Author: diane101

Hi Everyone, it’s been a long time since I have written anything for this site but now the time has come when I just must because I cannot handle the current events without having somewhere to vent.  I have a hard time doing it on facebook as I have many on my list who are either on the other side or who are ambivalent including in my own family..
So here I am again to connect with you folks and share the sadness and sometimes outright horror with this new world we have entered.  I think many people have their eyes shut as to what the future ramifications are.  I fear for my children and grandchildren what kind of world we will be leaving to them.
I have another thing to discuss also.  Our friend and my very close friend for years Shirlstars has dementia and at this point she still knows me but nothing about me.  That is despite over 12 years of daily comunication with her.  
It is sad and hard for me to accept.  I really am unsure of what to do as far as continuing any sortof relationship.  She is living in Oklahoma with or rather sort of under the care of a very nice woman but she is at the point where she is being rebellious  and cannot handle money anymore while her caretaker has been trying to protect her as she has power of attorney and tries to limit the cash she gets as she loses it, etc.

So I’ve done it, I’ve written again and I would love to hear from any old friends or make new ones.
Hugs

Hi all, I haven’t written much on this site for quite awhile, but today I thought I would share with you what has been keeping me busy.  Well there are several things:

One of my big pleasures is playing the game of World of Warcraft, meet my character Katcora, an 80 mage, and for those of you not familiar with the game, 80 is as high as you can go.

Here she is riding her own personal gryphon, which makes it much easier to get around the very rugged terrain of the newest addition to the game, Wrath of Northrend.

She has lots of powers, here she is with her 3 mirrors, ( a spell) fighting the evil forces.

Of course I’ve been doing other things too, like crocheting, here is a picture of the stack of blanket I have made recently which I am trying to sell on Etsy    a site for selling handmade items.  

And the third big thing that occupies a lot of my time is babysitting for 2 grandkids, Mathew and Bentley.

I am still doing gardening, have a lot of seedlings coming up right now and lots of flowers in bloom around my house.

So all in all, I’ve been keeping busy, what about you, I would love to hear about what you’ve been up to.
Have a great day everyone!

Hi everyone!!! If you are like me and have been waiting and searching for a really down and dirty column from ‘someone’ about the latest phenom otherwise known as Sista Sarah, then please read the following exerpt from a Dick Cavett column today in the NY Times.
Any old folks reading this will no doubt be able to picture Dick, with his wicked and sardonic but yet innocent at the same time, manner of delivery, and that could be even more enjoyable.

September 12, 2008,  7:40 pm
Experience 101

Dear Reader:It may be time to give up on writing about current events in this space. When you think how news travel time has been telescoped, it’s dizzying. It took days for even the rumors of Custer’s annihilation at Little Big Horn to reach the east. Now any news over two hours old isn’t news — it’s “olds.” Anything from the day before is virtually archaeology.

In reading what follows, be aware that nothing here is exactly meant to be a “this just in” bulletin. And so, the inevitable phrase: “By the time you read this….”

Or, for short:

B.T.T.Y.R.T.: Sarah Palin will doubtless have been outed even further from the witness protection program in which her handlers have kept her secreted since her smasheroo solo performance on That Memorable Night.

There’s no denying that she rocked the place and, as her enthusing boosters said, “She really delivered the goods.”

So she did, even if some were shoddy.

Back here in the past, when I’m writing this, we have just seen part one of her quizzing by Charles Gibson, with mixed reviews for both. So far I have not seen her confronted with some of the things about which she has been, to put it in that awful Diplomatically Correct phrase, “somewhat less than fully truthful.” (Typesetter: If space is scarce, use “lying.”) As in claiming “no thanks” to the bridge money while failing to disclose that she kept it.

and here is a favorite passage:

Every time I nostalgically try to regain my liking of John McCain, he reaches into his sleaze bag and pulls out something malodorous.

If there were a prize cake available, McCain’s lowbrow ad attempting to paint Obama as a virtual pornographer and peddler of sex to kindergarteners would take that pastry. Plate and all.

I’ve been wanting to write something about Sister, for lo these many long days since she was nominated, but was just to lazy.  But the fever has been burning inside me to articulate some of the thoughts I have about our new girl, so this was a perfect opportunity.

You know what I like about her, she wears glasses, and she’s proud to wear them.  You don’t see many glass wearers at all these days, that is in the public eye.  Since I am a glass wearer and have been most of my life I like the idea that women all over are buying the really cute rimless, Kawasaki frame among her several pairs..  
I would like a frame like that too, if I hadn’t spent nearly $1000.00 2 years ago for my current pair, incl. exam and the lowest prices frame they had in stock ( I did transition lenses and a special coating for glare from computers.)
I was so shocked at the price that  at my age I intend to wear this one pair for the rest of my life, that is unless I live to be 90 at which time I will consider getting a new pair.

I think all in all we are going to see an upswing in the numbers of female Americans wearing glasses.

Anyway, aside from that I am pretty disappointed that the first Rep. female VP pick has to be so near the bottom of the barrell.  Watching her interview with Gibson, especially the first one, I believe that not only did she not know the Bush Doctrine, but I don’t think she knew the meaning of some of the words “Charlie” used to describe it, therefore she was at a loss as how to answer and her brain must have been spinning to figure out how to answer.

So bottom line for me is she’s cute as heck in an Alaskan sort of way, but not for one minute would I put the reins of power of the US in her tiny hands.  Seriously.  

Getting through both conventions has taken a toll on me and I bet on a lot of you folks.  What to do to get through the long days.  Well, last week I started to bake bread.  Not that I need bread, not that bread is on my diet, but rather that I needed something constructive and fullfilling, (No pun intended), and baking fills that bill.

First I started with regular white bread dough with some calamata olives and garlic cloves.    Oh that was good and I made several more loaves.  I then started to run out of yeast and not living within walking distance of a purveyor of yeast, I decided I needed something I could count on to be there when the need arose, thus I settled on making my own sour dough.  
For sour dough you make a starter, which is yeast, flour and water, which you let foment for days before combining with more flour and water, then more fomenting to make a sponge.
The sponge is then the basis for your bread and the unused sponge is then combined with more flour and water to make more starter.  Yeast can be added to the origional starter, but not required as there is natural yeast in air and flour.  For mine, I did add yeast as I wanted to rush the project a little.

If you are interested in making sour dough bread here is the excellent site I used.

So I’ve had a great time baking, baking and more baking.  Giving away and freezing, and then more baking. I’ve make fry bread, bread sticks, flat bread and rosemary and olive oil (my favorite).  I am just now awaiting the fomenting of the sponge so I can make more bread today.

One note of caution, be careful of the amount of bread you eat as I found out the hard way.  One day this week I ate quite a bit of my bread combined with quite a bit of homemade humus and I had a very bad case of indigestion and heartburn.  So I am now more careful in limiting the amount consumed and planning on giving away more.

So what kinds of food have you been making and please include any recipes.  I got my humus recipe from google searches as I do most of my recipes.  I would also like to hear of any cost saving recipes you may have.  Making your own bread for example can cost less than a dollar a loaf, depending on the cost of your flour.  

I know politics has been depressing for oh say the last 8 years or longer, well anyway I think getting out in to the garden might help.  Please join me and post some garden or flower pictures of your own.

Plumeria in bloom, reminds me of Hawaii, I pic the blossoms and float in water at my desk.  Oh the aroma, wish you could smell them.

Plumeria getting ready to bloom, can’t wait.  

A view of our nice little tomato garden area, busting with tomatos but only a few ripe so far, looking forward to a big harvest.

A beatiful large sego palm that just plumed out, the leave are so tender at first then they harden to pointy little devils.

My little rock garden.

I could post lots more pics, but I would love to see some from you all.
And BTW, hi everyone, I’ve been lurking mostly so I’ve been keeping up.

I picked up this from Yahoo news and I think we all might want to take a look at this.  I posted as a comment but don’t know how many will see that comment and I think this is serious enough to warrent a diary.

link
Update: Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Charles Grassley is pushing the bill.
Hidden deep in Senator Christopher Dodd’s 630-page Senate housing legislation is a sweeping provision that affects the privacy and operation of nearly all of America’s small businesses. The provision, which was added by the bill’s managers without debate this week, would require the nation’s payment systems to track, aggregate, and report information on nearly every electronic transaction to the federal government.
Call Congress and Tell Them to Oppose The eBay Reporting Provision in the Housing Bill: 1-866-928-3035

FreedomWorks Chairman Dick Armey commented: “This is a provision with astonishing reach, and it was slipped into the bill just this week. Not only does it affect nearly every credit card transaction in America, such as Visa, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express, but the bill specifically targets payment systems like eBay’s PayPal, Amazon, and Google Checkout that are used by many small online businesses. The privacy implications for America’s small businesses are breathtaking.”

snip

Payment Card and Third Party Network Information Reporting. The proposal requires information reporting on payment card and third party network transactions. Payment settlement entities, including merchant acquiring banks and third party settlement organizations, or third party payment facilitators acting on their behalf, will be required to report the annual gross amount of reportable transactions to the IRS and to the participating payee. Reportable transactions include any payment card transaction and any third party network transaction. Participating payees include persons who accept a payment card as payment and third party networks who accept payment from a third party settlement organization in settlement of transactions.

So folks, I think we better pay attention to this one or we are going to be in a world of hurt with even more of our privacy taken away from us. This will make the spying with telecoms look like small potatoes. I wonder what else is in this bill and what chance it has of passing.

By the way, hi everyone, hope all are in good health and happy.

I was so happy to read in the Washington Post this morning, a great article about the resurgence of trains in this country, and that is both passenger and freight. This follows a conversation Shirlstars and I had last week about our hopes and dreams that there would be a comeback of trains. Then we reminisced about what a role trains played in the development of this country, the opening up the west and which allowed for easier communication between those who moved on west and those left behind in the east. Not to mention, the role trains played in the great glamorous time of Hollywood’ 40’s, all the stars traveled by train, from coast to coast and points in between. Many movies of the 40’s and 50’s took place on trains, not to mention Murder on the Orient Express.
I have to ask you is there anything more romantic than travel by train?

A Switch on the Tracks: Railroads Roar Ahead
Global Trade, Fuel Costs Add Up To Expansion for Once-Dying Industry

By Frank Ahrens
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 21, 2008; A01

RADFORD, Va. — When Bob Billingsley hired on with Norfolk Southern railway 31 years ago, he was a rookie on work crews that were closing unused lines as the nation’s economy turned its back on the railroads.

Now he’s in charge of raising the roof of a Norfolk Southern tunnel in southwestern Virginia to clear headroom for the double-stacked container cars that have become the symbol of the industry’s sudden surge thanks to a confluence of powerful global factors.

“For years, we were looking for ways to cut costs to increase profits,” said Billingsley, as a train rumbled by. “Now, we’re building business to increase profits.”

The freight railway industry is enjoying its biggest building boom in nearly a century, a turnaround as abrupt as it is ambitious. It is largely fueled by growing global trade and rising fuel costs for 18-wheelers. In 2002, the major railroads laid off 4,700 workers; in 2006, they hired more than 5,000. Profit has doubled industry-wide since 2003, and stock prices have soared. The value of the largest railroad, the Union Pacific, has tripled since 2001.

This year alone, the railroads will spend nearly $10 billion to add track, build switchyards and terminals, and open tunnels to handle the coming flood of traffic. Freight rail tonnage will rise nearly 90 percent by 2035, according to the Transportation Department.

In the 1970s, tight federal regulation, cheap truck fuel and a wide-open interstate highway system conspired to cripple the railroad industry, driving many lines into bankruptcy. The nation’s 300,000 miles of rails became a web of slow-moving, poorly maintained lines, so dilapidated in spots that tracks would give way under standing trains.

The Staggers Rail Act of 1980 largely deregulated the industry, leading to a wave of consolidation. More than 40 major lines condensed into the seven that remain, running on 162,000 miles of track.

Do you have any train stories to share?

Is it the day after tomorrow yet?

I was just browsing through some web sites and I ran into this in the UK guaridian.  I think it’s particularily troubling that the is all happening faster than predicted by scientists in the 90’s.  

A vast hunk of floating ice has broken away from the Antarctic peninsula, threatening the collapse of a much larger ice shelf behind it, in a development that has shocked climate scientists.

Satellite images show that about 160 square miles of the Wilkins ice shelf has been lost since the end of February, leaving the ice interior now “hanging by a thread”.

The collapsing shelf suggests that climate change could be forcing change much more quickly than scientists had predicted.

“The ice shelf is hanging by a thread,” said Professor David Vaughan of the British Antarctic Survey (BAS). “We’ll know in the next few days or weeks what its fate will be.”

The Wilkins shelf covers an area of 5,600 square miles (14,500 sq km). It is now protected by just a thin thread of ice between two islands.

Vaughan was a member of the team that predicted in 1993 that global warming could cause the Wilkins shelf to collapse within 30 years.

The article goes on to say:

“I didn’t expect to see things happen this quickly. We predicted it would happen, but it’s happened twice as fast as we predicted.”

The retreat of the shelf was first spotted from satellite data by Ted Scambos, a glaciologist at the University of Colorado.

He alerted the BAS, which sent an aircraft to assess the extent of the damage.

Jim Elliott, who filmed part of the breakup, said: “It was awesome. We flew along the main crack and observed the sheer scale of movement from the breakage. Big chunks of ice, the size of small houses, look as though they’ve been thrown around like rubble — it’s like an explosion.”

The Antarctic peninsula, which stretches north from the frozen continent towards South America, has experienced unprecedented warming over the past 50 years.

What do you think, have we waited too long to begin to do anything, have we dragged our asses long enough to have reached the point of no return. If not now, when and how soon will that point be reached.

I wonder how bad it will have to get, how much will the earth have to rumble and shake before the human inhabitants take notice in a serious way.  Oceans dying, droughts in one location, floods, winds, tornados in another.

Here is socal we are having unseasonably hot weather, in mid 90’s the other day.  Officials are wondering how we will make it through the summer, will the grids and transformers hold up, will there be enough electicity to go around.

I am feeling pretty distressed about all of this, but there is a bright spot from none other than Dean Kamen, inventor of the “segway” and yeah the one you ride on, lol. I happened to watch Stephen colbert’s show the other day when his guest was Dean and he demonstrated this most wonderful machine, and I’m thinking places like Socal better start investigating this possibility, the machine can even use ocean water or any kind of horrible waste water and render it perfectly pure.

<a href="San Francisco – Dean Kamen, the engineer who invented the Segway, is puzzling over a new equation these days. An estimated 1.1 billion people in the world don’t have access to clean drinking water, and an estimated 1.6 billion don’t have electricity. Those figures add up to a big problem for the world—and an equally big opportunity for entrepreneurs.

To solve the problem, he’s invented two devices, each about the size of a washing machine that can provide much-needed power and clean water in rural villages.

“Eighty percent of all the diseases you could name would be wiped out if you just gave people clean water,” says Kamen. “The water purifier makes 1,000 liters of clean water a day, and we don’t care what goes into it. And the power generator makes a kilowatt off of anything that burns.”

So what do you folks think, should we be worried and should we be getting busy right now and start working on all these things.  This machine of Dean’s is pretty uncomplicated to hear him describe it so it could easily be put into production all over the world and I’m sure be made bigger to provide water to cities or communities.  This is the kind of thing we should be working on all over the world.

This entry is going to be two diaries in one, since there is a lot I want to share with you.

First the title. Many of you here may know that for several years I had the site Village Blue which I closed the  down in November 07, due to lack of participation and the cost.

Village Blue was a site about anything but politics, a lot of this and that, a dash of spiritual,  a frame built upon The Native America Code of Ethics, lots of beautiful art and flower pictures (mostly of my garden) and many just plain fun entries.

“Well sometime in early march I got an hankering for that kind of site again, seems I had a lot to say and just couldn’t find the appropriate place to publish my thoughts. Of course I dropped a few diaries on Booman, but you know it just wasn’t the same, so I set out on a journey to restore the old VB.  

10 days later, much hair pulling, frustration, angst and anger, 2 hosting services later, I once again had A VB.  It was at this point bare bones, nothing like the old VB, that had been carefully nurtured for 3 years, just a plain old site and for 2 days I stared at the site, wrote a word or two, tried to spruce it up, and then started to ask myself, why!  Here I was again staring at this site, that would cost me money again and now I could barely write a word.  LOL.  Writers block.

So being the sometime sensible person I am, I thought, “heck over here on the other hand I have this lovely free site, Village Blue 2. with guess what, all kinds of bells and whistles, easy to use, didn’t need a degree in computing to fix it up, so what the heck, I canceled the paid site and kept the free one.

Which brings me to the point of inviting you all to come and visit Village Blue2 , a non political site, once again beginning to be filled with flowers, lovely words, art pictures, and Shirlstars and Whisel with their uncanny ability to write the most delightful series of words. Expanded Views which is mainly the purview of Shirlstars to post the esoteric and spiritual material she collect and receives from various sources, of her group of spiritualists and friends around the Internet.
Secondly, Divorce California Style
    As I have written previously on this site my 32 yr. old daughter is going through what has become a most nasty divorce.  Due to my closeness with her I am the one she confides in and tells all the stories to, I am one of the many who try to bring her comfort, I try to help keep her and kids fed properly, help her to navigate her way through both the nastiness, the pain, the legal system, and any other associated systems that we have been doing research on and of necessity must apply to.  
Boy, I tell you, it doesn’t get any easier to go through a daughters divorce than your own and the constant ups and downs emotionally play havoc with your stomach and temperament.  I guess an upside of this is that I am losing weight.

There however is a good side of all of this too. I am witness to my daughter’s blossoming and blooming. I am seeing her grow in her own inner beauty, strength,  happiness and worthiness. I see her beginning to really love and embrace the wonderful and glorious side of her life and personality.  I have seen her come to the realization that she can indeed have a life of joy.

The whole family remarks that we have never seen her happier (for the most part),  and we are collectively so proud of her for taking this step of shedding that which was constricting and hurting her for lo these many years.

So that’s my story for today, and please do come and visit both VB2 and Extended Views, come often, contribute your own words and pics, we would love to see you there.
I leave you with a beautiful flower picture, best wishes to all and have a great day!

This is loser as applied to an individual, as in “You’re nothing but a loser,”, oh wow do I hate that label and no time more than this morning.

Let me explain:
My daughter is going through a divorce, as some of you might know from comments I have made, and it’s like a lot of divorces, not going well, in fact when I wrote that I thought, do any divorces or separations for that matter, go well?  
Perhaps, but this one surely has it’s ups and downs…Just yesterday I was feeling good about the whole deal, she and I had worked through some difficult things, found that a restraining order was not a good thing at this time and I could write a bunch about what it takes to get one.  Not good.
Anyway, she did not feel in physical danger, only emotional and she always has the option to call the police and the possible ramifications of getting the order itself seemed to out weigh the daunting process.
Fast forward to later that day, one of the things that had been in contention with him was that she would not go to counseling , mainly because she feels done with it.  Then I thought, why not, you can counsel your way out of divorce and that might be for the best not to mention it could help the children to deal with the process.  She texted him she would go, he was elated.
We spent the next few hours planning what she would do while counseling was going on,, such as organize her life, get grants for school and so on, use the time to her advantage and maybe save a little cash for herself.

All is well in the land of divorce, I can rest a sec, relax and think the worst is over.  I have to add in here that this has effected me very emotionally, in all its ups and downs, I am losing weight (needed to, but not this way) and pretty much don’t even feel like eating, as in  “this morning”, which brings me to loser and what happened today.

This morning I got a call from her, and something had happened that I wasn’t very sympathetic to her side, she got more upset, hung up, we texted back and forth, she called, we both cried, she texts that I should not worry, I text that I’m sorry, she calls again and still crying says, “I must be just a loser just like he (the ex) has always said, and I am worthless and ugly (she is beautiful both inside and out) and so I might as well do all the things I am always accused of.

Then she hung up again, more texts back and forth between us, and by now I am crying like crazy, imagining her on the freeway, hysterical, you know the thoughts, plus I can’t stop crying, cause and oh by the way I told her something her brother said that I probably shouldn’t have but I thought it might help her to see what she ought not to do during this process.
That apparently made her feel more like a loser, and so  that all added up to make one big emotional feeling and  breakout in both of us.  Plus now my son is going to be mad at me for telling that.

Then we texted back and forth again, with the end result she said she is fine, don’t worry, hates to see me upset, stop…

So I stopped crying for a bit, but I keep feeling that label loser, I know how I hated when someone called me that once, boy it made me mad.

Loser as a label seems like the person is hopeless and irredeemable, just lost, just nothing, I really, really hate that label.  Then if you are female, called a s..t, and a loser, well it’s not good how you feel.  And by the way I hate the word s..t so much I won’t even write it out and I could include it here as well for the terrible ramifications it has on women and no equal word to apply to the male without the same venom and disgust attached.  

Anyway,those labels applied to my daughter and I’ve felt the sting of those words myself, built up over the 17 years with (him) and out it broke today like a giant dam and washed all over my daughter and I and we both felt the pain and it hurt us greatly.

So please let’s wipe out those 2 words, for sure, and I wish we could wipe out divorce as well and probably a lot of other words too and a whole bunch of things.  But for today I just want those two words of derision to stop.

I will end this by saying, words hurt, ‘yes they do’,’ and words help “yes they do’.

So I will give out these words today:

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
Forever in the next.
Amen.

–Reinhold Niebuhr,

and these Native American Indian code of ethic words:

Give thanks to the Creator each morning upon rising and each evening before Sleeping. Seek the courage and strength to be a better person.

Showing respect is a basic law of life.

Respect the wisdom of people in council. Once you give an idea it no longer belongs to you, it belongs to everyone.

Be truthful, at all times.

Always treat your guests with honor and consideration. Give your best food and comforts to your guests.

The hurt of one is the hurt of all. The honor of one is the honor of all.

Receive strangers and outsiders kindly.

All races are Children of the Creator and must be respected.

To serve others, to be of some use to family, community, or nation is One of the main purposes for which people are created. True Happiness comes to those who dedicate their lives to the service of Others.

Observe moderation and balance in all things.

Know those things that lead to your well-being and those things that lead to your destruction.

Listen to and follow the guidance given to your heart. Expect guidance to come in many forms: in prayer, in dreams, in solitude and in the words and actions of elders and friends.

Blessings of All That Is and Best wishes to all who read these words.
Love
Please share your thoughts as I have with you.
PS Oh by the way, she is ok and calm and we are ok with each other now.