Sisterhood Award/Prayer Request

I'm honored that KimboSue nominated me for the Sisterhood Award. KimboSue was the first blogger I ever followed and really connected with, plus she motivated me to start blogging. Thank you, Kimbosue. Please take good care, lots of love to you, Dean, and Peanut coming your way. Now, onto the Sisterhood Award:





So here are the rules:

Put the logo on your blog or post.
Nominate at least 10 blogs with great attitude and/or gratitude.
Be sure to link to your nominees in your post.
Let your nominees know they have received the award by leaving them a comment on their blog.
Be sure to link this post to the person who nominated you for the award.

And in no particular order, the Nominees are...

Cara - The Bear and The Comedian
Mrs.Spit Spouts Off
Tara - Too Much Information
Soralis - Twins plus One
Sara - Gas Passer
Annie - Witches, Words, oh my!
Kim - Wicked Stepmom
Lori - Weebles Wobblog
Heather - Joys in My Life
Momma Val
Susan - Musings over coffee
Barbara - Burble

I appreciate each one of these bloggers and thank them sincerely for sharing their thoughts, spirit, and wishes and allowing me to do the same. Blessings to you all, always and in all ways, Martha

Please keep my dear blog "sister" Kimbosue, and her baby in your prayers and best wishes. Kimbosue is being monitored for the pregnancy complication of preeclampsia. Thank you so much.

What's Up Wednesday

Our dog, Charley is usually a very sound sleeper in his crate. However, last night, Charley cried and fussed throughout the night like a brand new puppy. My husband and I both went down to alternatively check, then yell at him to "Be Quiet!" My cat, Abigail was also on high alert last night, sitting on her perch by the window, instead of asleep as is her usual routine for 22 out of 24 hours. There was a disturbance in the animal kingdom.

I found out the cause of the pets' upset when I went outside this morning to walk Charley and found literally gobs and gobs of cat hair. It looks like the fur of possibly two of my neighbors' cats and luckily no blood. So hopefully that means it was just a cat fight and not an owl or coyote attack.

I live adjacent to the Santa Clara River which is a desert river which sounds like an oxymoron. A desert river's flows are seasonal based on rain. It also flows underground during the dry season, approximately 9 months out of the year. (Gee, aren't you glad you stopped by for this little geography lesson?) Anyway the riverbed is a direct "wildlife highway" for the coyotes, possums, bears, (Yes, we had a bear cub in our neighborhood almost twelve years ago!) and other creatures to come down from the surrounding Santa Monica Mountains to hunt, drink, and reclaim this territory from suburbia. It is not a place to have outdoor pets and another neighbor has lost several cats to coyotes. (They are slow learners I think. The humans, not the coyotes who learned really quickly that pets = reliable food source.) Our bunny, Copper got killed by an owl several years ago when she refused to go into her hutch one night. Pets are definitely not on the top of the food chain in my neighborhood.

I am relieved I don't have to deal with any injured (or worse) animals in my garden, as I plan to spend some time out there planning my garden and lawn "rehabilitation". First on the list is reseeding the lawn which looks like a mud pit. Of course, serious weeding, trimming, and debris clean up is needed. Then, onto the fun stuff, composting and mulching the flowerbeds, replenishing the bark under the tree swing, and then putting in flowers and seeds for lots of Spring, Summer, and Fall color. I was looking at Pacific Giant Primroses at the garden store yesterday and the flowers were so brilliant and happy. I also can't wait to go to the "Rock" Store and pick up a couple bags of river rocks to use in the front flower beds. I enjoy seeing the boulders, slabs of slate, and rocks of all sizes and colors. A couple years ago I put in a slate pathway in front of my husband's shop in the backyard. That was fun, and not as hard as I expected. I do like rocks, especially in a garden. I like yard work too, I enjoy getting my hands dirty and feel at peace working with Nature. Plus, nobody bothers you when you are pushing a lawnmower.

What's up with you this Wednesday?

Perfect Moment Monday brought to you by Mr.Crankypants

Our youngest son, the 11 y/o, has been Mr.Crankypants, disagreeable and short tempered, very much not his usual upbeat and sunny self.

I asked him if he liked being part of our family. (He has been exasperated with all of us, so I was unsure what to expect.)
S. said, "Yes, it would be too hard to get used to another family's habits."

This reason made me smile, "...another family's habits" indeed. No "I would miss you, Dad, and brother", no missing the pets, our home, it was our "habits"! Another routine or lifestyle would just be too much for him to cope. So, even though he is frustrated with us as only an eleven y/o can be, he's sticking with us.

Thank you and for more Perfect Moments, please visit Lori.

Q&A about blogging

From Zen Ventures, a little Q & A about blogging-
1.What do you hope to achieve in blogging?
2.Why do you blog?
3.What do you blog about?

1. I really don't know what I hope to "achieve" with blogging, really no aspirations except learning and connecting with folks on a host of topics, share some laughs, and learn more about myself and the great world through others' experiences.

2. I comment, therefore, I blog. I can be quite the commenter, so turn around is only fair play. Some of the bloggers I follow share very personal and heartfelt experiences and I want to give them the opportunity to weigh in on what I have to share. The give and take is what it's all about. I also telecommute and enjoy the virtual community and support of my blog friends. There is genuine connection and caring, it's just wonderful.

3. To borrow the term from the inestimable Lori of Weebles Wobblog, I am a free range blogger posting about whatever catches my fancy and touches my heart. And I try not to bore anyone, including myself.

So there you have it, please play along by answering any or all. Thank you so much.

Black Humor- Warning:Clinical Adult injury/death/stupidity discussed

Like alot of clinicians and first responders, I have a black sense of humor to help cope with unique and often stressful situations.

When I first became a RN I worked in surgery and recovery room at a community hospital. One evening we had an elderly gentleman accompanied by his extended family come in to have a foreign body removed from his backside. He required surgery, as this foreign object, a can of air freshener, was firmly lodged up his lower intestine. The surgeon said the man told him he sat on the can "by mistake". Some mistake. After the can's removal, we tested the air freshener, (away from the sterile field of course!) It worked perfectly before we put it in a specimen bucket to send to pathology. (That must have made for an interesting pathology report.)

Twenty years ago when I worked in the Emergency Room at a large medical center in Florida, we had multiple trauma victims arrive from a high speed police chase and collision. This included an elderly woman driver in the wrong place at the wrong time and a drug dealer trying to evade arrest. I remember the ER doc and I working on the dealer and when she found a big zip.lock bag of crack coca.ine stuffed in his pants, she held it up to the waiting police and yelled out, "Party at my house tonight". The drug dealer survived. The elderly woman, a grandmother, did not.

Fifteen years ago when I was flying out to California from Florida, the airplane flight crew requested professional medical help. I dutifully pushed my call button and went up to First Class to "check out the situation" at the request of the flight attendant. (Btw, whenever anyone uses the word, "situation", it means seriously eff'ed up.) I walked into the first class bathroom to find a man pouring blood out of his cowboy boot into the sink. There was blood on the floors, the counter, alot of blood. I asked him, "What happened?" He turned to me with bloodshot eyes and reeking of alcohol and said, "I had a zit on the back of my leg and I popped it." I said, "Well, I guess you won't do that again." (Clinical note:It was not a zit. He suffered bleeding from a leg varicose vein and had clotting problems due to alcohol use.) He was stable and we did not have to make an emergency landing, saving Amer.ican Airlines thousands and thousands of dollars from fees and missed passenger connections. For my trouble, I got a lame letter from the airlines giving me a $100 off a FULL FARE Ticket with blackout dates! Talk about black humor, I guess the airlines have it too.

Death of a Hired Hand

It has been gray and dreary here these last few days with strong storms coming down from Alaska. Winter is the rainy season in Southern California. The rain reminds me of my "Repair Guy" Alex who died in an accident on the slick roads last winter. Like most homeowners, once you find a "Repair Guy" that is good, reliable, trustworthy, and knowledgeable, you are breathing easier knowing you have a partner to help with the things that inevitably break down. Alex was there to help ever since we bought our house twelve years ago. Alex nursed my old washing machine back to health and gently broke the news when it was time to let it go. He tuned up the furnace and easily diagnosed and fixed our tempermental refrigerator. We got to know each other through our intermittent visits to keep this 40 year old house running. He saw my kids get bigger and I learned about how he moved to the United States from the Ukraine twenty years ago and about his wife and son. We had a bond.

I didn't find out Alex had died until last summer when I called his office to schedule a repair. The man who answered the phone became choked up and told me that he was sorry he would have to send someone else out as Alex had been killed in an accident in the rain last winter. I burst into tears, the loss of this young man struck me so hard and I was overwhelmed for quite a few minutes. I apologized for my emotional outburst and expressed my sympathy for Alex's family and coworkers.

A friend who also had Alex as their repairman had a similar reaction as me upon learning of his death. I thought, "Gee, we were just customers of a serviceman. Why this level of emotion?" I realized that it's not the quantity of the relationship per se, but the quality. That this person and I had a genuine connection and caring, and like ripples in the water, it touched my heart and spirit. I think of Alex's wife and young son and how they must miss him. I am not ashamed to say I miss him, not because of his work, but because of who he was and how he treated me, kindly, patiently, and warmly.
Rest In Peace, Alexander. Thank you. (Отдых в мире, Alesander. Спасибо.)

Love is In the Air

Hello this after Valentine's Day Monday and I hope you had a weekend filled with love. I sure did, I was treated to a favorite meal cooked by my husband. This meal is fantastic, it's broiled salmon topped with brie served on a bed of cooked spinach with dill cream sauce, with a side of sliced poached green apples and Yukon gold mashed potatoes. We are talking major heavenly delight in the tastebuds department. Ah, so good. My other delights were sweet cards from the family and a one lb.box of See's chocolates. Yum, yum, yum. I am lucky that my husband is so romantic. (Sometimes more so than me!)
I think my husband has passed this trait on to our soon to be 14 y/o son who is at the movies on his first date. Ack! Our teen was walking on air and a little nervous when he told us, "C. and I decided we like each other and want to go to the movies tomorrow. Sorry for springing this on you." It's okay, I told myself, it's just great. It's so sweet to see him all excited and walking on air getting ready this morning. I asked him how his guy friends will take his new status as part of a couple to which he said, "They will have to deal with it." And so will I.

"And stay right here, 'cause these are the good old days." Carly Simon, "Anticipation" lyrics