Taking Action

Yes, I have started taking a Vitamin D supplement as advised.  For the first few days I doubled the dose by taking a pill morning and evening to see if I could jump start how I feel.  I also renewed my calcium supplements.  Both of these were recommended by my physician a few years ago, but I did not follow through for very long as I should have.  (Thus, I am not taking these just because many of my blog readers recommended it.  We all should follow the guidance of our doctor when paired with blogger advice.  I do love you all for being so helpful and kind!)

I will wait on the therapy unless my next meet-up with Doc says it would be a good idea.  (I AM feeling better mood wise and MAYBE energy wise.)  I hate that mental therapy in culture is so stigmatized!

There was a delay in re-starting my exercise program because I have company coming this week.  These are old friends of hubby that we have not seen as often as we would like since they live in Florida.  They are the "millionaires next door" because they have received several mil from the DOD for their land.  They are allowed to live in their charming little house on this land until they die.  You would NEVER know they had this much money because they live a normal retiree life-style except for more travel to exotic locations than the average retired couple.

I did finally open one of the two Yoga DVDs that I bought so many months ago.  This summer has been too crazy for Yoga and I have been too lazy.  I will try to follow one of these when I am through writing this post.  I have found that only the beginners Yoga levels can be done with any safety by me!

I do think one of the stimulus for this downer period in my mood was a "co-leader" that I work with on one of my volunteer projects.  In the beginning she was very critical at the lack of communication from my end but this mid-summer anything from her role as the museum contact was deadly silent.  I would show up at our meetings to find that I was faced with some deadline or misunderstanding because the DD at the museum had met with her but I never got emailed or contacted on any of the decisions and/or resulting deadlines that she agreed to.  When I returned after my cruise and asked what had transpired while I was gone (so I could write the monthly report) her total response was "We accomplished a lot!  Just look around!"  It seems my resignation as co-leader did not release me from angst as much as I had hoped and feeling that I failed in some way...but I am moving forward on that.

The final punch to my gut has been the TP group that with hubris, glee, confusion and ignorance has adversely affected the lives of many young and highly professional people I know.  (When you cannot win the game by playing by the rules, kick that ball into the woods and then blame it on the other team.) The hidden frustration of my bureaucrat hard-working and furloughed friends on FB has worried me.  In a second fell swoop these past years the TP gang has reduced much enthusiasm for entering public service.  Big money has flooded the rural areas with radio and TV dishonesty and fed the frustration and anger most of us had with this world by advocating a slash and burn agenda.  And many have been boondoggled into thinking this is a good approach.  If this continues there is a good chance that my Social Security check will stop or at the very least pause.  I have saved several months of cash...but I know many, many, many folks do not have this luxury.  No wonder I am depressed, and not listening to the TV news doesn't remove what I see happening all around me where I live.  I have been waited on by an administrative assistant who lost her job at the nearby military base due to sequestration, I know scientists that have lost their research due to a lengthy gap in funding their work, and others whose federal budgets have been FLAT for a decade.  This President has lost my strong support by allowing the TP to put us in this corner with his lack of hard negotiating skills.  He gave away much with budget cuts with the sequestration months ago and now we are STILL in a corner and I do not have the stomach to go through this again in mid-November if we do move on.  He and his team have also failed to really explain the pros and cons of the ACA implementation...where it costs us more and where it saves us more.  (Although I will admit I am amazed at how stupid many Americans are about this. Sanjay guupta says 2/3s of Americans admit they do not know much about the ACA.   If you have not seen Jimmy Kimmel's street segment you probably do not know what I am talking about.)

On an uplifting note the pottery below was our recognition gift from the County for being one of their "beautiful" people.  The dozen people we were nominated with were so much more "beautiful" than hubby or I and I was impressed with how carefully they made this ceremony more than a token feel-good event.  Each County Commissioner was responsible for reading the information on two or three of the people being honored.  (It did surprise me how many of these Commissioners could NOT read!)  The press from a half dozen news offices snapped away making me feel like a celebrity and they provided a nice lunch.  I met that one County Commissioner (yep, a TP dude) with his genuinely warm smile and handshake and the fact that he remembered my protest letter...showing what a good politician he is...even though his response to me had been somewhat condescending in the original email reply last year, he was super warm and friendly at this event.

The wine cork trivets in the back were made by my lovely DIL as gifts from her wedding.

Thursday Thirteen #34--Random Conflicts

Is it sort of like answering the door in your pajamas when a new reader visits your blog for the first time and the post they read is a 'Debbie downer' rant on how bad you feel?

There are women who have regular hair appointments and then there is me...who realizes it is time to get a haircut when my side combed bangs cover my eyes and I trip on a fallen branch.

For almost a decade I have hated the low or even 'regular cut' jeans because only a 20-year-old has a flat
abdomen.   Please note, the term muffin-top began at the same time fashion move the waistband on jeans. By the way, wiki says it originated in Australia and was the word of the year in 2006.

The minutes from Congress this week, "I know you are, but what am I?"

Why is it that neighbors always say, "He seemed so normal," after someone runs amok?  (No I am not writing about Ted Cruz.)

So we are now 95% sure that mankind is causing global warming...when will scientists be 100% sure.  I know,  it will only grow to 99.9%  at the most but most of us will be treading water and not notice.

October 2 was National Kale day and also the day Putin was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize...I think these are linked in some way...it is a conspiracy of some sort.

While there were poor people on the streets of Budapest when I was there I was surprised that the legislature recently passed a law to ban sleeping on the streets or must tear down the shelters they have built in the woods.  Homeless will be assigned to community service or a  fine when caught.  A fine?  Has the world gone mad?

Something I never thought I would read in a headline "revenge porn."  ?

In case you or your children do not know this...the natural color of water is NOT green or even 'greenish'.

The shortest war in history lasted only 38 minutes...the Anglo-Zanzibar War of 1896.

There is a restaurant in Pittsburgh called The Conflict Kitchen and it only serves food from nations the U.S. is at odds with.

Only 11% of jewelry stores in the U.S. have a conflict-free diamond policy.  Where do you buy your diamonds, sweetie?

Depressing News?

Feeling wet, sticky and tangled these days.

I love fall, and am not sure why my mood is not lighter and brighter.  It is not S.A.D. because I do not feel that way until winter days have lingered with their cold gray shadows for some time.  I am having trouble sleeping.  I fall asleep easily but after four hours I am wide awake and wishing I could do something around the house without waking hubby.

I find that certain people with their self-centered or non-compromising approach to life annoy me more than ever.  I find I have feelings of paranoia, where my super confidence used to reside.  I worry that my children may be tolerating me more than I know.  Thank goodness my husband has enough self-confidence for a small army and takes my arm as we plunge forward.

I hiked about 15 miles over the three days we were in the mountains with no real exhaustion, so I am determined that this is not a health issue. I move lots in the gardens.  I hike.  I walk.  I move household goods.  My diet is reasonably good since fall is harvest season, so I get lots of fresh veggies.  I have not increased consumption of sugar or alcohol...although I think I am drinking more coffee these days. 

At my age if one lets one's mind wander, it can drift down dangerous and depressing avenues.  Could this could be a mild health issue camouflaging more serious issues?  I watch the news too much and wonder if, indeed, our world and our society are coming to a sad end?  Is that the source of my angst?  As I age I realize various neurons do not fire as they should...am I slowly loosing my mind?  Why am I forgetting things that I don't really care about?  Why don't I care about stuff?

My only plan for right now is to try to stop thinking about this.  And, yes, formal exercise should begin to filter its way into my web of days...maybe starting tomorrow?

I just hate that at this time in my life I am not more stable and more 'normal'.  I thought life would be far less of an emotional roller coaster.  I sometimes feel like I am in junior high once again second guessing every decision and every conversation and wondering who I really am and what the h**l have I actually done with my life thus far?

Trying to Find Time to Watch a Season Pass

I have been waiting for down time to write in depth on at least one or two of the many thoughts that flit through my head just before I drift off to sleep.  I think of some 'great concept' or some 'interesting idea' that I could elaborate upon in my 'unread' blog, but by morning the idea has melted away like the mist in the valleys of West Virginia this time of year.  My mind is freshly empty as usual, or the idea looks like stale popcorn in the cold light of day.
 

We both felt a call of the mountains this week, and while there was much to do here to get ready for winter, we took off on a last minute trip to one of the state parks.  We lucked out on getting the last room because they were renovating (which we had not known) and everything was being torn up.  Noise and sawdust and hearty laughs of construction workers mingled with autumn colors, morning mist, evening shadows, fearless deer and wet mossy trails to hike.

It is illegal to feed the deer, this tourist is just rattling some paper!

The pool was empty of summer visitors.

The tour bus and the convention started the following day, thus we had the old fashioned bar to ourselves.  It was slated for paint and new furniture that week!

Even the sign above did not discourage us in our pursuit of peace.

This trail was marked as "more difficult."

Finding a few last cranberries.

These prior weeks before and after the cruise were busy:  we had been briefly honored by the County Commissioners (yes including the one I wrote that nasty email to a year ago about the trees) for our volunteer work, visited by my daughter's family with her three children and her two friends and their twins to feed and entertain, worked at the art museum for their Art Fest and filled other weekends by working/packing/painting at my son's house which has now SOLD!!

Today we head up to son to help him move furniture into the new house.  I have made green chile.  But the craziness is not quite read to end.  This coming week it looks like we may have visitors from Florida for a few days!

Then maybe a break in busy activities?  Really!!  We needed that mountain respite.  I might have missed fall altogether.

My New Header

This wall sun clock in my header was taken while I traveled in Germany.  I saw a number of these, some simple in design and structure and others much more elaborate with a lovely painting as a background.  If the angles are even slightly off you will never get the correct time.  The clock has to be aligned parallel to the axis of the earth's rotation.  I am not sure how this works with the changing of the seasons and dropping angle of the sun.  That is way too much math for me!  i.e. "Since the gnomon's style must be parallel to the Earth's axis, it always "points" true North and its angle with the horizontal will equal the sundial's geographical latitude; on a direct south dial, its angle with the vertical face of the dial will equal the co-latitude, or 90° minus the latitude."

Just ONE image in this formula from wikipedia.

 

 I, of course, was more fascinated that it seemed to be an incorrect time when compared with my watch and I was enjoying the beauty of the swatches and swishes.

You Know When It Is Time to Move On.

I do not know if you have ever experienced working with a group and noticed something has changed or shifted in its personality.  You cannot put your finger on it, and you ignore it or forget about it because there is so much to do and accomplish.

I have been coordinating a volunteer garden group of gardeners for almost two years.  I had been cautioned when I took over leadership that the last leader did not communicate well enough with everyone.  Thus, I focused on maintaining an accurate email and tree phone list, wrote a weekly update along with plans for the coming week, made sure that people were thanked and praised for whatever project they finished or started.  I asked for ideas, suggestions, etc. on the work ahead.  I wrote a monthly report for the museum, which the prior person had not done.  But since all the other volunteer groups write monthly reports I thought we should do so as well.

I even took over the work of purchasing plants and equipment through the museum's various accounts (which is a nightmare!), because my "co-leader" had been doing it and felt she could no longer.  I had asked this woman to be a co-leader since both she and her husband were much more involved in the museum than I and I wanted an insider to make sure we were connected to the museum and its various activities and that we had a reliable contact and I had a back-up when I was on trips and such.

This woman that I asked was a very hard worker but she was also a hard critic of others.  I ignored her criticism of others and tried to focus on what was working rather than what was not.

The group's size has grown and shrunk and grown over the months as most of these folks are elderly and find the physical work challenging and new members to the area decide to join and give it a go for a while.  We can have as many as 10 volunteers but mostly we are down to a small core of permanent loyalists. 

I have noticed in the last few weeks that some of the group are more reticent in talk and tend to work in a smaller group in areas of the grounds.  I try to ask questions of each person for input on how we were doing and for ideas on challenges.  One of the more communicative members suggested that we needed to get a fall schedule of projects formalized and she compiled a nice draft suggestion list.  I pulled this together and organized it for weekly tasks and added a few things that went with the plants and their growth habits as the cool weather began.

Then I took off on my two week trip leaving all else up to the co-leader.  When I returned I sent out an email for input on what was happening and did not get any response.  When I showed up on the day of our volunteer work , the few that were there had already started earlier.  I assisted where I could although no one explained what they had been done and what they were planting.  At the end of the work session I asked how things had gone for the past two weeks and where we were on the fall schedule and what had been completed.

My co-leader, without stopping in her walk back to the shed, said over her shoulder,  "A lot.  Just open your eyes.  Look around!"

I was a little dumbstruck as she sounded impatient or at the very least short, but I smiled and said, "Great!" but also realized that I was not going to be able to write an update for the week or the monthly report with this much 'detailed' information as she walked away. 

I also decided at that moment in time and with surprising relief, this group was ready for new leadership.  I was ready to move on to something else, many other projects, garden and non-garden, that are waiting for me and that are more in the gardening education mode rather than maintenance.  On Monday I am stopping by the volunteer coordinator's office and letting her and the Admin. Assistant of the museum know I am quitting.  I will not be able to meet with the group on our regular session as I have a bank meeting that morning, but on Monday afternoon I will email all the volunteers and let them know.  I will finish a plant inventory that needs to be done in the coming weeks.  Our group usually disbands at the end of October until spring, so this gives them plenty of time to re-group and me time to mellow out and quite second-guessing myself!

Arrrgggh!

Since today is international pirate day is seems appropriate to post about the boat/ship part of the cruise on the Danube.

In one of the earlier posts on this series of posts about my river cruise I included a photo that showed how many times this Danube river floods and how high those floods go.  Actually, when booking the cruise, we had heard that sometimes you spend more time being shuttled by bus from town to town because the river is too dry or too high for using the long boats.  It cannot be helped.  We had read that the spring floods were more of an issue, so we booked in the fall and lucked out with gorgeous weather except for the colder rain on our last day in Nuremberg.

These ships are high tech including 110 and 220 outlets, wi-fi for passengers, and a flat screen TV in every room!

Since the Danube has numerous bridges across it, ten built in the last decade, the ship has a wheel house that lowers to go under the older bridges and sometimes the top deck will be closed to passengers if the bridge is deemed too low for safety.  

 

Everything in the photo above, including that wheel house, collapses or lowers down to the level of the railing on the right side of the photo when going under a low bridge.

This cruise also goes several hundred miles through three countries and I am guessing over 40 locks...but I did not count.  Most of them are entered during the evening when we were sleeping.  It took less than 30 minutes to go through most.  Some of the locks rise or lower the ship 100 feet and there is a high wall on each side of the ship during that time.  Lock time must be reserved ahead with the lock master since dozens of passenger and cargo ships go up and down the Danube each day.  Sometimes we had to wait for a ship to go through the lock before us and sometimes it was wide enough for two ships to go through at the same time.

During our cruise there was a strike in Germany by the lock masters.  Technology has made these jobs more obsolete with the trend to have many locks being managed by one lock master via computer.  Therefore, our schedule was bumped up just a little so that we got through the regular locks before the strike.  We were bused back to one of the cities for our day tour as a result of that.

These locks can be a tight fit and yet were rarely felt a bump!  But the piloting did require miniscule movements. 


In the photo below is a boat transferring cargo.  The interesting thing about these is that they are called "family ships" because a family lives on them in the back cabin.  They eat, sleep and work there.  Usually these ships are operated 24 hours for economic reasons.  We were told that the husband does an 8-hour shift, the wife an 8-hour shift and then there is a mate that is hired who lives in the front area of the ship and he/she pulls the third shift. Children are raised on the ship until they are of school age and they are sent to a special school with the children of other families that work on cargo ships.  There is even a 'town' of 'family ships' somewhere on the river which includes a hospital ship and repair ship. etc.  It is like a little water world community.  The children usually follow in their parents footsteps when they become adults starting out as mates.

Well, that is the end of my journey and I have enjoyed reliving it through my blog posts.  Yes, I did enjoy every bit of it and had not a single complaint for the whole time!  Thanks for enduring this memory and am so happy that some of you enjoyed this series.

The Danube Dump

I was perusing my (many) photos and found that there were so many interesting things that I did not discuss here and I can briefly address in the post below.  This post is what I call a photo-dump.  (Plus...just for Mage and other boat/ship fans I have ONE MORE post after this with an interesting history on shipping in the Danube and a few bits and bytes about that.)

Hungary and Budapest itself are primary places for making movies.  I could not get closer to this very interesting architectural building (multiple styles were combined) because they were making an Italian movie.  When the wardrobe lady passed with her plastic bag of Italian shoes, I did have to stare a little.

This driver lost control of these beautiful animals just as I was about to cross in front of him.  The reins had come loose and the animals were not being told where to go.  The jangle of a harness being flung around and hooves being clomped down can be quite breathtaking and attention getting!  

Above is a picture of my shipmates taking photos of the vast vineyards in Germany.  Such wonderful wines they do have!

As most of us know, Germany is taking the lead in renewable energy.  These were HUGE!

The tiny town of Passau, maybe 50,000 people, seemed to have an unusual number of doctors!!

This was the only shop where I was yelled at for taking  a photo...ooops...too late!  Clearly the doctor above is not helping with the stress of some of the folks here.

Food, Glorious Food!

 Only one more post after this on the cruise to make sure I covered a bunch of odds and ends as I promised some readers I would do and then back to my mundane thoughts about life!  I know that my blog readers cannot wait!

Oddly enough I never took photos of the meals while I was eating on this trip.  I totally forget about my camera when food is put in front of me! Those people who take pictures of their breakfast, lunch and dinner need therapy.  Also much of our food was eaten on the boat ship so I usually did not have a camera with me, although it might have been useful in remembering the many names of my mates.  Anyway, just scroll and drool at all the other places and things to eat:

German beer garden.  FRESH PRETZELS!

Really good beer...not too heavy.

Yellow beans that look like Italian flat green beans.

Love the low calorie foods that were found everywhere!

Exotic mushrooms.

Holy paprika and I did bring some home along with Gingerbread!

Setting Sail

I went on a large Disney cruise years ago and the person who coordinated it said it would be wonderful because I would never have to worry about seeing my grandchildren.  She was absolutely correct in that I never saw the kids except at dinner and that made me rather sad.  There was manufactured fun on the ship or lots of sitting around on the ship or exercising on the ship and nothing to see but the ocean for hours.  I disliked the whole experience.  Our stateroom was small with no windows and very crowded since we also had the 'pac and play' for our youngest and tucked her in each evening.  Therefore, I will never go on a cruise with over a thousand people like that again.  Whenever we came into a port we disgorged lots of people and swarmed over stores and restaurants like nasty bees.  We got only one beach day after all the confinement!  There were lots of sticky sweet tropical alcoholic drinks, if that is your cup of tea!

This Viking river cruise was so different in that there were no waves, no manufactured fun (well a little) and the room was just a little more spacious and the groups for tours were much smaller-one bus load.  The views were always interesting as you could see the shore each and every day and most of this part of Europe is not ugly industrial.  The cruise director and all of our guides had a wealth of knowledge about the area and its history and answered our various questions completely when we saw something curious or wonderful.

One of the responders to a prior post voiced concern about how the lower level staff could be treated (mistreated) on a cruise ship.  It is my understanding from the upper level staff that Viking works very hard at keeping good working relations and decent living conditions among all staff.  I do know that the ship interrupted their schedule to stop at a small town to let off one of the lower level staff who had a family emergency, and they provided him with a train ticket to Vienna and a plane ticket home.  Yet, I am sure their living quarters were tight on board ship and I do know they worked very long hours.

We did learn that the Danube can be a ruthless river and the flood this last May left devastation to these lovely old medieval cities all along its coast.  Where our guide is holding his hand is the level of the flood waters of that most recent flood in May of this year in the city of Regensburg, Germany.  All the other dates and marks written on the wall are other floods in this town dating back to the 1500's.  The people do not have flood insurance to cover losses and the government no longer allows them to live on the ground floor.  They may use it only for business.

Perhaps that is why this tattoo parlor on the ground floor is so sparsely furnished?

Most of the architecture away from the river is not as old as it looks.  Many parts of the various cities were rebuilt or restored after fires and wars and are not original...but you would be hard pressed to recognize that restoration except for their clean condition.  They paid great attention to detail creating buildings that looked like the original.  They are proud of their heritage and proud of their link to the past and their part in the history of the world.  But I did get the impression that the Germans were most happy to pause only shortly at WWII sites for tours and quickly move on to the wonderful medieval history that reflects their history so much more fully.  They know that those of us from the new world are most fascinated by this much older history and most depressed by the most recent World War.

There was a small mix-up in the call for the tour guide and this lovely woman in black had left mass (it was Sunday) to come guide us through her hometown of Regensburg.  She appeared to be late until her son, the young man in the photo below this, appeared and said that he had been scheduled for the tour which resulted in the mix up in names.  Honestly ladies, which guide would you rather have??

Just as an aside, our guide's lederhosen belonged to his grandfather and he had just inherited them from him as a gift and was most happy as they were far more comfortable than his newer ones.  He explained that it might take years to break in lederhosen to a comfortable wearing level. His shoes are a traditional Bavarian half shoe.  Isn't he scrumptious even right down to his shoes?