Nov 19 2007, 08:12 AM

Little Tykes.com is the place to buy your Christmas toys this year. No Chinese crap. Buy USA!!!!!!! Support our country!!!!! Safe toys for our kids, made right here in the good ole USA!!!!!
Permalink | Comments: 0



moiraine Collage 1997

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 18 2007, 03:36 PM



I found this old poster today that I made in 1997. I did the best I could to get a nice clear picture. This is the kind of person I was 10 years ago. That person is gone now, but sometimes I look back. I look at myself now as I am, and shake my head sadly. You can see I was into spirituality, women's issues, Sarah Mclachlan, Enya, angels and fairies, as well as earth based religions. What can I say
Permalink | Comments: 0



moiraine All Americans Are Not Wealthy

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 18 2007, 10:48 AM

This is for the people of the world who think all American people are rich, live in huge beautiful homes, drive huge gas-guzzling cars and live like all the advertising people on TV want you to think. You guys just see the tip of a gigantic iceberg, the wonderful pie-in-the-sky tip. In every country on this planet there are two classes: the extremely wealthy and the extremely poor. It's like that here in the US as well. I am sick of hearing how all Americans are feasting when the rest of the world has nothing, how we are all big and fat because we eat the best of food, how we have the best of everything at the world's expense.

This story was in my Sunday paper. It is long, I don't expect everyone to read it but it's just that what's in this article has been happening all along, but now it's getting much worse and winter hasn't even started yet. I am not complaining here at all. I'm just hoping when other countries say we have everything, they realise that is only applying to the very few at the top of the food chain.

BTW most Americans are huge and fat because you eat what you can afford. It's no great suprise that the cheapest food is the most fattening. Think Ramen noodles, cheap junk food and white bread and sugary drinks.




01:00 AM EST on Sunday, November 18, 2007

By Karen Lee ZinerJournal Staff Writer


In September, well before the holiday season got under way, a new statewide "211" phone referral line for social services logged 9,300 calls that overwhelmingly reflected desperation. Families stranded on the streets. Tenants evicted by foreclosures. People forced to choose between medication and food, or food and fuel.

On Thursday, "someone called to say they had a week-old infant and a 15-month-old child, and nowhere to go," said Courtney Smith, one of a dozen information specialists who handle calls on the 211 line operated out of Crossroads Rhode Island and paid for by the United Way of Rhode Island. "They were homeless."

Several days prior, "we collectively received calls from people who shared one apartment house. All had paid their rent, and it turned out their landlord had picked up and left. They had no utilities, no water and nowhere to go. The house had been foreclosed upon."

Social-service advocates predict that a potentially disastrous confluence of events is going to make things worse, from record heating-oil costs and record foreclosures to spikes in gas prices, diminished childcare availability, lack of affordable housing, slashed state spending, a soaring state budget deficit and a squeeze on philanthropic giving.

Add to that a soon-to-be released study by the Poverty Institute of Rhode Island at Rhode Island College that cites a slight decline in the state's median wage, says Kate Brewster, the agency's executive director.

"I can't even begin to tell you how depressing it is right now," said Anne M. Nolan, president of Crossroads in Providence, a nonprofit agency whose many services include crisis intervention, housing, health care and vocational training.

Since January, Nolan said, "we've seen a 21-percent increase in the number of homeless adults" from last year. Owing to budget cuts and demand pressures, Crossroads is heading into its 2008 budget "with the worst deficit we've ever had."

Nolan also said the agency is beginning to feel the impact of record foreclosures in Rhode Island. During the second quarter of this year, 8 out of every 1,000 mortgages fell into foreclosure, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

"We are seeing people who are renting in properties that are being foreclosed upon. When they rent it's very different. A landlord will say, 'I'm being foreclosed on — you've got to get out.' " When they leave, "we see the trickle-down effect," Nolan said.

A CASE IN POINT is that of Ameena Gatlin, who was evicted last month from a Central Falls apartment after the city condemned it. Foreclosure proceedings may have figured into the equation.

Gatlin, 26, said she and a friend shared the $600-a-month apartment until things went awry in October and they began receiving notices of a water shutoff.

According to Gatlin, when the landlord — Peter Kaczmarzyk of Warwick — came to collect October rent, he said he was unaware of a pending water shutoff. Subsequently, Gatlin said, "he came and said he spoke to the water company and that 'everything's OK.' We were all under the impression it was not going to be shut off. We all paid him rent."

Then the water was shut off and tenants were without it for a week until the Fire Department brought some, she said.

City officials confirmed last week that they condemned and boarded the building in question — 144 Central St. — after police investigated a complaint about a chained animal, and found animal and human feces scattered through the house, as well as roaches.

Gatlin said the police came on Oct. 20, "and told us the whole house is uninhabitable, and we had two hours to get out. We all had pets. We took what we could carry, and then we left." When she and her roommate went to City Hall after their eviction, "we found out the bank had foreclosed on the house."

Gatlin also said that only one of about nine tenants got rent back from the landlord. Others were unable to reach him: a police report cites the same difficulty.

The city assessor's office could not confirm that the building was actually in foreclosure when it was condemned, but the Pawtucket Times on Friday ran a legal notice of foreclosure: the property is up for auction on Dec. 7.

Reached by phone on Thursday, Kaczmarzyk called the situation "a private matter."

He said it was "not the case" that tenants were not repaid their rent. "Everything was pretty much squared away. Everything. I got hold of everybody. Everyone is informed," he said.

For Gatlin, things got worse. When she called her boss to say she was homeless, "they told me they were not putting me back on the schedule," she said. She and her friend lived at Amos House shelter for weeks before the Blackstone Valley Community Action Program helped them get another apartment. She is still without a job.

Cases like Gatlin's appear to be the early squalls in a chilling forecast issued by many social-service advocates. They report increased requests for help with food and fuel oil, increased homelessness, shelter space at capacity and donations in decline.

"It's going to be a disastrous winter," says Henry Shelton, coordinator of the George Wiley Center, an antipoverty agency.

Shelton, a fixture in the fight against utility shutoffs, said he learned last week "that National Grid broke an all-time record for shutoffs [with] almost 30,000." (See related story). He said he takes particular exception since the governor and legislators stripped $15 million from a new fuel-assistance program this year and put the program on hold for at least 18 months.

He intends to raise these issues when he visits Governor Carcieri's office tomorrow to deliver signed "letters of conscience" from religious leaders urging the state to restore utility service to all residents who have lost heat or electricity due to nonpayment.

Brewster, of the Poverty Institute, said her agency is set to release a study of the state of working Rhode Island that shows a slight decline in the median wage. Rhode Island "is the only state in New England to experience an actual decline in our median wage since 2000," she said.

Eileen Hayes, executive director of Amos House in Providence, said "it's already been a bad fall for Amos House" and predicts that the winter will be equally bad..

"The nonprofits are left trying to be the safety net for all the people trying to come to us, because the system is not working. It's no different than it always has been," she said.

Hayes said the new 211 clearinghouse number — similar to the 911 emergency line and accessible from any phone — has brought "a bombardment" of calls that Amos House cannot keep up with because it, too, lacks money. The nonprofit agency's many services include shelter, a soup kitchen, job training and referrals.



Tony Maione, president of the United Way of Rhode Island, joined the chorus of gloomy predictions.

"Think about it; it's more expensive to keep your household going; it's more expensive to go to work," said Maione. "You may have lost some daycare support from last year, which was provided to help people go to work. You're paying $2.89 [a gallon] for fuel oil at home, and $3.15 at the pump.

"So all of this kind of comes together and puts tremendous stress on families and households. If you're on the edge to start with, you could be really in trouble."

Andrew Schiff, executive director of the Rhode Island Community Food Bank, said he believes that the demand for emergency food, particularly at food pantries and soup kitchens, is going to rise.

(Food Bank spokesman Michael Cerio estimates that the agency's average distribution of 700,000 to 720,000 pounds of food per month will grow by 10 percent or more as the holidays, and winter, begin.

Said Schiff, "I think that the increase in costs of heating oil, which has doubled since 2002," will mean that people "are literally deciding between paying the heating-oil bill or having enough money to buy groceries. It's going to drive more people to emergency food programs."

Jamie Cassidy, state social worker director for the Salvation Army, said fuel-oil requests are up significantly, and "we've also seen an extreme need in food assistance."

Cassidy also reported that the level of donations for Thanksgiving baskets "has not even been close to what it was last year at this time" in the collection bins at Shaw's supermarkets.

Lorraine Burns, who has operated a food pantry at St. Teresa's Church in the Olneyville section of Providence for 12 years, said she is now seeing "about 600 people a month, and it's going up."

"They're concerned about heating, or eating," said Burns. "And for the elderly, it's not only 'heat or eat,' it's medication. They're taking their medication every three days, instead of daily. It's a horror show."

Burns said she is joining Henry Shelton of the George Wiley Center in the quest to get people's utilities restored by Thanksgiving.

"If you don't look into that person's eyes, and see that person's hungriness and homelessness, then you don't see it," said Burns. And of those people who turn away, she added, "If they don't see it, they don't care about it. It's not affecting them."







Permalink | Comments: 3



moiraine Exercise In Futility

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 12 2007, 09:23 AM

I've been thinking some things over here lately, kinda feeling sorry for myself. Seems like whatever I take up turns to $hit. Every time I raise my head up to try something else, against my better judgement. You know how it is when everytime you try something, and it fails, after a while you give up.

Social Security sent me a letter on Friday saying they turned down my application for disability. I am resigned to that because everybody says it takes 3 tries and you have to get a lawyer somewhere along the way. So I have to drag myself up to fight The Government again, because I need the money and the insurance. I paid my insurance a few days late and they cut off my medication coverage until they received the money. I had called for a couple of refills at the drugstore and they called me back to say I had no coverage. After a week or so the coverage was restored. I don't know how I will raise the $370 this month. I get $105/week for my part-time job. Like I said, I am losing the fight here.

DH got laid off the end of October and is waiting for his papers to come in, so he can fill them out and send them on so he can get his cheques. I applied for partial unemployment just in case. The jury is still out on if they will send me any money or not.

For those of you applying for Unemployment, it is an exercise in futility. You can't get thru on the phone. I tried and was asked what letter my last name started with. They told me to call back on a certain day. When I did, I wasted over 1/2 an hour of my cell phone minutes, only to get cut off when they were connecting me to a human being. I cried. You have to apply for everything online. You get answers there, they will send you an email if you email them a question.

So far, they told me a week ago DH's papers were in the mail. Saturday after the mail ran I sent them a message asking where they were. They will be open tomorrow, lets see what happens. Meanwhile DH (who is 67) remembers the days when you went to the office to sign up, spoke to a person, put in your waiting period and got your cheque a week later. I tell him it is all changed for the worse now but he doesn't understand.

Else for me, because my application was unclear they called me October 30 (after setting up a date by letter that they would call me between 1-3pm.) They told me to get my med nurse to send them a fax telling them why I could only work part time. After a week I messaged them to ask if they got the fax yet. They did and they have to make a decision on whether I am entitled to anything or not.

I feel very discouraged, yet I have to make another stab at The Government. Tomorrow straight from work I am going to the Social Security office and sign up for my appeal. I will ask if the officer who dealt with me before, will see me again. Then I go home and wait for a letter telling me the date and time for an appointment.

Meantime, I will call my med nurse and see if I can get some more samples of pills to keep me going a little while longer. She told me all I had to do was ask. Then I want to get $20 and go see my Pdoc and see if he will give me some samples. He gives me whatever he has that I take. You know, I never ask for samples unless I have a hard time paying.
A month of generics is $15 deduction, and then the brand names are $25 deduction. If I lose my insurance entirely I might as well hang it all up. The money I could save by getting samples, I could save for the insurance. It's so confusing.Because I take 10 different kinds of pills, this is a constant worry to me.

It seems like life nowadays is one long petition for this or that. I don't think it will get any better anytime soon
Permalink | Comments: 4



moiraine The Songs Of My Life......1969

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 9 2007, 06:22 PM


This was my second year in high school, and I was 14. I wasn't a very outgoing person. I did a lot of reading, studied and did my homework, and listened to the radio. I am not sure, but I think it was this year that they added FM to the radio stations. All music and no announcer and other stupid s***. I had a diary like most other girls my age.And I was still a very dreamy, far away person especially when I thought about "my crush." Anyway, the songs. While I liked almost everything they had on the charts, these are the songs that I considered "my songs of 1969"

AQUARIUS.....5th Dimension
This was a popular song in school that we all knew. When I have nothing else to do, I "play" music in my mind. I did a lot of this in the school bus because my ride was almost an hour long. Needless to say, I day-dreamed a lot as well. This is one of my "in my head" songs

SUGAR SUGAR.........The Archies
This is a fun, fun song. I had a ton of comic books and one of my favourites was "Archie" so it was cute to hear them on Saturday cartoons playing this song.

LOVE THEME FROM ROMEO AND JULIET.........Harry Mancini and his orchestra
This is the one made in 1968 with Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey. We had to go and see this as a field trip because we were doing "Romeo and Juliet" in English Lit.
I visualized myself as Juliet for a long time. It was nice to be beautiful, even if it was in my imagination.

SWEET CAROLINE.......Neil Diamond
Another catchy song "in my head" for my long bus ride.

GOOD MORNING STARSHINE.....Oliver
I just LOVED this song. The name itself was sparkly and magical and it was another song to add to my "day-dreamy" list.

GALVESTON....... Glen Campbell
I loved Glen Campbell (he was so good-looking!) and all his songs. This was "unrequited love" something I was very used to. This song still touches me today and I like to sing to it if I hear it on the radio.

THIS GIRL'S IN LOVE WITH YOU......Dionne Warwick
Are you seeing a common thread here. I was down with all the drippy love songs and I had plenty of school girl imagining with them. I was very sheltered and had never been out with any boys. Not like the girls today who know more than I ever know by the time they are 12 or 13.....

THIS GIRL IS A WOMAN NOW.........Gary Puckett and the Union Gap
Remember this group from 1968. If only "my crush" would notice me, I could sing this with some conviction *at least that's the way I thought then as I gazed out my window at the full moon*

HOOKED ON A FEELING.........BJ Thomas
Another schoolgirl song that played in my head as I rode the school bus

WEDDING BELL BLUES......5th Dimension
All the girls in my group sang this with some longing because all of us wanted to get the big engagement diamond and have a great big wedding with tons of attendants and take vows with our crush-of-the-moment. Funny how I can still put myself in the moment of those days when I remember these songs.

PUT A LITTLE LOVE IN YOUR HEART......Jackie DeShannon
This is a 60's "love can conquer the planet" songs. Also, the one time I was actually in W's (as I will call my 4 year crush now) house this song was playing. It was the Youth Group again, and we were invited there by his mother for supper. Now you have yo understand. I passed this house every day in my bus. It was perched high on a hill and I always looked, just to see if I could see W outside, or even any one of his family. I can't remember much about that afternoon except that I was thrilled to see what W saw everyday in his house, and touch things that he had touched. I had it REALLY BAD I can tell you! I remember peeling the skins off boiled potatoes with everybody else, to be made into potato salad. Somebody should have given me a good shaking in those days. I must have made a real pest of myself.

Well this is enough for now. As I said, there were many good songs that year, but these are the ones that really stuck with me.
Permalink | Comments: 0



moiraine Looking Back In My Life~"my Songs"

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 7 2007, 04:55 PM

I have always wanted to make a list of the songs that have made a difference in my life, one way or the other, and things that happened that I associate with these songs. I will start with high school, when I was 13, 1968.
Looking back on the pop charts, I knew, sang or heard of all the songs at one time or the other. The songs that stayed with me the most were the love-type, kind of innocent songs, or the songs we sang in school, among the girls, that kind of thing. I was a very shy person with little esteem, made worse by a very bad case of chicken pox that left marks all over my face. To make it worse, acne also set in and I was plagued with this all thru high school. There was a boy I had the greatest crush on for four years but he hardly paid any attention to me at all. I kinda stalked the poor thing. I watched him where ever he went and wanted to be wherever he was. To show you how bad I had it, I got hold of one of his note-books and a comb of his in my second year. I am embarrassed to say, I slept with this comb and sniffed it, just to smell the stuff he used on his hair. Maybe if he had ever paid attention to me, I might have gone away, who knows. So I stayed in a rosy cloud of "never-never land" and the songs I loved suited how I felt.

Songs I had to know that were popular in school at this time:

SITTIN' ON THE DOCK OF THE BAY.......Otis Redding
HARPER VALLEY PTA.........Jeannie C. Riley
PIECE OF MY HEART.......Big Brother and the Holding Company
I SAY A LITTLE PRAYER.......Aretha Franklin
I WISH IT WOULD RAIN.......Temptations
HEY JUDE......Beatles
DO YOU KNOW THE WAY TO SAN JOSE........Dionne Warwick
LA-LA MEANS I LOVE YOU.......Delfonics

Songs I loved for myself:

LITTLE GREEN APPLES.......O.C. Smith ( I used to sing this with my cousins)
YOUNG GIRL........Gary Pucket and the Union Gap (Anything by this group made me
realise just how young I was in the
Great Scheme Of Things)

SPOOKY........Classics 4 (I didn't have much in the way of 45's, this was my very
first one. The "a" side was what I bought it for. Spooky
was the B side. I grew to like this song anyway)

DELIAH.......Tom Jones (This is kinda personal. The kid I had a crush on belonged
to a church where I had gone to Sunday School for a long
time. He and his family moved to this church from one
further away. So I joined Youth Group just to be near him.
One night, his father was driving us home from a church
meeting some way away. Many of us were crushed in the back
seat of the car, sitting in each others laps. Someone
grabbed my left boob and I didn't know who it was but I
was convinced it was this kid. Guess what was playing on
the car radio. DELIAH.

ANGEL OF THE MORNING.........Merrilee Rush (just another crush song)

GOIN' OUT OF MY HEAD/ CAN'T KEEP MY EYES OFF OF YOU........The Lettermen
(self-explanatory!!!!!)
Permalink | Comments: 6



moiraine Slippin' Away

Email this entry | Print this entry Nov 1 2007, 09:36 PM

I usually go downhill every year around this time. I get very sleepy, no ambition and have less and less ability to push myself forward. This year I have two things different from other years. I changed medications from Effexor to Lexapro, and I am using my c-pap machine faithfully every night. I think this is why I have a certain amount of energy so I am not sleepy all day, I function better in that case. But I still have that "slippin' away" feeling like I am leaving this big fat old body to get along as best as it can until January or February. I just describe it as a kind of "shutting down" of my personality or something. I feel kind of cheated that I made two changes and i am still left with feeling this way. It's a kind of "disembodied" feeling, for lack of another way of putting it. Every year I hope I will escape this. My favourite season of the year has always been fall because I enjoy the changing seasons, the colours of the leaves and the smell of wood stoves in the cold air.

Christmas used to be a favourite holiday of mine before I got like this. I would say, maybe I've been this way over 10 years. I used to like the preparation for the season, buying gifts and even cooking a big meal. And it was also that way for Thanksgiving. We had friends who used to have Thanksgiving here and Christmas we would go to their house to eat. Now I don't even cook any dinner. DH does all the day to day cooking, and now he has been cooking holiday meals for a few years. About 3 weeks ago I put Halloween decorations up for my GS and now it's time to take them down and put up the Thanksgiving decorations. I have to make this effort. Then after Thanksgiving the Christmas things go up. I know all this. Why do these things become so difficult to do each year. I really hoped I would escape all this this year. I have said this year after year. I have hope that the SAD will stay away this year. It shows up and takes me away from myself no matter what I do.
Permalink | Comments: 3



moiraine Catch-up

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 30 2007, 10:04 AM

I have been around, just havn't posted. I take that back. I posted yesterday about a woolly bear my daughter found on Sunday and lost the post. I felt so down-hearted I didn't feel like writing it out again. This hasn't happened in a long time. I must have hit a key or something when I was ready to "submit." Anyway what I was about to say was, DD found a completely black woolly bear. All black. No brown band at all. For the ones who are asking, "what's a woolly bear", I will try to tack on a Google pic of one I went to post but didn't. DD took a picture of it with my cell-camera but I don't want to try to blue-tooth it to my pictures. There are some cute pics of GS on there and if I lost them, it would just make me feel worse.

Anyway the saying goes that the wider the brown band is on a woolly bear found in the fall, the milder the winter will be. So the one DD found was all black. Heating oil and natural gas heat are going up up up. I might be posting in the library before the winter is over.

As for me, I worked the weekend and yesterday. I work 15 hrs/week. I applied for partial Unemployment online a couple of weeks ago because it is impossible to get hold of a human by phone there, as everybody knows. They sent be a letter last week that they want to speak to me about something and they are calling me between 1-3pm. I worked yesterday because I needed today off. I imagine they want to know why I "voluntarily" left work in April. They don't leave much leeway in answering questions in their online application. If they don't like what you put, the questions won't continue until you answer them "correctly". So I piled my papers together and am as ready for them as I can be. I'll have to explain the vocational rehabilitation thingy. I just hope they take me on because I need the money. Bills are piling up and I had to borrow my insurance payment money from DH. He is on Unemployment himself because he has run out of work in his job.

What can I say, we are all trying to keep our heads above water here
Permalink | Comments: 4



moiraine Planet In Peril...until The Day Is Done

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 23 2007, 10:24 PM

I havn't posted in quite a while here, just havn't had much positive to say, sick of sounding down all the time. But whenever CNN ran a trailer for "Planet In Peril" (which started tonight) I always wanted to know about the music.

Well I should have known. My old fave group REM wrote the song, "Until The Day Is Done" and that is the music that I was hearing. If you want to see the video (which has scenery from the programme, here is the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AozqGxaeB70

Also if you think Anderson Cooper is hot (like I do, even tho I am fat, crazy and 52) there are some cute shots of him too. I had heard somewhere that he was gay but I don't believe ie *thought I'd throw that in as well*

Also, for those who want to hear the song in it's origunal form:

http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/atoz/2007..._the_day_is.php
Permalink | Comments: 5



moiraine Neither Here Nor There

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 18 2007, 08:23 AM

I am just so afraid the SAD is returning this year. It makes you soulless. I just tried to read some posts in the "recent posts" forums and I want to reply to all of them but I have nothing to say. It feels like a one-way street. I can see the posts and want to say something but there's a wall I can't get thru to put some comforting words together. I don't like being like this. If it's SAD, it is very insidious and creeps up on you. One day you are normal, hopeful for the future, with concentration and focus and the ability to make a difference (like offering sympathy and encouragement to my friends and others here, for example). Things are happening beyond the glass wall that I talk about and I know they are happening but the ability to react to them in an emotional way is slipping away from me. I see my med nurse on October 22 and my T on Oct 29. Every year this happens. Every year I think I will escape this emotionless feeling of "standing by myself watching things happen." Changes to my life as far as my health is concerned is the Lexapro (20mgs/day) and using my C-pap machine every night without fail. The only thing I havn't tried is the light box therapy. I can't afford anything now. My paycheck last week was $139 and that was 20 hours work. This week will only be 15 hours and so will next week. All my TDI is gone. I have applied for partial Unemployment and my application is in the system. They will get to it when they get to it. The money is bothering me but it's just one more thing happening outside my glass wall. There is no fight left, less and less every day. My insurance payment is due. I will have to get this $370 from DH. I hate too because his little savings is dwindling week by week. He gets his SS cheque every month but is still working but the work is so small he would do better to draw Unemployment himself. I know other people have it much worse than me so I am ashamed of myself even to write this out. To crown it all my grandson isn't doing as well as he was. He has been biting himself and is so impatient with things that he is throwing things around and really acting up. I hug him and do all the grandmother things and give him all the attention I have to give. The glass wall is there and I see all this going on and want to help my daughter, be a good support but she is a private person and my glass wall won't let me take the initiative to dig beneath her privacy and get her to cry on my shoulder. I know she is having a hard time and she doesn't tell me everything. I feel so useless.
Permalink | Comments: 6



moiraine Got That Empty Feeling Again

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 14 2007, 06:06 AM

I'm sorry I havn't been around for a few days. I just honestly havn't had anything to say at all. I was hoping this wouldn't happen again,not with the new medication. I hate feeling like this. It always seems to start with my concentration and my ability to concentrate on anything. I have also started stumbling over my words again. Something I havn't done in a long time. Maybe you guys have had this happen to you. There is a word you are looking for when you are having conversation with someone. The word, whatever it is, just eludes you and you end up saying a bunch of words, grasping for the right one. I hope this isn't the SAD coming on. I was hopeful that this would bypass me this year, what with the Lexapro and all, and how well I was feeling. Last week there was a day when I was home and was making a lot of phone calls, like to Unemployment (an exercise in futility in itself.) I could write a whole book about the frustrations of trying to get a real live person in any Government or Insurance agency. Anyway what happened was I got real upset and made two calls to my job finder, who calmed me down somewhat. I saw my T that afternoon and told her how frustrated I was that things were starting to get away from me again and sending me into a tailspin. And now this, the grasping for words and loss of concentration. Somebody might say, "If you have lost your concentration, how are you writing this right now?"

I can concentrate on generalities to a point. But there is kind of a boundary where everything fades into the mist. What bothers me is that boundary is beginning to get closer. I thought I would escape that this year. I really did.
Permalink | Comments: 3



moiraine Wish I Was Here...indoor Beach???

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 7 2007, 07:11 PM

The Miyazaki Ocean Dome is in Japan. I am fascinated with anything indoors that is supposed to be outdoors. I guess this is as close to the beach as you are gonna get inside. I just love the way the lighting is here, bright, bright sand and blue, blue ocean. I would love to check this out!
Permalink | Comments: 5



moiraine Kids Of The Baby Boom

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 7 2007, 11:31 AM

On Sundays DH listens to the Country Western station on cable. He gets up before the crack of down so when I get up I hear some of the songs playing. This morning the Bellamy Brothers were singing "Kids of the Baby Boom." This song came out in 1987 but the strangest thing is that it fits today as well as it did 20 years ago.


KIDS OF THE BABY BOOM
The Bellamy Brothers


Our daddys won the war and came home to our moms
They gave them so much love that all us kids were born
We all grew up on Mickey Mouse and hula-hoops
Then we all bought BMW's and brand new pickup trucks
And we watched John Kennedy die one afternoon
Kids of the baby boom

It was a time of new prosperity in the USA
All the fortunate offsprings never had to pay
We had sympathy for the devil and the Rolling Stones
Then we got a little older, we found Haggard and Jones
A generation screaming for more room
Kids of the baby boom

Kids of the baby boom, we had freedom, we had money
Baby boom, here in the land of milk and honey
Counting our chickens way too soon
Kids of the baby boom

Now we all can run computers and we all can dance
We all have Calvin Klein written on our underpants
And at six-o'clock, like robots, we turn on the news
Watch those third world countries deal out more abuse
Remember the first man on the moon

Kids of the baby boom

Kids of the baby boom, we had freedom, we had money
Baby boom, here in the land of milk and honey
Counting our chickens way too soon
Kids of the baby boom

As our lives become a capsule they send to the stars
And our children look at us like we came from Mars
As the farms disappear and the sky turns black
We're a nation full of takers, never giving back
We never stop to think what we consume
Kids of the baby boom

Kids of the baby boom, we had freedom, we had money
Baby boom, here in the land of milk and honey
Cuonting our chickens way too soon
Kids of the baby boom

Our optimism mingles with the doom
Kids of the baby boom


I was born in 1955. I thought those days were the way life was supposed to be. Everybody showered attention on us and wherever we went, we set the trends for everybody else. The world catered to us when we were babies, teenagers and young adults. Now we are changing the way people look at 50 and 60 year olds'. It's all gone now. The days of milk and honey are over. I spent the 80's and 90's waiting for the good days to come back, when life was carefree and revolved around us baby boomers. When 9-11 came, I knew those days would NEVER come back. I buried the dream. Welcome to Reality.


PS...........later. I have spent 4 hours trying to find this music video. I see all the other songs on videos but for some reason I can't find this one. If I ever come up with one I will edit it in
Permalink | Comments: 0



moiraine I'm Still Around!

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 5 2007, 06:33 AM

I'm sorry I'm just getting around to posting. Today is my last day for work, this weekend I have the day off. Nobody knows how close I came to just not bothering day before yesterday. I woke up late and felt like warmed-over crap. Until I had a few coffees I just wanted to go back to bed and give the whole job thing up. The only thing that made me show up was the fact that if I keep sitting here in the house, two things would happen:
1) I would just get fatter and fatter and more and more useless
2) I wouldn't come out of the house at all because panic attacks would increase and I would be too afraid to go out among people and other situations.
My back and feet were giving me hell. DD had some good pain pills (Naprosin? am I spelling it right?) and this helped me thru the day. Any pain was more easily coped with.

Yesterday I had the day off, but had to show up for a stupid Inservice. Any health people around here know what I am taking about. It is a mandatory meeting where someone shows up with information and we are forced to attend on the threat of death, just about. The threat in this place was, if you don't attend, it will count as an Absence From Work. I get paid for the hour but it was my day off. I hate these things. At the old job there was never much that affected what I call the "downstairs people", ie Housekeeping, Kitchen and Laundry.

Yesterday's joker was a representative from the Attorney General, there to lecture us about patient abuse and stealing good pills and pain patches from said patients. Number one, it meant my daughter had to pay for the hour that GS spent at Daycare waiting for me. They had to get him off his bus and watch him until I got there. Insult #2 was I had to stand for the whole hour, fidgeting and shifting from foot to foot. This man ran on for a whole hour. I wasn't the only one standing by any means. You'd think if some fool was gonna lecture he'd have some mercy for the standees. Especially the fat ones. There was a very heavyset man across the room. I saw him sneak out after about 20 minutes. When I've been there a while, maybe I can do the same.

Anyway yesterday I got a lot of calling done on my health issues. I have an appointment with the Disability Dr. for the 16th. I had to arrange for my free ride. I missed my appointment for my Med nurse the day before. I left a message on their machine that I was working and couldn't show up to 10am that day. I called and got another appointment for later on this month. The best thing of all that I found out was, TDI would make my money up from working part-time. You see, by working I was gonna get a lot less money and I was worried about my pills and living expenses, as well as my insurance.

Today I do feel better. I got up on time and was showered and in my work clothes by the time GS got here. And I intend on taking another Naprosin with my breakfast today. No sense asking for trouble. I'll catch up with everyone over the weekend
Permalink | Comments: 5



moiraine First Day On The Job

Email this entry | Print this entry Oct 1 2007, 08:07 PM

Thank you to everyone who wished me well on my first day. I STILL hate first days! The girls were all very friendly and welcoming, I didn't have a problem at all there. But everything is SO confusing. I've done housekeeping in two other nursing homes but every place is different. It's just so much to take in. You follow someone around who is trying to train you and you are trying to understand but it is so much to remember. So you give up and just go along for the ride. I imagine I will find my way around the place and I imagine I will get the job down to the point that I can go thru the motions without thinking about it eventually. I like to do my jobs without even having to think about them

I've trained enough other people in my various jobs that I can see both sides of the problem, but believe me I would much rather teach than learn! This is why I tend to stay at my jobs until i can't any longer. One good thing about is, I won't have to dry-mop and wash the resident's rooms. They have enough porters for that. There is a fair amount of bending, like to change small waste bins, and cleaning toilets, and when I have to wipe radiators and wipe spots on walls. It's not the work I am afraid of. It's the routine. I am working from 9-2 so there's a certain amount of work to get done before I go home. That's the nervous part, that I won't get my work done, or I'll fall far behind, or not keep my end up and get yelled at or be thought lazy.

Needless to say, after pushing this big fat body around for 5 hours (had a 15 minute break), my feet are killing me, and my back also. It's my own fault, I sat at this computer day after day, not even taking a five-minute turn around the block to keep my muscles up. Never mind, I'll be back at it again tomorrow, got no choice. I've been very good about going to bed at 11pm to get the c-pap running. Last night was a little better than the others.

I will try to do what I can now, because I am so sure "the monster behind the door" is still lying in wait for me. So far the Lexapro is holding up
Permalink | Comments: 4



moiraine Work Tomorrow..... Nervous!!!!

Email this entry | Print this entry Sep 30 2007, 06:49 PM


Tomorrow will be a very nervous day for me. As it gets closer and closer I wish I didn't have to bother. I show up for work tomorrow in a nursing home, doing housekeeping. So it's not like it is such a hard job to do, once I learn their way of doing it.

I just hate anything outside of my "comfort zone", anything that means I have to expose myself to new situations, new people and new places. This is why I stay in my jobs so long, and only leave when they shut their doors or am run out (like my last job!). It is the natural thing for people at work to watch the new person to see how they will work out. They will watch to see how you are dressed, what you say, if you seem friendly or stuck-up. They will wonder if you will be a good worker, taking some of the load off them, or if you will be lazy and of no use. They wonder if you will tell tales on them to the supervisor, hang around the office or "act better." Most of all they will watch to see if you get away with anything that they can't. Like hanging around talking to people wasting time, showing up late every day, taking longer breaks. I know the whole nine yards. So this is why I feel nervous because I know these eyes will be watching me until the others feel like I can be trusted.

Maybe everything will be ok. Maybe I will find my way around the building easily (it's a 200-bed nursing home). Maybe I can come and go without any problems, and sink back into the woodwork where I prefer to be wherever I work. I hate being noticed. I hate standing out. I hate people watching me and talking about me. Whatever happens tomorrow I know I will end up here to say something about it. OMG my stomach is in knots already
Permalink | Comments: 5



moiraine Struggling With C-pap

Email this entry | Print this entry Sep 29 2007, 10:30 AM

I have been struggling with my C-pap machine for a couple of nights. I have a thread over at the Sleep Apnea Forums that I add to now and then. So this is what I posted over there:


Hello to whoever reads this post, just putting down a few more words. Basically, I am struggling but I won't give up. I have bothered too many people for help and have come thru with as little expense as possible, not to keep on until I can get this thing licked.
This is what the sleep report said: the apnea/hypopnea index was 68.5, with oxygen saturation as low as 78%. I am still at 12 as I was 2 years ago. Th summary was: This pt. has severe obstructive sleep apnea with an apnea/hypopnea index of 68.5 with significant oxygen desaturation.
When I went to Medical Supplies to get my mask, I also brought along my machine and all the stuff with it. What I thought was a crack in the water reservoir was just a little line in the decoration. The lady pointed all this out, also said my hose and machine were in very good condition. Because it was in bankruptcy and the 2 year warranty had passed, Vanguard had no more part in it. Now for those of you who want to know about the mask, I was fitted for a medium Resmed Ultra Mirage full-face mask. The mask and headgear came to $250 and they will send me a bill for whatever the insurance doesn't pay for. I know the deal 2 years ago, they pay 50% for durable goods which would leave me with $150 to pay. I am sure I could talk them into letting me pay $25/month because of my circumstances.
I think I did very well considering I was in fear for 2 years and didn't dare to ask for any help with my machine because they would come after me for money I didn't have. Also all of this will only have cost me $150, if there is not some hidden thing I havn't seen yet.

I have tried to go to sleep at 11pm these past 2 nights, instead of my usual 1am, thinking I could get 2 hours more of good sleep. Thursday night I took my pm meds at 10pm and filled my water thingy, put my mask on and went to bed when I felt sleepy. It was hot. I tossed and turned. The mask felt fine, the lady had fitted it for me, and the clips made the mask easy to put on and take off. I didn't feel suffocated like I thought I would. In the sleep lab I went straight to sleep before the machine got up to 12. Last night and night before last I was awake when it got to 12 and I would much rather be asleep when all that air gets forced on my mask. Last night the weather was cooler and I always sleep better at that temperature. But I had the same problem.
Thursday night I must have finally fallen asleep but only after I took off the mask. At 3am I got up to go to the bathroom and when I came back, I tried the mask again. Because I was sleepy I did very well and woke up when my daughter came in the room at 6:30am.
Last night I removed the mask, went to sleep and woke up with a very dry mouth at 5am. I tried the mask again and this time I didn't so as well as the night before. It's the pressure. I have to get to sleep before that pressure gets up to 12.

Tonight I will restrict all caffeine, even tea, after 6pm which is a hardship I will put up with if I can get to sleep easier. Maybe I can get some decaf tea because tea at night is a habit of mine. I will try it this way tonite. I am determined, after all this trouble, and the kindnesses of other people to help me, and of course my bad health, to beat this thing. I have to make sure I get to sleep in 20 minutes. That is my goal. Thanks for reading.


Permalink | Comments: 6



moiraine I Feel Lost Today

Email this entry | Print this entry Sep 26 2007, 12:23 PM

I was looking for mood icons the other day and this one kinda sums up how I feel today. Things have been moving along real well for me here lately, so I just hope this is a down day. I have been working on a job I pretty much have in the bag. It's housekeeping for 15 hours a week, $7.70/hr but then I don't want too much money, $900/mo is my limit. Maybe I can pick up a few more hours here and there. I can even come in for 9am, so I can put my grandson on the bus. I get out at 2pm so I should have time to race and get him off the bus as well. Plus I have to work every other weekend and holiday but I am used to that anyway. OK I have all I wanted in a job. Part time, no responsibility, no opening and no closing in surroundings I know. So why am I feeling lost.

Tomorrow I go to get my new sleep mask for my machine, and to get all that straightened out, so I can get some decent sleep, perhaps to feel much better about life. I am bringing my old machine so they can work with that. It's mine (from the bankruptcy) so I don't have to pay anything for that, and the insurance will pay 1/2 for the mask and headgear. I am poor so I will ask if my section of the payments can be sent monthly or something. All that is moving right along so why am I feeling lost.

On October 5 I have to go to see the Disability Doctor and I don't even have to drive there or get somebody out of work to bring me, as it is some distance away and I am too nervous to drive. They will pay for my taxi ride up and back. This doctor wants to test my physical (not the mental part) as I put down in my petition that I was very heavy. I intend to add in that I have Sleep Apnea and they can check the place where I had my test done. So things are moving right along in that direction. So again, why am I feeling the way I am today?

I have seen this coming on for a few days now, and I can tell because I sit in front of this computer (remember, my favourite place in the world) and hardly have anything to say or none of my favourites or bookmarks hold any interest for me at all. I just go from website to website, I may read a few sentences and I can't concentrate. I show up here all the time, read posts, try to frame a reply and in most cases it's like trying to feel like cotton wool, only a greyish cotton wool, sort of like piled up grey clouds before the weather gets nasty. That's the best way I have to explain it.

I am tired but I expect the C-pap to take away this once I start to sleep properly. The hair forum, where I used to spend a lot of time to banish depressing thoughts, was the first website to go by the wayside because I lost interest in it and gave up trying to frame answers for posts I was more than happy to reply to about a month ago. Else for the Sleep Apnea Forum, I never joined that and I am glad I didn't, just another thing I would have to keep up with. This is the Forum I am concentrating on because of all my family friends here. You guys understand what it is like when it comes to no focus, no organisation.

The landlord wants to add a couple of shelves, cupboards and a hood for my stove, something I have always wanted. He is out in the yard getting things ready. How come I am not at least in the kitchen washing the dishes from last night. Where is my pride, not to be clean and tidy. I used to be spotless and on top of everything. There was spring cleaning and fall cleaning, My windows were always washed, my curtains were changed and so forth. The landlord is in here now, painting a little shelf. I had asked him for a little paint and a brush and I could have taken care of it myself. Painting I know. I have painted walls and trim for years. What has happened to me over the years. I feel so useless
Permalink | Comments: 4



moiraine Let There Be Peace On Earth

Email this entry | Print this entry Sep 24 2007, 09:36 PM



LET THERE BE PEACE ON EARTH


Let there be peace on earth,
and let it begin with me.
Let there be peace on Earth,
the peace that was meant to be.


With God as our Father,
brothers all are we,
Let me walk with my brother,
in perfect harmony.


Let peace begin with me,
let this be the moment now.
With every step I take,
let this be my solemn vow,
To take each moment and live each moment
in peace, eternally.
Let there be Peace on Earth,
and let it begin with me.



Permalink | Comments: 3



moiraine Looking At Early Eating Habits......

Email this entry | Print this entry Sep 23 2007, 10:47 AM

Hedgie brought up a good point when she replied to my lower post about how much influence my father had on my eating today. I couldn't just write a brief comment so I thought I'd try to post about it.

When I was little we lived a distance from town so my mother was able to limit my exposure to candy and chocolate, so I can't say that I had sweets from the very start. As far as I can remember, when I was of kindergarten age, we moved close to town and sweets were more available. When I went to school, other children had plenty of candies and chocolate as well as soda (or mineral as we used to call it.) Across from my kindergarten was a Mom and Pop type store that sold everything but the penny candy is what I remember the most. A penny would buy you a nice amount of dolly-mixture, or pear drops, bubble gum and other good stuff in the row of glass containers. The shop owner made little twisted paper cones and weighed out what you wanted, you paid and went out of the store hoping the other kids would leave you alone so you could eat some of it, anyway. There were not many very overweight children in those days because we had to walk to school if we lived in town.

I had to walk further to elementary school but getting any money for the Tuck Shop was difficult. My mother didn't have any money to spare, but my father always had a handful of change in his pocket. I can't remember being able to buy much but as always there were kids who always had plenty of money. Sometimes if people liked me from time to time, they would offer me a bite of chocolate or a few chips, or a sip of soda. Mind you I had plenty to eat. My mother packed me a sensible, adequate lunch every day so I wasn't hungry. I had a thermos of milk, a sandwich (usually egg salad, ham or tuna fish), a piece of fruit. For recess there may be a few plain cookies (or biscuits, as we called them.) My mother made homemade cookies and cake, maybe I might get some of that for recess.

I always envied the kids who got boxed milk everyday. I imagine milk money was paid by the week, but everyday the milkman would come with the little 1/2 pint boxes, and they would all be lined up along the little ledge under the blackboard. You know, the one where they kept the erasers and chalk. I imagine you could say I felt left out of a lot of things when I was in school. People would often threaten to beat me up after school and I would be scared to death to go home after 3:30pm. I was one of the ones who got picked on just because. I was also a "Teacher's Pet" which made things much worse. Teachers, please don't favour one kid over others. You are doing them no favours, it does more harm than good.

So there was the row of milks along the eraser ledge. I remember 3 CHOCOLATE ones! I never got a white milk one, much, much less chocolate. I felt very left out because I didn't have the pocket money everybody else seemed to have.

You know, I think I will make another post on this later to carry on about the sweets etc.I havn't even gotten to Daddy yet, I don't want to make this too long and bore everybody to death!
Permalink | Comments: 4



15 Pages < 1 2 3 4 > » Jump to Page