Because some days you need a lil motivation to get you through the grocery aisles.

My friend and I were discussing the need to tackle the grocery today.  We have common complaints/comments about shopping.  I said that we needed to make a bingo game.  

Not everything on this list should be viewed as an irritation.  Some things are just common observations that both of us have.  

Zillow and The Lumineers: Did Zillow listen to the lyrics?

I'll say from the very beginning that I love The Lumineers.  M bought me Cleopatra, the special splatter version, the day before it was actually on sale.  I would see them if they came anywhere remotely within reason.  Love them.

I was surprised when I was toodling around the bedroom, folding clothes and the Zillow commercial came on.  A familiar tune came on.  I love the song Sick In The Head, but I also know that I have to pull it from my iTunes selections to play at work.  You see, they drop the f word.

As the song plays along and as people are considering purchasing houses, the words go through my mind:

People say I'm no good
Write me off, oh yes they should
F%$# 'em they're just sick in the head

They're writing my history
Think somebody should've asked me
Everyone was safe in their beds
Their beds

And I said

I won't live, won't live like them
Everyone, they're all seeing red

I don't know
If it's alright with you, but I'll be gone
A ghost will be here in my stead, my stead

And I said

I can't live life underneath it all
Everyone is older now and gone

I will not be here forever dear
So let's just make this count a lot in here

People say I'm no good

Just wondered.  Zillow, did you consider the viewers that may know the lyrics?

Dear Clothing Industry,

I have an 11 year old daughter whom I love more than anything.

She's tall for her age.  She's over 5' 1", which I might add is taller than me.

She is long waisted and the bulk of her weight lands squarely on her torso.  This is not a build that you consider when making clothes. Not everyone is built like a ballerina.

My baby is, well, starting to be a young lady.

When looking for garments for her the other day, I've found that she can wear some in the children's section, but mostly pants.  Shirts are too short.  They give her the Dora the Explorer (first generation) kind of look.  More disturbing though is . . .

. . . why are all of the bras made in junior sizes PADDED?

My baby doesn't need to enhance anything she has.  She needs to be a responsible young lady and to wear proper undergarments, but at 11, she does not need padding, nor does she need wires.  It took me so long to find proper items that I needed for her.

Pajama shopping was a hoot, too.  Children's pajamas are way too short.  Adult pajamas are basically, well, too adult.  I did track some down at Kohl's, but it wasn't without great pains to do so.

It would be great if we had a clothing industry that catered to helping our children to remain CHILDREN and not to enhance what little bits that they have.  I don't believe in having my child dress as an adult.  It would be wonderful if we had an industry who was willing to allow our children to remain kids.  Let kids be kids and not mini adults.  Allow them to dress respectfully, age appropriately and not suggestively.

Just some feedback from a frustrated mama.

Thank you for your consideration,

Amy

The Finicky World of Vinyl

We didn't want to pull that trigger.  We tried not to.  We knew that 1.  It was an expensive hobby.  and 2.  We didn't have a turntable.

Bring Christmas and my husband gifts me a turntable.  Turns out that I had put some vinyl on my list, but with the intention of collection only.  He thinks that it is insane to just own vinyl and knows that I'm not a collector.  I'm a user of things.  I hate having a ton of stuff just sitting around and, well, doing nothing.

Fast forward to now.  This was our first official Record Store Day where we owned a turntable that we could use to spin some delightful wax.  RSD was Saturday and though both of us knew about it, M worked and we were helping him with his Earth Day Fishing Derby.

I got a bit of an itch that night though.

"You know, I didn't realize that Slayer put out a 7"."

"I knew."

"Do you want us to see if we can find it?  I have one I'm looking for and we can stop tomorrow before soccer."

A little arm twisting :sarcasm: and we landed at our record store the next day.  Of course, they had what I was looking for plus a 2011 RSD PJ release.  No Slayer for M.  Bummer.

I went home and did, despite other people's choosing, spun my Citizen Dick (one side, of course) and The Frogs version of Rearviewmirror.

M did find his Slayer 45.  He texted me.  It was "cracking and popping" on the one side all over the place.  I did listen to it later.  It has some pretty intense surface noise, but it kind of is what it is.  The pull was limited to 5000 copies worldwide and though contacting the distributor/manufacturer, it seems as if there isn't a really great resolution.  He's received vinyl from this particular outfit before.  It had chunks out of the edges and a big scratch across "his favorite song."

He bought me the Jeff Ament vinyl and it's warped.  The needle rides along like it is on a roller coaster track.  It plays fine.

Surprisingly, my friend purchased a limited edition release that he waited months for.  It arrived and it had two huge skid marks.  They didn't play on his turntable.  They were replaced and since he had the extra, he asked if I would like them.  I said sure and you know what?  They play just fine without skips on my turntable.

We don't just drop the vinyl from the package and onto the turntable.  Nosiree!  There is cleaning to be done.  Then you have to flip the adjustments to make sure that you're running for a 45 and not a 33.

Now, M wants a needle cleaner.

We bought a record cleaner.  Works like a charm.

Here's the thing.  Neither one of us remember doing any of this stuff when we were kids.  We just slapped the filthy vinyl on the turntable, dropped the needle and listened to it.  There could be hunks of peanut butter stuck to it.  It could be skipping all over the place.  We also reached down WITH OUR HANDS and removed the fuzz from the needle.  You mustn't do that now.  YOU'LL RUIN THE NEEDLE!

Has vinyl equipment gotten more finicky over the years, or have we?

Please don't copy art and don't come into the gallery and tell me about it.

I had a customer come in with her friend.  We have a lot of different people come in, but you could really tell that these two ladies were not folks to generally frequent a gallery.

"My friend wants you to tell her who did a painting that she has."

"Well, that's not really our thing.  We're a fine craft gallery and a fine art gallery would be more the place to look for that."

She pulled out her phone.  She showed me a cock-eyed photo of a painting.  It wasn't close up.  It wasn't detailed.  I could see what it was but she wanted to tell me the artist because . . .

Wait for it . . .

She took a photo of the painting, then sent it off to [a big box corporation] and had a canvas made of it.

:tips of the head:

She wanted me to tell her the name of the artist of the painting that she has.

1.  It is not a painting that you have.  You have a printed canvas.
2.  You have a forged printed canvas of a work that you took a photo of.
3.  The artist would now be [big box corporation] because you STOLE SOMEONE'S WORK!

She was stunned that we didn't know, even though they admitted at this point that the piece was from an original that the one woman's brother had and it was from Washington state.

:tips of the head:

We're in Ohio.

I tried to explain that copying an artist's work is kind of rough for the artist . . . I trailed off because the ladies turned and talked to another coworker and listened to not a word I was saying.  A customer was at the counter.  She witnessed the whole thing.  She was appalled and was shaking her head in agreement with me.

Don't knock off artist's work.  It isn't nice.  If you do, don't come to a gallery expecting us to tell you all about the art that you just forged.  That is not cool at all.

No soliciting means no soliciting.

I came into the kitchen to do some dishes and I saw a flock of people canvasing the neighborhood.

Can I tell you how much I hate that?  I hate it so much that I put a sign on my front door that says, "No solicitors, please."  Because the Jehovah's Witnesses didn't think that the front door sign applied to them, they decided then to start going to the side door.  I wanted to make certain that it was clear that they were included in the "No solicitors, please," that I posted one to the side door.

They are very unsuccessfully canvasing the area and I saw the one saw me in my kitchen window.  She made a beeline up the driveway.  I thought that certainly she saw both signs.  She did.  She saw the front door sign and went to the side door.

Knock-knock-knock.

Really?

She caught me in a bit of a mood.  I opened the door a few inches and said, "No solicitors," and proceeded to close the door.  I did see the look on her face.  She was in shock.  Well, I could see her face just on the other side of the No Solicitors, please sign.

She made her way down the driveway.  I'm thinking that she may not stop again.

The drop offs come through our neighborhood on a quarterly basis.  This past spring/summer, I was outside and again, there was a man knocking on doors.  He saw me, made a beeline down my driveway and I said nothing.  I walked to the backyard.  I closed the gate and latched it.  He picked up on the hint.

I was out gardening and on the phone.  Again, I had another woman not care to uphold my wishes.  She interrupted the phone conversation because she wanted to convert me to her religion.  I kept the person on the phone, spoke with her a moment and said I wasn't interested.  She was strong in trying to give a defense for her religion.  I'm not telling her what way to believe.  I wasn't attacking.  I just didn't want her on my property.  She finally left.

So for those who are solicitors coming to my door:

1.  Jesus is our man.  We have religion covered.
2.  We have the cookies.  We don't need more.  If we do, we have a dealer.
3.  We like our phone service.
4.  We don't need your cable.
5.  We don't want your chemicals on our yard, even if you insist that we're "the only ones in the neighborhood without" because, well, that's a flat lie. Organic is the new green, after all.
6.  Our child may not come to your house for Backyard Bible Club.  We don't know you.
7.  We have a child in school and have fundraisers.  I'm not being cheap, but understand that we have to buy from her first even if you don't agree.  (I had a child argue with me.)

Stop coming to my door.  If I know you, come on in.  If I don't, please stay on the sidewalk.

To all of the college students complaining that they have class during the cold spell.

From the local university where K takes swim lessons:

Closing the University because of low temperatures 

Rarely does the University close because of low temperatures alone.  

The safety of all students, faculty and staff is our primary consideration in determining if the campus should remain open. No other factors supersede that one. If we receive information that weather conditions, or any other risks, pose a significant threat to the safety of our campus community, we will act appropriately and immediately. 

We serve a different clientele than our colleagues in elementary and secondary education. Our students and employees are adults. They are capable of preparing themselves for inclement weather and for deciding if weather conditions and their own personal circumstances warrant altering their schedules because of the weather. 

Second, we offer a service for which its students pay directly. If we close, we temporarily deny that service to students – including the many who live on or near campus. So, if our observations and consultations indicate that conditions do not present an undue threat to the campus community, we are obliged to provide the service that we have promised to our students. In other words, our job is to keep the University open.

 I get it.  It's cold.

This is the e-mail we got yesterday afternoon from the Director of the Aquatics Program:

Bundle up, bring your hair dryer!  We will still have our Thursday night swim lessons as scheduled.  Stay warm, Diane

When I was in college, it was -25 F.  (That was PRIOR to the windchill being factored in.)  Kent was the ONLY school in the area NOT to close.  Did I complain?  No.  I suited up and went to class.

Did it kill me?  No.

Here's the thing, you ARE in college.  That means that you are an adult now.

You ARE in college.  Do you know how many people would love to BE in college, but can't afford it?

I was reading through the Twitter feed while I was watching my dear child swim back and forth.  College kids were complaining.

It's ridiculous.  The university isn't watching out for our safety.   

If I wasn't graduating this spring, I would go to a different college that cares about their students. 

We need to text and e-mail the professors to tell them that it is too cold for class.  If we all do it, then maybe they'll cancel on their own.

Really?  You are going to flood the e-mail and text of your professor to get them to cancel class?  :tip of the head in confusion:  Um, aren't you a big girl and big boy right now?

Suck it up.  Go to class.  Wear some more layers.  Leave more time.  Skip through from building to building like I did.  You'll survive.  Look at it as the Amazing Race, only with this one, you get a degree at the end.

Feeding the birds, travels through blizzard conditions, a trip to the pharmacy, being ID'd for shoe glue and other happenings.

The soundtrack you should be playing for this particular post would be Joseph Arthur.  :)  Just kidding.  It's just what I'm listening to while I write it.  I do highly recommend it if you haven't listened to it!  

Onward.

There have been busy weeks and days off for cold and all that.  

Last weekend, we traveled out to Alliance to hand feed chickadees at a park there.  We won't be giving free press to that particular park because the people working there had the personality of wallpaper paste.  It was much like the woman we encountered when we visited the NPS Johnstown Flood Memorial.  There are few parks we will NOT visit.  The few we have marked off the list are those with people who just don't care about the people visiting and helping them TO KEEP THEIR JOB.   My husband is a public servant and just doesn't understand why people can be so very crappy in that job.  He is thankful every single day that he has the job he has.  He knows that in this day and age of technology, he's a bit of a dinosaur that can easily be replaced by an app.  (Not in our eyes because he is truly VERY good at his job.  Still . . . ) 

At any rate, we tempted the thick layers of ice, hiked about 3/4 mile into the woods and found the site.  We didn't find the human handing out seed.  There were no signs.  It wasn't obvious to figure out what was going on.  We went into a little shack that they had and we may or may not have helped ourselves to the trash can of sunflower seeds.  We went out to start with the feeding and a somewhat disheveled woman, looking much like the bird lady from Mary Poppins, came up with a reused peanut butter jar of diced peanuts.  (I really though she'd say, "Tuppence a bag!")  Instead she said, "Oh, I see you brought your own seed!"  "Kind of."  

You have to stand still with your arm out.  It seems silly, but your arm starts to hurt rather quickly.

My girl had her handful.

M was the first with a visitor.  It turns out that he would be the only one of us.  Those chickadees are quick.  Not the greatest photo, but it's all I could do!

You see, there was a boy scout troop that came in ahead of us.  Now, this isn't to say anything against boy scout troops.  The boys do great things and can truly be wonderfully behaved.  These children were not those children.  They were loud.  They were running around.  They were throwing snowballs.  They scared all of the birds away.  In fact, we moved to the bridge to try to get away from them. 

My beautiful girl here trying to be patient.  Neither she or I corner the market on patience.  

In other news, these were hand-me-downs from my girl.  They are just slightly big on me.  I just figured this might the place I state that we can no longer share shoes.  Girlie wears an 8 1/2 and I wear a 6 1/2.  These happen to be Keens that run a half size small.  With thick socks, the 7 1/2's fit my feet just fine.  Still, girlie has such big feet!

I admit that we gave up.  K and I couldn't take the snowball fighting and screaming any longer.  I looked over at her and said, "If that were me, my mom would have beat my butt."  She smirked.  The ladies standing somewhat within earshot laughed and agreed.  

Yesterday was our 18th anniversary.  We had plans to go snowshoeing at The Wilderness Center.  We packed up the snowshoes.  We headed out.  People kept talking about how cold it was supposed to be.  We had planned for that.  What we hadn't planned for was this.  

The true white out photo is on my phone.  I had to stop a few times, put my hazards on and hope that no one hit us.  This photo is the same one as below.  They would come and in a minute or so, the white out would be gone.  Still, the driving was nasty.  

Add to that that we were in -- Amish County-- home to the unmarked 90 degree turns.

Oh, yes.  The 90 degree surprise turns about wiped us out.  The road suddenly disappeared.  "Where'd the road go?"  I asked M, then suddenly I found it.  "It's a curve!"  The traction alarm was going off.  We were sliding.  I was hanging onto the steering wheel with one hand, tempted to shift into neutral with my right.  My foot was on the break, but I didn't want to slam on it and cause it to be any worse. There was one very small, low arrow on a sign in the middle of the 90 degree turn.  Um, thanks for that.  I didn't want to shift into neutral because I thought the traction control wouldn't work.  It seemed like we were sliding for minutes, but truly, it was only seconds.  The traction control kicked in and stopped our sideways slide.  We weren't head first sliding.  Oh, that would be too easy.  we were sliding sideways across the turn with my drivers door clearly where the front end of my RAV should be.  She corrected it.  She pulled us all around.  She saved us from biting the ditch.  :shakes of the head:  Wow!  We did have a nice day and I was able to buy all of my spices in bulk.  I found that my spices were old and frankly, some were dead.  

Sunday brought us negative temperature weather.  I guess it got to -12 F last night.  What are my people doing today?  Oh, they are headed to the Columbus Zoo because it is free admission day.  :shakes of the head:  They wore so many clothes that K looked like Randy from A Christmas Story.  They promised to be down there for a few hours and to head back up before the storm hits.

I have a cold.  It isn't severe, but it's enough to make me feel a little funky.  Yesterday, we were stuck going to the Big Box of Blue.  M needed his cold drug of choice-- Advil Cold & Sinus.  I pop up and asked the pharmacy tech, "Can we get some Mucinex with that?"  "You have to purchase it separately with a different ID."  I told her that I understood.  She laughed and said, "Not that you guys look like you are a problem."  "We aren't.  I promise, I really do have a cold!  Besides, my teeth aren't rotting out of my face and my skin is surprisingly clear."  "Honey, you would be buying generic in the biggest box you could and would be faking a cough."  (To note, I bought the smallest box of Mucinex that they had.)  So we suited up with our cold remedies, K and I perused the leftover Valentine's items for Easter egg stuffings.  (I watch what I buy, but the kids don't care.)

M threw some shoe glue into the basket.  We were going as a line of ducklings towards the Kleenex.  M disappeared.  It's okay, because I had to stand and patiently wait for the tissue display.

There was a woman and her 9 year old daughter.  They had the entire display either blocked with the cart or the woman body blocking the rest of it as she dug through all of the boxes.  She looked up and saw me standing there.  I admit that a cold in combination with a delightful case of PMS may not have caused me to give her the loving look that our Lord would have preferred.  I think she was struck with a sick look combined with bewilderment.  "Oh, I just don't know why but I just had to dig through all of the designs!"  I reached over, grabbed the massive 4 pack and said, "Ma'am, I just need to wipe my nose."  Grant you, they are the marbly ugly Kleenex boxes, but I'm going through them so fast that it doesn't matter as long as the box doesn't empty out at the wrong time.

We went to the cash lane.  We obeyed the sign that talked about 20 items or less.  The girl flagged us and our basket over.  I was ID'd for the shoe glue.  "Are you 18?"  I laughed.  The gray streaks on the top of my head might suggest, but I told her, "I promise, we have shoes to repair.  No huffing at my house!"  She did laugh.  Just doing her job.  I get it.  She managed to somehow overcharge us for Airborne.  She caught it and charged us again.  She overcharged us by over $9.50.  She charged for 3 packages when we got 1.  Of course, I didn't find that out until we got to the car.  We schlepped everything back in.  They cheerfully refunded the money, but still . . . Rrrr.  I know, I know.  It's another reason of why I don't shop there.

K had a "snow" day on Friday for cold.  I think that they called that one too soon.  I envision another "snow" day for cold this week.  Never mind that they have today and Friday off anyhow.  I see Thursday being possible.  Who knows?

Finally, my husband handed me a bag of chocolate yesterday.  "No, really.  I bought this for you.  Please eat it.  If it runs out, I promise that I can buy you more.  Please.  Have chocolate."  Bless his heart.

Be warm!

A social media reminder. Not everyone wants their children posted on the internet.

"You know, there are pictures of your daughter on the internet."

"There shouldn't be."

I was flipping through a few of the blogs that I read regularly.  One of them has an Instagram account block on the side.  I clicked it out of curiosity.  There was a picture of all of the children on the basketball team.

Were the parents asked permission to place the children who DON'T belong to them on the internet?  I wonder.

I've been asked.  I appreciate it.  I've also declined.

I've gone into this in a few different posts in the past.  Every now and then, I think that people need to be reminded that if the photo is not of their child, they shouldn't post without permission.

I had an individual debating my internet choices for K.  "You know, if you are on the sidewalk here during the school walkathon, that is public property and I can place a picture of your child on the internet."

"No, you may not."

"It's public property."  :add sarcastic head bobble:

"My child is not on the internet for a reason.  It is not up to you to place a photo of her on there."

Our internet opinion is that K's internet story is for her to write.  It is not for me to write for her.  I do not post her face on here because of several reasons up to and including that 1. it is my right and 2. she is adopted and we chose not to.  The internet legacy lasts forever.  That follows them to every school they go to.  That follows them to every job interview they attend.  Again, it is not for me to write what will follow K all of the days of her life.

We have to issue reminders every now and then to people at school that our children might be children of a custody dispute . . . and that we simply can't post photos unless there is a written permission to print form on file.  The school has their own and the PTA has its own.

Does my child play sports?  Yes.

Have there been team photos?  Yes.

Should people print those all over?  No.

Can they?  Sure.

Should they?  No.

Don't assume a group photo is okay.  You may have known the parents for years, but do you absolutely know what their stance is?

Not everyone is using social media.

Not everyone wants to.

Let's stop to think about respecting those who don't.

Stepping off of my soapbox now.

Sheets of ice and piles of Common Core.

Do you know how the runs look for Olympic bobsled?  That's the side streets to my house right now. The road is covered in thick ice, which has thinned in some places.  I have determined that people must drive down the road in a drunken fashion because you get caught in the ruts, can't get out and you shimmy back and forth until you reach the next intersection.

Nice.

I'm convinced that Common Core is going to kill us all.  I'm just saying.  It seems that the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing and the kids are caught up in the middle.  I fully understand that I sound like a broken record here.  (Let it be a record and not vinyl.  I hear that those things can cause injury when broken.)

You see, K had some assignments last night.  She may or may not have a math test today.  Friday, she was told it would be Tuesday.  Monday she was told it would be Wednesday or Thursday.  Last night she was told that he didn't quite know yet.

Excuse me?

So, is the test today or tomorrow?  M prepared her in the best way he could but she was also sent home with this insane plotting homework that had NOTHING TO DO WITH THE TASK ASSIGNMENT AND STUDYING FOR THE TEST!  It was busywork.  Why in the name of Jesus and all of his men would her teacher do that to her?

M took the math book assignment and the test studying.  I double checked the plotting assignment.

I had to walk away a few times.  The stupid assignment had at least 100 plotting points.  Rrrr.

It took me about an hour to check it.  After I checked it and admit that I fixed some errors, then she had to color it.  Rrrr x 2.

Wouldn't you want your students to be allowed the time to STUDY?

After winter break, the kids had 90 more days of school left.  Of those 90 days, 45 of them are testing days.  The remaining 45?  Those are probably freakin' test prep days.

OST.

PARCC.

MAP.

DAP.

The State of Ohio and the city that I live in needs to STOP testing the hell out of my kid and every other kid out there.  My daughter has learned NOTHING this year.  They were doing spelling up until the middle of the year.  Now that they are teaching to test, they don't have time to do spelling so they dumped it.  There have been no projects.  There have been no reports.  There has been no consistency with anything even in the land of general teaching.

5th grade will go on the books as my daughter having attended it.  She has had a small section on science in the fall, though it has a section on the OST.  The reading finally started near the end of the first grading period and that has been so swell that I can't even begin to express my anger with that.  I'll just say that gone are the days that the child has spelling, vocabulary, and constant digging into a story during the week for prep for the test at the end.  Nosiree!  Reading has boiled down to a semi-coherent multi-paragraph cold read with some insane questions at the end.  Social studies, when done, is generally just sent home as worksheets.  Health has only been worksheets and no in-class instruction whatsoever. Language used to be spelling and an occasional paper.  There is no book, so it's not like she is learning the parts of speech or anything.  Frankly, I don't know what the hell they are learning with that.  Then there is math.  The math review for the test at the end of the chapter gave a lot of things to review and very little of it was actually covered within the chapter or the text in general.

5th grade is one hot mess and it makes me mad that my child is caught in the middle.  I understand the premise of Common Core, but wished that they put more thought into place before putting it into action.

At this point, it is making our children dumber.  They aren't teaching anything of quality.  They are teaching spots of this and spots of that, but none of it actually coincides with each other making the teaching that they are doing moot.

Please go back to teaching my child.  Whatever you are doing now is not it.

And people wonder why I don't bother with high school reunions.

The party I attended last night is a big reason as to why.

The party itself was innocent enough.  A surprise 40th birthday party for a friend, given by her mom. Her mom is a great lady and just truly wanted to celebrate this milestone for her daughter because, well, her husband wouldn't have pulled together the shin-dig that she did.

I knew that going to the party was going to leave me out of the social loop.  I knew that going in.  I knew that though there were people there who I knew somewhat, I'd most likely be on the outside of conversation.

Yup.

My kiddo, ever the kid loving social child, went running and playing with the kids of varying ages-- most she didn't even know.  She's good that way.

Since the party was an open house listed from 6-9 PM, our needing to be exactly on time wasn't necessary.  It also didn't help that we got stuck in traffic on our way back from visiting Hubs at work and that I somehow had it in my mind that the party was going to start at 6:30 PM.  Turns out that when we arrived, my friends had just pulled up a second beforehand.  She didn't notice it was me because she was just thinking that her kids were at open gym and needed a pair of shoes.  We waited a few to come in.  I told K that we needed to let her be surprised.  :)

Everyone had a place to sit.  Everyone was chatting and getting along well.  It left me without a real place to drop in and slide into a conversation without looking like I was butting in.  I was thinking that K would hang around a few, but she was off like a bullet.

Drat it all.  I was stuck with no one to talk to.

Her husband came over and we talked a bit.  Someone else's husband came to talk with him.  He knows me, but his wife has kind of decided to not to speak to the likes of me any longer.

That's quite okay.  Allow me to share with you why she isn't a fan of me.

Pretty much everyone who knows Hubs and me know that we are Democrats and quite proud to be.  We are blue through and through, but respect other's choices.  We're not here to convert.  We're not here to pound you with political choices and propaganda.  We feel the way we feel.  Every now and then something will leak out, but we really don't share because my mama taught me never to discuss religion or politics.  It really is a decent policy.

At any rate, back when Barack Obama was running the first time, I had an acquaintance decide that she was going to have an impromptu play date at my house.  She invited herself and her children.  That's fine.  I thought for a split second of taking my Obama sign down in my yard just so that I didn't offend, but I decided that she invited herself and that it wasn't like I was trying to smear her in the face with my choices.  For the record, I wouldn't have invited her clan by, but social convention being as it is, I had her come on over.  I was being kind.

She pulled in and handed Hubs her keys so that he could move her vehicle.  Um, the last I checked my husband was not a valet.  She did it with such airs about her.  It infuriated him.  It irritated me.  Little did I know that would be the highlight of the play date.

I don't really recall what she had talked about that much while they were here.  I can tell you that as she was wrapping up their stay, she stated that she had to "talk to you about that sign in your yard."

"Okay."

She went on about infanticide and different other crap.  Since we had watched the debates, I was able to effectively and honestly answer back to each and every one of the accusations.  To come to my house and berate me for how I am to vote took balls.  (I'm sorry.  Not nice, but it is what it is.  I could be meaner.)  To assume that I was voting for a man just because he was a minority and not that I actually considered qualifications just stunned me.  She had come to my house because of the sign in my yard to get me to vote in the other direction. She knew it was there and she was on a mission to convert me.  Um, she did not.

She left.  I don't believe we've ever spoken again.  Needless to say, she didn't speak with me last night.  That's why her husband came over to talk to A, but never said a word to me.  Nice.

I told Hubs that I felt Amish.  I sort of felt shunned.  For the record, Hubs had to work late.  He wouldn't have wanted to attend the party (he's not a party guy) but he would have gone for me.

She had a few high school friends there.  One knew me and talked to me for a bit.  I pulled up a chair to the end of a table and ate the food that I had grabbed.  I realized that though she had talked my ear off, my pulling the chair up was probably not appreciated by the three other people sitting there who didn't know me.  Opportunity arose to move the chair back and to sit in at the table behind.  There I sat.  Rose, mama of the birthday girl, came to sit with me and talk.  I think she felt bad.

Cliques.  How magical they were in high school and how they always made me feel left out.  At 41, you'd think that I could get past that.  Nope.

Damaged goods!  Hi!  My name is Amy.  I'm a Democrat, an artist and in the past few years, my family and I changed to the Methodist church from being Baptist for nearly all of my life.  PLEASE IGNORE ME!  I should have come in wearing a sandwich sign, some type of headband with obnoxious things bobbling from it and one of those drug store cash lane light up necklaces.  And a boa!  I suppose that if I wasn't to fit in, dammit, I should not fit in ALL the way around.

I missed the boat on the obnoxious.  Drat.

The birthday girl came to apologize that she hadn't been able to make it all the way around the room. I told her that it was no problem.  She and her husband can't be the people expected to entertain me and my daughter all night long.  Grant you, K wanted to sit at their table and I told her no.  I said that would be rude for us to do.

So life hasn't really changed with the social aspect.  Good to know.  I still don't fit in.  It's okay.  I don't want to.  Just sometimes, it would be nice for people to accept you regardless.  Boy, we're going to revisit this subject again and again with K.  Maybe it was nice for me to get a recent example to rip the top of that scab clean off so that I can better relate.

Yuck.

I had to pull the Mom Censorship Card while waiting for my pizza at Little Caesars.

From Monday - Wednesday, I worked 12-13 hour days getting ready for our holiday open house this weekend. Thursday, I worked our Scholastic Book Fair from 7:30 AM - 6:30 PM.  Today, I worked the Book Fair from 7:50 AM - 4:30 PM.  Exhaustion set in.  K and I went to LC's for our dinner.

We bought the pretzel crust cheese pizza.  Yes, we also bought the crazy bread.  We were wild and crazy girls.  We had evening plans that involved pizza, crazy bread and some TV.

Since we ordered the cheese pretzel crust pizza without pepperoni, we had to wait.  I'm used to it.  "Hot and Ready" has never been "Hot and Ready" cheese. Since we had to wait 6 minutes, we opted to just sit in their tiny waiting area.  There were three chairs.  There were 2 chairs to the left of the door and one near the cooler, to the right.  K took the right.  There was a construction guy off to the left.  She left me to sit near him.  It's all good.  He was tired and quiet.  So were we.

They were busy humming along and making pizza.  They were chatting it up.  I was texting a few friends and so tired that thinking and typing were difficult to be done together.  The talking got louder.  Several words seemed repeated.  My ears perked up.

Are they really talking about that?

Nah.

They can't be.

I can't be hearing right.

Oh, I am.

The girl at the drive thru window was discussing periods, pregnancy tests and doctors appointments.  These things were not being discussed in hushed tones.  She kept mentioning "period."  She kept mentioning pregnancy tests.  Finally I heard enough and like sudden onset Tourette's, I couldn't take it anymore.

I leaned up a bit, the cashier had looked over at me and I said, "We don't need to know about her peeing on sticks."

"Well, she's not talking about herself," she said with a snarky, sarcastic tone.  Obviously she couldn't see a problem with it.

I looked over at the construction worker.  He looked as if he wanted to crawl under the chair.  The ongoing banter behind the counter was embarrassing him.

"This is stuff we don't need to hear and besides that, I have a 10 year old in here."

"Oh."  She was nonplussed by my Mama Bear Censorship Card being pulled.

The guy looked at me and said, "That is so inappropriate anyway, let alone wanting to look to see who the crowd is and to have a 10 year old sitting there."  "Good, then it wasn't just me."  "Um, no."

When we got back into the car, I talked with K about  it.  We've had discussion about menstruation and whatnot, but nothing like what they were talking about.  "Mom, did you hear that they were talking about killing or dead babies?"

"No!  Were they really?"

"Yes.  I heard everything, Mom."

"K, I'm sorry.  It was something that should have never been discussed out in public."  We talk about things with K.  If she asks something, we're honest.

So, have you ever had to pull the Parental Censorship Card?  I hated to do it, but I felt like it was necessary.  I can only imagine what the drive thru window patrons must have heard.

Why do people vote against safety levies?

We had a safety levy on the ballot.  It would have increased our sales tax by .25%.  It failed.

Our sheriff was quoted as saying, "This was a true need. This was not a want. ... "

A local resident had this to say:

"I’m against any more taxes.  They’re taking every damn dime out of our pockets.” 

My guess is that when that resident experiences an emergency such as a fire, rowdy neighbors, a car accident or a heart attack, they'll be calling Ghost Busters?  Uh, no.  They'll call 911.  They'll expect service.

There are many safety service levies in this area that passed.  There are many that didn't.  People vote against the levies, then complain that service is slow when they call for them in their time of need.  STEP UP, PEOPLE!  Things cost money.  Cost of living has increased for you.  Don't you think that there is a cost of operations increase for others?

UGH!

"Life Changing"

I just read a Pinterest pin about crock-pot mashed potatoes.  She said that they were "literally life changing."  :tipping the head:  Am I misunderstanding something?  I mean, I love a good mashed potato.  I've just never found them or the variety of other foodstuffs on Pinterest to be life changing or "a life changer."

What would life changing be for me?  Allow me to give a list of my personal life changing things:

1.  Meeting and later marrying my husband.
2.  Bailey.
3.  Meeting and later adopting our daughter, K.
4.  Being adopted by my then stepfather (now father) at the age of 15 and having a legal name change.
5.  The deaths of many people in my life.
6.  The births of many people in my life.
7.  The purchase of our home.
8.  To learn just this past week that the health hiccup that my mom had was just a hiccup and that she was fine.  Life changing?  Yup.  Mama is okay and I asked that she never smoke again.  She promised she wouldn't.  My life is changing because my mama decided to change hers in a positive way.

There are a lot of other "life changing" moments in my life.  Some squished up root veggies aren't life changing for me.  They are tasty though.

What is "life changing" to you?  Feel free to belt out a list in the comments or if you choose to do your own list of "life changers," leave the link in the comments so that we can come visit!

Confessions of a Germophobe: Ebola was in my airspace.

I live in Ohio.  I live in Northeast Ohio.  While I won't divulge my exact locale, I will tell you that my region is under the Ebola Scare due to the second nurse's visit to our corner of the state.

At this point I should tell you, I did not visit with her.  I do not know her.  I wish her well and pray that she heals and that her family and this ENTIRE community is kept safe from the scourge that is Ebola.

It is now that I start on my rant.  I'm probably saying nothing new.  First, my parents live less than a mile from her family home.  My father had a fit.  That isn't going to transmit Ebola to my parents, but it is a bit unsettling to think that it was that close.

The amount of information, conflicting and readjusted information is getting to the point where I almost can't stand to know anymore.  Let me start with today's revelation.  She felt tired and "funny" on her visit to Ohio?  Really?  So you are feeling a little punky and while that wouldn't normally be reason for concern other than figuring that you are coming down with something, she just cared for (heroically, I might add) a gentleman who arrived in our country, came to the hospital for care and passed away as a result of the heinous disease that he contracted before his time here in America.  Hmmm.  He had a horrible disease that he brought from a 3rd world nation.  That disease is killing 70% of the people who get it.  Could it be Ebola?  :insert sarcastic face:

I would never wish Ebola on anyone.  I feel horribly that the healthcare workers who did their best to provide care for this gentleman contracted it.  However (and this is a big however) if I had been caring for someone in his state and under such stringent biohazard needs, I would probably have-- let me state this as clearly as possible-- stayed home to monitor my health and well-being rather than go on a commercial airliner, TWICE!

Yes, I realize that she had permission.  Those people who gave her permission were clearly smoking crack.

We're talking common sense here.

This story is not really at all relatable, but it is the only relatable tale I have.  Let's keep it that way, yes?  When my people have something such as the stomach virus or even when Hubs had rotavirus, we treated the house as if a hazmat tent had dropped overtop and no one was permitted in.  No one was permitted out.  When Hubs had rotavirus, K and I steered clear of the bathroom, utilized the camping loo that we have, took sponge baths and all because until he was done, the bathroom was off limits.  (We're a one bathroom house and we made do with what we had.)  I then suited up, covering my face, and bleached the entire bathroom down.  It took an hour and a half and you know what?  Though K had it and was over it by the time we got back home from Chicago (oh yes, fun filled weekend it was) I didn't get it.  Still, we hung out until it seemed all was clear.  We returned to normal lives, but we had waited.

My point is not to say that the nurses weren't careful because I'm sure that they were and they worked with what they had.  My problem is that the nurse didn't have the common sense kick in to say that since she was still in the time of self-monitoring, she should have stayed home.  We have someone floating on a cruise ship with God knows how many passengers.  They are self-quarantined.  I think that is great that they are doing that, but WHY are they on the boat to begin with?

I understand that the CDC hasn't been all on top of it.  The WHO has also claimed responsibility in not tending to things as they should.  President Obama today appointed an Ebola Czar.  I'm not starting a political debate because that is not where I want to go and I have turned comments off to avoid backlash over the post in general, but why would you appoint a lawyer as a czar over a deadly disease situation in your country?  I'm sure that we have more than enough and willing medical professionals who could have filled that position.  I am democrat and proud to say that I am blue through and through.  :shakes of the head:  I just don't get that one.

We have a well-known bridal store in our area-- a mom and pop-- that is closed for right now.  Having worked in the bridal industry for years of my life, I know that October is like June.  Busy with brides getting married and homecoming.  You also have brides for other weddings, but it is a big, busy month.  How exactly are they going to be compensated for their loss of business?  Will people trust their business?

You have many workers that are off of their jobs-- with pay-- from companies such as the Cleveland Clinic, Metro Health, Aultman Hospital, teachers and at three schools, folks from an area utility  along with all of her bridesmaids, a few of their children and a husband.  Her stepfather can't leave the house.  Police are posted outside of their house.  Who is going to pay for the loss of money?  I know that a lot of the people are being paid their salary, but are they all being compensated?

Planes were decontaminated, but they are on a daily basis.  However, Cleveland Hopkins Airport was decontaminated.  3 schools were decontaminated.  I don't know what they'll do with the bridal store and the hundreds of thousands in merchandise that may be damaged in decontamination.  (They didn't say that would happen, but knowing the nature of the fabric and industry, I have to guess that is a concern.)

You have 7 flights of people that need to be tracked down.

In the industrialized world, disease knows no borders.  We can move too quickly.  Disease can, too.

We've had an all call from the school.  We've had e-mails from the superintendent.  We've gotten a letter with an Ebola need-to-know information sheet attached.

God bless, Dr. Kent Brantley.  He has donated blood to Ebola victims, but he only has so much blood.  When you have a virus, it knocks your immune system down for a bit, doesn't it?  How wonderful of him to be so selfless, but we can't drain him dry.  I'm certain that after this health crisis is over in their lives, the nurses would probably do the same if they could.

In sum and to clarify, I appreciate all of the work that these nurses did for Mr. Duncan.  They did everything that they knew to do.  I can say with certainty that they did everything that they could to protect themselves from Ebola.  My issue is with permissions to travel and the consideration to even travel given the gravity of what they had been dealing with and that self-monitoring hadn't been lifted.

I don't know what the answers are.  I wished we would have had the horses quite a bit of a distance ahead before this came to American soil.  We didn't and that is very sad given our nation's capabilities.  Could this be worse?  Absolutely.  Let's hope that it doesn't get to that.  In NE Ohio, I'm hoping that we all get to Election Day (and beyond) Ebola free.

Smile! A post about the church directory photos.

This week has been picture week.  K had soccer photos on Sunday.  I had to send her back up the hill because they didn't take her single shot, just the group shot.  Since I paid for it, I kind of wanted it.

Yesterday was school picture day.  K went all rainbowy and if I didn't have an issue posting her beautiful 10 year old face on the internet, then I would.  Just take my word for it-- she looked fabulous!  A 10 year old in her rainbow glory.  :)

Last evening was the church directory photo session.  M came home feeling a bit under the weather, so the fact that he was even with us was pushing it.  His coworker has been sick and though she missed a day, she came back to share.

As church directory photo sessions always are, it hearkened back to the days of Olan Mills.  When she had me to the hands on the shoulder thing I did comment, "Really?  :snarly nose:  You want me to do the Olan Mills pose?  I'm feeling very 1980's."  She laughed.  I wasn't being snarky, but I'm thinking that they need to update the posing a hair.  She did after that.

To their credit, they did take a few nice photos of us.  The time came for us to view and select and all that.  We got a free 8x10 and a directory.  Super!  We haven't had a family portrait done since K's adoption.  We discussed which portrait for the directory and chose the free one.  We decided that 2 additional 5x7s would be great for the parents.

"Okay, then that will be $70.35."

"Um, the 8x10 was complimentary, right?"

"Yes."

Y'all, it was $50 for the 2 5x7s and then the additional $20 was for tax and ship.  The last I checked, it shouldn't cost $15-$20 to ship two little 5x7s.  I'm just saying. Oh, and especially with the 5x7s being shipped bulk to the church and not to the house.

"I'm so very sorry.  I didn't expect 2 5x7s to cost more than the picture package that I bought for my daughter today that includes 2 5x7s along with 6 other sheets of photos.  I apologize.  We should have asked the cost.  We will just take the complimentary 8x10."

I felt bad to lead her on, but we couldn't have been the only people to have sticker shock.

I understand that they are trying to make a profit.  Good for them.  However, highway robbery was spoken to me many times last evening when telling people our story.

Eeek.

If you choose to purchase church directory photos, and I know folks who have, just know that they are going to be photo studio prices.  My comment to my friend?  "It's not like Lance Mercer or Annie Leibovitz came out and took the photos."  Now for them, $70 would have been just fine.  They wouldn't have made me do an Olan Mills, either!

The media and panic.

Wednesday, we had an episode here with weather reports that sounded somewhat like when the tornado hit Tuscaloosa.  Mom called and said that they had reported that those "in the downtown area need to get away from windows and doors."  Of course, that's where I was at.  I had just been outside.  We were under a tornado warning and so help me, I couldn't find anything that suggested anything that would spin up into a tornado.  There were no swirling clouds.  Believe me, I saw those above my house years ago when we got hailed.  Turns out that whatever they were concerned about over downtown blew and split and split again and dropped a few EF0 tornadoes just a few miles past my in-law's house.  Some roof damage.  Yards turned up with plants and trees.  No one hurt.  (The in-laws and their condo are fine.)

Thursday brought us the prison break of TJ Lane and his fellow inmates.  Y'all, that is 2 hours away from our house and though I realize that they could have secured a car and all, everyone was advised to stay in with doors and windows locked.  Bless the people of Chardon.  They immediately sent security to the homes of those injured or to the families of the victims.  But, we were 2 hours away.  Cleveland news was pre-empted.  They couldn't tell us anything more.  They just kept saying the same thing over and over.  By 4:30 AM, the three inmates were found and have all now been transferred to a high security prison in Youngstown.  Still, living in Lima or in the Mansfield area?  I could get all of those "lock your doors and windows" warnings.  Where did they find them?  Well, TJ Lane was 100 yards from the prison.  His one inmate buddy didn't even make it off the grounds and the other guy didn't get very far away.

As we were walking the other day, Hubs and I were talking about the state of the world and my theory is that it is all made worse by -- social media.  They were begging people not to give any type of updates on where the police were or whatnot the other night on social media because they didn't know if the escaped inmates had access to any of the updates and they didn't want to compromise the search.  Governments watch each other, made much easier by -- social media.  I told Hubs that I seriously doubt that world peace will ever occur again due to instantaneous coverage of "news."  :shakes of the head:

How often have we found that "breaking news" was inaccurate?  The Boston Marathon bombers were reported found by the AP and other news organizations far before it actually occurred.

The internet, news and whatnot can be a blessing.  We do not, however, need to incite panic and worry over states.  (Boston is not the story I'm talking about.  That was necessary to keep everyone safe.)  How do you feel about the saturation of news coverage?  Kate Middleton is having it tweeted that her shoe is falling off before it even hits the ground.  (A silly example that I don't know happened, but go with me here.)  Do we always have to know everything "as it happens?"

The difference between Target and Home Depot.

I stopped by the local Target store yesterday to hunt down some items that our fearless Santa Shop chair was looking for.  I was closer than she was, so I volunteered.  As I was checking out, I asked the cashier what she thought of the Home Depot debacle vs. how it was handled with Target.

"Target caught it in what, three weeks?  Home Depot had it happen in April, they are just announcing it now and it is a much larger breach than what Target had, yet Target was raked over the coals."

"Ma'am, you don't even know."

"I can only imagine."

"Actually, you probably can't.  I had people screaming at me and still do on a daily basis.  I was part of the hacking victims, too."

"If that is accurate - and if even a majority of Home Depot stores were compromised - this breach could be many times larger than Target, which had 40 million credit and debit cards stolen over a three-week period," he noted.

Why did Target get so much flak?  You can say it is because it was the height of the Christmas shopping season, but wouldn't we say that from April through September would be Home Depot's main shopping season for home improvement projects?

Target got a lot of flak for it taking them three weeks to notice/announce it.  Um, I'm counting up 5 months + with Home Depot.  Where is the back peddling with them?  Why aren't people up in arms like they were with Target?

I still shop Target.  I'm there a few times a month.

Will I continue to shop at Home Depot?  Yes.  Why?  Since our city tax information was stolen by Turkish hackers a little over a year ago, I locked all of our information down with Equifax.  No one can open a credit card without us being alerted.  No one can run a credit check, well-- not without our authorizing it with specific codes and whatnot.  We pared down our credit cards and took a bit of a credit rating hit for a while for canceling one.  (They don't want you to cancel them, but you can just leave them hanging there unused.  Tell me that's not an invitation to someone to use a dormant card.)  Our financial well-being is monitored.  You know what?  My friend who works for the Federal Reserve told me that it's just not an option anymore.  Cases like this will be the norm and not so much an occasional occurrence.

So, Home Depot, how are you going to correct the situation?

Because he won't let me throw them away . . .

These were in my laundry to fold this evening.  They have a large hole under the one cheek.  "Can't I throw these away?"  Well, you see what his response was.

"Just put x's on the legs like you do so that I know not to wear them to work.  I did once wear x'd pants to work.  S just loved it."

Am I the only wife who has a husband who doesn't want to throw things like this away?  I've taken to putting these type of garments in the kitchen garbage and then scrape dinner leftovers on them to ensure that they will remain in the trash.

They are breezy.  He could at least use them for a rag, but he will still wear them painting and mowing.  Ugh!

A small theft is still theft.

The other day, I confronted a man about leaving the store without paying for a magazine.  Now, that magazine is a local publication and costs probably $3.95-4.95.  I saw that he had it.  I saw that it had no receipt.  He had the front cover towards him, so when the cover tipped slightly, I looked to see if the price had been removed.

It hadn't.

(We always remove the price tags from everything we sell.)

He and another woman were leaving.

"Sir, would you like me to write that up for you?"

He looks at me.

"Your magazine, would you like me to write that up for you?"

He looked down, then back up at me and said, "No.  I already paid for it."

"Oh my gosh.  I'm so very sorry.  Would you like a bag for that?"

:nervously:  "No."

He left and my coworker looked at me.  I told her that he didn't buy it.  I called next door and confirmed.  He hadn't.  It walked out the door.  I could have gone out.  I could have followed after him.  When telling our bookkeeper about the issue I said that, "It wasn't worth getting shot over $4-5.00."

You know what?  That sucks.  He knew that he stole it.  I politely confronted him about it.  He lied and then he walked out with it in hand.

Probably 4-5 years ago, I saw a woman loading her purse up with shampoo and whatnot.  I went to the cashier and was talking to her about it.  The woman came up behind me with her cart so that she could quietly leave.

"That's her.  She has stolen things in her bag."  I blocked her cart from leaving.  The woman asked me to please move.

"You've stolen things.  You know you have.  You have them in your bag and I can even tell you what is in there that you haven't paid for."  She moved on past me and left.  What did the cashier do?  Nothing.  They did nothing because they didn't see her do it and since they didn't see her do it, it must not have happened.

People stealing things.  That's twice now that I've tried to stop someone and it was unsuccessful.

What's your thoughts?