12/30/07:
Jay pointed out an interesting article in the The New York Times last month. There are many interesting things in the world and Jay points out many interesting things to me, but I don't get around to writing about most of them. The picture of the apple to the left links to an excerpt I did of the article, which talks about how very many different kinds of apples there are and have been in the world. Check it out. I am thinking I would like to try one of the ones tasting like roses, or maybe spices.
In the beginning there was nothing. God said, 'Let there be light!' And there was light. There was still nothing, but you could see it a whole lot better.— Ellen DeGeneres
12/28/07:
I have now finished 4 weeks in my new job— hard to believe. I am getting the hang of some of it, other parts are very different from any other agency I have worked for. Four weeks into the job the jury remains out, as far as long term staying power goes… The people by and large are nicer than in my more recent job; the commute is great.
Speaking of jury, I was called for jury duty in January, when I am out of town for statewide training. I told my supervisor, but was unsure any response was forthcoming. I wrote a letter myself, for signature and it did get signed. My duty was postponed until April. Will there ever come a time when I don't have to take care of myself? No? Damn.
A funny coincidence has reared its head. I have had problems, sometimes what I would classify as severe, with numbness and pain in the outer aspect of my left thigh since 5/06, after being on Lipitor for 2 months. Some nights when I rolled over on that thigh the excrutiating pain, worse than any I ever experienced, would wake me from a sound sleep and leave me exhausted for the new day. Sometimes my left thigh felt like someone was running an electric vibrator up and down it, although Jay could feel nothing. My regular medical MDs found this interesting but not worth pursuing because, when they felt my leg, it felt no different to them than the right one. However, they were very concerned about my elevated cholesterol. I tried three "statin" cholesterol medications, each left me with severe muscle pain, until I stopped the medications. I changed to a naturopathic physician when once again I was told they would watch the nerve pain, but suggested I try yet another statin to address the cholesterol. Hmm, disabling pain or cholesterol above 220 with no high blood pressure or other significant factor… time to look for a doctor with a brain.
I have worked with my naturopath, lowering my cholesterol pretty well with alternative "medications", and no statins. He suggested different exercises for my back and thigh, and agreed with pursuing accupuncture, massage and chiropractic, then had me get an xray when the numbness and pain did not leave. My xray showed Degenerative Disk Disease, or DDD. Interesting, as DDD is also the initials of my new agency, Division of Developmental Disabilities. See? Freaky. DDD is a fancy term for my spine being compressed, compressing my discs. In looking up info I discovered the most common age of diagnosis is 40, so I guess my body is actually doing okay, although it is hard to tell. Damn, seems these bodies are only temporary vehicles afterall. Here I had hoped for more… Well, on that note, more later. Meanwhile, bite the bullet, click on the eyes— they both go to the same place.
The really frightening thing about middle age is that you know you'll grow out of it.— Doris Day
12/25/07:
Merry Christmas, everyone. Today we listened once again to Jonathan Winters' reading of "A Christmas Carol" on NPR, gave gifts to each other and had a nice meal. Jay gave me a lovely necklace and earrings set and a set of tools for jewelry crafting (I make pierced earrings out of vintage screwback ones).
We had an enjoyable, peaceful day. This year, unlike last, I did not cry because my children did not come, or call. This year I wanted but did not hope. Not that I have given up hope, I still have hope for reconnection, for healthy relationships, for "normal" lives, but I have to be realistic about what is now. I have to take care of myself. So Jay and I had a quiet, pleasant day in each other's company.
I finished reading a library book this week, the autobiography of Edward O. Wilson, Naturalist. Mr. Wilson is a revealing and interesting writer, talking about his childhood and how he came to be interested in science and ants. His ideas seem unattached to any outcome except a search for the truth. In the process of searching for his truth Mr. Wilson upset both liberals and conservatives alike. I copied some excerpts I found particularly interesting— I found the book cover up to the left interesting too and if you click on it you will go to those passages. Check it out, they are interesting. Best wishes, Cindy
I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.— Jorge Luis Borges
12/24/07:
Happy Christmas Eve, hope you are warm, cozy and full of good cheer. My old friend Will reports his church "gave away between 80-90 tons of food to poor people. We also provided money so that every child in the elementary schools of our district will get seven books. Earlier this year we started a separate corporation to help poor people get free or very low priced drugs for their health needs." Good job Will. Meanwhile people celebrate Christmas many other ways— click on the caroler to the right for some "over the top" holiday lights.
Happy Christmas (War Is Over)
So this is Christmas
And what have you done
Another year over
And a new one just begun
Ans so this is Christmas
I hope you have fun
The near and the dear one
The old and the young
A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear
And so this is Christmas
For weak and for strong
For rich and the poor ones
The world is so wrong
And so happy Christmas
For black and for white
For yellow and red ones
Let's stop all the fight
A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear
And so this is Christmas
And what have we done
Another year over
And a new one just begun
Ans so this is Christmas
I hope you have fun
The near and the dear one
The old and the young
A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear
War is over over
If you want it
War is over
Now...
— John Lennon
12/23/07:
My, my, we do love pie.
State workers have Christmas Day off, most of us are working tomorrow. One of my co-workers, Kristine, said she would treat everyone to pizza and a salad Christmas Eve, another worker, Anne, said she would bring in another salad and I volunteered to bring in dessert. Yesterday I made some applesauce bread, adding walnuts and some chopped up dried figs Mrs. Becker gave me quite a while ago (I soaked them in some white wine). It turned out good. Today I made two lemon pies, one with meringue and one without, because I am not a big meringue fan. Both pies turned out well, so I am taking the pies, some of the fig applesauce bread and some rice pudding. I am eclectic, what can I say?
It's a simple formula; do your best and somebody might like it.— Dorothy Baker
12/22/07:
So, some of you know this story but I think most do not. I met Jay in October 2002 and we began spending a fair amount of time together. I knew Jay was a vegetarian from the beginning, and later learned many other things about him, including that he never adds salt to any of his food. This I found out in what I have thought of as an interesting way.
I don't add salt to my food much at all, mostly to sliced tomatoes or baked potatoes (interesting that both items end in "atoes", actually). One day in the first few months of our courtship we were here at the house eating baked potatoes. Jay had a combination salt shaker and pepper grinder like the one up to the left. I picked it up and shook it, took a bite of food, found it still not very salty, shook some more salt out, still found the potato unsalty and so shook some salt out onto my hand— but nothing was there in my palm. Hmmm… I told Jay something was wrong with the salt shaker, nothing was coming out. Jay looked puzzled, saying he knew there was salt in it because the shaker came with salt in it, just as it came with pepper in the mill. Hmmm… I looked closely at the salt shaker part, opened the top and pulled out a strip of white paper… Later I brought some salt from my apartment and filled the shaker.
Recently the old salt shaker/pepper mill bit the dust, so I picked up a pepper mill at the store and decided to get an antique or vintage salt shaker. I picked up the one to the right at The Red Door antique shop in Mount Vernon. I liked the ornate sterling silver top and the cut glass. When you turn it upside down and shake it, salt comes spilling out. It works good. Click on the picture to the right of our new salt shaker's silver top for a look at the whole shebang. Also, if you click on the picture of our old shaker above, left it links to the Cadbury drumming gorilla.
This evening I received an e-mail from my cousin Diane with pictures of her new granddaughter born early yesterday morning while Diane was visiting in California— great timing Grandma! Taylor Grace Fine weighed 7 lbs 15 oz and is 19 1/2 " long. Click on the picture to the left of Diane with the baby for a nice large picture of mom Sara and sister Shelby with baby Taylor. Congratulations and best wishes for the young family!
Grandmas are moms with lots of frosting.— Author Unknown
12/21/2007:
So, well, jeez Louise— where ya been? I continue to try to figure out my new job, but it seems more manageable now. It is clear that my new office is staffed by kinder, gentler people, so even though my new work is rather hectic and stressful, I feel less stressed overall. A good thing.
What with changing jobs in December, the holiday stuff has crept up and leapt upon me. For the last year I have printed out my webpage each month and mailed it to my folks, along with a monthly calendar with an interesting or amusing picture that Jay makes for them. Earlier in the month Jay suggested we put together a 2008 calendar for my folks using pictures of my choice. We got it together and Jay printed it up— it looked good. My mom called to thank us when they got the calendar, she said it made her cry, and I know that means it was a good present, thanks to Jay's idea. It is handy having a printer in the house. I got our family Christmas letter with a lot of pictures together just last weekend, Jay printed it and we got them in the mail Wednesday… I think most of our Michigan family will get them in time.
I was looking through seasonal pictures to use for this entry and I decided to check back on some old, previously used ones, running across some winter cartoons. Here is a cartoon from 2002 and one from 2003. I'm sure you have seen both of them before, maybe even recently as these things seem to pop up year after year. Skating Santa also has a Christmas message for you, just click. More, as always, to come.
Vitality shows not only in the ability to persist but also in the ability to start over.— F. Scott Fitzgerald
12/16/07:
At the beginning of the month I went to see In the Shadow of the Moon, yet another wonderful movie directed by Opie Taylor, otherwise known as Ron Howard.
Ron's movie is a wonderful review of the Apollo Program, including lots of old footage and lots of interviews with astronauts who are now quite a bit older. Their discussions of things like Apollo 204's January 27, 1967 fire in the cockpit killing all three crew members gave that history more depth. Did you know that mission was renamed Apollo 1 at the request of the astronauts' widows? Many lessons were learned in the development of the moon mission, some more painful and costly than others.
I really, really enjoyed the movie, see it if you possibly can.
Man can learn nothing except by going from the known to the unknown.— Claude Bernard
12/15/07:
Today I met friends from my last job, Anita and Kate, in Everett for lunch and coffee out. I last saw Kate when I left my old job the end of November, but I hadn't seen Anita for several months— she stopped working with Kate and I over a year ago.
Anyhow, it was great fun yakking and jabbering, enjoying good friends and good company. Now I need to get busy and work on those Christmas cards...
The picture of passed out Santa links to an adult-themed cartoon, beware!
Those who agree with us may not be right, but we admire their astuteness.— Cullen Hightower
12/14/07:
My entries are sparse these days.
Work this week was again tiring, if I were a bus commuter I too would need to resort to a device such as the lady in the picture is using.
There will be more later about all this, in the meantime click on the picture if you are in the market for a math job, or for a chuckle.
The one serious conviction that a man should have is that nothing is to be taken too seriously.— Nicholas Butler
12/8/07:
This last week was busy and wore me out. I started my new job Monday, with lots for this not-young brain to learn. By Wednesday I was pooped, but was offered an opportunity to attend TASH's Annual Conference Thursday and Friday. It was being held in Seattle for the first time in over a decade— can you believe that?
It made for a long week, commuting two hours down to Seattle and always longer getting back, for whatever reason. It was a great opportunity for me to learn a lot and meet quite a few people. Although I have had occasional clients with developmental disabilities, I have never worked exclusively with that group and have a lot to learn. The conference offered a huge number of workshops and some interesting speakers.
I really enjoyed a presentation by Sue Rubin, a severely autistic 29 year old college student. Sue's name links to her website. Sue used a keyboard setup to communicate, and it was extremely laborious for her to speak in this way, typing one letter at a time with difficulty. She had a prepared presentation to give us most of the information, however. Her parents were told Sue's IQ was 24, and they had no reason to doubt this. Then in 1992 a psychologist approached them about trying facilitated communication, but they refused a number of times, thinking it would not work. The psychologist persisted and they gave in, finding themselves astounded at the first session when Sue identifed several letters. They scrambled to get some phonics reading education set up, but before it could be put in place the psychologist called and said to forget the phonics, the teacher had just asked the class what their families liked to do and Sue had responded "vacation", spelling it correctly. It took Sue 3 weeks to get up to grade level in math. Sue told us she "wasn't thinking" until she started typing. Sue was gradually weaned from facilitated communucation and now types with just the assistance of someone holding onto the keyboard and setting everything up for her.
Another interesting presentation was about a program that takes disabled people on long rafting trips in the Grand Canyon, Right To Risk. A great video if you get the chance to see it. Friday's general session was addressed by Dr. Gail Christopher, Vice President for Health of the WK Kellogg Foundation. Dr. Christopher gave a wonderful speech, not always complimentary of our policies, our government, present or past. I wish our political leaders had half her vision.
Anyhow, a very, very tiring week full of interesting things, with more to come. The weather has cleared here, sunny skies and cold nights. Click on the picture up top of a frozen Niagara Falls for a You Tube video put together by autistic students, click on the pictures, follow the links... Take care, of yourself and each other.
I am locked in the house
of myself. There is no
Door, no key. I cannot
leave the place that I inhabit,
Until I am dispossessed.
This house can never be a home,
for here none may enter,
none may leave.
I can only sit by the window
and watch, and watch
life that sometimes watches me,
a peeping Tom.— Robin McKee
12/3/07:
Last fall I picked up an acorn squash at the market. We ate the squash and I saved some seeds for planting this spring. Our squash grew dandily, and the squash plant that sprung up in the compost bin grew even more dandily. Our squash have been mighty, mighty tasty. When we went to the Rexville store a couple weeks ago we took one of their butternut squash from the "free" bin, who can resist "free"? That squash was milder, less flavorful than our own but nonetheless I saved some seeds to plant next spring. It takes a bit of determination these days for me to save squash seeds because they are so very tasty when toasted as the squash bakes…
This last week I picked up a couple of squash at the market that were marked down (two for a dollar), since we were down to the last of our own home-grown squash. Saturday I baked a big batch of our favorite wild rice with toasted pecans along with four halves of squash, two from our last home-grown one and two from the market. The rice and squash sufficed for nice dinners both Saturday and Sunday. I saved seeds from both squash, and now we shall have a lot next year— three different kinds. Interestingly, our own squash was more flavorful and yummy than the market squash too. Jay is a good gardener, yes, indeed.
If you think dogs can't count, try putting three dog biscuits in your pocket and then give him only two of them.— Phil Pastoret
12/2/07:
Does anyone reading this remember the '60s? Oh yeah, that's right, everyone reading this remembers the 1960s because, well, because they can.
Jay has a lot of music on his computer. As I write this his computer speakers are playing Janis Joplin, a blast from the past. It is indeed interesting how cultural icons and events from our "formative" years, those in our teens and 20s, blast a lasting place in our beings. Have you ever caught yourself saying "oh, yeah, when I used to ___" and realized you did that only a year or two, maybe less? Yet here it is 30 or more years since having done or said that, but it remains part of your internal definition of who you "are". Maybe it is just me.
I was reading a bit on Jack Kerouac in the New Yorker today. I have never read Jack and actually know little about him and his "beat" generation. Although I was born in the '50s, my memories of that decade are a bit blurry. I found it interesting that, according to the piece, Jack considered "beat" to mean just that, a generation beaten down by war, the possibility of nuclear annihilation, and the ongoing cold war. And here all these years I had thought of Maynard G. Krebs, "The G. stands for Walter", when I thought of beatniks. "Like What?" I liked him as Gilligan too.
So much for the oh-so-far-away 1950s. Like I said, does anyone remember the 1960s? Yeah, I thought you might. Those lazy, hazy days when someone cared that the last couple of windows on the bus were always where the "negroes" looked out. It was quite a decade, although sometimes hard to say just why. What were the '60s about mama? Lord, I don't know honey, it was just quite a decade…
Tom Brokaw thinks the greatest generation has come and gone. Wow man, if that is so we are all screwed. No, wait, maybe there is no greatest generation. Maybe we are all one. And maybe I do remember something from those '50s and '60s.
There is no more important decade than the present one. As Jay points out, we always think the "Golden Age" is in the past. He is right. Same as it always has been: today is made up of the past and it is where the future is made. You are part of and determine the future. Keep on trucking, it is the only way to go.
Throughout our lives, we see in the mirror the same innocent trusting face we have seen there since childhood.— Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960
12/1/07:
In the news of late has been talk of eliminating the Don't ask, don't tell US military policy put in place in 1993. The radio report today said the move was supported by Democrats and not supported by Republicans. Guess that makes sense, duh, given that so many high-ranking Republicans have never served, and so many that make the news certainly wouldn't want to be "asked"…
Hypocrites kick with their hind feet while licking with their tongues.— Russian Proverb
Jardot's World: December Edition, 2007
All pictures on my page link to somewhere... go ahead, click!
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