A Different Kind Of Driveway Moment

Minnesota Public Radio, aka MPR, uses that term a lot, particularly during pledge drives when reminding us how valuable their programming is to us. It refers to our hearing something so worthwhile to us that we sit in our driveways until it finishes, rather than leaving the car. I've had a few of those myself.

This is a different kind of driveway moment, and while I personally haven't had one of these, I fully understand the need.

I have several women I spend time emailing back and forth with. More than one of them are or have been stuck in a situation where they are a primary caregiver for somebody they love who needs nearly round-the-clock care. Their own needs come last, of course, affording them precious few for themselves, for private time, refresh and renew time, vent time.  Add in covid's further isolation, even the worry for another loved one battling its serious effects, and life becomes overwhelming.

This particular excerpt comes from an email conversation with a friend who's in both situations right now, caregiver for one, worried frantic about another. She found her own driveway moment yesterday.

"______ is still on all the machines, but responding, tired, is now in a bed tilted at 45 degrees & can sit up?.....couldn't tell from text if he has yet talked or is "awake" at times, or still sedated.....so we don't ask....just accept what we can find out and grateful to be informed.

But after shopping Costco, had another little errand to get stuff at Walmart without _____ because he hampers my routine when uses the stroller and he was tired from the earlier Costco thing. ANYHOW, when I was in the car by myself......I just screamed out loud and swore and banged on the steering wheel, kept screaming & crying & swearing & cussing everyone I think is evil and corrupt and liars & shouting at _______ to hear me and get well, you have lots to do ..........I never did that before.....it felt good."       

My response was simply to let her know how glad I was that she could find that moment for herself and encourage her to find more. Sometimes it's all one can do, and hope for a moment it's enough.

Fighting With The Corporations, Part 2

I hadn't realized when I started this pairing that both posts involve an insurance company. It's the same insurance company since both my house and car are insured by the same one. The fight part is with separate companies, however. Last time it was the roofer. Now it's the insurance company.

It started three years ago. No, not the insurance issue, the issue causing the claim. I just never reported it and that's most of the problem.

I have full windshield replacement coverage. Arizona turns out to be full of rocks - who knew? - a decent percentage of which manage to creep out on roadways and wait for passing vehicles to pick them up and carefully aim them at the windshields of following ones. I have this reluctance to actually use my insurance coverage in the firm belief that even unavoidable claims tend to increase my premiums. You know, experience. Plus, back when this started, I'd already just had a claim in to the company after a piece of tire tread from a semi flew off and hit my bumper, mandating a replacement. That was in Minnesota, apparently home to more rubber pieces than rocks.

This time we were returning from Kartchner Caverns down by Benson, AZ. Highly recommended, by the way. But it was winter by the calendar, and snow surprised us as we emerged from the cave. By the time I got back on the freeway, heat was blasting along the inside of the windshield to help maintain visibility. The contrast in temperature with freezing air outside meant that when the rock took aim, it didn't just star the windshield, but left long lines trailing off in both directions horizontally. No chance of just a star patch. I'd need a new windshield.

I postponed doing anything. By the time we passed Tucson, the crack hadn't advanced from where it first appeared, all on the passenger side. Drove Steve nutty, but no problem at all from the driver's viewpoint. I was also petty sure that as soon as I fixed it I'd get another rock, and off we'd go again. 

About a year later I did get that next rock. That peculiarly loud CRACK! is unmistakable. I looked all over the windshield and couldn't find a thing. I was in the habit of tracking the original crack by running my finger across the end of the crack and seeing if the crack passed the line my finger left. It never moved. Nothing else started. Until....

Something like a year ago, but in the heat of summer, I took the car into the dealer for some maintenance. They "rewarded" my patronage with a free carwash. It must have sat out in the sun for a while between finishing the work and getting the wash, because the cold water on the hot windshield helped me locate where that second rock hit. All I had to do was follow the two new long curly cracks back to their one starting point, way down on the bottom, behind black shadow and a wiper blade. Now it was time to get that windshield fixed.

Of course, inertia, covid, lack of need, avoidance of everything and everybody, all yielded a predictable result: it's not yet fixed. Rich and Steve now have both been nagging me about replacing it, including a recitation of how serious various states take that kind of thing, even though I promise you those cracks do not interfere with my vision. 

The final impetus was the coupon. It's on the back of my Fry's grocery receipt... and Steve's receipts and Rich's receipts. It may surprise you but none of those places are things I actually look at. But it's a coupon for $75 in a cash card for any windshield replacement fully paid for by the insurance company. OK, I'm finally sold.

However, it's gotten hard to schedule where my car is going to be a few days into the future. I mean, there were shots, doctor visits, club obligations, a whole lot of which are "maybes", depending upon things we couldn't predict. With most of those resolved, we're down to simple procrastination, finally ended this morning when I'm pretty sure the calendar entries are what's what for a week. By now I had a completely different question for the insurance company as well, so it really was time to make that call.

So far, so good. I'd prepared by going out to the car to get the insurance card with the policy number on it, as well as all those extra letters at the end of my model that apparently mean something about my car being a little different from those other Hyunday Accent hatchbacks as far as the windshield (or every other bleeding part like tires, battery, fuel filter, wiper blades... with nobody able to tell me why.) Anyway, armed with all the needed info, or so I thought, I hit the phone for their auto insurance division.

"This number is out of service. Google will be recording this call..." Instant hang up on my part. WTF? OK, I called the homeowners branch and got transferred to the right person with little hassle by what is usually an idiotic and incomprehensible voicemail program in any other company. Smooth as our sweet dog's ears this time, sent to the correct person in short order.

So why is this a "fight"?

I got transferred to the person who would start my claim file for me. She asked the exact date of the claim.  OK, so after three years, who has that? I probably blogged about it, but right then this wasn't handy and the research would take a bit. Steve and I guessed the month, threw in a day, with the explanation of how the crack had happened, etc., adding at the end we weren't trying to do any insurance fraud, we/I just hadn't reported it until now because reasons.

What was our policy number? I had that, gave it. She repeated it back to me, incorrectly. How about our address? I started wondering if I had suddenly started speaking Mandarin without somehow realizing it, because I would give a name or a number and it would be repeated back clearly, but wrong. How does an 8 sound like a 6, or Arizona sound like Missouri?

Once that got straightened out, she started looking at how far back I'd carried their insurance. Way back before this first rock, I knew. Had they maybe changed my policy number? If so, nobody told me. She warned me I might have to pay for the whole windshield. I decided to look for proof, heading to the back of the house where tax documents are stored. Those files have shrunk every year since I retired, but I still keep any 1099s, all my bank statements, credit card receipts, etc. I hoped the insurance information with policy number had gotten filed, but no. However, insurance payments are on auto-deduct from the bank, always on the 15th, so all I needed was the year in question's tax file and any month's statement. There they both were, house and car payments. Before the rock. Would that help? 

Not really. But let's go ahead with other information. Did I have a (...jargon...) windshield? I decided I needed to head outside and take an actual look at it. I've only looked through it for 125,000 miles so what did I know? I look down or straight when I drive. Not much pavement as a rule up in the sky. Did she mean there across the top where there was a 4" band of color shading? You know, usually behind the lowered visors and rear view mirror, that part of the windshield? Because if that was what she meant, yup, I did. (I guess this means I get that shading again.)

What kind of hatchback do I have?  Two door? Four door? Does it have a trunk (aka couldn't I tell a hatchback from a sedan? Grrrrr.) I thought for half a second and informed her it is a 5 door! Another question sent me to another part of the house for information, and on and on, back and forth enough so that we were finally both laughing at how I was at least getting my exercise this morning.

Since the only issue in her mind was whether their company was actually responsible for this claim, I was instructed to write down a couple numbers, prompting yet another walkabout to locate pen and paper along with place to sit where I could write while on the phone. Did I want to use their own company for replacement? She could cite my benefits in doing so. I declined. Was I sure, because.... No. Well, then what's the phone number of who I'd chosen? Back to the coupon, different part of the house than the last question had taken me. She called it. Wait a minute. Wrong number, not their main office: did they have another number on the coupon? Sure did. She called and this time verified information with them. (Now that first number was at least a contractor for the company. Couldn't she have asked them for that office number? Too easy? Yeah, I know.)

Now I was told to wait for two different emails to come through before I was the one to actually call the window company. The first would verify that they were working with my insurance company but couldn't verify my deductible, aka $0. but it would have one of the numbers she'd had me write down, proof that they were the real deal. The second would have both a second number I'd written down but also show my deductible, aka proof that the insurance company had actually verified I was insured with them for the incident in question. I would be able to set up an appointment to get my new windshield only after that second one came through, or risk paying the whole bill myself. She also warned me that most of these companies were booking two or three weeks out from getting their first call.

Once done, my paranoia was prodded enough to go back into old tax returns to prove for my own satisfaction  as well as be armed in case the insurance company tried to deny coverage that I'd actually been paying them well before that first rock attack. The first packet I grabbed was 2016, and right there on top of the stack it was. The real shock was noting that my premiums back then were a third of what I'm paying now!

I turned the computer back on to check my email. Both emails were there. I called and set up an appointment for Thursday. Yes, this week. They had several openings to pick from that day.

If I collect another rock on Friday I'm calling the insurance company right that day. Or maybe Monday. Or....

Fighting With The Corporations, Part 1

Apparently, my back isn't hurting enough to prevent me from taking on two different battles, one nearly a year old, the other postponed for three.

First, the roof. Skye Builders is the company which reached out to me about loose/missing/folded shingles after a March 18 windstorm. It turned out they were hoping for a full roof replacement for this house. My insurance company took a look and authorized replacing 11 shingles, some of the hail-damaged turbines which bleed hot air from the attic, and the highest buck item, removing and later replacing properly the solar panels in order to do the shingle work. They sent the check. To me. 

Good thing.

Skye was only very intermittently in communication with me over the next many months. What was going to be done in two weeks is... still waiting. There were excuses. The assessor was over-booked. They found a new issue justifying a full roof replacement (which happened to be a second roof under the first, which to me simply meant the very rare rain would have twice the trouble wending its way down to where it could cause any damage to the house.) They simply went away for months, waiting for the insurance company to change their mind. That was fine with me. It's not like we'd had any rain, right? The money sat in my savings account earning, uh, a whopping $.38. Whoopee! Profit! I mulled over having a handyman with some roofing cement secure or replace the shingles and calling it a day, but never pursued that thought. 

Last week they called again. Apparently my insurance company's adjuster was standing firm on the 11 shingles bit. I was relieved, since I'm on the hook for a quarter of the replacement, and a whole roof would be a big pinch. Did I still want Skye to do the work? (What, are you that desperate? Having problems getting customers?)

I invited them over for a chat. The owner himself showed up this time. There were new issues in the past year. Pigeons, primarily. My roof held enough fertilizer to feed every tree and plant in my yard for the next decade. No problem, they'd just power wash before they started. (Mental note made to get Rich to move everything our from under that gap over the patio where its roof was added after the house was built, and which for the last few years has been leaking onto the patio and running across its floor and on to the ground beyond: it won't be just water coming down this time. Also get things sitting on the floor up and off it. All of which he promptly did.)

OK, then how about that roof join? One of their guys promised as their apology for the delay about half a year ago to run a fat bead of silicone along that gap to seal it and prevent dripping. Nope, I heard now, that wasn't me who said that, and no-can-do. Wouldn't work anyway, he decided after a new walk on the roof, because jargon-jargon-jargon somebody had done something weird in previous incarnations of roof construction and repairs, so a new flange would need to be shoved up under what was sitting there to bridge the gap and shuttle water out far enough on to the patio roof to drain further outward. Plus now that he'd looked closely at it, 12" wasn't going to do it. It needed 24".

By the way, I should really get some kind of a vertical jargon thingy on the far edge of that patio roof to keep the pine straw from collecting there. Well, I liked the flange part for that gaping joint, but don't care about the pine straw: it's kind of amusing to watch the baby cacti work to grow up in that crack, rooted in air and a few pieces of pine straw every year after we've removed their predecessors. 

How about the turbines? After another roof trip, he declared replacing them was going to require going down through both sets of shingles and a wide area around the current mounts. Or they could leave the old ones in place and just put up dormer vents. He never explained how those wouldn't need to do the same things, since they had to reach attic air as well. I chose not to ask. This last summer was the only one we plan to spend here again. No new or repaired venting is in the contract. Perhaps in the future....

He explained the difficulties of getting shingles to stick to older shingles because they'd been painted, and I had to bite my tongue to keep from asking whether he ever heard of roofing nails. Might take a few extra whacks each...

Returning the conversation to the pigeon problem, as the wind picked up a bit and a few pellets were hitting just over our heads on their way earthward, I inquired how, once the project was done, we could keep the pigeons from returning. He came up with two things, both of which I approved. One was installing a pair of a kind of a whirly-gig contraption mounted near the roof peak. Each has a short vertical stem, then three side branches off the top which each hold a chromed rounded half cup. Any bit of a breeze sets them moving, the shininess accentuates that movement, thus making the birds very uneasy. Others people's roofs are suddenly found to be much more agreeable. Then he would wrap the sides of the solar panels with a metal mesh which would keep the birds from thinking they could snuggle under them for nesting. This of course would be very difficult because jargon too short jargon clamps jargon.

We'd discussed prices for each part of what needed to be done, including those initial 11 shingles without removing and replacing those solar panels.  He promised to start Saturday, if I would respond to his emailed estimate listing job details and the prices we'd discussed. My reply to the one covering those details would be considered my legal signature, he'd stop for the first half payment, second upon completion. We shook on it. There was a little glitch - of course, right? - where he forgot to include the part about wrapping around the solar panels in his proposal so it had to be amended, but I carefully worded my reply each time to make sure all knew what I was agreeing to. 

The crew would start 8:00 AM Saturday.

Uh huh. 

About 10:00 AM he called. They were still finishing a job from yesterday that ran long but would be there in about half an hour. Ahem, cough cough, the whirly gigs were not, in fact, available anywhere locally. He'd had to order them online, and wait for their delivery. I settled for suggesting that it was really good it wasn't Christmas right now, so I could expect they wouldn't take weeks to arrive. I'm not sure if his chuckle was because he found that funny or was uneasy about meeting my implied deadline. You know, track record and all that.

The crew was two men. The pressure washer turned out to be only a blower. There was a lot of banging for a while, which I determined to be the flange going in, as attested to by the jagged cut off piece on the ground next to the patio. By this time I was outside in the back yard, kinda faking yard work, watching their progress. So far as I can see, no shingles have been replaced. It's a shallow roof, so I had to step back to the farthest corner to see even part of the bottom of the rear solar panels. There was a big mound of "stuff" under the end, a combination of pine straw and pigeon poop.

It was still there when they came to the front door to (try to) inform me that their part of the job was finished. After inviting one of them into the back corner of the back yard and pointing to it, both returned to the roof for another 15 minutes of work. While I'm not sure where it went, the pile disappeared from where it was. I was positive for a bit that, while one fellow was on the topside of the panels using a broom or something to sweep  crap off to the side of the panel and down off the roof,  clearly landing on the ground, the other was aiming his blower up under the bottom of the panels, hiding the crap as if the panel were a rug where it would never be found again, nor leach nasty brown stains down the shingles, possibly back flowing under the flange as well, in the event it ever rains here again. He seemed to notice me staying there, and eventually a small bunch of stuff was blown sideways, off the roof on the other side. I wasn't too impressed, but not ready to argue when they left. I hadn't proof. Rich was unavailable, and I don't do ladders.

I had Rich take a good close up look via ladder today to see what exactly was done in back. He reported that my suspicions are correct, crap is piled under the bottom of that section of solar panels. After cooling off a bit, and incidentally having a late lunch while I did, I called the owner of Skye. I started with letting him know we had a problem, that his crew was cheating both him and me. He asked a couple questions, then thanked me for the feedback. It he's not there, he doesn't know how the job is being done. He added once the mail brings his package, he personally will be out here to finish the job... correctly! This time it will include a washer, so long as I have no problem with his using our water.

Nope, no problem at all. I'd already figured that into the project. It comes with a bonus, since all water falling off the patio roof hits the dripline roots of the pine tree, still thirsty after last summer's punishment. Better, it comes with fertilizer this time! Yummy. I bet this incarnation of our roof cactus approves too.

Now I'm just waiting.

A Bit Too Much Work

I finally figured it out: it was the raking that did it. Not, as you may expect, raking leaves, little twigs, grass or pine straw. This is Arizona, a suburb with zoning restrictions, so what was getting raked was rocks. 

Our back yard fills with pine straw on a monthly basis, or even more often right now since spring winds knock it down regularly. Being cheap, I've hired getting that part of the raking done but only on an annual basis. Leaves do fall off our few very young trees, and bushes need pruning, but most of that I do myself when able. It may take the whole 9 months we're usually down here, but I manage. While I'm picking up behind dogs, I may as well collect a few branches as well. None of that is why I need to rake rocks.

It's because of a couple wanna-be yard clean-up guys. The first came knocking at the door, looking to make $50 in exchange for raking the back yard pine straw and pine cones. He was hoping to afford an engagement ring. We agreed to the deal. Once he was paid, we took a better look at the yard. Yes, the stuff he agreed to remove was gone. However, the river rock beds which border the back yard had huge amounts of their rocks raked into the rest of the yard.

You may well ask, so what? Well, they're very noticeable, first of all. Some idiot previous owner had taken the rest of the back yard, covered it with uniform smaller rocks, spread out evenly and semi-flat, then cemented everything in place with a dark green coating. 'Cause, you know, they just can't give up their illusion of grass, I guess.

They may be savvy enough not to bother to try to grow it, wasting all the water and the energy to keep it mowed, but still, flat & green. So river rock stands out. It also trips you up as you walk across it without picking your way carefully. That green stuff is already bad enough and old enough that large patches of it have loosened and been removed so it's uneven enough all by itself. The river rock just makes it worse.

If that wasn't already bad, the crew for this last cleanup, including a major pruning of the pine tree clearing out swaths of branches which had died over this last record hot summer, included the otherwise unemployed brother of the head of the crew. He need to both look and be busy. We had specified before work started that we wished the yard "blown" as the final pick-up. In other words, a powered air blower lifts the light straw and leaves  into a pile on top of a tarp to be hauled away. It leaves the rocks in place!  But dear brother just couldn't do something that simple. Or perhaps it was he couldn't do something quite that complicated. While the pruning was going on, he was digging his rake into all the rock beds knocking everything he could reach out into the main yard. Besides leaving a rocky mess, a lot of those (expensive to replace) rocks got raked up onto the tarp and hauled away to the landfill.

But there were still a great plenty needing to be returned to their border beds. I nominated myself for the job. I could do it in small patches, and get the damn things where I really wanted them. I didn't charge for my services either, feeling my reward was both in the progress in making the yard look nicer but in getting exercise without risking covid exposure like I would walking in the pools.

I had rakes, both leaf and garden varieties, moved down here back in 2012. By now they are likely 20 years old, and wear their age. The business ends are rusty, and the wood cracked and splintery. Gloves are a must - I know! - but they still have enough strength to be useful. The leaf rake does the job without digging up more rocks, most of the time. Patches of green chunk still break off but they've been undermined over the years between wind, foot traffic, and various animals not limited to dogs. (Tunnels are plentiful.) That part I don't mind, and larger chunks get tossed under the baby mesquite tree to provide mulch. The eventual plan is to get rid of all the green and replace it with pea rock or something easier on the feet than all the sharp angles on the red rock in the front yard. We can fall, after all. We shouldn't need to worry about bleeding out while we maneuver our way to vertical again.

I have discovered a tiny benefit to the concrete-like finish over the years. It keeps water from absorbing into the ground to support weed growth. Of course, that also keeps water from soaking into the ground to keep the pine tree alive. Or other desired plantings. Weeds can be sprayed or pulled, much more economical than watering. So still going ahead with the grand plan.

Back to raking. The garden rake being too heavy for the job means the leaf rake needs to make do. It's fairly flimsy, so more arm work is needed. The first few energetic days I went to bed with mild soreness. No biggee, it was gone by morning, and after several days of raking an hour or so, no longer a problem. That was good since I still had weeks of raking to go at my rate. The flimsiness of the rake means I adapted my own technique to the job, more of a sideways sweep then a pull-to-me stroke. It took a whole lot of motion, a lot of twisting, especially as each pile of rocks grew. Initially I took a dust pan, scooped them up, and dumped them where needed in the rock beds. That was great for the bare spots - and yes, there were plenty of those. But later, quantities of remaining rocks vastly outnumbered obvious dumping spots, and those dustpans full of rocks got pretty heavy to carry. So I just kept sweeping smaller patches further in order to get close enough to the border beds that I could just sweep really widely to kick those rocks up over the brick borders and into the beds. It worked! Yesterday I managed the largest big sweeps ever. That corner of the yard is finally finished.

As am I. When I came in and sat down, it was a big relief. When I tried to stand up again, not so much. Quite the opposite, in fact. My back loudly announced that it has exactly one semi-comfortable position. None of the other possible 75 positions are it. No compromise.  A full night's sleep made a big difference... until I really woke up and had to move.

I am blessed by two things. First, a large refill of the well-used bottle of ibuprofin in the bathroom. Long years of experience have taught me that I can tolerate the maximum dose of 800 mg., 4x a day. With food, of course - never a problem as long as I stay off the scale. Second, a son who understands the actual nature of the job needed and willingness, strength and time to finish the job for me. 

But excuse me, I'm needed down the hall. It'll be a while before I get back, since the back position needed to properly use that perforated paper off the little white roll on the wall is a long way from being that one comfortable one I previously mentioned. Even getting there and back again uses 9 more of the 75. Then it's time for more ibuprofin, reaching for which uses 3 more, so....

Never Quite The Same

There were some changes this visit. Steve, my son Rich, and I went to Gilbert Riparian Reserve yesterday. The guys hadn't been before. I was there several years back, but with my youngest, Paul, along on one of his visits. Possibly he was there more to assist me, like Rich was there to assist Steve. Last time I was on a scooter, shortly after one of my knee replacements. This time I was walking. But Steve needed his scooter, and that monster is so heavy that I can't break it down, load it, and put the pieces back in the car any more. Even Rich insisted that I never had been able to, but I was in great working shape years ago. I manhandled Daddy's scooter too. Honest! Of course, I took the batteries out from the heaviest part first.... So Rich came, but rather than walk the trails with us he decided to catch up on his sleep in the car while we were gone. 

But hey, still help.

This time both of us had cameras. (Paul isn't much of a photo enthusiast, though he can often get shots I can't if he's along, and does a pretty fair job of it.) Steve had just bought a new tripod and was giving it a whirl before we do our northbound sojourn. By the time he'd taken his first half dozen shots, he announced that it had already paid for itself. My hands are still steady enough to support my camera (the same kind as his, by the way), so I get by without one for now. I'm sure the day will come.

Last time was a much longer trip. When I was on my scooter, I could last as long as the trails did. Yesterday I made it around the first big lake and back to the parking lot, with pauses at every stop on a bench or large rock the place offered, which were a lot. My feet ached by the end as well. Steve made it only as far as I did, quitting first mainly because his back was bothering him. By the time he needed to head back, I was beyond protesting.

I wanted to. The back ponds have fewer visitors and different birds to shoot from closer viewpoints. The first time I was there several flocks of shore birds and dozens of turtles hung out where the shooting was good. Today a few turtles hid on rocks behind brush but no sandy strip of shore was lined with dozens - at least not where my route was. The shore birds stayed hidden out back. The ducks calmly swimming along a walkway last time were now frantically going after whatever a plethora of kids and parents were feeding them, so one good shot I managed to get was something of a miracle. But it was a great shot! The details in the feathers and the iridescence in the head were spectacular. Kind of a shame it was "just" a mallard drake. So ordinary in Minnesota.

There were some benefits to pooping out early. Having to sit on the benches to rest gave the smaller birds the security to come back and rummage for food within good camera range, enough so that a couple I'd never really seen before posed for a half dozen shots each, in much the same spots, so I could be fussy about which I kept and which were deleted. Bees visited close enough for portraits, even as fast as they flit between flowers, and shy gambel's quail dashed in and out of what I thought were just scenic shots of the water and surrounding trees, posing at just the right second. One bench was apparently a traditional feeding spot for a variety of ducks, and one little lady kept me company for quite a while, finally deciding that whatever was on the bottom was tastier than the nothing I offered.

I was disappointed about not getting a chance to shoot a great egret at one of those back ponds however, nor any herons like last time. I had taken pictures, but not good shots. My best egret shot cut off its tail and a heron was a blur of distant wings before the camera clicked. A green heron was so far away that I'd deleted the picture before I remembered there was supposed to actually be something in it. So imagine my delight when I snuggled up to a multi-trunked tree at water's edge to try for some ducks which were too far away anyway, when right by my feet an egret strolled past, seeking lunch. It was a small opening in the brush along the shore, and he wasn't dawdling, but I got time to get two shots off. This time, of course, one shot beheaded it, but the other one was perfect. I even had to zoom back in to include the whole bird! But I got it.

I would have danced the way to the car from there, but, well, I think those days are long gone.

I may have to bring my little scooter down again some trip when we're otherwise traveling light and have room in the car for it. Anyway, it gives Steve something to use for a trip to the post office or convenience story when we're up north, and me the means to hit the whole bike bath through town if I need it. Nice path, two miles, three benches. Let's not pretend it's just the 8,000,000 mosquitoes that keep me off it.

Them's Fightin' Words!

Or maybe just stupid. But I am making an assumption.

It was just a glimpse in the grocery store as we turned different ways at the aisle end, just enough to capture the concept boldly printed on her tee shirt that she chose her religious views over peace.

Now I get feeling strongly about whatever your religious/spiritual views are, whether or not they include any actual religion, whether or not that choice is different than mine. That's your right. But what if it's a false choice?

Here's where my assumption comes in, that since nearly all major religions ask for its followers to be peaceful, her views spring from one of those. That's the love part, the "do unto others" part. Sure, there's proselytizing, the mine-is-the-best-so-I-must-convert-you idea. But doesn't fighting, even killing to achieve that contradict the very core of those religious teachings? We humans have a very long history of killing each other over whose religion is best. Maybe that very history is why we need to pay attention to our religions, because we are a tribalistic species and need religion to teach us to be better. Religion is too often subverted to gain power over others.

Whatever else my religious views are, they are peaceful at the core. For me it's never a choice between them and peace. I find something very wrong with believing you must make that choice. But then I'm one of those people who are much more impressed with how you live your life than what particular set of words you use and when, or deity names you drop.

Never Say....

I heard this on TV this morning. "The Stephanie Miller Show" on the FSTV network is also simulcast as a radio show on AM channels which haven't been bought out by right-wing folks to air anything else, though always with worse ratings than Stephanie brought.  The comment came from a caller known as "Sue in Rockville" during a discussion trying hard not to celebrate the death of Rush Limbaugh. Yes, really trying. It was hard. He's done so much damage in his life, spreading hate, propaganda, misinformation, and hipocricy. 

Sue's mother always told her not to say anything about the dead unless it's good. Always respectful (of her mother) Sue came up with what I think is the perfect comment.

 "Rush is dead. Good."