Cost of Living

As many of you know I’m forced to live on Supplemental Security Income and I get food stamps.   Well I was so happy to find out that we were finally going to get another cost of living raise.   I got a $24.00 raise!!!   Ain’t much, but better then nothing.

Guess what?    I got a letter from the food stamp office.   With that huge $24.00 raise, they cut my food stamps by $70.00!    What the heck???   I get a measly $24 from one place and they take almost triple that from another????

How does that make any sense?    I’m so tired of watching these politicians throw money around like it’s nothing while people like me sit here struggling just to figure out how to keep the damn electric and water on.

If you break down my SSI check, I would be making about $4.36 per hour based on a 40 hour week.    That’s just sad.    How is anyone supposed to make it on that?    I would need to receive another $500 a month just to average a minimum wage job.    That would make my head spin to actually have an extra $500 a month.     That alone would pay my electric, water, gas, and car insurance.

How about actually giving us a Enough to Live on raise instead of a Screw you raise?

Four cups of coffee and counting!

Okay, so far today in the last 2 and a half hours I’ve had 4 cups of coffee and just started the 5th.  hehehehe    I’ve called three people and called them Vern and tried to call my bubba to wish him a happy birthday, but it was his wife who answered, he was still in bed.   Yeah I know, he’s a lazy butt.   :)     Shhhh…going to try calling him again.    Woohoo He answered!

So now what should I do?   It’s C.O.L.D out there.    Right now having fun texting and bugging my cousin.    She’ll be reading this later and I can see her now….she’ll be nodding her head and saying oh yeah….caffeine overdose.     Normally I don’t drink this much coffee, I have the obligatory first cup and it normally lasts an hour and I heat it up with a little more coffee, then maybe later on another one.    LOL   Wish you could see my fingers flying over this keyboard.   I’ve had like 3 and a half years of typing classes back in high school and thanks to the internet, I keep my skills honed.    Trying to remember, I know Mrs. Davenport set me on the road to becoming a typist in Middle School, then in high school, I can see her face, but I can’t remember her name.   That’s sad, I can pretty much remember every teacher I ever had.   I definitly remember Mrs. Hill.    Man I loved her.   I used to see her in the hall at Vocation School back in High School and I would sing I love the sprite in you (80s sprite commercial) and she would sing back that she loved the crazy in me.   :)

Okay, it’s time for another cup of coffee, so have a great day and we shall talk again soon.

It’s me again! :)

Today is Saturday and it’s Octoberfest weekend!   At least I think that’s what they are calling it again.   It used to be a huge thing in town, booths lined both sides of the sidewalks in downtown, crafts, food, etc.   There were some carnival rides for the kids, music playing and a decent parade.   That’s when the local newspaper was doing it and the money raised went for coats for children, now the City of Hartford does it and it ain’t worth nothin.   There’s still a parade, but not like it used to be.   A few booths in town, but that’s about it.   It’s really sad.   It could be great but they don’t seem to want to do anything to make it great.   I made some suggestions to the Mayor earlier this year, we’ll see if she listened to any of them…doubtful!

 

Oh well, maybe I can get a funnel cake at least.

Volunteering

Well, I was at St Vincent DePaul weekend before last and I seen how badly they needed help so I’m back volunteering again.   It’s really actually kind of fun.   I get to visit with Ruthie and I get to pick on Jennifer again.    Plus it gives me something to do during the day while James is at work.   If your unemployed, disabled, a housewife it might be something you can check out.    I’m sure all SVDP stores could use volunteers and I used to volunteer at Salvation Army when it was here in town.   It makes you feel good inside knowing your doing something good.

Of course after being away from it for almost 2 years, I can tell by my muscles and joints that I’m active again.  :)

Vitamin F

A friend shared this article with me and I want to share it with you.
Why do I have a variety of friends who are all different in character?
Some of them can even be considered marginal?
How do I get on with them all?
I think that each one helps to bring out a “different” part of me…
With one of them I am a polite, good girl.
I joke with another friend.
I sit down and talk about serious matters with one of them.
With another I giggle at every silly thing.
I have A GLASS OF TEA (Long Island or Short Island) with one
And dance with another.
I listen to one friend’s problems and give her advice
Then I listen to another advising me.
They are all like pieces of a jigsaw,
When completed they form a treasure box.
A treasure of friends!
They are my friends who understand me better than myself, who support me through good days and bad days.
They are like colorful anti-depressants that I take on different days.
Real Age doctors tell us that friends are good for our health.
Dr. Oz calls them Vitamins F (Friends) and counts the benefits of friends to our well-being.
Research shows that people in strong social circles have less risk of depression and terminal strokes.   If you take Vitamin F constantly, you can be up to 30 years younger than your real age.
The warmth of friendship stops stress and even in your tense moments, it decreases the chance of a cardiac arrest or stroke by 50 %.
I am so happy that I have a stock of Vitamins F!
In summary we should value our friends and keep in touch with them.
We should try to see the funny side of things and laugh together, not forgetting to open our mouths big to swallow the floating vitamins F!!!

Sunday’s Rain

Yesterday around 3pm it started to sprinkle and James said let’s go fishing and I said let’s go.    We headed out to one spot and it started pouring down rain and I had my window down and my arm out the window and was enjoying the cool wind and rain.   James was laughing at me.   We get to the fishing hole and it’s still pouring.   James says it’s raining to hard and I said oh come on let’s try anyways.   He says okay and tells me to get out and he’ll hand me the fishing pole.   I jump out and he hands me a pole and within seconds I’m drenched.   He gets out and comes around the jeep and decides it’s just raining too much and runs back around the jeep and tells me to get in.    We sit there and drive around while he decides if the rain is going to let up or not.   We finally head home, me with my window down enjoying the rain.

I miss the days when it was okay to go outside and play in the rain and have fun.   Sometimes you just have to unzip your adult suit and let the child step out and play in the rain.   It won’t hurt you, afterwards you can put your adult suit back on if you must.

My Garden

Went out a couple of evenings ago and had to replant my yellow squash.   While I was out there I checked my cucumbers.   The one plant I checked was loaded with little tiny cucumbers.   Well, last night James and I went back out and was looking at the other plants and I was able to pick my first cucumber of the year!!  My zucchini are in full bloom and I should start getting some of those next week maybe.    My tomato plants are loaded with little green tomatoes.   It’s so exciting!

You know growing up I hated the garden.   My mom had to literally drag me out there kicking and screaming to help her.    It’s only been about the last 9 years that I’ve really gotten in to it.   I thought it was because mom’s health was making it harder for her to do and I was only doing it to help her out, but she’s been gone since May 2009 and I’m still planting that garden.   Maybe now I still do it for her but in a different way.

This month was my mom and dad’s anniversary.   I know the year dad died mom said they would have been married 25 years if he had made it just another month.    That was back in 1994, that’s been 17 years.    Wow, doesn’t seem like my daddy has been gone that long.    Well now getting all weepy.

Here’s my advice!   If your mom or dad has a dish they make that you love, take the time to learn from them how to make it.    My dad used to make these amazing hamburger patties and his green beans were the one thing he was always asked to bring to dinners and stuff and let’s not forget his beef stew, I’d give my little toe to know how he made that.    I learned how to make pretty much everything mom cooked, I just wish I had paid more attention during the canning process.

Anyways, sorry I went all maudlin on you.    :)

Burger King

A week ago we stopped at Burger King in Central City (Kentucky) and got dinner on the way home.   We ordered the original chicken sandwich combo and the whopper Jr. combo.   The chicken was supposed to be no lettuce, no tomato, extra mayo.   It came with lettuce, tomato and one small glob of mayo in the middle.   The ends of the sandwich were dry.   The whopper Jr was cold.    The fries tasted nasty.   So I called about it and was told to stop back in and my order would be replaced.     Along comes Saturday and we are in Central City again, so we stop….

The woman at the window asks me, that was a number 4 and a number 9, correct?   I said no it was a number 3 and a number 9.    I was thinking the whopper Jr combo was a number 3.   We get our food, the fries are HOT and good, needed a hair more salt, but still good.   As usual we eat our fries first.   As I’m sitting there putting a bead of ketchup down each of my fries and watching the scenery fly by it starts teasing the back of my brain that something isn’t right.    Slowly it dawns on me.   The Burger King Combo menu.    Number 1 is the whopper, number 2 is the double whopper and holy cow the number 3 is the triple whopper….number 4 is indeed the whopper Jr.   We are half way back to Ohio County and I look over at James and I said I made a mistake.    He says what’s up.    I tell him that we didn’t get the whopper Jr, we got the triple whopper.    I pull out the chicken sandwich and I reach in and pull out this HUGE mammoth triple whopper.   His eyes bug out and he starts laughing.    He suggests that we share.   I’ll eat half the whopper and he’ll eat half the chicken then we’ll switch.    He starts with the chicken sandwich and I sit contemplating this burger.    I have eaten a triple whopper before with fries and a drink, but at the time I was a size 30-32 and weighed 319 pounds.    James is laughing at me as I take the first bite.    Three bites in, he says too bad Ruby isn’t in the backseat, she’d help me out.   Ruby is our Beagle.    I said no kidding.   Then I get to thinking, I remove the bottom bun and take two patties off and toss them in the bag.   I said Ruby may not be here to help me, but she can sure do clean up at home.   :)     James laughs and I look over and I said hey where’s the chicken sandwich.   He done ate it all.    So I’m stuck with the burger.    Needless to say even with removing 2 patties I was still not able to finish that burger.    Half of it was all I could handle.     I was glad I could no longer finish a triple whopper.    That’s probably why I’m only a 20-22 now.   :)

Sorry Burger King, I swear it was an honest mistake.    The food was excellent though.   :)

Finally Friday!

Woohoo!!   It’s Friday everybody.    I have two songs stuck in my head.   Finally Friday by Sammy Kershaw and Working for the Weekend, but I can’t remember who sings that one.

Back in high school I had three friends and every Friday we’d go to Morgantown where some of our friends lived and we would hang out on Friday and Saturday night with them.   Every Friday, no matter what time we headed for Morgantown the same song would play when we would hit this big curve in Beaver Dam that was on the way to Morgantown.   Mony, Mony by Billy Idol would play on the radio.

Those were good times.   We’re all still friends and we may not see each other every weekend anymore, but if one of us needs the other I’d bet they’d come running.   Our song then was Lean on Me by Bill Withers.    James was one of the friends from Morgantown, he was like a superhero to me back then.  I thought he could do anything.   Now here we are all these years later together.    I asked James one night if God came to him and said he could change any one thing in our relationship or about us, what would he change.   He finally said he would realize how special I was back when we were running around and gotten together.     I sometimes wonder what our lives would be like today if we had gotten together back then.

Don’t you sometimes wish it could be like it is in the movies?    Be able to visit an alternate reality and see what your life would be like if you had made a different decision?

Welcome

Summer is just beginning and I’m just about ready for winter already.   It’s been a busy and rainy start to this summer.  We went through some bad flooding here in Hartford, Ky.   Yes, Kentucky, not Connecticut.   There for about a month it looked like Hartford was an island, but it’s all dried up now and the farmers are finally able to start planting.   I was finally able to start my garden, not only did I start it, but I finished it in the same night.  I planted a row of cucumbers, 8 tomato plants, 3 hills of zucchini, 4 hills of yellow squash, and James planted 3 watermelon plants.   It’s not much but it’ll do since we got such a late start.

I just hope the tomatoes do good this year, I want to make a batch of spaghetti sauce and some salsa.   I may even attempt to make some corn relish, if I can get enough corn together without James and my niece eating it first.    My niece is this little bitty thing, weighs 100 pounds soaking wet, but she can sure tear up the corn on the cob.