Well,it's been a week since I stopped smoking and let me tell ya,it was WAY easier to quit drinking than this is(for me at least).
Day One:
Not as bad as you'd think,but it was a busy day and that probably helped considerably. I also ate more than one human should in a day,but it kept me at least partially sane.
Day Two: Rough. Bright light and loud noises drove me crazy and worked my last nerve,why,I have no idea. I also plotted fiendish demises for various morons on the roads,my overly nosey neighbors,and the dumbasses who plan on widening the road in front of my house. Get out of my yard damnit!
Day Three:
The Husband made some crack about"letting me"do something,which resulted in me chasing him around the dining room table. I think he was genuinely afraid for his safety,which is funny considering he's twice my size. I also allowed myself a small amount of coffee today,which has helped with the food and cig cravings.
Days Four and Five:
Cravings for a cig lessening a bit. Bad Mood lessening? Umm,not so much. Let's just say I've been a tad less than thrilled. Husband is still smoking ,which annoys the snot out of me,but the smell is disgusting,which,in an odd way, is actually helpful in my quest to give up cigs for good. My car doesn't stink anymore either,one more bonus. On Day Five,Hubby and I went out to dinner and finished holiday shopping,at The Mall. I was reminded Why I Hate The Mall so much. I haven't set foot in The Mall for over 5 yrs,and god willing,this was the last time. Blech,yuck,((((cringe)))). I simply must come up with a bullshit overpriced idea to sucker rich people with more money than sense. This would solve any and all financial issues I may ever have for the foreseeable future. Anyone willing to spend 140 dollars on a pair of jeans and 85.50 on a t-shirt has to be in need of a pet psychic who charges 200 dollars per house call,no?
Day Six:
Atilla the Fun was in bed, due to an oncoming nasty cold,so I spent my day taking his temp,making him tea and otherwise doing that Mom voodoo I do so well. That and 6 loads of freaking laundry. And cleaning,cooking,and cat wrangling.Busy hands help with cig cravings,but I think I'm gonna have to go hard core and do some yard work,window cleaning and other such projects to get this out of my system for good.
Day Seven:
Not a bad day,Atilla stayed home from school,the cold is hanging in tough. Ended up taking him for a haircut later in the day,and really didn't crave a cig until evening when I finally got to sit down and relax. Early mornings and evenings seem to be the toughest time for me,not coincidentally those were the times when I smoked the most.
Day Eight:
Today. I'm finding the nicotine patches do help,though the amount of nicotine in them is WAY less than my actual intake while smoking. I try to go as long as I can before putting on a new patch in the mornings(I take the patch off at bedtime,since I never got up in the middle of the night to smoke),so far I can last about two hours before I have to put one on. After week 2 has passed,I'm stepping down from a 21 mg patch to a 14 mg one. Two weeks at 14 mg and then I go to the 7mg patch and wean off that to a nicotine free existence. I'm having surgery to remove impacted teeth in January,I want to be off the patch before that happens.
So,it's been rough,but not as horrid as "cold turkey" might have been for me. The real test(s)will be times of major stresses and tribulations we all go through,but I think I might make it this time. The doctors and health pros say most people try quitting at least two or three times before they make it,I think this one might be my final attempt.
Just putting this out there for those of you who smoke and have considered giving it up. The trick is having something to do to replace the act of smoking itself. Trust me,that helps ALOT. I also had a long talk with my son before I quit,to explain to him that Mom might not be so cheerful and a delight to be around while I go through this process. The kid has been great,reminding me that the crapola mood isn't me,it's the withdrawl process. "Take a breath Mom",is his reminder to me to lighten up.
Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Don't know about you ...
But here on Long Island, the price of regular gas has gone up 25 cents a gallon since Election Day. Hmmmm ...
But what about the schools?
Spudnik:
Yeah, too bad all that new paint ain't bulletproof. Why are they even bothering to try and put a gloss of bullshit on this mess anymore? Even the die-hard Kool-Aid drinkers are under no illusions that anything good is going on in Iraq.
Let me tell you something; sending 20,000 or 30,000 more troops to Baghdad ain't gonna do shit except doom more of our kids to come home in a 'transport tube'. As out pal Atrios likes to say, nothing will unshit that bed.
Update:
The Joint Chiefs have had it too:
It must be going to Hell more quickly than we realize over there.
BAGHDAD - Iraq's schools, long touted by American officials as a success story in a land short on successes, increasingly are being caught in the crossfire of the country's escalating civil war.
...
Yeah, too bad all that new paint ain't bulletproof. Why are they even bothering to try and put a gloss of bullshit on this mess anymore? Even the die-hard Kool-Aid drinkers are under no illusions that anything good is going on in Iraq.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 18, 2006 - The Pentagon's latest assessment of the security situation in Iraq paints a grim picture of the level of violence, which it said is higher than at any time since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime.
One top general categorized the spike in violence as rising at "an unbelievably rapid pace." [my em]
...
Let me tell you something; sending 20,000 or 30,000 more troops to Baghdad ain't gonna do shit except doom more of our kids to come home in a 'transport tube'. As out pal Atrios likes to say, nothing will unshit that bed.
Update:
The Joint Chiefs have had it too:
The Bush administration is split over the idea of a surge in troops to Iraq, with White House officials aggressively promoting the concept over the unanimous disagreement of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, according to U.S. officials familiar with the intense debate. [my em]
...
It must be going to Hell more quickly than we realize over there.
Monday, December 18, 2006
This one made me choke...
E-mail from Mrs. G. Liquid alert.
[Two hillbillies walk into a restaurant. After ordering their cornbread and beans, they talk about the latest addition to their junkyard business.
Suddenly, a woman at a nearby table, who is eating a sandwich, begins to cough. After a minute or so, it becomes apparent that she is in real distress.
One of the hillbillies looks at her and says "Kin ya swallar?" The woman shakes her head no.
"Kin ya breathe?" The woman begins to turn blue and shakes her head no.
The hillbilly walks over to the woman, lifts up the back of her dress, yanks down her drawers and quickly gives her right butt cheek a lick with his tongue.
The woman is so shocked that she has a violent spasm and the obstruction flies out of her mouth. As she begins to breathe again, the hillbilly walks slowly back to the bar.
His partner says, "Ya know, I'd heerd of dat dere 'Hind Lick Maneuver', but I ain't never seed nobody do it."]
[Two hillbillies walk into a restaurant. After ordering their cornbread and beans, they talk about the latest addition to their junkyard business.
Suddenly, a woman at a nearby table, who is eating a sandwich, begins to cough. After a minute or so, it becomes apparent that she is in real distress.
One of the hillbillies looks at her and says "Kin ya swallar?" The woman shakes her head no.
"Kin ya breathe?" The woman begins to turn blue and shakes her head no.
The hillbilly walks over to the woman, lifts up the back of her dress, yanks down her drawers and quickly gives her right butt cheek a lick with his tongue.
The woman is so shocked that she has a violent spasm and the obstruction flies out of her mouth. As she begins to breathe again, the hillbilly walks slowly back to the bar.
His partner says, "Ya know, I'd heerd of dat dere 'Hind Lick Maneuver', but I ain't never seed nobody do it."]
Methodists don't like Bush's methods...
Think Progress
Mrs. G is a Methodist, and she agrees.
It'll take a hell of a lot more than cubic money to polish the turd that is Bush's legacy.
On the bright side, a Bush library won't take up much space and the books won't cost much.
Bush is attempting to raise $500 million to build a library and think tank at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, the alma mater of First Lady Laura Bush. "The more [money] you have, the more influence [on history] you can exert," one adviser said. Much of the money will be used to build a "legacy-polishing" institute:
The legacy-polishing centerpiece is an institute, which several Bush insiders called the Institute for Democracy. Patterned after Stanford University's Hoover Institution, Bush's institute will hire conservative scholars and "give them money to write papers and books favorable to the President's policies," one Bush insider said.
Now, SMU faculty, administrators, and staff are speaking out. In a December 16 letter to R. Gerald Turner, president of the Board of Trustees, members of SMU's Perkins School of Theology have urged the board to "reconsider and to rescind SMU's pursuit of the presidential library."
We count ourselves among those who would regret to see SMU enshrine attitudes and actions widely deemed as ethically egregious: degradation of habeas corpus, outright denial of global warming, flagrant disregard for international treaties, alienation of long-term U.S. allies, environmental predation, shameful disrespect for gay persons and their rights, a pre-emptive war based on false and misleading premises, and a host of other erosions of respect for the global human community and for this good Earth on which our flourishing depends.
The letter concludes, "[T]hese violations are antithetical to the teaching, scholarship, and ethical thinking that best represents Southern Methodist University."
Mrs. G is a Methodist, and she agrees.
It'll take a hell of a lot more than cubic money to polish the turd that is Bush's legacy.
On the bright side, a Bush library won't take up much space and the books won't cost much.
Pot is No. 1
LATimes
Shameless local plug:
When Archer Daniels Midland finds out about this, pot may be on the road to legalization. We assume they have more lobbyists and political clout than the DEA.
For years, activists in the marijuana legalization movement have claimed that cannabis is America's biggest cash crop. Now they're citing government statistics to prove it.
A report released today by a marijuana public policy analyst contends that the market value of pot produced in the U.S. exceeds $35 billion - far more than the crop value of such heartland staples as corn, soybeans and hay, which are the top three legal cash crops.
Shameless local plug:
California is responsible for more than a third of the cannabis harvest, with an estimated production of $13.8 billion that exceeds the value of the state's grapes, vegetables and hay combined - and marijuana is the top cash crop in a dozen states, the report states.
Nationwide, the estimated cannabis production of $35.8 billion exceeds corn ($23 billion), soybeans ($17.6 billion) and hay ($12.2 billion), according to Gettman's findings.
When Archer Daniels Midland finds out about this, pot may be on the road to legalization. We assume they have more lobbyists and political clout than the DEA.
Good on Sears
Technobabe via Brother D:
Show Sears some love because they know what it means to 'support the troops' as opposed to sticking a stupid magnet on your car and saying you do.
...
I assume you have all seen the reports about how Sears is treating its reservist employees who are called up? By law, they are required to hold their jobs open and available, but nothing more. Usually, people take a big pay cut and lose benefits as a result of being called up...Sears is voluntarily paying the difference in salaries and maintaining all benefits, including medical insurance and bonus programs, for all called up reservist employees for up to two years. I submit that Sears is an exemplary corporate citizen and should be recognized for its contribution. [my em]
...
Show Sears some love because they know what it means to 'support the troops' as opposed to sticking a stupid magnet on your car and saying you do.
Quote of the Day
Steve Soto on Iraq's legal system and what it's become:
...
We have obliterated their infrastructure, and failed to rebuild it; we have blown up their historical legacy and cast it to thieves and looters; we have destroyed their public health system and failed to rebuild it; and we have destroyed their security and left them to ethnic cleansing. And the best we can do is to leave them a court system like this, which treats women deplorably, as a sign of what they can reap from being "liberated"?
Sunday, December 17, 2006
Ack ...
I seldom use the desktop computer in the house, mostly working with the laptop since I set up the WiFi. I notice that now my laser mouse is doing something very annoying. Double-clicking when I want single-click ... intermittently but getting more regular. Not good when attempting to steal quotes or make links. Back to the laptop. A new mouse can wait until after the holidays.
More whoring ...
Not for me this time. I realize that since I started posting over at The Practical Press, my long-winded chapters really glom up the page. Most of the folks who submit stuff are short story writers [and poets, can't forget them, and songwriters too] and that gets sandwiched in between my crap. So, to that end, below are links to the short stories and musical creations in between the chapters of my saga of war and intrigue in the 22nd Century. Good stuff and I urge you to click on the links.
Farquiar, the Dragon. The Preacher's Son Small Town Boys - Chapter 39 I got a hold on you tonight. Ode to Lost Flakes Airplane Story University. Of Massachusetts, please. Just Like Looking Through Heaven. Or something. A Fable Parking Lot Fine detective work! Mouse Story Visibility
Presidentials
Right now, I don't give a shit who's running for President in '08. But Bill Richardson raised his score a few points:
Anybody who'll call bullshit on that spineless weasel gets a pat on the back from me.
The leading advocate for escalating the war is Senator John McCain. I have served with John in Congress and I respect him. But John McCain is wrong, dead wrong to think that we can solve Iraq's political crisis through military escalation.
Anybody who'll call bullshit on that spineless weasel gets a pat on the back from me.
Twits
Paraphrasing Gen. Jack Keane on Little George: "We should put together a socio-economic package for Iraq that will help them get on their feet."
Me: And who's gonna pay for it, twit? A half-trillion dollars already and we have nothing to show for it. I don't know about anybody else, but I'm sick of throwing my hard-earned money into that sandpit.
It would have been nice if we put it in place as soon as we got to Baghdad but we blew that chance. Doing it now won't make a damn bit of difference. No more money, no more American lives, no more stalling. Bring 'em home and STFU.
Me: And who's gonna pay for it, twit? A half-trillion dollars already and we have nothing to show for it. I don't know about anybody else, but I'm sick of throwing my hard-earned money into that sandpit.
It would have been nice if we put it in place as soon as we got to Baghdad but we blew that chance. Doing it now won't make a damn bit of difference. No more money, no more American lives, no more stalling. Bring 'em home and STFU.
What he hath wrought ...
Brother Bulldog has two family members home from Iraq for whom he's trying to get help. As I've said here many, many times, just because you come home physically intact doesn't mean you're okay:
Bulldog's doing the right things but until someone with PTSD wants to get a handle on it, there's nothing he can do. Unfortunately, once someone is on the downhill spiral of drugs and alcohol, their judgment gets worse and worse. I hope ... pray ... these guys get the help they need and, with a relative like Bulldog on their side, they've got a good start.
The thing, having been down this road myself, is that none of this was necessary. All these young men and women, ours and theirs, suffer needlessly to make a few extrememly rich people even more wealthy. This is what George W. Bush and the Neocons have wrought.
...
Now, he's been home for some time and is struggling with that incident. It repeats itself over and over in his mind's eye all day long and into the night. He gets barely 3 hours of fitful sleep a night. He has broken up with his girlfriend over fears that he'll end up hurting her. He, like many combat veterans before him, tries to drown these thoughts and memories in alcohol each and every weekend and most every night as well. For those of you who've seen combat, be it Vietnam, Iraq during Gulf War I, any of the lesser campaigns over the years, and even some of you old-timers from Korea, you know the hell this kid is going through. How do you deal with something like this?
...
Bulldog's doing the right things but until someone with PTSD wants to get a handle on it, there's nothing he can do. Unfortunately, once someone is on the downhill spiral of drugs and alcohol, their judgment gets worse and worse. I hope ... pray ... these guys get the help they need and, with a relative like Bulldog on their side, they've got a good start.
The thing, having been down this road myself, is that none of this was necessary. All these young men and women, ours and theirs, suffer needlessly to make a few extrememly rich people even more wealthy. This is what George W. Bush and the Neocons have wrought.
...
It's stories like these that will be Bush's legacy when his presidency ends, be it by impeachment or end of term. These are the things that I hope will haunt him the rest of his life, not to mention the thousands upon thousands of dead and wounded Americans and Iraqis. Yet he will never know the pain of dealing with PTSD first-hand or having to adapt to using a wheelchair for the rest of his life because his legs were blown off in a land far away for a cause that was unjust and unneeded...
Saturday, December 16, 2006
Shopping trip
It seems like about every twenty years or so, we have to buy Christmas presents for little kids. I haven't quite figured that one out yet. Anyway, Mrs. G didn't like my idea for a baby-sitting device:
Maybe it's because they're her sister's latest batch of grandkids. Maybe it's because duct tape's hard on the drywall. I coulda just gift-wrapped what I have on hand and saved us a trip, but nooo...
So over the mountains and through the woods to Carson City we did go. First to Costco, then to the exclusive boutique Tar-zhay*. Mission accomplished.
We left home in clear bright sunshine, but while we were gone the weather turned to shit. Did I mention that from Carson to my house, it's up 2500 feet, through a 7000'+ high pass down a thousand, up a thousand to another 7000'+ pass, and then down over a thousand feet in a final three-mile stretch of the steepest two lane state highway in California?
That last stretch was spent in 4-wheel-drive low gear coming down an icy mountain road with people who should have known better following too close. I didn't mind the Porsche Cayenne S too much because I'm sure he had good insurance, but I actually had to stick my arm out the window and wave "Back you people! Back, I say!" at the guy in the twenty-year-old 2WD crapcan. I flashed my brake lights at him and slid, so there wasn't going to be any stopping if an incident should occur. You can't always count on 'em sliding directly under your hitch receiver where they can't do much damage.
Go slow, leave lots of room between cars, don't touch the brakes. 4WD's for traction, not for speed. Leave earlier.
The Tacoma goes into 4WD with the click of a dash knob which I assume is hooked up to something under the truck. It's a far cry, but not removed so long in time it seems, from stopping, getting out, getting all wet, putting the hubs in, selecting "in" or "out" on one floor-mounted lever and "high" or "low" on another, and proceeding on your way in a rig with no heater to speak of, a shop rag for a defroster, cable-operated, or worse, vacuum windshield wipers, and maybe an AM radio. Good thing, too. I'm gettin' too old for that shit.
I'm very content at this stage of life to poke along at a safe pace in a comfortably heated cab with my favorite tunes coming out of the speakers, thank you.
It does seem, however, that when it took a little suffering to go places back in the old days, there was less traffic. It's probably just me.
And how did your day go?
Maybe it's because they're her sister's latest batch of grandkids. Maybe it's because duct tape's hard on the drywall. I coulda just gift-wrapped what I have on hand and saved us a trip, but nooo...
So over the mountains and through the woods to Carson City we did go. First to Costco, then to the exclusive boutique Tar-zhay*. Mission accomplished.
We left home in clear bright sunshine, but while we were gone the weather turned to shit. Did I mention that from Carson to my house, it's up 2500 feet, through a 7000'+ high pass down a thousand, up a thousand to another 7000'+ pass, and then down over a thousand feet in a final three-mile stretch of the steepest two lane state highway in California?
That last stretch was spent in 4-wheel-drive low gear coming down an icy mountain road with people who should have known better following too close. I didn't mind the Porsche Cayenne S too much because I'm sure he had good insurance, but I actually had to stick my arm out the window and wave "Back you people! Back, I say!" at the guy in the twenty-year-old 2WD crapcan. I flashed my brake lights at him and slid, so there wasn't going to be any stopping if an incident should occur. You can't always count on 'em sliding directly under your hitch receiver where they can't do much damage.
Go slow, leave lots of room between cars, don't touch the brakes. 4WD's for traction, not for speed. Leave earlier.
The Tacoma goes into 4WD with the click of a dash knob which I assume is hooked up to something under the truck. It's a far cry, but not removed so long in time it seems, from stopping, getting out, getting all wet, putting the hubs in, selecting "in" or "out" on one floor-mounted lever and "high" or "low" on another, and proceeding on your way in a rig with no heater to speak of, a shop rag for a defroster, cable-operated, or worse, vacuum windshield wipers, and maybe an AM radio. Good thing, too. I'm gettin' too old for that shit.
I'm very content at this stage of life to poke along at a safe pace in a comfortably heated cab with my favorite tunes coming out of the speakers, thank you.
It does seem, however, that when it took a little suffering to go places back in the old days, there was less traffic. It's probably just me.
And how did your day go?
*Actual spelling: Target.
It's Saturday night ...
A time for whoring. Chapter 10 of my novel The Captains is up at The Practical Press.
Darwinism in blossom
This should be the equivalent of throwing the skimmer in the gene pool. Only in Texas.
Broken or Broke
Smirking Chimp:
I just sat there reading this with my jaw hanging open. My grandfather told me stories like this of the German Army, after Normandy and Stalingrad, after German manufacturing resources were bombed into oblivion and there was nothing left.
Seems the Chimp has reached that milestone without help of a conquering army. All he needed was Halliburton, KBR, and the other 'mercenary corporations' who've privatized everything the military used to do. They should all swing.
Read. The. Whole. Thing. and get really pissed.
I have no idea why this story was not on the front page of every newspaper and at the top of every newscast yesterday, but it wasn't. The story ran on only one front page, that I'm aware of. And that was on the paper that broke the story, the Wall Street Journal.
...
Yesterday the WSJ's defense correspondent, Gregg Jaffe, reported that US Army officials have told the White House they are broke. Worse than broke actually. The Army, despite its $168 billion budget, is out of money and being forced to cannibalize operations, here and in the war zone, just to keep the lights on. [emphasis in original]
...
I just sat there reading this with my jaw hanging open. My grandfather told me stories like this of the German Army, after Normandy and Stalingrad, after German manufacturing resources were bombed into oblivion and there was nothing left.
Seems the Chimp has reached that milestone without help of a conquering army. All he needed was Halliburton, KBR, and the other 'mercenary corporations' who've privatized everything the military used to do. They should all swing.
Read. The. Whole. Thing. and get really pissed.
Tip o' the Brain to Xan @ CorrenteWire.
Friday, December 15, 2006
Quote of the Day
The Guardian (UK) via Maru:
What an amazing bloody catastrophe. The Bush administration's policy towards the Middle East over the five years since 9/11 is culminating in a multiple train crash. Never in the field of human conflict was so little achieved by so great a country at such vast expense. In every vital area of the wider Middle East, American policy over the last five years has taken a bad situation and made it worse.
...
Pantload
18 months ago I threw down the gauntlet:
Jonah's still sitting behind his keyboard, spewing horseshit. Today, Norbizness directs us to Dr. Cole's place where 'General' Goldberg made this prediction at about the same time I had enough of his whining about not enlisting to fight in the war he helped start:
With that kind of intuition and judgment, he should be putting on his fouth star by now. All these idiots who read Tom Clancy and watch 24, but who've never served, knew everything. Keep your $1000, Jonah. It'll be a lot cheaper meeting me at the recruiting office.
... I'll go these warmongers one better. If Jonah Goldberg makes the attempt to enlist, so will I. I'll dust off my DD Form 214 and head down to the recruiters the same day. Regardless of the fact I already served this country for 8 years (6 active, 2 reserve), I'll go back if the man who said he'd serve (if he didn't have a family and a job) gave it his best shot...
Jonah's still sitting behind his keyboard, spewing horseshit. Today, Norbizness directs us to Dr. Cole's place where 'General' Goldberg made this prediction at about the same time I had enough of his whining about not enlisting to fight in the war he helped start:
Anyway, I do think my judgment is superior to his when it comes to the big picture. So, I have an idea: Since he doesn't want to debate anything except his own brilliance, let's make a bet. I predict that Iraq won't have a civil war, that it will have a viable constitution, and that a majority of Iraqis and Americans will, in two years time, agree that the war was worth it. I'll bet $1,000 (which I can hardly spare right now). This way neither of us can hide behind clever word play or CV reading. If there's another reasonable wager Cole wants to offer which would measure our judgment, I'm all ears. Money where your mouth is, doc. One caveat: Because I don't think it's right to bet on such serious matters for personal gain, if I win, I'll donate the money to the USO. He can give it to the al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade or whatever his favorite charity is.
With that kind of intuition and judgment, he should be putting on his fouth star by now. All these idiots who read Tom Clancy and watch 24, but who've never served, knew everything. Keep your $1000, Jonah. It'll be a lot cheaper meeting me at the recruiting office.
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