Tuesday, December 27, 2005

For Christmas

I got a reading log book – I’m excited to get started. I just finished The Secret Life of Bees and started The Life of Pi.
The last fiction book I read was The Historian. I’ve applied for an opening in the children’s department of the library I work in. I read Snowflake Bentley last week in the Caldecott section of picture books. My last children’s fiction book was Because of Winn-Dixie. I haven’t seen the movie, but the book was EXCELLENT!

Sunday, December 25, 2005

Merry Migraine Christmas

The children are all snug in their beds and I should be stuffing their stockings, but blogging instead. It feels like I haven't slept in a week. Half of my head feels like it's been blown off and I didn't get my migraine medicine refilled dammit. The lights on the tree are driving me nuts. I'll go back to bed for an hour or two, then get up and drink coffee to see what that'll do. Hopefully the spots in my eyes go away and there will be some cheer in my Christmas Day.

Wishing everyone the best of holidays!

Monday, December 19, 2005

Making a list

Today I went Christmas shopping. It was 12 degrees F outside this morning at 7 when my husband and I went to the garage. He drove the Aztec and I drove my car - without heat (one of the reasons it was going to the shop) and ran out of washer fluid halfway there. After dropping him off at work, I took the Aztec for a day of shopping. Since it was before 8 a.m. and Target wasn't open yet, I stopped by Home Depot. Did you know that Home Depot opens at 6 a.m.? I'm supposed to be picking out a countertop for our new cabinet and by extension the rest of the kitchen. No luck with that - On to Target! After that, the mall. By then, it was only 9:30 but as I shopped, more and more people appeared. Mall walkers were replaced by shoppers and by 11:30 it was crowded.

I love buying cool stuff that I'm excited to give to people. Some things come from my list, but others just appear on the shelves in the store. After an afternoon nap, I met my daughter for a snack. It's so enjoyable to hang out with her. My car was going to have to be kept, so I had to get going to pick up my husband, but on the way he called to say they finished it so I could go straight home. Too bad there was two slow spots on the expressway. Good news: the car repair was less than we thought!

Lastly, I worked on Christmas cards. Left to do: wrapping, a few more gifts, cards - oh and we don't have our tree up. Still, good for one day.

Friday, December 16, 2005

Holiday Blues

I've been feeling quite blue lately. No motivation to do much of anything, which means the house is messy, dinner is whatever can be heated up and naps are in abundance. I keep going over accomplishments that are being made - some Christmas shopping done, grocery shopping, conferences at school, work, dog to the vet, mammogram and making the bed every morning. There's probably more, but you get the idea. So even though I feel as if I'm dragging along, things are managing to get done. A visit to the beauty shop for a cut and color resulted in complements from husband and step-son! My son is on break for two weeks, so a few less things to do there. My strategy for coping is reducing stress as much as possible, calling the psychiatrist (who increased one med) and waiting patiently to feel better. I think it's starting to work.

Friday, December 09, 2005

Go strait to hell - do not pass Go

This man claims self-defense in nun's death because she reached for her bible. He shot her five times and it seems that he did this for a rancher or group of ranchers. This area of Brazil has been a hotbed of violence over land ownership of rain forest. So there's two sides - ranchers who own land and have to make a living on the one hand. The other side is made up of settlers and rain forest advocates that are demanding land reform. There have been 1000 deaths in the last 10 years!

No matter which side you think is wrong, shooting a nun five times is gonna get you sent to the fiery big house for sure.

What would you sacrifice your life for? Besides my family, I haven't worked myself up to feeling that passionate about anything.

Sunday, December 04, 2005

You don't know what it's like....to be me

Children of the mentally ill, an article from an Australian website devoted to adults, adolescents and children with mentally ill parents, gives an intro to what it's like. Programs like Al-Anon and Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACoA) are geared toward focusing on yourself and your growth. Abandonment sums it up - feeling like the rug has been jerked out from underneath you again and again. A firm foundation of parental love is non-existent. Adult children have lost trust, hope, control.

Our family went back and forth between normal and dysfunctional as the roller coaster of manic-depression ran through. I became an 'emotional perfectionist'; always wanting to be in control, to feel normal. After many bouts of depression that weren't responding to treatment, I was diagnosed with manic-depression myself. Wow - what an utter failure. Shouldn't that be the absolute worst thing? Like finding out you have a terminal genetic disease. But, hey - perseverance is one thing I learned and listening to the pdoc(psychiatric doctor) was another. No hospitalization, no suicide attempts, no days and weeks in bed or staying up all night rearranging furniture and no drug and alcohol misuse or abuse.

Hopefully, my kids have come through and know they are loved, have a rug to stand on, can trust in me and themselves, have hope for the future while acknowledging that God is in control.

Saturday, December 03, 2005

Science faces 'dangerous times'

It seems as if progress has stopped and we are moving backwards. Both science and faith are vital to the human existence. People can and do live with both. When science meets God offers a discussion on this topic.

Thursday, December 01, 2005

Anti-Flag

Anti-Flag on MySpace

Lyrics to 1984 by Anti-Flag:

Who would Jesus bomb? Yeah, who would Jesus kill?
The double talk is past surreal
The word of god is now the word of hate
War is peace, and freedom is the police state
Can't you see the writing on the wall?
Democracy lays trampled on the floor...

You better believe that...
Hell yeah I'm confused for sure what I thought was the New Millennium is 1984!
Mr. Orwell from the grave, adding fresh ink to the page
As the unpresident declares an endless war...
Welcome to 1984!

Feels like Nazi Germany, and Hitler on TV,
As the unpresident spews homophobic speech
You say the Allies fought a war to end extremist fascist law
So tell me NOW what the fuck are we fighting for?

I just can not take it anymore
Democracy lays trampled on the floor...
Man, isn't freedom great?!?!

Hell yeah I'm confused for sure what I thought was the New Millennium is 1984!
Mr. Orwell from the grave, adding fresh ink to the page
As the unpresident declares an endless war...
Welcome to 1984!
Now we've got...
Armies of peace, armed to the teeth, delivering death to make the world a better place
So celebrate the weapons spending, say a toast to Armageddon, raise some hell!
We're headed straight to hell!!!

Hell yeah I'm confused for sure what I thought was the New Millennium is 1984!
Mr. Orwell from the grave, adding fresh ink to the page
As the unpresident declares an endless war...
Welcome to 1984!