JUST Do Your Job

Another government shutdown looms.
Why?

Well, many will tell you it's the president's fault.
Or the Speaker's.
Or the guy who talked for hours without saying anything.
Or -- someone else.

First of all -- who cares? Fix it NOW, fix the blame later.

We elect people to govern this country.
And THAT is their job: to govern the country.

So what if the president doesn't agree with their plans and doesn't sign?
Don't they know that that is covered in their job description?
They have the power to do their job without the president's approval.

How?

By going ahead and doing their job.
 Again.
Day after day, hour by hour.
Just like you and I when we go to work (or went to work, in the days when employment existed.)

Had they been DOING THEIR JOB all along, things would not have got down to this -- again. They would have learned from the last debacle, and the one before that, and the one before that.
Instead, they are either placing blame or throwing their hands in the air saying "What's the use? It's not going to be signed anyway."

Presidential vetoes can be overrode by a united Congress that is doing its job. (Not signing IS a veto. A/k/a  a pocket veto.)


If these people worked in the private sector, they would have been fired after the last time this happened.
Many of these people have fired employees for less.

I think they should be fired.

Remember, when election time comes, that it's not their fault, it's someone else's, that they are NOT doing their jobs, and you -- Yes, YOU -- decide whether or not they get fired, or if you will allow them to give themselves a raise and blame it on the figurehead.

September

I love the autumn.

Not just the beauty of the color changing tree, of the land slowly baking under long days of slanting sun.

There's also the scents -- dry, dry, dry leaves, grains, grasses, weeds. The washed earth as the harvest is gleaned from the depths. The wood cuts and stacks for winter warmth.

I love the feel of the air on my skin. A lingering caress as warmth says a lingering farewell, with reminders that it will return -- someday.

I love the tastes of fresh produce, the good clean tangy taste that is in the air, not the mouth. (I'm not real crazy about the taste of pumpkin spiced everything that has become a cultural norm, but I like that it exists and is everywhere to remind me that it is again glorious Fall.

I like the sounds; the plop of fruit dropping from trees, the crisp crunch of leaves, the crickets drowning out the cicadas. (This is the first summer in my memory where I have ever sat on the porch and heard the crickets and cicadas together in concert.)

 I enjoy these other senses as I do wait for the visual changes. The sky is shading into that deep October blue shade, but the trees and plants are only just beginning to turn. For now they are yellow, brown, withering.


Will this be a Golden Autumn, with trees of gold and yellow and orange?
Will it be a flaming autumn, when the leaves are red and copper and magenta?

Will the green tarry a while, or will it vanish over night?

I can't wait to find out, and yet I must.

The season itself cannot be gathered until ripe.

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.

Cooling Off

Cooling off seems to be the trend this week, after an uncomfortable start.

The weather started out hot and humid; a mini heat wave, the forecasters called it. We had two days with heat alerts or some sort of weather warning. Hot and humid making the 'humiture' three digits. It was nasty out, that's for sure. I usually open Rex's door for a couple hours every day, but not this week. We kept the door closed and that nasty stuff outside. We even turned his air conditioner up on high a time or two. At night, we could turn it on low fan.
Tomorrow we could be flirting with some light scattered frost notices, although nothing of the sort has been mentioned as yet. I just won'e be surprised if it happens. Two heat alerts and a frost advisory all in  the same week.
Yes, it must be September here in Ohio.

I had some disturbing mail earlier in the week -- see the previous blog entry. That, too, cooled off, and very nicely, too. Seems it was all a tempest in a teacup. One of those not-quite-AI-computers applied and rejected Rex for a program that the humans never applied him for, because he didn't qualify. I'm not sure why he doesn't, but since we've never had it, it's okay.
Makes me curious, but it's okay.
All that took was a phone call.

Tracy finalized her surgery dates; I got approval to get the medical tests I need; and Tammy got Hailey's birth certificate and turned it in to the school.

Done, and done, and done.
A satisfactory end to the week, and a reason to not dread the coming week. That's a good deal, any day.

Benefit Bafflement.

Got new letters today from the Department of Jobs (hahaha) and Family Services today. I thought it would be about cutting food benefits, since that has been big in the news lately.
I  was wrong. We get a ten dollar increase.
How did that happen?

Rex also got a letter from the same place. He gets other/different benefits because of his disabilty, so he occasionally gets his very own letters. He's the only one in the family with any type of medical coverage.
His letter says that they denied his Qualified Medical Beneficiary application. The reason given is that his income exceeds the program eligibility standards.

Now, the QMB has been covering the cost of his Medicare payments, and his drug program. (Medicare parts B and D). The cost for the Part B was in excess of $100 a month. We don't know about Part D, because he never had that before we had to go for help after I lost my job.

So, I go online to see if I'm correct about the QMB being that program, and find that yes, I am right. It is that program. Okay, so that means $100 less per month.
That must be why we get $10 more in food benefits!

But I read on, on the website/page that explains all this and the page clearly states that  the income level for him to qualify is @ $200 more than he gets.
So -- what the hell is going on?

It's after business hours today, so there's no finding out anything.

But it makes no sense to me.
Did someone have a bad day?
Did someone make a mistake?


Oh, and about my other problem I had with Medicare Part B -- I got a letter Saturday that explained they would only pay once a month for the drugs, no matter what the prescribed dosage, etc. Now they tell us, after we'd figured it out and resolved the issue.

On the whole, it is what it is. We can live (survive) on less money. We can manage with no health coverage. We can pay his insurances because he does need/use/benefit from them regularly. Nothing financial is fatal, although the health care issues could be. Any help we are grateful for.

But I really think there should be more explanation than what was given.

Stay tuned for the next dramatic act in "If it's Not One Thing, It's Another," a/k/a My Life.

Fading Out

Rex is down to 84 pounds. He is better but not doing as well as the doctor thinks he should be, and has given him a prescription for prednisone. He told Rex about all the drawbacks with the daily prednisone. the most concerning is that it can cause osteoporosis. Rex already has severe osteoporosis. Oh, yay, Rex gets to choose between working bones or working lungs, when neither is working as it is, and never will work correctly ever again. At least the prednisone gives him a little bit of an appetite.

And Tracy tells him to "Get well." Like that is ever going to happen.
And she starts yelling at me when I tell her so.
Why?
Because she doesn't want to think about it.
I guess I do. It's my favorite reflection, I guess. How much more miserable he will get, how much frailer he will become, etc.
I'm already watching him disappear, one pound at a time. If he stays at a pound a month, that's 85 months before he disappears completely. @ 8 years. Of course he will be gone long before 0 pounds.
I wish I could go first, but then no one would take care of him.
Why not?
Because they don't want to think about it.

NOT My News

They say the world gets smaller every day, especially with the Internet so readily available.
I'm pretty sure the world is approximately the same size as ever, but people and how they communicate are very different.

What I'm not sure about is whether or not this is a good thing.

Easy access to the World Wide Web offers any business a larger audience for its product, whether that product is a twice weekly scribble, such as this blog, or selling services like Time-Warner Cable or Verizon, or marketing goods as Amazon does.
Big audience, big sales should somehow equal better service or maybe even (gasp!) better service for your Primary Customers.

Because really, even though the prospective market is there, if your product is for a targeted audience, wouldn't you rather hit the target? And isn't the closer you get to the bull's eye supposed to be better?

So why are local news stations featuring interstate and international stories instead of what is happening in their areas?

Most news stations are located in or near big cities. Most of these cities have vast suburbs, exurbs, metro areas, and sometimes overlap other cities. (Or sometimes not.)

In all these --urbs of these cities, there are many many things happening; things  that are newsworthy, especially to the residents and neighbors thereof. There are car accidents, barfights, break-ins, buildings giving way, murder, shooting, ambulance calls, fires, runaways, shoplifters.. Not every county, town, village, hamlet has all of these every day, although it seems the city does.
But one of them has one of these things happen, at the very least. Several of the outlying areas could have several things happening. You never can tell. And your local newa may never tell you.

The 'local' city's news, both on air and on social media, sees more importance in reporting a housefire across the country than one across the county. Somehow the availability of all this news minimizes what really is important to their 'local' audience.
The really annoying thing is many of these sations like to brag about how "Local"  they are. Some of them have "Local" as part of their program name. Some have "Local" as their website address.

So why, near Cincinnati, am I being inundated with news and news clips from Colorado and New Jersey, about mundane events such as runaways and bar fights. We had both of those two towns over, in all four directions.

Will we get to see out "Local" stories on the Denver news?

Bully Entertainment

How many of you are watching programs like Impractical Jokers or Deal With It?
You know, those shows where they bully people into doing stupid things?

Oh, you think it's not bullying, because they are getting paid for it?
It's not bullying because they agreed to it?
It's not bullying because they are just stupid for doing it and therefore deserve anything they get?
It's not bullying because it's funny?

Which of those excuses are not used by the REAL bullies of life?
Maybe the one about getting paid? You've led a charmed life to have never been the victim of a workplace bully/boss.

Money, of course, excuses all sorts of bad behavior in this world. Just look at our lawmakers.

Let's put aside the money issue. Children don't know too much about money,  nor do they value it as adults do.

Do you have or are you around young children?

What are they seeing when they watch you watching and laughing at these programs?
They see you, one of their role models, being amused and entertained by some people coercing other people into doing sometimes cruel, sometimes careless, sometimes dishonest activities. It doesn't matter what they are doing, or why.

The children see you laughing at the results of bullying.

How are you going to explain that to them?
How are you going to stop them from emulating this behavior that gets all this favorable attention from you?

What are YOU going to do?

Smoother Sailing

Babies have gone home, heart-breakingly early, but for the best. Best for them, best for me, best for where we all are in this crazy life.

Supposed to be taking my ailing daughter to the hospital to apply for their financial assistance program so she can get her gall bladder out before it kills all of us. She hasn't wakened yet -- sleep is a  healer and a small cessation of pain.
Anybody wanna bet the first thing she says will be "Why didn't you get me up?"

I could, of course. Make her start hurting again, make her NOT have to take responsibility for her own needs, for her own health care.
I think not. She needs to learn independence, something that she has somehow failed to learn.
She also needs to make her own medical decisions, because that is the law of the land.

Did she not learn, or was she not taught? I've thought often about this and have no definitive answer. Not teaching would be my failure; not learning would be hers.
It doesn't matter, anyway. That's in the past, and we -- I -- must go on from here and keep trying to get those lessons across.

Not easy, with her daddy's nurturing helpful dispensing of the knowledge that "Your mom knows how to do that."
I learned by doing, as everyone must.

Dad has an appointment with his pulmonologist this week. We have questions about headaches and a tickle in his throat.
Anybody wanna bet I'll end up being the one who asks the doctor about these issues, because he won't speak up? (I'm going to try, if I must, just reminding Rex he wants to ask about these things.)

This issue annoys me because it makes me sound like a bossy managing dictator, and not in a good way.

Yes, I'm bossy. I'm the oldest of eight, and I know no one in that situation who isn't bossy. It's part of the job description of oldest child ( of a multitude.)

Yes, I'm managing. Someone has to take care of things.

A dictator? Possibly at times. Waffling on decisions has to stop somewhere; decisions need to be made.

But I only look like one of those militant fat-ass Battleship Broad!

That said, I have had some sleep and feel capable. I hope that I can remain so, even when the sailing once again gets rough. As it will.
As I well know it will.

I'll be ready.
I hope.

At least, for a while, I'll be rested.

Mammaws are Only Human, too (Even me)

Today, I feel like the worst Mammaw in the world.
Because the baby cried all night.
Because In  yelled at him.
Because I pushed  Hailey off him.

Because I am going to have to take them home early, and I never, ever want to take them home early. I wish they could stay, longer and longer. This is Hailey's last weekend/week to stay here as OUR  Hailey. Next week she meets the world; she'll be becoming a different child. (She starts school,)
I wanted this to be a long lovely time to enjoy with her.

But she's anxious about school, wants her mommy for every head-butting dispute, is weepy and whiny and singing the ABC song, incorrectly and incessantly.

The little guy is teething. Yes, young as he is. He has not one but two teeth just below hid gums and the pesty things won't come through. Poor little guy.  Mammaw can give him pain med -- not really a good idea -- and rub numb numb on his gums (very carefully) but all these things wear off way before they can be readministered.
He has chewed bigger holes in his nipples so now he drowns himself in milk and chokes. That is 4 nipples in about 36 hours.

Then there are the residents of my home. Rex is chronic, and Tracy is having a crisis. She's had intermittent gall bladder problems, and in this last week it's become constant. She went to the ER twice in the last ten days, but it's not quite bad enough for them to be able to help.

Took her to the doctor yesterday, kids in tow.
They were astonishingly good in the boring old waiting room for almost two hours. (Maybe that's why they had problems later on. They used up all their ability to be good.)

Anyway, Tracy is still in pain and trying to learn to deal with it, but in the meantime she wants cuddling and soothing that should be the babies' purview. (We all want our mommies when we're sick, even if they never really did anything for us. Such an odd facet of humanity.)

Anyway, the nine hundred bazillionth time I had to get up with Fussy Baby, in the wee small hours of the morn, I sat and cried with him in my arms.
When that didn't help, I put him in the playpen and I went outside on the porch to cry alone.

Baby Warren yelled at me, and I yelled at him. He can make quite an astonishing amount of sounds now.
It would have been funny if it wasn't so heartbreaking breaking.

I hope the little ones and their parents know if it were a necessity they could of course stay. That I would expect them to.
I hope they all know the little ones will always be welcome here and understand that some Times are just a little more difficult to live through.
I hope I hope I hope.

And still I feel like the worst Mammaw in the world because I am having such a hard time coping.

I feel so old and inadequate.

Crisis at Mammaw's house, I am ordering you to pass.
Mammaw just wants to be Mammaw again.