The National Weather Service
Des Moines, IA
6:31 pm CST, Tue., Mar. 9, 2010

… DENSE FOG ADVISORY REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL MIDNIGHT CST TONIGHT…

A DENSE FOG ADVISORY REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL MIDNIGHT CST TONIGHT.

* SHORT TERM TRENDS… CONDITIONS ARE BEGINNING TO IMPROVE IN FAR SOUTHERN IOWA SOUTH OF HIGHWAY HIGHWAY 34. AREAS OF FOG WILL PERSIST THERE… BUT VISIBILITIES SHOULD RISE UP TO A MILE OR TWO. FURTHER NORTH… LITTLE CHANGE IN CONDITIONS IS ANTICIPATED THROUGH THE EVENING HOURS WITH CONTINUED WIDESPREAD DENSE FOG. VISIBILITIES OF A QUARTER MILE OR LESS WILL BE COMMON… AND EVEN DOWN TO A FEW HUNDRED FEET IN SOME LOCATIONS.

* IMPACTS… THE WIDESPREAD NATURE OF THE DENSE FOG AND EXTREMELY LOW VISIBILITIES WILL PRODUCE VERY HAZARDOUS TRAVEL CONDITIONS THROUGH THE EVENING. VISIBILITIES MAY BE NEAR ZERO AT TIMES… WHICH IS QUITE UNCOMMON FOR THIS TIME OF DAY. SEVERAL ACCIDENTS DUE TO FOG HAVE ALREADY BEEN REPORTED.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS…

A DENSE FOG ADVISORY MEANS VISIBILITIES WILL FREQUENTLY BE REDUCED TO LESS THAN ONE QUARTER MILE. IF DRIVING ALLOW FOR EXTRA TRAVEL TIME. SLOW DOWN… USE YOUR HEADLIGHTS… AND LEAVE PLENTY OF DISTANCE AHEAD OF YOU.

&&

SIGH.…

HELLO????  The earthquake in Chicago, felt in Iowa, was on a little known fault and now it shakes? After the huge one in Haiti? And then there is a bigger one in Chili? And this week in Turkey? EVERY WEEK??? Is no one paying attention to this but me? Is there something scientist are not telling us? Is the earth cracking apart bit by bit?

I’m not panicked but I sure as hell am concerned!! What is going on?????????

If anyone hears…let me know.

Sheesh.

Our 5 year old granddaughter loves our hayloft. LOVES IT!. Says every time she goes up there “grandma, this is the best place in the whole world!” And it is, especially if you are 5. With hay stacked 5 high at it’s highest, and stair stepping other places, and the whole loft huge, it makes for hours of fun. She and her grandpa have taken to going up there every time she comes out now and she has made herself and obstacle course for her and her grandpa to take. Jumping here, climbing there, peeking under, going over and she can do it for hours. But each time now, consistently, she stops at a certain point in the barn, points to the area, tells her grandpa to shush, because “there is an old woman sleeping there”. Every time. Doesn’t matter if she hasn’t been in the barn for weeks. She will still avoid the area and become really quiet going around it.

Kids know these things. Their innocent minds and spirits allow them to see what we don’t. Never doubt a child who tells you someone you cannot see is there. More than likely they are.

Our lady of the barn. I like it. Now I’m hoping to get our granddaughter to find out her story. I’ll let you know.

Today there was a news report of the growing concern of kids swallowing those very small button batteries. They are in your remotes, scales, thermometers, kids toys that make noise and more worrisome…those greeting cards you get that “sing”. In most kids toys, the batteries can only be removed with a tool, as a screw and cap keep most in. Check your kids toys!! If it is just a slide in cap, more than likely your genius toddler will soon figure out how to slide the cap off!! When you get a singing card, immediately remove and destroy the battery!! I know my 19 month old grandson loves gadgets. He examines them like a doctor, I am sure mostly to see how many buttons work and what they do, but examine them he does!! He is 19 months old!! The button batteries are incredibly easy to swallow. However…once they are swallowed, they immediately begin to corrode whatever they come in contact with. Because the symptoms mimic flu, most parents don’t know what happened until it becomes extremely serious and they finally do an x-ray!! 9 children have died from this and that is 9 too many!! Not to mention countless others with severe damage to their esophagus and lungs!! PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE… pay attention to this and right now go check your home for this silent problem!!

The second thing, and I know this one from experience, was a very small toddler who picked up and started chewing on the clear plastic wrap that a mother had removed from a bottle of infant/childrens tylenol.  You know what it is…that plastic that surrounds the lid that “if tampered with” you are to throw the product away? It comes on most meds for kids and adults now. And because it is clear, it is impossible to see in their mouths when the child is choking!! It gets over the airway and gets suctioned to the roof of their mouths and they can’t breathe and you can’t see it!! Always sweep the roof of their mouth to see if this is what is going on!! Always!! When my granddaughter was choking, it was on the clear plastic removed from the sticky part of a band-aid I had put on her a bit earlier!! Clear plastic that is soft, easily forms to the roof of mouths and they cannot breath!! Luckily I was able to feel it and pull it out!!I have hated those things ever since and always make sure to bury them deep in the garbage as soon as I remove!

To manufacturers.…if you have to wrap this stuff for our protection make it an easy to see color!! It is easier to see when it is dropped on the floor and easier to see if they put in their mouths!! Same goes for the covers on bandaids!! Make them visible!!! And for god sakes…use your heads and don’t make them red or orange or any color that blends in with the mouth!!!

We cannot watch our kids 24–7 even if we think we are the most alert parent in the world!! We cannot know what they will put in their mouths even though we scan their play area with an eagle eye! We cannot say they won’t put something in their mouth because “they know better” or “they never put things in their mouth”!!  Yes, they do and have probably swallowed stuff, that if you knew, would have you cringing. They are not bad kids intent on mischief. They are oral kids trying to figure life out and we have to be their guardians!!

Please write or call the manufacturers of these products and let them know this has to change. I am begging you to not let one more little life be lost because we are too lazy to make a call or write!! And check your stuff today!!

One minute I was sitting reading something, stood up to leave for an outing and bam…thinking “wow…that was weird” and it was downhill from there.

I have had occasional back issues. This one is on the side of my back along the spine, thank god, and not lower back, but yet is placed so, until yesterday, it was spasming every few minutes. I can take alot. A spasm that must feel like a cattle prod every couple minutes sucks.

What gets me every time I hurt my back is how much I use it. Right now, no matter how much I might want to, I could not get on the floor to play with the grandson nor pick grandkids up and swing them around as I like to do. I cannot start painting the stuff I want to get done before spring. I cannot do chores this week. It’s not that my husband isn’t capable…he is…but then he leaves to go to work and I am home feeling like I am contributing nothing and he is doing everything.

For those reasons alone it makes me want to work harder to strengthen my back, although my chiro doc tells me where I injured myself is not the easiest place to strengthen by regular methods. Of course not. But because I hate when I hurt my back more than anything, it is something I will seriously explore this weekend and hope to start doing next week.

My son-in-laws dad has a serious back problem. Disc bone on bone. He does get cortisone shots, which I know help immensely, but I still say to him “How the hell do you do it? How do you get around, get stuff done, without collapsing, throwing your hands up and saying NO MORE?” My little injury is nothing compared to his and yet I am wiped out. Afraid to move the wrong way. Pissed it is using up beautiful days I could be doing something else. I really don’t know how he does it.

So that is my woeful tale. Just wanted to catch you up. Now, is that heating pad still on???????

Some people like to take stock of their lives on the first of the year. I like to do it on my birthday. Of course my birthday falls early in the year, but still, I think I’d use this time no matter what day it was, just because.

Take a breath. I’m not going to recap 58 years. Not a enough time, for one, but even if there were, important to no one but me.

I have to honestly say that 58 gives me pause. I fully intend to have another 50  years to put under my belt, but statistics say that may not be so. I think it so strange God only put a warranty on our lives of little over a hundred years, on a good day. I wonder why. Talk about planned obsolescence! This would be the ultimate example, don’t you think?

Mostly, as I recap my life at this time, I want to have the courage to be brutally honest with myself. About what is mine to own, mine to change. I am so gifted at either telling others what they should do, be, want, or have, or needs changing. Time I made that gift a gift to myself. Not because I’ve have a great epiphany. I have, in an odd sort of way, but because, dammit, I have tried it for 37 years now and no one is listening to me!! Hello? Time to stop being clueless.

I think my biggest fear, as I recently told someone, is losing myself. I know who I am on the inside, who I want to be ‚who I hope I am, and yet, for whatever hardheaded reason I use, when in the presence of conflict, anxiety, or change, I slip away. Some would say that at that moment, I probably am exactly who I portray, and I get that. And yet I live in this body and this mind. I know that at that moment I have taken on their stuff, and I truly am NOT who I know I can be, and I hate, really hate that the people fixing, people pleaser, doormat comes charging out, while the real me, the person I know I am capable of being, trembles in fear. Sounds so dramatic, doesn’t it? It’s not. But it is real, and something I know needs changing, whether I am 58 0r 20. Growing up I had to “disappear” to save my soul. It’s time to come out of hiding.

My epiphany this last week is mine and mine alone. Maybe it’s the blood running in my eyes from hitting the brick wall all the time and refusing to see the window next to it. Maybe it’s time to just grow up.

I am glad to have reached the age of 58. A lot of people I know have not. I am in excellent health and mind. My waiting for someone to come fix things so I am happy is done. For the many amazing, wonderful, I “would never change” years I have had, I am more grateful then you can know. But if you don’t mind an old cliche.…I do believe “the best years are yet to come”.

It has been a fun, fast and furious week and I am glad all is settling back to some semblance of normal. A quick trip to the cities to help with some babysitting duties (which I am still suffering from.…HA…right). Avoiding a snow storm to get there. My daughters first, and hopefully her last, time seeing her infant projectile vomit, which, as she says, is like a scene out of a horror movie, but all was well. Spending time with other grandbaby which is never enough with either of them as they are changing faster than imaginable. Watching the olympics with my son-in-law and daughter. I’m telling you, it is really boring here without their “comments”.  Finally getting to spend a little time with my oldest daughter trying to catch up and we NEVER have enough time. Giving my son and his wife an unexpected night out. Then coming home to a sick employee for whom I had to fill in for and that makes for one crazy week!

So back I am with lots of thoughts on lots of things. And yet, I am still getting the giggles every time I think of my daughter having to use her inhaler, she was laughing so hard at something her husband had done. I know, I know, you are wanting to know but it is her story to tell. I will say that everyone should have a night when they need an inhaler because they are laughing so hard. Life would be so much richer!!

Thanks guys!!

My question, however, is not about my general clumsiness, but why, now that I have truly hurt my toe, that legs of tables, chairs, and furniture have become magnets for my sore toe? My toe never heads in their direction when it ISN’T sore so why now? Does hurting it somehow changes it’s polarity? It must, because since hurting it this morning, I have come so near to bonking it on the edge of furniture, beds or cupboards that is not only scary but unnerving. There ought to be a government committee to look into that.

I’ve yet to try a shoe. Will need to sooner rather than later. Just watch, today is the day the horses decide to be clumsy and set their incredibly heavy foot squarely on my boot, I just know it. My toe is blinking.…“Here I am!! I hurt like the dickens!! Since I am already sore, go ahead and give me your best shot!!.….I just know it is. Now can someone just tell me why?

Well, I hardly know where to begin. My husband, who was watching, said “what’s wrong with her doing that?” Are you kidding me? So I asked. “Were she (God forbid and shudder)to ever be President, would  you want someone who writes notes to themselves on their hand when a teleprompter is nowhere to be found? Someone not smart enough to remember what they want to say, much less articulate it? Meeting with heads of countries?” I can see it now…the Queen of England asks her a question and she says “oh, excuse me”, as she turns away to cough discreetly into her hand when she is really  looking for an answer written there? Really? You really want someone who cannot think on their feet?

But even that sophomoric writing on her hand isn’t what worries me most.  What worries me is her not washing her hands!! Good heavens!! The woman meets hundreds of people, sometimes in any given day!! Does she only wash one hand after going to the bathroom? Very talented lady to be sure!! And when she gets down from the podium after giving her speech and shakes all those hands, does she ever, not once, use hand sanitizer? I don’t know about you but I tend to put sanitizer on both hands. I’ve watched these multiple handshake people and although they shake with one hand, they usually grasp the top of the clasped hands too.  Does she ever leave ink marks on top of peoples hands? Do they then enshrine their hands, never to wash it again, thus successfully pulling off a Sarah P.?

In an attempt to make light of getting caught “cheating”, at her next speech she wrote “Hi Mom” on her palm and showed it to those watching. As funny as she may have thought that was, I thought it sad. She can no longer write notes on her palm as everyone will be looking! What ever will she do? Poor Sarah.