February. What can you expect from a month spelled like that ?

  My latelys have been a crazy mixture of trepidation and contentment and wonder and sorrow.  Am I just human ?  More often than I care to admit, I am emotionally rocked by external goings on in the world I inhabit. On a large scale (school shootings, government, world politics) and on a small scale (my life and home and community). And I seem to react equally. Huh. What's that about ? 

   The truck engine gave up the ghost last week. After an $800 repair bill *that included a new battery*.  Seriously ? Sigh. So we are now down to one car and I have been looking at cars the past few days.  Online.  And then the sales people track me and start calling, offering me all kinds of deals. lol  I got a letter in the mail telling me I was pre-qualified for 75K in auto loans. 75K.  Really guys ? I think not.  That's more than I paid for my home.  So anyway, it looks like we are about to enter the "Ididn'twantacarpaymentbutIhavenootherchoice"  zone.  The talk around Honeysuckle Hill is to get a newer car for me and he will drive the Malibu to work. Discussion is continually ensuing over whether or not we even really need to have a truck.  My vote is not so much. His is oh yes we do. And so it continues...endless debate between married couples that has been going on since time began.


   Things have been relatively calm around here (and by around here, I mean in my head). lol  In spite of broken cars and choking dogs and exploding canning jars. I thought about canning pinto beans today, but have decided I'm not doing much of anything instead.  Himself is off hiking or something and I am home here with 60's hits playing on the radio.  Haven't even cleaned up the breakfast dishes yet, because I didn't want to. Looking around at my living room and  kitchen/dining room I am annoyed...it was all cleaned up on Friday when I played Holly Housewife all day and had things looking great. Now the dog toys are scattered everywhere, his shoes under the end table, crap spread out all over my nice clean table, mud tracked in all over the floors from dog feet and his boots. Sigh... job security, I guess.

  I just read this and thought it should be passed around--A LOT.  lol 

Women aren't nags--we're just fed up



  And so it goes... just another day in February.  It's been sunny all day for a change and the temps mild. The whole next week the temps look like May.  I need to figure out what's for supper and make a plan. Sun rise, sun set...and the world keeps going. Himself is out taking the last dog for a walk, I watched The Library of Congress Gershwin Awards ceremony in honor of Smokey Robinson and then The Royal Tennenbaums. Made some lunch, washed the dishes.  Straightened up the living room, picked up all the dog toys and put them, back in the basket. I'm meeting up with someone this evening and will be leaving here in a couple of hours.  For now, that's about as far ahead as I can plan.  Adios amigos.

This is December in Illinois ???

 
By the middle of the week they're saying high 60's. The temps have gone up down up down.  It's almost Christmas and there are still a couple of standing corn fields out there. The grass is still green.  Feels like we died and went to southern Tennessee.

  I have had a busy couple of week and today I have 2 business meetings I have to attend. Then should be home by 4.  I'm tired. Some of the busy has been fun stuff... but it still quantitatively adds up to exhaustipated.  (Too tired to give a good crap).  Last night we attended our annual winter solstice celebration at the La Vista Ecological Learning Center. It was pretty awesome...the young lady who has been turning our staff at these things is now 23 and almost finished with her masters degree... it has been a joy to watch her grow up. We've been doing this for about 11 years now, so she was 12 when we first met. Wow... She is a twin, and her sister used to come too, but not so much now, as she's off in the middle of her life. This one has a hearing disability and has stayed closer to home I think. She's a lovely and brilliant young woman, in the astrophysics field, I believe. Her sister is an engineering student who has been instrumental in mentoring young girls in the sciences field. It started as a course project and is something she has fallen in love with doing.  Anyway, we had a nice crowd, I met some new people, connected with old friends and just basically had a lovely evening. Good job on the awesome parenting, Christine and Gary !

  I'm baking and canning and whining some. lol  Still haven't got the Xmas stuff out and it's getting so late I might not. I have one holiday basket with cards in it and a couple of gifts that have been given to me out on the table where the birdcage use to sit.  I bought some dog toys, a couple of husband gifts and everything else is going to be home made stuff.  My house is still messy.  My dogs are still happy.  My son wants nothing for Xmas so he is getting some jerky I made, some granola and maybe something else. He's a minimalist, lol. And Scroogey.

  I had a small epiphany last night... almost a spiritual experience. We did our ritual of talking about what we will do in the coming year to make the world a better place. Lots of-- I'll be better about composting and recycling. I'll stop using so much paper. I'll spend more time in the woods. Mine was-- we started paying for city garbage pickup a few months ago, and I have already gotten sloppy about throwing things away.  Before, when everything had to be recycled or burned in my barrel, I was much more mindful about what I was doing with things. I've gotten lazy..  The second was... I said that I was in my usual flurry of furious anger and fear over what is happening in the world. I am cursing Republicans and Trump and have so much hatefulness in me that it simultaneously wounds me and scares me.  Then this came across my Facebook page...

And it occurred to me that I needed something to change. That I am not seeing the thousands of tiny miracles when I am in that space of anger and fear and hatefulness. That I am NOT doing what I usually try to do when faced with unpleasant people or situations or things...and try to see them through God's eyes. That I am not looking for God in all the things that are going on. 

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I just found this unfinished blog post in my draft folder Wondering why I never finished it. The holiday, of course are way over and everyone I know [almost] survived them.  It is now February and winding down...and all that brutal weather we didn't get in December has been dropping in randomly and trying to kill us. And then the temps shoot back up to 60. It's been crazy. We have had personal financial issues, car troubles, mass murders in schools, and now the high school students from the last one are taking to the streets and the airwaves and social media to protest the lack of gun regulations in this country.  They are scared and they are furious. As are many of us.  Mueller's investigation goes on, 14 Russians indicted for elections interference. And he isn't stopping.  Thank God.

A woman that is very important to me is in ICU with severe infection and they can't figure out what caused it and said they may never know.  She is sedated and on dialysis and  slowly starting to improve.  Her liver may be damaged. It has been a very scary time and lots of folks are praying for her. Today they said they think she is out of imminent danger, all signs of the infection are gone. They may try to wake her up today... it's been terribly frightening. As usual, these things make you sit up and pay attention. To your loved ones, to your life.   To the really important things...

So, I think I will post this draft as a blog entry, even tho the dates are screwy and the content is old and there you have it.  One of my blogs has disappeared into the Ethernet. Can't find it anywhere, can't access it.  Says it has been deleted, but doesn't say who deleted it or why. It's one I stopped mostly posting on, but still... the last time I posted on it was probably only 6 months ago at most.

Happy Wednesday. I just heard that a zoo in Ohio or somewhere gave birth to a baby camel and named it Alexander Camelton. That was worth every minute I have wasted online this morning...bahahahahahaha

Egg Salad Days

  Sigh... I just put an almost 500 dollar electric bill payment in the mail.  I cannot keep this up.  We had bitter cold temps the past 2 months for days on end.  We are held hostage by an electric cooperative that charges us outrageous sums of money for electric.  My car is in the shop getting new brakes. Last month we had an 800 dollar truck repair bill and now it is on the fritz again.  I'm trying to breathe in and breathe out and just stay where my feet are. I am okay, right here , right now. I am tired of struggling to make ends meet and I am tired of all the work and all the animals and everything.  Rant over.


   Time to stop buying groceries for a while and live out of my pantry totally again.  I will have to buy eggs now and again because I have no chickens. But otherwise... I am boiling some eggs now to make egg salad. I can eat that on the low carb diet.  And it's a cheap meal. I remember a time when I was so poor, all I had to eat was eggs and bread. I ate eggs: fried eggs, scrambled eggs, egg salad, hard boiled eggs.  And I lived. lol  And I will survive this time too, because that's what I am. A survivor.

   I drive a 21 year old car.  I live in a doublewide with an attached garage. On some dirt out in the country. There is nothing fabulous about my life.  Mostly.  Sometimes I have to talk it up to myself.  Look at the things that make me happy (gardens, space). Be grateful for the things I do have.  Trust that tomorrow will be better. This financial insecurity is killing me. Or not. Maybe I'm just a drama queen.  Lots of people have it worse than me, I know this for a fact. But today I am flailing about, trying to understand how, at my age, it can be like this.  It's not like I didn't work most of my life. It's not like I am wasteful or extravagant. And somedays, probably like a lot of people, I feel like throwing in the towel.


    So, for now, the eggs are boiling away in the kitchen, the cat has just knocked over my big pot of aloe vera plants and scattered dirt all over the office, the puppy wants to eat the dirt and has pooped in the floor twice after being outside for an hour.    I cannot house break this defective dog and it's driving me insane. Of all the animals I have had over the years, I have not experienced this. We have had her almost a year...I don't know what to do. Except constantly clean up carpets. Because, of course, she never pees or poops on the wood floors.  Sigh...


    I need to find some kind of work. I am looking into a company called Upworks which my friend works for...and that may be a fit. I can work from home. In my sweatpants. lol   I am trying to navigate their site and reading some tutorials about getting started with them.  Hoping it will turn into something that helps.


    So...til then, I'll eat my egg salad and make a concerted effort to not buy anything more than what I absolutely need for a while. Staying home and cutting down on the gas bill (himself may be having to take my car to work anyway if his gets worse).  Turn down the thermostat (why does 60 in the spring feel so much warmer than 60 in the house in winter ?)  some more.  Cut some corners where I can.  You think you live a frugal life, but you can always find more ways to cut costs...


  Welcome back, egg salad days.  It will be alright...eventually.