tina_black: heart (Default)
In June of this particular year, I saw an ad for a forthcoming book about the Teenie Weenies, comic characters from the 1940s and 1950s.   John Taylor was a major Teenie Weenies fan, so I called his wife and said "I saw an ad for this book.  Dibs on it for a gift."  She agreed since I saw it first I could get it for him.  So I ordered it.  In June, mind you.

August anniversary came, no book.  October birthday came, no book.  I pretty much put the idea aside, but the Christmas stuff was so boring! Shirts! Meh! It was Christmas eve, and almost everything was wrapped, even a boring pile of shirt boxes.  The phone rang.  It was the bookstore asking if I still  wanted that book.  Yes!! "And don't you dare close before I get there!" It was Lawrence, so it only took about 10 minutes to get downtown for the book.  I got it home...and in a fit of inspiration put it in a shirt box and hid it in the pile of boring shirts.

Christmas, you could tell he was bored with the shirts -- heck, *I* was bored with the shirts -- and then he hit the box with the hidden book.  He picked it up, whammed it back in the box and let out a scream, then hid his head in his hood and yelled "Who did this to me?"  "Me.  At least it isn't a boring shirt."

He came out, opened the box again, opened the book, and did not come out for anything until he had finished it.

Many years later he still said it was the best present he ever got.

Steps

Oct. 17th, 2017 03:32 pm
tina_black: heart (Default)
Well, I went and had my eyeglasses altered to single vision.  I can actually read without aids, so maybe these nice distance lenses will help me stop tripping...maybe.

My next move has been to create the first vegetarian vegetable soup of the season. 

chopped red onion
carrot strings
1/2 a bag of frenched green beans
" chopped broccoli
" chopped spinach.
bag of traditional shredded cabbbage

large box of vegetable broth
envelope of knorrs vegetable soup mix plus 4 c water.

This creation is pretty tasty -- i added kosher salt, but the individual serving still needs a bit extra salt.

My old LiveJournal had many soup recipes -- and I will probably keep putting them here.  I do have all the half bags of things tucked in the freezer, and there will be future soups -- probably using the zucchini and the potato I have, plus new and inventive things.
tina_black: heart (Default)
Well today, once more, I fell.  Missed a step and hit the deck.  I am bleeding in spots, black and blue in others.  I think it is a turning point.

So I called Weight Watchers.  Those buggers lied.  When I got to my goal, it was a given that if you got there, and then gained weight, you would be charged a maximum of your beginning fee.  For me this would be 4.00 per meeting.  And you had a lifetime membership for getting to goal.  When I called they could not find my membership THROUGH THREE INQUIRIES. You know what those pirates say now?  14.50 per meeting, or more depending on the location. Liars.  Liars.  Liars.

Then I called Jenny Craig.  They found my membership just fine.  The only problem I have with them.is the evil cheesecake, and the young, skinny "counselors".  No warm fuzzies there, but the food is good.

So as of Monday, I am back to a food program.  I need it.
tina_black: heart (Default)
There are things that creep in that I like, and others that I loathe. The most recent that I like lots is "hot mess."  I first ran across it as a description of a character named Giselle Cox in The Proviso, a book by Moriah Jovan.  It was so appropriate.  She'd had a run-in with a man that shook her extremely, and it left her in a condition that hot mess captured perfectly.

Now the recent word that I despise is ganked.  The alternate dictionary lists it as meaning stolen, but my innocent friends on Facebook use it in the meaning of copied.  Possibly it was without permission, but the whole of Facebook is a permission-free zone of borrowing.  Using ganked is precious, you little thieves, you.

tina_black: heart (Default)
I have become something of a snob. When I read book summaries, I reject starting any series that lists vampires, werewolves and shifters. Any two of the three and I won't go there. All three is a definite downcheck. I already read at least three series that have those kinds of characters. I like the ones I read, but am leery of starting others. The ones I read? Laurell Hamilton (vampires and shifters), Ilona Andrews--Kate Daniels (vampires and shifters), and Patricia Briggs (vampires and werewolves with a lone coyote shifter). And that's enough for me. I have accidentally started some books and stopped reading them when I found they were just more, without being better.

Wow

Apr. 7th, 2017 05:45 pm
tina_black: heart (Default)
From my point of view, the Hugo nominees are all obscure.  I am not sure I have read more than one or two items in the whole list, from novels down. It's not that I don't read.  I still read a lot.  It's just that I don't seem to find the things that get nominated.
tina_black: heart (Default)
I have been nagging everyone I know to go out to Amazon and buy books by Moriah Jovan. I usually recommend the three book bundle, which has my favorite of her books --The Proviso.

She has male followers...and really it would be a stretch to classify her works as romances.

I have read everything she has written, and I will wait impatiently for the next book; but I am afraid it will take awhile.  Her books are layered and dense, which can't be a snap to write.  wonderful characters, plenty of action.

Go buy some books!  

It's done

Apr. 4th, 2017 04:41 pm
tina_black: heart (Default)
Went onto LJ, deleted all my friends and then killed the account.  Somehow, TOS in Russian doesn't make for warm fuzzy feelings.  It might make me  a Republican or something.

Nostalgia

Jan. 2nd, 2017 10:56 am
tina_black: heart (Default)
Today is my step-daughter's birthday.  She is 33 by now.  Still silent these seven years.  I wish her well.

Sigh

Dec. 30th, 2016 03:05 pm
tina_black: heart (Default)
Looks like LiveJournal is going belly up -- servers moving to Russia and things they don't like being scrubbed.

We probably knew this was coming.  So time to move.
tina_black: heart (Default)
I read this article today:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jennifer-gauvain/doubts-before-marriage_b_919868.html

and it has no surprises for me.  I did it twice, after all.

The first time I realized the mistake as I crossed the altar rail.  Oh well.  Sometimes you just have to make your mistakes and work to undo them later.

And when you do two unsuitable marriages in a row, the second time should not be -- done in ignorance? -- at all.  I actually had man #2 agree to to the terms of the divorce before I agreed to marry him.  Basically, the second time I knew what I was getting into, and just did the best I could to make sure that the end would work out for me.  I suppose it did, all things considered.

Stuff

Jul. 27th, 2011 07:57 pm
tina_black: heart (Default)
I have eaten two tomatoes, there are 4 ripe ones on the table, and there are 16 green and pinking on the vines.  An entire cage fell over, so I have put it upright again and taped it to the rails of the deck.  I hope it holds -- the tomatoes must have pulled it over, they are so fat.  And I had to stake the pepper plant that got hit -- not badly enough to uproot it, but enough to make it lean. 

I went to WI last weekend to see the Hundred Cousins -- there are almost that many.  I took lots of pictures, and read books and went out with Mary Beth, who's the one I wrote to longest.  Even Ruth and John came to the picnic, which was great.  It was a nice and relaxing weekend, all things considered, especially since I got to have naps.

I'm one of those folks who think Congress should do its job and stop dithering.  George Bush got the debt ceiling raised 7 times and spent billions many times over for his wars.  All the posturing is nothing short of sick -- they could have reined in the Boy King and it wouldn't be half as bad now -- but they have no guts for real work.
tina_black: heart (Default)
From 1982 until last year, I spent every Thanksgiving with John Daniel, Pati until 2006, Miranda, Bryant, John J while that marriage lasted -- and all the folks who gathered with them at the Taylor houses on Jefferson St and Wyandotte.

1982 was the first year John J and I made it to the big dinner Pati always prepared.  I was the first person she ever allowed to enter her kitchen on Thanksgiving, because she had found that I was her equal at cooking.  She could tell me "make dressing" and the results would be just what she wanted.  She also asked, that first time, if I knew how to carve a turkey.  I said yes, and that was the start of many years of carving.  So we worked together that year, and I brought the first of the pecan pies into their house.   I remember Mike Watson telling me it was better than his mother's -- and he was devoted to his mother's cooking.

That was also the day I discovered I had a slight jealous streak.  The phone rang, and John Daniel picked it up.  He sat on the steps and talked to the person who called at length.  I could tell by his face and his voice that whoever it was, he loved them very much.  Hm.  Later I asked who had called, and he said it was his mother.  That told me a lot about him, and about her.  I think I also decided permanently that being jealous was a waste of time.

After that first year, the years melted together for 10 or so -- turkey at 2, dessert at 6, and Thanksgiving most often went until 1 AM.  Games -- charades and Encore.  Cindy McEldery's pies, the brownies with caramel that even Dani Lites couldn't finish (but that John Daniel polished off for breakfast over the next few days), the cheesecake that disappeared by 3:30, consumed by those who were afraid they would miss it if they waited.  The dinner itself was Pati's sole production until the year I started cooking with her -- and even then almost all of it was a Taylor gift to the people who came.

As the years passed, more and more people were allowed into the kitchen for various tasks. 

Then Pati had a major stroke.  At the first Thanksgiving after that, all the folks who had been coming for years brought dishes and sides to their house on Wyandotte, and Pati did the turkey.  It may have been the last of the huge gatherings.  By the next year the dining room table  was gone (and the person I was married to as well), and Thanksgiving became very small 

For several years John and I made dinner for Pati, Miranda, him and me.  We kept it to turkey, potatoes, dressing, gravy, Tucker's Ruin, green beans, and two pies.  I recall Miranda making a dinner plate for Boo the dog, which made me giggle.  Finally one year, John declared that we shoulod go out for dinner.  He did this while we were   grocery shopping, and I said "OK.  Well I am still going to get turkey."  I got all the things for my part of a dinner.  On the night before Thanksgiving it snowed -- and Pati's wheelchair could not go through snow.  So I called him.  "OK,  the turkey is in the oven, the pies are baked and the potatoes are ready to go.  What can you add?"  
"Green beans?  But I don't have onions for the top,"
"I have onions.  See you after 1:00."

The next year or three we successfully went out to Nichols for their Thanksgiving dinner.  It had a set menu, and was very nice.  Eventually, Pati went into a nursing home, and John's mother moved to Kansas City, first at his house and then at Carondelet Manor.  We had dinner at the buffet on Bannister Road, with me picking up his mom  and John getting Pati.  "Three seniors and one adult."  Hmph.  They told me my turn would come.  Last year it was down to John Daniel, his mother, and me.  His mother passed away the week of Christmas last year, so last Thanksgiving was the last time I saw her.  And this year, I lost John.

But I remember Thanksgiving,
tina_black: heart (Default)
I was living in a hospital when we had a time change.  I visited my place sometimes, but guess what I didn't do?  I did not change my alarm clock in the bedroom when it fell back.  So this morning I grudgingly got out of bed at 6:15 and showered, only to find my 6:30 alarm making its second reminder when I got out. 

So I will have a cup of coffee before I go to work.

Enough Day

Nov. 23rd, 2009 10:28 pm
tina_black: heart (Default)
I am back at my own townhouse.

Today would have been Pati's birthday, a fit day to move out of John's house.  I still have a few things there and some I promised to remove, but the bulk of my stuff is back where it came from.  

The person who was supposed to move it just failed to show, so I called a local mover and threw myself on his mercy.  His son and a son's buddy came and rescued me, moving my stuff in time for me to do dinner with K and D.

Today I found out that if you marry someone and he gets run over by a bus any earlier than 9 months into the marriage, you are SOL for survivor or spouse benefits.  That is right -- the foiling of predatory widows is sacred to the Social Security mission...that an denying disability on the first round are evidently prime principles.

Tomorrow is work.  I suppose I will survive, even though I am deeply tired.
tina_black: heart (Default)
Oh yes.

When I move this over to LJ most of it will go behind a cut.

On Monday, John and I went to get a marriage license.  Since he has started falling, Jim and Paula Murray came with me, and we used a wheelchair to get him to the office.  Yes, the rules are that both of you must appear in person - and so we did.  We all went back to his house, got him back inside, moved a bed downstairs, and put him into it.  We were due to get married on Sunday, 11/1. 

Around 4 PM John said "I have a bad feeling about waiting to get married.  Can we bump it up?"  I said "Sure, we can do it right now if you want to."  And so Jim went home to clean up and change.  We dragooned Cindy N into coming and being our second witness (Paula being the first AND the photographer), and as soon as Jim came back, he performed the ceremony, and John and I were married.

Well of course, I then declined to leave him and go back to my house for the night.  I was worried about him.  I woke up once and changed chairs, and then when I woke a second time in the middle of the night, his head was hot.  I took his temperature and it was 99.9.  So since I could not cope if he was really sick, I called 911.  He went by ambulance to St. Lukes.  They did a chest x-ray, and found what they thought was pneumonia -- which explained a lot about his constant naps and shortness of breath feelings.  So they admitted him.  They gave him a shot, supposedly for pain, and whatever was in it made him agitated and  -- almost hallucinating.  I told them whatever that was, he was never to have it again.  The shot to calm him down made it worse.  I told them no more of that either.

I called his child on his phone, and left her a message to call his room.  She called, and then she came there.  I said

Oh yes.

When I move this over to LJ most of it will go behind a cut.

On Monday, John and I went to get a marriage license.  Since he has started falling, Jim and Paula Murray came with me, and we used a wheelchair to get him to the office.  Yes, the rules are that both of you must appear in person - and so we did.  We all went back to his house, got him back inside, moved a bed downstairs, and put him into it.  We were due to get married on Sunday, 11/1. 

Around 4 PM John said "I have a bad feeling about waiting to get married.  Can we bump it up?"  I said "Sure, we can do it right now if you want to."  And so Jim went home to clean up and change.  We dragooned Cindy N into coming and being our second witness (Paula being the first AND the photographer), and as soon as Jim came back, he performed the ceremony, and John and I were married.

Well of course, I then declined to leave him and go back to my house for the night.  I was worried about him.  I woke up once and changed chairs, and then when I woke a second time in the middle of the night, his head was hot.  I took his temperature and it was 99.9.  So since I could not cope if he was really sick, I called 911.  He went by ambulance to St. Lukes.  They did a chest x-ray, and found what they thought was pneumonia -- which explained a lot about his constant naps and shortness of breath feelings.  So they admitted him.  They gave him a shot, and whatever was in it made him agitated and  -- almost hallucinating.  I told them whatever that was, he was never to have it again.  The shot to calm him down made it worse.  I told them no more of that either.

I called his child on his phone, and left her a message to call his room.  She did, and then she came there.  I didn't say hi, just "Your dad and I got married yesterday" and I left the room so they could be alone.  When she emerged, she was very upset because he was confused.  I said "I promise you that this is a bad drug reaction, and that he is still all there.  When it wears off you will see."  The next morning when she came there he was almost back to normal, and she was much cheered.  I suspect she is also much cheered to know that she will not be going through what's coming all alone.  I was her godmother from birth -- and now she's my stepdaughter.  She knows I can make the trains run. 

That night his temperature climbed to 101.8, and they started IV antibiotics.  He has had them until this morning, and now he has moved to oral antibiotics. 

meanwhile, his doctor ticked me off big time, and on the third morning, I had a Come to Jesus meeting with him, and required changes in both regimen and behavior.  I told him he had been both negative and dismissive, and he had to stop that.  He had been attributing the confusion to cancer instead of to bad drugs -- a mistake -- and acted like I couldn't observe.  I told him I'd seen lots of people die, and of lung cancer, too -- a dozen in one year -- and while that might not be as many as he had seen, it was still plenty and I'd know when it had gone bad for real, because I've already seen it.  And I would thank him to listen when I tell him something, and not act like John was a goner while he was still fighting and maintaining.  He had suggested hospice -- and John is absolutely not ready for that yet.  My, he pissed me off.

He wrote the things I thought John needed into the orders, and come Monday John will be going to rehab to help him recover from a couple of weeks in bed.  The whole week before he spent "napping" almost around the clock -- getting very sick, in other words.  He wants to work at wellness -- and I  am going to make sure he gets the chance.

So here we are and it is Saturday.  Monday he moves to rehab, and maybe I will sleep in a bed again, at his house after today since I'm moving my bed over there.  It has been quite a week.  I actually went to work 12 hours or so!  Imagine!


Dither

Oct. 25th, 2009 09:28 pm
tina_black: (Marvin saucer)
Dithering is what I do best at the moment.  I've had rails installed at John' s back steps.  I ordered a bed frame.  I have people lined up to move stuff.  I need to clear out all the books in the path of moving beds.   I got him supplies he needed today.   I have boxes for stuff.

The reception is sort of under control,  with shopping Saturday.

Right now I'm done for the day -- any stuff that didn't get done can wait until tomorrow.
tina_black: (Marvin saucer)
We all work for Lucie Van Pelt.  We had a layoff meeting.  We were supposed to be laid off at the end of next week.

They called it off again.  I rather thought there was too much work for them to just send us out.  But RATS ANYWAY!!  I was looking forward to spending time with John and now I have to work instead.  I will take a couple of days vacation for week after next.  I took one vacation day  today because my leave got cancelled with the layoff.  With the LAYOFF cancelled I guess I can take leave.

Grrrr.

2:40 AM

Oct. 23rd, 2009 02:42 am
tina_black: (Beam Up)
Yes I'm awake.  I went into hyperdrive about 10 days ago and it is still going on.

Since I was wide awake I called a wide-awake John and went over there for a bit.  Now I am home and eating a Sonic breakfast burrito -- food substituting for sleep.  In just a bit I will try to get another four hours.  Can't take any pills or I will never get to work. 

The good news (how times change!) is that we will be laid off on 10/30 (officially Saturday 10/31).  This makes John happy because we can then spend more time together.  I can get by for the rest of the year just fine, especially since I killed off one of my credit cards.  We might have to go back for a week of classes, or for work that needs to be done, but the official word is that  we will be temporarily without jobs until the start of the year.

I think that bed is calling.  It's either that or the hamster wheel very busy tonight.

Oh yes.

Oct. 19th, 2009 09:44 pm
tina_black: heart (Default)
John Daniel is one of my cases of love at first sight.  I went to an SF convention in 1977 in Kansas City.  While there with my first husband, dragonet2 came over and asked him for a ride home because her dog had a crisis.  I thought that was fine, so he left me at the convention and headed to Lawrence with her.  I went into the room to the north off the suite and there was a man sitting with his back to the headboard, singing Broadway show tunes with the fols in the room.  He had a good voice and the most graceful hands I'd ever seen.  I was -- rivetted would be the right word.  I followed him around for the rest of the night.  At a very late hour we had all migrated to the easter room off the con suite, and I sang a solo directed at him.  When I realized that was what I was doing, I broke off before the last verse.  He said "Finish it."  I told him  I couldn't.

Singing a love song to someone you have just seen for the first time is -- the only other person I know who did that was his wife of 30 years.  She and I both chose music with the same sort of intent.  Her song was the love song from Romeo and Juliet.  Mine was called "'Til Then".  You can Google it if you are curious.

I'm still freaked out an how much I love this man.  It's very intense, even 32 years after the events above.

Profile

tina_black: heart (Default)
tina_black

December 2017

S M T W T F S
     12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930
31      

Syndicate

RSS Atom

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags