Cancel Those Vacation Plans as the Ship is Sinking--A Thursday 13

My universe is cracking!

This is my Thursday Thirteen, which I have not done in a long time, and which, unfortunately instead of a thankfulness list, is reduced to a reality to do list!  (As a background, before you read ahead, this house was completed in 2006 so she does not yet have that patina of charming old age.)

1. Front door knob not turning easily and slipping on the catch and door can swing open--I am sure that is how that mouse got in!
2. Large burner on range not auto-lighting - using a match
3. Deck steps to back yard are sinking to one side or I am having too much wine
4. West wall on garage is cracked near door - probably sinking
5. A few inches of taping on front room ceiling (two stories up above my head) coming loose due to a nasty storm years ago
6. Taping in guest bedroom ceiling coming loose now
7. Gate not hooked up to electricity, waiting on budget ease to hire electrician as we have given up on the solar panel option
8. Some smoke alarms need to be replaced in basement and top floor but cannot find plug-ins that match
9. Wine cooler not working (Yes, I see the small violin you are playing.)
10. Water pump has low pressure--called for repair yesterday.  Repairman came and fixed it in an hour.  We were told it could have cost $1900, but our repair was only $100.  (Thankfulness #1)
11. Gutters need cleaning badly and I will not let hubby up on the ladder and it is not in the budget for right now
12. Window in right guest bedroom does not close easily--so I no longer open it!
13. Driveway pavement needs cracks filled AGAIN!

Next Thursday Thirteen will be a thankfulness theme...I promise!(Thankfulness #2  ease on the future budget is that most of the spring vacation has been pre-paid.)

Post Script. Regarding Blogger stats:  My  most visited post (2394 visits) was this Thursday Thirteen back in September 2012... in case you are curious.

The Time for Savory

Each weathercast directed our way indicates that a cold freeze is coming.  Each night the temps drop into the low 30sF and each morning things look chilled, but there is no 'frost on the pumpkin' yet.  Of course the only pumpkin that I have is inside on the table.  I purchased the one below because it has such lovely colors and textures.

But we know that Jack is coming and soon behind him his colder friend Hard.   Thus we headed outside with harvest baskets in hand to do some last minute collection in the garden.

The dramatic swings in temperature are causing these zavory peppers to crack.  They are not hot but have just bite of heat.  They also have a bit of fruity essence when dried and smoked and used in soups, on salads, and in marinades.

We have a small smoker that is very old but loyal.   Outside on the back patio is the sweet smell of wood smoke.

I spent a couple of hours yesterday afternoon pealing these cloves of garlic.  I washed them, steamed them in the microwave for a little over a minute to make them easier to peal.  Then they go into jars of olive oil and into the fridge and the rest of the ivory orbs go into ziplocks with a bit of olive oil and into the freezer.  We are sometimes to humid to let them hang dried all winter, but I do have a half dozen left for fresh cooking.

When all  is done I take some time to practice a bit of photography still life.   Yes, this is quick setup and should have had a nicer background and base, but the sun's lighting through the window caught my eye and that sun moves fast.  Those tiny limes were immature kaffir limes I had to harvest before a bit of pruning to bring the tree inside for winter.

Soon it is dinner time and this snapper filet will be baked in a savory garlic, curry, basil, smoked zavory pepper flakes sauce with fresh cloves of garlic and bits of kaffir lime.  Very savory!

Bloggers Are Like Coat Hangers

Maybe now is the time to take a walk to the post office and see if there is any snail mail that is worthy of my time.

I have 147 blogs listed on my blog role.  Many of them have been abandoned by their authors but they have not been removed from Blogger so I can sometimes go back and see what they used to write.  I sometimes wonder if the Library of Congress will archive some of these like they do the letters of pioneers and soldiers.  In other cases the authors have passed on for some of these idle blogs and they are, perhaps, blogging to his/her heart's content in some other part of the vast universe.  Their blog remains as a memorial and an example of how brave we can be when we fight that last great battle.

I add some new blogs every once in a while to my blog roll.  I do not go trolling for new blogs to read---who has the time?  But something catches my eye on a comment they have made to a blogger I read and thus I go read a few of their entries and then add them to my list because I find I am interested in what they have to say or the way they say it.  (I must admit that I have been thinking of trolling for Irish blogs as no Irish bloggers are on my list.  Smile.)

But what this could mean is I can lose my life (such as an old lady's life is) to reading blogs and living others' lives with too many demanding my attention and then I end up reading each of my well-known bloggers only intermittently.   I started thinking about this because a nice Blogger pinned one of my photos to Pinterest, which I have never used, but I was certainly flattered since he gave credit!  We grow whether we expect it or not.  How many lurkers read your blog but never comment?

Do any of you think about this?  Does Blogging add balance to your time or do you find it sometimes takes up too much of your time?  How many folks on your blog list?  How many do you "follow."  How often?

Soldier's Poem

Lessons 

Do away with medals
Poppies and remembrance parades
Those boys were brave, we know
But look where it got them
Reduced to line after perfect line
Of white stones
Immobile, but glorious, exciting
To kids who haven’t yet learned
That bullets don’t make little red holes
They rip and smash and gouge
And drag the world’s dirt behind them
Remember lads, you won’t get laid
No matter how good your war stories
If you’re dead
So melt down the medals
Fuel the fire with paper poppies, war books and Arnie films
Stop playing the pipes, stop banging the drums
And stop writing fucking poems about it.

Poem written by Danny Martin.

"I am an ex soldier currently in the third year of an English and Creative Writing degree course in Liverpool. I was in the army for just under seven years, leaving in early 2006. I completed two tours of Iraq, totalling one year over there. Most of my poems are based around my experiences during my second tour (TELIC 6 in 2005), when I was serving as team signaller on a Tactical Air Control Party, mainly based around Maysaan province."

Flirting

Yesterday when I was home, with the afternoons becoming shorter and the air turning cooler as soon as the sun's angle begins to drop lower on the horizon, I retreated to my sitting room and went through emails and paid bills, later to read some story that takes place in a warmer climate while trying to not think about winter's gray finger pulling constantly at the sun.  But the river does not let me sit forever.  Soon she winks at me through the windows.  She giggles when the sunshine tickles her back and I have to put down my laptop and head outside with my camera.  This is a good thing, because I would have missed this if I ignored the flirtation.   The dance of river and light is just too seductive.  (Yes, this belongs on my other blog but there is a canoe trip going on there.)

So I put on my outdoor shoes and close off my email and go outside to smile for a while.

The sunlight bounces right off the top of the river into my eyes with fire.  It bathes the pomegranate, now as high at the second story bedroom window and devoid of its red fruit, into the most stunning "lime" light.  In the distance with trees throwing off leaves I can see my neighbors house once again.

Then what should happen but this morning while hubby left early to test his guns at the neighbors field, I was called again to my back yard to see what gifts Mother Earth left me to cheer me up against the shorter days.

These leaves are the exact color they were hanging above my head.  No hue or saturation adjustment as Mother Nature has an excellent palette.  Is is not a wonder that winter comes as such a shock to the soul?

The Party is Over

I think everyone is relieved that the contest is over whether their candidate won or lost, because it means no more negative ads to fast forward on the DVR and no more email boxes and snail mail boxes stuffed with junk and endless requests for money.  Our Congress has an approval rating of 12.7%.  Now the work lies in the hands of those elected and re-elected.  So, if like me, you want a break go here for an outdoor respite.

There Were Two Paths

Well, I am resigned to taking this country in a new direction today.  Yes, my liberal candidates lost...some of them so weak I am not surprised.  I can only hope that moderate conservatives exist to fight against radical tea party guardians who want to pretty much abolish this government and turn it over to the rich to run as their own little tea party.  The winners are now claiming they will go forward and get stuff done.  This has been touted as a 'sweeping' victory but I see us very much as a divided country with no strong majority on either side.  I do not think we are going to get big things done for the next two years.   I am an elder and it will not affect me much one way or the other.  I have economic security and thus will not have to suffer.  It is up to the young to decide if the poor are a lazy drain on society, working poor have no initiative or right to a voice, immigrants cannot make a contribution, we no longer have racial or gender biases, a profit motive is better for prisons and schools, health care is not a right, and science is a fraud.

Washing the Brain and Coming Clean With You

I had promised in my last post to talk about my addictions. First you need to accept that all addictions are by definition compulsions you cannot control based on the rewards that your brain receives from them. But, with the exception of drugs and certain weaknesses in personalities, there are varied degrees of addiction and sometimes the addiction is strong on one day and weak on another.  I will not dwell on to what extent all addictions can be bad.

Years ago, when I was young and surrounded by diapers and baby food and bills and long days at home, I started watching a few soap operas on television during baby nap times. As I look back I realize it was truly escapism because my life was boring and the over-the-top adventures of Audrey and Mike and Dr. Whats-his-name with their perfect hair and breasts and shoulders kept me distracted just long enough to be willing to face dinner.  Eventually soap operas seemed repetitive, and predictable, and boring, and as my life was no longer tied to the house, I said goodbye to Barbie and Ken and their trials and tribulations.

Recently as my life has now slowed and I spend more time in my house once again, my entertainment addiction has become British mysteries. I love trying to solve them alongside the expert and befuddled detective, or in other cases the unofficial detectives Miss Marple or Hercule Poirot. If I watched an episode three years ago I may re-watch it because I have forgotten most of the details and the brain reward is the same. Hubby is most generous in sitting through these with me but usually he cannot understand half of what they say with their chin wags over a half-pint at the local "Swan and Blind Beggar" pub.

About two years ago I began to fold laundry, plan dinners, prepare food or pay bills in front the TV in the late afternoons and I returned to my former addiction.  Low and behold I came across a soap opera, one of those that fed my elder brain nicely. If you research the title of the show a description reads "An English Priest is transferred to a small Irish village." The show is called "Ballykissangel" which is the fictional name of the village in the show, and it is, of course, in Ireland. In the first episodes a very young and naive priest struggles with an overbearing Parish priest and a bunch of quirky parishioners. Eventually sexual tension between the priest and the pub owner surfaces, and while a soap opera trick, it really is done nicely and without lots of prurient plot scenes. (My opinions about Celibacy among the people of the cloth is a whole other post!) This soap opera moves beyond this priest as new priests arrive to replace him and the yearly episodes involved each of the quirky characters in amusing and sad adventures and I loved each and every odd villager, and the Irish culture and scenery was so addictive.

Yes, I will FINALLY get to the reason for this post, and it is not to show that I know how to waste time watching TV AND do work OR write wordy posts about nothing.  The real name of the Irish village where this soap opera was filmed was Avoca in Ireland. One of the reasons, and probably the primary reason, I selected Hunters Hotel for our first night, was because it was about 10 miles from the small town of Avoca! This is what addictions do...enforce you to make arbitrary and illogical decisions for that brain reward.

I dragged everyone traveling with me to that little village as a bypass on our way to a national park. I immediately found the famous pub, and just up the hill the Catholic church and crossed the bridge where many a plot point had been revealed. We pulled into the nearby parking lot and I spent about two minutes taking quick pictures and giggling. No one with me understood a wit about my school girl reaction, except for my DIL who had visited the house in the movie "Goonies" just a few months ago and posted her giggling self in front of that same house.  My intellectual mind knows that this is 'scenery'...a 'location shoot' because I was a drama minor in college.  I understand the smoke and mirrors part very well.  I also know that the little town made money for some time on this series.  I am guessing the actual name of the village in the TV show is copyrighted and that is why the name of this gift shop in the photo below is a little odd.

And, of course there was that magnificent and powerful and important character that had no lines in the series...the church.

But I also understand the magic of a storyline and how it captures you and compels you and makes you reminisce and puts you there in the lives of the characters.  And when it all comes together at the right time, it is magnificent.

Now aren't you glad you followed me all the way to the end? ( It is too bad for those others that stopped reading and went to get the mail.)  Do I not seem more human?  No? OK.  Go ahead and see if the re-runs of this show are in your TV schedule on PBS or BBC .  I won't tell anyone.  Try to start from the beginning or you will not get the full soap opera effect or addiction.

The Silliness of Life and Getting to Know the Locals

As I wrote earlier, about our recent trip to Ireland, our fellow travelers made most of the reservations and selected most of the places we would visit.  We had no problem with this, even though we had never visited the Emerald Isle, because we have been blessed with tons of travel and lots of adventures in our life, and this was a rare trip for them.

You may remember that hubby had a fall from a ladder a few weeks prior to this trip, and with his compromised neck issues, I was a bit concerned about how he would feel after such a long flight.  Therefore, we went a day earlier than everyone else and checked into a country retreat just outside Dublin to get used to driving on the "wrong" side of the roads and the difference in an earlier time zone.  I must admit that I did not spend hours searching for a perfect and inexpensive place to stay.  It was for only one night, and our friends had already reserved all reasonable places for the rest of the trip, etc.  I found a place with an afternoon tea garden and a kitchen garden and a long history for 130 Euro for the one night breakfast included which translates to about 162.00 dollars in the US.  Some would say it was too much, but I found it acceptable. It was in Wicklow County which is a beautiful area and I wish we had had more time to explore more than just a few hours in this area where a number of well-known movies have been made because of its beauty.

I came across a website for this Hunter's Hotel in Wicklow County  which is about 20 minutes outside of Dublin.  The photos were very inviting, of course.  Built originally in 1650 as a forge, it was then converted to an Inn that had been owned by a wealthy family in the 18th Century and had a long and colorful history of owners following that.  Now Europeans might read through this and think cold, damp, dark and old.  I thought 'romantic escape.'  I thought 'nostalgic dream.'  Mel Gibson and Daniel Day Lewis have stayed at this hotel!  It sits out in the middle of nowhere and we almost could not find it on our tracker.  Signs in rural areas can be hidden in Ireland.

The hotel was mostly what I had expected in a creaky old way and the furniture definitely showed a history.   It was a bit of a hodge podge in decor, and when I showed my travel photos, my daughter said it looked like staying a Great Old Aunt Somebody's place.  She has no sense of history or atmosphere.  I felt right at home!  We had a glass of wine in the beautiful garden out back while waiting for our room to be ready.

At dinner that evening I observed at the nearby table two rather healthy-looking women in their mid-fifties that could have been Lesbian hikers in a Hercule Poirot story discuss plant species and birds that they had seen in a sharp and efficient conversation over their meal.  They did not mention that they had come across a body in the woods, though.  Later I sat in the lounge just across from an elderly British couple after our evening white tablecloth gourmet dinner and closed my eyes and entered an Agatha Christie mystery as I eves dropped on their gentle conversation about people they knew and gossip they shared as only elderly Brits can carry off.

After a wonderful breakfast the next day I walked in the kitchen garden and met a lovely bubbly Irish lady about 55 who was an artist and explained that she was known for her paintings of naked men.  She was a plump lady wearing a lovely silky flowered dress with a small fancy hat perched on her blonde head.  As the small talk progressed she was very willing to share her recent divorce issues after a long time marriage, her husband's awfulness in the process, and the new art studio and business which she had expanded with her two sons.  She also indicated how she could certainly be willing to paint my husband as he was a good body shape!  Her grandchild had been Baptized that very morning and that is why the family was all there to all have a late breakfast together.

When our other group of travelers arrived in Dublin and joined us later to head further south they asked if the hotel could fix a late breakfast for the four of them.  The hotel kitchen which is only open very specific hours was most generous in accommodating them with both a hot and cold breakfast.  Later they toured the gardens while we checked out and they met a landscape expert whose house was being fumigated while he stayed at the hotel.  They were able to get lots of information on all the exotic plants we might see and also some good places to visit on the island and how to avoid a few tourist traps.  All in all the casual elegance of this place was a perfect place to start our Ireland adventure.

My next post ... a soap opera addiction.

Questions

So I have been asking myself that deep philosophical question posed to me by some of my readers in respondes to the prior post.  Why did I not react as they would have?  What was holding me back?  Was I afraid to admit my mistake?  Am I the type of person that plows onward even if the plow is now turning soil in another field?  Was there some issue I saw in their approach that would be more negative than positive?  Had I some insight that they were not able to understand?  Was this a political issue?  I thought long and hard on this.  And the only reason, which did not come to the forefront of my mind at the time, but was probably deep in my subconscious lobe, was frugality.  Who would wash away down the drain so much sugar?  Cups and cups of that expensive and important ingredient?

Maybe I am overthinking this...but who knows.

The New Recipe for CRABapple Pie??

50 apples for $14.00?  That sounds like a deal.  Mix and match even?  I could choose as many as I wanted from the Virginia gold bin, the Winesap bin, the golden delicious bin, the Stayman bin, the Roma bin, the York apples bin and the granny smith bin.  There may have been a few more bins, but I had already filled my half bushel paper sack and was studying the shiny reds, peach blushes and yellows with anticipation as I carried them to the wooden counter just beside a small barn.

Since I grew up in a family where money was scarce, bargains on foods tend to catch my eye and the fall abundance of apples always calls to me.  We drive three hours West in a hybrid car and find a local orchard and then buy apples.  Some we eat before we get home and all the others I process and freeze for desserts.  We also were invited to walk the orchards up the steep hill, which after sitting for hours in a car, and with camera in hand, was the best offer I had been given all day.  Almost all of the apples had been picked from the trees, but there was still beauty to capture as the afternoon sun fell across the hillside.

Now, back to processing apples---but with a twist!  Stick with me here.  While the texture of a frozen apple is not as crisp once frozen, that fall apple flavor does remain.  We core them with an apple corer, peal them and then slice them into equal sizes keeping the species types apart just for our own preferences.  We immediately put them into a bowl of water and lemon juice to keep them from browning.  Our sweetest and crispest were the Winesaps and they seemed to brown the fastest as well, no matter how snappy we worked...chop chop.

When the particular  apple batch is are all done, I take out the slices from the huge bowl and let them drain in my hands before dumping a full pie serving amount into a freezer Ziplok bag labeled by apple type and date.  I add a pre -mixed mixture of cinnamon/nutmeg/allspice to taste, about half a cup of sugar or 1/4 brown and 1/4 white sugar together, and a little salt and a teaspoon or more of cornstarch depending on their juiciness.  I toss the slices a few times to coat them with the bag sealed.  Then, squeezing all the air out of the bags, I pop them into the freezer for winter desserts.

With 50 apples hubby and I got an assembly line going.  We were moving like a Japanese train on schedule, but my one glitch was that I had just cleaned out my pantry closet a few days before.  Shelves washed, items moved and reorganized, some items taken to the basement, others to give away.  A photo below showing a part of the closet and clearly illustrating how neat and organized it was!  All the bins were labeled!  The spices in pseudo-alphabetical order.  But a bit of a mistake because ... well, perhaps you can see in the second photo.

Yes, I used the jar on the right side.  I did not read the labels!!  Into the first 5 batches of pie filling went Old Bay crab spice! (Something those of us who steam crabs use tons of in the summer.)  Once I discovered my mistake by licking a finger I changed jars and into the last 6 batches went the cinnamon that I was supposed to add.  We labeled those freezer bags that had Old Bay spice because I am too cheap to throw this food out and figured I may find some way to use that mistake. (Maybe stuff apples into chicken or use with a pork roast?)

We decided to make a pie that very afternoon with the mistake spices (Old Bay) package...and much to our surprise, while it was not super good without the cinnamon, it was really quite delicious and just a tiny bit unusual.  But we each ate our entire piece of pie and we will certainly finish the rest of the pie!  In the future I will add the pie spices to those batches and perhaps another bit of fruit or nuts and top with butter bits.

Hubby just dumped the slices into a pre-made pie shell with some disdain after draining the juices which he felt might be too salty and then he watched it bake not anticipating an edible snack.  But we were both pleasantly surprised.

So I posted on FB that I am going to call this my "Crab Apple Pie."

Back to the City

Seems I am in a bit of rut, as I headed back to the city on Sunday.  Usually my husband does the driving and I help with the technological wizards that talk us through the street turns.  This time I made the decision to drive in on my own.  This was a really big decision for me as I am terrified to try to find a place on my own in the city...TERRIFIED.  Some folks get anxiety on meeting new people, others find it anxiety producing to throw a dinner party, and of course giving a speech usually ranks right up there in heart-pounding efforts, and even others are anxious to reach the top of a cliff and look back down.   All of these things are thrilling to me, but not terrifying.

None terrify me as much as trying to find an address in an unfamiliar part of town and then finding parking in the crowded areas of a city and all with a time deadline!  I had been invited to a class by a 30-something new friend I have made and I just knew at my age hanging out with 30-somethings is essential to good health!  This gal admires me for some unknown reason.  She is smart as a whip, independent as an albatross, and doing interesting things in her own life right now.

So, throwing caution to the wind (or whatever trite expression you want to insert here), I dropped hubby off at the son's house, plugged in my destination, and headed deep into the bowels of the city.  The mapquest folks wanted to take me straight through the heart of the city to the other side, but with a major marathon taking place as well a numerous streets under construction, I was smart enough to program a bypass way.

I allowed myself about 20 minutes extra time, and I still arrived 5 minutes late!  Every parallel parking space left on the side streets was 4 inches too short for my compact car.  I finally found a space just in front of the bus stop and three blocks away, but not blocking any city buses.  I backed in and locked the car rushing off all the while praying I had not misread the signs and would not be towed!

When I had gone online I saw that the meeting was in one of those tall brick apartment buildings on a tree shaded street.  I had written my gal friend about an apartment number, but she said she did not have one, so I assumed we would meet out front, in the side yard or the lobby.   I got to the building exactly 3 minutes late, opened the door and found I could not move beyond the little entry room and was faced by the dial-in directory.  It has been years since I have used directories in apartment buildings but I figured out how to scroll through the two dozen names and nothing seemed familiar.  I paused.  I did not have my gal friend's phone number...just her email.  I dialed into the email on my phone and just 15 minutes earlier I saw she had emailed the name of the person giving the class and the apartment number.  With a little old-age dyslexia I finally got buzzed in and headed up two flights of stairs.  Reading small print on apartment directories and going up two flights of stairs...challenges that rarely give the 30-ish crowd pause...already had me a little out of breath.

As I entered the cute little apartment, I saw the other young ladies had already started on their  mimosas and brief introductions were made.  I found it easy to fit in and soon the class was started.  It was nothing super-special...something I could easily have picked up in a book on my own or watching a YouTube video...but my learning experience this day was far more important than this class, and perhaps, not something these single gals would not understand at this time in their lives?

Oh, this is what I took home at the end of class...yes it got knocked around a little in the car...but so did I!

So what thing gives you more than pause...what gives you a terrifying bit of time?

Taking a Pulse

I was in the "city" a few days ago.  I was actually in an outside town of the city, but the power and the pressure of the city are so great that it leaks over into the air and smells and sounds and activities.  You have heard about the pulse of a city?  It is exactly that.  Like a heart rhythmically racing in a march to the end of the day.  I had forgotten this undercurrent.  There was a meeting...a series of meetings... and thus the day began early in the first muggy light with the heaviness of gray endless rain, the irregular pumping of brake lights, the tick, tick, tick of a turn signal at the intersection, the spray as cars fled by.  I had forgotten it all, but it was just like riding a bicycle.  It comes back with a somber vengeance.  Mothers rushing children under umbrellas, men avoiding puddles in shiny shoes, well dressed women never looking down, young men with an aimless morning to fill as they hung out at the local coffee shop.

I must admit that it was not all dismay.  There was the excitement of an energy I had forgotten.  The throbbing of a pulse that told you there was life, the stimulus of people with places to be and things to do, things that might even affect your life.

I had returned to an area I lived in about a decade ago and the changes were amazing in places and the lack of change was both dismaying and reassuring in other places.  There is lots of creativity in cities.  Creativity in products and in ideas.  People with hope meet in cities.  People planning big jobs live in cities.  I had been living in the edies of the world and thus had to make sure my paddle was well into the water as the currents shoved me here and there.

But at the end of the day I was glad to return to my woods, to my place of restorative pauses, slow thought and more realistic hope. I guess mankind needs both, and a balance of both places is best.

Challenges

A little perspective.  I do not normally walk 7 or more miles.  Hubby and I do walk about 3 to 4 miles when we take a hike in our local parks and woods during the warmer weather.  I do run between 3 and 4 miles on the elliptical in my basement about 5 or 6 times each month.  So, the 7 miles, while strenuous, was not a super challenge.  We started about 11:30 in the morning and got back to our cars about 4:30 P.M. stopping frequently for photography and once for lunch.  You can do this.  Perhaps not on a tree root covered path, but on a sidewalk around your town.  I think you would be surprised.  Even if you have serious health issues, just walking a little ways is good for you.  Just add a quarter or half mile each time and breathe sweetly the good air.

Those First Steps

The best advice I got from my readers to improve my health was to walk.  It requires no special equipment and can be done almost anytime and anywhere.  I just read a recent study that revealed that the best way to lengthen our telomeres which lie at the ends of our chromosomes and keep us from aging was walking and standing...even better than actual exercise!

So two days ago I took a 7 and a half mile walk in the woods around a nearby artificial lake.  Yesterday I spent several hours wearing a weight vest as I cleaned house, vacuuming and mopping all the floors.

If you want to enjoy with me the beautiful walk I took,  go here.

A Bite of Reality.

Since the Ebola epidemic is on almost everyone's mind these days, I think it is time for me to do a health post.  I just wanted to update a few of you who know that I have been struggling with some small health concerns prior to my trip to Ireland and after my return.  I will not do this again as I hate writing about my health!  What a bore!

Anyway, there was a time just last year when I could brag/blog that I was under no prescription medications.  I was shooting toward 70 and still in reasonably good health.  Then this year I changed doctors and after a whole battery of new tests and a couple of lingering illnesses and resulting doctor's visits I have been informed that I have osteoporosis and must take a prescription for that along with calcium and vitamin D supplements in goodly number.

Also, since my lungs decided to turn themselves inside out this summer and I had a chronic cough for no discernible reason,  I was given an an x-ray just before my trip.  I was also given heavy duty cough medicine.  The X-ray showed several things: that I "probably have underlying mild COPD," I certainly have a mild scoliosis and definitely have some bone degeneration in the scapula.  This diagnosis and a collection of prescriptions to loosen phlegm in my lungs and reduce coughing at night made me pull up for a time. 

Then 4 days upon my return I got a sore throat which went into an upper respiratory virus and I was back to coughing once again.  Upon my return I was given something even stronger and the result was that I lacked energy for a while and the contrast from my high energy activities while in Ireland gave me pause about all this drugging.  Last week I still was weak from my flu that I probably caught in the Dublin airport or on the plane and added to  all of the above I added a mild depression to my disposition.  The depression seemed to me to be both psychological and chemical!  Researching COPD was not helpful.

As I weaned myself off the medicines for the lung infection I got my energy back and my creative urges have now returned along with a better disposition.  I am almost back to normal.  I am lifting hand weights again trying to strengthen back muscles for my lungs.  I am sleeping much, much better as well. I have far less health issues than many of my loved ones, so no complaining here.

But, reality bites, doesn't it?

Broken

I was thinking about the comments that I got from my last post about the young man in the grocery store.  I guess I did give the impression that I looked down my nose at grocery clerks.  I do not, although it is not a job I would want to have.  I respect anyone who can stand on their feet all day and deliver a presence in their work and still have the energy to be pleasant and make small talk.  I also realize that it was my shortsightedness that indicated he would have no future in this career path.

My own view on savings, though, comes from my history.   I had to save money all of my life, even when I was a kid.  Money was set aside for holiday gifts long before stuff for myself.  As I got older, a certain percentage was set aside for college expenses.  Maybe I felt free of money pressures when I was under ten, but never after that.  I grew up in a family where saving money was as important as praying is in other families.  Save for life improvement, save for a rainy day and if there was some left over save for something fun.

I never went on vacations (except for camping or visiting relatives) until much, much, later in my life.   As a young woman clothes were purchased when necessary and repaired as needed.  Fashion was considered a way to lose money easily.   We grew much of our own food.  I sewed most of my clothes and those of my children...all as a means of saving money.  I am now in a very different economic group ( I think, due in part, to being frugal in my youth), and feeling thankful if sometimes a little embarrassed for that.

I have a republican nephew who feels strongly that poor people are poor because they are lazy and stupid and that liberals are short-sighted in wanting to raise the minimum wage to reward these low-class people who have demonstrated a lack of effort in furthering themselves.  He thinks that hamburger flippers are stupid for taking such a low paying job in the first place.  He feels you make your own breaks.  To a small extent he is right.  But to a large extent chaos reigns in peoples lives and many people get broken through no fault of their own.

But for a liberal such as I, when in front of such a cavalier young earner as my grocery clerk in this day and age, I almost think a little more like a republican.

Priorities

Waiting in line at the grocery store, I am once again at the register of that young man not much older than 20.  He is easygoing and carefree, reflected in his chubby size and casual smile.  I wonder how someone his age can be happy working as a register clerk checking people through with coupons, asking if they want their chicken in plastic, counting the bags they have brought, and then making small talk before reading their gas points to them from the receipt.  Maybe it is because I am not a fan of small talk.  I can play the game with the best of them and I can cheer anyone up at this game or ignore them if I have to.  But he has to do it for a living.

Since he has been working at the store for a couple of years I have been able to draw him out in the small talk game we play as he slides my grapes across the scale.  I have learned that he loves fantasy games, Comic Con, science fiction novels and Halloween.  He is already way too set in his ways for someone so young.  He already knows it all, and is the first to reach any conclusion that satisfies his view of the world.

This week he was talking to a heavy set customer with feathery blonde hair and a smoker's wheeze in her voice as she finished paying for her groceries.  They were discussing how expensive food had become, how the minimum wage was too low and other familiar subjects about making ends meet.   He handed her the receipt and then turned to me as she left and said he really was not too worried about raising the minimum wage because he already made over ten dollars an hour and he was also due for a promotion and even more money.  (Check Out Clerk Level II?)

I felt a small dark cloud move in behind me.

"I hope you are saving something,"  I said trying to catch his eye as his hands moved my yogurt containers across the scanner.

He looked up with his self-same grin and said that he most certainly was saving.  He said that he had $400 already set aside. 

"I have been saving for some time.  I am waiting for a certain flat screen TV to go on sale and then I want to add an X-box to the system."

I kept my smile as tight as a Marilyn Monroe sweater and tried not to sigh too audibly.  That was not the saving I was thinking about.   I was thinking about saving for tomorrow, that tomorrow which for his age never comes.  I thanked him and collected my groceries, knowing his world view right now was very different from mine and that this generation is never going to get old.

Faces of Ireland

It seems that everywhere I travel I find a song of life that grabs me and worms its way deep into my heart.  It adds one more thread to that tapestry that is mankind and is also another puzzle part of me.   I felt that song with the brave energy of warrior songs in Hungary last year and I felt it again in the lyrical beauty of this Ireland where human bravery took on a heartbreaking honesty and gentle love.

Here are a few faces of that magical Ireland.

An artisan cutting crystal at Waterford factory.

Good looking, full of jokes and stories, following a family tradition with his own carts and horses and becoming the perfect romantic horseman for our carriage ride.

A busker outside the National Library who stopped to talk to me and told me he was working on a Masters in Literature and Language.

Originally from Brooklyn and transplanted here with his Irish wife to enjoy a better life.  Full of the gift of gab and flirted with my DIL.  Told us he still dragged his wife out on weekends to look at "stones."

Our teacher and guide in the church bell tower.  Tight as a whip and probably too devout but patient with our messy efforts to attempt to ring those historic bells.

Our very first guide and our first red-head to remind us that Vikings had been here.

A busker on the mall, unique in face.

More evidence that Vikings has been here.

Such abundant red hair!

OMG!!  Hoping these guys are wearing wigs!

My last post on this trip, and I thank you for keeping the tea warm.