Friday, April 25, 2008

All in a Day's Time


Come on, already, I said I want in!


Scream louder and pick on the screen with your claws, that'll bring her for sure.


Back in Mobile again.


'Shroom garden



The pretty Gerberas


Grape tomatoes - won't be long now.


Pink rose hiding in non-blooming Day Lillies


Big Meowie ready for bed.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Buyers' Regret



I went shopping today, I hate shopping. Used to love it. Even when I didn't have any money to spend. Didn't have that much today, but looking decent in clothes caused me to go unwisely, even for a sale, a bit bonkers - I needed something for a funeral and a "meet the family" dinner besides the clothes I garden or exercise in - but didn't want to get any mid weight loss clothes. But did. I bought two outfits. I like them. No, I love them. But I am having what marketers call "buyer's regret." Oh, well, stop with the negative - I will have all I need when I need it if I don't start getting way negative and a couple of outfits will not change the way the universe spins.

So much of what goes on in the today grows from roots of yesterday, doesn't it? Here, a step dad who was too stingy (fear, in his roots?) to buy clothing for his kids, a mother who did her best, but hid the clothing to pay the dues later, and what did I do? What I was taught, married someone who hates me buying any thing, even with my own earnings, especially clothes and flowers for my garden. But then if you are with someone who will not communicate, one really doesn't know for sure what they are mad about, so perhaps there has been a lot of unhealthy assuming.

Very unhealthy, mind you . . . but YES, I hid them. But this time for the funeral, he said "get an outfit." Errrrrrrk - he did not say two outfits. But wait a minute - wasn't half that tax return mine? ...and here we go....jeez....get healthy, self, will you, already?

Maybe will post a pic next week or whenever I can get back to the 'puter and quit feeling guilty that I bought two.

What makes the above sort of funny for me, is that in marketing class, my professor covered the very process almost down to the exact process above. He and I used to have a good laugh over my buying stories, it was so entertaining for me to find out this "syndrome" is documented as part of a marketing course.

Speaking of weight loss - am really stuck. Beeeeeg plateau. Doc prescribed that wonderful pill that helps so much with pain and my feet felt weird last night - I looked down and they looked like corpse feet. Or eggplants. They were purple, red, and SWOLLEN! Called the doc and he ordered me in for visit today. Nothing serious. We don't think anyway. So gave me water pills. Suspense - will that break the platt toe?

Did I mention the pills make me goofy and I can't remember my name?

Friday, April 18, 2008

Under Construction


Still planting! Today we bought Gerbera daisies, a blue bush to bring butterflies and birds, and some fire plant. I had to pull more of that devilish dollar weed before putting these in the ground. I love the bright simplicity of the Gerberas. The roses are blooming nicely.

Called the doc and told him, I'm done, can't stand the pain or being sick from the pain meds. He phoned me in something that is taken regularly twice a day for seizures, it just happened that a discovery was made that nerve pain was helped with this med. It does help a lot - but its only a "masking," I can tell. Also it makes me very dizzy and loopy (mmmm, what else is new?) so its not the answer. I also got a referral to a pain clinic that specializes in nerve blocks. We'll see, I go next week.

The calendar is whopping full until mid May.

My hair is now very short - don't know if I like it - went to Walmart and bought some large earrings. (Not driving across town to avoid Walmart!) We'll see. It's easier - just spray and push it around.

Psycho has peed on the boy's school backpack. I had covered the catnip with a laundry basket with a brick on top of it. Have the cats figured out a way to chew the plant to the roots anyway? Of course. Devious little whiskered varmints.

I've been watching the last three seasons of Nip/Tuck. And getting a lot of the elliptical done with the pain meds and the edited (no commercials) version. I have laughed, I have cried, I have identified, I have thought how ridiculous, yet I'm hooked. I don't usually like anything that has a lot of visuals on sex thrown in purely for entertainment value - I'm old fashioned enough to think that belongs in private. But somehow the steamy scenes fit in with the series without driving me bonkers. The writers and directors are brilliant as well as the leads. So, this is confession time, I have been hooked - popping in and out of these when I'm alone and no one is there to corrupt besides myself.

Still following the fast from negative thinking studies and reading the Bible and Tolle's book as well. A contradiction? I don't think so - maybe some do.

Still sorting clothes - egad. So hard to get rid of them out of fear that I'll gain it back. Especially with these sodium based pain meds - I'm not losing so fast now.

It is in the upper 70's and I think summer has landed - it will get hotter and steamy and that is my luscious Southland!

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

A Pea Green Kind of Life


Clothes! I'm still working on weeding out my closet.

See, its a problem because I think things should last forever. I tried on a twenty year old pants suit, No problem, it's still good - isn't it? Yeh, it is still good, but its not me. Never was. It's causing me to squeak putting away the big clothes that are still new (uh, new to me is three years old and under) though I'll never be an executive whatever any more - I don't need them - thank God.

I've never really known how to dress for sure - to please myself and other's expectations - often the two have been at odds - I always have gone against the flow of what is currently fashionable, or pushed over the edge a bit past trendy, but the last two years I have been buying what is timeless. I haven't purchased much at all compared to most people I know. I love the new slim looks, the geometrics, the cuts of the clothing - I would stay in this era forever!!!

I tried on the pea green outfit, era - uh, I don't remember - a mark down Liz Claiborne - and the pants were super baggy in the seat and legs - the top seemed to flare around the middle after I had sat down for a while. I looked in the mirror today and wondered what I could have been thinking to buy it even if it was on sale. Perhaps it was an effort to look appropriately middle aged????

Still, I wonder how to dress "appropriately" even now. My guts tell me to dress like me - to decorate my body with lush splashes of color and fabrics that flow in celebration. I look around in church - let's see, a blouse, slacks, lace up shoes - maybe an occasional pair of heels - a jacket. Well, the pastor's wife is middle age and she's HOT - geometric sleeveless dresses - blue jeans, cute sandal shoes. Looking good. Hmmmmmm. Should I end the wondering and just be ME, and wear what I like?

Never will forget one place I worked about 20 years ago. One day I wore black stretch leggings and was called in and told I couldn't wear knit pants unless the top came down over my hips. ????? Thereafter I went through a stage of wearing clothing a size too large.

Another place of work: I made a gorgeous black with red flowers flowing dress and wore it without a bra. The boss was a happy man.

The tattoo I guess was a way of waving goodbye to a pea green kind of life...and clothing. (Funny how doing stuff that is good for us sometimes doesn't feel so good on one level.) Give me the happy geometrics! The bright colors - bubbles, circles, combinations - clingy, so what - everyone just about seems to have a bit of extra at the waist. And if the tattoo peeks out - so?

Ok, I now feel better for getting the pea green outfit and the others to the Goodwill box. Just takes a bit of reflection.

Wish I was here.

Can't post much today - "H" on the warpath because I forgot to turn off the water in the flower bed - cleaning lady coming and I have a mess to try to clean up so she can clean - stuff needs sorted and disposed of and put away - its going to be one of those days that I am going to have to go look for something to do to get away from the "seething." The sun is shining. Maybe the beach for a walk if not some browning of the body covering -

God grant me the wisdom to change the things I can, to not worry about the things I can't change, and the wisdom to know the difference - something like that. LOL, maybe I should go find an Alanon meeting.

So, I have to get moving - have a great day everyone.

Sunday, April 13, 2008

So Much Fun.............






What a weekend! First we rescued a turtle from the highway - poor thing was lumbering along and stopped - I pulled off the road, put up my hand as a sign for the traffic to stop, and ran out and lifted him up. We put him in the wading pool until we could find a place away from a four lane highway for him. Today we located a wonderful place, a large acreage with ponds, and it was fenced as well. When I picked him up for transport, he was strangely still. He didn't make it - perhaps he'd been hit - yet one part of me feels like a murderess or something for interfering with nature - but I could not stand driving away letting him get smashed.

We had a baseball game, a trip to Target where I found a couple of things on sale to fit, the boy had crawfish at a buffet and chocolate eclairs. We moved on to Albertsons to pick up a prescription for a new non-narcotic pain med for me and Lean Cuisines (under 300 cal) for my meals. Next, came the ice cream store which I navigated through managing not to get ice cream.

The first dose of the pain med felt like three Martguerita's - which is nice - but, hey, most of my life is spent needing to function on all cylinders. Oh well, the pain was like 65% reduced. Now, I realize how bad I really was hurting as I'm on my second day of meds. I hope the "woo woo" feeling will pass. Apparently the med was/is used for seizure control and they found out it also controlled nerve pain. Ok, we'll give it a whirl.

Today was Missions Conference day and I met up with many old friends and folks I had assisted while they lived on the foreign field, and old friends from school days who came from all over the country to participate. I will go to a luncheon Tuesday to spend further time with some pastors and the missionaries - these were nine years of my life.

I was particularly intrigued with the talks from the folks in Nepal and then in a town in Chechnya, which was southern Russia. It is only a few miles from some "hot spots." I would like to go there in July. I'm going to look into it. Maybe it'll work out, maybe not. That's not much time in which to raise money.

The top photo is a fella that is completely nuts - in a good, fun way. He's worked in England, Philippines, and South Africa. He makes everyone laugh - he was on a TV show in England and had people rolling on the floor with laughter.

I also burned up my heavy duty shredder. Grandson inherited the insides and tinkered all afternoon with it.

Then last we did more gardening. Still have so much more to go - but I'm enjoying very consciously not "thinking" but being in the now with the dirt, the silence, and the war with the dollar weed!

Friday, April 11, 2008

Have a Great Weekend.


As a relief from the two disturbing posts previous to this, here is the orange first rose of summer. Isn't she gorgeous?

Do We Really Want to Eat This?

Yes, I'm on a roll this a.m.! Check out the new link on the left to Scientific...etc.
Also view:



I will never darken Kentucky Fried Chickens' drive through windows (or walk-in) again. And I thought China was bad, and we haven't cleaned up our own yard, so to speak.

Lately, I have noticed that sometimes I will get a chicken from the grocery store and I have to throw it away because the meat is mushy. The video probably explains why. If one jumps and stomps on live chickens for a long enough period of time I guess the meat would get mushy. The last one I bought from "H"'s store was awful - since he goes there everyday I asked him to take it back and get my money back, pick up another from a store he drives by on his way home (cheaper there too) and he could have the leftover money for gas. I got lambasted - that was the last big chicken fight - to me to return the chicken with an explanation would not only have been a good financial thing to do, but would also let the store know that the meat was unacceptable so they could maybe do something about it. This would also save me 40 miles of driving to make an extra trip to that store and seemed more environmentally sane as well. But then I have to admit, I have one of those inferior female brains. So what do I know?

OK! The computer goes off now for the day. I am moving on...........

Weapons of Mass Destruction in the Back Yard



My question is, why don't we just move it overseas like they did with our manufacturing, computer, and other jobs? Huh?

Dangerous Animal Virus on US Mainland?
By LARRY MARGASAK,
AP
Posted: 2008-04-11 08:29:54
Filed Under: Nation News, Science News
WASHINGTON (April 11) - The Bush administration is likely to move its research on one of the most contagious animal diseases from an isolated island laboratory to the U.S. mainland near herds of livestock, raising concerns about a catastrophic outbreak.

Skeptical Democrats in Congress are demanding to see internal documents they believe highlight the risks and consequences of the decision. An epidemic of the disease, foot and mouth, which only affects animals, could devastate the livestock industry.

One such government report, produced last year and already turned over to lawmakers by the Homeland Security Department, combined commercial satellite images and federal farm data to show the proximity to livestock herds of locations that have been considered for the new lab. "Would an accidental laboratory release at these locations have the potential to affect nearby livestock?" asked the nine-page document. It did not directly answer the question.

A simulated outbreak of the disease - part of an earlier U.S. government exercise called "Crimson Sky" - ended with fictional riots in the streets after the simulation's National Guardsmen were ordered to kill tens of millions of farm animals, so many that troops ran out of bullets. In the exercise, the government said it would have been forced to dig a ditch in Kansas 25 miles long to bury carcasses. In the simulation, protests broke out in some cities amid food shortages.

"It was a mess," said Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., who portrayed the president in the 2002 exercise. Now, like other lawmakers from the states under consideration, Roberts supports moving the government's new lab to his state. Manhattan, Kan., is one of five mainland locations under consideration. "It will mean jobs" and spur research and development, he says.

The other possible locations for the new National Bio-and Agro-Defense Facility are Athens, Ga.; Butner, N.C.; San Antonio; and Flora, Miss. The new site could be selected later this year, and the lab would open by 2014. The numbers of livestock in the counties and surrounding areas of the finalists range from 542,507 in Kansas to 132,900 in Georgia, according to the Homeland Security study.

Foot-and-mouth virus can be carried on a worker's breath or clothes, or vehicles leaving a lab, and is so contagious it has been confined to Plum Island, N.Y., for more than a half-century - far from commercial livestock. The existing lab is 100 miles northeast of New York City in the Long Island Sound, accessible only by ferry or helicopter. Researchers there who work with the live virus are not permitted to own animals at home that would be susceptible, and they must wait at least a week before attending outside events where such animals might perform, such as a circus.

The White House says modern safety rules at labs are sufficient to avoid any outbreak. But incidents in Britain have demonstrated that the foot-and-mouth virus can cause remarkable economic havoc - and that the virus can escape from a facility.

An epidemic in 2001 devastated Britain's livestock industry, as the government slaughtered 6 million sheep, cows and pigs. Last year, in a less serious outbreak, Britain's health and safety agency concluded the virus probably escaped from a site shared by a government research center and a vaccine maker. Other outbreaks have occurred in Taiwan in 1997 and China last year and in 2006.

If even a single cow signals an outbreak in the U.S., emergency plans permit the government to shut down all exports and movement of livestock. Herds would be quarantined, and a controlled slaughter could be started to stop the disease from spreading.

Infected animals weaken and lose weight. Milk cows don't produce milk. They remain highly infectious, even if they survive the virus.

The Homeland Security Department is convinced it can safely operate the lab on the mainland, saying containment procedures at high-security labs have improved. The livestock industry is divided. Some experts, including the former director at the aging Plum Island Animal Disease Center, say research ought to be kept away from cattle populations - and, ideally, placed where the public already has accepted dangerous research.

The former director, Dr. Roger Breeze, suggested the facility could be safely located at the Atlanta campus of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or at Fort Detrick in Frederick, Md., home of The United States Army Medical Research Institute for infectious diseases.

Another possibility, Breeze said, is on Long Island, where there is no commercial livestock industry. That would allow retention of most of the current Plum Island employees.

Asked about the administration's finalist sites located near livestock, Breeze said: "It seems a little odd. It goes against the ... safety program of the last 50 years."

The former head of the U.S. Agriculture Department's Agricultural Research Service said Americans are not prepared for a foot-and-mouth outbreak that has been avoided on the mainland since 1929.

"The horrific prospect of exterminating potentially millions of animals is not something this country's ready for," said Dr. Floyd Horn.

The Agriculture Department ran the Plum Island lab until 2003. It was turned over to the Homeland Security Department because preventing an outbreak is now part of the nation's biological defense program.

Plum Island researchers work on detection of the disease, strategies to control epidemics including vaccines and drugs, tests of imported animals to ensure they are free of the virus and training of professionals.

The new facility will add research on diseases that can be transferred from animals to humans. The Plum Island facility is not secure enough to handle that higher-level research.

Leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee also are worried about the lab's likely move to the mainland. The chairman, Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., and the head of the investigations subcommittee, Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., are threatening to subpoena records they say Homeland Security is withholding from Congress. Those records include reports about "Crimson Sky," an internal review about a publicized 1978 accidental release of foot-and-mouth disease on Plum Island and reports about any previously undisclosed virus releases on the island during the past half century.

The lawmakers set a deadline of Friday for the administration to turn over reports they requested. Otherwise, they warned in a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, they will arrange a vote next week to issue a congressional subpoena.

A new facility at Plum Island is technically a possibility. Signs point to a mainland site, however, after the administration spent considerable time and money scouting new locations. Also, there are financial concerns about operating from a location accessible only by ferry or helicopter.

The Homeland Security Department says laboratory animals would not be corralled outside the new facility, and they would not come into contact with local livestock. All work with the virus and lab waste would be handled securely and any material leaving would be treated and monitored to ensure it was sterilized.

"Containment technology has improved dramatically since foot-and-mouth disease prohibitions were put in place in 1948," Homeland Security spokeswoman Amy Kudwa said.

Cattle farmers and residents are divided over the proposal to move the lab to the mainland.

"I would like to believe we could build a facility, with the knowledge and technology we have available, that would be basically safe from a bio-security standpoint," said John Stuedemann, a cattle farmer near Athens, Ga., and a former scientist at the Agriculture Department.

Nearby, community activist Grady Thrasher in Athens is worried about an outbreak from a research lab. Thrasher, a former securities lawyer, has started a petition drive against moving the lab to Georgia, saying the risks are too great.

"There's no way you can balance that equation by putting this in the middle of a community where it will do the most harm," Thrasher said. "The community is now aroused, so I think we have a majority against this."

In North Carolina, commissioners in Granville County originally endorsed moving the lab to their area but later withdrew support. Officials from Homeland Security ultimately met with residents for more than four hours, but the commissioners have taken no further action to back the facility.

"Accidents are going to happen 50 years down the road or one year down the road," said Bill McKellar, a pharmacist in Butner, N.C., who leads an opposition group that has formed a research committee of lawyers and doctors.

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

Whole Lotta Shakin Going On


Dear heavens - I have been on the computer for about two hours trying to make MySpace work for me. I still don't care for it. But we'll see. I came back to blogspot today - it feels like a warm robe on a cold winter day - comforting somehow. I think MySpace is for the youngsters - but hey, I'm hip. Old, but hip.

Dang, the Blue Angels are practicing and shredding my nerves - I guess its that time of year. I will be back later to comment. Just checking in. I can't think with my walls shaking.

Yeh, too much coffee too.

Oh - the first rose of summer is breaking out in bloom - orange as sherbet! I continue trying to weed the flower bed, a bit at a time, so slow, so slow. I have to fertilize the grass somehow - will figure it out. Then I'm going to write a book on how to continue to live life with a bad spine.

Saturday, April 05, 2008

Tall Women Rock


I'm blogging like crazy this weekend!!! Well, it is raining.

I just found a Tall Woman's Website, its marvelous. Loved the above video.

Catniposa Ecstarocia or "I get High with the Help of My Friends"





Dried catnip is usually a treat for the cats. When I planted my herbs and vegetable starts, I decided maybe a little of the fresh stuff would be nice. I have also heard of using catnip tea for various ailments. If it works for cats, why not humans. Well, the start for the catnip is now covered over with a laundry basket and a brick, as the cats nibbled off most of the start and rolled in that. Then Psycho began eating the dirt around the plant. Whoa. That must be strong stuff. How's that for a blast from the 70's?

Raining here - and I hoped for sunshine. We'll see what the morning brings, this may mean no softball practice. So besides enabling cats to get high, I'm not sure what is on the agenda this weekend.

I had better get a shower and prepare some breakfast just in case there is baseball practice. So I will leave you and wish you a very good weekend.

Early Friday a.m. befor a Happy, Happy Weekend.


Have a great weekend everyone.

I'm back to the ballfield.

Still trying to quit thinking negative/uncontrolled thoughts.

Trying to stop wondering if the mental states of people around me are a by product of tap water filled with prescription med residue.

Why? Why? Why? It just is.

I think I need a program - Al Anon?

There is squeaking in my walls. Are the mice having sex? (I only want to know, because baby mice will be a problem.) I am not kinky. Well, a little, maybe.

I let the cat in when she started tearing the screen off. I had to let Psycho out last night because he was all over the counters, the stove, the sinks, but he didn't come in with the screen tearer. Is he ok?

My back has felt reasonable for two days. And the vegetables are planted. Cucumber, 3 different types of peppers, tomato, thyme, basil, and catnip..........catnip probably will have a difficult time surviving - it attracts cats (no duh), cats that roll in it and bite off the new shoots. Maybe I should chew it?

My tooth hurts - I need to see the dentist - drat, I know I'm looking at half a grand with it.

I ate chocolate yesterday, last night. It was good.

I yelled at the boy because he is beginning to refuse to mind me and will have to go back to school without his assignments done because he is refusing to do them.

I slam the door to "H's" bedroom cave because he will not participate in life. That is, anyone else's life.

I regret both.

Toller's book is not for me. I've spent days trying to get through it, and he is just on a different planet than I am. I continue with my fasting from negative thoughts devotions, trying, trying, trying. I can't do it myself, I need God's help. There I differ from Toller. I am not God. Knowledge does not free me - I agree that is the first step, knowing that we need to change and what we need to change, but then we humans fool ourselves - and I think that is what Toller refers to as Ego, and the followers of Christ refer to as the "flesh" or "fallen man." I still have to rely on God to show me what I need to change because there are things in myself that I lie (or don't realistically see) to myself about. And for me, only a supernatural power (God) working within me frees me, enables me to change. But I am not God. So, I leave ascended consciousness or whatever it is to Toller and seek to become more Christ-like, or Christ filled. I yearn that "I would decrease so He could increase in me." I believe God wants the "I" to be very present or it wouldn't be there in the first place, but to have the "I" subdued and yoked with God. That way we could do ANYTHING, even replace fear with faith.

It's now 5:30 a.m. and Psycho is home and it is 73 degrees outside. I will pack the swimsuits and towels with the baseball gear - we'll go eat at the Shrimp Basket and at least walk the beach and splash a bit today - I bet it will reach at least 80 degrees. I love you, sunshine.

Missions conference is this weekend, a Nepalese friend will be here and I can find out what is happening in Nepal as well as Tibet from the people's point of view. I will see my beautiful friend from Kenya who has orphanages for street kids. I just received photos of 29 new kids coming in. I check my budget to see if I can get out the ridiculously low amount it takes to support one for a year and allow them to go to school. I will see my friend who is a medical missionary in the jungles of Nicaragua. I will cry when 100 people march through the church carrying flags high in the air from as many nations.

It will be a good weekend, one in which I am thankful for the gift of being alive, for sunshine, for the boy, for a beautiful, if a bit small, home, for dirt and plants, and grass, for little boys and girls playing baseball, for left over pot roast, even for the challenge of getting the clothes washed and dried without bending over and starting a war with pinched nerves. Yeh!

Wednesday, April 02, 2008

Cougar



Red posted a beautiful post about big cats which prompted me to share my experience with a big cat.

The above cougars are prints from oils done by a Wyoming artist who lived out on a ranch and painted incredibly realistic wildlife in dreamy backgrounds. She is now passed away, but I have three limited edition prints - The above two cougers: "Footloose" and "Golden Eyes." The coyote below is called "Belly Deep and Blowin'"


It is surprising I feel any affinity for cougars or wildlife of any kind.

Doesn't everyone have a crazy uncle tucked away in the family closet somewhere? Well, ours is buried now - which makes us all a lot safer, but this is where the cougar story starts.

This wacked out uncle would try to tame anything that walked out of the forest, prairie, den, tree, or other wild place. All the family members have stories to tell of being attacked by a coyote, a bob cat, a badger, or, yes, a cougar. I was around the cougar a lot. It had its front claws and fangs removed. Still, several hundred pounds of putty tat that would lie on top of cupboards so it could swat visitors (crazy uncle thought that was hilarious) was a bit scary. Once he claimed the cougar was constipated - I must have been ten years old - he told me to hold the cougar down while he gave it castor oil. The cougar was at least twice my size and it was quite a wrestling match with uncle standing by laughing his crazy head off. Finally he held the cat down while I straddled its broad chest and poured down a bottle of castor oil. I never did find out if the cat had a proper movement.

Another time he and my mother decided a picnic would be fun for my sister and I. They threw us in the back of the pickup with the cougar that, once we hit open road, heading for a remote mountain area and all the exciting smells added to the smell of little girls in deep fear, made the cougar start screaming. Ever heard a cougar scream? You will never forget it.

We lived through it. My sister came back with a huge burn on her temple where a discarded cigarette blew back and burnt her.

Next, Uncle decided to take a male cousin rabbit hunting, claiming the cougar was as good as any hunting dog. Yeh, you betcha. So off they went, until they came back to town full speed - Togie, the poor cougar who knew no better, got a whiff of rabbit blood and turned on my cousin and pretty effectively shredded my cousin's face with what was left of his cougar chompers. My cousin carries the scars to this day.

Needless to say, Togie went to cougar heaven that fateful day.

Why our parents put up with this behavior, (not from the cougar, but the crazy uncle) I will never know. A psychologist I once visited said, "Gee you kids were at risk, weren't you?" We all thought it was normal, what did we know?

Meeeeeeeeeeeoooowwwwwwwwwrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Diverging from the cat story, another fun thing my uncle planned for children was to take them "snipe" hunting. There was a small lake on the property and when it became dark, one child at a time was taken to sit by the lake to watch for the "snipes." I became very conditioned to love the night as I sat there alone, feeling brave to overcome the fear, and looking at the stars shining on the lake, inhaling the prairie and sagebrush smells as adrenaline, like electricity, would course through my body at any sound. I was also aware that big kitty cats, rattlesnakes, coyotes, an occasional bear, or bald eagle looking for prey roamed the area. Later I read in my textbook studies similar methods were used by satanists to condition children. No wonder there are more than a few in this family with anxiety problems.

Anyway, the good news is that I have no fear of any animal, but proper respect is due each one, besides strange large dogs (because I was bitten once) and am often found leaning over a zoo enclosure telling whatever is caged up that it is such a lovely creature and I hope it's happy.