Balancing

What if I had been born not very smart?  How would my life have worked out?  At least my mother’s push towards being a secretary (or at least having that skill) worked out for me in my life.  I guess I owe her for being able to type at least well enough to maintain this blog and do my work.  Little did she know.

I’ve been dealing with the return of the bad neighbor in these weeks since Ike.  Since my neighbor’s son and I interacted then, he’s come to understand that I am someone he can sponge off of.  He owes me money, but asks me to take him to get his check and then cash it.  He offered to pay me back, after having told me that he gave his father’s truck to one of his nephews while drunk and then having to report the said truck stolen.  I haven’t talked to his dad.

While driving him to work today, the son asked about when I have to go to work, in an effort to get yet another ride to the storage lot holding his father’s truck.  I’m not doing it.

On the other hand, I’ve gotten things in line so I can volunteer again.  I have a name and number and will see if I can just go play cards or dominoes with some lonely people.  Perhaps it could also be an opportunity to socialize Murphy.

It’s difficult being smarter than those you interact with and still stay there (there being where they are).

I’ve gone all retro — buying a turntable and playing my old albumns.

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Thanksgiving Success!

I took the Magimix3150 with me to my mom’s and when the rest of the family got there, had the help of my oldest niece in slicing the sweet potatoes.  The slicer blade is very fine — hardy chip level — and as I fried the slices in extra virgin olive oil, the rest of my family gobbled them up.  It was only three small yams — one was quite a bit lighter in color than the other two — but they made a nice pile of fried chips. 

In my mom’s small kitchen, I had to negotiate the rolls in the oven, the potatoes in the microwave, the yams in the olive oil and the the gravy.  I had layered the yam chips on paper towels, but by the time we were ready to eat, they were almost all gone.  Success!  The gravy even worked out nicely.

After dinner, my brother and sister-in-law went out to Micheal’s for some scrapbooking thing that was on sale — lots of drama about that when they got back — but while they were gone —

The nieces and my sis and mom and I made turkeys out of tiny clay pots and some very small pieces of wood.  We painted, we hot glued and we painted again.  Then we filled the little pots with Skittles.

And now for the state of relations.

My oldest niece has matured into a very sweet girl.  She’s stopped being a pain and has learned to help in the kitchen and especially with the dishes.  The other cool thing is that we had a serious talk about what books she bought with the Barnes and Noble gift card I gave her for her birthday.

My middle niece was hoarse from talking so much from a sleepover, but she wouldn’t stop talking.  She makes thing up all the time.   At least I didn’t have to hear about how that means she is lying this time.  She just has an active imagination.  I played along, as always.

The littlest one liked the yam slices I made for her before she didn’t.  She also liked the special eggs I made for her until she didn’t.  She didn’t give me a kiss goodbye.

She’s just growing up.

Thanksgiving Eve

I’m ready, more or less.  My youngest niece is allergic to almost everything, so I tried to think of a way to make plain potatoes fun for her.  My mom came to the rescue by saying that she had seen my niece eating sweet potato fries once.  I got some and will probably take the fantastic Magimix 3150 over to my mom’s and get all three girls to help me make them.  The littlest one also likes raw broccoli (say what?) so I got some crowns at the store, too.

I went to Petsmart, too, to get Murphy a harness.  He was a huge baby when I took him to the vet last week and the hand-me-down collar didn’t work at all.  The only made in America harness I could find was for hunting dogs and was that bright reflective orange.  I ended up buying him a purple one made in China, but I compensated for it (in my mind) by getting two cool rope toys.  They are made by Pet Carousel.  One had a couple of cow hooves on it and the other a cut of shank.  I also got a spearmint rope made in Mexico.  They loved them, even though it took Murphy a little bit to figure them out.  Once he had, he tried to hog all three (but not in an aggressive way — he just paid attention 🙂

I’m grateful for this long weekend.  Work has been hectic and just a little depressing.  It’s always difficult in the advanced level writing class when someone you have taught before decides that it’s time to start plaigarizing.  In trying something new this term, I thought I would be able to avoid it, but no.  Next week won’t be fun.  But for now, I’ve got four days not to think about it.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Barbara Bush is in the Hospital

I hope everything is working out well for her there.  She’s 83, so I think she’s had about enough time on the planet.

The Road

I had hoped there wouldn’t be a movie of this, but with the success of “No Country for Old Men” I half expected it.

Anyone who has read all of Cormac McCarthy must feel the same way.  “The Road” is brutal.  It takes the reality of “Blood Meridian” and applies it to our current situation.

Yes, I’ll go see it.  Viggo’s face on the paperback in the supermarket today sold me.

Hagel on Limbaugh

This is exactly so:

“You know, I wish Rush Limbaugh and others like that would run for office,” a sarcastic Hagel continued. “They have so much to contribute and so much leadership and they have an answer for everything. And they would be elected overwhelmingly. [The truth is] they try to rip everyone down and make fools of everybody but they don’t have any answers.”

I don’t have the opportunity to listen to even a tiny bit of Limbaugh this session, so unfortunately, I won’t be able to report on his reaction tomorrow.

Local radio host Michael Berryactually was a Houston city councilman for about 6 years, then gave it up for radio.  Another local host, Dan Patrick, actually moved in order to run for a Texas state senate seat that he correctly figured he could win.  He’s skirted the line on actually campaigning for himself on the air, but no one here in this state will probably go after him about it.

Mark Levin has been on the radio tonight calling a district attorney he disagrees with a thug, clown, dummy, blah blah blah.  Now he’s screaming about cutting taxes on corporations and capital gains.

Of course, the most glaring example of having the courage of one’s convictions is Al Franken.  I really hope he wins, but even if he doesn’t, at least he put himself out there in front of the voters and made it a race.  Can any of the other national radio talkers (or bloggers for that matter) say they have done the same?

I’m not sure what to do

Tammy’s new chemo didn’t come in yesterday.  The specialty vet pharmasist came out and told me she couldn’t get it while holding another pup who needed it in her arms.  She asked me how old Tammy was and then said the pup she was holding was 12.  Poor Tammy is maybe 5 or 6.

Given how happy she is and how crazy it’s been trying to get the damned thing that may kill her, I don’t know.  I want her to stay with me for as long as she can, but I also want her to be happy, like she is now.

I wonder if the vet could just cut out the obvious tumor and then check the area regularly.  Would she perhaps get better?  It’s so hard to decide what to do, especially since she’s just her happy normal self.

McCain Meets with Obama

Could he be SoS?

I’m more tired of this rumor shit than I am of Kathleen’s nonsense:

Did you get the feeling that this Presidential race was a lot like a reality show? But only for the minor players, because we never saw the reality of Obama or Michelle.

When did people become celebrities just for being a part of it? I saw William Ayers doing the morning shows to promote his book that he is re-releasing (which I would NEVER link here, and if you buy it I hope the teeth in your head rot out). Ayers knew that this was his 15 minutes of fame (without blowing anything up anyway) and he is taking advantage of it.

I’m waiting for Rev. Wright to do the same. Why waste your 15 minutes of bigoted fame?

Joe The Plumber said that he has received 2000 marriage proposals since he asked that one question of Obama. Maybe they had him confused with Mr. Clean?

Just kidding. I liked Joe The Plumber.

The reality of the Obama adminitstration is going to hit her like a bus.  I saw the aftermath of a bus vs. person accident in Mexico many years ago.  It made a huge impression on me, unlike some teeveee show.

I think Kathleen is disappointed that the rumors about Obama didn’t take hold and let her smear him anymore than she already has.

Still good for a laugh

Rove looking like he will live to be the person those who watched him on election night thought he was.  I didn’t see it, so when I read this, I thought, yeah sure.  He’s fair.  He’s someone who can give a good analysis.  So, it looks like he has turned it all around and now will be able to cash in on his analysis for 2010.  Obama isn’t even in office yet, but Rove is already writing the future.

Speaking of which, I have to paste her whole post:

The biggest myth of this election is that our country will be united under Obama. That isn’t going to happen. It will seem so because it’s our side on the other side and we won’t be making films about Obama while he is in office distorting his words and bashing him. We won’t be drawing pictures of him with monkey ears and calling him Obamahitler like the other side did. We won’t have people running up to Obama’s Sec. of State with ‘blood’ on our hands like Code Pink did. We won’t parade paper mache images of Obama and Biden in prison uniforms down streets of our towns.

And one thing is for sure. The classy and gracious staff of Pres. Bush won’t be pulling the “O” off all the computers and vandalising offices like the Clinton staff did. The Bush family won’t be stealing furniture from the White House either. You won’t have country music artists slamming Obama on foreign soil or agreeing with our enemies about how awful he is.

It will seem better because of the class of Republicans, but it will still be as divided because our ideology and vision is so completely opposite of Democrats and nothing is going to change that.

Given how long it took her to acknowledge material that she stole, I feel certain she won’t make a stink.  And who would she make it to anyway?  She probably won’t understand anyway.

That post is chock full of wrong.  At least she gave up her Chronicle blog.

Disturbing

Kids chanting on a bus:  “assassinate Obama”

A long list of racially motivated incidents since election day from across the country.

I’m not surprised by any of this, well maybe the thing about the kids, but there were enough actually interviews with people who felt the same way even before the elect.