Home, Sweet Home

Or that is the idea anyway. So, a long flight with two layovers, screaming children kicking the back of the seat, no sleep the night before and no nap on the plane, I get home to a soggy bedroom carpet. Oh the joys of home ownership!

Granted, my son had done his best and we' had talked about it on the phone. The plan to get new floor covering for living room/hall etc will just have to expand to include the bedroom. Rats. Nothing like getting up in the night to use the bathroom and stepping on cold wet carpet! LOL. Used the shopvac and pulled it back but still there was enough dampness to get my attention. The dog didn't much like it either. She'd been sleeping on the sofa but with me home she had to sleep on the floor by my bed. Poor Su. True love is giving up the comfy sofa to be near mom on a slightly wet carpet.

I left home in mid May, so it has been a while not counting the short weekend back at the end of May. It is good to be home though I do worry about mom there in SC. We had a nice visit. Did not do a lot but stay at the house, eat, sleep, watch tv. I understand that works well for mom but must confess I found it rather slow.

One weekend we went up to the mountains. I had planned on a short vacation with an old college friend. We wanted to do the raft and rail thing in the NC mountains (Nantahala river, Bryson City, Nantahala Outdoor Center providing raft and guides) and figured mom might like part of that as well. Big sis and her husband came along, so they and mom simply did the train ride. I went with my friend and two more on the train one way with them then the four of us came back down via raft. What fun! It's an easy river, suited for families and people like us just out to have a good time. We started planning our next vacation together that afternoon as we enjoyed our time together so much.

Now it's time for me to get back to jail ministry, the Christian Women's Job Corps, and a bit of geocaching! And perhaps a bit of sub work to pay for the extras. Like carpet.

Slough of Despond

Well, I have avoided posting due to being in such a depressed state of mind. Oh I thought about it but had nothing positive to say! Things happen that cause sadness, that can't be undone, that one must simply come to terms with in time. I fight the battle of beating myself up - blame, guilt, feelings of worthlessness. Age old battle but occasionally things occur that ramp it up to a level I can barely deal with so.... back to Zoloft.

Coming home often brings me down but this time another incident was added to the mix. So here I am, just hanging in there, knowing that while there will always be a sadness that it will lessen with that great healer time.

Summer here in the countryside of South Carolina passes slowly. Mom shows signs of age and that makes me sad as well.

Gray day

Sometimes, life just sucks.

And that's my big thought for the day.

East Coast, again...

Well here I am again in South Carolina. Flew in to Charleston's airport and have been staying in Sommerville this weekend past. Today will be on my way upcountry to visit my mother for a while. My head is beginning to spin! One coast to another is not my usual thing, LOL, but it sure was fun. Such a difference in weather too. Love that southern CA coolness, yet now I am in the coastal SC region I must admit that heat feels pretty fine too. My friend here thinks I am nuts. Give me a few days and perhaps I will agree with her.

California!

We made it! Drove over 800 miles yesterday so got in today around noon. My daughter's new landlord was here to meet us and do the walk-thru. She is such a nice person! Actually it is a couple but he was working. My daughter has met both already. I was pleased to meet at least one of them. She brought some household items so we would have all we need while waiting for the mover's to arrive with said daughter's possessions, and also some food stuffs! So thoughtful! The condo is lovely. I think this will be a great place to live.

Now, California. Well, the last time I came here by car I was a young child so there's no memories of it at all. The last time I visited was by plane so only saw the coastal area, San Francisco and Long Beach. I must say, coming in from the east it is not too impressive, unless you are impressed by really huge sand dunes, and small mountains that consist of boulders. Then farm fields and what looked like scrubby arid lands a bit worse than some of West Texas. Finally we reached Vista and met the traffic. Oh my. I just do not know if I could ever do this! Or at least, not willingly for long! Zoom zoom indeed. Thankgoodness I did not have to drive.

The kid's at work, the cat is in hiding, and I'm holding down the fort. Drinking coffee and talking to folks back home and others that is, enjoying the pleasant weather and not being in a car.

Check out these sand dunes. People were riding bikes out there. Probably fourwheelers too but we only saw bikes.

and rocks! Oh my goodness, rocks.. mountains made of ROCKS!

Then it got uglier before we finally reached the city of our destination, as I said. No pics of that, I was nearly asleep. And no pics of this lovely apartment as it is not mine. So that's all for now!

Arizona

We made it quite a ways today, further than we thought when we started out this morning in San Angelo. It was still fairly early (not quite six) when we went through Tucson. So here we are at Gila Bend, Arizona. Long stretches of desert and hills in the background. Rather pretty in its own way.

We've made good use of google's number to call for businesses like hotels. Am so glad my son told me about that! We just call up and ask for the hotel of our choice in whatever city and get connected. Much nicer to know where you are going to stay and if they take cats than to wait til you drive up to figure it out.

The gps is getting a workout finding caches, but it doesn't do bad at finding gas stations either. Which is a lot of help when the distances can be so long between towns along I-8.

The cat we are taking to California is a quiet rider. In fact I have to keep feeling under the seat to assure myself she is still with us. Once in a while we can hear her purr!

Here's a couple of photos we grabbed along the way while driving..

New Mexico. .. much prettier seeing the real thing than in this picture..

Tucson had really gussied up their overpasses and bridges.. missed all but this one shot:

and the last cache of the day gave up this picture:

Texas!!

Back home in Texas for a quick stopover. Dropping off two cats and picking up one to take to California. Nice to have a day to just relax and visit out of this long road journey. John baked us cherry tarts and then cooked a great supper of mahi-mahi tonight. I did a few things here, got to visit with one friend and never did call mom! Oops. Well she's getting daily emails. Tomorrow morning we head west, and hope our first stop will be in Tucson. The next night should see us in California!

Back in Ohio

We had a lovely visit in South Carolina. Saw my sister and brother, well one of them, and aunt. Mostly spent lazy days in the country with mom. The time passed by quickly. Well it wasn't but five full days there!
We made a fast trip (not speedwise but no stopping to sightsee) back to Ohio. Good weather all the way and lovely scenery. I particularly liked the farms in one valley along a river. Large barns and silos, wide green fields with mountains behind them. Picture book sights almost in many cases. We made one stop for a cache with a nice overlook. While we did not find the cache we did get a picture!

*which somehow disappeared so had to be edited and the big blank spot taken out!

Not at home

Boy do I miss my "stuff", even if it isn't fancy stuff, LOL. Have been to Ohio, am in SC, am soon going back to Ohio, then down to Texas, then... well anyway... about half the time won't have internet. So even though I have nothing to say, I'd better say it!

No thoughts, just hanging out. Watching Golden Girls with Mom. Visiting sis, brother, aunt. Listening to the crazy cur dog here bark like mad, thinking how every dog has some issue or other. Generally, the owner only puts up with what the owner can put up with so for them, it's good. However others have different things they don't like and do, so sometimes for them, it's not so good. Life is like that!

Same with people. Everyone's busy with their busies and happy for it. While others think that person should not be doing that or should be doing this - but that whatever they do is just fine. Or if they admit it isn't it's a matter of well it's my stuff and I'm good with that. But you need to change, LOL.

Aren't we a mess though?

Virginia and the Blue Ridge

The first day out on our trip we reached the Skyline Pkwy, which is a National Park. The day was overcast and threatened to rain most of the time. Even so the drive was lovely - and we took many piictures. Our second day was spent on the Blue Ridge Parkway. I had never seen this part of the country before. What a treat even if it was terribly overcast!

There were bikers and hikers on the road with us (bicycle, but also motorcycles of course) and we marvelled at their being out there in such weather. I suppose if you truly love a sport a bit of rain, coolness and gray days make no difference. We stopped too see a small waterfall.

While like everyone else we had always thought of making a drive like this in the fall to see the 'colors' I must admit it was worth it even in the gray spring. Maybe one day we can make a return trip in the fall some day. Here is one shot, that shows so well why these mountains are called the Smokies.

and a few more shots - azaleas and a newt? and some other flower...

On the road again

Back in Ohio... first stage of a long trip. Yesterday had a long day at the airports. Storms caused flight delays everywhere. My flight out was delayed, the next one missed, the next two full, but space remained on one going to a nearby location. Stacey drove there to get me. Arrival went from 7 pm to just past midnight! Slept good last night anyway, LOL. Leave here tomorrow, sightseeing our way to SC to some degree or other depending on weather.

Here's Pris. She will miss us while we are gone. But has Mello for company. (Another cat).. then they will get to enjoy a long car drive later in the month.

On the road again (soon)

The last month the mind has not wandered much. Rather tired, busy and contemplating another long trip away from home, indeed the days have been enough to keep me from much mental wondering. Which is a wonder in itself.

There is one thing that does stand out though through all this – my reluctance to leave home.  When others have said such I thought what a stay at home! Go nowhere? How dull! Yet the older I get,  the more I align myself with them.  Is it age alone, a lack of energy, being ever so comfortable in my own place? Will I actually reach a stage of saying No, thanks for the thought but I’ll just stay at home? That’s a bit scary.  Is that a common thing I wonder?

We have a lot planned. A flight to Ohio,  trip to SC and a visit there with stops along the way, back to Ohio then off to California. Maybe thinking about it makes me tired ahead of time. However I do want to go and know that once gone – once on the plane flying above Texas – all reluctance will fade away leaving nothing but anticipation for the time to come.

Geocaching

People will sometimes ask me WHY I geocache. There are so many reasons! It boils down to some of us will love it, some will always wonder why in the world would you want to do to do such a thing as that?

Some of my reasons:

It’s a social activity if you want it to be. I rarely go alone. My friend and I enjoy not just caching but stopping for a meal at some bbq place in a small town perhaps, or Starbucks.

It’s a good clean family activity. Well, if you don’t get in the mud anyway.

I wouldn’t walk a mile for exercise alone very often but I will walk a mile for a cache. Or more. Or less. Getting to the waterfall below in the Big Bend was not easy but oh so worth it!

View Full Album

I enjoy nature. We see quite a bit of fauna on our excursions. Snakes are always fun and then there were the camels and the kangaroos. Imagine that. Longhorns I expect to see but I am still bemused by camels and kangaroos in a field in west Texas.

View Full Album

Earth caches (a unique geoscience feature or aspect of our Earth) can take you to interesting sites. Also virtuals (example, a historical site) where there is no physical cache, just a location to visit and information to discover. I’ve been places I might have missed otherwise a few times. In the Bahamas while others visited stores close to the waterfront, the lure of a cache led me to the Queen’s Staircase. It’s on a tour true but I’d have missed it if I had not been going for a cache because no one else in my group was interested. So I hiked there alone!

View Full Album

Wherever you are, there are caches near by for you to find!

Goodbye Lolli-cat

I wasn’t here when it was time to say goodbye. A part of me will always regret that. Lolli was a rescue from the country living days, a sweet cat who in her mind belonged solely to my daughter. My son said she was not eating much to speak of and getting so thin. So it seemed time to say goodbye.

My preference is for them to die quietly in their sleep. I guess that is what we all hope for whether for ourselves or our beloved animals. Some can't stand the thought of 'putting down' a pet. Yet I hope that they too realize once in a while, it is the best choice for the animal. Consider quality of life, are they in pain? Is there any hope for recovery? I hate euthanasia. I want that beloved pet to be around as long as possible. Yet I also believe that sometimes the last good gift we can give to our animals is an easy, peaceful end.

Lolli was so frail at the last, wobbly on her feet. Then John said Mom, she's barely touching her food. So I made the choice from which there is no turning back. I can only hope it was the right one. I did so want to give her one last good summer in the sun. In any case, she did not lose many days we suspect. Goodbye Lollers – you were a good cat.

Weep Not for Me, In Memory of a Beloved Cat

by Constance Jenkins

and other writings (Rainbow Bridge)

Failure isn’t my fault

or is it? Failure of one sort or another happens to all of us. We try, fail, try again.. or make excuses! Failure in life itself, failure to achieve your goals and dreams because of ___ (fill in the blank) seems on the surface to be acceptable. At least, I know a few people who have good reasons for not ‘getting there’, wherever ‘there’ is for them. Their divorce, their children (having to care for them), their boss, their looks, the list goes on. I never felt this was quite sufficient an excuse but never had a handle on how to respond either. Once in a conversation with someone good at excuses for why not but many dreams, growing tired of listening to the dreams that would never happen, I said, Less talk! More action! And I walked away wondering, Why do some of us stop at talk? What issues are we not dealing with or what nice psychological reason is there for some of us to end up stalled out?

Now I can’t say a lot, not being a ‘getting there’ kind of person myself. However I never wanted to that much, being happy as a SAHM and not needing to work. Yet I admit at this point that I have excuses for not working that would all fall aside if I really needed to work. So what is the reason we just quit? We read about people who overcame odds that seemed insurmountable or at least very daunting. They did it and we tend to give them some marvelous characteristic uncommon in most men to say, Yeah, they are remarkable people. Meaning, I’m not don’t expect this of me.

Then my son handed me a book. (Some of you knew this was coming right? My children could count on it being a book.) The idea was that someone else needed it, and from the title I did not see much point in my reading it. Then I opened it and read the first chapter.

Oh my. This guy nails it. 13 Fatal Errors Managers Make And How You Can Avoid Them, by W. Steven Brown. Doesn’t really sound like a title for a book just anyone would want to read does it? It did not take many pages though for me to realize this could be a good one for any of us.

We’ve all heard the phrase, the buck stops here. Brown says there is a way to predict failure: People will fail in direct proportion to their willingness to accept socially acceptable excuses for failure. Ouch. There’s another term I’ve heard a lot lately: accountability. So we can have our excuses, uh I mean reasons, and accept failure as something beyond our ability to change, or we can be accountable and accept responsibility. I used to tell my children this very thing. We could blame it on someone (something) else, which meant it was out of our hands, we don’t have the power to do anything to fix this, change this, etc. Or take personal responsibility and then have the power to change things because it is ours. Ownership gives us power to have an effect. To change it, to overcome it, to do whatever is needed for a better outcome.

This is so basic I think yet, something many of us tend to do. It isn’t my fault, I can’t help it – if only ___ then ___ (fill in the blanks, if only I’d had better chances and an education, I’d have a better lifestyle.) Well that might be true, but the question really is, so what are you going to do about it?

So now when someone tells me their dreams and their why nots, will I have the courage and tact to ask gracefully – so you know the problems and what you wish for, what are you going to DO about it? And sometimes, I will need to ask myself that very question.

the cats are out!

Usually this would be a problem, that cry would mean come help corral cats! (see the Fela up a tree post.) These days though I’ve given up. My son started letting them ‘do their own thing’ while I was out of town. No complaints from me. The cats are happy and stay in the yard. I am working on a total solution – cat pen/garage set up – so they can be out and we do not have to worry about them.

Meanwhile Fela enjoys the grass and hopes a bird will come close.
LBK, the rotten baby, even goes out to roll on the pavement and get all nice and dirty.

Amazingly even Angel, the rescue from the city park nearby, is overcoming her fears to venture outside on the rare occasion. She runs back inside fast though if anyone goes out to take a picture of her! No evidence no evidence! I can hear her cry.. I’m an inside cat only now! (yeah right)

I really advise not letting your cats run free. There are too many dangers outdoors for them, and I’ve lost enough to know better. With luck the handyman will get the cats fixed up with a safe alternative soon.

click! good dog!

My dog Su has taught me so much over the years. Su was just a little puppy wandering along a country road when I found her. I've picked up a lot of dogs and cats, and this one was to be no exception. It did not take long though to realize she was an exception in her own right. Su came with attitude. So much attitude the vet thought it would be wisest to euthanize her. I don't know enough about dogs to say what the problem was (and to a degree still is) for certain sure but this was a puppy who wanted things her way or no way. And she had the teeth to back it up. All was fine until you made any effort to restrain her or in any other way physically direct her path. Those puppy teeth were sharp! I think she sank them to the hilt in more than one person. Looking back it is amazing when you consider the rabies issue in Texas that we got away with keeping her anyway. She was a puppy. She was cute. I could not believe it was hopeless or 'too much work'.

Today, a long/short eight years later, I look at Su lying quietly on the den floor and think about how well behaved she is in the house, how sweet she is and okay, yeah, she's still not a dog to push around but she's a good dog and I tell her so every day. It's also been a whole lotta work. Yet it was worth it not just for the results (a good dog) but for all that I learned.

Some people are good at teaching, at training, whether it is an animal or a child. Naturals we might say. Some have studied and learned how to do a good job. But some? We expect so much, want it now, make demands, complain about non-compliance, but rarely seek new 'tools' to use that would help both sides have an easier time along with a better outcome. But no one had ever threatened to bite me before so there you go - I didn't learn until I had to or else!

So this is my plug for clicker training - a gentle positive way to modify an animals behavior and shape it to get the end results you desire. Yes, if you followed those links (and my personal favorite clicker site here, Shirley Chong's) you will see this "clicker training" is a way to relate to your dog resulting from concepts that can be used with people as well. I use a form of this in schools where I substitute - it is called tag teach. It grieves me to sub a class where some young child says, "I'll never earn a sticker", because he is a 'behavior' problem and has had only negative feedback. Sit down. Be quiet. Do your work. Pull your tag/write your name/lose recess. Whatever method is used in the class. Certainly there must be consequences for some actions. Yet too often that becomes our main focus. My focus is going to be rewarding the actions I desire - even if there is only the slightest move towards doing that thing, whatever it might be. In time you gain the behavior you want, whether from a dog, a lion, or a child.

There's not room here to tell all of Su's story, the issues we had and how I handled them (and we still train!). This is just to encourage you to search the 'net for these subjects and use them yourself.

It's spring.. when the air makes you want to get out and go places

like the Palo Duro Canyon. Here are two of my three, enjoying a bike ride to the "Lighthouse" a year or so ago. Someone told me once it is one of Texas's best kept secrets. I don't know about that but it certainly is a great place to visit if you like the outdoors. Plenty of walking and biking trails, at different levels of terrain, cabins and camping sites, horseback riding and even a few geocaches! There's nothing quite like waking up in the morning to see the sun come over the canyon rim, while cooking breakfast on the grill.

And then a pic of the youngest, as we take a break climbing
one morning.

Check this one out for a great vacation at a good price. If you don't
like camping, there is a nearby town with plenty of hotels.

(I would post the snake picture but some people don't like those. However, we never saw but two snakes in all the times we were there so don't worry about it.)

The Carnival of Cats!

The blog carnival of cats is listed in the sidebar. If you like cats, check it out!
----
deleted widget but google it if you run across this post and are interested. it's out there, hosted on a different blog each week. or check out http://blogcarnival.com to see all the carnivals.

Lovely, lazy spring day

It was such a lazy day. I napped all afternoon then jumped up at five-ish to fix us some supper. Easy enough to pull out rice w/mushrooms, a sweet potato, chicken and mixed veggies. Usually I quit at that point but this time I went for broke - desert! Ah well, that was easy. If you are into tasty deserts that are simple try this one out - Pineapple Angel Food Cake. Not from scratch please. Keep it simple. Not high in calories either unless you eat all of it between two people in a sitting or two, like we do.

It was such a pretty day. The rose bush is putting out new leaves. John and I walked Su down to the quickstop for a newspaper after supper. We both wish the weather was like this all year round. It occurs to me it is the perfect day for lying in the hammock, thinking of nothing. In fact, I think I will....




It's spring fever.... You don't quite know what it is you DO want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!
Mark Twain - American Humorist, Writer and Lecturer. (1835-1910)