My Real Life Scary Movie Story - repeat post from 2007

I had turned off the bedside lamp about 15 minutes earlier and had just drifted into a deep sleep. A screeching sound pierced my dreams. Or was the ghoulish scream only part of the nightmare? I half-awoke to find my husband was soundly sleeping, as was the dog at the foot of the bed. Must have been dreaming.

Laying my head back on the pillow, I shut my eyes and tried to recapture the sleep mode.

"YEOWOOOOO!"

I sat straight up, but husband and dog continued sleeping. I thought I must be crazy. Was I the only one hearing this ghostly shrill? Then I heard the scratchy moan yet again, but not nearly as loud. It appeared to be coming from beneath me.

Quietly I got out of bed, trying not to disturb the others. I knelt on the floor in the pitch black room and reached around under the bed, assuring myself that nothing was there.

I patted the floor. Nothing. I reached further into the void. Nothing. Patted the floor again.

"YEWOOOO!" This time the screech came from me.

My hand had landed on something warm and hairy and I jerked back suddenly. It wasn't the dog; he was still on top of the bed. Shivers were running through me and before they could reach my toes, I had the light turned on.

Shaking but with some courage, I peeked under the bed to see what I really did not want to see.

It was only a cat, much to my relief. Then it suddenly dawned on me:


We didn't own a cat.

By now, husband and dog were awake wondering what all the ruckus was. I reached back under the bed and pulled out the friendly feline, who was as frightened of the situation as I."How in the world did it get in here? " I mumbled as I walked downstairs to the back door and released one happy critter.

Then I saw my big potted palm that I had brought inside late that afternoon. I had propped the door wide open and with a few minutes of effort, I dragged the plant into the house due to frost warnings. Apparently the cat ran inside during my struggle and made a protective bee-line under our bed, perhaps after confronting our tiny poodle. Some watchdog she was.

Every child worries about the hairy creature under the bed or in the closet. I just never expected to ever meet up with it personally. Never want to again. Especially in the dark.

A twitch in your eye

I am not sure what the R&D folks were thinking coming out with a vibrating mascara wand. I doubt the eye is the first body part women think of when contemplating purchasing something that hums.

It may suprise you, but I like them both

On the one hand, we have a woman who is the epitome of a frontier woman; she loves the outdoors, animals, can fire a shotgun, and hunt as well as any man. She wears her hair away from her face to look more professional, but when she lets the shoulder-length mane fall, we see her natural beauty and those great legs poking out beneath the skirt. Her infectious smile charms us and belies an intelligence deep within that she often hides. She believes that hard work, personal responsibility and entrepreneurship are what keep this country great and that government and entitlements are not the answer.

That other one is an attractive, articulate intellectual with a similarly described spouse Both spouses have professional careers and in addition have been community organizers, volunteers, fundraisers, and champions of the underdog. They are a team who believes in health care for all, higher taxes to help those less fortunate, and global warming. They surround themselves with friends whom some might consider radical, but are at most leftist liberals of varying ethnicity and sexual orientation.

I can't help it. I like them both.

After all, they are my daughters.

Free money is not "free" money

My previous link to names of persons receiving farm subsidies generated a great deal of interest in my email.


I know a farmland owner who required his farm tenant to agree that none of the owner's land/crop would be placed in any ag subsidy program . Of course, farm tenants were always shocked that the landowner did not want the bonus money. Nevertheless, the government required the landowner to sign/file papers with them stating that he did NOT want their money.


So you must sign documents if you want their money and you must sign documents if you don't want their money because no one would believe you'd be such an idiot to refuse "free" money.


Whenever one signs a contract with the government, whether for business purposes or personal reasons, he has agreed to let Big Brother tell him how to manage his affairs; he has given up property rights and personal freedoms. It is amazing that so many people sell-out their liberties to make the government their life partner.


This is the very same thing that occurs when churches want their tax-exempt status and cry about lack of free speech.

It sucks! Part two

And I thought our new bug vaccum was thrilling. This guy knows how to get really cheap thrills.

Unintended Consequences?

What do you expect if you walk into a bar named "Booby Trap?"

And Now For A Refreshing Change of Pace

Despite most TV networks being politically biased, it is always refreshing to see ABC allowing libertarian John Stossel so much freedom with his reporting. His 20/20 report Friday night was a good one. You can view all parts here.

There is an interesting interview with Walter Williams and an excellent analogy to ice skating about the current economic crisis.

And if you're curious about the farm subsidies portion of the report and who's getting all the government money in your area, you can search your area here.

Breakfast of Champions

They say it's because of dopamine - either too much or too little (researchers haven't figured out which) - that some people have a propensity to risk their lives.

This morning on the Today Show I literally almost threw up breakfast watching 29 year old Nik Wallenda walk a tightrope 235 feet in length, 135 feet up in the air without a net underneath, then cross back over the same wire on a bicycle. Before he crossed back, he sat down on the wire and made a cell phone call to the Today Show. Then he almost lost his balance near the end of his walk. He almost didn't make it up the slight incline at the end of the bike ride. He set a new Guiness Book of World Record for the longest distance crossed on a tightrope on a bicycle. He wants to walk over the Grand Canyon next year.




He is a member of the famous Flying Wallendas family of which several members have been killed in tightrope accidents since the family first began performing in the 1700's.

It sucks!

Now that the pirate bugs are gone and the Asian beetles have appeared,my husband produced his latest purchase - a bug vacuum. I thought he was nuts, but this product is great.

Those Asian beetles that have dared to enter our home this year have been humanely sucked into the portable vacuum to their deaths. No nasty chemicals. Cordless w/rechargeable battery.

The bug vacuum costs about $49.95 and is available at Hammacher-Schlemmer, Sears, and on line stores.

Works on spiders and flies too. It's very entertaining to use, but not quite as much fun as stomping a large beetle on the sidewalk and hearing the crunch and watching the ooze. Beware: cats don't seem to like this gadget.

Real Life Sci-Fi

As a kid-lover and responsible parent, I'm a sucker for sappy movies about good people influencing the lives of children needing love. We watched Martian Child (2007, rate PG) on DVD this weekend. I rented it because both John and Joan Cusack star in it and both generally save their talents for independent, sometimes quirky, films. This was one of them.

I have to say that the child actor, Bobby Coleman, stole this film as the child who insists he is a Martian who has been left on Earth by his parents and is awaiting their return. The viewer is not sure if this is a sci-fi movie or not until the end and that makes the film even more endearing.

There are lessons taught in the movie that unfortunately will most likely not fall upon the ears of those parents who need to be taught. For the rest of us, it gives us hope that every child can be saved and loved.

The movie was based upon a novella based on real life incidents of the writer David Gerrold. Gerrold is a single adoptive father, who happens to be homosexual, although that is not mentioned in the film. The novella won several awards. For those of you Star Trek fans, Gerrold wrote the famous episode, "The Trouble with Tribbles."

To Keep Things Fair and Balanced

Just to make sure that readers don't think I'm a Reublican because I've defended Palin as a mother and Cindy McCain as a financially independent spouse, I am printing a column that was written by an old friend who is an accomplished political critic and author of a number of sea-faring books. The opinion expressed below is his opinion, not necessarily mine.

Published 9.16

Trailer Trash or Glasses in High Heels
by Stan Zimmerman

You feel a little down on your luck, so you slip into a bar for a beer. Trouble with the mortgage, trouble with the neighbors, and debt is killing you. The kids aren’t doing well in school, and close relatives are starting to give you the shifty eye because you’re developing a reputation of beating people up. Things are lousy.

You’re midway into beer number two when the door opens. In walks a babe. Honey-colored hair, long legs and glasses like a librarian. She walks over and sits down right next to you.

You feel better already. Suddenly the neighbors and the relatives and the mortgage and the kids aren’t so important any more. She starts to chat, tells you how big and strong you are, how smart you are for liking her. Your head starts swimming. You feel "chosen" somehow. You don’t want to ask why, you just want to bask in the attention.

You know she’s playing with you, she’ll use you. But you don’t care. She’s hot, you’re desperate to forget, and as for tomorrow? That’s tomorrow. Tonight is now!

If you were an adult, you’d thank the lady, pay up and go your way. But she’s no lady, and you’re about to repudiate years of diligence for a pair of glasses in high heels. You’re a sucker, and in your gut you know it. But you’re so besotted, you don’t care. You are about to throw away everything you care about. For a pair of glasses in high heels.

How is Sarah Palin gonna fix your problems pal? She doesn’t understand how mortgages work; she thinks Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae are government agencies. In fact they are private, but a Republican president is about to bail them out with billions in Federal money. Not exactly privatization. More like corporate welfare.

Trouble with the neighbors? Like Venezuela, Cuba, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, North Korea, Palestine, Sudan and Russia? If she doesn’t know the back-story, it is unlikely she’ll be able to come up with an idea of how to calm them down. Eyeglasses and high heels won’t do it for that crowd. They didn’t climb to the top of the heap being suckers. Nobody snatched them from obscurity because somebody liked their looks.

As for your debt, well it’s our debt too. The current administration started with a surplus in the budget, the current account and the trade balance. But that didn’t stop rock-ribbed-conservative, God-fearing, who-is-minding-the-store, we’re-all-businessmen-here-together Republicans from squandering it all – recording record deficits, throwing the trade balance into the toilet and ruining the domestic economy. I mean RECORD deficits, THIRD-WORLD style deficits, HIGH unemployment, record BANKRUPTCIES. High heels don’t impress the repo man.

Your kid’s in school just like all our kids are in school. Banning books doesn’t sound educational to me; it sounds jihadist, fundamentalist, anti-science and anti-knowledge. Your kid gonna get ahead in the Twenty-First century with anti-knowledge? Imagine if Barack Obama suggested at any time the banning of books from Chicago libraries. Yet eyeglasses atop high heels can waltz away from such fascist activity in Wasilla, untouched by charges of Fahrenheit 451 – the ignition temperature of a book. Book-banners are as anti-American as you can get without blowing something up.

And those close relatives – NATO and Japan and South Korea and Australia – growing increasingly nervous about another war in Iran to save American bacon? The propensity to attack targets in "friendly" countries like Pakistan? The unnecessary war in Iraq is another very bloody shirt waved by discredited politicians to obscure a total failure of vision and understanding. There are terrorists there now, mind you, created by our mindless strategy.

Who’s getting rich today? The very people funding the terrorists killing our kids, that’s who. They are building palaces while you face foreclosure. You pay them every day, at the pump. Every gallon is another bullet in their budget, more gilding in their palaces. Have you seen what they are building with your money? Your V-8 is their cash cow.

If you think so little of your family and your country pal, then cozy up with the eyeglasses and high heels. Have another beer. Take her for a spin. Believe her lies. And she’ll laugh and laugh at what a sucker you are. In December you can figure it out – was the trailer trash you or her?

Ps. I grew up in a trailer. Eight feet wide and fifty feet long. From first grade through high school. I met a lot of nice people in the parks, and I met a lot of lousy people I wouldn’t trust with a snotty handkerchief. Sarah’s one of ‘em. Sober up, pal

Things go better with Coke.

I've been putting Coke in my pie-hole for as long as I can remember. Now it's been proven to be effective in the opposite end.

And talk like a pirate day was 3 weeks ago

There is nothing more frustrating than being eaten by a stupid pirate, with the exception of perhaps this one:

Yes, it's a clothing store.

I'm always intrigued by successful businesses based in small communities or rural areas, especially ones that are innovative or quirky. Check out Billy Reid's website. Don't you want to just hurry out to one of his stores?

Hip clothes plus antiques, and attitude. I imagine they have no problem selling those vintage hankies for $35.00 each, even though we can find them for a dollar at local garage sales. It's all in the marketing.