People of their word

I have been on disability for almost 10 yrs and Mike quite a bit shorter then that. And if there is one thing that we have painfully discovered is that there is no way we can live on our disability. We just found out today that the government in its infinite wisdom has decided that we need to pay out $95 a month for Medicare. Mike will opt out of Medicare because he has the VA, but I have to have this and we can ill afford to loose close to 100 dollars a month. So to this end we have been trying to get some work at home gigs going. We thought we had a sure thing going. About a month ago we got a free dinner and had to listen to a sales pitch for Master Guard fire alarms. To make a long story short Mike got a job offer from one of the gentleman in charge of selling this Master Guard alarms. It took us two weeks just to get an interview set up with this guy. He tells Mike that he will pay to get us set up with Ignite Electric(another long story), give Mike a cell phone to make calls and contacts to call. We were suppose (according to this bozo) be able to make good money. Well we were suckered. The old adage that if it sounds too good to be true it probably isn't proved true to us. Mike has been calling this guy leaving phone messages at his home and on his cell phone and has been sending him emails but he has not bothered to return one phone call. Not even a "Hey I'm really busy but I haven't forgotten about you". So Mike is going to call this guy and tell him to stuff his job where the sun doesn't shine. And we were really counting on this money to pay bills and pay to bring Tara & Elisa out here for the summer. We are currently talking to a lady online who will pay us for posting on forums. I can only hope that this isn't a scam either. If it is we will be in a world of hurt. It is frustrating and annoying to have people tell you something and not keep their word. I can't stand liars.

Spring storms yet again

Spring has definitely come to the state of Texas. For the past month we have been having storms once a week, usually on a Tuesday. For us in The Colony we have been fortunate in that the worse we have gotten was lots of rain and lightening. Others in the area have gotten tornados and flooding. This evening was not much different with the exception that we actually had tornado sirens going off in our area. We had a friend of ours from our church over for a visit and first we had to power go off. Then I was standing at the back door listening and could hear the sirens. At first Mike thought that it was a police siren, but then it got louder and we realized that we had to move to the hallway. We had candles lit in the living room and we just sat and talked for about 5 minutes or so, then Mike opened the front door and the sirens were off. We got power back about half an hour later. We were lucky there also. Just down the street from where we live, the power had not been restored as of about 9 pm. I will be curious to see if any of the other cities got tornados. I know some areas had a lot of flooding. This will help the drought immensely.

Texas Tornados

Ah Spring, the time where a young mans' fancy turns to love and everyone who lives in tornado alley holds their breaths, waiting to hear that dreaded siren and run for their lives. We have had two storms over the past two weeks that have produced tornados. There has been only one death when a young man hid behind a stack of lumber and suffered a heart attack when the wood fell on him. Not to bright, but considering we have had a total of 12 tornados in the Metro Plex, it could have been worse. Yesterday we had some storms move through and Fort Worth area had several tornados touch down. Mike and I were taking a nap and when our alarm clock went off the radio station was telling everyone about the tornado warning. We got up and turned on the TV and watched with much concern the line of vivid orange and red colors that were heading our way. Sandy had an appointment with her therapist and we called and canceled that when we heard that Denton county (where we live) was also under a tornado warning. We had told her we would pick her up after school so when the time arrived, Mike went out to get her. She comes home and tells us that the school officials had them in the halls because a funnel cloud was over the high school. She said the sirens were going off and the principals were on the PA system, telling them to stay where they were. What worried me was that the sirens were going off and we did not hear them! More then a slight concern. So we are going to get an all weather radio alarm clock that is connected to Noah weather radio and will go off if there is an alarm of any kind in our area. I will admit that I am terrified of tornados and if it were possible I would spend March through October in an under ground shelter. Perhaps when we build our own house we can do something like that.

Yet more proof that men don't have a brain

Mike did something yesterday evening that confirms what I have been saying for years. Men have no brains. It got chilly last night and we decided to build a fire. We had used sticks and boards we had found around the neighborhood. One stick, while brittle, was too long to fit in the fireplace. Mike goes out into the garage to break it. He leaned it against an empty kitty litter bucket, with plans to snap it in half. He puts one foot on the bucket (you can see where this is going) lifts his other foot and at that time the bucket crumples and shoots out from under him and down he goes. I am in the living room adding pieces of wood when I hear a thud then "Ouch, that was really stupid". My first thought was "Oh God! He has fallen and hurt himself." I go out into the garage to find him on his feet, holding his right upper arm. I ask if he is OK and he says he doesn't know. I look down and find the bucket in pieces and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what has happened. I ask him what happened and he tells me the sordid details. He is fine, thank Good. He has a bruised arm, scraped back and shoulder and wounded pride. I told him that from this point forward, if he gets anymore of these "brilliant" ideas to run them past me first. He will never live this one down.

How stupid can you get?

There was a story in tonights (4/4/07) news about a woman who came home to find her apartment being burglarized. She watched until they left and then followed them. At some point they realized that they were being followed and started shooting at her. She was very lucky, she walked away with only a flesh wound to her lower arm. What really upsets me is that this idiot woman had her three kids in the van with her. They were unharmed, but can you imagine the terror these poor kids felt as bullets were hitting the car that they were riding in? This poor excuse for a woman admits that she shouldn't have done this absolutely stupid stunt. My take on this is that she should be charged with reckless endangerment of her kids and CPS should be brought in and those kids taken from her. At least until she proves that she is putting the kid's welfare above her own.

Terrorists, Grandma and coughing teenagers beware!

Not only do terrorists and your grandma need to be aware that they may be booted off a plane, but now our teenagers need to be worried. There was a sixteen year old girl who was booted off of a plane because the pilot felt that "she was a risk to the other passengers". She was on a class trip to Washington D.C. and New York. She caught a cold while she was there and when she boarded a Continental plane to come home she fell asleep. She woke up and started coughing and couldn't catch her breath. After a few minutes she was fine. Her friend said it was just that annoying little tickle that you just can't seem to get rid of. She was examined by a doctor that was on the plane and was determined not to be a threat to the other passengers. But the pilot insisted that she leave anyway. She had to spend an additional night in New York with a teacher. Continental left them to find their own lodging and they had to pay for clothes and toiletries because all of their things were on the plane on the way home. Continental said they would pay for the hotel room only. The mother talked to someone from Continental who said the matter would be dealt with internally. If any of my daughters were treated this way I would sue Continental for everything I could get. You just don't boot kids off of a plane because they have a cold. You best be sure you don't have allergies or asthma if you fly on this airline. Especially after they have been examined by a doctor and deemed not to be a threat. You can be I will never use Continental Airlines.

Hot topic

We have a very sensitive topic around here. It's called illegal immigration. There are several states that are on the front lines as it were in dealing with this growing problem Texas, California and Florida. There is a small city where we use to live called Farmers Branch. There is a large Latino population living there and local law makers have put a ballet forward to make it illegal to rent apartments to undocumented immigrates. Now I am of the opinion that if you are here illegally, then you have no business being here. What sort of ticks me off about this is that there are people who don't live in Farmers Branch who are contributing large amounts of money to the against camp. Which means that these people are tipping the scales toward making it legal to rent to illegals. Somehow this seems wrong. If you live in Farmers Branch and are swimming in the bucks then by all means contribute how you feel toward this ballet. But there are rich cities around Farmers Branch who are sticking their noses in business they have no real right to be in. If you feel that strongly about illegal immigration then start your own ballet,. Now I know that what happens in Farmers Branch will set a precedence for the rest of the country, but it seems wrong that other cities can and are swaying the outcome. I have also read that a person who is working in the against camp was arrested for removing for signs from businesses and some people who live in Farmers Branch are afraid to put signs in their lawns for fear of reprisals. I feel for the people who live in Farmers Branch and I am glad we no longer live there.

Trying a new angle

As you are aware Sandy is in JROTC and wants to join the Air Force. You are also aware of some of the problems we have been having with Sandy. Today we had some rule breaking, snotty attitude, disrespect, ect. Mike & I have decided once and for all that we are sick and tired of all this "typical" 15 yr old behavior. So we are going to implement a military household. She will respond with "Yes sir/Ma'am-No sir/Ma'am". And we will call her by Cadet or Cadet Bacon. We are going to start implementing Non Judicial Punishment. Which basically means that she will be written up and treated as she would be if she was in the military. Since I am the Commander in Chief I get to decide what her punishment will be. At first it was 24 hrs without her computer as a night light, 5 push-ups, 5 sit-ups, 50 jumping jacks and running around the block once. She took this pretty well. Then I was reading a report that she has to do in ROTC. It has to be 8 minutes on any subject. I suggested that she write about wolves. She has been working on this since Saturday. She had three pages computer typed. As I read this I realized that most of what she had written was taken directly from the information she got off of an internet page we printed for her. I made the comment that I should make her do it over completely when I came across a sentence that went something like this. Pups will pounce on each other and old bones to practice their hunting skills and as people say practice makes perfect. Add that to a statement about wolves hanging out together after they have hunted just didn't work for me. When I made that comment she stomped off in a huff and it went down hill from there. Mike was talking to her like a DI (Drill Instructor) would and all she could do was stand at attention and laugh. That ticked him off more. She was not taking this seriously and we were very serious. So her punishment was doubled and she was told that she would get it added to if she kept up the stinky attitude. It will take a little time but she will come to realize that we are serious about making this a military household and anything she does that breaks the house rules will be dealt with in this manner.

Where NOT to go to school!!!!!

A few years back I decided that I wanted to improve my lot in life and to that end I initially decided that I would attend Capella College online. I went there for about 8 months and for various reasons I decided that this college was not for me and that I needed to take a break from school. I recently decided that I wanted to take up the college torch again. Mike & I had looked into the possibility of going to Kaplan online. We contacted them and the admissions rep, one very nice gentleman by the name of Dwight Fields contacted us. We started the looong process of filling out the initial entrance paperwork (online). We went in and changed our FAFSA and sent the confirmation to Dwight. We then talked to Trica, the financial aid adviser. She then transferred us back to Dwight. We talked to him for a bit longer. Then we got transferred to a Donna Herman, who was suppose to be our school adviser. This broad was, for lack of a better word, ditzy. At one point she bubbled "Isn't this fun?" Uh-huh, yeah right. We were then told that to insure that we were "serious about going to school we had to come up with a $95 admission fee which would not be part of our tuition and would this be a problem". We said it would be a major problem as we are on disability and can't afford that kind of a fee. We were then told of a scholarship that is available to students in financial need that they would be more then happy to help us get. We said sure, why not. We were told that we had to write a 250 word minimum essay on why Kaplan College, why now and why we needed this scholarship. OK, no problem there. At no point was it indicated that this essay had to be done today. We filled out more forms then told Dwight that we had to break for dinner. Our first phone call from him was at 2:00 p.m. and this was now after 6. We broke for dinner and I wanted to go for a walk. While Sandy was doing the dishes, we get an email with someone Else's information on it. Very sensitive information like SSN, address, phone ect. Whoops! Someone frucked up big time there. Dwight said he must have sent the information to the wrong person. NO!! Ya think!!!!???? That should have been our first major clue. He seemed to be alittle put out that we had to break for dinner. There was more information that he was trying to send to us but was not showing up in Mike's email fast enough. More phone calls ensued. He said he would call us back after checking on something. We waited a bit for him to call back, but finally decided that we would go ahead and take our walk. The phone was ringing while we walked out the door. Sheesh! Talk about over enthusiastic. I wondered aloud to Mike if perhaps he was working for a commission. I've dealt with used car salesmen who weren't as pushy. We get back and by this time I am mentally and physically exhausted, so while Mike was occupied with other things, let the phone ring......and ring............and ring. Mike calls Dwight back and he is wondering if something was wrong. We told him we had to run an errand. He starts pushing us to get the essay in right away. At first we reluctantly agree then decided that we needed to take a break and emailed Dwight that we would get to the essay later that evening and he would have it on his desk in the morning. We get another phone call from Dwight, again saying we HAVE to get this in immediately. Mike trys to tell him that we have hit a brick wall and need some down time and he puts the director of the admissions scholarships on the phone. Mike talks to her for a minute or two then says to me "You talk to her, maybe you can get through to her" and hands the phone to me. She trys to tell me that this damn essay just HAS to be in right now, that her staff is already working overtime to get us processed and that this is a one time only deal and if we don't get it in right now it won't be available later. I ask for just an hour, that this essay needs to be good and if it is going to be good we need to recharge our batteries and she tells me that if I give her a chance she will walk us through it to make it easier for us. Now how is she going to do that I might ask? All she is doing at this point is pressuring us to do something that we are willing to do if she just backs off and gives us an hour. We did not ask anyone to stay over and work overtime. I told her to forget it that we are no longer interested in going to Kaplan and hung up on her sorry ass. We get one more phone call which we did not pick up and whomever called did not leave a message on our voice mail.

We have since received a very insulting email from this lady saying that obviously we were not serious students if we needed to take a break. We have written an email to the head of Kaplan informing him of the practices of his Florida office (where we were going to go), the email we got with someone else's sensitive information on it and that we have no plans of ever going to Kaplan. We have also emailed the gentleman whose information we received by accident, telling him what happened and we are also going to try phoning him tomorrow. It just amazes me how hard these people were pushing us to get this one little thing done. Makes me really wonder if these people do get some sort of a commission if they get students in by a certain deadline. I mean, we were not going to be able to start classes until April 18, so what was the all fire rush to get us to submit an essay in less then 20 minutes? Did they wants us to do a sloppy job so they could say no to the help we were getting? Did they think that if they turned us down for the help on the admissions fee we would be able to cough up the money after all? Did they not want to give us the assistance? Gotta wonder.

Lazy Sunday

Today we were kidless so decided that we would sleep in a bit and just go to church. I was surprised at how few people showed up. I tried to call Tara & Elisa today but nobody was home. I tried calling yesterday but the first time I got a busy signal and the second time I got no answer. This is typical. I keep a phone record of when I call and when he calls. More often then not I am the one who makes the calls. Which is in contempt of the Missouri court order. He is suppose to let my girls call me every other week. I find myself lucky if they call me once a month. I checked the log yesterday and discovered (not to my surprise) that it had been a month since I had called and talked to them. I don't know if I can do anything about this right now seeing as the Missouri courts threw out my petition for a GAL. I think any other legal work that needs to be done will need to be done with a lawyer and that will require us to wait until we have more free money available. It really makes me angry that he gets away with so much crap.

Mike and I have started walking again. We only walk around the block but ya gotta start somewhere. I feel good about starting again. Another exciting day in the Bacon household.

Happy & Sad

Today we had a health fair at church. It was very good. There were several booths with various health topics. They had some senior citizens come in and play ukuleles and sing. At one point a gentleman's dentures came flying out. He made a good save and went on with the song. Too bad I didn't have a camcorder and could have sent it to American's Funniest Videos. There was a labyrinth that was very relaxing and enlightening. Basically it was a huge sheet that had a winding path painted on it that you followed to get into the middle. There was a basket with pieces of paper that had little scripture saying in it. You could journal if you felt the need. They served healthy lunch which for the most part wasn't too bad. Sandy has next week off for spring break. Our friend Mary offered to take Sandy for a few day to give everybody a break from each other. Mary use to teach ADHD kids so knows how to deal with Sandy's temper tantrums. However she did confide in me that their elderly Shetland Sheepdog Nikki is dieing. Neither one of us took that news too well. I don't know at this point if Sandy knows or if Mary will have to put Nikki to sleep. She is an old dog and lived a good long life. She is a sweetheart and just loved going out into the back yard and playing with Sandy. She will be missed. It brought up memories of when I had to put my dog Max down. He was as old as Nikki is now, but sometimes I wonder if I had done enough to save him. My parents went back east to settle my grandfather's accounts after he died a year before. I was going to my fiancé's grandmother's birthday party. We put Max into a kennel and they did not follow our directions on how to take care of him. I got him home and he had lost a lot of weight. I went back to work the next day and found that he had made about four messes (most of them in my parents room), justice if I ever saw it. I had asked that he be put down knowing that he would not survive being in a kennel, but my father couldn't do it. One of the few times that my so called mother didn't over rule him. So I took him to the vet and she gave him some fluids and he seemed to perk up, but she couldn't tell me if that would have been enough to keep him from making more messes and my mother was very clear that when the dog started messing her carpet up that she would put Max down. So I figured it would be easier to do it then rather then hear my bitchy mother complain about all the messes. I wouldn't have put it past her to take it out on the poor dog. But sometimes I wonder if I gave up on him too soon.

Thursday grocery shopping

Every Thursday Mike & I (or one of us) will go to an organization known as CCA. It stands for Catholic Community Action. It provides all sorts of help to people who need it. They have helped us get caught up on our utility bill and provide food vouchers. The food that you get there for the most part is pretty good. The amount of food you get is determined by the income and number of people in the house. They have frozen meat like hamburgers, chicken, turkey rolls, sometimes diet food and today gallon containers of ice cream. I was really tempted to pick up some of the ice cream. But we are allowed three frozen items and I figured it would be better to get actual food as opposed to junk food. Besides our freezer was filled to the brim with bread. Each time we go we are allowed five loaves of bread. Which is far more then what we normally eat. We have tried to tell them that we don't need that much but they are very insistent. We finally got to the point where we pulled out what we thought we would not eat and gave it away to the neighbors across the street. So we did our good deed for the day. Now our freezer isn't as full and we can put other things into it (no not ice cream as much as I would like to) we can go out and buy some meat on sale to give us a little more variety.

Invasion of the kitty snatchers

I don't know if any of you have seen the old movie "Invasion of the Body Snatchers"? But it's a movie (and I am sure I will get this wrong as I have only see it once and that was in 8th grade. Memory is not what it use to be and SOME of us don't have a brain filled with useless movie information) about these plants that suddenly appear on earth and these plants change you while you are asleep. You look the same but don't act the same. Now you are asking what this has to do with our four footed kids. We currently have two cats and one kitten. Jenny, our Calico, is the oldest at 4 and is the "typical" cat in that she will give you affection when she deems that SHE wants it. She views her humans as people who are here to cater to her.....i.e a cat. Shadow is our black Siamese mix and he is 3. He is a talker and thinks he is a dog. He will wag his tail and play fetch with you for as long as his toy will hold out. He use to be the lover of our family until we brought Mac into the mix this past June. Mac is an orange Tabby who will purr the moment you pick him up. He loves to make bread on me and the down side to this (other then his claws that need to be clipped every two days it seems like) is that while he is making bread he will also make a puddle of drool. He is also the resident bully. He loves to torment Shadow to distraction.

Now the past week or so Shadow and Jenny have traded places. Shadow has turned into a butt head. He has been growling at Sandy (something he has not done in about a year) and he wants very little to do with me (which is unusual). He will stiffen up when he gets picked up and he complain when you pick him up and put him down. He will not sleep next to me at night, he might sleep next to Mike, provided that Mac hasn't chased him off. Jenny on the other hand has been super affectionate to me, jumping in my lap, sleeping next to me (which in very rare) and following me around the house. It's like these two cats have traded places.

Rain, rain please come again another day

As Mike mentioned we got a storm that moved through about 4 p.m. The sky got all dark and soon we had rumble booms (my name for thunder) then it started to pour. Our little town even got on the news as one of the areas that got the most rain. Usually when we have storms we are missed. If we are lucky we will get some gusty winds and maybe some sprinkles and that will be it. I use to be terrified of thunder and lightening as a kid but somewhere along the line I find them fascinating. I will stand under an overhang or porch and just watch the storm move through. I love the smell of rain and hearing it on the roof is so relaxing. I do have some concerns as we are living in tornado alley, so in the middle of the night or the wee hours of the morning I will stay up just to be sure that there no tornado warnings I should be aware of. Until we get a decent underground shelter, not a basement, I won't sleep easy from the months of March through November. But then who am I fooling, I don't sleep much anyway, so there is not much difference.

Oldie, moldy poems

I have dredged up some poems I wrote way back when I was in high school. Some of them are upbeat and others are...................well...............a bit depressing. But what can I say? I was in high school, I was a walking hormone. I hope you like.

Rain:

Down came the rain in sheets of dismal gray. To fall upon the earth, to bring forth new shades of green. Spring has come, life has begun. The cycle is renewed, life is complete.

Glory:

Laying alone in the dark I let my mind and soul rise above the strife and poverty. And as I drift over the crowded tenements and crime infested streets, my heart is saddened at the thought of leaving. But there is peace in my heart also. For at last I have triumphed over all.

Awakenings:

Standing on the hill facing the rising sun, my heart flies like a soaring eagle. As the horizon slowly turns crimson, my soul is freed to roam this land. As I drift above the earth I see the boundless beauty that can only improve with time. Beauty that will last for countless generations.

Spring has arrived in Texas................for the moment

I noticed while out doing yard work yesterday that the trees and birds think that spring has arrived. A few trees in our neighborhood had burst into flower. We have a male and female Cardinal feeding at our feeder and sitting in our big tree. I heard the first lawn mower today and the balmy air feels nice. But there is a motto here, if you don't like the weather in Texas just wait five minutes. This could change, after all it is only March. And the old saying goes March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. I have to say my favorite season is Spring. I have a poem about spring that I will have to post soon. However I am not looking forward to summer's heat. Oh well, at least it doesn't last as long as the heat in Phoenix.

Yard work

Yesterday was Saturday and it was a perfect day for doing some yard work. I raked the leaves in the back yard and Sandy followed picking them up and putting them in the trash bucket. We didn't get the entire yard done, gut it looks alot better. Note to self tho *Self, be sure to do this activity in the fall when you are not fighting with the growing weeds*. Mike & I got into yet another row with Sandy (what else is new). She had decided to spend last Sunday with a friend from church (and of course she couldn't decide to do her laundry on Saturday). She got home too late to do her laundry on Sunday, so it waited until this Saturday. We have told her over and over that doing her laundry while we are still sleeping is not a problem, but she "forgot". Now while I understand she was trying to be thoughtful, we have given her permission to use the washer and dryer to get her clothes washed. Seeing as I was barely awake when she started her laundry I didn't pay attention to what she was doing. About 20 minutes into the wash cycle I look over at her basket and see that it is empty. She had taken two weeks of laundry and stuffed them into my washer. I have showed her over and over just how much laundry constitutes one load and yet she still stuffs all of her clothes into my washer. Well we had more then a few words with her. The washer finished with out exploding or dieing in the process but I will see what happens when I do our next load. Since I can't trust her to do as she is told I will have to do her laundry on top of all the other chores I have to do around here since Mike is laid up with his back. We both cleaned/raked so much that both of us didn't make it to church today.

We still don't know about her World Geography grade as the teacher hasn't posted the test that she took at the end of last week. However we did find one project of maps that was worth 400 points that she managed to loose. She made no attempt to talk to the teacher to see if she could do something to make up these points and there was another project that she had 5 days to complete and in typical Sandy fashion put it off until the last day (probably Friday morning) and she "didn't get enough time to complete it" and did not turn in what she had done (if anything). I think that project was worth 200 points. So while she did thinks she did well on her test and had brought her grade up to just below a D, we don't know what it is at this point. We will have to contact her contact teacher Coach Herrod to see if she can find out what her final grade is in this class. If she has flunked this I don't know what this will do to her chance of graduating from the Freshman class. I can hope that she will be able to take summer school, other wise she will have to repeat her Freshman year, or at least that class which will put her one class minimum behind where she should be through the next three years. We have an ARD meeting in April to discuss her future options. We will also have to contact the Air Force, Army & Navy to see if they have a minimum grade GPA to get into basic. Let's just hope and pray that she makes up her mind to graduate and make a life for herself. Mike & I certainly can't make her do the work let alone turn it in. She has to be the one who wants more for her life then flipping burgers or ending up with 5 kids on the welfare system with a boyfriend who will not work to support his kids and beat down Sandy.

Start of spring cleaning

Today Sandy came home early because she had testing. Mike put her to work washing and waxing our car. And naturally it is suppose to rain on Sunday. Oh well, it needed it. Anyway I took the time that Sandy was otherwise occupied to clean out her dresser and closet. Any clothes that she had not worn in the past three months or was what I determined to be too small was put into a large garbage bag. I ended up with two bags stuffed to the gills (do garbage bags even have gills?). I put the bags in our room figuring that if I put them in the garage Sandy would go through them and pick out what she felt she still needed. However I forgot to take into account that we have two kittys that just love to shred plastic of any sort. So I walked into our room a few hours later to find one bag shredded. I hope no one swallowed any pieces. I guess we will find out soon enough. Mike then tried to get Sandy to rake our back yard. She had no clue and did not get a clue on how to do it even after Mike showed her several times. I will have to go out tomorrow and finish what she didn't do and she can follow behind me and pick up the piles.

We got an email from Sandy's contact and Algebra 1 teacher. It seems she is a distraction in the tutoring class as well as her Biology class. She takes after her father, she talkes too much. She is no longer allowed to have any time on the school computer unless a teacher insists on it. The only reason Sandy is doing and turning in her work is because of this teacher. Both the Algebra and the Biology teacher feel that she can do the work, she is just lazy and refuses to do it. Mike and I feel that it would be better if Sandy was put into Special Education classes, at least for the time being. Until she decides that she wants to pass her Freshman year and eventually graduate. In a strange way this news is encouraging..................to us anyway. It's kind of nice to know that we are not the only ones that Sandy is giving a hard time to.

Busted again............................naturally

I keep thinking that someday Sandy will learn that she can't get anything past us. This morning I got up with Mike. I was going to my ladies bible study and Mike was going to the food bank to get our weekly allotment of food. At 7:45 this morning (the time that Sandy is allowed to leave to catch her bus) I hear her trying very hard to walk quietly down the hall. I look up and she is about to walk out the door and see that she is walking out with sandals on her feet. It was far too cold for her to wear them to school and she did not ask if she could wear them. So I told her that she needed to turn her butt around and change into sneakers and that she is not allowed to wear sandals to school. She turns around, goes into her room for about 30 seconds and stomps out the door, yelling bye over her shoulder and slamming the door. I turn to Mike and say "She was not a happy camper about changing her shoes". He says "Oh well, she will get over it. I would have considered letting her wear them if she had asked and it was the last day of school". Since we can't trust Sandy to do as she is told I decided that I would take her sandals into our bedroom so she would have to ask before she can wear them. I search her room top to bottom and could not find her sandals. I figured she put them in her backpack. When she walked in the door this evening after school, I searched her backpack, but could not find the sandals. I asked her where her sandals were and she gets this "Oh crap I'm busted again" look on her face. She just gives me a blank look. Mike asks her if they are in her locker and she said yes. I asked her how they got there and she gave me another blank look. I said you took them to school after you were told not to, didn't you? She was honest enough to say yes. I told her to bring them home and that she was going to loose them. She was not too happy but right now she is lucky to even have shoes. I will not tolerate disobedience and lying.

Something I did not know

I have lived with animals, mostly dogs (well one dog) and several cats all my life. I used to work at the Toledo Zoo and have watched all sorts of animal programs. I have also read lots of books on how to take care of dogs, cats, horses ect. So I consider myself, well not an expert, but knowledgeable on the animals that live with and around us. But I have to say that today I learned something that I was not aware of. I guess you could say that a day you don't learn something new is a day that is lost to you, but this was something that I can honestly say that I would have been happier not knowing. I was in the bathroom taking care of a few necessities and our black Siamese Shadow wandered into the bathroom to see what I was doing. After rubbing up against me a few times he wandered into the shower. About three seconds later I heard my cat belch. Yes, a full blown, very rude sounding belch. I was so surprised. I did not know that cats could belch. I know that alot of animals fart, but a belching cat was a new one on me. I moved the shower curtain and said "Goodness sakes Shadow, need a napkin or something"? He ran out of the shower and stopped in the doorway. He had the good grace to look embarrassed. So I have learned something new today.