My uncle Howard died a few days ago. He was my mother's favorite person in her family. He used to be married to her sister many many years ago, but he stayed in the family even after they divorced. He went into the hospital to have bypass surgery. He was having problems with fluid around his heart and had had a heart attack sometime last year. He was 78 years old. Before he went in for the surgery he spoke to my mom and told her that he was afraid. Maybe he knew that he wasn't going to make it. He didn't do well with the surgery and his recovery was slow. He was in an induced coma for several weeks because of complications. I think he regained consciousness only a few times during the five weeks he was in the hospital. Earlier this week he became seriously ill and they realized that he was not going to make it. He was removed from life support on Wednesday. I've always heard from my mom that he was a great person. She's known him for 50 years and said he was always so generous and kind hearted. He was hardworking and had a lot of money but you wouldn't know it to look at him. He made his living as a recycler. He used to go to the dumps and find things to recycle or sell. If you passed him on the street you might think he was homeless by his appearance. He didn't act like he had money but he never hesitated to help someone with it. I don't think he ever used it for himself because he lived very simply. What makes this so sad is the mentality of certain of my family members and their actions upon hearing of his passing. My aunt Jeanette, his ex-wife, is a thief and a liar. When she found out that my uncle was dead she immediately went over to his house and cleaned him out. He kept money in the house, quarters in jars and several thousand dollars cash in a box. This money was to go to my other aunt who lived with him. She was his sole beneficiary. When she came home from the hospital she found that everything was gone. My aunt Jeanette made up a story about receiving social security benefits to explain the sudden increase in cash flow. Everyone knows she took the money but no one will do anything about it. It sickens me to find out these things about my family. It's sad that the end of someone's life can be treated so callously by someone else. Sometimes it makes you wonder why the good have to die but the bad seeds get to hang around so long. I hope she gets what she deserves someday.

I've written about my mom's side of the family before. These people live by a different set of standards than most of society. Their mentality is take all you can get, even if it's from someone you know. They live at poverty level, living off of the state, scamming relatives for money or just stealing what they can't get any other way. My mom is one of the few of her siblings that has done anything to change that about their lives. She got away from them and did everything she could to keep me away from them. For that I am truly thankful. Apologies for the bummer post but this kind of thing just turns my stomach.

A few days ago I heard about a co-worker that was having problems at home and was now sleeping in his car. This person is married with three kids. I think that he and his wife are having marital problems. I'm just assuming this of course, I haven't spoken with him about it at all. The person that told me about his current situation did so in confidence because she was looking for a way to help him. She told me that she would offer him one of her rooms to stay in but she felt uncomfortable about it because she lives alone. She thought it would be too weird having him there with her, so she was wondering if I knew anyone that could help him. Her comment to me was that she hoped someone would do the same for her if it ever came to that. That comment got me to thinking. My husband and I have a two room apartment. The extra room is our office. I started thinking that maybe we should offer the room to my co-worker. The thought wouldn't leave me alone. I finally emailed my husband and told him the situation. I wasn't sure what he would say but I was very surprised when I received his response. He said that since we were in a position to help we should offer him the room, because we knew what it was like to be in that predicament and if I wanted to open our home to him, he would support me 100%. Wow. Is that awesome or what? My husband is a very wise and generous man. I forget that sometimes.

This was our situation a few years ago. My husband had lost his job and was unemployed for several months. At the same time our house was in foreclosure. We did everything we could to try to save it but finally realized that it was a lost cause. Things were very desperate for us because we needed to find a place to live but didn't have the income to meet the requirements of all of the apartments that we were looking to get into. The day came when we received the final eviction notice. That's the one that says that if you are not out of the house by a certain date and time, the sheriff will come and escort you and your stuff out. We were still going to church at the time and one of our closest friends there heard that we were moving and offered to help. During that conversation he learned about our situation. Our friend told us right there on the spot that we could stay with him and his family for as long as we needed. He didn't have to think about it or discuss it with his wife. He just opened his arms and his heart to two people (and two cats) that he knew needed help. I'll never forget his generosity. He didn't judge us, he didn't ask a bunch of questions, he just welcomed us into his home. Things worked out for us after that. We stayed with his family for a week and enjoyed their company. My husband started his new job that same week and we got the apartment we wanted with the help of my husband's parents who loaned us the money for the deposits and such. Remembering those days brought back the feelings of helplessness and despair that we went through. If we didn't have the help of friends and family I don't know what we would have done or where we would have gone. It's been five years since that happened. Now we have the opportunity to return the favor to someone else. I don't know if he'll take us up on our offer, but it's nice to know that we have the ability to help someone in their time of need. It may not be comfortable or pleasant but it is the right thing to do and that makes me feel good.

What's new with me you ask? Well, maybe you didn't ask, maybe you were just wondering when I was going to post something new, because it's been 6 frickin days already and it's time. Well, sorry to disappoint, but I've got nothing. Again. This really must stop.

I realized that on my site I like to tell stories about my experiences in life. Some are recent and some are past events. I don't really like to write about my every day experiences, like my morning drive, what I did at work, what I ate for lunch or what my groceries cost. To me these things are mundane and don't need to be related here. There are other sites that pull this sort of thing off very well, as they are good writers but I don't feel as though I should try it myself.

So, please be patient. I'm sure something interesting will happen soon that I can share with you.

In case you really needed to know or were interested in my every day activities, here is a run down of what I do. I work Monday through Friday. Monday evenings I watch 24 with Kiefer Sutherland. Tuesday evening I have Spanish class at the local community college. Wednesday is reserved for homework (blech). Thursday is Spanish class again (I'm doing well on the few quizes we've had so far. Out of 30-33 questions I only miss an average of 3. For me that's pretty good). Friday or Saturday night I go dancing with my friend (we're taking lessons at the club and they are more advanced than what we were taking before. We must be good dancers though because we've been able to learn the moves). Sunday is lazy day and I try my best to do nothing at all.

Oh yeah, tomorrow I have jury duty. I'm supposed to call between 11:00 a.m. & 12:00 p.m. because I may have to report at 12:45 p.m. Whatever happened to showing up at 8:00 a.m.? I think it's silly and the whole jury duty systems needs to be revised. I don't get paid for it either. I wouldn't mind serving if I got paid for it. I think it's too much of a burden to put on people if they are not compensated for their time. Well, maybe it will give me something to write about.

I stole this from Mental Tech...My first car.

I didn’t get my license to drive until I was 21 years old. I didn’t do any driving in high school because we didn’t have the money for lessons and never really had a stable car to drive. My step-dad was a BMW mechanic. Instead of fixing our cars he would bring home his clients cars and drive those around. Yeah, I know, not a cool thing to do. My step-dad bought me my first car. It was a 1970 VW Fastback. It was white and had around 250,000 miles on it and we paid $300.00 for it. The car sat for a long time after we got it because it was always breaking down and I could never get my step-dad to work on it. My husband’s dad was a mechanic too and he said he would fix it for me. He spent a lot of time on that car for which I was oh so thankful.

Let me describe to you how messed up this car was. The paint had oxidized and looked like powder. You could rub your finger on the paint and it would leave a white residue behind. Both fenders in the back were pushed in. It looked like a giant had tried to pick the car up and accidentally squeezed too hard. The door seals had rotted out and when it rained I would end up with an inch or two of water inside the doors and on my floor. When I would stop at lights the water would rush up from the back and soak my shoes. Also, because there was so much water inside my car I would have to squeegee my windshield from the inside before I could drive it anywhere. The driver’s seat had rusted in position so I needed to use a pillow to be able to reach the pedals. One day my mom borrowed the car to run some errands. As she was driving down the road not too far from our house she heard an awful sound. She turned around and went back home. Come to find out that the engine had fallen out. The braces holding it to the frame just gave way and there was the engine, just hanging there. I drove the car for maybe a year before it finally died for good. My husband took it to visit a friend. They lived 15 miles away. On his way home the car broke down and he ended up walking home in the middle of the night. Even though the car was a constant pain to deal with, I cried when the tow truck came to take it away. It was after all my first car.

Thanks to my super smart computer savvy husband I now have a new look for my blog. Woo hoo!

When I came home from school last night he showed me the template and asked me what I thought about it. He’s always looking for something new for his blog so I thought that maybe it was for him. I told him I liked it but I didn’t think he should use it because it had a flower and men don’t put flowers on their blogs. At least that’s my opinion. Then he suggested that I use it instead. I thought why not? It’s time for a change. So he asked me a bunch of questions on how I wanted it to look and spent the rest of the evening tweaking it to look just right. When I got up this morning to peruse my site and my favorite links, there it was all pretty for me. I think he did a fantastic job. Thank you Hon. It looks great.

I occasionally have these “moments” in my life where I just miss it. I miss the details about something and go off of an assumption of what I think is true and correct. If I would just take the time to think and consider the situation and double-check the facts I could avoid these precious “moments”.

I bought a car a year ago this month. It’s a 2003 Toyota Camry and had 23,000 miles on it. I knew it was time to get it serviced when I checked the mileage earlier this week and saw that I was now at 45,000 miles. I thought that seemed high, since I only drive to work and back. I even mentioned to my husband how high my mileage was and couldn’t figure out how I had racked up so many miles in a year. I scheduled my service and arrived for my appointment this morning. The nice man that came to help me asked what I needed and I responded that I was in for my 45,000 mile service. He checked my odometer and says “Oh, you’re only at 35,450 miles. You must have been looking at the trip meter.” Huh? The what meter? I suddenly felt that a “moment” had snuck up and bit me on the ass. Apparently, there are three meters recording mileage on my car. One is the odometer, and then there are two “trip” meters. I use one to check my mileage per tank of gas but the other I just ignore. Why? Because. I mean, what do I need two trip meters for anyways?

I was relieved to find out that my mileage wasn’t as high as I had thought, but I sure did feel silly about it. The upside? It gave me something to write about. I feel like such a girl.

Well, I had this great post that I wanted to share with you but I got vetoed by my husband. It seems that the subject matter (interesting places we've had sex) was a little too revealing for him. I guess it makes sense since there are co-workers and family members that read our blogs, but it really was a good post and I thought most people would get a kick out of it. Oh well, I guess I'll have to find something else to write about. Soon. Right now, I've got nothing. Zip, zilch, nada.