More and more I find myself at home with just J for the evening. My daughter's activities have notched up a hair since 8th grade and he and I spend our evenings actually talking together. We watched a movie not long ago and as we sat on the couch next to each other, he put his arm around me, sort of across the back of the couch. It was funny and I was totally surprised. He is much more affectionate and sweet nowadays and not weirded out by sitting next to his mom. Many times he hugs me and tells me he loves me or grabs my hand and pats it. I hope his ability to show affection easily continues on into adulthood so his girlfriends and SO may enjoy it. None of my family members are physically affectionate and it seems strained when they show affection. I have always been. My kids both seems to need touched or to touch. It seems comfortable for them.
Anyway, my time with last night was spent with us ripping cds to his mp3 player finally. When he was done, he was singing at the top of his lungs and dancing around the living room to the All-American Rejects and an Arabic Groove cd. I love to see him enjoying himself this much! And although it is way overused, the phrase "quality time" is what it is!


Last night, as my very sleepy head lay down on my pillow, the moon shone through my curtains into my eyes and lead me off to a dream of dead horses shallowly buried in sand on a beach and a bear walking around in a huge cabin ready to eat unsuspecting people and dogs. I think I'll pull my curtains tonight.

Too Good Not To Share

• PONDERISMS
  I used to eat a lot of natural foods until I learned that most people die of natural causes.
• Gardening Rule: When weeding, the best way to make sure you are removing a weed and not a valuable plant is to pull on it. If it comes out of the ground easily, it is a valuable plant.
• The easiest way to find something lost around the house is to buy a replacement.
• Never take life seriously. Nobody gets out alive anyway.
• There are two kinds of pedestrians: the quick and the dead.
• Life is sexually transmitted.
• Health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.
  
• The only difference between a rut and a grave is the depth.
• Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing.
• Have you noticed since everyone has a camcorder these days no one talks about seeing UFOs like they used to?
• Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.
• All of us could take a lesson from the weather. It pays no attention to criticism.
• In the 60's, people took acid to make the world weird. Now the world is weird and people take Prozac to make it normal.
• How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?
  
• Who was the first person to look at a cow and say, "I think I'll squeeze these dangly things here, and drink whatever comes out?" Who was the first person to say, "See that chicken there? I'm gonna eat the next thing that comes outta its butt."
  
• Why is there a light in the fridge and not in the freezer?
• If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a song about him?
• If quizzes are quizzical, what are tests?
• Do illiterate people get the full effect of Alphabet Soup?
• Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog's face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him on a car ride, he sticks his head out the window?
• Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?

Odds and Ends

More sleet and snow. Nope, no pictures. I'm sure people are tired of my weather woes, as am I.

Do you all ever get the feeling sometimes some people's blogs you comment on don't really care for your comments? They have a terse reply to your comment or they just don't say anything when you ask a pointed question? Do you continue to go back to those same blogs "waiting it out" for a kind word to diffuse your worries or do you quit visiting? I try to wait it out and keep visiting because many times, it's blogs I really enjoy reading. I enjoy lurking and getting to know from afar. I don't have a lot to add but I always take away something.

I know, for me, blogging is a hard medium to convey real emotion with. ( I think I get my whiney self heard pretty well.) I have read some bloggers who do such a great job of relaying their idea, I feel I can almost hear what their delivery would be like in person.

I've taken out a bunch of fruit from my freezer to make jelly today and start a batch of wine with. I'm thinking even though I don't have a mixed fruit wine recipe to start with, I would try a blueberry-blackberry-cherry mix. I don't have enough of these to use by themselves. And I need to make more blackberry jelly for our use. I also took out red plum juice to some jelly with. If you all have never had homemade red plum jelly, you are missing something special.
My supervisor has wonderful seedless, thornless blackberry vines she let me pick off of a couple years back. She told me they had so many in the freezer, they wouldn't need any for years. She hasn't asked me to pick any the last few years. I told her I was making wine with some of them and she hasn't asked offered any since. Oh, well, it was fab while it lasted.

My friend and I do a pretty good job of hunting down free fruit for our wine making ventures. It's an adventure to see what we can come up with.

My daughter and her boyfriend are still seeing each other. They have been fine with the chaperoning. He has asked her to Homecoming in a couple of weeks as well as Prom. Oh, geez. sweating palms. Mine! Dresses, shoes, accessories are the least of my worries. She and I have had some serious talks lately - very open and revealing convos. Trying to keep the lines open. It's all talk if she isn't listening or being honest. Ack!

J is struggling so much to stay on top of his assignments at school. They have implemented an accountability system to encourage (scare) the kids into handing in their homework on time and thereby taking some of the work off the shoulders of the teachers. They were trying to hunt down kids for due homework and giving them more time to find/do their assignments which was extremely time consuming as well as unfair and unproductive for the student. Teaching them they could forget about it and still get the homework done when they wanted to. No biggie, the teacher will take up the slack. When they go on to middle school, the teachers eat them alive because they haven't learned how to hand in assignments. I like the system. It has begun to sink in that not only will the lazy or spacey kid visit with the principal after 5 accountability notices, which will not be fun, but he will run the risk of being in in school suspension,equally not fun). Then there is the fact that after 20 notices, there is a strong possibility he/she could be held back.
Well, guess where my son falls in all of this? He is the spacey kid and even with all the planning and double checking I am helping him with, he still spaces out and forgets or loses his assignments. I am trying to teach him to systematically take a minute and check list his assignments. It works half the time but if I miss asking him what's due when and if he has everything before we leave the school every night, he will have a problem. Or if I forget to say something pointedly about homework, it's the same crap. His grades are great- it's not that he can't do the work. And all that memory is apparently going into things like the morphing ability of the Ojama Black beast when palmerized with the other Ojamas on the playing field. Yu-Gi-Oh reference there, by the way.
I am looking at myself. I was the same way. I remember until 7th grade really struggling to get my work in. Same reason, too. I was a space cadet. Maybe he will mature before 7th grade. He'll be really mature if he get held back.

Ok, coffee is finished, now the Sunday paper. Naw, I need more coffee. Not quite jacked up enough.
Happy Sunday!

Ok, the visitors I see here are not the bloggers I am speaking of so don't think I am pointing a finger. Thanks for the visit, by the way!

Just An Ordinary Icy Day in the Midwest

Everything is ice covered except the roads. It is frackin' cold here. Wool sweater is out for the first time in a few years. No school today, perhaps tomorrow either. Haven't gotten word yet.

I pruned these trees plus one more at the end of the house so they might make it through without splitting.

Got some small jobs to make the day go by faster. I hope I can find the ear plugs since Guitar Hero and Dance Dance Revolution is making an appearance soon as are the 5th grade boys and Slim.

The Ice Man Cometh

Yes, sirree, folks. We got ice. Ice on the wires, ice on the trees, ice on the outdoor kitties.
More to come and obviously I have power as of right now but more than likely I will lose it over the next day or so. Our major metropolis nearby is 90% powerless. Bedroom communities are half and half. I chose not to invest in a kerosene heater ensuring the worse-case scenario will happen.

Otis, Wildman and I rented Man On Fire and oh, my was it good. Gritty, emotional, and gory. E And I also found The Woods to be an interesting scary flick for Saturday afternoon fare.

By the way, Otis, have you seen Black Robe?

At this moment we are watching Ferris Bueller's Day Off, one of my daughter's other favs. She's introducing it to her boyfriend, Slim. How he receives it will say a lot about the boy.

Time for a shot of Bailey's.

A Lack of Interesting Subject Matter

Good movies or the lack thereof were mentioned on a couple of blogs. I thought about what I had viewed lately.
Of the John Hughes collection finally completed for my daughter- "Sixteen Candles". One word- loser. Not in keeping with "Breakfast Club" or Pretty In Pink". Although, young Mr. John Cusack caught her eye which means another cache of PG-rated films I can purchase for her.
"Ice Age-The Meltdown"- Cute, cute, cute. My son and I watched it together and had belly laughs throughout. Queen Latifa is good in anything.
"A Series of Unfortunate Events"- a favorite of all of ours. Craig Furgeson and of course, Jim Carey in hilarious roles. The graphic art and sets make me wish I had that kind of ability.

I have many movies from the 60's, 70's and 80's I really want to see. However due to the proximity of Blockbuster (seemingly in a galaxy far, far away) and the severely restricted offerings the town video store has, I haven't made a dent in the list. It's long and now apparently misplaced since I want to write about it. #@*%!

"One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" - a movie I have always wanted to see after having read the satire in my brother's Mad Magazine. Wildman rented it not too long ago for us and it was better than I ever thought it might be. Speaking of Jack Nicholson, I would see anything he did in the early days. The only thing I've seen of that era is "Easy Rider"-heehee.

Little Big Man" bought it for myself 'cause I could never find it to rent.

"The Graduate" -My mommy would never let me watch this on regular t.v. since it might give me the wrong idea. If she only knew...

Back to the current movies...

"Cars"- fell asleep.

"School of Rock"- a movie we are constantly annoying people with lines from. It's what we do.

To be honest, I haven't even seen what's playing in the theaters. It's been too hectic to even consider going.
I remember as a teen the Christmas holiday weekends were THE time to go see some blockbuster. I saw "King Kong", the version with Jeff Bridges and Jessica Lang which was so much better than the latest version with Jack Black (saw both in the theater).
"Superman" with Christopher Reeve- not figuring the new version is worth much.

What are some movies anyone would recommend and why?

The sadness I have felt since last Saturday is still hanging in there. I know what it is stemming from along with hormones. It is the fact that our two family farms are going up for sale to pay the farm debt from my dad and brother's farming business. One farm is where my dad's family house sat which we lived in till I was five. The other farm was bought during a particularly tough time in farming- the 1980's. It 's acquisition
was solely for farming.

I know, many people don't really care about a loss like this and it isn't that big of a deal but to me, and all of my family, it is a tremendous loss.

From the pride of ownership and through the blood, sweat and tears of working to buy it to the fact that my parents planned on living off the money generated from having it farmed for their retirement. Then there's the fact that it has been in my dad's side of the family since the 1900's, owned and farmed by them. That is quite a story there for perhaps another time.

My sister revealed to me lately she uses the farm where we all grew up as a quiet place to go sit and meditate. I never would have guessed it. And what is my brother feeling after all the time he has farmed that piece of ground? Does he feel dispair or failure? I hope not but I want to tell him not to worry. I really should do it soon.

Anyway, as I sit here and write this, I can't help but feel such a sense of loss I have never felt about any possession. And I realize it IS a possession, not a person from my life. I shouldn't feel this much emotion.

I guess there are many changes coming and this is one of the bad ones. Most likely my brother and his family will move away to get a job which means my mother will be left with just my sister and her family to take up the slack of helping with my father until he goes into a care facility. Don't know when that might happen.

Nasty feeling in the pit of my stomach now... Great...

Welcome to 2007

Thanks Kate, for the idea on an otherwise clueless night of posting. Guess I like this idea of me better than being the "freaky kisser".

Samwise Gamgee
A brave and loyal associate full of optimism, you remain true to your friends and their efforts, to whatever end.
But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer.
Samwise is a character in the Middle-Earth universe. You can read more about him at TheOneRing.net.
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