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Hi. I'm trying to think of another description to put here. Any ideas? I'll try again at 420.

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Good morning!

It's a lovely day here in Florida. I see that it's not so nice around the country what with the flooding in the heartland. That's too bad. I wonder how much of that is our fault? How much of that flood is there because we messed with Mother Nature? It'd be nice if Georgia could take a bunch of that water away from those poor people, nice for Georgia as well as the Midwest.

I swear, sometimes I think that my kids get together and say, "OK, how long has it been since YOU'VE asked Mom for money?" I can just hear them bickering over who's turn it is to hit me up. It never occurred to me to ask my parents for money but that's only because I knew that it wouldn't do me any good.

I had friends whose parents wouldn't let them work when my parents were saying, "If you want new clothes for school this year you had better get yourself a job!" My parents were from some school of parenting that taught them to let the kids take care of themselves. But I watched and paid attention. The friends of mine whose folks helped them didn't end up bums...they were just fine. So, I decided to help my kids when they needed it.

I wouldn't let them work during the school year but I did give them an allowance so that they would have a few bucks to spend. They could work all they wanted during the summer but during the school year, their job was to go to school and do well. I can't say that I did anything wrong, I have decent kids.

My father thinks that I help the kids too much but that's OK, I don't think he helped us enough. Not that I blame him for anything...as I always say, good or bad, parents do the best job they can on any given day. Sometimes the best they can do absolutely BLOWS but they are trying. I know that my father was a considerate parent and it would have been easy for him to give his kids cash but he thought that his way was better for us. I happen to disagree.

When my kids need help, I want to help them. I would hate to think of them so desperate that they would do something illegal, immoral or just plain stupid. It'd be different if they were assholes or drug addicts or even if they were just taking advantage of me. I know that they hate to ask me for money and they only do it when they're in a tight spot so I don't mind.

In case the kids are out there...Annie just had her turn. I think it's William's turn now.

I wanted to go out for a while last night but I didn't because I was just too tired. The night before Jean had a bad episode and then she had to wake up early to go to dialysis so I got about 3 hours sleep. I had her sleep on the chair in the living room last night so that she could be in more of a sitting position to help her lungs expand. I slept on the couch so that I could hear her if she got up.

That was a good idea except for one thing...that lady snores worse than any other female that I've ever met. Of course, I haven't slept near too many women in my life so I wouldn't know how badly they snore. But I do remember trying to fall asleep before Rick so that I didn't have to listen to him snore. That rarely worked...he would be asleep as soon as he was horizontal. I wish I could fall asleep that quickly.

Rick's son was probably the worst snorer that I've ever heard. I never slept in the same room as he. That boy could be in one corner of the house and I could be as far away as humanly possible and I would STILL hear him...even with doors closed between us. He's living with some poor female who probably doesn't get much sleep at all.

Anyway, with all the snoring, I couldn't fall asleep for a long time and then, this morning while it was still dark outside, I heard a loud, "Where are my cigarettes!?" I hid the carton and she emptied her pack so I had to get up and look for the carton. I tried to go back to sleep but it didn't work. Once I'm up, I'm up and there's not a damn thing that I can do about it. I'm not a nap person so I don't take naps during the day.

Anyway, the lack of sleep is nothing compared to the hideous stench of the constant smoking. I asked my father why he didn't get one of those smoke-eater ashtrays and he said that he tried that once but after 3 days the ashtray itself reeked so badly that he had to throw it away. This morning the smoke was so bad that my eyes were burning. I didn't get this much nicotine when I DID smoke...I don't know how my father deals with it. He quit in '64 when the Surgeon General proclaimed cigarettes bad for you.

I had to open the windows to clear the smoke out and that meant that I had to turn the AC off...ain't that a bitch? I have two options...I can sweat and breath or I can be comfortable and suck smoke.

This reminds me of why I started smoking in the first place. My mother, my best friend and my boyfriend all smoked so I basically started out of self defense. If you're smoking yourself, it doesn't bother you when someone else does. Even if I were still smoking now, I couldn't keep up with this one. And I don't understand something...when she's in the hospital, she doesn't smoke and she doesn't bitch about not being able to. She loves to go play bridge and she can't smoke there. But I can't get her to go for 20 minutes without another cigarette because she doesn't remember that she just smoked one and if you tell her that she did she gets mad, calls you a liar and says, "Don't treat me like a baby!"

I found a box fan this morning and set it in between her and the sliding glass door so that it would suck the smoke and blow it out of the condo. I had been sitting further away from her and I watched as the smoke constantly drifted into my father's face. I think that should be considered an assault...don't you?

I told my father that we shouldn't buy them at all but he doesn't want to listen to her bitch about it. I also told him that he should get an air filter for the living room. I hope that he does. Any other ideas out there? It's not fair that two people who quit smoking years ago should be taking in more smoke than most smokers. I don't bitch at people who smoke...I actually think that society is being ridiculously harsh with some of the smoking bans that I've heard about. But this is one new and improved smoker person...I've never seen anyone smoke so much in my life.

If and when she goes into a nursing home...she'll have to live with maybe 4 fags a day. And that's only if they have the help to take her outside to smoke.

She smokes in her chair so my father put a big plastic thing under it to try to save the carpet. But the plastic thing, the chair AND the new carpet all have so many cigarette burns that you would think that a bunch of drunks in a bar had been using them. Her clothes have tons of holes in them yet the woman NEVER burns herself! Of course when she falls asleep with a square in her hand, my father or I take it before it has a chance to burn her. But still, you would think that sooner or later she would burn herself. Oh well...they say that God looks out for drunks and fools.

Oh! I just found out that my father has 2 laptops! He could have been playing Solitaire on one of them and I could have been here! He doesn't know how to hook them up to go online and I haven't had a chance to look at them yet. If I can remember to call Sol tonight...maybe she can talk me through that. She is a computer expert extraordinaire!

With any luck at all, I'll figure out how to get one of them up and running so that I don't have to wait for my father to finish playing games on this one. He gave me one of the laptops...all I have to do now is talk to Sol or someone else who knows about such things and I'll have a nice laptop!

OK...I must go into the smoke filled room now and see if that fan has helped. It surely couldn't make things any worse.

Oh! My father and I went to Home Depot while Jean was at dialysis yesterday and we bought some paint for the living room. I get to paint it. I'm basically using the same color...white. The walls were painted white before but in the short time that Jean has been here, they've pretty much turned yellow. Ick, ick, ick.

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