Nobody Ever Listens

Well, I'm trying not to lose the momentum of returning, so since I have nothing very intelligent to say, I thought I'd share some of the things I write to the government about all the time that nobody listens to.

Nobody Listens to Me #1:

First, the thing I've written about over and over during the health care riots was a way to make (I think) Medicare both more fair and more self-sufficient. I'm really lucky to get Medicare even though I hate doctors and never go. Still, it's there. And actually I do get my money's worth because I talk to Dr. Jim every week and he then waits months - up to a year - to get the pittance they give him for the pain of talking to me. He's covered by Medicare Part B, which is where I think a little re-thinking would make my life easier and add tons of money to the Medicare trough. The way Part B is done now is they take money out of your stipend every month. In my case, they take $96 and some change. That's about 14% of my stipend.

I couldn't find my Medicare book from this year, but this is an excerpt from an email I wrote to someone back in 2007 when I began my one-woman campaign to talk about this. So far, it's still a one woman campaign. Anyway, here are the numbers from 2007.

$80,000 or less (individual) or $160,000 or less (joint)

you pay $ 93.50

$80,001-100,000 (individual) or $160,001-$200,000 (joint)

you pay $105.80

$100,001-150,000 (individual) or $200,001-300,000 (joint)

you pay $125.00

$150,001-200,000 (individual) or $300,001-400,000 (joint)

you pay $142.90

Above $200,000 (individual) or Above $400,000 (joint)

you pay $161.40

Math is not my strong suit (to put it mildly), but by my calculations, those at the 80,000 end of the equation in my $93.50 category are paying less than 2% of their income towards Medicare versus my 8%. The low end of the $80-100,000 category pays 1.5% of their yearly income and the upper end pays about 1.25%. Moving to level three, the bottom level folks pay 1.5% and the upper level folks pay 1%... Level 4, the bottom rung pays about 1.15% of their total income and the top end pay less than 1% (.085 or some such thing). Those at the bottom of the top range pay under 1% (.097% approximately). For someone with $500,000 in annual income the percentage is about .004%...

Even though the numbers are off for the current year, the principle remains. Someone with 10 times my income pays only $150 more per year than I do for Part B. And someone making $750,000 (50X what I get) pays only $814 more/year for insurance than someone with a yearly income of $14,000. Doesn't that seem a little nuts?

Nobody Listens to me #2:

My other big idea is about recycling. I don't understand why (sorry Republicans) don't nationalize our recycling system so that instead of each state recycling some things the nation recycles everything. If New York is set up to recycle #1,2 and 3 plastics, let them ship their #5 to Arizona where they recycle that and so on. This would be good for the environment and it would provide much needed jobs. It's a win-win.

Well, That's all I've got. I got side-tracked in the middle. I'm saving fairies from wistful spirits and it I thought I was just going to check in, but it took much longer than it should have.

Hope you are all having a lovely Thursday. Hard to believe the week has flown so fast.

It's Ruby Tuesday!

Probably nobody has noticed, but I kind of left the planet for a while. I've really missed Ruby Tuesday. Haven't taken a lot of pictures during my journey into the abyss, but I'm going to post some not very good ones anyway. Mixed bag. A couple of red touches in my beautiful new kitchen... well it's 9 months old now, but I still rejoice in it every time I walk in there, so... Also a sort of blurry picture of my flowering quince which, given our bizarre weather here, is already in full bloom. It always blooms pretty early, I guess, so maybe it's not the quince that's ahead of schedule but me that's behind. In any case, I love this bush, as do hummingbirds and other birds... a little magical spot in my back yard.

I can never decide whether to put cations

above or below pictures.... one of my red

pots on my beautiful new cabinets/counter tops...

and there's a red hand on the clock if you look closely.

Shannon likes to bake from time to time. They

have a giant

Cane Corso Mastiff at her house

who makes it very difficult, so she comes over here.

She's very fond of sprinkles.

The flowering quince. More pink than red, but...

HAPPY RUBY TUESDAY! HAPPY SPRING!

Just realized that I'm so out of practice that I forgot

to thank Mary at The Work of the Poet for

inventing and hosting Ruby Tuesday. Thanks, Mary!

Climbing Out of the Abyss

It has been a long 11 months. I'm not sure what happened to me... Well, that's not quite true because the trouble started when my older brother died. Something went out of me. I knew then and know now that I wasn't grieving. Phil and I were estranged and had been estranged for more than 20 years. I had spent almost 20 years - my 30s and 40s - doing a lot of care taking (Phil had Parkinson's Disease) and trying to work through the gradual realization that he was not my friend in any way. In fact, in may respects, he was the seed of my agoraphobia. Unlike many agoraphobics, my "I can't breathe" panics happened at home, in my apartment. It took a while for me to figure it out, but contact with my brother was often the underlying source. I had adored Phil from childhood on. I'd been taught to make excuses for his cruelty and to blame myself for my hurt feeling. I had spent a life-time swallowing hurt and anger and directing it at myself instead of where it should have been aimed. Anyway, I think I can call the 10 years of therapy, trying to work through things with him, my mourning period. There was nothing left to mourn by the time he died. Besides that, his physical condition had deteriorated to a state where he was not really living. There's nothing sad when someone is freed from that kind of bondage. At least not to me.

So if I wasn't grieving, why did I pull into a cave for eleven months? It took me an embarrassingly long time to figure it out and a while to process it after that. I'm just totally pissed off. I don't do well with anger in general. Even though I know better intellectually - the relentless training (from a group of really angry people) that forbade me be angry still rests deep in my bones. I can override it intellectually. I know better than to think anger is a "bad" thing. It's an uncomfortable thing, but it's a human thing. Anger isn't bad. It's what we do with anger that can make it negative. It's just a feeling and if we let our angry feelings move through us as we would our happy ones, life would be much easier. So if I know this, why did I fall into an abyss for almost a year?

Well, when I have feelings, I tend to get disembodied. I kind of leave the planet. Used to drive my therapist crazy. One minute he'd be talking to me and then I'd be gone... sitting there, smiling, talking, but emotionally far, far away... Ooops a feeling... gotta go. Until he died, I don't think I had actually realized the depth of my rage. Maybe I hadn't realized it until right this minute. You see, I always try to take the high road. Damned, bloody high road. So there were my sister's children. He was their uncle. I wished he wasn't, but he was and they had lost their mother. They knew we were estranged, but I tried to keep the details from them and tried not to influence their feelings about him.

And he was very ill. My mother's family seemed inclined to buy his lies about me.... that I was cruel and had abandoned him. This hurt me profoundly, but I decided that Phil (who was headed to a nursing home at 50 something) needed their friendship more than I did. Let them believe what they chose. I had shopped for Phil, called him daily- and sometimes twice daily to make sure he was ok, watched over him, invited him to every gathering I ever had, given him my time and energy for 15 years and then when I recognized how toxic he was to me, had still spent years trying to work things out with him. I had been his punching bag for my whole life. It cost me nothing, I deluded myself, to let him lie. That others chose to believe him said as much about them as it did about him. Or so I told myself. He had nothing. I had reasonably good health and friends. Let him have people who would believe the worst of me after I had sacrificed so very much taking care of both him and my parents. I would tell my story when he was dead and beyond hurt.

And then he died. The friends who had watched over him (as his sister had abandoned him) wrote to me about his death. Whether it was there or not, I read coldness and judgement in their emails to me. We're letting you know that your brother died. Please put us in touch with your nieces and nephew. Cold. That was the start of my seeping rage. I wanted to defend myself. But they had loved him. What would it serve to try and take that away from them? What did it matter to them how cruel he had been to me for my whole life, how he had poisoned my self-esteem and even my relationships? What did it matter to them that he had spat on what was originally supposed to be my life's work to such a degree that I was unable to pursue it? What did it matter to them that he might have raped me when I was a child? What did it matter that he had tried to make me think that my parents didn't love me, wanted me institutionalized? It wasn't their fault. But it felt like my childhood revisited. Poor Phil. To the lawyer, I wrote a pathetic email saying that I was glad Phil had had friends, that I would not give any details, just saying that it was hard to be painted as the villain when I felt like the victim. Not surprisingly, I didn't get an answer.

And how do you explain the kind of damage growing up the victim of a psychopath causes? How do you explain - when it took 40 years to even begin recognizing it - the slow drip of emotional acid on your psyche? How do you explain how frustrating it is to always have that pain turned against you? To have every cruelty rationalized away, every small accomplishment poisoned because your brother was jealous of any praise sent your way, any love given? How to explain the pain of watching him hurt others you love? Of having him tell your 18-year old nephew that his late mother had "complained" about him, a cruel lie designed to make himself important and to hurt someone he viewed as a "rival" (the only other male in the family). How do you explain the wound of endless, diminishment disguised as kindness? How to explain coping with someone who could tell a lie in such a way that he let you it know it was a lie, but so cleverly done that you couldn't prove it? How to explain the kind of slimy sadism that responds to a question like, "is it possible that you molested me?" with the response. "It couldn't have been me. I think I'm gay and only sadism turns me on." How to explain all that hurt? How to cope with all that repressed rage and pain?

Clearly, I didn't have a clue. It probably didn't help that almost immediately after Phil died, hordes of people descended (thank you very much, Delaware Opportunities for the awesome gift of my bathroom, kitchen and ramp) on my house for three months of pounding and sawing and painting and.... I had to process all that stress and unusual human contact too.

And then months passed a tiredness I can't describe came over me. Somehow every time I thought about posting I just felt too tired to connect to other human beings. I would try. Sometimes I would start a post and it just seemed like too much effort to follow through, too much effort to visit and leave comments. I just couldn't. I felt bad about it, but I just couldn't. I'm sorry about that, because I have missed people and a few have been kind enough to hang in there anyway. Thank you for that. It has meant a lot to me. Well, that's my story.

Anyway.... I think maybe three weeks without a computer followed by a week and a half of flu gave me the necessary time to process more deeply. While I was sick, I did a lot of reiki and healing work on myself. You'd think I'd have thought of doing that sooner, but I guess everything happens in its own time. At any rate, I feel like I have returned to planet earth for the first time in ages and it feels good to be back. Hopefully I will be able to stay.

Sunday Morning (Afternoon) Thoughts

Well, I'm still battling a kind of weariness that won't let go of me, but my brain is ticking away this morning, so I thought I'd blather on for a bit and see if I can't push myself past my inertia and start posting again.

So anyway..... things I'm thinking about.

The volcano in Iceland. Somewhere over the winter I was listening to an interview Fahreed Zakaria (one of the only Sunday morning shows worth listening to) had with some computer guy who was convinced that we could turn back global warming by putting focussed pollution into the atmosphere. He had come to this theory because of research he had done on the impact volcanoes have had on the ozone layer. I think that's what he said, anyway. It was quite a while ago and I just remember thinking it was a very cool idea. So anyway, here we have this awesome volcano, not only spewing stuff into the atmosphere in a very focussed way, but grounding massive numbers of polluting air planes. Maybe this is a gift from the Universe. Of course then all the loony tunes people who don't believe in global warming will delude themselves that they were right all along, but let them, if we get a reprieve on all the pain of the reality they have been ignoring. I went and did some googling to see if I could add a reference and it looks like there are different views on volcanoes and global warming. Some say they add to it, some say they can cause cooling, depending on what kind of stuff they spew. I'm going to hold happy thoughts that this volcano is benevolent. At the least it's cut back on air traffic, which is apparently a major factor in the warming process. That's something.

So then, when I was done thinking about that, I was (sorry, talking head day and politics is everywhere I turn) listening to Religion in America on PBS which is part of my Sunday morning routine. They were doing a piece on Jimmy Carter's work that has almost completely defeated one of the worst diseases that has ravaged Africa. I was listening to this and at the same time listening to a clip of Clinton saying he had been wrong on some economic policy and I got to thinking that these two men embody in some ways the deepest difference between Republicans and Democrats. The Republican presidents I can think of have retired to their ranches and made money giving speeches and writing books. The two living Democrats are both totally involved in trying to solve world hunger, disease and other social ills. They build houses, they are completely absorbed in making the world a better, healthier place... and not with big government, by the way, with individual actions. I think that speaks volumes.

Dan included the new Google Chrome browser when he gave me his computer. I like it a lot, but I'm still getting used to some of the differences with how it works with blogger. Great browser. I like it ever better than the Mozilla one. Doesn't crash as often. Of course that might have as much to do with the computer as the browser. I continue to loathe Explorer.

I had some other thought earlier but I got side-tracked for about 4 hours and can't remember what it is/was.

Weather here has turned chilly again and it's gray and rainy besides. Sigh. Even so, though, there are daffodils in bloom and my quince has got flowers, so Spring is here even if the temperatures are in the 30s today. Finally reinstalled my Canon program thingy so I've added a pictures of Angel and Tara Grace, my sweet girls.

Saturday Wordzzle Challenge: Week 105?

This is week 105 (I think it's 105... since some of you posted during my absence... ??) of the Saturday Wordzzle Challenge. Anyone new to the process can refer back here to find out how it works. I have to admit that I had intended to post catch up wordzzles for the weeks I missed but haven't had the gumption to do it, so I may post them later or with this post or... I feel very out of the loop, out of synch our of inspiration. Hopefully it will all come back to me once I get started with this week's words. It's almost 6:30 and I just barely got this week's offerings (all of which I hate) done, so I will try to add the back entries either later this evening or tomorow. Boy, this week's words seemed really difficult to me.... maybe I'm just out of practice, but I had a rough time. Hope everyone else did better. I'm sure you did.

This week's 10-word challenge was: oh, my aching bones, Spring has sprung, solitude, spearmint, platitudes, cardboard box, chimney, yogurt, shattered, flagrant and for the mini: dragons are forever, jelly beans, practice makes perfect, asparagus, spelling bee

My 10-word:

Spring has sprung, but oh, my aching bones are still feeling very wintery and achy and shattered. They are showing a flagrant disregard for my happiness and I must say that I rather resent it. But such is life. I have to say that some days my solitude wears on me more than others. I wish I was able to do some gardening... I'd plant spearmint and roses and maybe some tulips too.... and another flowering quince. I love my flowering quince. I look forward to seeing it burst into color every Spring. Well, I have moaned enough for one paragraph, I guess. Maybe I'll go have a yogurt, pack up some of my cardboard box collection for recycling next week. I was hoping that google would offer up some nice platitude about clean chimneys so I could finish this off in a tidy way, but alas, no such luck, so I'm forced to fit it in like this. Happy Spring, everyone.

The mini:

I had so much fun at the State Spelling Bee finals. Didn't hurt that I won. Practice makes perfect, my mother said over and over, and I guess she was right because considering the pressure, I was pretty relaxed on the whole. I met lots of nice kids and the whole thing was just interesting. I think my favorite part was the lady who made up the sentences (can you put that into a sentence?) . She had a wonderful sense of humor and came up with some really silly things that made us all laugh and helped us feel less anxious. Asked to put the word medieval into a sentence, she came up with "Medieval writings tell us that dragons are forever." For asparagus, she offered, "the vegetable asparagus is better for you than jelly beans." I can't wait for nationals.

And the mega:

"Oh, my aching bones," Jelly Beans, the world's oldest dragon moaned, "I'm so glad that Spring has Sprung at last. These old bones ain't what they used to be." He had burned the last of his cardboard boxes a few weeks earlier, finished his annual house keeping spree, and even cleaned the cave's chimney in preparation for the annual birthday gathering of his family. He had several children, all named in the family tradition of food names passed down both sides of his family tree. His father Spearmint and his mother Asparagus had been devoted parents and had raised their children and grand children to be flagrantly and outspokenly proud of their dragon heritage. "Dragons are forever" was part of the family crest and his daughters (Ice Cream and Sherbet) as well as his youngest child and only son Yogurt all served on the dragon high council, Ice Cream as chair person. He was very proud of them, though for himself, particularly given his extreme old age, he preferred solitude over politics and only allowed for his isolation to be shattered for very special events like his 1,111 the birthday. Popcorn, his first grand child, knowing his love of platitudes, had made a fire-breath wooden plaque onto which he had burnt the words "Practice makes perfect," which was one of his grandfather's favorite sayings. His grand daughter, Spaghetti, who was the world's youngest (and history would sadly record the last of their kind), shyly gave him a video of herself winning the International Dragon-kind Spelling Bee. In accordance with Dragon tradition on such an auspicious occasion, Jelly Beans gave each of his children one eight of his accumulated treasure and in keeping with his own personal tradition, each of his grand children 11 of his finest gems with which to seed their own future treasures along with a personalized family crest wrought in silver and gold with diamond highlights. They were quite stunning. All in all, it was a grand party and everyone, even Jelly Beans, had a wonderful time.

*********************************

Some catch-up... In my computerless/flu burdened absense, Argent offered some words: For the 10-worder: Minute, shave, orange, cardboard, scissors, speaker, calligraphy, wooden, picture and jute... and for the mini: hope, milk, freshness, earring, blinds.

I'm just going to do a mega for this one, if nobody minds.

Jute Blinds was an expert in calligraphy, among other things. He was well known for his decorative wooden plaques, which were generally made up of an etched picture (he was also a gifted artist) and some wise saying or quote in exquisitely minute gold, green or orange lettering. There was a freshness and creativity to his creations that kept them from being just the ordinary kitch. He was a great fan of recycling and had done some amazing things with old milk cartons and cardboard boxes that made the critics rave and customers flock to his shop. Give him a pair of scissors, some old plastic bottle caps or pretty much anything and he'd whip up a pair of earrings that would make Cartier envious. His talent and inventiveness were an inspiration that gave hope to the live green movement and eventually one of them persuaded him to shave his beard and go on the road as an inspirational speaker. He agreed to this mostly because he had fallen madly in love with her (she got his vision for saving the earth and she also happened to be quite beautiful). As with everything else, he took to speaking - perhaps because he so believed in his own words - that the tour was a great success and moved many artists and customers alike to begin thinking more "green."

and the challenge from a month ago when my computer crashed.... The ten word was comprised of eight words a friend had given me 10 years ago and 2 additional ones... Here's what I'm doing with them today. Once I'm done, I'll write to Vivian for what I wrote before and post both as promised... I guess I'll post what I've done and add the old one when Vivian emails me.

10-word challenge: culture, sheep, skin, mentally, box, desert, several people, church, Greece, thirst,

Next week's mini challenge: swimming pool, cargo, czar, focus, fine

The 10-word:

Since early childhood, Fred Gregory had sought out ways to be mentally challenged. He had an exceptional and creative mind along with a deep thirst for knowledge. He was fascinated by the dynamics of different peoples and loved to immerse himself in those cultures he was interested in. He had early developed a special fascination with Greece and the evolution of Orthodox church there. He had moved to Athens at age 20, learned the language and served as an acolyte for a number of years in order to "understand viscerally" as he put it. But he also loved learning about the desert cultures and had once spent a year sheep herding with Bedouins in order to understand their ways more completely. His passion and his love of experiencing many different ways of living made the books he wrote best selling page-turners which caused jealousy in some circles. Anthropologists, sociologists all wanted either to claim him as their own or disown him as a diletantte. He was generally among the most open minded and genial souls on earth but he did have a thin skin when these people tried to put him and his interests into a proverbial "box." Several people who had tried to do so had seen his dark side and would not make that mistake again. It was rare that he lost his temper, though. He had too much else to do. Tomorrow he would head for the American desert and spend some time living among the Hopis. How could his life get any better?

mini:

Carlos Sanderson, the swimming pool czar, watched the cargo plane land with focussed anticipation. This job installing pools at a chain of the finest hotels in Greece was going to make him richer than he had ever dreamed. He had come up with some amazing designs and was looking forward not just to the money (which he loved) but to creating several of the most magnificent swimming pools ever seen. Life was good.

************

Words for next week's 10-word challenge are: salamander, lawyer, prank, flaccid, spurious, angst, flowers, once upon a time, genesis, spark


For the mini: largesse, salad dressing, flying purple people eater, priest, Spanish

Thanks for playing. For those who are new, here are some guidelines to make the process more fun.

Enjoy! See you next week!

DON'T FORGET TO ADD YOUR
NAME TO MR. LINKY!!!!!

Next Week's Wordzzle

Hi everyone,

Sorry to be leaving yet another week's gap in the flow (such as it is these days) of wordzzles, but I just couldn't quite pull it together this week. I do want to post words for next week, though, and to do them in good time for everyone. I'll post a catch-up or two (I hope) over the course of the week. I'm feeling much, much, much better, but still a bit snurfly and tired. Wow. Can't complain, though. Haven't had a real chest whomper in about 10 years, which is pretty good... and I'm almost over it, which is even better. So anyway, here are the words for next week's wordzzles. I can't help thinking that Dr. John and Fandango will be clucking their tongues in heaven... there are a number of wordy phrases...

Next week's 1o-word: oh, my aching bones, Spring has sprung, solitude, spearmint, platitudes, cardboard box, chimney, yogurt, shattered, flagrant

and for next week's mini: dragons are forever, jelly beans, practice makes perfect, asparagus, spelling bee

On the off chance that someone new has dropped by and is wondering what this is all about, you can refer back here to find out how it works and here are some guidelines to make the process more fun. Hopefully, next week we (well I - since I'm the one who has been absent) will get back into the flow.

Free Speech?

Still coughing a bit and stuffy, but much better today and feeling like there is light (breath?) at the end of the tunnel, so to speak.

I'll post new words for next week's wordzzle in the next day or so when my brain is functioning more creatively, but I want to rant a bit this morning, or to raise a question that's been bothering me for a long time now.

Is there a difference between free speech and disinformation offered by news organizations like Fox News? Are hate and fear mongers like Glen Beck exercising freedom of speech or are they doing something else. If Beck was standing on the street corner, spewing venom and lies, I'd have no problem with it. That IS free speech. Ugly, but constitutional. But when someone is using public airways - that my taxes pay for as much as anyone else's, does it become something else? I don't know the answer, but it troubles me that a larger portion of the American public gets its information from a source that acts very intentionally to mislead, misinform and frighten them.

I don't know what the solution to a problem like this is. We certainly don't want the state monitoring or news broadcasts, but what about instating financial penalties for every inaccuracy and or distortion offered by left or right-leaning news organizations? Fox News alone could probably balance the budget in no time.... and such a system might make all broadcasters return to the strange antique custom of fact checking. We could fine politicians who lie too. That's shakier ground, because they really are exercising freedom of speech, even when they lie. But wouldn't it be fun to charge them for verbal pollution? Imagine how quickly we could bring deficit down! I really love this idea. I know it will never happen, but I actually think it would be a good thing to hold news organizations accountable for the crap they spew.

And that's used up all my energy for the day, I think... except maybe to go and find an clip from last night's Daily Show.

The Big Bang Treaty

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Update

Hi Everyone,

As usual, it's only when I'm at the recovering end of an illness that I actually catch on to how sick I have been. I'm breathing better today and my cough is looser so I know I'm getting there. My ears still feel buggy, my sinuses are cranky again and most of all, I'm still awfully tired, so if the wordzzlers of the world will forgive me, I'd like to take this week off - maybe catch up with the rest of you and do the week/s I missed and post some new words for next week.

I'm hoping that once I get past this, I can start posting again more regularly. I think I've had a revelation of sorts about what has been going on with me since my brother died last year. I knew it wasn't grief, but it has taken me almost a year to figure out what it was/is. (How's that for a teaser? What could it be, her adoring fans wondered?)

Anyway, thanks for your patience and your kind good wishes. I'm really looking forward to feeling better.

Bad News, Awesome News and Less Good News

The bad news is that Nate wasn't able to fix my old computer - at least not so that it would work well.

The awesome news is that my friend Dan bought himself a new computer and has given me his "old" one which is considerably younger than mine was and way cooler. It's a Sony Vaio with Pentium D and lots of capacity. Very cool. And it works, which is also very cool. I still have to reinstall some programs and get myself caught up.

The less good news is that, although I'm feeling a bit better today, I've had the flu. My voice is barely there, I'm coughing and aching and generally feeling pretty sorry for myself.

Took a few pictures and did some reading during my cyber exile, but I haven't got things set up yet to share anything.

I'll try to catch up on things and post wordzzles on Friday, but that's the news I have for the moment.

Thanks for good wishes and for the faithful wordzzlers. My apologies for vanishing for such a long spell.

Not-so-Saturday Wordzzle Challenge: Week 103

Hi everyone,

My apologies for the sudden vanishing act. I am still only semi back, I think. My friend Nate came and spent several hours yesterday evening and got the computer so at least I could get the Explorer browser running. Things are still kind of messed up, though, so I'm not sure how long this will last or if I'll be able to do more than pretty basic functions. Having trouble with visual stuff and not able to get things to download. It's all frustrating and aggravating. I was lucky that SKYPE and AIM kept working so I was able to get my niece to post the notice that I wasn't able to post... so at least I didn't just vanish.

Anyway, I'll be around this morning to check out people's contributions and will see if I can catch up and write my own. Meanwhile, so it doesn't get forgotten, here are some words for next week. The first eight words in the 10-word list have a history. Ten years ago a friend of mine who lives in Greece (Hi Viviane!) sent me a list of words. She has been having computer problems too and during her crisis started sorting through papers - she has printed out a lot of stuff - and came across the words and what I'd written. She challenged me to use them again and then she'd compare what I wrote now 10 years later to what I wrote then. So I thought I'd use them for our Saturday challenge and add a few more. So...

Next week's 10-word challenge: culture, sheep, skin, mentally, box, desert, several people, church, Greece, thirst,

Next week's mini challenge: swimming pool, cargo, czar, focus, fine

Here's a quick stab at a mega for this week...

Pluto, the labrador, was champing at the bit to explore all the wonders of the beach. There was that cool slimy seaweed and the starfish and that soggy thing full of matches that smelled really interesting. His human had no sense of adventure these days. She was always worrying about him doing something called "upsetting the apple cart" (he had done that once quite literally at the farmer's market and it was apparently a chapter in his life that he would never be allowed to live down. Even though his person had helped to get it upright again and had given the person some paper stuff, someone had nicknamed him Pesticide Pluto - a farmer joke, they said - and eventually, the human had stopped taking him along when she went there. But the beach... it was a puppy's paradise and he couldn't understand his human's reluctance to let him loose to explore. These days she seemed more uptight than usual. She was struggling with something called depression and her moods were unpredictable. Plus she seemed sometimes more unsteady than she used to be when she walked and he had heard her talking to a friend about something called liver spots. They had sounded very upset. It worried him. These days she mostly sat on the sofa in her plaid robe and slippers with a channel changer in her hand, so he was grateful that they were at least out together on an adventure. He looked back at her sitting in the sand and saw something in her demeanor that made him pause. Exploring could wait. And despite the wonders around him, he curled up quietly beside her and nuzzled against her, licking a tear from her cheek. At that she smiled and her face looked peaceful for the first time in days. Thanks, Plu. You keep me going, you know. I love you, you silly overgrown rascal. You give me joy as well as love. Thanks.


I HOPE... hope, hope hope,... that I'll see you all next week. I'll try to get around to read the posts from those of you who posted even without me.

Sort of late for this, but I'll put Mr. Linky up in case anyone wants to use him:

DON'T FORGET TO ADD YOUR
NAME TO MR. LINKY!!!!!

Cyber Deprived

There's a good chance I won't be posting wordzzles for a bit. I am currently cyber deprived. As soon as I am up and running, I will post. Be back soon.

Reason's to Pass Health Care

In the best of all possible worlds, health care reform would mean universal coverage - a system like Canada or France. This not being the best of all possible worlds, I think we should at least take what we can get. Imperfect reform is still reform.

The following came in my email from the White House. I thought it was worth sharing...

Good afternoon,

$1,115 -- that's the average monthly premium for employer-sponsored family coverage in 2009. Annually, that amounts to $13,375, or roughly the yearly income of someone working a minimum wage job.¹

It gets worse: a recent survey found that if we do nothing, over the next ten years, out-of-pocket expenses for Americans with health insurance could increase 35 percent in every state in the country.²

In an effort to put the past year's debate over health insurance reform into perspective, we're launching "Health Reform by the Numbers," an online campaign using key figures, like $1,115, to raise awareness about why we can't wait any longer for reform. We'll be sending out a new number every day. Learn what you can do to help spread the word:

$1,115 is more money than what many Americans pay for rent or mortgage. But there's more to the problem than just numbers.

Take Leslie Banks, an American mom with a daughter in college. In January of this year, she received a notice from her health insurance provider that her plan was being dropped. To keep the same benefits, the premiums for her and her daughter would more than double. Leslie was told by the insurance company that there was nothing she could do -- it was an across-the-board premium hike. If she paid the same monthly premium amount as before, the deductible would increase from $500 to $5,000, and she and her daughter would no longer have preventive care or prescription coverage.

Yesterday, Leslie introduced President Obama at a health reform event in Pennsylvania. Check out what they had to say.

It's important to raise awareness about numbers like $1,115 and stories like Leslie’s because skyrocketing health care costs impact all of us. So take a moment to forward this email to your family, friends and online networks.

With all of us working together, we'll send the message loud and clear -- the time is now for health insurance reform. It's time we made our health care system work for American families and small businesses, not just insurance companies.

Let's get it done.

Nancy-Ann DeParle
Director, White House Office of Health Reform

As I've said before, I don't get people's resistance to universal coverage.

Massachussetts has a program similar to what the White House has proposed and it is apparently working quite well, the Republican Governor of the state opposes offering the rest of the country desperately needed help. One has to wonder if this is concern for the country or politics. Well, one doesn't really have to wonder, the answer is pretty obvious.

I read recently that Sarah Palin used to go across the border to get health care for her family. You know that horrible socialist country to our north where she didn't have to pay for care. Hmmm.

Another great reason to support Health Care reform is that Rush Limbaugh has threatened to leave the country and move to Costa Rica (which has universal health coverage) if health care passes. Would that the man ever spoke the truth. When he got sick in Hawaii a few months back, he raved about his care until he discovered that Hawaii has had universal coverage for its citizens for 40 years!

The biggest reasons as far as I'm concerned, though - are human decency. What kind of nation are we if we let our own citizens suffer and die needlessly, when we don't make sure that every pregnant women gets the best possible care. There's also the common sense reason. While there may be short-term costs to reform, there are long-term savings... in money and in lives. I bought new windows for my house a while back. I had to accrue debt to do it, spend money I couldn't afford. Do I regret the decision? Not for a second. My quality of life has improved enormously, I'm saving on heating costs and the environment is benefiting too.

I don't know if this analogy works, but I'm going to try it. The current state of health care - the uninsured, the outrageous costs - are like a cancerous tumor slowly killing the nation's people and it's economy. We can keep postponing surgery and see our people and our economy die while we wait - or we can take action, even imperfect action. Maybe we'll need additonal surgery. We'll be alive to have it.

Sometimes you have to spend to save. Sometimes you spend because its necessary. Our current health care system has left many bankrupt or in crippling debt, even those who thought they were insured. That's just destructive of individual lives and of the nation's economic well-being.

Lastly, I guess, it's simply not right for so many people to live without access to health care. We are our brother's (and sister's) keepers. It's true that if we don't hang together we will all hang separately. If we don't hang together way too many of us will die separately, needlessly in pain and in poverty. That's just wrong.

Guess that's all I have to say. Not sure how coherent it is, but...

Saturday Wordzzle Challenge, Week 102

This is week 102 of the Saturday Wordzzle Challenge. Anyone new to the process can refer back here to find out how it works. My list of mistake this week is overwhelming. SOOO sorry. Am I wrong or was pregnant on our list recently I try not to repeat words and phrases but sometimes I slip up. Sorry. Sorry too about food cream... and the fact that unlike a couple of weeks ago when there were 9 words, this time there are apparently 11. Agggghhhh! I have no idea what food cream is, how it got there, or what I was thinking. Probably meant whipped cream. And I spelled Hershey wrong. Clearly it wasn't a good week here in Hancock. Maybe they should start preparing my room at "the Home."


Participation seems to have dropped off significantly of late but I plan to keep going for a while and reassess the situation at some point down the line. I would like some feedback from everyone about taking "Saturday" out of the equation since quite a few folks are having trouble making the Saturday deadline. It never really was a deadline in my mind, it's just back when I started the Wordzzle Challenge, I was posting daily or close to daily and so I picked Saturday for this challenge. If people would prefer it, we can change it (except for the logo which I'm too lazy at the moment to revise) to the WEEKLY wordzzle challenge and people can just post whenever they are ready. I'd still post mine on Friday evening as I've been doing. Let me know what you think.


This week's words were: smoothness, sugar daddy, page, Copernicus, liquid, craggy, trapezoid, milquetoast, blizzard, food cream, dental problems For the mini: Hershey kisses, pregnant, scarring, cadet, grist mill



My mini:


Cadet Wanda Walker sat on her bunk and cried. She couldn't believe she was pregnant. How had this happened? One romantic dinner at the Grist Mill Inn with Max and her career was ruined. She had been worried by the occasional bouts of nausea but when she started craving Hershey Kisses, she knew... Now she would have to leave the army, the career that she loved. She knew that she carried deep emotional scarring from her own childhood as an army brat and she would not let that happen to her baby girl (she knew somehow that she was having a girl). She didn't know how Steve would feel about things, but she guessed she had to tell him. With or without him, though, this child would be loved and have a stable safe life. She would make sure of it.



The mega:


What on earth is food cream??? Who made up these words? Didn't she proof read? I have no idea what I was thinking... obviously I WASN'T thinking. The grist mill of my brain had ground to a halt, wasn't functioning... major snafu. Sigh. Anyway... here's a bit of nonsense with for the rest of the words (which were also pretty awful). I wish I had a sugar daddy named Copernicus Trapezoid Jones. He'd have a craggy, handsome features, beautiful liquid brown eyes you could drown in, an urbane smoothness (not creepy or fake, just a natural easy charm), a wry but gentle wit, and piles of money. No dental problems, no major scarring (though I really don't care about that a bit... just have to get rid of the word). A gorgeous smile. We'd be on the same page politically. He wouldn't be a milquetoast, but he'd be agreeable. I'd win most of our arguments because he'd be persuaded by my thoughtful intelligence. Our days would be pregnant with laughter and inspiration. We'd write books together. On those days when I'm down or feeling like a space cadet, he'd hold my hand and see me through. And during Hancock's winter blizzards, we'd snuggle together and sip hot chocolate or nibble Hershey kisses. I'd like that. So Copernicus Jones, if you're out there.... I'm waiting.



The 10-word:


Copernicus Jones was considered by some to be almost too perfect. Men who were jealous called him - erroneously - a Harvey Milquetoast. He never much cared what people thought. Considering how perfect he was, he was remarkably modest and self-effacing. He'd had a trapezoid shaped face, handsome "craggy" features, skin that was reputed to have the smoothness of silk, and huge, liquid brown eyes that positively oozed with intelligence, humor and compassion. He'd never had a dental problem in his life. At age 58, his teeth were still perfect. His smile was reputed to make women swoon. When he had - in a moment of loneliness, because amazingly Copernicus Jones was lonely - listed himself on one of those e-harmony type websites, his email had been overwhelmed with a positive blizzard of responses. He'd had to take down his Facebook page because it too had been overwhelmed with admiring fans and women hoping for a handsome sugar daddy to buy them whatever they fancied. (Yes, Copernicus J was filthy rich too.) He'd responded to one woman because he was curious about her email address which was angelfoodcream@... etc. She had turned out to be a touch crazy and he had given up on the idea of love and companionship. Then last night he'd had a strange dream in which a laughing raven had been calling out his name... When he woke up he had a feeling that maybe there was hope for him yet.

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Words for next week's 10-word challenge are: slimy, Pluto, champing at the bit, peaceful, chapter, upright, depression, starfish, matches, channel changer


For the mini: liver spots, pesticide, plaid, unpredictable, upsetting the apple cart

Thanks for playing. For those who are new, here are some guidelines to make the process more fun.

Enjoy! See you next week!

DON'T FORGET TO ADD YOUR
NAME TO MR. LINKY!!!!!

The Coffee Party Movement

Very interesting... The young woman who has started this movement makes wonderful good sense. I hope people listen to her. The last guy is a libertarian (not my cup of tea or coffee, but he's very interesting and thoughtful).

Saturday Wordzzle Challenge, Week 101

This is week 101 of the Saturday Wordzzle Challenge. Anyone new to the process can refer back here to find out how it works. For anyone new to wordzzles, the words for this week's mini are a memorial of sorts for our wordzzle/blogger friend Dr. John Linna who died last week. He will be missed.

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I wanted to share two things this week. We had two very late posts last week. One was from Stephen in AZ who shared that he has been posting late because he has not been feeling well. Maybe we can all send our prayers and good thought to him. I also - even though I don't like to play favorites - wanted to recommend that you stop by last week's other late post. Gabrielle wrote something truly wonderful using the words from 2 weeks ago and I'd hate for everyone to miss it.

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This week's words were: smoothness, crafty, purchase, brief, chirping, forever, shift, moonrise, lampshade, stereotype For the mini: remembrance, Dr. John, Agent 012, dragons, Fortress


My mini:

The dragons, led by the noble Fandango, had gathered en masse at the Fortress of Remembrance. Many were weeping unabashedly, something that Dragons seldom do even in the most dire of circumstances, but they had lost a great friend - a human - but a great friend, none-the-less. Dr. John Linna - whom they affectionately called Agent 012 - had offered friendship and had become a spokesperson of sorts for the Dragon community, greatly improving human-dragon relations. They had enjoyed his wit and his kindness and his generosity to his fellow humans and to the dragons. He would be written up (and remembered orally), they all agreed, in Dragon Lore. For today, they would collect their tears and put them into a crystal bottle, which Fandago himself would deliver to Dr. John's beloved wife Betty and to his children. Dragon's tears were reputed to have legendary healing powers because they were rare and made of love. Fandango wished they were as healing to dragons as they were to humans because he thought perhaps his heart had broken. Of all the treasures he had amassed over the centuries, his friendship with Dr. John was perhaps the one he held most precious. He knew that friends like Dr. John never really leave us. They stay in our hearts and our memories, but memory was different than life and though he was now enshrined in the Fortress of Memory, thing would never be the same.




My 10-word:


Samson could not believe that the crafty merchant had gotten him to purchase ten cases of Moonrise Moonshine, but apparently he had. The last thing Samson remembered was being told about its smoothness and the words "just have a taste." A couple of sips later it felt as though the earth had shifted and after that he had a brief and very vague recollection of dancing with a lampshade on his head (could it be he had done something that was so sterotypical?). This morning with a headache/hangover that made the sweet chirping of birds sound more like thunder, he thought perhaps he would give up drinking forever.



My mega:

The dragons had invited Raven to attend the ceremony at the Fortress of Remembrance for their friend Dr. John or Agent 012 as they had liked to call him. She had been more than a bit uneasy about the idea of attending a moonrise gathering of dragons but now she was glad she had decided to go. The the sight and sound of dragons weeping was something she would remember forever. It certainly shifted her existing stereotype of them as crafty, dangerous and cynical creatures. The memorial ceremony itself had been brief. The leader of the dragons - a dragon with a name like Tango or something like that - had appeared carrying what had (at first glance) appeared to her to be a lampshade. Fandango - that was the name - had later explained that it was a crystal container in which they would collect their tears to offer as a gift to the family. Anyway, Fandango had appeared, said something in a language which sounded oddly (especially given the massive size of dragons) like chirping except that there was a depth and smoothness to the tonality that was simultaneously moving and consoling and she found herself wishing she could purchase a recording of the sound for times when life was too much. She wished she could have brought her camera too record the occasion, but it had been expressly forbidden. She would have to remember it in her heart, along with Dr. John and so many other wonderful souls who had crossed through her life as she traversed this world. She asked if she could add some of her own tears to the dragons vial and they graciously allowed her to do so. It was not much, but it was all she had to offer.

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Words for next week's 10-word challenge are: sugar daddy, page, Copernicus, liquid, craggy, trapezoid, milquetoast, blizzard, food cream, dental problems


For the mini: Hersey kisses, pregnant, scarring, cadet, grist mill

Thanks for playing. For those who are new, here are some guidelines to make the process more fun.

Enjoy! See you next week!

DON'T FORGET TO ADD YOUR
NAME TO MR. LINKY!!!!!

The Dying Process

This is in two parts. Worth listening to. I have been where Olberman is now with his dying father. It is not an easy place to be. I wish there had been "death panel" discussions to help me through. Lucky for me, my parents and I had talked some about it and I had Dr. Jim. Not everyone has that.