Happily, still manic.
I had an interesting day.
Bubba-cat (the big black one) slept with me, most of the night. I just loved the feel of him walking over my legs to find a good spot in the bed. He's my boy, I adore him. He doesn't have to be cuddly, he's Bubba, and he's been with me through some very dark times.
Bubba used to be the one bright spot in my day. I was imprisoned at home, caregiving. Ron needed 24 hour care, and I was the only "provider". I'd take him outside in the wheelchair for a "walk" now and then, and I'd take a run a few times a week.
We lived on a cul-de-sac and he lived about halfway to the end. I'd always smile as I ran past his house, and see him peeping out from under a car, wrestling with his litter mates. Sometimes he'd run across the road in front of me just to hear me squeal "Awww!"
I brought him treats for months before he decided to let me pet him. That was such a wonderful day. He let me stroke down his back a few times and then pranced off. Ten and a half years ago.
After that wonderful wake up, I did my God time. Then we went to the wholesale warehouse. Ron asked me to get a flatbed cart. He sat on the cart and I pushed him around the store.
We got the soda we needed for work, and priced the glucosamine. He needs more. He loaned me $20 and I got some vitamin C. My gum is bugging me. It gets "mad" sometimes and vitamin C always fixes it up.
It wouldn't hurt to floss more, either.
We got our stuff and had a good pickup. I teased the driver about getting tie downs for the flatbed cart, so we could take it with us.
On the way to work, he told me the origins of the "N-word" - from the Ethiopian word for "King" apparently. I'll see when I get an Eritrean driver. They'll know.
We got to work and I left Ron with the supplies, as I got the handcart. I loaded the soda onto the handcart. Ron walked to the door, where I'd left his wheelchair (he tries to walk as much as possible but it isn't much).
The machines look good, I stocked sodas and took care of things for Ron. We had a terrible ride home, it was over an hour late. I was pretty cold and lamenting the lack of a good knit hat. I'm putting one in my bag, tonight.
I didn't complain to Ron. Because I had to watch the street, I couldn't read or work on my knitting. Price of transit.
Eventually, someone came and we went home. Ron wanted Chinese so we got the lunch special. I ate, took my pills and went to bed with Bubba (again! Squee!). We had a good nap, I shut the door so the kitten wouldn't bug him.
Got up, Ron took the trash out for me. Nice. I put the insulation in the door. We have some spaces around the door, where it meets the frame. Insulation and weather stripping don't work, but we did find a solution.
Ron tied together plastic t-shirt bags, the kind you get from Walmart or the grocery store. He made a long "rope" about 10 feet long. I stuff the rope into the cracks around the door, with a plastic knife. The door is now well insulated and we just pull on the rope to remove it. It's a good fix until we can get a new door (the way things are going, a long time).
Now I'm watching Doomsday Preppers. I even caught up on the laundry.
Even if I qualified (I don't), I would never go on the show. Years ago, between Hurricane Rita (2005) and Hurricane Ike (2008), I used to preach preparedness to tell everyone I met, especially my drivers. I'd ask them, do you have supplies in case of disaster? How much canned food do you have? Do you you have a manual can opener? They'd say no and asked what I had. I'd tell them, I have plenty of food and water so I don't have to worry. I even have cat food. You really need to prepare.
No, they said (several of them), they didn't. They would just come to my house and take my supplies. They would say this deadpan. I would stare at them and say "What?" and they would repeat themselves. "After all, it's a disaster, and I don't have any food. I'll just take it from you."
So, I learned to SHUT UP about disaster planning. I'll talk about it online, and I think that's a good thing. I get over 2 thousand hits a month. I talk about it because I doubt 5, of the 2000, know me in real life.
After Hurricane Ike, (I had stopped talking about it years previous) I had drivers begging me for food, on the off chance I had some. I told them how to find the FEMA distribution points and shut up.
I had learned my lesson.
1 comment:
Heather, that's why part of our disaster preparation is exercising our Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. It's not a hypothetical for us-the necessity of this right was tested for us after Katrina (I live on the MS Gulf Coast). My stepson's elderly neighbors evacuated, and their home is right on the beach (Hwy 90), as was my stepson's-the old ante-bellum homes that survived Camille. My stepson (all our family actually) chose to "ride it out", as we have pets, businesses and homes to see after, plus we agreed to look after those of neighbors who needed to evacuate. We all rode out Camille, so we were prepared for what this could entail. My husband was on the police force during Camille and helped round up the elderly and infirm to get them to safe shelter (he has told me one story of having a group of elderly hold hands in a line against the increasing wind, and the elderly man at the end of the line being blown down the street-he was rescued, of course).
Anyway, my house was on high enough ground, that despite having the beach app a mile south of us and Back Bay less than that north of us, we got no water damage, and very little wind damage-uprooted plants, that kind of thing. A few trees across the streets after a small tornado-the neighbors all came out at the same time, as if they had read each other's minds, and began powering up the saws to cut the trees in the street and move them. Almost all of us had generators-ours would power almost the entire house, though we choose not do that, just the fridge, freezers, and A/C, a couple of small appliances.
Unfortunately, my stepson's historic home which had survived Camille, was turned into a heap of matchsticks by Katrina. (Camille had higher winds, but Katrina had a greater, more powerful storm surge). He had stayed with us during the actual storm-we actually sat on our front porch and watched it. No, we're not stupid, we knew our situation from long experience.
After the storm, he went back to his home to salvage valuables which weren't moved, such a large heavy safe, and to keep an eye on the neighbors' properties. We didn't see any real looting, just a few people with shopping buggies walking around looking for "opportunities". But one guy did boldly walk into my stepson's neighbor's garage and make ready to take off with a bicycle. My stepson knew he wasn't a friend or relative, and asked him his business. He claimed to be just "borrowing" the bike, and that he was a friend, but my stepson knew otherwise, and let him see the shotgun he was carrying for such situations.
My other stepson and nephew were checking on the businesses and were similarly prepared.
The local police had their hands full and seemed quite ready to allow we the people to take charge of our own personal and property security, and it seems to have worked, as I don't know of any significant instances of looting in our area.
Anyway, we got through just fine, as did our neighbors, each filling in gaps for the other as needed.
It does amaze me to realise that as we sat on the porch watching/feeling the wind and rain, just blocks from us, whole casino barges were being torn from their moorings and moved by the surge across Hwy 90 and onto the tops of cars, etc, and that buildings were being flooded stories high. Yet the only damage my husband and I sustained, just a few blocks away, was a somewhat trashed yard and uprooted plants. Not even the roof was damaged, no water damage, with the Gulf on one side and the bay on the other.
I thank God for His mercy, and our Founding Fathers for their foresight in enshrining our right to keep and bear arms in our Constitution. Politicians will try to abrogate that right, but at least they have to come out into the open as defying the Constitution to do so, and that helps us.
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