Daffodil Days Are Here Again!!!

So now that the kids have gone I must clean and wash clothes and dust and wash sheets and clean the shower and wash towels and ..... more company coming for the weekend.  Yes!  It's DAFFODIL days in Nantucket and we MUST be there to record the event for posterity.  Dogs in tutus and old cars covered with ribbons, yellow of course, and ladies in LARGE daffodil adorned bonnets.  Remember last year?  No?  Well here's a bit of a reminder - - -

And this too

Can't wait.

Tired Tired Tired

It's Sunday and this busyness thing?  It is really, incredibly exhausting!  Just sayin'.

Busy Busy Busy

Did I say that my husband had reunited with his children after an absence of about 40 years?  We went to visit in September and then went back for a week in March.  They are really great kids and this week they are coming for a visit with us to see the area and meet family.  Here's the Itinerary:

Tuesday:

Check the house, make the beds, bring supplies;
Grocery shop
Drop off Raven at Canine College

Pick up DD in Providence approx 4 PM

Pick up DS in Westwood approx 7:30 PM

Grab a bit to eat

Return to Cape

Wednesday:

Breakfast

Walk to beach and around neighborhood

Eventually drive to Ptown stopping along the way to view Marconi, Highland Light,

Coast Guard Beach walk to water for Atlantic dipping and on to Race Point

Ptown – see the Monument and walk through town to pier – etc

Back home and ?

Thursday:

Breakfast and walk

Drive to NY

Check in and see Central Park and Empire State

Dinner at Gallaghers

?

Friday:

Breakfast

Check out

Drive to Ground Zero

Drive to NJ and Liberty State Park

Tour Ellis Island and Statue of Liberty

Drive Home

Saturday:

Breakfast

Darling Niece arrives

Drive to Boston – The Pru to get tickets for Duck Tour

Hopefully do the Duck

Drive to Constitution for a tour

Drive to Marketplace – walk around and eat at Durgin Park

Home

Sunday:

Breakfast – Walk

Drive to Plymouth – Rock and Mayflower

Lunch in Kingston at 1 – til?

?

Home

Monday:

Breakfast – walk

Drive to Holbrook pick up Raven

Back to visit in Kingston

No plans

Tuesday:

DD leaves

Wednesday:

DS leaves

Thursday:

Be sad

I'm Organizing Today

How does this lady know me so well?

The Miracle

C. S. Lewis, Miracles (New York: Macmillan, 1947), 112, 115-17.

The central miracle asserted by Christians is the Incarnation. They say that God became Man. Every other miracle prepares for this, or exhibits this, or results from this. . . .

In the Christian story God descends to re-ascend. He comes down; down from the heights of absolute being into time and space, down into humanity . . . down to the very roots and sea-bed of the Nature He has created.

But He goes down to come up again and bring the ruined world up with Him. One has the picture of a strong man stooping lower and lower to get himself underneath some great complicated burden. He must stoop in order to lift, he must almost disappear under the load before he incredibly straightens his back and marches off with the whole mass swaying on his shoulders.

Or one may think of a diver, first reducing himself to nakedness, then glancing in mid-air, then gone with a splash, vanished, rushing down through green and warm water into black and cold water, down through increasing pressure into the death-like region of ooze and slime and old decay; then up again, back to colour and light, his lungs almost bursting, till suddenly he breaks surface again, holding in his hand the dripping, precious thing that he went down to recover. He and it are both coloured now that they have come up into the light: down below, where it lay colourless in the dark, he lost his colour, too.

In this descent and re-ascent everyone will recognise a familiar pattern: a thing written all over the world. It is the pattern of all vegetable life. It must belittle itself into something hard, small and deathlike, it must fall into the ground: thence the new life re-ascends.

It is the pattern of all animal generation too. There is descent from the full and perfect organisms into the spermatozoon and ovum, and in the dark womb a life at first inferior in kind to that of the species which is being reproduced: then the slow ascent to the perfect embryo, to the living, conscious baby, and finally to the adult.

So it is also in our moral and emotional life. The first innocent and spontaneous desires have to submit to the deathlike process of control or total denial: but from that there is a re-ascent to fully formed character in which the strength of the original material all operates but in a new way. Death and Rebirth–go down to go up–it is a key principle. Through this bottleneck, this belittlement, the highroad nearly always lies.

The doctrine of the Incarnation, if accepted, puts this principle even more emphatically at the centre. The pattern is there in Nature because it was first there in God. All the instances of it which I have mentioned turn out to be but transpositions of the Divine theme into a minor key. I am not now referring simply to the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Christ. The total pattern, of which they are only the turning point, is the real Death and Re-birth: for certainly no seed ever fell from so fair a tree into so dark and cold a soil as would furnish more than a faint analogy to this huge descent and re-ascension in which God dredged the salt and oozy bottom of Creation.

Thank You Lord for Miracles.

Easter Round Up

Sorting through the Easter activities and things have really turned around.  We are having a new septic system put in and right now the house is almost inaccessible.  The size of this thing is unreal.  We have a teeny tiny house and the system we have to install takes up more land than the house does.  There is a moat that runs along the house on two sides.  I say we could flush a bazillion more times than we ever have in all the years of the house's existence and it will still never be full.  Oh well.  For that reason we have changed plans to have the whole fam here as we usually do.  There is no parking available and with the rain, the mud and muck is everywhere.  Easier to go out and go out we shall.  Meanwhile I still have to clean and such since my nephew will be with us for the weekend.

Oh and yes, at the moment we only have one car since on the way back home on Tuesday my husband went through what he thought was a puddle and instead it was a lake.  The car ran for a while after that but then stopped.  Fortunately he was able to coast into a rest area and call AAA.  Naturally parts have to be ordered and blah blah blah, might take until Monday to be back with us.  So, as you see, business as usual here.

I will probably be back before Easter but just in case I don't have a thought to share, let me share this one.

Maxine is Always Correct

And today all those power mad creeps will be all over television telling us to calm down over their power grabbing health (no)care bill.

Something I needed Today

All of this nonsense being imposed upon us by power grabbing, morally bankrupt leftists led by that man who lied and posed to get into office has disturbed me greatly.  I needed this and I think there are more of us out there than the press will let us know about who need it too.

HUMBLING, ISN'T IT?
Especially when you know our sun is just one of many in this mix

And yet, God knows how many hairs are on your head;

and, not even a single sparrow dies apart from His will.

(Mt. 10:29-31)!

NOW HOW BIG ARE YOU?

AND, HOW BIG ARE THE THINGS THAT UPSET YOU TODAY?

AND

HOW BIG IS YOUR GOD?

KEEP LIFE IN PERSPECTIVE!

Our God is the Creator of everything and is on His throne in charge of the same. 

Thank You Lord.

Back from the Gulf Coast

I'm here.  Even I find it hard to believe.  Went on vacation to Gulfport MS and intended to say hi from there but life got in the way and now, I am down with a NASTY cold that has settled in my chest.  The cough comes from the bowels of the earth and does nothing except leave me exhausted and with sore diaphragm muscles.  Aches and pains everywhere and Yes! I went to the doctor who said go home and rest, take aspirin, here's a prescription for that cough and see you in a week or two.  So that's what I am doing.  The cough medicine hits me over the head and puts me into a coma.  I don't cough though.  I am going to put my head down and not think about those suitcases that need unpacking.  I also feel as fat as a goat.  Just so's ya know.

Frustrated

So after I got that letter from one of my doctors telling me that my insurance is not accepted by him I wrote to my useless piece of work Senator John Kerry to tell him he is a useless piece of work.  I told him that I didn't expect him to do anything that would benefit his constituents unless they were union wokers or high paid public "servants".  I probably just put a big target on my property to be confiscated for the "public good" down the road.  I called Blue Cross and told them that this insurance card is not worth the paper it's printed on if there are no doctors that will accept it.  I ranted and raved and spit and spewed and now?   I am exhausted and frustrated and yes, frightened.  What a world.  I would email Scott Brown but HAH!! there is no email address set up in the Congressional Website.  Normal Delay?????   I think not. 

Have to find a Doctor who will care for Old Folks.....maybe in Canada

It has begun already.  I got my first letter from one of my doctors telling me that he no longer will accept my Medicare HMO insurance.  I can still see him of course and try to get some pittance of reimbursement from the insurance company but.. . . . .  can't wait for the real ax to fall.

Gee.  Do you think that maybe the doctors can see that they won't be paid as much as they have been? Think that health care might suffer with the plan these IDIOTS have in store for us old F's?  Think that when they move on our health care and then take over the retirement accounts and then totally destroy our Social Security . . think that then we can say they are what we already know they are?  Ya think?  And their Obama man leader is nothing more than a despot and a tyrant and a rotten little piece of ...... who still is upset that in the third grade someone wasn't as nice to him as he thought they should have been and he married a piece of work who feels the same way......Ya think????

Ready for Spring

Doctors and dentists and haircuts - oh my!  That's the week and then some.  Shopping and errands and walking the dog.  Shoveling snow and bringing in pellets for the wood stove and laundry and laundry and then doing dishes and cooking and serving and more of the same.  Cleaning the toilets and vacuuming and dusting and occasionally washing the windows where the dog's nose hits them as she waits for us to return from the shopping and errands and doctors and dentists and haircuts.  Such is the way we spend the winter.  Hurry Spring and get here.

I'm Ready!!

A Lovely Holiday

Happy Presidents' Day

Enjoy

Abraham Lincoln's Birthday

Happy Birthday Abe.

This is how I like to think of him....warm, nurturing, good father.

Also a supreme leader during a horrendous war.

We are lucky to have had him and we should take time to honor his memory and his legacy. 

An Unfinished Outburst

Honestly, I know this sounds nuts and it sounds as if I am some kind of conspiracy crazy but tell the truth.  This crowd, the bunch running the country, they are totally whacked.  If they aren't trying their damndest to destroy every shred of capitalism that keeps our wheels running, I don't know what they're up to.....these job things aren't the way to do it since the only jobs that are being tended are those public servant level types ... the union workers who

Just Checking In

This week has been a tad dizzy.  Oral surgery for the hubby yesterday so most of the week was filled with his anxious mood changes although he will deny every word of that.  He did have valium to take prior to the appointment and although he said they did not help at all, the muscles of his face denied that.  He kind of started to look like a melted candle and at one point he was staring at nothing and became a mouth breather.  Glad that part is over.  It all went well and only one more appointment on Tuesday.

Weather is the topic of the day and since I have the dog walking duties of late, I can testify to the nastiness of 10 degrees with a brisk wind in your face.  Last night I wore silk inserts for my gloves since during the morning walk, even though I wore my heaviest duty gloves, I could not feel my fingers when I got home.  The inserts really helped but they are my husbands and too large so I still could not feel my fingers because of the thickness of the gloves over the inserts but my hands stayed warm.  My forehead was frozen and felt inside like that old "ice cream freeze" thing.  Hurry up April!!

I am typing with band-aids on just about every finger since this below freezing weather cracks my skin.  Once cracked, forever until Spring cracked.  Johnson&Johnson stock should soar.  I try my best for the economy folks.  I truly do.  Last year I discovered that using Polysporin every day for two months creates a bigger issue than the cracked skin you are trying to heal.  It seems that you develop a reaction to that stuff and it actually begins to burn away the healthy tissue.  Also.  Once that occurs.  Don't use it again.  It does the same thing but immediately.  Trust me!

Lunch with one of the nieces today and we are looking forward to it.  She's a peach, as are all of them but you know, she's here or will be later and so we have always worked with the "your favorite is the one you're with" method.  They all know this and too bad for those who aren't with us.  They will be favorites next time, if we see them.  Love them all to pieces.

Have to go load up the pellet stove for the day.  It will be running non-stop if the temperature doesn't move in the upward direction.  At least the sky is blue and beautiful.  Later.

More Scott Brown Fun

Well...congratulations to us!!  Have to say it feels good.  We did a good job here in MassTaxachusetts.  For a change.  I know you will find this hard to believe but my husband and I had Scott Brown yard signs in front of the house and along the side, we're on a corner lot.  Today I heard someone knocking on  our front door.  No one ever uses the front door.  It took me a while to realize that was where the knocking was coming from.  I answered, finally, and it was a very cute little man with a large smile and he introduced himself and told me where he lived.  He said his wife was MADLY in love with Scott Brown and he wondered if he could have one of our yard signs to take home to her.  I gathered that he was not as much in love and probably was afraid of the backlash from his other party neighbors if he let her put a yard sign out during the campaign but now.....now....all was well and up the sign could go.  I said fine...go with the sign and peace and love and oh yeah, WE WON!!!!!

How fun was that?

Later that same day I am doing my domestic duties, dusting and such.  Hah!  Like that could be true.  I was sitting here at the computer reading everything there is to read about the afterglow of the election and some one knocks at our side door.  What? is? going? on?  This time of year no one knocks at any door.  It's winter.  We are at Cape Cod near the ocean in a very summer area.  Two in one day is incredible.

I answer the door to a very tall guy, gray hair, big smile who grabs my hand, shakes it and thanks me for Scott Brown.  He said we saved the country.  I am not kidding.  He's from New Jersey, drove by, saw the yard sign and wants to take it back with him.  I direct him to the side of my garage where I have a couple.  "You're just in time," I said.  "I have these that I was wondering what to do with."

"You could sell them for a fortune back in New Jersey."  he said.

"Go for it."  I told him.  He then proceeded to tell me that he was a retired exec from a health insurance company.  Forty years in.  He was disgusted with all the deals and pay offs and bribes and generally with the direction this in power crowd was trying to move our country and how they were willing to do it.

New Jersey sure did their part when they could.   We pushed back in Massachusetts.  Now who's next?  What exciting times we live in.

GO SCOTT BROWN !

GO SCOTT BROWN!!! I love him.......he is such a normal guy!!!  Common sense and so decent. 

Good news Sunday

The husband will be home tomorrow if all goes well today.  He is about to eat real food, of course it will be low fiber and low sodium and low taste and . . ., well you got the picture.  If that real food causes no disturbance then he will more than likely be discharged tomorrow.  My days will be easier since he will be here.  The 4 or 5 hours spent at the hospital (I include the commute and errands to and from) will be better spent here.  I can sit and read and nap or knit or . . . .

Happy Sunday and hope you have good news today too.

Starting the New Year

Happy New Year!  We start off with a hospital stay.  My husband is back in with emergency surgery.  The colon surgery he underwent in October left him with adhesions that were cutting off circulation in his small intestine and the pain hit on Friday evening.  We were in the emergency room on Saturday and that afternoon he was whisked away to surgery.  All went well and he is recovering as I write.  The incision is in the same spot but larger and the recovery will be as long if not longer than before.  Sigh.

So there you have it.  God is good though.  He saw to it that we moved quickly and He arranged for the surgeon who operated on him in October to be on duty so there would be no delay in correcting the situation.  Everyone was in the right place at the right time.  Thank You Lord.

And now on with my day.  Once again I realize how much that man does when he is home and well.  My chores seem to never end now.  At least when I hit the pillow I sleep like a rock.  We're expecting snow today...oh, that's right, it's January.  I must find that darned shovel.