Sunday and I am at home in a world of pain and stiffness. Yesterday, I went to my sister's to help do some more painting and cleanup. We got a lot of trim done but found that the bedroom windows have been painted shut and that the vinal siding was put on OVER the storm windows. We now have to figure out how we are going to take them down without tearing up the siding in order to unstick the painted windows. If we can't do that, we have to break at least two windows to open the storm windows so we can then unstick the regular window and then put new glass in them.
We also powerwashed the basement and unstopped the drain where the moron has never cleaned and allowed the washer to stop the floor drain. It is much cleaner now and just needs painting. We got a bit of carbon monoxide I think because it was a gas operated power washer. We had windows and the door to the stairs opened but still I think we all got a bit sick. Very dizzy at the end of it. Felt better after an hours lying on the floor of my sister's apartment and relaxing. But we are all tired and sore.
I am attempting to work on the novel again. I have found, with the help of a friend, a solution to my block and feel like I can move forward now. I hope so, anyway.
The baby has not arrived yet but Dave and Becca have a problem. She is due any day. The project where they are living is infested with roaches and they found three in the baby's bed. They are trying to find a place they can rent cheaply so they don't have to be concerned about roaches getting to the baby. I am not sure what they can do. If anything happens to Dave's job they will be in terrible trouble anywhere else.
Things are not good financially with us either. We are having so many money problems and Jerry still has no job. He is not going to get one I believe. That is very negative of me but I have nothing that would indicate I have anything to be positive about. I am positive things are bad. May not have internet much longer. I can save $100 a month by shutting off cable, phone, and internet. That will make nearly all the car payment. If he could just get a job bringing home $100 a week it would solve the major problems.
Ok, I've had my whine and cheese session. Go out and make a difference in the world. I have no life but you ought to be out doing something.
Sunday, August 27, 2006
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
The End is Near
I am beginning to think blogging is the biggest waste of time. I have been working at it since May ... I think... and so far I don't really see the sense of it. I have vented, waxed poetic, contributed great prose, and preached a little bit. I think it is just not something I am cut out to do.
I am trying to figure out the timing of it but there doesn't seem to be any timing involved. I have considered content but have not found anything original out here. Most are just repeating information they heard somewhere else, show photos I have see long ago, and tell jokes that have been coming in my email for years!
So, I am going to just give it a bit longer, see what happens, how I feel about the process and then, probably just drop the whole thing. The second blog is not going well either and I still have two websites that are now extremely overdue for an update.
Not to mention my novel is languishing. I just got a few tips last night on it and I am thinking about that aspect of it. I think it will help jump start me but now I am not in possession of a lot of free time. This next two week I suspect I will be very, very busy.
I am supposed to help Phyllis paint the rest of the apartment, the baby is due in the next 14-18 days, I need to get her a bed up, finish stripping her chest of drawers and get it repainted. And write. Somewhere in there I have to go to work and sleep!
I will post photos of the new baby before I end it. But, while this has been fun and it is really just a lazy person's way of avoiding real writing. I will probably just stop bothering after September.
I am trying to figure out the timing of it but there doesn't seem to be any timing involved. I have considered content but have not found anything original out here. Most are just repeating information they heard somewhere else, show photos I have see long ago, and tell jokes that have been coming in my email for years!
So, I am going to just give it a bit longer, see what happens, how I feel about the process and then, probably just drop the whole thing. The second blog is not going well either and I still have two websites that are now extremely overdue for an update.
Not to mention my novel is languishing. I just got a few tips last night on it and I am thinking about that aspect of it. I think it will help jump start me but now I am not in possession of a lot of free time. This next two week I suspect I will be very, very busy.
I am supposed to help Phyllis paint the rest of the apartment, the baby is due in the next 14-18 days, I need to get her a bed up, finish stripping her chest of drawers and get it repainted. And write. Somewhere in there I have to go to work and sleep!
I will post photos of the new baby before I end it. But, while this has been fun and it is really just a lazy person's way of avoiding real writing. I will probably just stop bothering after September.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
Gripe Session in Progress
I feel as if my nose is stuffed with cement. The air must be teeming with something. Over the last several weeks I have been struggling to breath. I got so frustrated that I even stopped taking Claritin. I was having these allergy symptoms and I wanted to see what kid of difference it was making. Guess what... it wasn't! I was off it for two weeks and my situation did not get worse. It didnt' get better either.
I am supposed to have my crown put on this afternoon. I am having lunch with a friend at noon. And this morning, I am chained to my desk. In about three minutes I am going to be attacking the files to see what I can process. I do not want to loose the momentum of the last week but right now I need verifications to come in so I can actually do the work. Of course, I could start on December files....
Housing assistance. That's what I do. I work with a government agency to provide rental assistance to low income families. You call it Section 8. HUD likes the kinder, gentler term Housing Choice Voucher (HCV). The government will pay 60-70% of of your rent if you qualify. I am the person who maintains the client's file and continually monitor their status to insure they are receiving the correct amount of subsidy. They are supposed to pay 30-40% of their adjusted income for rent.
Of course, that is only on income they have reported. Taxpayers get ripped every day by people who are not reporting their income so they can receive more of your tax dollars to pay their rent. They justify it by such excuses as "I have a car payment." "I won't be able to afford cable if I pay that!" Isn't that lovely.
Don't get me wrong. Most of the people who need housing are not the problem. It is a segment of society who believes it is someone else's job to pay their way. When a healthy, 20 year-old can sit at my desk with three small children and say, "My grandmama was on Sec. 8, my mama was on Sec 8 and I will always be on Sec. 8 and my kids will too." I get ticked. That is a great inheritance. Poverty passed down through the generations by choice. I was trying to get her into a program that would help her become self sufficient, go to college, get an education and buy her own home. She wanted her inheritance of Sec. 8 assistance! What is wrong with that picture?
So the next time you bleeding heart liberals think that more social services are the answer, come see me! They are NOT solving the problem. They are creating it. Social services should be designed for the elderly and disabled, people who require help because they are either too old and sick to work or because they have some disability that prevents them from being able to support themselves. And a transitional assistance until healthy people get a job that will support them. A healthy adult needs to get out and work. Atlanta already has the idea. You have to have a job to be on their program. Great idea, Atlanta!
Ok, I think that will about do it for me. I have a headache and my eyes feel as if they are floating in fluids in my sinuses.
I am supposed to have my crown put on this afternoon. I am having lunch with a friend at noon. And this morning, I am chained to my desk. In about three minutes I am going to be attacking the files to see what I can process. I do not want to loose the momentum of the last week but right now I need verifications to come in so I can actually do the work. Of course, I could start on December files....
Housing assistance. That's what I do. I work with a government agency to provide rental assistance to low income families. You call it Section 8. HUD likes the kinder, gentler term Housing Choice Voucher (HCV). The government will pay 60-70% of of your rent if you qualify. I am the person who maintains the client's file and continually monitor their status to insure they are receiving the correct amount of subsidy. They are supposed to pay 30-40% of their adjusted income for rent.
Of course, that is only on income they have reported. Taxpayers get ripped every day by people who are not reporting their income so they can receive more of your tax dollars to pay their rent. They justify it by such excuses as "I have a car payment." "I won't be able to afford cable if I pay that!" Isn't that lovely.
Don't get me wrong. Most of the people who need housing are not the problem. It is a segment of society who believes it is someone else's job to pay their way. When a healthy, 20 year-old can sit at my desk with three small children and say, "My grandmama was on Sec. 8, my mama was on Sec 8 and I will always be on Sec. 8 and my kids will too." I get ticked. That is a great inheritance. Poverty passed down through the generations by choice. I was trying to get her into a program that would help her become self sufficient, go to college, get an education and buy her own home. She wanted her inheritance of Sec. 8 assistance! What is wrong with that picture?
So the next time you bleeding heart liberals think that more social services are the answer, come see me! They are NOT solving the problem. They are creating it. Social services should be designed for the elderly and disabled, people who require help because they are either too old and sick to work or because they have some disability that prevents them from being able to support themselves. And a transitional assistance until healthy people get a job that will support them. A healthy adult needs to get out and work. Atlanta already has the idea. You have to have a job to be on their program. Great idea, Atlanta!
Ok, I think that will about do it for me. I have a headache and my eyes feel as if they are floating in fluids in my sinuses.
Monday, August 14, 2006
Stop the World
I haven't run out of things to say but lately I have turned melancholy... a little bit anyway. I have always loved poetry and especially the works of Tennyson and Longfellow. They recite words that speak to my spirit and that for a few minutes take me back to a time of my life when things moved at a slower pace and my happiness was found in simple things, such as good books, a walk in the woods, Sunday dinner with my extended family, and my children's laughter.
The world is moving at such a fast pace now and I want to scream "STOP!" We are missing the finer things in life in pursuit of toys, of pleasure for pleasure's sake rather than to enrich our life. How many people are left who can find joy in the summer breeze as it blows across the front porch bringing the sound of children laughing and playing in the twilight? How many children are laughing and playing in the twilight? See, we have lost something. Are we too stupid to see it?
I might be called old fashioned but there is a reason certain television shows are considered classics and have channels devoted to reruns of them. Because there is a large segment of society out there who is hungry for just a taste of that past. And it is not because of the things they had then.
No, we don't long to go back in time and live without our conveniences. We don't want to give up microwaves, computers, and indoor plumbing. We just want the secret to the innocence, to the laughter, to the family around the dinner table, to the trust, and even next door neighbors who wave and call you by name as you sit in the twilight on the front porch.
We want to know how to recapture the magic and wonder that we heard about from our grandparents. We want to understand how, in the midst of depression, famine, and war people could loan a cup of sugar and not expect its return, people could build a house in a week, take in orphan children they never met, buy a car on a handshake, sleep with the doors unlocked.
Where can we find the component that causes this kind of life? What makes them say please, thank you, excuse me, or let me help you? What have we lost?
I grew up in that life, among those people.
Today, I want to go home.
The world is moving at such a fast pace now and I want to scream "STOP!" We are missing the finer things in life in pursuit of toys, of pleasure for pleasure's sake rather than to enrich our life. How many people are left who can find joy in the summer breeze as it blows across the front porch bringing the sound of children laughing and playing in the twilight? How many children are laughing and playing in the twilight? See, we have lost something. Are we too stupid to see it?
I might be called old fashioned but there is a reason certain television shows are considered classics and have channels devoted to reruns of them. Because there is a large segment of society out there who is hungry for just a taste of that past. And it is not because of the things they had then.
No, we don't long to go back in time and live without our conveniences. We don't want to give up microwaves, computers, and indoor plumbing. We just want the secret to the innocence, to the laughter, to the family around the dinner table, to the trust, and even next door neighbors who wave and call you by name as you sit in the twilight on the front porch.
We want to know how to recapture the magic and wonder that we heard about from our grandparents. We want to understand how, in the midst of depression, famine, and war people could loan a cup of sugar and not expect its return, people could build a house in a week, take in orphan children they never met, buy a car on a handshake, sleep with the doors unlocked.
Where can we find the component that causes this kind of life? What makes them say please, thank you, excuse me, or let me help you? What have we lost?
I grew up in that life, among those people.
Today, I want to go home.
Sunday, August 13, 2006
Crossing The Bar
From “The Works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson”
Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.
Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.
Friday, August 11, 2006
Sea Fever
By John Masefield (1878-1967)
I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking.
And a gray mist on the sea’s face and a gray dawn breaking.
I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied:
And all I ask is a windy day and the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the seagulls crying.
I must go down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the winds’ like a whetted knife:
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And a quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking.
And a gray mist on the sea’s face and a gray dawn breaking.
I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied:
And all I ask is a windy day and the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the seagulls crying.
I must go down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the winds’ like a whetted knife:
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And a quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
Wednesday, August 9, 2006
The Blower's Daughter
Damien Rice - (Video)
I don't know what it is but it is a beautiful song that makes you ache inside.
I don't know what it is but it is a beautiful song that makes you ache inside.
Monday, August 7, 2006
Wednesday, August 2, 2006
August Thoughts
August... a majestic month. Fall is around the corner. Sarah Cheyenne is just weeks from her arrival. My birthday is about 8 weeks away while Jerry's is days away.
I am exhausted and frustrated and just plain ticked off at everything. I am again trying to find money to cover expenses and expenses keep rising. Although, gas has dropped a few cents. I have been praying for that.
Yes, I believe God answers prayer. I also believe if enough people with right attitudes and motives, pray for something, God will hear and answer.
It is Saturday and I just finished paying the bills. I have been moving money around like a high financier for a bankrupt company. I am about to go to the grocery store where I am sure I will have a mild heartattack about the price of eggs or some such staple.
I am exhausted and frustrated and just plain ticked off at everything. I am again trying to find money to cover expenses and expenses keep rising. Although, gas has dropped a few cents. I have been praying for that.
Yes, I believe God answers prayer. I also believe if enough people with right attitudes and motives, pray for something, God will hear and answer.
It is Saturday and I just finished paying the bills. I have been moving money around like a high financier for a bankrupt company. I am about to go to the grocery store where I am sure I will have a mild heartattack about the price of eggs or some such staple.
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