I hate chipmunks. I know that sounds horrible especially because they are considered to be the Justin Bieber of the varmint family--namely cute--but in my corner of the world, they are just like mice. For some reason this season, we have a proliferation of chipmunks, scampering around the yard, jumping into gutter downspouts, hiding in car engines, and setting up house in my garage. And just yesterday, one actually had the cheek to break into my house.
Well, it's not really "breaking in" when someone leaves the door open. Which I did. My husband had pulled out of the driveway for his morning trek to work and I had left the door to the house open. Much to my surprise, a chipmunk raced into the house right in front of me as I walked back in. I screamed, of course. And then I chased him into the back bathroom and shut the door. Tight.
Then like any good wife with the whim whams, I called my husband, who promptly turned the car around and headed back home to save me. Not one for killing animals, he instructed me to arm myself with a broom. He carefully opened the bathroom and chased the furry burglar out. The rodent raced down the hall right toward me. Screaming to beat the band, with one brave swoop, I swept him out of the open door with such gusto, he flew across the garage right into the driveway.
I kissed my hero and off he went to work to bring home the bacon. As for Alvin and his cohorts, I live to face them another day. And you can rest assured, next time, I will be prepared.
Check out my Erie Times-News blog.
Friday, May 27, 2011
Monday, May 23, 2011
I'm still standing...
But looking through the obits yesterday, I realize quite a bunch of people were summoned upwards on Rapture Day. But it could quite possibly be that their numbers were up prior to the prophecy anyway. It may have already been in the cards.
When 6 p.m. came and went on Saturday, I didn't notice anything different, except that Shackleford won the Preakness about a half hour later. Yes, he was the long shot. But beyond that, nothing visible. There was no shaking, no ominous sky, no voice from above, no floating souls or ethereal music. I have to admit, I was disappointed. I figured there would be some pageantry, even if the event-to-end-all-events didn't quite fully manifest.
I was raised in a religion where certain pivotal events came along with faith-enhancing visuals: back-lit angel visitations, deafening floods, blackened skies with streams of heavenly light. No one spared the horses. And I like that in a religion. It adds some Hollywood, a la Cecil B. DeMille, if you will. Who wants to die without some special effects? There has to at least be a light. You know, the big glowing light we're all supposed to walk toward. I just don't know what I will do if there isn't a light. Talk about a let down.
Well, we will never know if those who did happen to pass away on May 21, or any other day for that matter, were transported in red carpet style or not. Guess we'll just have to wait until it's our turn.
Check out my Erie Times-News blog.
When 6 p.m. came and went on Saturday, I didn't notice anything different, except that Shackleford won the Preakness about a half hour later. Yes, he was the long shot. But beyond that, nothing visible. There was no shaking, no ominous sky, no voice from above, no floating souls or ethereal music. I have to admit, I was disappointed. I figured there would be some pageantry, even if the event-to-end-all-events didn't quite fully manifest.
I was raised in a religion where certain pivotal events came along with faith-enhancing visuals: back-lit angel visitations, deafening floods, blackened skies with streams of heavenly light. No one spared the horses. And I like that in a religion. It adds some Hollywood, a la Cecil B. DeMille, if you will. Who wants to die without some special effects? There has to at least be a light. You know, the big glowing light we're all supposed to walk toward. I just don't know what I will do if there isn't a light. Talk about a let down.
Well, we will never know if those who did happen to pass away on May 21, or any other day for that matter, were transported in red carpet style or not. Guess we'll just have to wait until it's our turn.
Check out my Erie Times-News blog.
Friday, May 20, 2011
Where will you be when rapture strikes?
I never thought I would spend my last hours in State College, Pennsylvania, home of Penn State University. I never even knew State College existed when I was a kid. And now, it would appear, it will be the last thing I see when God calls me home on Rapture Day.
And why wouldn't he? I have done nothing wrong, not in the eyes of the law anyway. Sure there have been some missteps along the way, a couple of stupid knee-jerk decisions, a bunch of tiny sins that don't amount to a hill of beans. My life as it has progressed hasn't been saintly, but it hasn't been satanly either. Why not me?
I wonder if I should be doing more to state my case. You know, market myself during these waning hours before the souls start drifting up to heaven. Make a pitch for myself, write a jingle, pray like a cloistered nun, or something. Not that I want to leave right not...I have a lot of unfinished business here. But according to the prophecy, what will be left here won't be so much fun. And I can't even handle this cold spring, much less global pestilence, famine and natural disasters. Plus, I have always wanted to float up into the sky, like a character in a Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel. An ethereal, transparent being fueled by light and superstition.
But like everyone else, I will have to wait to see if I get called up. It will be easy to tell--just check this blog on Monday. I'll post an entry no matter where I am---I do, after all, have a smart phone.
And why wouldn't he? I have done nothing wrong, not in the eyes of the law anyway. Sure there have been some missteps along the way, a couple of stupid knee-jerk decisions, a bunch of tiny sins that don't amount to a hill of beans. My life as it has progressed hasn't been saintly, but it hasn't been satanly either. Why not me?
I wonder if I should be doing more to state my case. You know, market myself during these waning hours before the souls start drifting up to heaven. Make a pitch for myself, write a jingle, pray like a cloistered nun, or something. Not that I want to leave right not...I have a lot of unfinished business here. But according to the prophecy, what will be left here won't be so much fun. And I can't even handle this cold spring, much less global pestilence, famine and natural disasters. Plus, I have always wanted to float up into the sky, like a character in a Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel. An ethereal, transparent being fueled by light and superstition.
But like everyone else, I will have to wait to see if I get called up. It will be easy to tell--just check this blog on Monday. I'll post an entry no matter where I am---I do, after all, have a smart phone.
Sunday, May 15, 2011
A bittersweet anniversary
My mother died too young. 63 is too young. That was 21 years ago, as of 1:00 this afternoon. That fateful day, I found out she had died from my father, who called me and said, "Honey, I have the saddest news in the world." He and my brother and sister and had left her hospital room to get lunch, after being persuaded by the nurse. Apparently, minutes after they left, she passed. Clearly, it was her last journey and she wanted to take it alone.
It was a humid day, oppressively hot and sticky. Not a typical May day in Connecticut. I remember floating through the halls of Yale-New Haven Hospital, dressed in crummy workout clothes, having taking the day off of work to stay home in the morning and go spend time with her in the afternoon to spell my siblings.
I did spend time with her that afternoon. The staff let us spend as much time as we needed to sit with her lifeless body, which was still terribly bruised from all the abuse that only cancer can ravage on a person. It was a tough seven months for my mother, the consummate trooper.
She could, in my brother's words, "eat pain." Not one to complain, my mother bare-knuckled it through the last days of her life, spaced out on morphine for most of it, barely lucid. The last day I saw her like her old self was Mother's Day, just two days before she died. She was sitting up and laughing, opening gifts and sharing her acid, hysterical sense of humor.
I loved my mother very much, and while time does indeed heal most wounds to a point where you are able to live with them, there will always be an Irene-sized hole in the universe and in my heart where she once resided. I miss you, Mom.
It was a humid day, oppressively hot and sticky. Not a typical May day in Connecticut. I remember floating through the halls of Yale-New Haven Hospital, dressed in crummy workout clothes, having taking the day off of work to stay home in the morning and go spend time with her in the afternoon to spell my siblings.
I did spend time with her that afternoon. The staff let us spend as much time as we needed to sit with her lifeless body, which was still terribly bruised from all the abuse that only cancer can ravage on a person. It was a tough seven months for my mother, the consummate trooper.
She could, in my brother's words, "eat pain." Not one to complain, my mother bare-knuckled it through the last days of her life, spaced out on morphine for most of it, barely lucid. The last day I saw her like her old self was Mother's Day, just two days before she died. She was sitting up and laughing, opening gifts and sharing her acid, hysterical sense of humor.
I loved my mother very much, and while time does indeed heal most wounds to a point where you are able to live with them, there will always be an Irene-sized hole in the universe and in my heart where she once resided. I miss you, Mom.
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
A farming we will go
What's all this with the farm tour you've been doing on your other blog, you might be asking? Yes, I have been taking time to visit the small, independent farms in this part of the state. Why? Because I care about our food sources and believe in supporting those who provide for us locally.
Let me answer your question with a question. Who doesn't love to go to a farmer's market or visit a country store stocked with all kinds of fresh foods and organic goodies?
There is just something very wholesome about farms, even though the scents and sites can take some getting used to. I feel healthier when I am there. And interviewing the farmers is truly a breath of fresh air. You talk about getting back to basics. This is about as basic as life gets. Producing the food we eat. Who was it that said, control the food supply and you control the people.
I turned my back on processed food decades ago. And that was without fully understanding just how damaging and potentially disease causing additives and chemicals are to our bodies--physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Reading about the players in agribusiness (like Monsanto) and their aggressive movement toward creating genetically modified food. The debate directly concerns you, though you may find that ignorance is bliss, which of course, it's not. Especially when you realize that much of what you are eating is making you sick.
Health concerns and risking the control of the world's food supply by several, profit-driven corporations aside, there is another casualty in the way the industry of agriculture is going--the small farmers. And there are a lot of them in Pennsylvania, thank goodness. My attempt to visit as many as I can is my small effort to increase awareness and hopefully create a new habit for all of us, namely, the routine of spending our hard earned dollars on food that is grown in this region and therefore help those people who continue to do the back-breaking work that you and I personally do not want to do.
Let me answer your question with a question. Who doesn't love to go to a farmer's market or visit a country store stocked with all kinds of fresh foods and organic goodies?
There is just something very wholesome about farms, even though the scents and sites can take some getting used to. I feel healthier when I am there. And interviewing the farmers is truly a breath of fresh air. You talk about getting back to basics. This is about as basic as life gets. Producing the food we eat. Who was it that said, control the food supply and you control the people.
I turned my back on processed food decades ago. And that was without fully understanding just how damaging and potentially disease causing additives and chemicals are to our bodies--physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Reading about the players in agribusiness (like Monsanto) and their aggressive movement toward creating genetically modified food. The debate directly concerns you, though you may find that ignorance is bliss, which of course, it's not. Especially when you realize that much of what you are eating is making you sick.
Health concerns and risking the control of the world's food supply by several, profit-driven corporations aside, there is another casualty in the way the industry of agriculture is going--the small farmers. And there are a lot of them in Pennsylvania, thank goodness. My attempt to visit as many as I can is my small effort to increase awareness and hopefully create a new habit for all of us, namely, the routine of spending our hard earned dollars on food that is grown in this region and therefore help those people who continue to do the back-breaking work that you and I personally do not want to do.
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Non Sequiturs abound
Granted, I have been markedly under the weather for several days now. Something to do with this stomach virus running rampant through our human ranks. Perhaps I am a bit fuzzy in the head. I admit that. But is it really all me?
"Uncle Mo has gastrointestinal illness," my husband announced from the kitchen while I was struggling to make the bed this morning, still woozy and somewhat drained from my own bout with that same illness.
Who is Uncle Mo? I thought. Poor guy. I would wouldn't wish this on anyone, much less some distant family member of my husband. He repeated what he said, having not heard a response from me.
Finally, I walked toward him and flatly asked, whom he was talking about. "A horse in the Kentucky Derby. Don't you remember? We were just talking about him," he said. No, we were not. This was another example of his use of non sequiturs.
"Just" is a relative word. For my husband, "just" can apply to a period of time extending anywhere from minutes ago to sometime last year. Yes, we had been offhandedly discussing the race during a brief moment an hour before, when we were both reading the newspaper. I tend to half listen to these conversations because I lost my ability to do two things at once when I started the phase of my life sweetly known as "the change." I am lucky if I can focus on one thing for more than several minutes. I vaguely recalled him mentioning several names of horses, but honestly thought when he said Uncle Mo, he was referring to his uncle or a local restaurant whose owner had the stomach flu.
Like my son, my husband has a tendency to have internal conversations in his head that he thinks everyone is privy to. So when these things pop out of his mouth with no prior prompting or transition, he wonders why I am not keeping up. He is honestly bewildered because to him it makes complete sense.
Uncle Mo has a gastrointestinal illness. Now you know.
Check out my Erie Times-News blog.
"Uncle Mo has gastrointestinal illness," my husband announced from the kitchen while I was struggling to make the bed this morning, still woozy and somewhat drained from my own bout with that same illness.
Who is Uncle Mo? I thought. Poor guy. I would wouldn't wish this on anyone, much less some distant family member of my husband. He repeated what he said, having not heard a response from me.
Finally, I walked toward him and flatly asked, whom he was talking about. "A horse in the Kentucky Derby. Don't you remember? We were just talking about him," he said. No, we were not. This was another example of his use of non sequiturs.
"Just" is a relative word. For my husband, "just" can apply to a period of time extending anywhere from minutes ago to sometime last year. Yes, we had been offhandedly discussing the race during a brief moment an hour before, when we were both reading the newspaper. I tend to half listen to these conversations because I lost my ability to do two things at once when I started the phase of my life sweetly known as "the change." I am lucky if I can focus on one thing for more than several minutes. I vaguely recalled him mentioning several names of horses, but honestly thought when he said Uncle Mo, he was referring to his uncle or a local restaurant whose owner had the stomach flu.
Like my son, my husband has a tendency to have internal conversations in his head that he thinks everyone is privy to. So when these things pop out of his mouth with no prior prompting or transition, he wonders why I am not keeping up. He is honestly bewildered because to him it makes complete sense.
Uncle Mo has a gastrointestinal illness. Now you know.
Check out my Erie Times-News blog.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
If April showers bring May flowers, what do May showers bring? Floods.
The winter clothes were packed away and I planted basil in the outdoor planter outside the kitchen recently: Two acts meant to send a message to Mother Nature that I am through with this cold, obnoxious spring and ready for her milder, warmer twin sister to enter the scene.
Other parts of this country are experiencing higher than average temperatures and even heat waves by Erie, Pennsylvania standards. We have yet to consistently top 50 degrees. And on the days we do, the infernal wet weather continues to rain on our parade, so to speak.
As far as I am concerned, this all has to stop. Right now. Like a tantrumming child, I am stomping my feet. And if that doesn't work, well, I just might have to get tough and start some fist-balled, threats. Come on out, spring, you wimp. I dare you.
When all else falls, time to give in and give up. I guess I just have to step back and reassess. It's only rain and cold, after all, not tornadoes and tsunamis. Sometimes I just need a little perspective in order to regain my gratitude. Spring always does come and like most things, it doesn't conform to my wishes or bend to my control. At least there is some green in all this gray.
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