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Text of the page (random words):
ped in drove the short distance to the store leaving the car running i ran in grabbed the milk paid the cashier dashed back to the car to see my little dog delighted to see me again jump on the door locks locking all 4 doors i stood for a moment at a complete loss i ran back in the store this is 10 years pre cell phones and explaining my predicament asked they call 911 about 5 minutes later the fire truck pulled up chastised my thoughtlessness explaining carefully if a living thing had not been in the car they would not have come to help well i thought that living thing was the reason they were there no matter i had the milk got breakfast in my son as we sat at the light to turn in to the school i jotted a quick note explaining his tardiness a jarring jolt accompanied by crunching metal i looked up to see the front of my little car neatly folded under the rear of the concrete mixer in front of me at the light apparently i could not maintain proper pressure on the brake pedal and write simultaneously why didn t you say something i wailed to my son i wanted to see what would happen he calmly replied days better spent in bed unhappy puppy maybe unhappy isn t quite right gracie covets her freedom so last night when she tore into the backyard to fend off raccoons or anything else that might be there in the dark i heard yelp and she came limping back holding her right forepaw i checked carefully gently pressing the toe pads and extending the little joints limber no complaints from gracie this morning i saw a small red spot below her right eye barely much but the white of the eye was also a bit bloodshot her vet being closed for memorial day we had a little road trip to charleston she s not amenable to the medicine applied to the abrasion she is perplexed about the cone but finds she can still eat and drink from her bowls and importantly jump up on her favorite chair and window seat i marvel at her persistence in learning to maneuver with this clearly uncomfortable thing and when she s had enough of all the effort she takes a nap dogs continue to teach me triple whammy i never get sick having said that when anything happens i don t respond calmly grateful to see my doctor early thursday morning so he found three things going on gave me antibiotics instructions diet recommendations and sent me on my way i am simply not accustomed to being at the mercy of anything but gracie friday he called to check in almost a miracle the difference in how i felt very grateful gracie almost had to board somewhere we ve never been apart in the 4 years since i adopted her harder for me than for her i imagine international space station and fireflies nasa has a fun geeky program where you can have emails or text messages sent whenever the iss flies your geographic coordinates i know nerdy with all the trees around my house it s hard to see spring and summer but if its trajectory is high enough i can so last night it was visible for 7 minutes as this bright dot of reflected light soars overhead i marvel at the genius of it all my son and i visited cape canaveral about 20 years ago when it was under construction we were allowed access to see parts and incredulous the enormity and the dot i see hurtling through space is hard to reconcile so as it diminished in brightness and disappeared behind a leaf here and there i noticed more tiny blinks of golden light fireflies or lightning bugs as we knew them i haven t seen any in years i live in a humid summer climate so the county sends a fogger car to spray for mosquitoes so far it s killed everything but the mosquitoes dragonflies lady bugs butterflies and lightning bugs so when i hear that car driving up the road i run to the end of my driveway to stop it the driver kindly turns the fogger off and drives away so maybe that is why i am again seeing these magical bugs flashing their tiny lanterns to each other light and seasons the fresh green of spring is light in itself even under layers of heavy pollen the canopy illuminates itself after a rain the bright shimmer rests in stillness as a tremulous orchestra s first notes the awakening from winter colorizes slowly and teems with birds vines dragonflies songs and joy life rouses from the quiet grey of winter not yet the cacophony of hot humid summer still young tentative soft spoken everything has a cycle nothing in life has a separation everything is connected or a continuation it s reassuring in the depths of winter to remember but families i sometimes don t get families i have a niece 22 i have never been included in a birthday celebration nor her graduation i likely could not have gone since they live far away and the graduation was during covid yet my son was invited to be fair he lives close but still no invitation to me even if i d had to decline and nearly every gift i send i chase them down to see whether it was even received never mind thanked for it i have to conclude i am not considered part of what they want to celebrate there must come a point at which i need to stop trying to be part of something i ve never actually been part of as a child my place in the pecking order was bottom nothing i thought or said mattered it s weird the way you look for attention not in good ways when you re at that place finally though i just have to stop when you want to change that order of things with or without them they don t like it much but there comes a point where being the family doormat doesn t work anymore what people say and do does matter their opinions aren t the only ones that count good manners matter courtesy matters being counted matters not more than anyone else but as much so don t expect me to go along anymore if it makes me discounted or invisible if there is no place for me as i am in this family on your terms only then i humbly bow out i am not a game player or an enabler you will never even know because you only knew me as whatever suited you and that was not me so i watch the seasons they are what they are as they are and that is enough gracie s first snow we don t see much snow here in the coastal low country so even sleet which we got a couple weeks ago is a novelty but this storm has been talked about for weeks and it delivered six inches in houston ten in new orleans our amounts ranged from five to eight inches i do realize for most this is nothing you are well prepared for ten times what we have several days before enzo hit we brought in trucks to treat the roads main surface roads and the one primary highway ocean blvd we borrowed snow plows but neighborhood roads depended on sunshine to do any significant melting since the temperatures were below freezing until yesterday gracie is not a fan of anything falling from the sky so going outside in the sleeting part wasn t great but she likes the snow even so a warm pillow inside looking out is nice too stay warm and dry y all monkeys when i was young my parents went out a lot my brother and i had our favorite sitters one sitter i especially remember enjoyed reading dr seuss books to me especially the cat in the hat this book terrified me here these kids are alone in their house a total chaotic mess and their mom is walking up the sidewalk to the house they got it all clean miraculously but i really stressed over this since i liked the sitter i never said a word so this week day after the election in a little town south of me there is a research facility that breeds little monkeys for research 43 of them escaped when a caretaker cleaning the area left two doors unsecured i strongly dislike monkeys i think they are the only animal on the planet i don t like there are many i hope not to encounter ever like alligators but i really just don t like monkeys in the natural world they have no specific laws relevant to other species i understand they are fiercely protective of members of their families but they are chaotic loud make huge messes are mean and have no regard for or even fear of any other species unlike the cat in the hat they have no interest in restoring or even creating order so this research facility they have set traps for these monkeys what a joke their employees are out hunting for them the public has been cautioned to keep windows and doors shut so they don t get in their house not to try to capture or even pet them but to call 911 there are several of these escapees that are hanging around the facility perimeter fence cooing to the ones still in there probably encouraging them to make a break for it this same facility had this happen in 2016 nineteen monkeys got out then no idea if they ever recovered those either in the wind both are years donald trump is elected president maybe this is a lesson in how to get inmates back in the asylum the h storm in 1954 the coasts of north and south carolina were massively struck by hurricane hazel a category 4 hurricane unprepared and ill equipped for the damage the areas struggled for months with recovery nineteen were killed hundreds more hurt the nc weather bureau reported all traces of civilization on the immediate waterfront between the state line and cape fear were practically annihilated thirty five years later in 1989 hurricane hugo category 4 blasted south carolina near charleston and charged inland still raging into charlotte nc where my son and i lived at the time as a category 2 storm 90 mph winds the path it took through south carolina left a war zone like devastation in charlotte it was months before the chain saw and wood chipper whine stopped from grinding the uprooted trees and 20 foot high mounds of wood chips steamed through the cold winter until they finally got carted away i can t even remember how long the national guard were there we were without electricity for two weeks we were among the fortunate ones so this year 2024 another 35 years i had a cataract procedure scheduled just as another tropical depression churned offshore my son and i climbed in the car to travel to near charleston lashing rain some wind not bad also not the dreaded h storm it never made it this time helene completely went its own way through the gulf into florida s big bend area category 4 again storm surge was the worst but instead of slowing down it maintained its speed which meant it also kept its power we had 14 tornado warnings in the 2 3 hour window where helene passed through but north carolina those mountains they had received days of rain before this storm helene tore out trees and flooded the inundated area where one river was 24 feet above its normal level unprecedented is too small a word catastrophic works because as waters receded bodies appeared whole towns chimney rock lake lure gone indescribable destruction and damage and obliteration because of plain ordinary americans people are getting food water generators internet service by helicopter many by horses goats pack mules most paved roads are gutted and impassable even interstates and we learn gradually our government has nothing to give us no help so americans are pouring our hearts out to help the people of appalachia people who have survived so much who work hard and are so grateful for whatever little or much they have god s people the bedrock of this country so fema government please stay out of our way we have work to do friendly it s been a while since i wrote anything i was a programmer in the early days 1980s of computers so maybe i should welcome the nanospeed of technochanges well i don t could be at my age i don t want to be bothered or i just haven t anything substantial to write about so many bloggers i follow make interesting pertinent points and their minds are creative i admire this but these constant changes on wordpress simply complicate things don t get me wrong i love a challenge as with discussions or ideas but this whenever i open this everything is different having to stop to figure out what an electronic platform wants in order to continue seriously affects the flow of words from brain to fingertips i enjoy writing here having a spot to express thoughts opinions whining joys concerns whatever and i refuse to be intimidated by an intractable electronic device that does not communicate well the programming i did nobody ever complained about i attribute this to the coding and formatting which easily enabled creating a universal program anyone could use i don t know maybe it s just me i called an electrician recently to check some outdoor security lights that weren t working normally before tropical storm debby rather than test them they completely dismantled them so now i have to buy new lights repair shouldn t be so complicated neither should writing really life would be better enjoyed if things were simpler but then i suppose our brains would stagnate if we had nothing new to figure out sigh courtesy pinterest gracie s first road trip up to now car rides with gracie have been at most half an hour long generally to her vet her day care the beach or the pet store for treats fun places so a drive upstate to our blue ridge appalachia foothills was not in her wheelhouse every dog i have ever had loved car rides long short several days of traveling didn t matter he or she would sit quietly passenger or back seat signaling for a potty break by panting pretty simple not gracie after the first 40 minutes when it became clear she was not going to any of her usual places and i did not appear to be stopping she got antsy she whined she bounced on the steering wheel she panted after a bit of this i stopped to let her walk around get it out of her system we returned to the car and started up again oh no she wasn t having this it s about a 5 hour drive so an hour or so later i stopped again we walked around gracie convinced this must be our destination but it s a walmart parking lot this made no sense so she s not where she wants to be and the car becomes a torture chamber we have another hour i pull off into a parking lot marked no parking and we get out gracie thinks we re there i let her drag me back and forth a few times until she looks at me again with ok now what i brought water food toys a blanket pheromones nothing helped back to the car the views are beautiful between snatching a glance while driving hilly winding roads and holding her away from the car s parking brake and turbo buttons i see how lovely it is we come to a pretty area nestled by a gushing rocky stream and get out to explore a bit it s oddly humid and buggy so we don t stay long surprisingly gracie stays in the back seat practically all the way back we stop once at a rest area and she wanders around then back to the car where she returns to her comfy spot maybe it was just the initial longer journey that flummoxed her but if anyone has suggestions i d love to hear them love i m not much of a church goer i was raised in the episcopal church sang in choirs christened confirmed and married in the same church when i was married i attended my ex husband s church my son was baptized there...