The past couple of weeks have just been pure Hell for me. I keep thinking man I hope something really nice is coming back around because of all the bad stuff, life HAS to have something to even out the scales. I sure hope so anyway…

(Picture courtesy of Wikipedia.com)

For the last 6 weeks, different co-workers have been on vacation, and although nearly everyone is full-time, our coordinators didn’t send full week replacements like they are supposed to except for one week. I am just worn completely out, and feel like I NEED a vacation. For the company I work, my pharmacy is technically the fourth busiest in North Texas, although we have a suspicion that we’ll be 3rd after this go round. Usually during summers, it slows down, but with the new generic $4 program, things have gone crazy, and we’ve actually become busier. My store actually has given the most flu shots the last couple of years in a row, so I dread this coming fall. My boss has been looking at hiring someone, but I think he needs to hurry up and jump on the board the boat before we capsize. So that means we’ve all been having to work even harder with energy we just don’t have to make up for the personnel shortfall the last few weeks.

About a month and a half or so ago, I noticed emotional changes in our head pharmacist. I noticed that his wife had quit coming by to bring him lunch and has quit calling him at work…completely. He’d made mention that she’s been going clubbing a LOT with a friend or two, but no longer wants him to come with her..and yes, they are on the bit older side, but not old…just on the down-slope of middle-age. Turns out, she’s met someone and been dating him on the side, and so they are getting divorced after many, many years of a good marriage. And here I thought I HAVE relationship issues, guess I just have no clue. I feel very sorry for him, but then again, from what I understand, he cheated on his previous wife with his soon-to-be-ex-wife, while she was also married. I myself do not think I could have gone for someone like that because I am a firm believer that if someone cheats, especially an already married person, that they will allow history to repeat itself. To me, it doesn’t seem as if the sacred vows of marriage were being honored the first rounds, so maybe it was easier when problems came along to simply turn to someone else. I do not know, nor do I really want to. But, I must confess that since I am the one that everyone turns to for advice or for someone to simply listen, I think my ears are worn out.

My boss has been worried and severely depressed, and thank goodness he actually listens to me, and saw his doctor. I, along with a few others, convinced him that there is nothing wrong with taking anti-depressants, that as a pharamcist, he should be well aware that it does not mean you are crazy or anything, that they simply are to treat a chemical imbalance. He made his decision based off of our advice along with us talking him through the fact that his own father AND a brother had committed suicide in the past. I told him life is not fair, but it always takes time for life to heal the wounds it has inflicted. I have to believe that and think my own good friends on here have been very supportive and said this to also be true to me when giving me words of encouragement. Another bombshell was dropped on him last week though. His only child and her family are having to move because of her spouse being transferred for his job. So, he has been quite upset and saddened by the moving away of the rest of his closest family. We all at work have insisted on him not cancelling trips to see other family members or to play golf. The poor guy already is on four, maybe five, blood pressure medicines, and I am afraid he will just have a stroke or heart attack if anything else awful comes his way.

Then, for the rest of the story, my other boss had an awful miscarriage week before last. She has had a history of them, and was fortunate to have several miracle children thanks to modern medicine and prayer. She and her husband weren’t planning on enlarging their family further, but life happens, as do accidents. Unfortunately, after her several month sonogram, she was notified that the fetus was not alive, yet still enlarging. She had to have a procedure done to remove it, and lost a lot of blood. After coming back to work last week, several of us noticed that she seemed “off.” We all knew what was going on, but it wasn’t really that. She got so cold, yet the A/C in my area of the store does not work. We have fans blowing, but it is 80 plus degrees AT LEAST in there everyday, and a 100 plus outside. Yeah, nothing like working in a sauna to make you nauseated with heat exhaustion. She even put on a long-sleeved work jacket, which we REALLY thought was weird. Later, after the morning shift left, I noticed she had developed chills, so she took her temp and it was way too high. By this time, she had become dilerious, and her skin was soo hot and red. I ended up putting ice packs on her and making her sit down and rest, yet you could just feel the heat emmanating from her. I called her mom to come get her ASAP and get her to the ER because it got to the point that I could NOT keep her awake, and she was shaking violently all over with chills. I was so scared that she was going to go into seizure or coma on me. Someone asked why I did not call EMTs. I was like, uh, do you know just how long they would take to stabilize her before they even began to head to the hospital. I have seen our EMTs in action here, and I am NOT impressed. I told her mother that I figured she could get her to the ER quicker than the EMTs and ambulance would. I got our other boss to come in to take her place, while her mother drove her to the hospital, since her own husband works 2 hours away. She ended up with toxic shock, and it took until the following morning before the fever and chills broke. Her mother and she told me the doctors told them that if I hadn’t sent her to the hospital when I did, that she probably would have died, but that she got very lucky since it was caught early enough. Talk about stress, plus, I was the one being left in charge until the other pharmacist arrived, so the store manager on duty and I did get into it. Some people do not understand the word emergency, but thank goodness my other boss backed me up big time. I give him kudos for that, as did my area boss.

So not only has work about given me a conniption fit, I have had my own not so nice problems to deal with. My mother had to have surgery a few weeks back, plus has been having some other health problems, but things are finally looking up on that end of things. And then my brother actually got hired for a job he’s been wanting, which is really exciting since he was inbetween jobs in a small town. That is a major load off of my shoulders already with things looking up on the homefront *fingers crossed*.

As for me personally, well, a week ago, I told CS exactly how I felt, and that I did not think it a good idea for us to be friends anymore. I also told my female friend, AL, that CS has been flirting with and trying to date right in front of my face the same because last weekend was the straw that broke this camel’s back. This is what went down… We went shopping because he needed some new clothes and it was his birthday, so I let him pick the mall we went to. He’s been needing/wanting to go for sometime, but doesn’t have a car, so I thought it would be a nice birthday gift so-to-speak to take him where he wanted. Anyway, I am honestly NOT much into shopping for clothes. I cannot shop with other people, I get embarassed. I do not want others seeing exactly what size I wear, plus I always feel like the superskinny people are giving me weird looks. I know they really were at the one store we were shopping at..giving me that, “I dunno why that fat chick thinks she’ll find anything in here” look. My female friend AL went with us because CS originally wanted to get to know some of my friends, so he and AL have been calling and talking to each some over the past couple of months or so, after we’d all been hanging out together. This was after the conversation of how he needed more friends, and wanted to date others besides just seeing only me. Well, after 20 minutes of him clothes shopping, I mentioned how weird the place made me feel, so I got told to basically go wait in the breezeway outside. My friend AL chose to stay with him, not me. After about an hour, I got a call from CS asking where I was. I informed him that I was looking at stuff across the way in a shop, and he told me that he and AL were not done shopping for clothes, but wanted to see where I was. I thought, “as if he cares” at this point, because the light bulb had already come on at this point. I told him to call me when THEY were done, and I did not call him back for an hour after his next call; I was determined to have fun for myself. I failed miserably, but hey, I tried.

We ended up going to a movie at the mall, and before the movie, he made some rude comments to me. I think he probably thought he was being cute, and since AL laughed, then it was obviously okay and funny, so I got up and moved down a few seats.. away from them. I was very hurt by this point anyway, but I was NOT about to let them know it. After it, we were heading back home, and he decided we should all go see ANOTHER movie and that he’d pay for it since it was his birthday. When we arrived, I refused to let him pay for my ticket because I am not that stupid. I had already figured by this time that this was his way of taking AL on a date, and I was of course just the chauffeur. The whole time while waiting to be seated, he made snide remarks, so once inside, I simply did not sit with them. I am not going to deliberately watch any drama unfold that will crush me into a further pulp. Unfortunately for AL, her dad came and picked her up because as it turns out, she was supposed to be home early at her parents request. After the movie, I dropped him off, came home and cried for a while.

I decided to get on the internet so that I could blog about my issues since it is the only way for me to get stuff out these days. Well, CS popped up on one of my instant messengers, saying how he enjoyed the day so much, but the evening had not gone as he hoped. I informed him, that I read between the lines that he was “on a date” and that was why I refused to let him pay for my ticket. He thought that very intuitive of me, saying hopefully it will go better for him and AL next time, that they needed some alone date time. I told him to kick out his roommate and have her brothers bring her over if that is what he wanted, and I guess he thought I was thinking it was all good, great and much fun. He then said he had a better idea, next time, I pick them both up, since neither have a car, drop them at MY apartment, and for me to go find something to do for the rest of the evening. That way, they could get to know each other better. He’s been trying to get her and I to room together for at least 2 months now, so I now see the real writing on the wall, and it says, “Ara, you have been such a fool.” The comment about me leaving my own place actually is what finally broke me, physically, emotionally, and socially, at this point. I told him I had to go, and signed off IM. I then proceeded to email him saying I wanted nothing else to do with him, that simply I love him, but I love him enough to let him go. That he and AL being together finally broke my spirit, and I just cannot deal with ”them” anymore, that I would not be going anywhere with them, taking either of them anywhere, or anything else. That it is what is best for me. I also emailed AL and told her I had unresolved feelings for him and felt it best that I not hang out with them anymore either because they both had really hurt my feelings at the mall, but with some comments made as well.

I could not write my blog, much less finish it at that point because not only was I so upset, I went through more than a box of kleenexes. I needed rest. This past week has been hell, literally. I did finally go shopping one day, and found a nice blouse because I NEEDED something to make me look pretty since I certainly do not feel it at this point. The other side to the coin with CS is, as WmWB, 6mile, and others know, is that CS would not tell anyone we were dating before..because of the different culture thing, but he’s not afraid now to tell people he’s dating, since he’s dating others, and we’re not. I used to beg him to go to the movies, but he would not, so I have come to realize the fool that I was played as. It is real simple, I was not good enough to be treated as such because he was obviously embarassed by me since I am not beautiful and I am not skinny.. he really has become truly Americanized..more so than I will ever be, or so I hope.

As a follow-up to the “I do not want to hang out with you two anymore” thing, they both have begged me not to quit being their friends, AL saying just her and I would have “girl’s day only outtings.” I am still speaking to her, but, I have made myself find other things to do. Yes, I am a fool, but I finally gave into seeing CS on Sunday. He apologized, bought me dinner, and gave me a gas card because he says I take him a lot of places and never ask for anything in return, that he should be a better friend and help contribute. That next time we go shopping, it will be just the two of us, but since we have different tastes, that we should both shop for what we both want and meet up when we are ready. He asked me to go watch The Dark Knight at the Imax for this coming Saturday, so I gave in because I am weak. He obviously still does not get it, since he later told me he bought 3 tickets, so AL could go too if I didn’t have a problem with it. I was like whatever, and my friend at work told me not to be so dumb about any of it anymore since she’s been in my shoes, and knows that I am simply lonely, but that I still need to find new friends. She is right, I am being pretty dumb and stupid, but when you feel all alone and broken.. what do you do?

***Note of Disclaimer*** Yes, I am feeling very sad and depressed right now, and yes I AM feeling sorry for myself. I am doing my best to dig myself out, but sometimes it is hard. This is the only way I can get out what I am feeling without exploding or having a literal meltdown, so if you do not like it, that is okay as well…

I simply despise Friday the 13th’s. I know that many people consider 13 to be an unlucky number, and normally, I am not superstitious. However, when it comes to Friday the 13th, no matter how much I ignore it, it always comes back to bite me in the @$$. Today was no exception, in fact, I think it will hold a special day for me..the Friday the 13th from Hell..

Over the years, I have tried to simply hide out when I see a Friday the 13th on the calendar. I’ve even been known to ask for that day off, and simply not leave my home. Things seem to be safer that way..generally, anyway. Several times I have turned my ankles, not both at the same time luckily, on these infamously freaky days. Those times I was hobbled for weeks due to severe sprains that were near breaks. So, I do try to be a little extra careful, such as wearing good, solid shoes…my feet stay a little more firmly planted that way. As it was, I did not turn my ankles today…that being a good thing.

That’s about the ONLY thing good that happened today. I guess everyone was just simply having a bad day. Before I made it to work today, my mom called and told me she was taking our nearly a year old cat to the vet. I dearly love that little critter. I lost her momma last year after a wonderful 14 years. Her momma surprised us with a litter of kittens last year, after not having a little in several years. Unfortunately, we lost 2 of the 4 early on. Then, once the other two were weaned, my dearly beloved ca’lico passed on us. We finished raising her two kittens, a male and a female, and decided to keep both. Last Halloween, the neighbor’s dogs got a hold of the little male and caused his horrible death. He was such a wonderful little guy, I miss him very much. I tried my best to save him..running through the woods barefoot, chasing the dogs to make them stop hurting him. I miss my little buddy. Well, while at work, my mother called. She had some bad news for me. She took our little girl to the vet because she was having a LOT of trouble breathing besides having a horrible runny nose. Mom and the vet discussed the prognosis, and decided to run a blood test. Her liver function was triple what it should have been, she had a horrible respiratory infection, was severely dehydrated, and her kidneys were shutting down. She asked if there was any hope of saving her, and the vet honestly told her it was slim to none. The vet and my mom think she got a hold of a rat that had ate poison to destroy her system so quickly. Out of kindness, mom made the heart-rendering decision to have her put out of her misery by letting her take that final, peaceful rest.

Mom called me at work to first tell me that her OWN doctor had called and said her own MRI showed that her tibia was broken, instead of having broken cartiledge in her knee. She has to see an orthopedic surgeon on Monday AND stay off her feet. She had also just found out last week that she has a severe case of gallstones and is scheduled to have her gallbladder removed at the beginning of next month. Then mom gave me the heartbreaking news about my little kitty.  It didn’t help that rude customers acting like jerks abounded in the pharmacy today. I just fell apart. I had to go to the backroom and just sit down and cry. I am positively feeling overwhelmed with grief, sadness, and worry right now.

Tomorrow, I will be taking a breather, and going to the lake. None of my friends can go, but it will be okay. I need to be alone to grieve, and I will do part of that through sketching and drawing. It is a major stress reliever for me… so if I am MIA again for a few days, now you know, the rest of the story…

Well, I just had a really crazy thought. It is about some Ancient Civilizations and global warming/ice ages.

Think about it, scientists said the last major little ice age was about 8000 years ago. Well, that means there were HUGE glaciers all over the earth. If there were ancient civilizations 10,000 years ago, and archeologists keep looking for evidence of this. They will not find it except in places like Peru, Egypt, India, etc, along the equator where the glaciers did not make it because it was a bit too warm even for them. Glaciers would have chewed up and spit out any buildings they had come into contact with in the northern/southern part of all of the continents. There would be NO evidence left behind of the ancient civilizations in those regions.

What will WE leave behind when the next ice age hits? Global warming usually triggers ice ages, although at this point, I really do not believe that global warming exists. If you look at the evidence over the last recorded 150 years for most temperatures throughout the world, a LOT of places have actually COOLED off by a degree or two. The normal weather pattern is eradict, not predictable like it has been, so people look out when mother nature decides to be moody!

Back to the thought about what will we leave behind. One of the history channels was discussing ice ages on TV the other night, and it said what would New York City have looked like with the last ice age. Well, it would look like NOTHING. The glaciers would pick up, grind up, and spit out in random places ALL of the great buildings. That is what gave me this idea of how all our ancient civilizations left very little behind for us not by choice, but by eradication by mother nature and the weather of the planet. Even the subways will be eradicated because the glaciers obviously grind deep gouges into the ground. Don’t believe me? Well, just what did you think made the Great Lakes, which are some of the largest lakes in the world. It was glaciers, which is a proven FACT.

So all we have to show from old, ancient civilizations is a few pyramids, a few great temples, a sphynx, some crystal skulls, ancient computers discovered buried in the mud of the Mediterranean seas, etc. It has been hypothesized by scientists that perhaps we are only just NOW rediscovering what we once knew. Think about it, whatever greatness is in store for us in the future may simply be a re-discovering of our OWN great past. What if our own ancestors were actual star people..that is, WE created our own technology to travel to far off galaxies, and when some of them returned, what they found is the remnants of THEIR/OUR people.

The current civilizations find it hard to believe that perhaps what we are now is what we once were….

Well, I was tagged by NK to list 6 quirks of mine, and like her, I have NO idea how to tag others, so I’ll list some people…and they can participate if they choose…or not. Let the countdown begin…

6. Notoriously apologizing for EVERYTHING. I have tried to break this habit, but so far, to no avail. I have to be a bit empathetic in my job, so the easiest way to get around customers is to say sorry for this or that…or I understand.. unfortunately, it has run its dyes into my everyday life as well.

5. Vacuuming only after I have dusted ALL of the furniture, used the lint roller/furminator to remove all cat fur particles on any of my furniture, and changed the litter box.

4. Not inviting people over to my apartment because I am afraid the carpet is a bit dirty or I haven’t had a chance to make sure cat fur isn’t everywhere, plus, what if the trash started smelling although I just changed it the day before… yes, I am a clean freak..but do NOT confuse that with a neat freak.

3. Making very blunt comments unconsciously. I have a tendency to open my mouth and say what I am thinking…regardless of the situation. I am just a very blunt and honest Sagittarius, and I tend to fit the profile for my Zodiac sign, although I do tend to let people run me over a bit. Most people that know me well enough just tend to ignore my blatent comments, or pardon me once I’ve apologized over an hour later, when I realize what I said might have been construed as rude or mistaken.

2. Not letting friends pay for my meals or giving me gas money when I’ve been doing all of the driving. I am getting better at this though, since the price of gasoline is now nearly $4 per gallon. I figure, if I am driving since some of my friends do NOT have vehicles, then it is only fair that they do chip in in some sort of fashion. I never say anything, but if they offer now, I try not to turn it down.

and drumroll please….

Numero UNO - Letting my food touch on my plate. I CANNOT tolerate my food mixing or touching on my plate. I am notorious for getting down small bowls to put peas, corn, beans or any other foodstuff that might let its succulent juices run over into something else. If the bowls aren’t available, a slice of bread will work..but of course, I won’t eat the bread..it is wasted.. somehow.. I find it contaminated at that point, unless it is cream style corn or red beans. Guess I am more like NK’s R on this one than we knew

My tag list will be…

Mirchi

WhiteyMcWheatBread

Enreal

ColorBlindCupid

ChineseAmbassador

and whoever else would like to participate….

sorry if I missed anyone, but the clause above will include you if you so choose to accept..especially since nearly everyone has already been tagged previously.. it makes it difficult to find NEW people to tag

For the last couple of weeks, I have been Missing in Action otherwise known as MIA. I have had a LOT of stuff going on. A co-worker has been ill and was put into the hospital, so I have been, along with other co-workers, picking up all the extra work. Extra work that I really do not have the energy for to be honest. It has been wearing me out.

Then, Saturday night, I went to a friend’s little sister’s birthday party. When I came home that night, I had started itching around my waist extremely bad. Sunday morning, I woke up with two small dime-sized rashes on my waist. So, I did what any normal pharmacy technician would do, I bought some hydrocortisone cream and benadryl. Monday morning, I awoke to an intense itching, and to my absolute HORROR, I saw many new welts had developed, all along my waistline plus one on the bend of my leg. I knew it was not poison ivy or oak because it does not weep nor spread like that.

Some of my friends suggested I had shingles because of the band it had made along my waistline, so I went to the doctor. He ruled out shingles due to it passing the midline, although it does look similar to it he said. He ruled out poison ivy and oak, but stated that I had contact dermatitis. The doctor has NO clue to what is causing it, and prescribed a prescription strength topical steroid cream, along with Claritin in the morning and more Benadryl at night. He told me I may have to actually take steroid medication or get a shot. I personally vote for the shot. The pills caused tremendous weight gain in me last time, not to mention severe nausea.

So far, the cream is helping a little bit with the not so severe spots, but new ones keeping popping up. The only thing we can think of that changed was washing my clothes at my parents in the new 2x detergent. Since I am allergic to a lot of stuff as it is, I am having a hard time figuring out just what exactly IS causing this. I honestly am absolutely miserable, so if anyone has any suggestions, I am all ears and eyes at this point….

As many of you may have figured out by now, I am a bit of a nerd. I LOVE the hard sciences with the exception of physics. I just don’t understand it so well, although I can apply it to everyday life..I know… WEIRD. I never really have understood what they call the soft sciences. For those of you I have REALLY confused now.. the hard sciences are your chemistry, biology, biochemistry, physics, etc. The soft sciences are sociology, psychology and I usually put philosophy in this category as well. I am sure you are now wondering what the heck does this have to do with shopping…? well, I am getting there, give me a minute and you too will see just what it mentally DOES have to do with shopping…

As long as I can remember, my mother has tried to force me into shopping for clothes and enjoying it. I do not ever remember enjoying it in the least little bit. I especially hate having to go to the dressing room, try on something, model it for her to tell me, “no, it really isn’t you.” Duh, I tried to tell her that. Did she listen? Obviously not, but you know how mother’s are.. mother’s know best

Not only do I not enjoy shopping, but I am an Uncle Scrooge when it comes to my money. I HATE to spend it, I always have, and honestly get it straight from my momma’s daddy’s genes. It has to be inherited because everyone says I act just like he did. I know I didn’t get it from my father or his side of the family, they spend money as soon as they make it if they don’t have a spouse that is willing to watch their finances. My brother is unfortunately a spend-thrift as well, although he is now learning the hard way about credit card finances. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean I won’t spend the money if I NEED to, I just don’t like to spend it.

When I go to the grocery store, I may come home with only 20 items, but I promise you I have spent no less than an hour and a half deliberating if I reallllllly needed those items or not. I also learned that to keep from buying a bunch of junk food, I will allow myself one treat, and one treat only. If I see something I want more than something else…then I have to put the other item back. I know it sounds crazy, but it does seem to work for me, and keeps me from eating only bad stuff which tastes just ooooh so good. The experts also say never to go to the grocery store hungry, and this is true, but if you MUST do so, then what I mentioned above will actually help you from buying up the whole store. I also create myself a preset limit on how much I will allow myself to spend for each trip, and try to keep a mental tally on it, so that helps as well. You have to do, what you have to do on a tight budget.

Then, there is the infamous shopping for clothes. You will shortly read just exactly how nerdy I now am. I am very paranoid about trying on clothes. Why? Simply because you do not know who tried them on before you, and you KNOW they haven’t been washed between those try-on’s. I became like this in middle school, so it had nothing to do with working in a pharmacy, but oh, after working in the pharmacy, it is SOOO much worse. Any article of clothes that I see a spot on or make-up on the collar, I immediately rule out for trying on. There are just soooo many contact dermatitis issues out there, not to mention what kind of viral/bacterial/fungal spores are lingering around the collar of the fabric. And let’s not even discuss swimsuits. All I can say is, ARHHH! Well, I think I WILL comment on them anyway since it’s almost as bad as trying on pants or shorts.

Do you KNOW how many people do NOT wear underwear out there? or if they do, only a THONG! OMG, how disgusting is that? Are you now grossed out too? I know most experts say you cannot usually catch sexually transmitted diseases or conditions from such things as restrooms or clothing, but this is not always true. You can actually catch lice, scabies, and a few STD’s through this method. When my little brother had just started junior high, he actually caught a cureable STD from the boy’s bathroom at school. See, we went to a very small school, so the junior high AND high school were all in one building, and the men’s room he frequented happened to be in the lunchroom area. Since my brother was a summer baby, he had JUST turned 12 when he entered the 7th grade (the beginning of junior high at our school). My mom knew where he was at all times when not at school, and then at school, he was constantly under MY foot. So when he finally came to my mom bawling about not knowing what was wrong with himself, she took him to our family doctor. The doctor interviewed my brother, discovered that he had NEVER had sex, but had picked up an STD by using the men’s restroom, which he frequented thanks to irritable bowel syndrome. I won’t say anymore about that, but now I am sure you understand just how he picked it up. I know it is harder for ladies to catch such diseases from toilets, BUT now you see why I am REALLY paranoid about swimsuits, pants, etc.

Moving on to shopping for shoes… this is my final disgust. My mom at least forewarned us kids to ALWAYS wear some sort of sock/nylon/etc when trying on shoes. You just do not know how many people out there have fungal foot infections. And yes, anytime someone has tried on that shoe with no socks on and has athlete’s foot, you have now become a prime target for that dirty little fungus once you have slipped you pretty little foot into the slipper of nastiness. And just to further disgust you, you can also pick up toenail infections this way too. Those little fungi are just waiting and saying, “I’ll get you my pretties, and your little nails too..”

Once I get past the trying-on point of clothing and shoes, I am back to the point of deciding just how bad I really want or need the article in question. I may walk around the store for an hour just to decide. At the same time, I am sure I am making the security personnel jumpy because I walk round and round because I can’t make up my pretty little head. BUT, if I do decide not to get the product, I make sure I put it back where I found it because then I know security has usually watched me enough to see that I have simply decided not to purchase their product. From working in a grocery store, I know that by making a product disappear all of a sudden from hand when you’re not in the area where you picked it up, makes security and managers go nuts and start immediately searching to see just where you either hid the item on yourself or where you discarded it on the shelf.

It’s okay, go ahead and call me paranoid. Go ahead and call me OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder). I will not take offense to it, I will just laugh it off. I work a pharmacy, so I have seen and heard it all, trust me. And yes, by-the-way, I AM a little OCD, but I think being just a tad that way makes me a more wary person. I think most people working in pharmacies are that way, we simply like to count things LOL.

And for one little last bit of personal advice, when you get home, throw those new clothes in the washer and make sure you lysol the inside of those shoes before you wear them because you never know who has “walked a mile” in those shoes.

My whole life, my mom has referred to me as “a cold-hearted bitch.” I always pretended not to be interested in anyone because of the redicule and constant picking she enforced upon me. Everytime someone showed a minute bit of interest in me, it was constantly, “how’s your boyfriend?” This began as early as second grade, and she will never know how much it damaged me.

I have always been a shy person, from as early as I can remember. It began with my embarassment in kindergarten. I sat in between two boys that would constantly look up under my dress, and I would go home crying and complaining because my mom forced me to wear that damned things to begin with. I quickly learned to hate being a girl, to hate frilly clothes, and anything else that was associated with being a weak, little girl. 

In the middle of first grade, we moved to a new town and a new school. The school I had came from, I had lots of friends, and other than those two boys, people were not mean to me. Even as a small child, I was abnormally tall and overweight (tall enough to ride the adult rides as Six Flags at age 5). So at the new school, I was taunted merciously with, “big momma and fat momma.” I didn’t understand why I was being called these names because I had never done anything to these girls. I learned to absolutely hate that school. I was so far ahead of my class coming from a big city to a small town, that I already had been introduced to Spanish, computers, and wrote in cursive. My new first grade teacher docked my papers because I was confused about whether to write in cursive or print. At lunch, when these weird red lights were turned on by the lunch monitors, no talking was allowed, otherwise you were given “licks” as it was called. This meant your teacher paddled your behind with a wooden board for misbehaving in the cafeteria. One day, a kid threw all of his lunch trash onto my plate. I said no, and put it back in front of him, and he proceeded to do it again. Well, sometime during this, the lights came on, so when I told him no and to throw away his own trash, I got licks for defending myself. He just got reprimanded for not throwing away his own trash. I quickly learned how unfair life is, that no one will stand up for you, and you had to be strong and keep your mouth shut and just take it. In no way will I say I never did anything wrong while at that school, but I won’t say that doing anything right got me anywhere either, and besides that I was just a little kid.

The next year we moved into our permanent house, and another new school. This time, kids were friendlier, as were the teachers. I enjoyed my time at that school, but was still a bit fearful of getting into trouble. I didn’t want to get whipped for something that wasn’t my fault again. By third grade, I was at yet another new school because of the convenience for my parents of picking us up after school. I made new friends and I had fun, although I was just wasn’t that outgoing. I had learned the hard way too early on to receed into my shell lest all hell break loose and it be blamed on me. By this time, my brother was old enough to start school kindergarten even though he was a summer baby, and ended up getting spanked nearly every day at school because of his misbehaving. He was also behind a lot of the kids since he had JUST turned 5 when he started school. My mom and the school wanted to hold him back a year, but my dad said no.

I really feel that my little brother would have benefitted from this by giving him time to grow up a little more. He was in trouble ALL the time. I mean REAL misbehaving, not just standing up for himself..and he honestly could have cared less. Because he was constantly in trouble for being too hyperactive and into everything at school, I tried to be the good child, to disappear and stay under the radar. If my brother did well, he was rewarded and if not, punished accordingly. My parents at first tried spanking him, but he laughed at them, so they would take away toys that he loved. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t..and shortly thereafter he was positively identified with attention deficit disorder after the recommendation by his teacher that he was quite behind compared to the other five and six year olds. This was before it was the big “craze” in the schools…when you could really tell who had it and who didn’t. Plus, mom always had this guilt complex because she feared that she personally caused it because she was drinking alcohol on a regular basis when she learned she was pregnant with my little brother. She’s always felt that she was the cause of his behavior problems by drinking when she was UNAWARE that she was pregnant.

See, my mother and my father did not plan on having anymore children. My dad had a son by a previous marriage that is eleven years older than me, so I was supposed to be the one and only. The doctors always said my mother would never be able to carry a child to term anyway, especially after multiple miscarriages, even a late one. There are women out there who do have menstrual cycles while pregnant, and therefore, do not know they are with child. Plus, I was supposed to be born twins. There were two heart beats for a long time, and we stopped moving, and were thought to have passed away. Eventually, I moved, giving my mother hope. This was in the time when sonogram machines were really new and the technology was still being developed so expectant parents did not get to take home pictures of their unborn children. From what I am told, she had a lot of trouble with her pregnancy of me. The doctor’s finally took me a month later than my due date after mom just could not seem to deliver me, but I fortunately had a good birthweight 6 pounds and a few ounces, but I was very sick often as a small child. The doctors did not want her to have anymore children, so that was supposed to be the end, until one day, my parents were surprised with the news of another baby on the way.

As my brother and I grew up, I slowly became the straight A student that was never in trouble, and he became the little hell-raiser. No one could get him to do his school work. My parents did everything they could, finally putting him on Ritalin so he could concentrate. He was on it for years until the point where he begged my mom no more because he felt so weird with it, and not himself. The teachers would berate him about why couldn’t he be more like his sister. That did not help matters. At home, he would get into trouble, and blame me for it, and for some STUPID reason, my mom would believe him..so once again, although MOST of the time, I didn’t do anything wrong, I got spanked or grounded for his actions. I love my little brother and my mom, but I learned to further recede into that nice chiseled, ice castle I had built around myself.

This will be continued in a further segment..so stick around if you want to see how things turn out…

I myself have lived in Tornado Alley my whole life. You may ask just what Tornado Alley is. It is an area in the United States that has a significant outbreak of tornadoes in that area every year. Most of them occur in area covered from Texas north to the Dakotas and east to the Appalachian Mountains. The states usually included in this area include Texas (due to its shear size), Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, Iowa, Ohio, southern Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Arkansas, northern Alabama, and the western halves of Kentucky and Tennessee. Below is a copy of a map from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tornado_Alley in which it shows the prevalence of tornado activity in the U.S.

Recently, my part of Texas has been experiencing the development of many supercell thunderstorms. These are the storms that spawn many of the tornadoes seen throughout the U.S. This is largely due to the area of the midwest sitting between two mountain ranges, the Rocky Mountains in the west and the Appalachian Mountains in the east. Warm, moist, sub-tropical air comes flowing up through Mexico and Texas and clashes with cold, polar air flowing down from Canada. When these collide, they form rolling thunderstorms, usually along a dry-line. A dry-line is the boundary between a warm, dry air mass and a warm, moist, sub-tropical air mass.

I overheard a young lady recently mention being afraid of all of these storms. She was not from here. I am not scared of these storms, but I do respect them. A favorite quote I like is from the movie, “Reign of Fire.” The quote is, “What do we do when we are awake? Keep two eyes on the sky. What do we do when we sleep? Keep one eye on the sky.” This is typically true of people from this area of the U.S., and as long as one pays attention, harm to oneself can usually be avoided. In fact, once a month, usually on Wednesdays, they test the sirens. 

What sirens are you talking about you may ask. Well, if you remember watching old movies about World War II, particularly that took place in Europe/Great Britain, in the background of air raids, you would hear a siren. This is pretty much the exact same sound because that is WHAT we use to warn the public of imminent danger from tornadoes. It means to take cover immediately, and that usually a funnel cloud has been spotted. A funnel cloud is the precursor to a tornado..it is basically a tornado that has not reached the ground YET, and if you’re lucky it never will.

The ideal storm shelter is in an underground concrete bunker, which many homes in the countryside have. But if that is not available, to take cover, you should take it in an interior bathroom or interior closet. These smaller, interior spaces tend to stay protected and intact if a tornado actually strikes. And although building codes in the alley area are more stringent than other parts of the U.S., 100+ mph winds can still force shrapnel through exterior walls and make windows deadly, leathel objects. Make sure to curl yourself in a ball, close to the ground, and protect your head and neck as best as possible. If out on the open road, seek shelter in a drainage ditch. Do NOT stay in you vehicle! The flatter and lower to the ground you are, the less likely for you to incur injuries from debris flying through the air. I wish my own family members had known this 44 years ago. My dad’s sister, brother-in-law, and 3 kids were all traveling in a car when a tornado struck. It picked their car up and slammed it like a toy into an oncoming pickup truck. My uncle and the 2 people in the other vehicle were barely injured at all, but my aunt and her 3 children were instantly killed. You cannot outrun a tornado, so please do not try. Being in a vehicle is one of the most dangerous places to be when a tornado is striking. Plus, don’t forget, it can go back up into the cloud, and drop back out at ANY other point as well. So running away may turn into running INTO the tornado.

Also, there are myths out there that should never be done. Such as opening a window to equalize the air pressure in your home. Duh, you just created a vacuum with suction doing this. Plus, if a tornado is hitting your home, it will probably break all the windows regardless of being opened or closed. Don’t waste your time on this, instead use it to protect you, your loved ones and your pets if you can get to them in time. Believe it or not, animal nature will tell most pets to seek shelter if it is available. Also, do NOT seek shelter under overpasses. Yes, a few lucky people have survived doing this, but many more have been killed than the media has let everyone know. Most people are sucked out from underneath those overpasses and DROPPED miles away, usually causing death or serious injury. Also, most tornadoes travel southwest to northeast thanks to the weather air currents, so seeking shelter in a basement is a good idea, just NOT the southwest corner of it. For more on myths or misconceptions, see http://www.tornadoproject.com/myths/myths.htm .

I suppose another reason people these days don’t fear them as much is due to the National Weather Service being able to issue warnings and hopefully give ample time to seek shelter. Also, in schools in these areas, tornado drills are frequently performed, teaching from a very young age what to do to be prepared. For us, it is a normal, everyday part of life..probably as much as earthquakes are to those on the west coast and hurricanes for those on the east. And yes, hurricanes do spawn tornadoes, but they are usually more in the form of water spouts and usually a lot less powerful. That means Florida also gets a lot of tornadoes, but a different kind.

A funnel cloud trying to form…

Above is a picture of a wall cloud that I took. Usually, the place where the strongest tornadoes form.

I don’t want people to fear tornadoes, but to simply respect them and be well informed. Fear causes people to act on rash thoughts and ideas in times of crisis. Keeping a cool, well prepared stance is what is best and needed when it is time to “keep both eyes on the sky.”

This thread is entirely dedicated to those who have been scammed…in hopes that others don’t fall for the same thing.

Recently, my aunt by marriage, I’ll call P, had a sister that got involved with a con artist. We’ll call my aunt’s sister, R. R owned her own home, it was paid off. She worked as a home health care aide, and made just enough to pay the bills. Then, one day, she met a man we’ll call, Jon. Well, Jon just swept her off her feet. Supposedly he has a degree from Clemson, and was from S.C., USA. He told her how he’d just sold his company there for a lot of money, and had decided it was time for a change in scenery, so he moved to Texas. He got a job in a plant, but later just quit.

R, let the guy move in with her. They bought a motocycle…in her name. They refinanced her home… THAT WAS PAID FOR.. to get some money needed to finance for a business he decided to start up. The bank put both their names on the title after that. R and Jon never officially married, but there is a law that many people don’t know about called “common-law marriage.” In the state of Texas, if you live and share the same bed with a person of the opposite sex for 6 months, you are legally, common-law married. That means, anything Jon bought, scammed, etc, R is ALSO now liable for. Such as Jon carrying a cashier’s check to a local bank for $100,000, and keeping out $20,000 for himself. First of all, whoever at the bank that allowed this, needs to be prosecuted because I personally feel it must be an inside job. I have used that same bank for years, and they put a hold on my own payroll checks from a major corporation that I received weekly. They even put a hold on IRS refund checks..so who in their right mind would knowingly fall for that? Yeah..right.. inside job I say.

Needless to say, Jon did not really have that money in another bank. He owes so much money now..and had it all financed in R’s name. She moved in with her sister now because she doesn’t have the money for the utilities. She’s also having to file for bankruptcy because he stole all that money from the equity of her home. She called the police, but they said since they LIVED together..common-law marriage was in effect, so there is nothing they can do. The officer told her on the side though (off the record), to move the motorcycle and sell it before Jon could get a hold of it. At least she can get some of that back with today’s gas prices..and it doesn’t have many miles on it. Obviously R has no common sense because my aunt kept telling her that this was all too good to be true. If Jon had soooo much money supposedly coming in from a sell out of his business in SC, where was the money, why did they need to re-finance R’s home..etc? Turns out, according to the police, Jon has been convicted of all sorts of con-artists scams all over the country. He seems to get away with most of it, simply because he cons an unsuspecting needy-type lady. Mom kept telling my aunt P, her SIL, that something was up with the guy because he had prison tattoos, and needed to have him checked out, but R was madly in love, and wouldn’t listen. Now she’s paying for it…49, broke, bankrupt, and nothing the law can do for her all because of her being common-law married. Plus, R, is not real smart, and we suspect maybe some mental learning issues, although she won’t get tested for them. This is just HORRIBLE! All we can do to help her is pray at this point.

Then, the other day at work, mom’s boss, we’ll call A, came in talking about some wonderful man that she’d met. That she had a date this coming weekend with…and his name was Jon.. from S.C., etc. My mom told her immediately that it sounded just like this other “Jon.” A was clearly upset, esp since she doesn’t know if they are one and the same. A’s Jon said he has a motorcycle, that he went to Clemson… hmm sound familiar. I told mom to remind A, that he is STILL common-law married as well.. so maybe, A can help the police some how set him up in a sting operation if it is the same Jon…which is what we suspect.

Another scam I was made aware of.. the jury duty scam. Early last fall, I was visiting my mother, and she received a phone call asking for my older brother, W. She asked what it pertained to, and she was informed that W had missed jury duty, and they need to verify his information to send him his ticket for failure to show. We had heard on a radio broadcast about a jury duty scam going on just the previous afternoon. Mom was immediately suspicious. She refused to verify anything about my older brother’s information. She then asked for the caller’s info, and he identified himself as investigator M. He gave her a case number and a phone number to call. She then asked why he called her, and he said that W listed her as a next of kin person to contact. All I can say is warning bells went off…

My older brother, W, is my dad’s son by a previous marriage..so he’s my mom’s STEP-SON. And although his mother has passed away, he and my mom are not close..and probably never will be. Also, he lives 8 hours away from us..why would we be his nearest contact when his wife’s family lives across town from him?!? Investigator M wanted to verify my mom and dad’s names and addresses..she wouldn’t..then he wanted to get in contact with me..not knowing I was sitting there listening to the speaker phone. She wouldn’t verify my address either. As soon as she hung up, we immediately called W. He was very upset. He called the county he lives in, along with a neighboring county, and they have no record with that number, nor has he missed anything. After calling mom back and telling her what he discovered, mom decided to contact the state attorney general’s office..as the radio program had suggested, but it didn’t say if it should be state or federal.. and they acted like they had no idea what to do. So she called the sheriff’s office and asked if they knew who to call.

The sheriff’s office had her come down to the station and give a statement. Mom had also taken down the phone number off of the caller ID where the “investigator” called from, and it was a New York area code. She looked up the number the “investigator” said to call, and it was all over the internet that it is a SCAM. The sheriff said anytime something like this happens, immediately give them ALL of the information. They filed a report and turned it into some federal division dealing with it because it had crossed statelines. We were told we did the right thing by NOT verifying anything and by not giving out any information. We were also told that you will NEVER be called by phone for anything to do with jury duty.

The best we could figure out, is they used a phone book to find the information. I guess because of all of the genealogy research I have done, I know that you can look in old telephone directories, but I will not tell you how because I will NOT help out any scammers that might decide to read my post. Another major warning flag that went up for us, they had forgotten to mention as a contact..my younger brother that still lives at home with my parents due to financial reasons. He doesn’t have anything but a cell phone..so they used lan-line numbers to look up the info..my older brother works for a company that puts together phone books, and said that was the best guess he could come up with..because it usually lists your phone number and address.

The next step we all took to protect ourselves was to get a hold of www.equifax.com. It is one of the major 3 credit bureaus. Basically from that, I took their phone number, called them, and had a warning placed on my credit/SSN#. I also had the option to have them call me if someone tried to access my credit, and I placed that on it as well. The warning is only good for six months from the time I did it, so I will place it again soon. I tried contacting one of the other credit bureaus first, but could not get through the long automated phone system. I found equifax to be the easiest to deal with. Also, equifax contacts the other 2 for you, and they put up the blocks/warnings as well. Each person in my parent’s household did this, and each person in my older brother’s household did it as well, including his 8 year-old child.

There are companies out there that will help protect you from identity theft as well. One such is called Lifelock. Their website is http://www.lifelock.com/ . Basically, they do what I told you about above. They actually contact the credit bureaus every 90 days from what I read and provide a million dollar guarantee to clear up your name if you do become a victim. As for the reduction in junk mail and credit card offers, when you place a warning/block through the credit bureaus, they actually are the ones who stop that for you.

Another thing I was also told to never do…never fill out to win free stuff in malls, grocery stores, etc. They “say” someone wins, but I have never actually met someone who has. It is simply a good way for them to get your infomation not only for mailing lists, but for persons wanting to steal your identity. Because if you think about it, it asks for your name…including maiden/married, address, phone number, email address, and good contact times. Well, you have just basically told someone where you live and just when you’ll be home. Other kinds of thieves can use this information to their advantage then, especially since no one stands guard over those win free stuff boxes. It is easy for them to just grab a few names out of the box and walk away with YOUR information.

The lessons I have learned from this, if it SOUNDS too good to be true..then it probably is! And to be paranoid in today’s society is to be safer.