Purging My Brain

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It’s 7:52 a.m. — an hour at which I have never risen joyfully, even when I worked at UPS and loved my job. (This also includes the times I got up at 6 to kick-box before work.) I woke up at 4:15 and couldn’t get back to sleep. Instead of going and making myself some Instant Breakfast, I played online and listened to podcasts. Bad idea. So… I’m going to purge my brain so that I can go back to sleep (if Jon does office hours from home this morning) or at least cat-nap (if he doesn’t).

[+] Lowe’s, you suck. I could understand if you pulled advertising from “All-American Muslim” because you disagreed with how the show portrayed Muslims and felt that it was not a correct representation of life in America in a Muslim household. (I’ve read non-biased opinions of the show that say that it isn’t really all that accurate. Then again, Islam is as diverse as Christianity in terms of practice and how people observe the tenets of the faith.) Instead, you caved into a group that claims that all Muslims are terrorists. I’ve signed eleventy billion petitions to boycott you and have your CEO removed. Apologize, OK?

[+] Daniel had a good park date with his physical therapist yesterday. We met S at a park in Elk Grove that’s tailored for younger kids and we got him working on climbing things, going down slides, doing steps, going on suspension bridges… It was great. S is also trying to hook us up with a play group in Elk Grove so he can be around other kids.

[+] I’m finally getting over the mutant death cold that landed Daniel in the hospital and gave me a sinus/bronchial infection. We have an appointment with his pediatrician today to re-check him and to maybe try and come up with a strategy so that we don’t have another hospitalization.

[+] Ahem CW… you picked two of the crappier episodes of “Hart of Dixie” to show on Monday. Could we remedy this please?

[+] We got Daniel on a sippy cup and off the bottle cold turkey on Thursday. This meant TODDLER RAGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! but it was worth it.

[+] I have online shopping to do once Jon gets paid tomorrow and then I’ll be DONE for Christmas. I have to toss a box in the mail to Claremont today but that will be once I have brain cells to spare.

OK… going back to bed.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: December 12, 2011

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Simple Woman's Daybook

FOR TODAY December 12, 2011

Outside my window… dark. I need to do this before 11 p.m. 😉

I am thinking… that Castleville is an an addicting Facebook game.

I am thankful… for two episodes of Hart of Dixie tonight even if they weren’t the two best ones.

In the kitchen… anything I can microwave.

I am wearing… blue maternity shirt and black sweats.

I am creating… Christmas card labels.

I am going… to have a park date with Daniel and S (his physical therapist) tomorrow. I’m looking forward to it.

I am wondering… why I have a headache.

I am reading… The Magicians by Lev Grossman. It’s magic/fantasy and it’s keeping my attention though I could probably take/leave it. I have the new Margaret Maron from the library as well.

I am hoping… the cough reflex will please die down so I can stop feeling like I’m about to have an asthma attack.

I am looking forward to… the Golden Bough concert this weekend with my Dad.

I am hearing… the 11:00 news and the furnace.

Around the house… *whistles innocently*

I am pondering… many things in my heart.

One of my favorite things… the Jacquie Lawson Advent calendar given to me by my mother-in-law.

A few plans for the rest of the week… physical therapy tomorrow, peds appointment on Wednesday, therapies on Thursday, San Jose on Friday, and Golden Bough on Saturday.

Hosted by The Simple Woman’s Daybook

7 Quick Takes — Life Lessons from Judge Judy

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7 Quick Takes

As I’ve mentioned in several recent Quick Takes, I’m addicted to Judge Judy. I love that she is very to-the-point about what she thinks and that she does not suffer fools gladly by any stretch of the imagination. Jessica of Grumbling & Gratitude expressed an interest in seeing a Quick Takes on this subject so… here are life lessons gained by watching Judge Judy. (What can I say? I am to please.)

— 1 —

Do not co-sign for a loan unless you happen to be married to your fellow signer. I think about 25-40% of the cases presented deal with this one. It’s usually a girlfriend who co-signs for a car loan with her boyfriend and wants the car back when they break-up or who wants their ex to make the payments even though the car is in the girlfriend’s name. This also takes place after the parties have only been dating for a month. Anybody else see a problem with this one? I don’t think I’d be ready to decide ANYTHING long-term after only dating someone for a month, especially something that could potentially screw up my credit rating.

— 2 —

If you’re going to move in with your paramour pre-marriage or with a friend, at least wait until you’ve known them for more than a month because most leases are not month-to-month and breaking them is expensive. Another popular theme is roommate break-ups where one roommate claims the other owes them back rent, utilities, and all that because the other moved out before the lease was up. Again, one month is not long enough to know someone well enough to want to do something that will affect my credit. I could probably share an apartment with friends but there would have to be a written-out roommate agreement as to who would do what. (I will cook and clean the kitchen and clean floors but I hate anything that involves the bathroom.)

— 3 —

Get everything in writing because oral contracts aren’t binding. It’s amazing how many people go on the show and claim that the other party claimed that they would pay back money/make payments on the car/pay X for the apartment/do _______ and are suing that party for not holding up their part of the oral contract. In nearly every case, Judge Judy tells them that they should have gotten it in writing because anyone can claim that someone said they’d do something. Seriously, this is almost a no-brainer.

— 4 —

You are not immune from paying people back a loan just because “you don’t feel like it”. These are the cases that crack me up due to sheer stupidity. If someone loans you money, you’re a complete schmuck if you don’t make good on the loan. In almost 100% of those cases, the judgement is for the plaintiff and the moral of the story according to the plaintiff is not to loan friends/adult children money.

— 5 —

Your parents don’t owe you anything past the age of 18/high school graduation except love. They don’t owe you a car, unlimited credit on their credit cards, free room and board in any dwelling other than their house, or anything else. I’ve seen parents who co-sign for car loans for their adult kids and then get stuck making payments while the adult child keeps the car and is supported financially by the parent. I’ve seen parents who take their kids’ debts and put them on their credit cards with the expectation that the kid will pay it back in a timely fashion while the kid thinks the parent should just tell the credit card company to kiss off and forgive the debt. I’ve also seen parents who give their child a credit card to buy things to start their career and the child runs up a huge bill of frivolous stuff. In all these cases, the parent is suing the kid to recover the debt and the child acts like an entitled brat in court. This is actually one of the things Judge Judy takes on in her most recent book Keep It Simple Stupid. Seriously, don’t screw your parents over if they decide to help you out. Pay them back what you owe, don’t abuse the credit card, and don’t put them on the hook for your car payments. Parents, wise up. Teach your kids to be responsible and stand on their own two feet.

— 6 —

If you borrow something and cause damage/destroy it, man up and pay for the damage. A number of cases involve property or a car borrowed and damaged by the borrower. The borrower usually thinks that they shouldn’t have to pay for the damage because it was an accident. Hello? Does the word “responsibility” mean anything? In the case of a totalled car, you don’t have to pay for a new one but you should ideally pay the deductible or whatever is left on the loan. With other types of property, pay for the damage or replace the property. It’s the adult thing to do as well as the morally right one.

— 7 —

People will take you more seriously if you behave like an adult. I really wonder where people learn their manners because some of them seem to think that her courtroom is an extension of “The Jerry Springer Show”. There are usually several warnings and threats from Judge Judy that she’s going to throw them out of the courtroom and/or dismiss their case if they don’t stop interrupting the other party or her. Don’t interrupt her. Just don’t. It’s not pretty as to what happens when people do that. 10% of the people also come to court dressed like they are going to be guests on Jerry Springer, an offense that also earns a rebuke from her.

— Bonus 1 —

Keep your hands to yourself. She makes no bones about the fact that she doesn’t tolerate assault. I think there is at least one case a day where someone claims to have been assaulted and she tells whoever did the assault that they should not have put their hands on the other person. In a few cases, she has awarded punitive damages. One thing she is strict about: you need photos and a police report to document it — I think this comes from her background in Family Court. If you didn’t call the police or seek medical attention, the burden of proof is pretty iffy that you actually were assaulted. Another category here is injuries you cause through stupidity. If you were drunk and sucker-punched a friend, you are liable for the bills to repair their eye socket and everything else. If you put someone in a choke hold (even as a joke to get attention from a girl) and they pass out, you’re going to be paying for their medical care.

— Bonus 2 —

BOTH parents need to be involved in their childrens’ lives. In a few cases, the mother has refused to let the father see the children and Judge Judy has lit into her for that. If there isn’t a danger in letting the kids have access to both parents, she is adamant that both parents be allowed to interact with the kids. She also is very intentional about making sure that the non-custodial parent pays support. Again, this is probably a holdover from her family court days.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.

Cleaning Out My Brain

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My Quick Takes this week are themed ones so here are some things in my brain that I need to talk about so I can fill it with other material.

[+] Please lift up a prayer or two for my friend Kathleen Basi and her son Michael who was born 3 weeks early and is in the NICU with lung issues.

[+] This is an interesting article on why some who identify as atheists go to church — it’s for their children. Some want to give their children exposure to different ideas so they can be freethinkers and maybe decide for themselves what they believe. I think we (the Church) have more than a few people who are atheist/agnostic in the pews but who attend for the purpose of having a community. I’m not arguing that they should or shouldn’t attend or whether it’s ethical to — I just simply think this interesting from a religious scholar standpoint.

[+] Apparently, Egyptian ballots had symbols for the candidates in addition to their names. (HT: CNN.Com) According to Fareed Zakaria, almost half of Egyptian adults are illiterate so having the symbols was a way of identifying the candidates on billboards for those who couldn’t read. This brings up thoughts of the purpose of stained glass windows in the Middle Ages: a means of teaching the faith to those who were illiterate.

[+] I’m taking Daniel off of his bottle cold turkey and putting him on sippy cups. I am in serious disgrace in his eyes but I’ve been backed up by his occupational therapist and child development specialist who told me that if he’s thirsty enough, he’ll drink from them.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: December 5, 2011

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Simple Woman's Daybook

FOR TODAY December 5, 2011

Outside my window… night and supposed to dip down below freezing. I am positively giddy.

I am thinking… that I should probably start pondering what to get people for Christmas.

I am thankful… that Daniel is occupying himself right now so I can do this entry.

In the kitchen… I haven’t had to cook today — I had something frozen for breakfast, Jon brought home some awesome veggie pizza from a meeting, and he brought me home fries for dinner tonight.

I am wearing… blue maternity shirt (no, I am not pregnant — it’s just comfortable) and my blue striped pajama bottoms.

I am creating… entries and Postcrossing postcards.

I am going… to be doing a fair amount of laundry tomorrow.

I am wondering… if I’ll ever get into the Christmas spirit this year. (I am seriously a Scrooge.)

I am reading… The Alpine Winter by Mary Daheim. Technically, I finished it last night but it could use a re-read.

I am hoping… Daniel doesn’t have another puke fest tonight.

I am looking forward to… Ladies’ Night Out on Wednesday.

I am hearing… Daniel playing with remote controls and “The Magic School Bus” on TV.

Around the house… *whistles innocently*

I am pondering… many things in my heart.

One of my favorite things… black cats who aren’t routing around in the laundry pile.

A few plans for the rest of the week… “Hart of Dixie” tonight, PT tomorrow, neuro appointment/speech therapy/Ladies’ Night Out on Wednesday, OT and child development on Thursday, and hopefully nothing on Friday or Saturday.

Hosted by The Simple Woman’s Daybook

Guest Post: 100 Goats

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I heard about this on a friend’s Twitter and thought it was a really great idea. I don’t know if we can give a goat on our own this year but I feel like I owe it to Katharine to help her publicize this as much as possible. If you can help out, let her know. –jen

At Christmastime in years past, I’ve received the World Vision catalog in the mail. And unlike the other catalogs, like American Girl, there’s a part of me that would be moved. World Vision’s catalog is filled with gifts to give that could save lives, that could combat world hunger, that could lift a family out of poverty. In years past, I would sigh, put the catalog in the recycling bin and pray that someday my family would be able to do something bigger for the world. Christmas, I would reason to myself, was stressful enough. I’ll get to it one day.

Today is that one day. We just as many expectations on us as there were last year, but this year, we want to not just pick up the World Vision catalog, but do something with it. This year, my family and I want to buy goats.

This year, my family and I want to buy 100 goats.

This idea came to us in a whirlwind. We were given a little money to do good with and we thought, yes! Goats from World Vision! But that seemed too easy, and certainly it did help ease our burden for the world a little, but surely there was a way to multiply our money, or multiply our efforts, so that it wasn’t just one goat bought. Could we get our friends to buy goats too?

So we’re launching a campaign. It’s called 100 Goats.

Our goal is to have 100 Goats bought through World Vision by December 25, 2011. A goat costs $75. As a family, we’re going to have bake sales and do yard work to raise money. But by ourselves, the best we could hope for is two or three goats. We’d like to invite you, our readers, to consider how you could help us. We know that lots of organizations are asking for help at this time of year and we don’t want to take away from them. But we believe that there are friends of ours who will get excited about this with us. We believe that God will bless those excited people. We believe that nothing is too audacious for God.

Are you excited yet? What you can do:

1) EASIEST: Go to our Facebook page and like us. This will tell all your friends about us in your feed and then maybe someone will be inspired to help.

2) EASIER: Click the link to World Vision and buy a goat yourself. The whole process will take less than five minutes. Then come back to our facebook wall and tell us you did it. We’ll give you a number “GOAT #54!” that you put as a badge on your profile, or your blog or print it out and pin it to your shirt.

3) EASY: Tell your friends about 100 Goats. Link back to this blog. Link to the facebook page. Tweet about this. You never know, weirder things than this have gone viral.

4) ALSO EASY: Allow us to guest blog on your website. I’d love to be interviewed. Or better still, interview my kids. Corbin’s making business cards to pass out at church. Miranda’s making bread to sell and raise money. Ariel’s blogging about this. I’ll put the younger two in a video. I’m not above using their cuteness to change the world.

5) A LITTLE BIT HARDER: Mention the 100 Goats campaign to your church group, your small group, your karate class or your writing group. Ask them if they would pool together the money they would spend on a piece of pie and a cup of coffee and buy a goat together.

6) A LITTLE BIT HARDER THAN THAT: Organize a fundraiser yourself and see how many goats your youth group or Sunday School class can buy.

Regardless of how you help, please pray that my kids get a heart for the world, that their compassion for others grows, that they don’t get so wrapped up in the latest video game that they forget what Christmas is really about.

And pray for me, that I don’t get stressed.

 

7 Quick Takes — Updating Since Thanksgiving

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7 Quick Takes

Daniel is out of the hospital and we’re finally back home. (Only a 4 day hospital stay instead of 19. Yay!) Time for updates on the rest of my life!

— 1 —

I had to give up on “winning” NaNoWriMo. I had worked a little ahead to compensate for being gone for a couple days at Thanksgiving but Daniel in the hospital and the sheer sleep deprivation of all of it completely shot my chances of finishing and validating by November 30th. I probably could have squeezed it in but I had a really fussy and angry toddler during the hospital stay and I would have had to do two 5000 word days when I got home. Both options were unreasonable so I’m settling for just making it to 40K again. Nothing I wrote is wasted though — I have a setting and characters for a murder mystery next year.

— 2 —

Kathleen of So Much to Say, So Little Time… had her baby. Go congratulate her. Do it now.

— 3 —

I have a massage tomorrow. Due to timing issues last month, it worked out that I only ended up getting one massage. I will hopefully have a chance to see my massage therapist more this month. It’s keeping the fibro at bay until I can get in to see a rheumatologist and it’s benefiting a small business owner in town — a win-win situation.

— 4 —

I am enjoying “Judge Judy” waaaaaay too much. I did feel sorry for a plaintiff today who thought she had a legal contract and whose cousin/aunt took advantage for her but the vast majority of people really need a good dose of reality. I could totally do a quick takes post on lessons that one can learn from watching her show, the most popular one being not to co-sign for a loan for someone unless you are married to that person. Almost every other case is someone who co-signed for a car loan with their boyfriend/for their spoiled adult child/for a sibling…

— 5 —

Daniel has taken to coming over and taking my hand to lead me wherever he wants me to go. Usually, it involves going into a forbidden room at which point I have to fake an inability to open that particular door. In one case, he led me to my parents’ room on Monday and he started flipping out by the bed under which their sissy Maine Coon was hiding. I didn’t realize it was possible to fluff a Maine Coon (especially this one) but it can happen. Sorry Bubba Cat! (I scritched his ears and his shoulder blades before I let him out and apologized to him.)

— 6 —

My local CVS has Cadbury Dairy Milk bars. It’s hard to find these outside of the Commonwealth so I took FULL advantage of the “buy 2 get one free” deals on them. I’m having to force myself to limit it to one (or part of one) per day though.

— 7 —

Here’s another plug for Postcrossing. I seriously recommend it for teaching your homeschooled kids geography or starting a postcard collection for your child. (I’ve got one started for Daniel.) I got a postcard almost every day this week from Belarus, Singapore, Finland, and Australia. Part of the reason for being at CVS was to get postcards to send out.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.