VENTING

I just had to put this down for posterity.

I have been doing some traveling lately.  Not real big traveling, but more driving than I have done in several years.  I have spent the last 5-10 at home and it has pretty much required my children, family obligations (think funerals), or a shoe horn to get me out of my house.

So lately I have been going places again and I have been repeatedly confronted with something that I view as a reflection of our current screwed up culture. 

I am talking about roundabouts.

What the heck is the purpose of these and why WHY, for Pete's sake, would we accept quietly the fact that now instead of going straight ahead we have to take the 2nd right in order to actually GO straight ahead?????  Is this supposed to make it more equal?  So now everybody has to slow way down and pay attention instead of having a through road and two stop signs?  How much do you think that cost?  In dollars, of course, not lives.  That could probably not be accurately calculated.

Has this not struck anyone else as street rat crazy??????  Am I the only one still awake?  Would it be worth it if I was?  I think not.

I was infuriated.  Especially when I came upon them unexpectedly in the dark.

I freely admit that it may not be advisable to travel in the dark when you really can't see anything.  But plenty of people do it all the time when they think they know the road.

Do not assume anything anymore, people.  Especially do not assume that anything is going to make any sense.  It may be safer to accept that but I will fight it until my death which I dread a little bit less every day.

The only good reason I can think of for something like roundabouts is that the powers that be are trying to restrict the bigger trucks from using these roads.  That works for me.  Unless I would have been behind the poor trucker who, knowing no better, suddenly came upon a roundabout where there had previously only been a stop sign and had to slam on his brakes, not hit anybody already in the circle part, and THEN hit the 2nd right without missing a beat.  That would be horrifying, no????

This was compounded in Columbia Sunday when taking the first right in order to actually turn right, I found myself at a gas station that, when I got out, I noticed had no trash can.  Instead of the usual trash can, there was a big pot of fake flowers in the middle of the pumps at each row.  In addition, instead of having the bins with the window washing solution and the squeegees (Oh, America, I miss you already!!)  there were more pots of fake flowers.

It being the last station on the way out of town on 763, near the God forsaken roundabout, I quickly concluded two things.

1) Obviously this gas station has been bought by people who are not from America, and know what you need to take care of a car.  I suppose they could be from America, but I doubt it.

2)  Never to take this route again.  Unless I'm only going to the 63 Diner, and to remember the culturally lost roundabout.

So, we are now living in a world where to continue straight ahead we need to take the 2nd right.

Does that make any sense to you?????

Busy Summer

I have been gone a long time, I know.  So much for making myself do something everyday, beyond what I feel I 'have" to do. 

Oh, well.

I have been to lots of cemeteries, and I apologize to those following who had all those notifications.  It seems that in trying to send pictures to an email address to be used in the blog, instead they all showed up as new posts.  Which would have been ok, had I at least put a caption with them.  Someday I hope to put them all into a post.  Barring that, I will at least add a caption to each one of them.  Obviously I do not know what I am doing.  However,  I have gotten through most of my life in just that way, so if you were expecting anything else, you should get used to this. 

Acceptance.  It's a quality that makes life easier.  For everyone, if you must know.  wink wink

Last weekend I took the Grand Finale over to see one of my friends who was visiting her folks.  They have a lake in the back with an island.  The boys immediately got in the water, then decided to take a canoe to the island.  They were warned before they started that the boat only had one paddle, but this did not slow them down in the least.  The next 45 minutes were spent with my friend and I laughing hysterically at two 14 year-olds trying their darndest to paddle a boat with one paddle.  I had measured them that very day, and one is 5' 10" and the other 5' 11".  I didn't weigh them but they are well over 100 lbs. each and wear size 11 and 12 shoes.  The one that was paddle less at the time (this changed periodically) would either use their arm as a paddle in the front of the boat, or sit in the back and kick.  Finally one jumped out, the better to push, and then they both jumped out.  So they are now trying to "swim" the boat to shore.  I don't know how long they tried pushing the boat before they discovered that they could touch, but we were laughing especially hard during that time.  Luckily they were so far away they couldn't hear it and I'm sure they didn't look back.  They had other things on their minds.

By now they were pretty far away, and our eyes are pretty old.  The boys were fine, the boat was safe, and they seemed to be playing some kind of game where they were taking turns diving into the water on either side of the boat.  We wondered what they were doing, but who knows what kind of games twin 14 year old boys might dream up?  We continued to enjoy the time uninterrupted, which is still hard for me to get used to, even though my children are practically grown men now.

When they finally made it back, we learned that they had thrown the anchor in and too late, discovered that the anchor was not, as it should have been, secured to the boat in any way.  So the diving "game" we had witnessed turned out to be them frantically diving to "save" the anchor.

We laughed extra hard at that.  It was a great afternoon and so good to see her.  She also finally got to see the twins for the first time since they were babies.  I do not know where the years go, only that they do, and they go very fast at that.

In other news I have had a few "high energy" days.  Don't ask me how, but I actually got through some closets and they are in order! 

Now, I have proof of my labor in the form of a big pile of clothes on the living room floor, carefully separated into sizes and in order by item.  I fervently hope that the high energy wave hasn't completely left the shore.  If  I don't get them sold or hauled away they will still be sitting there at Christmas, which just may be when I post next!

School is back in session.  Whether you view this as good or bad, if your children are out of the house all day at least there is food left when you come home at night, so take heart!  Take what heart you can and prepare to be five and ten dollared to death in exchange for food that no one is eating in your house all day.

This is as good as it gets these days, and it's not all that bad.

Grave Hoppin'

I grew up going to cemetaries.  When I was little, my grandmother would cut peonies, stack them with layers of wet newpapers in the trunk of the car, and away we would go to decorate graves.  There was rarely ever anyone else there and as we distributed flowers, my grandmother would tell stories about the people whose gravestones we knew.  In a small town this can be quite a lesson, and geneology as well as  history were absorbed as naturally as bedtime stories for me.  Get more than two people of a certain age together at a cemetary, and you will be amazed and delighted at the stories you will hear.

I loved the different stones, calculated how long the surviving spouse spent without their mate, witnessed the babies born who did not survive, and marveled at what their lives would have been like.

I still do.

 It was always a favorite way to spend an afternoon with my mother's family.  Many is the time I have picked up the phone only to have a relative say "Want to go grave-hoppin'?".  It's a little joke, as opposed to "bar-hoppin".  The answer was always yes.  It still is, and I love to go by myself too.  If I'm alone and I pass a cemetary I most usually stop. 

Here are just some pictures I took when I got the new camera, but I have always loved this angel.  She presides at the Catholic Cemetary here in town.  Angels and crosses dominate this cemetary.

Across the road is the city cemetary. Parts of it are very old.  Of course, they are my favorite.  This cemetary also has some angels, crosses, and also little bell shaped tops on the stones.  I do not know what the bell shaped tops mean.  My favorite stones of all are the Woodmen of the World stones, and we have many in the city cemetary.  Here are some from this batch.  I have many more of these taken at many cemetaries, and am saving those for a post just about them.  It is a wonderful story and you should look it up.  If you have never noticed these before you must have not been paying attention, they are immediately recognizable but also have unique features. 

This one I took just for the old tree.  It's in the oldest part of the cemetary and one of my favorite scenes there.