After Irene

     So it's now technically 3 days since Irene has wreaked havoc in the area and I have to get up in a few short hours.  Luckily, our house was relatively unscathed.  My car even survived the storm, considering how many branches and trees in the area came down.  That's not to say that it's not full of scratches from fallen branches, but nothing a good buffer can't take care of.  We did lose power for about 13 hours and I realized just how much losing electricity isn't as wonderful as it used to be.  Granted, not having running water always sucks, but I used to love the absolute silence a power outage brought.  No phones, computers, blaring televisions....just complete and utter silence.  Now within minutes of an outage (our area loses power pretty frequently considering we're up in the mountains) all that is heard is a myriad of generators running.  I can understand wanting to use one if the power has been out for over an hour during the summer months, but do we really rely on electricity that much now that in a span of minutes diesel and gas-powered generators have to be started?  Whatever happened to lighting a few candles, picking up a book, board game, or even just relaxing in such an amazing, total silence?  

     The news is still talking about the aftermath and cleanup, massive flooding, road closures, and how NYC came through relatively unscathed.  News about North Carolina has all but disappeared on local channels, and one of the hardest hit areas--NW New Jersey has barely been covered at all.  There's some major flooding south of here forcing evacuations, road collapses, and traffic jams, but that's pretty normal considering the areas affected are over-developed, flood prone areas.  Here?  Hardly a word.  Even from the "New Jersey News" channel.  It seems this area is some remote part that doesn't exist in the state unless something weird or unusual happens in a wealthy town.  Based on some of the pictures I have seen, it's still pretty bad.  To add insult to injury, my parents and I have yet to hear a word from my brother to see if he's even okay.  I saw on the news that his town is the latest in a long list of evacuation zones, but not a word from him.  We'd contact him if we had a way, but we have no phone numbers for him--still.  So much for family, huh?  Hell, even my neurotic neighbor stopped by Monday morning to make sure my mother was okay.  (There's 3 of us in the house, all adults, the news says to check on the elderly and the sick and she still comes over to make sure everything is all right).  I'm not going to stress myself about it.  To each their own, I suppose.  For me?  I'm going to pick up a book I started just before the storm and hopefully get some sleep. 

Family Trees

     The title pretty much says it all.  I began reading Stacy Schiff's novel "Cleopatra" on Sunday and just reading about her family made mine seem pretty normal in retrospect.  I mean, every family has their own quirks, but at least I can say that my family tree not only has plenty of branches, twigs, and offshoots; it's not full of plotting, murdering, bloodthirsty and powerhungry inbreds.  As my cousin put it the other day: our own dysfunction is what makes our family our family.  I mean, there's relatives we haven't spoken to in decades, some we try to avoid on purpose, others we see at the obligatory holiday gatherings and carry on polite conversations, and the usual fighting of course.  What family wouldn't be a true family without plenty of fights, right?  I've pretty much decided that blood or marriage relations or not, I'm just staying out of it all.  I have enough stress on my plate than to act like a high school drama queen or king.  

     I've come to realize over the past few years that I've more or less turned into my mother:  peacekeeper, referee, the one who does the right thing regardless of the situation, babysitter, therapist.... you name it, you can pretty much add it to my title.  Except more often than not, I have no problem actually speaking my opinion out loud about certain things.  Growing up in the generation that I did, I've learned first hand what adults who act like children can do to the children.  I'd probably not only know more about, but be closer to quite a few family members if the adults could put their differences aside for the sake of the kids.  And I'm seeing the process repeated.  Unfortunately, there really isn't a damn thing I can do about any of it, so I'm just going to continue to put my life together and live the way I need to.  Which is something I'm still figuring out how to do one day at a time.  What I do know is I don't have time for drama. 

Winds of Change

     So I took my mom to the 209 flea market yesterday out near Stroudsburg and during the hour plus ride I noticed something slightly disturbing--the leaves are starting to change already.  It's the middle of August and as we wound our way through the beginning of the Pocono Mountains, I'm seeing shades of red already.  I've noticed recently here the enormous size of the local wildlife--squirrels, fox, chipmunks... the small creatures that bulk up for winter.  Now to wait for the acorn showers to prove my theory.  We didn't have much of a spring again this year; it was freezing cold, then temperate for a week or so, then suddenly it was summer.  But it wasn't a wicked summer again.  Just a few days here and there with wretched heat and humidity (just in time for my Orlando trip thankfully).  Otherwise, it was chilly, rainy, and overall not too bad.  Not a good sign.  This is what happened last year and the previous year before we got hammered with an early and long winter.  Not a typical Jersey winter, mind you, but like something you'd find in say--Maine or Alaska.  Sub-zero temperatures followed by feet of snow followed by more bone chilling temperatures.  Not that I mind snow, mind you.  I actually happen to love the white fluffy stuff, especially since I neither have to shovel it or clean my car off.  Even on the rare occasion that I do, I use the snowblower and it's done in no time.  It's the temperatures that kill me.  I pretty much lived off of pain killers and ibuprofen last winter just to be able to get out of bed most days.  I'm not looking forward to another winter like that at all. 
     So with the seasons beginning to change, it's just about time for another semester.  Another semester that's looking to start off askew before it even starts.  I spent weeks straightening out my tuition only to find out today that one of my classes is now cancelled due to lack of enrollment.  This naturally is announced after I purchased the texts.  Looks like I might be commuting to campus 3 days a week now instead of 2, with a Monday night class in neuropsych.  That's if I can get an appointment with my advisor asap to sign me into the course considering it's full already, but a graduation requirement.  As much as I'd hate to miss Monday Night Football again, I'd much prefer that to taking a math class right about now.  Well, a statistics or research class at least.  I don't quite count statistics as math considering depending on how you want your data to look, you can change the numbers, formulas, or skew them to say what you want. 
    No matter what course I end up in this semester, I just want to finish it this time.  That means continued vigilance of what I'm eating and drinking, my workouts, and the hardest of all--stress management.  I literally cannot afford to be sick again. 

The Natural State of Things

     So,  I mentioned the death of my evil, angry gourami Geronimo and the new residents of his tank.  I'm not exactly thrilled with my latest purchase, all things considered.  I wanted many small, colourful fish, nothing aggressive, easy to care for, hardy, and no more gouramis (since my last 2 tanks proved they're murderous little things).  While at Petsmart looking for new tank residents, my nephew found a tank containing dozens of small, colourful, neon fish.  They come in neon pink, green (in my tank they look more of a yellow than a green), and blue.  I learned they're called "glofish," and are "friendly, easy-care, community fish."  The only ones I had to keep an eye on were the angel fish.  Yes, I was trying to raise angels again.  I also bought 3 mollies and a plecco who is happily stuffing himself on the plants and sides of the tank even as I type this.  Since Friday afternoon, I have lost both angels and a mollie.  It doesn't look like the dalmation mollie is going to survive the night.  Then I started just watching the tank and noticed my tiny quick glofish are not only hyper, but aggressive little guys.  So I decided to look online to find out more about them.  I discovered not only are they aggressive to tank mates,  but they are genetically altered to bring out that pretty neon colour!  I can't say that I am happy at all, as I never would have bought something that is not only patented, but genetically altered in a lab.  To me, if it's not created by nature, it shouldn't be created at all.  It's just not natural!  Now I'm stuck with 4 killer lab created fish...

Blah.

Yeah, another non-garden/nature themed title.  Truth is, my creativity is just plain sapped to come up with something clever.  It's a rainy Saturday night and I'm sitting here watching Shrek on television.  While I returned from my brief vacation almost completely relaxed, within 24 hours I was back in chaos up to my neck as usual.  I did quit smoking--kind of.  I finally got home around 130 Tuesday morning, passed out, and was so incredibly sore and tired, I didn't even want to look at a cigarette, let alone smoke one.  By late Wednesday morning I was smoking again.  My mother had a tough, late dialysis day and my nephew's mother called to ask if she can bring him over for a few days because he wouldn't stop asking her to come over.  I saw no problem with it.  If anything, I was not only glad to see him again, but was happy that I was able to give him the gift I bought for him in Florida.  This is probably the point where I explain that I began a new medication for my fibromyalgia and chronic pain Tuesday evening.  For most, it seemed to help with not only chronic pain, but the depression associated with it (one of my biggest problems).  By Friday morning, I was almost covered from head to toe in a rash.  Turns out that there's a possibility that I'm allergic to it, but it should go away as my body adjusts to the doses.  I had to stop it anyway.  While talking to a friend of mine who also tried it, I realized that my serious mood shift was because of the medication and was a warning sign that it wouldn't work.  Bitchy barely covers it.  I yelled, screamed, threw things, and told people off over nothing.  I was an irate, raging psycho for no real reason.  (Far worse than my usual "cheerful" self).  So for now, it's just waiting for the medication to pass through my system. 
     On another note, my pink Gourami Geronimo went missing when I was in Florida.  I found him Wednesday morning in the corner by the deck door.  His last escape attempt landed him almost 10' from the tank.  I admit I was impressed, but a little saddened that the angry fish that wouldn't die did while I was away.  I cleaned some of the tank and bought new fish.  In less than an hour of being immersed in the tank, one of my angel fish died.  Its little partner won't leave his own reflection alone, so it looks like another trip to the pet store to get him a few friends.  It is pretty relaxing having more than one fish in the tank now.  I have glofish, the typical plecco to clean the tank, mollies, and the lonely angel fish.  I spent a good part of this afternoon just watching them swim around.  Well, except the angel fish--he's STILL swimming from one side of the tank after his own reflection. 
     I'm also slowly getting back into a workout routine, preparing for another semester (which I WILL finish this time, regardless how sick I get), and still working on finding ways to alleviate stress.  I found out that I had mono the past 2 semesters, explaining how the Lyme came back again, why I was so ungodly exhausted, why my knee never properly healed, and why my liver tests were so bad.  What a wonderful parting gift from my ex, huh?  Three and a half years, I'm given mono and an email full of bullshit.  Sounds about right for him.  Here's to continuing to move forward while reconciling the past.