Moving on

I have been absent from the blogger world for awhile, experiences of life keeping me at bay. My mom-in-law died August 18th at a Hospice house, she left quietly when no one was looking. We all said goodbye to her as she lay in bed, tears streaking our faces as we said our final thoughts to her. This was very hard for me as I don't do well with sickness or dead bodies, I avoid visitations with open caskets at all costs.
She was Catholic and the family proceeded to have a long, drawn out catholic visititation, rosary, funeral, grave side, and luncheon. I now think that catholics may be masochists, I mean how many times can you say goodbye and go through the sorrow.
During all this I started a job and another sememster at school. My time is filled with working 40+ hours a week, two classes at night, and an endless supply of homework. Toss in my best friends wedding in September, a suprise 50th anniversary party for my parents in October, and you have one girl who is busier than a one legged man in a butt kicking contest.
One day I will finish these quests and take time to myself, for now I hope to have time to sneak peeks at those blogs I miss reading.

Life can change so fast...

It really amazes me how life can throw a curve ball. The last few weeks have been a whirlwind of changes and emotional rollercoasters. My mom-in-law went to the hospital with pain in her leg only to discover she has advanced bone cancer with spots in her lung and kidney. While in the hospital she fell and broke her pelvis because of the drugs she was on. Watching this woman go from a vibrant grandmother to a frail little old lady has been very hard. She is dying, there is no denying it and she is not strong enough to make it through chemo. Keeping her comfortable is the best they can do now, so very sad.

I finished out my summer classes with A's amidst all the commotion to my suprise. I received a job offer from a previous employer that suprised me. They are creating a new position and called me to ask if I was interested, I was very flattered by this. We had a meeting and I accepted the offer and start next week, I took a couple weeks off to finish school and deal with the mom-in-law situation.

So, while I try to wrap my head around starting a new job, the sadness of watching someone die, signing up for fall night classes because I am so close to graduating, I wonder how people handle it all. This emotional roller coaster of sadness, anxiety, and anger. I am starting to understand the concept of Prozac now even though I have never had it. Being strong for my husband and his family is first on my list, the rest will fall into place, I hope.

Catching Up

So I have been busy, apparently for at least a month since my last post. I finished the last semester on a good note of making the Dean’s List. I had a few weeks in between semesters I thought would be slow, not! Between doing favors for everyone and volunteering a couple days a week the last few weeks flew by, I was looking forward to school starting again so I could slow back down.

Yesterday was my first class, government. Boring. The class is three hours long twice a week and most of it is the professor talking and he doesn’t exactly have a captivating voice. I will now take coffee to class to keep awake.

My other class is on-line through the college, Marketing. Again, boring. I have never done an on-line class so this will at least be interesting in that aspect. He has something due every day so there will be no slacking in this class, I just hope I understand it.

Along with all the other my hubby and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary yesterday. We stayed home and grilled a yummy filet mignon, asparagus, and crab cake meal. He even bought me roses, what a sweetie! It is funny to think of how much has changed in the past year and how fast it went. We really are late-bloomers, lol.

I am hoping to get back on track for the next few months, I have also missed reading my favorite other bloggers and need to catch up on their stuff, especially Hunter, The Vegetable Assassin, and Nooter. See you guys in a bit.

Library

So here I am, sitting in the beautiful library I have come to know and love the past few months, pondering how much I will actually get here this summer. I will have to make time to visit occasionally, I don’t want it to forget me after spending so much time here. I am taking classes this summer, but only one will be at the school. This library has become a dear friend and kept me company with seemingly limitless books and quiet time to work, I shall miss our daily visits.

Will it know when I visit my other library, will it be jealous? No worries, I will be back soon good friend.

Distractions

Ok, here we go, I am ready to read this chapter for accounting. The full

disclosure principle calls for financial reporting (another hangnail?) of any

financial facts significant (that girl’s shoes are cute) enough to influence the

judgment of an informed reader. (Fat boys in shirts on the beach, ha ha, damn

you Hunter) In some situations, the benefits of disclosure (I wonder what the

best beach is to find shells?) not as apparent. (I wonder if anyone is on

Facebook?) For example, recently the SEC (to hell with this, I will do it later)

Swimming in work

Busy. That would describe me lately. The last few weeks of the semester is looming and all the teachers like to see just how much crap they can load on you before the end. I feel like I am either studying at home, the library, or in my sleep. You would think I would be brilliant by now, but not so much. I did sign up for a couple summer classes though, might as well keep going until my brain disolves.

With summer looming around the corner I have been having this urge to go swimming. Unfortunately the lakes are still nut shriveling cold, or in my case ovary shriveling cold. For now I will have to suffice with a short backstroke in the bathtub.

I could go to the hotel in town and pay to use their pool, but I am not a fan of chlorine. One summer when I was a kid I swam at a community pool, my hair had green streaks by August from the chlorine. So if you are blonde and want green hair, go swim in a heavely chlorined pool daily, or use hair dye, your choice.

Samson is still limping, which makes me think he tore his ACL instead of just straining it, poor puppy. He misses his walks, but I keep telling him he needs more rest, and he stares at me with those big, brown, full-of-hope eyes and I feel like such a jerk for saying no. The perils of parenting a puppy.

So I am off to the usual, kissing the dog and petting my hubby before more homework.

Stay Gold

I was watching an incredibly gold sunset earlier and all I could think was "stay gold Ponyboy".

For those of you who remember that movie or like Robert Frost, I thought I would post the poem.


Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafs a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

A poet I'm not

I read on Hunter's blog that April is poetry month. I am no where near being the writer he is, so I thought I would be silly instead. Enjoy.

A prance
is a dance
done by a guy named Lance
in very tight pants

Mr. Hop-A-Long

So, Samson being the big "puppy" he is, strained his ACL a couple days ago. We took him to the vet and decided no x-rays were needed yet and she gave us some pain killer/anti-inflamitory pills for him to take. She also told us we need to keep his activity limited, has she met our dog?

Samson is recovering well, even putting weight on his injured hind leg now and then. I find it amazing how fast he can move on three legs. Today, being nice and sunny, was very hard to keep him from running around like a mad dog.

His big brown eyes look like they want to explode from pent up excitement. Whenever we walk near the door he dances on his three good legs in anticipation of a good romp. How do you make a dog understand that he needs to rest? If anyone knows, please fill me in. I guess I should have also asked for a prescription of doggie valium for the next two weeks.

Therapy Rant

Do you ever just want to freak out? I sometimes feel like that, or maybe it is just PMS. I usually don’t hold grudges against people and eventually just let it go, but lately I find myself holding my ground. I believe that I am one of those people who are always reliable and would do whatever for a friend. When you needed something I was the person to call, even if you hadn’t called me for months, I let is slide.

Back in June we had a sort of wedding reception/party at our house for our friends. We supplied all the food and asked for no presents. A couple who I have known for years was invited and said they would come. This same couple had notoriety for moving a couple hours away and didn’t inform anyone, and also she had a riff with another common friend. They also expect all of us to call them when we visit their town and “look them up”, even though they never do the same when they come back.

The day of the party she calls saying they can’t make it, her husband has to work, she doesn’t. Well, she can still come right? Wrong. I hear excuse after excuse knowing full well she is afraid to face the other friend, that he may start something. I found it highly selfish of her to think he would ruin my party just to confront her. I let it go, but it ground on me in a bad way.

When this couple was married we went and did everything we were asked to make it great. Rented a tux to stand in the wedding, even though we were broke. Picking out a thoughtful wedding gift and generally giving them support and help where needed. This is what friends do, right? So I sent her an email saying how I was disappointed, but should not have been surprised because of their history, and that my feelings were hurt that she couldn’t give me any support in return.

She emails back, calling me selfish and giving more excuses. I finally end the emails saying she is right and fighting about it is stupid, just to end it. Again I apologized for something I had no reason to apologize for.

We went and saw our friend’s band play last night and she showed up. Couldn’t come to my wedding reception, but could come to the bar? Almost everybody welcomes her with open arms, rewarding her for something she should have done a long time ago. She didn’t approach me and I did not approach her, for once I will not apologize for someone else’s misgivings.

Some people don’t understand it and call it petty, I call it standing up for me. I finally decided I am tired of it and am not taking it anymore. Why be treated like second class by your own friends? Not me, not anymore, even if they think I am the bad guy.

So that is my rant for today. “Good riddance to bad rubbish” as they say. This is my way of putting it to rest. Call it drama or whatever you want, I call it therapy.

Dogs and Roses

You never have to tell a dog to stop and smell the roses because they stop and smell everything.

I like my critters

So, I made through my third speech this morning. I felt awful about it because I did not have as much time to prepare so I was nervous, but people in class said it was really good. How strange. I did the usual “tug at your heartstrings” speech about the abuse of traveling circus animals and why those circuses should be banned.

I find it strange that we can have more compassion for animals than other humans, not that there is anything wrong with that. If you want to turn me into a snarling maniac who will whoop your ass up one side and down the other, just purposely hurt my dog or cat.

I like people, but we can be real assholes towards animals, and I don’t always understand why. My cat likes to mutilate birds on the bedroom carpet and leave us a gift of guts and feathers to clean up. Sometimes this pisses me off, but I can’t hurt her as it is in her nature to hunt. I can tell her no and hope she gets the hint we love her without the presents.

My dog likes to do what my husband calls “crop dusting”, meaning he will come in from outside, walk in front of us while silently farting, and then go back outside leaving us with his butt fragrance. I don’t know if he does this on purpose, I swear that sometimes I see him smile when he slips back out the dog door. It could be revenge for baby talking to him, or putting the wig on him at Halloween and proceeding to point and laugh hysterically. It is just something he does and we accept it as part of the dog he is, maybe adding a little probiotics to his dinner to settle the tummy.

So I beg people to be nice to animals, what have they really ever done to you? And if they did do something to you, are you sure you didn’t deserve it? We should never underestimate the intelligence or compassion of an animal. I have seen animals that act more of what we consider human than some humans themselves.