, then Ducky woke up with a few complications. We’ve been reassured that he will be recover, but he is frustrated, incapacitated, in major pain (I mean crap it was a major surgery) and he’s bored. You know what they say about men being patient? My Ducky is more like the two vultures waiting for their next meal – “Patience, hell I’m gonna kill me something.” Yeah, two weeks into this, he’s at that point. I think it comes down to this – he thought it was a “snap your fingers” miracle cure. You know like when you take a pill and you don’t smoke any more? Yep – finally after saying he was going to quit, being stuck at home with no way to get to the store has handed him the perfect opportunity to quit. In truth while I noticed he wasn’t smoking, I barely noticed – what with the pain, pills, and incapacitation.

There has been work, there has been doctor’s appointments, there has been work, phone calls, work, insurance people, work, doctors, work, work, and pain pills. Yes, my life is harried, but it’s not terminal and I’ll survive. Now the question is will those around me survive?

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Resisting the Urge

My vacation posts have been interrupted by time this timely topic. The afternoon I got back to work I lost my voice. Ergo I’ve spent the last three days resisting the urge, and urging of everyone to talk. Despite the fact they all tell me to rest my voice, at the same time they attempt to drag me into a conversation that requires me to talk.

What’s that all about?

There is nothing funny about a DJ who has lost their voice. Ack! It is hideous. You know how some women will sound sexy when their voice gets husky at the onset of a head cold? Yeah, that last for about six hours and then the whole red runny eyes and nose things kicks in and sexy is long…. Long gone. I don’t have a cold, although there was this sinus thingie back on say Sunday night, but honestly I thought that was the remnants of my physical exhaustion from my vacation. And yes, I will begin that blog, replete with bald eagle pictures after I finish this. I think.

Any as I was saying, I lost my voice, my money maker opted for another week of vacation, but didn’t take the rest of me. So not being able to do my airshifts, or a ton of other things that DJ’s do when we’re not on the air, I stuck to my office and did paper works, CAUGH up on a lot of stuff. And I would answer the phone, “Good afternoon, Coast Radio may I help you?” (in a loud non sexy rasp of a forced whisper) and I would get back a range of replies from, “Does it hurt as bad as it sounds?”, to “Ouch, that hurts”, or “Oh, wow, it is worse than I expected”, to full out laughter. See my life sucked this week. Those who knew I should talk (and kept telling me to rest my voice) kept asking me questions. Those who didn’t want to talk to me laughed. I liked the laughter better.

So now my voice is trying to come back, but sadly I’ve already missed two opportunities perform non-drunken renditions of the Birthday Cake Polka for my sister in law (she got a birthday whisper instead) and oldest daughter, who today got a raspy greeting instead. So I continue to resist the urge to talk, to sing, to cough, though sneezing is a different story. Really I don’t want to make it raspier by coughing so I have taken to sleeping with a throat soother lozenge wedged against the roof of my mouth with my tongue.

The downside – my teeth may be succumbing to acid decade from the lozenge, but I’m not grinding my teeth right now.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Garbage – or a whole lot of things that don’t fit together

It’s day two (sort of) of my vacation and at 5am I’m awoke and couldn’t sleep, despite having taken 9mg of melatonin last night. So at 6 this morning I drug my awake head and tired ass out of bed and began my first cup of coffee. Sadly I could have slept in, I wanted to sleep in, but nada. That folks is garbage. Yesterday morning, I slept in until almost 10am and then spent five hours at work.

Friday night we went to Ducky’s fortieth class reunion. I had a great time and despite me just about having to break his arm, I think he enjoyed it too. He’d gone to his tenth, but not the others. After all these years I was able to put faces with stories. After all these years a part of Ducky’s life was there to be touched, people to like, and missing pieces to be put into their places. It was a wonderful evening.

In my youth and early years I embraced change. The reality of me is that I like knowing roots, touching roots, revisiting roots and sadly yes sometimes I miss certain aspects or friends of my youth. In the years between I’ve learned that not you can’t go back, in reality I don’t want to go back, and that just like me people grow and change, but not at the same rate or in the same ways as I. Just a few years out of high school a friend and I met up for an afternoon together, we’d already both been divorced, I had a kid, she was still living the independent reckless abandon of a life we’d had in high school, each had a focus so different and the fit wasn’t the same. I miss her (and several other old friends), but we did not grow “up” together, we just grew apart and she will be a fond memory forever, but we don’t exist any more.

Miseray is getting married Friday to the Brit, after eight years they are doing it. I delight in the soon to be son in law (unlike the Bosox) he is charming, responsible, and touchingly human. He treats Miseray like an intelligent equal, all the while protecting her. I love him and thank God for him nightly. Pictures to come. They’ve been planning and paying for this wedding for close to a year and a half. It’s been a year and a half of battling her mother (whom is the definition of Trout Pout – without the plastic surgery and enhanced lips – really think down gapping mouth with runny lipstick- oh god the horror) who has tried to dominate every aspect of the wedding to her specifications. She did it when the Cat woman got married so it was expected. My contribution to the wedding is standing back and out of the way, to be a support system and give my love, I also made Miseray’s something blue – a blue pearl and opalite anklet and matching bracelet set.

Sunday we are taking Burp on the Rogue River Jet Boats. Years ago (and a different husband) we took Psam on the jet boats, it is one of my very happy memories of her childhood and that marriage. Ducky and I always try to find events to build and create memories for Burp, and of late I’ve been trying to get him to photo blog about various things experiences and events. His birthday is Wednesday so that makes the timing, just right. Tomorrow is his next mini swim meet, my first, I can’t wait. Hopefully, pictures to come.

In the midst of all of this I have been trying to ignore the status and bottom line of my 401K. Growing up my mother use to tell us plan for the future, there won’t be Social Security when you get old. Well SSI has been running in the red for several years and with several years to go until retirement I am glad I heeded her words. Now if congress would get out of politics and get back to the job they are suppose to do we Americans would be able to survive. But instead, they play their partly line politics and throw their constituents under the bus. Social Security is bankrupt and now Congress, with a little help from the inept folks at Standard and Poors, has destroyed the retirements of millions of Americans. Thankfully, my 401K is diversified both domestically and globally and I’ve several years until retirement, but what about those Americans who have been planning, saving, and looking forward to their golden years? They have been fucked by the system, again. Garbage.

Last week, Wienie Rat Face (as Natalie has named him) was sentenced to life in prison for a rash of crimes. Thank you to the jury and judge in Utah for dolling out (for once) an appropriate sentence, Warren Jeffs (aka Wienie Rat Face) will never see the light of free day again. The world should rejoice.

In high school history we are taught that empires rise, get too big (aka a law unto themselves) and then empires fall. Welcome to the fall. America rose from the clay of a new world with new thinking. America prospered. America got to big for it’s own britches. America is a law unto itself and we will fall. We have not learned the lessons of history. We have not honored the intent of our fore fathers. We have not lived up to our potential. America has stepped over the sick, poor, elderly, and down trodden of our country to help up the sick, poor and down trodden of the rest of the world. We have picked up a big stick and yelled in a loud menacing voice, “Not on my watch,” to a world that took with one hand while whispering nasty no no’s and taunting names about us behind the other hand. We will not learn before it is too late. I love my country, but to survive we need to take several steps back, regroup, rethink, and respect. We don’t need to be the world police, we don’t need to be the world bank, we need to take care of our own business.

That being said, Michelle Bachman? Really, what is the world coming too? Rick Perry? Go read Buddhist in the Bible Belt’s blog it was perfection on the subject. I hate the long political seasons and the one ahead of us is going to get ugly. I am sad that Obama refuses to grow a back-bone and stand up for the platform he campaigned on and that Democrats scurry like rats in the face of opposition. I usually vote Democrat although I am an Independent, I rarely vote Republican. Give me something, someone worth putting my vote behind.

Okay, I’m done, for now
Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: Way Safe… or so we think

Sadly, I’m in a blogging funk, what the heck is that all about? No inspiration, even with a topic I’ve no idea what I’m going to write about, nada.

This week I was blessed to meet a friend, a bestest friend, whom I’d never met face to face before. I met Rose through Psam, she’d joined Rose’s online poetry group in a now defunct universe of chat rooms. I love poetry, in the past twelve years I’ve written well over one hundred poems, started a going nowhere book, and then began blogging – and I met Rose.

Psam has long since moved on from poetry, but our small group of three (sometimes four or even a short lived newbie) continue to met on Friday evenings in my chatroom. As in Talk Thursday we have a weekly topic (sometimes that topic hangs on for a month – okay for a while we didn’t have topics) we chat for an hour or so and then we post for critiques and just the pleasure of seeing what everyone wrote. I write rhythmic (oft times metered) poetry, but when I write from anger or sorrow my poetry will move into an asymmetrical structure or free verse. Writing free verse really screws with my metered poetic voice and I will have to go read the entire Austin library to get it back, if that doesn’t work I move to Tolkien.

Psam writes dark poetry, Rose on the other hand was strictly rhymed poetry until earlier this year when both her husband and daughter died (thirty days apart), it was a very dark winter for Rose. She is now finding her free form voice.

Over the years Rose and I have shared the ups and downs of our lives. It’s not always rosy, we once didn’t speak to each other for more than six months, over faults on both sides of the argument, it was a very sad six months of my life. This week she became a physical person in my real life and the grin couldn’t, wouldn’t go away. She is the sister of my soul, a safe place when words need to spill out. She is my friend, she is so very much what I expected and totally different than what I thought she’d be (if that makes sense.) She is more like me than I would have ever believed. And she likes my poetry.

Everyone , okay a lot of people both questioned us meeting someone, in my home, who I didn’t know. But in truth there was no risk in this meeting, I’ve known her for so very long. It’s like when I met Sid, he’s the brother of my soul. Rose is the sister of my soul. I am blessed with my friends.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: How many times do you need to experience it before you learn?

Not many, I’m a quick study. And the angel on my shoulder is screaming in my right ear, “Liar, liar, pants on fire.” Ah, there is no peace in the world. I began my evening with half a poem and no blog for the week. I now have half a poem, some hefty frustration, and a blog concept born of said hefty frustration.

Several days ago, Artgirl blogged, and I felt the need to comment. She’d written something about Stanley Tucci, so I attempted to leave this message…

You're not even in the right age group for him to look yummy, but I am and you're right. It's the whole package that does it. Cute, witty, and silently hunky.

I typed in my google account ID and password and nada, typed it in again, and got a word verification. Now usually I love myself some VW because the words are hysterical and I try to make a definition up for the truly kewl ones. This time it was just irritating as hell, when it sent me back to the ID and password page, then to the VW page, then to the comment page with some inane message. I gave up, dropped Artgirl an email about her comment section. Then said what the heck and signed an anonymous post.

In all truth I’ve not had time to blog this week, so I wasn’t prepared when I stopped by Kristin (the new girl at Talk Thursday) to check out her blog and leave a little comment. Now I know lots of people refuse to comment, to me it’s my way of supporting the blogger. You get paid in comments. So after reading Kristin’s blog I wrote this comment.

Kristin,
Welcome to Talk Thursday, you are so ahead of me, I’ve yet to figure out how I’m going to address this topic.

I typed in my ID and Password and entered what I now refer to as, The Blog Spot Bermuda Triangle, except instead of my comment disappearing into some other plane of existence where I have to worry about breaking the time travel paradox if I want to retrieve it, I get the endless loop of revolving door form applications. Oh mi god, Betelgeuse was wrong, hell is trying to comment on blogger.

So I closed my browser. Opened a new one (because you know it had to be EI, not Blogger) and I began to comment again….

Kristin,
Welcome to Talk Thursday. I’m not sure what I’m going to blog about, but I promise I won’t put my finger (or thumb – gotta cover all bases) into the cigarette lighter.

You had to be there.And enter the self- induced blogger conundrum again. WTF? I know I can do this. Ergo, I closed the browser, opened a browser, and typed in….

Kristin, (poor girl is beginning to get a bum wrap and it’s not even her fault – Damn that Blogger) I’m not sure you’re going to get this comment, I’m having problems. Regardless, Welcome to Talk Thursday. Now to go figure out my spin on this topic.

And then it happened, the lightbulb when on and I decided to just comment with my name and URL… and so I typed in and clicked on comment.

Mut!% Fr!(%en (omm#&1 H#!!

Kristin, (honestly Kristin I know it’s not you, honest, even I have blogger) Blogger hates me, so I apologize (although you'll never know it) because my comments (although I've tried several times) are not being accepted by blogger. I now know how I will write this topic.... oh by the way, welcome to Talk Thursday - Cele

This time I just used anonymous and all is well – that is if you don’t want to include the fact that I have now not only stalked, but traumatized Kristin. Until the next time I want to post. So reality being as it is, I’ve no clue how long it takes a quick study to learn how to properly post to Blogger or switch to Word Press.

I do know that Stanley Tucci is cute, did you see him in Burlesque? Adorable.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: The Next Time I’m President

The civilized world is thankful this will never happen, but what if? I’m discouraged at the state of American politics today. Democrat versus Republican and the rest of us get run over in the process. I proudly voted for Obama, the sign supporting him in the elections still remains in my living room window, but I am disillusioned at his inability to stand by his “convictions.” I know a politician makes promises and I think they generally believe their promises to the voters they are wooing. But when the vows are said and the honeymoon is over then life and politics begin and promises are trampled.

In the battle between the political parties we are lost. Remember the promise that lobbyist would be banned from the Obama administration? I’d ban lobbyist from Washington DC completely. I would then work to establish the following:

1) A loop hole free, equitable flat tax
2) Work for welfare system, where recipients would have to give back an equitable amount of work for the benefits they receive. This would include serving on jury duty, litter patrol, day care, and weeding in pubic by ways and properties and other public services.
3) Remove the busybody interest of one American in another American’s life – to misquote Hilary Clinton “It takes a village. Who cares who you fuck.”
4) Cut off funds to ALL countries that support or are terrorist – i.e. Pakistan (let India deal with them.)
5) Better yet, cut off nation welfare. If we can’t pay our own interest payment how can we pay other countries?
6) Bring our soldiers home, put them on border patrol. Think about it, if the American Indians had better immigration laws we’d not be in this fix today. No it’s not their fault they believed our lies. Tsk tsk tsk
7) Better yet, if they get in, let them work by setting up a system where illegal aliens can work and pay taxes into our system, but are not eligible for support benefits i.e. unemployment, disability, or social security payments.
8) Confiscate companies and imprison employers who are responsible for hiring illegal aliens who use stolen SSI’s and fuck up the lives of hard working Americans. Oh don’t give me that, you’d be surprised.
9) Create a national health system that takes the power of health care choices out of the hands of insurance companies and politicians and places it back in the hands of the patient and their physician.
10) Open the forest back up to reasonable and sustainable logging.
11) Focus on creating and sustaining renewable resources and affordable solar power.
12) Force the automotive industry to move solidly into affordable alternative fuel sources.
13) Place both steep taxes on American companies that take their manufacturing offshore, and steeper tariffs on their products when they bring them on shore.
14) Remove the pork barrel from American politics.
15) And fill the friggin pot holes – that should put thousands of Americans back to work alone.
Drats, I know I’m forgetting an item or three. This folks is why I would never be elected… And Jen thank you for this topic, tooo enlightening and fun.

Sith,
Cele