Phishers of Memes

Sometimes, my friends worry me.

I don't mean normal worries, like are they home safe or are they happy or how are their children worries -- those are a normal part of the give and take of friendship.
Lately. I have worried, probably way too much, over how gullible they are to "just for fun" Facebook memes.

It started with the silly holiday names. Mostly they go by initials, but some are poking around for your birthdate. Or someone else's initials, such as your first child's. Or maybe your father's.Those are harmless, for the most part. The phishers are building themselves a "just for fun" reputation.

Once that is achieved, the goal becomes one's birthdate, in all its unedited glory.
You see, on Facebook, many of us are wise enough to not put the year. The day, yeah, but the year is questionable.
Because one of the cues/clues to your credit/financial identity is your full birthdate.

So how old were you in 1969? I can do math enough to know that if you were 11 that means you were born in 1958. And if I can figure it out, believe me, someone smart enough to code can do so in half the time. They may even have a chart.

Now, they -- either the memes or the phishers; you choose -- have become a bit more nosy. Now they have people posting their family tree by last name. I am a who. My dad was a who. His mother was a what. My mother was a why. Her mother was a how.

What is the standard security question for online access to financial accounts?
Mother's maiden name.
BINGO!

You have given them information not only to your accounts, but also to those of your mother and your father, and possibly your grandparents, if you went back another generation.

I have seen where some say, "Yes, but the information is out there anyway. If they want it that bad, they can find it."
True, but why on earth would they go looking when you just hand it to them? If you don't play along, someone else will.
Do you really think they care WHO they defraud? They'll take everybody they can get.

And boy do they get a lot.

Phishers bait their hooks, cast their lines, and plan their next trip.
Already the memes are sneaking in to spell your child's name with the last four letters of your dad's middle name and the first initial of your maiden name.

What will you fall for next?
And who will be to blame when your, or your parents, bank accounts are emptied and the credit cards maxed out?

How fun is that?

A Not What It Was Day.

Today has just been strange. I am moving into my own trailer, next door to Tammy's. Today is the first day in a week I've sent much time in there. Did homey things like hang curtains.
Used a staple gun.
Used Rex's staple gun.
It felt weird.
I felt weird.

It's funny moving all our stuff out of storage and back into daily living.
I have a lot of papers and stuff to get rid of.
A lot to keep; a lot I want to keep, but should I?
How can I throw some of it out?

Found my dad's little coffee maker, but don't seem to have the pot for it.
Found my DVDs but have no player. Used to watch on my computer while Rex watched tv. Now have a laptop that doesn't play Cd's, No doubt I could buy something, either for tv or computer, or both, but it's different. It's not gonna be the way it used to be.

Odd to have a closet with only my clothes needing kept.
Odd to have a bedroom that is probably only large enough for bed and nightstand.

It's gonna be really strange when I get moved in, to be coming home to an empty house, even if the babies are just next door.

Roaring? Try Growling. Like a Tummy.

I went and got my little ones before the weather turned bad. The plan was to keep them if it seemed necessary, depending on the weather.

At least, that was the grown-ups plan. The little ones had something else in mind!(Not purposely.)

Friday night Warren cried and kicked like his belly hurt. Babies do that, and our water is different from theirs at home. No biggie, right. It was even funny when he spit up on me and Hailey while Tracy was holding him. Babies do that, too, after all.

Saturday was a wonderful together day, arguing with Hailey over the computer and the tv, wrassling around with Warren, who  was determined to chase down Tracy everywhere she tried to hide. That kid is really nuts about her. I think it must be the combo of Pappaw and Mommy, but it could be Tracy's childlike playful side.
Anyway, if she's in the house, Warren will track her down!
He also likes to walk under the curtains that are the doorway between the living room and the kitchen. He likes to step up over that little step, too.

Then came Saturday night, and one of the nightmares pf parenting. Hailey's belly started hurting and we couldn't make it stop. We tried warm packs and milk, and sipping diluted alka-seltzer -- that one sip was the only one she took, too. She didn't like the taste at all.
Soon enough the sick came out of her, and she immediately started wailing that she couldn't go to school with that brown stuff coming out! (They had sent a girl home from school Friday when she had the same problem.)
She also needed a shower! She had already had her bath, but Hails doesn't ask for  showers at Mammaws. She can get showers at home.

Poor little girl! I told her it was just a pookie bug and when it all came out she'd be okay.
She told me again that she couldn't go to school.
We were up all night with that pookie bug. I took a plastic pan into the bedroom with her/us, and she managed to use it as needed, crying all the time. I could tell she was really hurting, but any medicine came right back up.
Eventually she went to sleep, more dozing than real sleeping. I was grateful for that, you can believe. She was being pookie in my bed, and worrying herself about it. I told her me and her and the pillows and covers would all wash and to just get the sick out.

It was almost noon when we got up Sunday morning. Hailey was weak and wobbly, but no longer in pain and no longer sick.
When we got Bubby up, he didn't want to play.
ai thought it might just be a dozy day, getting ready for the "Titan" blast of winter.
Well, I hoped that was it.

Futilely, as it turns out.
The pookie bug had him too.
he wanted Mammaw.
he spiked a fever.
So I had to tell his mommy she needed to come and get them. Even put Warren on the phone with her.
Bapbapbap" he kept saying.
He and I had several bapbapbap conversations while he snuggled against me. He thought it was funny when  I'd say "Bap bap?" to his bapping.
Such a loving little bunchkin!

Eventually the sick caught up with him and got all over me.

Eventually (Titan was now upon us) the parents arrived. Of course by that time they were both in recovery mode, silly babies.

Of course it caught up with me too, Thank goodness the babies had gone home, that's what I say. I think Mammaw having the pookie bug would have scared Hailey half to death! Of course she could have helped take care of me. She would have liked that, I think.


But all is well now. She's back to school, he's back to toddling, and I'm back to sitting at the computer.

One more challenge met.

(I'm too old for this.)

What Am I?

I wonder.

When I lost my Rex, it seems that I lost a large part of my identity.

This wouldn't be so bad, if it wasn't for the huge chunk of me that I lost when I lost my job and couldn't get another one.

Since then, life itself seems to be chipping away at the essential "me."

I got a job and couldn't do it.
I write but have no way to share.
Shared writing has become more difficult and less frequent.
When I do write by hand, my fingers and thumb go numb, and I have muscle spasms all the way up my arm.

I am no longer a wife.
I'm still a mother, but my children are grown. (One is something of a big baby, but she's becoming an adult at a greatly decelerated rate.)
I'm a grandmother, but I can rarely see or take care of the babies, due to economics  (I'm usually literally out of gas.)When I do have them, they frazzle me, and it's not so easy to just take them home. I don't really want to, anyway.

I'm a writer, but losing the physical ability to write.

I'm a friend, but I have little to offer or share with my friends, when I can even keep in touch with them.

So, I am wondering, what am I?

Weekend

Pleasant surprise Friday evening when the babies were delivered to our door. We had been discussing it, and working at working it out, and then -- there they were!
On their way, Daddy had bought Hailey a pumpkin carving set and a kite, and these items were left at Mammaw's house.
So -- when Hailey got up Saturday morning, before she said "Good morning" or even "I'm awake, Mammaw!" she came to me and said, "We have to go get my pupmkin."
I fibbed. I told her the store wasn't open yet. The truth was, No one else in the house was awake yet, and I couldn't leave the baby to wake Rex up. (Tracy usually doesn't hear anyone on account of noise in her ears constantly, although she wasn't wearing her earbuds/headphones at the time.)

I didn't want to buy a pumpkin.
I sure as heck didn't want to carve a pumpkin. But the kit had stickers and that's what she said she wanted to do; put stickers on it.


Of course it didn't stop there.
When I told her she'd have to take the pumpkin home and let Daddy cut it, she went to Pappaw and he, silly man, told Tracy to do it, so it got done.
Badly, reluctantly, but done.

Then there was the kite. Numerous tantrums because she couldn't make it fly.
There was no wind.
No way it would fly and stay up, no matter how much she "runned and runned" with it.
Good job, Dad. Buy your kid a kite on a windless day and take her and it to ol' fat gramma's house. Good job.

Baby Boy was, for the most part, happy baby. He sat in his bouncer, his swing, and joy-of-joys, he would actually play on the floor instead of just flipping himself over and screaming. He's organizing getting himself to things and places and picking stuff up, so he's much happier.

We had the usual third-shift baby night Friday night, so I was groggy and short tempered most of Saturday (which started out with the pumpkin fiasco.)
Saturday, he was alert, talkative, communicated clearly -- a scream when someone leaves the room is pretty darned clear! -- went from person to person by his own choice. He surely does love his Pappaw who says "Tell me about it." to him and he at-ats and ya-yas away.
It was a nice day, and I took him outside on the quilt for going on a couple hours. He played and rolled and wiggled and squiggled himself all around. Finally getting up on all fours, although he's not quite figured out how to make everything move together. I had a heck of a time getting a picture, because the camera would go off and I had to turn it on and then frame the picture. BY then he'd be 'resting' again and I'd have to wait for the next time.

I do wonder if the outside time is why we had so many problems at bedtime, although he didn't show any symptoms. (Daddy has allergies, but Baby came with a cough and runny nose. Being outside seemed to ease that a bit.)
Saturday night we had a baby who wouldn't sleep, wouldn't settle. Wouldn't eat, wouldn't suck, didn't want held, didn't want put down. Finally decided he must be in pain and reluctantly gave him some baby ibuprofen, and he ended up sleeping through the night. Woke up around six for a diaper change and a refill, and back to snoozeland until almost ten. Two @4 hour sleeps in a row. I can rule the world today!

I had to take them home Sunday afternoon, and Hailey got up and started getting dressed and dressed up for the event. She's also making very sure that I plan to take Bubby home, too, and not just her.
She was  ready to go, and the situation was the same as yesterday -- she and I  the only ones awake.

She did get her kite "flied", and came in all sunshine and smiles.

Now, back to the sad, empty, and endless job of cleaning the house and the sadness of putting the toys away.
But not too "away." They WILL be back, and soon.

Hailey has already called and asked about "next time."
Warren yelled for "At-at Ya-ya"

Yeah, they'll be back. Soon.