Identify what is most important )0( Eliminate everything else
The idea that some lives matter less is the root of all that is wrong with the world. Dr. Paul Farmer
The suffering of others is not alleviated when no one knows about it.
There is no one right way to live. Daniel Quinn Ishmael
The only thing that you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right sort of people.
We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be. Kurt Vonnegut

Tuesday, March 14, 2017

weather

When you live where I do, the weather is a reliable source of conversation.  We often experience two or more seasons in a single day.  More likely is to have weather conditions that are close to expected, with the expectation that the usual will soon change to something else.

February was unusually warm.  Off came the winter garments, but they were not cleaned and put away for the next winter cycle because we know that cold and snow, ice and sleet and winter thunder storms are still on their way.

To no one's surprise, the icy stuff returned.  Up here we had over a foot of snow, although I think neighboring areas had much less.  I really do not know because I do not care.  Whatever wintry weather we get now is bad enough and it is irritating when the next city or county fares better.  The lucky and hated ducks.

Not hated.  More like envied.

Except for the pharmacy making a mistake in my medications and not being able to exchange the wrong stuff for the stuff I need, I am fortunate enough to not need to leave the house.  But, these storms have lowered the temperature and increased the winds so that this place feels like the inside of a refrigerator.  I am using the heat, but the drafts are nearly unbeatable.  Time to drag out the area rugs and duct tape them to the walls again.  All that balmy weather let me to roll them up and store them away. 

Just plain dumb.  I know better.

I have two medical appointments...plus exchanging the mis-meds...tomorrow morning, and I will be able to enjoy the sunshine, because the end (at least for now) of the snow and all that cold stuff, brought in a weather system that is relatively clear.  No more overcast skies for a while.

For now I am going to bundle up on the sofa, away from this corner of the house draft, after I put out some nuts and cereals for the squirrels and whomever can make it up to the porch.  Those critters have to be disliking this new cold weather more than I do.

This photo show the lie of the forecast for less than half an inch of snow.  It is just over 12 inches.  Winter wonderland my ass.


Saturday, March 4, 2017

no more cats for me

Cat sitting was wonderful, but what I thought was simply a return of my cough is allergies.  To cats.  Probably to other critters as well, but I do not have the funds to do all the testing and then whatever, if any, treatments are available.

The diagnosis of allergy was made by my doctor and myself.  No testing.  No extra money, no testing.  My symptoms meet all of the criteria, and since I have always had varying degrees of allergy to animal dander, and most especially to the proteins in cat saliva, it seems clear that being without a cat for nearly three and a half years has allowed my body to lose whatever tolerance I had to my own cats.  If you are exposed to your own cat, in your own environment, the allergic response lessens until you stop noticing the whole mess.  Decades of living with cats kept my symptoms subdued.

It just seems so unfair.  I know that I have been waffling about adopting another cat, and all my fussing about the hair shedding, but I felt that I would eventually get a cat. 

With the allergy issue, well, that pretty much eliminates birds, bunnies and rodents.  Testing would reveal is that is true or not, but no testing.  A tank of fish would be fine, and I like fish and would enjoy watching them, but I am sure that I would quickly resent the dedication needed to maintain healthy fish and fish environment.

So, whining and wishing officially over.  No pets for me.

I started volunteering at a nursing facility this past week.  I met the volunteer coordinator when she and her assistant were having lunch last week.  It is a place I go on my thrift shop volunteer days; lunch and then work.  The short story is that there were the two of them to wrangle and provide food for elderly people, many of them my age, and since I go to this restaurant every week, they know me well and allowed me to help the nursing home staff.

We talked a bit and I called their facility right after my own lunchtime and left a message for K, that I was interested in doing something there.  I met with her on Monday, right before my doctor appointment and she had a need for someone to teach cribbage, a card game.  I played it a lifetime ago, and said that I would try to teach myself to play it again.  K told me that I did not have to be great at playing, that what she really needed was someone to mediate all the fighting the cribbage group had every week.  Sort of rule-focal person.

I watched some videos on the game and knew before the evening was over that there was not any way that I could be fluent enough to resolve any of the bickering, which apparently became quite rowdy at times.

So, I am going to call bingo during happy hour.  The residents get to have pizza or some other snack of their choosing, soft and hard drinks and play bingo for fake money that they get to spend on some kind of thing, I think they called it an auction.

Yay.

I have two days where I have to leave the house, and once I stop being all cranky about having to actually leave the house, I am planning, with the help of nicer weather, to find at least two more reasons to get outside every week.  Four days out of seven is fine with me.