RDP: not fair!

Life is not fair. There are those in the world who are well off, get all the perks of life and live long, happy lives. They are usually white and well-off to begin with but not always. There are just as many raised white and well-off that get knocked down at every turn. Especially since the middle class has all but disappeared. The line is now drawn between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have not’s’ and gap widens.

It has been proven that a basic income of $1400 a month has taken people off of welfare and got them into productive and happy lives. It works! It’s given people pride and a sense of worth. It helps them dream of higher goals and reach those goals. It helps them give their children better lives, better futures.

However, our new conservative provincial leader has scrapped it. It was being tested in Hamilton (and was a success) so there are people who got on their feet, got apartments and jobs who are now getting knocked back down; unable to afford rent and child care.

This made me mad but it was yesterday I got furious. Doug Ford lived up to one of his campaign promises, “A Buck a Beer!”  Yeah, that’s what we need, cheaper beer! But it’s not that; it’s what he said that blew my mind;

He said he wanted to give Ontarians ‘more hope’.  a buck a beer. Sorry, I’m crossed-eyed again with fury.

Perhaps it means you can now afford to drink away your troubles. But heaven forbid you should buy beer if you are ‘on welfare’. That wouldn’t be fair to those hard-working tax payers.

How about getting everyone on the same playing field? How about making life a little more fair.

 

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/08/28/rdp-tuesday-prompt-fair/

SoCS: notice

Last night I noticed I had a big lump behind my knee. I never noticed it before; can’t feel it when I bend my knee. My knee has been sore and swollen but I thought it was the regular old-age-knee-ache syndrome that comes and goes. And I had to notice it on a Friday night.  I’ve been at the health centre almost every day for the past two weeks because the course I’m taking (Senior Fitness Training) and my Opening Doors group is in the same room and I had to notice it on a Friday night.

Today I am going to Bluesfest with my sister. There is a notice of severe thunder storms for exactly the hours we want to be there. Have you even noticed when you plan something in advance, you bring on rain?

I reminds me of the night last year when they had the Tragically Hip concert on a big screen at the Bandstand on the Beach. It was a beautiful setting, lovely sunset but with obvious rain clouds coming in. At first it was just a few drops, ah its just water. Then it came down harder and harder. The wind got so bad the screen blew around and rain was coming into the projection tent so they had to shut it down. There was a mass exodus of people trying to get back to their cars they parked in town away from the beach. We all got completely soaked but it was kind of fun there were so many people.

But at least it was free. The Bluesfest costs money and my sister already bought tickets. We are taking chairs, towels and umbrellas now that we have more experience with concerts in the rain but it doesn’t look good. It’s not just rain forecasted; its big, fierce yellow and red radar clouds passing over London in waves. Sonofabitch.

I’m also missing out on a garage sale with my neighbours. I only found out about it this week and I was too busy with homework to get stuff together. I wouldn’t even know about it except I went over to see how my neighbour was doing. ‘Oh yeah and we are having a campfire, too.’ If I hadn’t gone over there, I wouldn’t know anything about either. It’s probably ‘too hard’ to walk all the way back here a say ‘hello, we’re having a garage sale.’

Right now it is dark and the thunder is starting. I hope they cancel the garage sale until next week. I really want to get rid of stuff but not on this short notice.

Then I hope the storm passes through quickly and lets us have the concert. At least I can get something good for dinner. I’ve been given a lot of free vegetables, which is great but I’m getting sick of cooking zucchini, tomatoes, kale and/or beans every night. I want something else and someone else to cook it.

I actually would love to lie on my couch and watch TV today. That’s what I’m going to do this morning and hopefully I’ll be ready to rhythm ‘n blue rock and roll.

Yesterday was the last day of the course, Thank God, I am so sick of it! We did an exercise class at 9:00 a.m.  It was my fourth day out which is too much for this introvert. I had a headache and my knee hurt. First I walk into all the early birds chattering then she puts on the 50’s – 60’s pop hits I hate so much as I listened to the same ones every day all summer at work.

As I walked past the music player blasting, “It’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to!” I had a fantasy of smashing it with a baseball bat; way too much sensory overload. I will NEVER, I repeat, NEVER do an exercise class that early!

Have you ever notice early birds think that they are better and infer that you sleep in too late? That yoga teacher told us every day that she got up at 5:30 and the 10:00 classes were “too late!”   The first time she said it I said, “I get up early but I don’t like going out early”  I only said it once. Every time she said it after that I just thought “Good for you”  which progressed to “we know already” and then a mental “Shut the f*#k up”

When she said in very superior tone that she “doesn’t watch TV” I wasn’t surprised.

Luckily we will never see each other at exercise class!

I noticed I’m rambling….

Very nice new badge!

 

 

https://lindaghill.com/2018/08/24/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-aug-25-18/

SoCS: maniacal

ican’t sleep with my window open at night due to the maniacal tree frogs. They are so loud they drown out the maniacal crickets. Holy Moly, it’s a frenzy out there!

Remember back in the spring when the leopard frogs make their pretty musical song? Nothing like these harsh, deafening, rhythmic arguments going on here. And they are all over the place.

When they first started I though I had one in my ‘storage’ room (storage: where you put a lot of junk). I tore it apart looking for the damn thing until I thought to open the window. My ears were pierced by the sound of it right outside, on the side of my house.

Crickets can ‘throw’ their chirps. I swear they can find a spot where they echo. If my window is open, there is one that sounds like it’s in the bedroom. Go to the window, confirm its outside. Get back in bed; sounds in the room.

The tree frogs are somewhat quiet in the morning; the crickets are drowned out by the awaking cicada’s. They sing together making one continuous sound.

Living in the woods is noisy!

Its the ‘end of the summer’ sound. At first summer is light, airy and soft green. Now its harsh and heavy, too bright making its last burst of energy. Gone is the magic.

 

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “-ic or -ical.” Find a word that uses the suffix “-ic” or “-ical.” Bonus points if you use both. Have fun!

Oh boy, I get bonus points!

https://lindaghill.com/2018/08/17/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-aug-18-18/

RDP: fungible

Fungible? That’s a new one for me. Is it real? Is it something that has potential to grow fungus?

A tumour grew on my head for my whole life. It looked like a bald spot: I was told was a birthmark. Of course when I was a teenager I lived in fear that the wind would blow and someone would see it! The horror! Someone behind me going, “Hey! You have a bald spot!” was beyond humiliation. The older I got; the less I cared.

Sometimes it would change and get itchy but every doctor would say, “We’ll keep an eye on that.” It even went black once….. “We’ll keep an eye on that.” he said again.

When I moved to this area I got a new doctor who wanted to get a better look at it. He wanted to burn it off.

He did it in his office with local anesthetic. It turned out to be more than he anticipated and found a tumour had been growing with my hair in and through it so only the top was ever visible. It was much bigger than he thought and he removed a big lump. I had a huge burn hole on my head. When the freezing came out it was excruciating and I only had Tylenol.

He called me in for a second burning.

He said, “You wouldn’t believe what I took off your head, I sent it to the University.”

(and damn it, I wish he’d shown it to me!)

He read out the medical terms for what it was but what burned into my memory was ‘fungal’. It was partially fungal.

Now there is no birth mark, no bald spot. That thing grew on my head my whole life and it was fungible.

Okay, I just looked up the meaning of fungible; it as a way different meaning! Since I already wrote this, I think I like my definition better.

fungible; (of goods contracted for without an individual specimen being specified) able to replace or be replaced by another identical item; mutually interchangeable.

 

https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2018/08/12/rdp73-fungible/

SoCS: bodily functions

I had to whip past all the SoCS posts because I never read them before I write so they won’t influence my stream of consciousness.

There were a lot and you must have written them in the middle of the night. I caught ‘wind’ and ‘fart’ so I knew it was going to be a good one.

Then I went onto the website Linda gave us for inspiration. The first word blew me away; borborygmi.  I used to use that word all the time! When my stomach growled I would say, “Borborygmi” in a growly voice to match. I had forgotten it. I wonder if I’m getting stupider in my old age.

Come to think of it, my stomach doesn’t growl much anymore. I eat a lot more than I used to.

People don’t talk about their body functions very much, it’s generally considered rude. I do, so I know from the look on people’s faces that they don’t like it. It’s sort of a mild look of disgust.

And this is the main function I don’t tell people although it’s the elephant in the room of my mind: I go a lot in the morning, like 3 or 4 times over the course of two or three hours. When I went to work I had to set my alarm two hours early to have decent morning.

Going somewhere else is out of the question unless it’s a pressing problem. That is why I preferred starting my job at 10:00 rather than 8:00.

Retirement has been bliss for my bowels. Wake up whenever, have two coffees at my computer until whenever and go when I get the urge. I love it.

But now my fitness training course is going to start Monday at 9:00 a.m. I must be there bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and hopefully without a load in my pants.

So far the exercise classes for seniors have been at 8:30 in the morning. Forget it! They are training me and I will teaching a class for my Opening Doors group but I have been very vocal about not doing 8:30 classes.

The answer I keep getting is that lots of people come out for it. Well, good for them. Does that mean if you are not a morning person you are out of luck? I am fighting for those of us who enjoy our slow peaceful mornings. We have the whole day ahead of us!  Go out, drive in my car to people talking and goofy music playing? Torture.

But what I CAN’T say is;  I’m still pooping!

(Now I’m looking forward to reading what you guys wrote!)

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “bodily function.” Decide on one or write about a whole bunch of bodily functions. Bonus inspiration: here’s a website. Enjoy!

https://lindaghill.com/2018/08/10/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-august-11-18/

RDP: contact

I better write a post today to keep in contact with my blog world. Last Saturday I went to a reunion of old friends and it was great! These are a group of friends who grew up together, went to high school together and were graduating out into the working world when I met them becoming a girlfriend.

We were together for four years and moved out to Vancouver after two years together. My boyfriend was went to Simon Fraser University and I worked for the Vancouver Public Library.

Many of our friends followed us out to B.C. and live there still.

I left my boyfriend, moved back east and married an American. For a while I was in contact with a close girlfriend but our lives went separate ways and I lost contact with everyone for over 20 years.

I lived a very austere lifestyle with my husband for many years. After a terrible break-up I ended up starting my life all over. I could now do things I was never ‘allowed’ to do. Like Facebook: my ex would absolutely HATE Facebook.

One day I got a message from my old boyfriend asking to friend me on Facebook. Yes! Then I saw he was in contact with some old friends who knew old friends…. what a fun week that was connecting with everyone again!

They had been having a reunion up in Muskoka every year; friends who got married bought my boyfriend’s family cottage where we used to party. A few old friends had moved up there, too.  I went to three of these reunions before the hosts decided that was enough: they had gotten too big locally and couldn’t stop the momentum of people. That was five years ago.

This year a bunch of us turned 65 so we had a reunion in Toronto. People flew out from B.C. and drove down from Muskoka. I drove to Brampton, stayed at a friend’s along with another friend Friday night and drove back Sunday.

It was so much fun and I’m still recuperating. Not sure why…..  didn’t get very intoxicated….. the trip just wiped me out. Maybe all the built up tension, the explosion of energy and the zapping of my introverted being caused me to fizzle out for a few days.

I’ve always felt fortunate I met this tight group of friends in my youth and I’m so happy to still be in contact with them!

I’m in the white tank top with lotus, my old boyfriend is second from the left.

 

https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/83440335/posts/1953251240