Just passing through...

Hi! I'm just stopping in to say hello! Today is day 42 of my quitting smoking. I've slipped a couple of times, but I know that I'm done with them. Alcohol lowers the resistance, I've noticed, but as long as I don't go out and buy any and start up again, I'm cool with that. I'm not a saint, ya know???

Anyway, life is boogie-ing on by as usual. We are 2 months away from freakin CHRISTMAS!! I can tell you right now, lots of people will be having Christmas in July from me, cause there ain't no way I'm gonna get all the stuff done I want to do.

Of course, Halloween is here and TV is totally filled with all my favorite stuff. Ghost Hunters here, Ghost Adventures there, Paranormal this and Haunted that...

My brother and sister will laugh and be happy to tell you how funny it is that I like all this spooky stuff since they, 1) had to call my mom and dad to come get me from the theater when they took me to see Phantom of the Opera, and 2) watched as I jumped up and knocked my TV tray over when the invisible man started returning and all his veins showed up.

Yes, I was a wuss. Not any more...the scarier and ghostier the better. Thing is...that kind of stuff doesn't bother me now. Stuff like 48 hours and Forensic Files..that bothers me...cause there are weirdos out there, ya know??

Oh well, anyway.....I am hanging in there, battling the melancholy that fall always brings. Such a beautiful, bittersweet time of year. Hope you are hanging in there as well!

Begging for a Living?

OK, first I want to say that this whole blog may come across as being judgmental. I apologize in advance for that. This is just something that I've thought about several times over the past few years. If you have a comment or an opinion, please feel free to leave it. First and foremost, PLEASE realize that I am thankful for my job!! I don't want anyone to think otherwise.

Seems like there is a trend that kinda comes and goes around here. It usually starts in the spring, and then you don't see it so much. Then it starts up again around this time of year, fall.
It's people who stand on street corners asking for money. There is one guy who every single day when I go home is sitting waiting on the bus, and when the light changes, he goes up to the first car in line and asks for money or cigarettes. I know this because he's asked me for both. Now, I pull up to the light and roll up my window. This guy, in my opinion, is just bumming for the sake of bumming (I of course could be wrong...but...). He is not the type of person I am talking about.
The person I am talking about usually has a coat on, and a suitcase beside him. (I will say him in the general sense meaning him/her. Trying to be politically correct here.) Sometimes he will have his dog beside him, and I always feel bad for the dog. Invariably he will have a sign made of cardboard with the "reason" he is on the corner scrawled in marker in what looks like child's writing. Sometimes it will say "homeless and hungry". Some others are "laid off can't work", "if you can't give, pray for me", or the very simple, "please help". Some of the people look like they've been through hard times. They look dirty and tired, and their clothes are tattered. Even their sign is tattered sometimes. I feel sorry for them, but I still don't give. Why?
Because for every one of the legitimate down-and-outers you see, there is most likely one who is only pretending to be down-and-out.
I think I saw one of these the other day. She was at the corner of one of the major department stores, squatting down, with the cardboard in front of her eyes to keep out the sun. The sign said "even a penny helps. please pray for me". I stopped at the light and I had time to look at her. Her hair was clean, her jeans were clean, her shoes looked clean, she had on a clean shirt and a nice little gym bag on the ground beside her. Even the cardboard looked new. And I wondered...does she really need help? There have been others too..and unfortunately there is no time to stop and ask these people exactly why they are there, and to try to get to the truth. Are they needy or not?
Now, before you think I'm just being downright mean, let me say that there was a time when I was out of work, not homeless but nearly so, and I used to pick up Coke bottles to turn in for the deposit to get cigarettes and maybe a hamburger from McDonalds. I was not above holding my hand out to people and asking, "spare change?" I even ate part of a Gaines Burger once (that's dog food for those of you who don't know). It was either that or braunschweiger sausage, and even starving I wouldn't eat that! So I know what it's like. I also know what it's like to get tired of it and slink back to McDonalds with my tail between my legs and ask for my job back. Or any job. I know there aren't a lot of jobs out there right now. I am hanging on to mine for dear life, even though I can barely make the rent most months. I work hard for what little money I get, and if I have spare change, how can I be sure that my "investment" in that guy on the corner isn't contributing to a large tax-free income? Seriously!
If you are interested, go to a search engine sometime and type in "begging for a living". You will find information on there about people who make up to $50,000 a year just begging on the street corners. That's enough to give one pause.
This man who asks for help has enough gumption to go stand on the corner for hours at a time, in all kinds of weather, you wonder...if he walked from store to store to store asking, wouldn't one of them give him a job? I don't know..
And that's what I'm saying...how can you be sure? I suppose I could just give each one a nickel or a dime, since "even a penny helps", but I wonder, what happens to me?
Am I being selfish? Greedy? Not allowing myself to reap the blessings of giving away money? I don't know. All I know is that right now it is Tuesday. My gas tank is nearly empty, and I don't get paid til Friday. I have $3 and change in my car ashtray. I will need that change, because gas is so expensive and even that probably will just barely get me through till Friday morning.
I honestly don't know. And I honestly want opinions about this. I don't look at these people with disdain, or look down on them. Maybe I'm too lazy to have a job like theirs. I don't know if I could stand on the street corner like that or not. I look at them and wonder, and wish I had more time to talk to them, and pray for them if they ask for it, and pray that I may never be in the situation to find out what they are going through.
There, but for the Grace of God, go I.

3 weeks down

Well, here I am! 3 weeks and not one cigarette! I really can't believe that I've made it without cheating myself one time. It's kind of interesting. I found that the only time I really really miss it is when I get in the car to drive home from work. So I have little paper straws to hold and that makes me feel better. I'm going to a party next Saturday, and I will be drinking some wine, I'm sure, so I'm hoping that I will be able to get through that without smoking. I have friends who have said they will support me. Whether that means not letting me smoke that night, or making sure I don't continue to smoke afterward...well, either way is fine with me. Thing is, I can breathe now. I smelled my perfume an hour after I put it on for the first time since I don't know when. I do have weird dreams...that's the Chantix..plus I always had weird dreams anyway. But I found that I have time now to do things around the house that would've been put off because I would've been smoking. Something that my support group (Chantix support group) says is..if it takes you 6 minutes to smoke one cigarette, and you smoke a pack a day, that's 2 HOURS you have spent in a day smoking! That was amazing to me.

Anyway, I'm doing great, got new shoes so I can walk better, started eating better, my house is coming together. It's great!

I'm still lonely, though..lol..had to throw that in there. But I'm a lot more comfortable than I was before. I suppose eventually I'll get over being lonely. Right now, I'm trying to learn to like being with myself. Trying to get my shit together before I'm too old to have any shit!

It's sad that we don't allow ourselves to enjoy the good things in our lives because we are afraid of the bad things that "might" happen. Don't know if that's Christian teaching or Murphy's law or what. But it is nice to pat myself on the back today and say...I did it! I'm going to try to keep my chins up and look forward to good things, and pray that they will come to not just me, but to my family and friends as well. I couldn't have come this far without you and I love you all!

Now, off to another week of work, and another week of not smoking..and maybe lose a pound or two! It really is a mindset..but oh so hard to get to... I have some words of wisdom spoken by that great prophet Anthony DiNozzo on NCIS:

If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you always got.

Do something different today!