THURSDAY FIVE

It's that crazy day again..Thursday..and I have to admit..it's a pretty good day..it's almost as good as Friday!

What makes it even better is that it's Thursday Five..Where we get to look back on our week and and come up with 5 things that have made us..

Happy

Joyful

Excited

Jubilant

Grateful

Whatever you want..just no bad stuff..

Some weeks are harder..and we might have to dig deeper..but I 
guarantee you will find 5 things!

My Five..

1.) My (step) son called me on Tuesday to tell me he is moving in with me

(he lives in another state) next month. He turns 18 

(so his piece of shit bio-parents cant do anything about it this time) 

next month and graduates 5 days after that so as soon as his graduation 

 ceremony is over - he is mine!

2.) My son's social security payments resumed this week. Yay! 

None too soon either since DBD is now unemployed. (I hope those free 

drinks you gave your friends was worth it)!

3.) My mom's birthday was yesterday and she is now 

almost 60 I think. 

With all of her health problems; I'm very happy that she 

is still with us.

4.) Got all my papers, documents, print-outs, etc...together and out to 

my attorney on Monday. Yippee! That was the most stress I've had in a year. 

I'm super happy that it is over; my attorney takes over from here. 

(Watch out DBD; he's coming after you!)  :) 

5.) Raye got back with Blue yesterday. I think I forgot to blog last week 

about how they broke up AGAIN. I can't keep this shit straight. I am 

far from happy about this little reconciliation but seeing my daughter 

happy helps. So, my #5 is seeing my daughter happy again.

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L O S T - UPDATED

Just spent the last 4-1/2 hours with this damn show. Sneaking in spanish homework during commercials and spent the last hour of the show bawling my eyes out. Not because I'm so damn sad that the show is ending but because it was so damn emotional. I like the way they ended it. It made everything that has happened over the last six years acceptable. And actually - if anyone remembers - Richard actually told us this, that everyone was dead, a few episodes ago. I don't think anyone believed him though. Here's what I want to know though - this is my question - where were all the darma, other's and freigter people? How come they weren't in the church? Are they dead too? Desmond and Penny weren't on the plane and they were in the church so where were these guys? Juliette, Faraday & his mother weren't on the plane either. Why are they there? Even Ben was there. And where was the pilot guy? And where was Michael? And Vincent? Why was Richard leaving the island? And who belongs to that damn shoe? I gotta go to bed!

UPDATE: Okay I am very confused at something. Did they all die in the plane crash - just hours and minutes apart - making them all die at different times - and then once they died then they lived that alternate reality until they remembered they were dead? Or did they survive the plane crash but never get rescued so they all died on the island at different times and then experienced their alternate reality lives until they remembered everything that happened on the island and then once they remembered they went to the church and waited for everyone else to get there? So then the Oceanic 6 never really left the island? Everything that happened to the Oceanic 6 never really happened? Kate never really raised Aaron? Sun never really had her baby? Sayid never really went on a killing spree? Ben never really killed Locke? And why was Penny in the church? When the heck did she die? And where did Penny come from anyway? If the Oceanic 6 never really left the island so nothing that happened after being not-rescued happened - then where did Penny even come from?? Where is the plane that pilot guy, Richard, Miles, Kate, Sawyer and Claire, were on - going? I guess I'm asking - did anyone survive the initial plane crash? Or did everything that happened after the plane crash not really happen? But I really want to know why Penny and Juliette were in the Church! And why was Ben Linus there? Where was Michael? I think the ending was awesome though. When Jack was lying there with Vincent; I thought the show was gonna come full circle. I thought he was going to get up and see the crashed plane and all the survivers walking around and that everything was going to play out all over again but I think ending the show with Jack's eye closing after beginning the show with his eye opening was brilliant. I've never, ever cried during an episode of LOST and I was crying like a fricken baby all through the episode. But seriously - WHY WERE PENNY, Desmond & JULIETTE IN THE CHURCH????

Timothy

 ~~ Me & Timothy ~~

I have previously blogged about my little brother Timothy. He died 2 months before his 2nd birthday; when I was 18. I found this website:  continulife.com through another blogger: Jenn Sue Wild 
over at: http://lipstickandlaundry.blogspot.com/. Jenn created a memorial for her son, William. So I opened my own account at continulife.com to create a memorial for Timothy - to give to my Mother.

Timothy died 20 years ago today.  Every year, on this day, I do something special for my Mother to let her know that I'm thinking about her and that I haven't forgotten Timothy. For the first 10 years after Timothy died, I sent her a card on May 21st. I never mentioned Timothy in the card - but she always knew anyway. It was just a "I'm think about you" kind of card and telling her I loved her. After 10 years I stopped doing that and just called her on the phone to tell her I loved her or did something else for her. Last year I attached fake flowers to pens using green fabric tape and then put them in a short glass vase filled with rocks and gave it to her. It looked kind of like this one:

...and this year I'm giving her this website: Timothy. Please click the link and let me know what you think and please feel free to leave a Rose for Timothy.

Dear speaker-box makers:

Why is it that, in all the advance technology in this day in age where one can video-chat live with people 6,000,000,000,000 miles away from them and where one's cellular phone can do everything except wash their dishes ~ why then, when I pull up to a fast food drive-thru, why am I STILL ordering thru a broken speaker that has been in place for 50 years? That neither me nor the order taker can hear a damn thing the other is saying??!! Hello shitty-speaker-box-makers ~ do you not know its 2010? Why am I still trying to order out of a crackle-y, broken, pray-they-heard-you-right speaker-box?!?!

HOW DBD BECAME DBD. PART ONE.

Since I am using this blog for my Psychology final, and we are studying PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) I am going to blog about DBD. I haven‘t really written about my ex-hubby aka DBD and how he came to be my ex-hubby aka DBD. DBD is also an ex-military guy. Can’t say what branch. But don’t worry - they are all equally fucked up. I am all for respectin’, shakin’ hands, pats’ on shoulders, given credit where its due, etc…respect all around for those who are responsible for my freedom. But, with that honor comes responsibility. And when these guys return and don’t follow thru with their responsibilities; making MY (and thousands of others) children sacrifice the family they were entitled to grow up in - well, that just pissed me right off. My children (and thousands of others) are not of age to give consent to give up the lives that they were entitled to have - for our country; but that’s exactly what all 3 of them did and yes - this subject PISSES ME RIGHT OFF - so to those that are offended, well, its MY story, MY opinion and its MY blog so with that warning; continue reading at your own risk:

This government, the U.S. government, doesn’t give two shits about returning veterans or what happens to their families. Once your home and your contracts are up - that door opens and they literally kick you in the ass out it. Or they Stop-Loss you for 2 more years, fuck you up, and then kick your ass out the door. They don’t want Christmas Cards, your forwarding address, return visits, nothing. They are DONE with you. Goodbye, adios, farewell, see ya. They do not care about the thousands of U.S. children (and spouses, friends and family members) of these returning combat-veterans that have suffered and are still suffering so that another country can benefit. Don’t get me wrong. I am all for hanging that fucking bastard Suddam by his balls. But NOT at the expense of U.S families. NOT at the expense of MY family. NOT if it means that my children have now lost the privilege of growing up in a two-parent household with a father who loves them. That shit just pisses me right off because my children NEVER HAD A CHOICE. Wow - I am getting WAY off topic. This subject does that to me - I can feel my blood pressure rising. I think I need a time out - this is just as bad as when I wrote my essay last term about George W. Bush - yeah, he gets my blood boiling. Luckily for me, my English Professor is a Democrat - I got an “A”.

But where was I? Oh, yeah - why DBD is a DBD. We had been married for 8 years when he was sent over to Iraq. His unit was one of the first ones over - before Bush declared the war he INTENDED to start when he took office. DBD chilled in Kuwait for about a month before his unit was ORDERED to invade. He was one of those veterans who were NOT there for rebuilding. He was NOT there to ask questions. Not there to keep peace and order. He was there in the beginning. He was there to shoot to KILL; fuck the questions. Men, women, CHILDREN. Hard to believe how so many combat-veterans came back fucked up eh? DBD's unit was among those first in Baghdad. I remember Violet waking me up in the middle of the night and her, Raye and I watched the military help the Iraqi citizens knock over the statue of Saddam. DBD was there. His unit lost only 1 man. The press reported it as killed in battle but that’s not what happened. 75% of what the press reported was NOT what happened. There is so much COVER-UP that I’m not sure if the story-tellers can keep their stories straight. The man they lost was run over by their own hummer. In his sleeping bag. While he slept. Makes me wonder how many men & women we lost to our own. Knowing that just makes that war even less understandable to me. DBD was over there for about 5 months. His unit was shipped home after the invasion while other units were shipped over to rebuild. He was infantry. His job was to invade and kill; not rebuild. 

He was fine when he returned. At first. But just how is a person “fine” after that? How do you shoot a child and just be “fine”? I do NOT blame him for not being “fine”. I can’t imagine what he saw. What he did. He went to the VA for help. He was diagnosed with PTSD. He was assigned therapy and prescribed medication that he said made him feel like a “robot” so he stopped taking it. Then we started receiving bills for his therapy. Treatment is suppose to be free to veterans but when we couldn’t pay. They wouldn’t help. That’s when the trouble began. The anger. The violence. The drinking. The gambling. The arrests. The inability to care. About anyone. I became the enemy. I didn’t even recognize my own husband anymore. So now - my children are growing up in a broken home. Without a father. DBD lost his children, his wife, his home, his truck and just last month - his job. Yep - I think that’s what they call “rock bottom”. All so the people of Iraq could be free. Yes. it’s a great cause. But NOT at the expense of my children...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME and Materialistic, Attitudey, Ungrateful Cars.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME...HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME...HAPPY BIRTHDAY...you get the picture...

Okay, so its not my birthday. My birthday was yesterday but I forgot. Oops. Why anyone in their right mind would still acknowledge their birthday when they get to my age - I'll never know. But hey - who ever said I was in my right mind??

I blogged before that I was using my blog as my Psychology Journal so sometimes I'm just bloggin' about my day...

...LIKE TODAY...

...now I know what it is like to be stranded, at 7am, in my jammies, without my wallet, on the side of the road, because that is as far as I could coast, when my new car, who is apparently all materialistic and obviously NOT a morning-person morning-car, refuses to accept nice comments and bi-weekly washes, to get me safely to my destinations. You would think it would be happy with all that. Right? WRONG. My car wants gasoline too! Can you believe this shit? Some cars just are never happy. So, after my son HAD to walk the rest of the way to school - even though he suffers from the surprisingly contagious "my legs are broken and I can't walk to school but I have no problem walking to my friend's house" syndrome...and yes, he miraculously made it to school, after my daughter had to come rescue me with my debit card that wouldn't work (and there WAS money in there - I'm telling the TRUTH!) and then after my Mommy had to come rescue me with HER debit card (hers worked) - I finally made it back home, 2 hours later, from my whopping .5 mile destination. And all this WITHOUT coffee. And how was YOUR morning??

Wordless Wednesday ~ Social Parade

http://www.painfoundation.org/learn/programs/fibromyalgia/national-fad.html

(thanks to Misty for the Fibromyalgia link. Please visit Misty's Musings)

 

Click the Button Below!

Mejis I need cheered up ~ where are you with one of your funny stories??

Okay, bEAr with me (haha ..."bear" with me...get it?? okay) this is a crazy-long rant. I am in a seriously crappy mood. I just feel like crying. My aunt, my mother's sister, is 52 and just recently moved back to our home state, and in with her elderly father, after losing her job over health problems and subsequently losing her home that she owned. She has lived in Las Vegas for the last 30 years. I was the only one in our family to follow her there and Las Vegas is where I met DBD and where my kids grew up - so my kids and I are closer to her than the rest of the family who only saw her on vacations. Along with her home she had to get rid of most of her furniture, decorations, etc...and only has a few boxes of stuff in her father's basement along with the 5 cats that came with her and her SUV that she bought last year. Since she's been here (almost a year) she has had to put one cat to sleep and another cat lives at my house; that leaves her with 3. My point being that she's losing everything bit by bit. She's filed for Social Security but was denied and is waiting on the appeal hearing - at LEAST one year from now so she has NO current or any foreseeable income. She could get a part-time job (that is allowed when applying for SS) but chooses not to. She says she can't work because she hurts too much. Yes, she does hurt but she takes medication for it and I think a lot of it is depression. My mother (her sister) has been loaning her money to pay her car payment and bills but she can no longer do that. She lives, rent free, with my grandad but she has no money, and no way to - pay her car payment, insurance or cell phone anymore since my mom stopped giving her money. These are the only bills she has. She got a sizable income tax check back earlier this year but she's blown through it. I sympathize with what she is going through because when I moved back home after my divorce 3 years ago - I had to leave everything behind too (my house, my truck, MY DOG, my furniture, appliances, etc...DBD kept it all) and I had to start all over. No money, no household items - just me, my kids and my van. So, I know how she feels but, like my daughter said (and it made me feel so good to know that my daughter recognizes and appreciates the way I got myself back together) I lost everything too and I bounced back. I did what I had to do instead of dwelling on what I'd lost. So, I have recently come into some money as I have already blogged about - money owed to me - and I was looking to buy a new car. Since Violet (my aunt) had no way to make her car payments and was going to end up loosing her SUV - I offered to take over the payments and GIVE her my van so she would at least have a vehicle. That's way more than a finance company/bank would have done. They'd have repo'd the car, left her with nothing, and still sent her a bill! I thought this would at least help her and I even offered to sell it back to her after (if) she wins her case, as well as give her an additional $2,000.

So, lets recap: a free van, $2,000 and the option to buy it back. You would think she'd be grateful right? Wrong. Everyday since I traded her my van and took her SUV (and have already made May's payment because she doesn't have the money to pay it) I have heard about what a "piece of shit" the van is, how she hates not having power windows, hates the sliding door, hates having to lock the doors one by one, thinks it over-heating, hates having a car that she has to worry about repairs on, and on and on and on. Like she doesn't realize that she's lucky she had someone to take over her SUV and give her a car. Like she's lucky she doesn't have to walk or ride the bus. Not to mention that if she hates the van so much (and it is NOT a piece of shit. It is a very nice van and there are a million cars out there that are worse. She's just used to driving a new, everything automatic and 7 years free maintenance car) why didn't she get a part-time job working just enough hours to pay the car payment?.........

My mom said give her the car back and let it be repo'd and it would be her problem that she didn't have a car. Not to mention that my mom has SERIOUS health problems and takes medication everyday in order to work. My mom has chronic pain (as does Violet) among other things and she still works everyday. I, as well, have heath problems to which I depend on medication in order to work. Raye said that Grandma and I are able to work everyday with our health problems so why can't Violet? That's a very good question. Why can't Violet? Because she doesn't want to. She wants everyone else to support her. Raye told me that she is angry about that because her and Dakota are my responsibilities and my money is for them; not her. She's right. On top of that, Violet doesn't think she should have to pay my mom (her sister) back for the 8 months my mom paid all her bills. I wonder if she realizes how ungrateful she sounds. I know she's depressed. I know she lost everything. But I was depressed after my divorce. I lost everything (well, everything material. I got what I wanted: my kids) too but I didn't sit in my house (or my father's house) and whine about it and have everyone else pay my bills! Grrrrrr! It just pisses me off that instead of saying "thank you for giving me a car, thank you for taking over payments so my car doesn't get repo'd, thank you for being willing to sell it back to me, thank you for buying my food, clothes and toiletries for the last 6 months (which I have been doing)" I'm told how much my (I guess its her's now) van is a piece of shit.

Teenagers!

Raye is back with Blue. I knew she was being over-dramatic but she is a teenager. Blue came crawling back. Literally. He was agreeing to anything and everything to get Raye back. I told her that all these "rules" she's laying down for him (and boy is she laying down a lot of them!) go both ways and that she is not the "boss" in the relationship; there is no "boss", a relationship is give and take. A lot happened in the week or two that they have been broken-up. Blue went to Prom with his buddies and w/o Raye. Raye missed Prom Thankfully it was only her Jr. Prom. If she was a Senior; I would have dressed her and driven her there myself. No way was she missing Prom because of a high-school boyfriend! Even if she couldn't see it - I knew she'd wish she'd gone. She missed 75% of school in that 2 weeks cuz she was too upset to go or came home upset. Breaking up definitely had a negative impact on her grades/attendance. The last 2 weeks have taken a toll on me too. Its hard seeing your daughter act like the world is over. I told her she's only 17; he's just a high-school boyfriend. She told me that she was in love with him though. I don't know - do you really know what "in love" is at 17? This last week after talking to me & one of her teachers, Raye decided that she was better off w/o Blue and started to cheer up. Raye also told me, she realized that Blue didn't treat her very well, never stood up for her, put his friends before her, sometimes didn't talk nicely to her, etc; she just realized she wasn't very happy in the relationship. That made me kind of angry cuz I didn't know all this but happy that she realized it wasn't right and she was better off. Well, I guess "cheered-up Raye" bothered her boyfriend/ex-boyfriend/boyfriend/ex-boyfriend because he started trying to talk to her, calling her, texting her to the point that she asked me to call him and tell him she didn't want to talk to him, which I did, and he didn't call/text anymore - that night anyway. He didn't give up though, constantly asking her for another chance, that he realized he made a mistake, can he have just 10 minutes to talk to her. Raye wasn't going to but I told her to give him the 10 minutes. I told her she'd regret it if she didn't because after awhile, he will probably give up and move on and that would be just about the time she'd realize she wanted to be with him and by that time; it would be too late - that advice was from experience. So, 10 minutes later, he was walking in our door. Raye laid down the law and I mean LAID DOWN THE LAW - you can do this, you can't do that, etc...and he agreed to it all. So, I am glad that the "we're broken up" period is over because it was so exhausting - for me! I'm amazed I survived!

Wordless Wednesday ~ Oops ... I mean FRIDAY

I want this license plate for my car!

Went to my niece Marie's 3rd birthday party yesterday. Made Raye & Dakota go too. Marie's dad (my brother) and I hadn't been on speaking terms, prior to last week, for almost 2 years so I haven't gotten to see her very much. It was a nice family get-together. Dakota didn't complain too much about not getting to stay at home instead.

I don't think I have blogged this but I am using my blog as my journal that I am suppose to be keeping for my Psychology final. I'm going to print out my blog and bind it. So, on some days I am just going to blog about my day; nothing really exciting. After class today I get to pick up the kids from school and study espanol and criminal justice all night! Fun, fun, fun!!

Is it Sunday already??

Three. Not one. Not two. Three.

What do you do when your 17 year old daughter sends you a text message asking you to pick up three PREGNANCY TESTS for her??