Yeah…

Yeah, so I’m so tired, it’s getting stupid!  I’ve started my physical therapy and I’m going to have them twice a week for a month or so.  I’m hoping that it will help with all the pelvic pain I’m experiencing but who knows.

And I’m dealing with the guilt trip my grandmother has laid on me.  I haven’t e-mail her in a couple weeks, mostly because she is so damn nosey (what mom and my other grandmother are doing are none of her business, if she wants to know she needs to ask them, not me!) and she is a master manipulator and can get people to do things they don’t want to do without them knowing.  Never mind that she keeps pushing my Dad on me.  If I wanted to talk to him I could, there is no way that I’m going to, first grandchild or not.  She wrote me “Colleen,   is your key board broken so that you can’t write e-mails to me?  I wait and wait to hear from two of my favorite people and  really get sad when you don’t write to answer my questions.  I know that having a baby can be a strain on one’s nerves and patience but I  hope that you can spare me just a tiny bit of time to write how all of you are and what is happening in your lives. It’s selfish to keep your lives…all to yourselves… all the time” Hmmm…  Not only was I upset about her letter, but DH was pissed.  He and I lived with her for about 3 months and he knows the hell that she has put me through.  Plus, she is not above blackmailing people (me) to get her way.  I don’t wish her to die, I just wish she would leave me alone.

I know there are a bunch of people without grandparents that are upset at my opinions but I’m sorry, the woman is controlling and I can’t deal with her anymore without pulling my hair out.

Other than that sis’s camp went OK, she came back really upset and frustrated that they did the same things this year as they did last year.  I’m not sure if she will go next year.  We will have to see when next summer comes.  We are planning (fingers crossed) to go to Orlando next summer and meet up with some of my friends so that may be enough for her.

Mom’s new project is bee keeping.  A swarm of bees landed in one of her friend’s yards and on Sunday she went and got it and put it in a bee box that we bought and assembled.  The bee thing isn’t anything new for her, she used to do bees when she was in high school and 2 years ago she dated a bee keeper so that taught her a lot.  The only problem is it seems like she is very allergic to bees.  She got stung on the face (her hood slipped back and it flew up and stung her on the lip), not a big deal usually but this time her lip and right side of her face swelled up massively.  It is kinda hard to look at her it is so bad.  She went to the Dr today and he gave her a script for a epi-pen but didn’t do anything else since it has been 3 days and it’s finally starting to go down.  Hopefully in a day or two she will be back to normal.

So tired!

So forgive the short post, or what will likely be a short post…I’m exhausted!

Last year when we took sis to camp it was a disaster.  I had been there once but didn’t remember how to get there.  First I started my period on the trip and although I had the necessary equipment I didn’t realize it had happened until we pulled into Fort Bragg and by then my jeans were ruined.  And the worst part is I had no way to cover up the back of them.  How embarrassing. 

Then I got lost on the way to the camp.  There are two roads named the same name.  One of them goes WAY up in the hills above Mendocino.  The other has the camp on it.  We, well, I, ended up driving 40 miles out of the way before I gave up and let DH take over the driving and get us where we were supposed to be.  I never let anyone else drive since I tend to get car sick.  And those roads aren’t nice and straight.  No, they are like a badly drawn squiggly line with huge trees growing right up to, and sometimes in, the white line on the right side of the road.  Kinda scary.  But he got us there without taking any more detours.

After we dropped her off we went to the brewery to have lunch.  There I bought a sweatshirt to cover the back of my jeans and suffered the 3.5 hour drive back with a sweatshirt tied around my waist.

This time the worst thing that happened was the lack of potty stations on the way.  There are 3, Garberville, Legget (if we go that way, we didn’t), Mendocino and Albion (where the camp is).  I had to stop at all of them because Derek was playing on his pogo stick on my bladder.  Usually I can go the whole trip without stopping once, I mean come on, it’s only 175 miles, I can do that in my sleep, but it is also a terribly curvy road with signs that say “15mph corner” that really need to be taken seriously and no straight stretches longer than 100 feet.  Needless to say I was missing my Dramamine this time and more than a few times I was green in the gills, but I didn’t puke.  Yay me!  LOL

Other than that everything went OK, not much of any import happened, Lin is there and settled in and I’m sure she is thoroughly enjoying herself and I have a couple days without her.  I have to go back on Friday but mom is going with me and she is getting a hotel room for us for the night.  We will pick up Lin on Saturday and come back home…geez, I’m even more tired even thinking about it.  I might take my camera on Friday just so all of you can see the beautiful ocean at Mendocino and Fort Bragg.  It is really quite pretty.

Some updates and other stuff

Yeah, so I swear that my last post had a point but I seemed to have lost it while writing it because now that I’ve read what I wrote it seems that I missed my point.  And damned if I can remember what I was writing about!

Well, so the horse rescue stuff went pretty good.  There are very few horses there right now, only 3, out of the 40 that they rescued last November from one farm/pasture.  These are the worse ones, horses that have been severely abused and are pretty much unfit to have anyone around them.  It’s a shame that people are like that to animals, it makes me so sad.  One of them hadn’t had it’s hooves cut in years.  Well, their hooves grow like human fingernails and it’s hooves were a foot long and growing to the side.  *Shudder* They are fixing it but it’s such a slow process that they have a year or two to go before they will be how they should be. 

Since they only have 3 horses there isn’t much to do and they only meet once a month or so.  I was hoping for more but oh well.

I talked to my old horse-back riding teacher and she has a disabled riding program that she runs and sis is more than welcome to join.  She will get lessons every other week with the other weeks being a group thing with a bunch of other high-functioning disabled people.  They do pony cart rides and play with the ponies and the goats and just have a mellow day.  Sounds good to me!  Lindsey seems excited about it, she will start on August 6th and for a little while, until she gets comfortable, I am going to go with her and head walk for her.  At least that is the plan.  And the walking will be good for me.

Other than that Monday we take her to Fort Bragg/Mendocino for camp, Bishop and I will just drive her there (about 3-4 hour drive) and drive back.  Friday mom and I will go and get a hotel for the night and pick Lin up on Saturday.  For some reason mom isn’t able to go down there and just come back.  I keep telling her that I’m driving so what is the big deal but she is insisting and paying.  Who am I to argue with that?

Some stuff

Well, so it seems like everything changes when you don’t expect it.  And no one ever tells you what to expect with some things.

Sis is mentally disabled.  That is an established fact.  She is not physically disabled, she can do whatever she wants to do physically.  Keep those things in mind.  She has been riding at a 4-H program for disabled kids and adults for over 10 years now.  She is an OK horse rider, no problems, and she is very careful.  The guy who runs the program is getting older so his daughter is taking over a little bit at a time.  She has a lot of other things going on so she isn’t there much.  She hasn’t been there for almost 6 months now and the other day she came and laid down a bunch of ridiculous rules for sis that have never been there before.  Sis is pissed, mom is pissed, Bishop and I are both pissed.  I see this as the end of her 4-H membership and that is really a shame since sometimes it’s the only thing she has to look forward to.

But because of all this stupidity a couple other opportunities have opened up for her.  About a year ago the woman that gave me horse back riding lessons said that she is going to do lessons for disabled adults and if sis could lose enough weight, if she could get down to 200 pounds, she could take the lessons.  Well, I weighed her the other day and she is at 220, down from 275.  It’s amazing!  So after she gets back from camp in 2 weeks I’ll call and see about getting her signed up for the lessons.

Also she can start volunteering at the local horse rescue.  Not only does this mean that she will be working with horses regularly it also opens the opportunity of her adopting a horse when we have the space.  This morning she is starting the horse rescue stuff, in fact she just left.

She has a lot of things going on it seems but at the same time it seems like we sit around the house every day waiting for something to happen.  Usually today, Saturday, sis would help me with the laundry at the laundromat, then I would take her to mom’s house, they would go to 4-H and I would have the rest of the day to myself.  Instead sis is gone so I’ve got to do the laundry myself and since I’m so unbelievably bored I think I will clean house.  It really needs to be done but I just haven’t had the energy to do it.  With sis gone so early I seem to have more energy (she is really draining sometimes) so I may end up with a clean house tonight.  We’ll have to see about that one.  Also, I’ve had a request from some of my online friends to compile some of my recipes for them to try out.  We’ll see how many I can spit out in the next couple days.

Nice night

My fave website, CO isn’t working right now so I thought I would update you all one more time tonight…

So sis is over at mom’s house for the night and Bishop and I went out to dinner.

We don’t go to this brewery, the normal noise level is deafening so you can’t talk to the person that you are dining with and when they have a band there you can’t even think.  But they have the best food and the best beer.

We were hoping that since it was a Wednesday night that it would be a little quieter because we really wanted to go.  We got there and it wasn’t too bad, I didn’t have to scream across the 3 foot table we were sitting at.  Then the band started up and we were sitting right in front of it so of course we couldn’t talk or even think but thankfully it was a really good band.  I ended up getting the ribs with garlic mashed red potatoes and green beans, Bishop had the fresh fish tacos with locally caught crab, halibut and scallops.  Very good all around.  We would have stayed for desert but we were both stuffed after dinner.  Oh, well, it was a really nice time.  It’s been so long since just the two of us went out that I’m not sure if I want sis back tomorrow.  I’ll go get her of course but still… it would be nice to have a week off.

A week off, well, that is kinda coming up.  Sis goes to summer camp on the 21st and comes back on the 26th so theoretically we will have 5 days without her but in reality we will take her to camp on Monday, 150 miles one way and that will take all day.  Then mom and I will go get her on Saturday meaning that it will take 2 days since mom can’t seem to make the trip there and back in one day.  Hell, I’m driving, I just want someone with me on that long trip so if anything happens I’m not alone.  That means we have Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday alone.  Not what I want to do.  Maybe I can talk to mom about doing it in one day.

And I wanted to say thank you to everyone for finding and commenting on my new blog.  Love you!

Oh, and if you want to listen to the band we heard tonight search on myspace for Apple Barner.  I’m getting the CD I like them so much!