Never Enough Jewelry

Hubby's wedding ring has been sitting in my jewelry box for about 22 years. We've been married almost 23 years. He doesn't like jewelry. It doesn't bother me that he doesn't wear it, I don't even think of it. He is so attached to me as his wife, I am completely secure in that respect. But, I cleaned out my jewelry box not long ago, and found unwanted, unused, broken gold, GOLD, GOLD ...the rage in getting cash cash cash, or in the case of my little local jewelry store, trade- in power for new Jewelry! I drool at that big chunk of gold that he doesn't wear. I wonder secretly, how much could I get for this golden delight?
I gently talk about his ring that has been sitting, unused, for lo these many years. He says he'll get it sized so he can wear it. I say, "but you'll take it off and leave it somewhere."
"No I won't," he says adamantly. "Hubby, you hate jewelry. You never wear a watch, and if you do, you leave it on your desk, in a restaurant, in your car, never does it stay on your wrist a full working day." He suddenly catches on. "You cannot have MY ring to turn into more jewelry."
Damn. That was really fast. "Wouldn't it be nice if I turned it into something that can be seen and appreciated instead of wasting away in a dark jewelry box?"
He immediately goes to get the ring.
"You don't even know where it is," I say. After rustling around in his top drawer for awhile he demands, "Where is it?"
In my jewelry box. He finds it and tries to slip it on his ring finger. It doesn't work, so he puts it on his pinky and says, "I'm going to wear it always, just like this."
"Babe, you'll loose it."
Then, in the midst of our sacred marital bedroom, he tells me, "You can't have my ring to get more jewelry; you have enough jewelry."
I said with complete astonishment , "Never, ever say that to a woman, never!" We did break out in laughter, but I was shocked and mortified. I told him, "telling me something like that is telling you that you've watched enough football!" He acted like he didn't understand the analogy.
But, I know he did.

Adrift at Sea

When I first started working on a cruise ship in 1982, I heard a joke from one of the crew. "What's the difference between a prison and a cruise ship? A ship can sink."
I wonder if that's how the passengers and crew of Carnival's Splendor feel since they've been adrift at sea, and now slowly being pushed by tug boats into the port of San Diego.
Not too long ago, on our Mediterranean cruise, something happened to the engine and we lost power for about 8 hours. The captain dropped the anchor, we were close to shore, so that was reassuring, the emergency generator ran several pieces of equipment, like the refrigerators, one of the elevators, and the crew went out of their way to please us. The outage went right before we left for the evening meal, so as they informed us there would be no hot food, we said, "oh bring us a cheese plate." Voila. "How about some shrimp cocktail." "A little pate?" And of course, the wine was flowing freely.
Later that night we went to another couple's stateroom and opened a bottle of champagne. They had a flashlight. I always bring flashlights when I travel now.
The next day, even though the power was back on, we had to spend many hours running a course in the bay to prove to the authorities that we were sea worthy. The kitchen crew brought out all the gear to have a huge barbecue, and we're talking lamb, steak, pork, chicken, lobster, jumbo shrimp. There was caviar and salads and all the desserts you could see for miles. It was a ship of 500 passengers, and an 18 hour delay. We were fine. We missed the day in Monte Carlo, but when we got there at dusk, the captain sailed into the harbor and gave us a little golden- lit tour of the beautiful hills and city of that port. We also got a $1000 refund. Not bad.
I think the experience of a ship with over 4,000 passengers and many inside cabins and many hours at sea without electricity is something other than charming. Free drinks, that's good. But honestly, Pop Tarts and Spam? Canned crab? Oh, I hear croissants. That would just not be the vacation one bargained for. The inside cabin would be the worst. There is emergency lighting in the hallway, so if the door is open, there's some relief. But there's no air flowing at all. The toilets flush, Thank God, but no hot water for a shower. No light to see where anything is.
The cruise ship I worked on many years ago lost power for maybe a minute, and I was in the massage room (ships' masseuse) and it was pitch black. We were adrift. But really, only seconds. The worst thing that happened, and I wonder if this is happening on the Splendor, the enzymes for the "sewage" on the ship became
ineffective, and a few days later most of the ship smelled like the sewer. That was over twenty five years ago, and it was a 40 year old ship at the time. Maybe technology has changed and will save those passengers from further humiliation.
Will these passengers want to take Carnival up on their offer for another free cruise?

Catty, Fair Fighting, ooh, don't read this!

When I was married to the first husband, I admit it, we went to a marriage counselor. The details are fuzzy. I think I went by myself the first time and felt pretty good after the session. I remember that. Then the first husband came with me. The counselor, in his wisdom, explained "fair fighting" to us. Nice concept, a bit oxymoronish, but not bad. So we start, the first husband and I, kind of like an open hand when one is learning a new card game, with me saying what my complaints were about "him." The counselor taught us terms, and non editorial phrases, so as to stay objective and productive. I didn't get far. Somehow, when it was my turn, it all turned into the first husband's turn, and it was I who needed to change. Mind you, I never had a chance to really air my problem. This was the effect of the first husband on everyone: he was the righteous. He of the smoking-pot-and-staying-up-til-6am-and-not-having-a-job-kind. Those were the things that bothered me, but somehow my requests for him having an income was not fair to bring up during the "fair fighting." I showed them both. I got a divorce. I did keep the fair fighting concept somewhere in the back of my head. Because if done right, isn't that just a good debate?
So fast forward to this divisive time of life if one follows politics. I have had two long debates on facebook on the California Ballot Measure Prop 23. I have mentioned it, and supported it, and really wanted it to pass. I have 2 relatives who wanted it to fail. One just countered my arguments with his own opinions and articles he's found. The other started out by being sarcastic about my facebook status update that had nothing to do with Prop 23, but a little "spiritual" saying I believe in, but he linked it to Prop 23 because my avatar was Yes on 23. He said I should move to Texas because it's God's Country There. I agreed with him, and I guess it wasn't a spicy enough answer because he responded with yeah and there's lots of oil there, too.
I told him I love oil and all the things that it brings to us. Then we kind of went back and forth about God and who is God, and what are we doing here, sounding like he knew exactly why humans are here, "to heal the earth." Then it finally got to the fact that he said some of the sarcastic things because of my avatar. "I was prompted by your avatar." Was that fair fighting? I don't think so because he was "prompted" by something outside of himself, and not taking personal responsibility. We both were decent to one another, he just seemed to take my innocent, spiritual saying to such a dark place.
Someone he is heavily related to really got mad at me because I reiterated the "false report" about Obama spending 200 million dollars a day on his trip to India, etc. She was livid. Had she read a little farther down, I questioned it after someone asked me about it. But she didn't. When she's fired up, her arguments are rude. Really rude. Can you divorce a relative? Does she need to learn fair fighting? After she told me I was related to the conservative but crazy Michelle Bachmann (she spelled the name wrong) I did probably cross over to the unfair side of the fight...I told her she was becoming bitter like her father...which, is true, he was bitter, and that she needs to lighten up. Then I told her please don't bug me anymore, then I emailed her and asked her to be nicer to me, and that in the last 2 years she has said some pretty mean things, and she needs to apologize and to not be mean to me anymore. She emailed me back. She said she was sorry if what she said seemed intentionally mean. But she feels that I am rude and abrasive to her, and she will never change and I should look in the mirror and I should be patient.
I emailed her back. I said I never said the rude things to her that she has said and done to me (which I think hanging up on someone is rude....believe me, I've done it and I mean to be rude.) But I never hung up on her, ever, or related a crazy lady to her. (Well, her father, but he really is her relative) The only thing I do is pick on Obama. She takes it personally, he is her savior, her hero, a god. Obama is not any of those things to me. I think he really did spend a lot of taxpayers money in India, and I'm not afraid to say it! The Whitehouse never said how much, they just said 200 million and all the other figures were over exaggerated. Stupid Robert Gibbs. Is that unfair fighting? I digress.
Will the rift ever heal? Is this blog unfair fighting. She doens't read it, so I guess it's OK.

A Concrete Yes on 23

Proposition 23 is important to me because if AB32, The Final Solutions Act, is fully implemented, many many jobs are in jeopardy. AB 32 is California's own little "global warming" intervention.
Of course, now that the White House wants us to call it "climate disruption," there must be something wrong with global warming. Anyway, the California legislators along with Arnold Schwarzenegger's wife think California is a leader and everything we do all the other states will follow. They won't follow this one. Why? Because businesses are leaving California because they can't afford the fees and fines and upgrades that AB32 will impose. The other states will welcome business and don't tax, fine, punish and otherwise repulse businesses, and will be happy to have everything good that business brings. What are the things business brings: Employment and a huge tax base. What are states screaming about and lacking at every turn? Tax base. Tax base equals revenue in the state coffers. No one has any money, right? Businesses employ people, businesses create revenue, revenue creates taxes, taxes pay for lots of things.
Now I have liberal friends who say it doesn't matter that unemployment is at an all time high, there will never be a good time to make the environment healthy. Prop 23 does not create pollution, it only stops the terrible regulation on industry, so that we won't loose jobs jobs jobs.
My liberal friend used the no smoking ban in privately owned businesses to make a point. He said that it did kill his mother in law's bowling alley for 2 years, but then the business came booming back. So, that justifies punishing, taxing and fining businesses for their carbon footprints. How many businesses went out of business in those 2 years? How many people were laid off? Would you like the business you're in to be really really bad for 2 years so that you're laid off? Plus, this is just so different. It effects every business and every home. It justifies raising energy rates so that "clean energy" is subsidized, and every family and individual home dweller will be charged those extra fees. Every dollar taken from you will be another dollar sucked out of the economy. And for what purpose? The people who created the bill even admit it will do nothing to lessen global warming/climate disruption. My hubby is in commercial construction. They use lots of concrete. The making of concrete gives off lots of carbon dioxide. So, companies that manufacture concrete will either have to charge lots more to supply concrete for construction, or they will leave the state. What sounds better? None of it.
Prop 23 does not take away any environmental protections. It just does not allow AB 32 committees to fine and tax businesses. And by the way, how many new tax payer committees are going to be created by AB 32? People who are on the tax payer's back who will receive benefits for themselves and their families for life that you, in the private sector will be paying for? The more regulation, the bigger the government, the bigger the government, the bigger the taxes, the less everyone has to spend, the worse the economy gets.
Don't punish the private sector of California. Yes on 23!

Spoiler Alert!

After a thorough analysis of the movie I watched yesterday, I have come to this conclusion:
The Switch is a pleasantly pleasing facetious commentary on all sorts of liberal minded societal issues. I'll tell you some really good examples.
Kassie realizes that her biological clock is ticking down. She tells her best friend Wally that she really wants a kid, and who needs a man? She just needs sperm. She poo poos a sperm bank and its coldly technical procedures, and wants to find her own man. So, who does she find? A married man who needs the money because his associate professorship doesn't pay enough!
At the party where the sperm donation was taking place, the doctor for Kassie was smoking pot, and Debbie (Kassie's best friend) said, "he is very progressive."
Wally, because Debbie gave him some sort of herbal relaxant that he mixed with booze, messes up the sperm donation and decides that he needs to donate himself. He quickly finds a magazine with Diane Sawyer on the cover, and figures that should do the trick.
Sometime later, Kassie declares she's pregnant and has to move to be closer to her folks so her kid can have a good upbringing in a nice safe state like Minnesota.
Kassie realizes that family is important. She has no idea why her 6 year old son collects frames.
He doesn't put new pictures in of his family. He makes up stories that the people in the frames are his family.
Why do movies have such bad mother's in them? I guess it wouldn't make a good story if there were good mothers. She becomes a good mother because she realizes that her son really needs his father.
She came to the right conclusion.

Yeah, Dr. Laura gave me the right stuff!

I was a Dr. Laura addict. Loved her opinions, mostly, though I did make it on a KFI promo saying, "I have a love hate relationship with Dr. Laura. Sometimes she is so wrong." It was kind of cool hearing my own squeaky voice on the radio. I remember telling my sister once that I took a break from her because I felt like I was always doing something wrong.
Since she switched stations at noon, I have listened only hit and miss. I still get her email updates, and when I saw "apology," I thought, "ooohh, what is she apologizing for?"
Then I heard her whole shtick and didn't really think much of it. I know having listened to Dr. Laura for 20 years, from meeting her and writing for her for a few months (really, I did) she is not a racist. She is like a bulldozer, I admit, but she is not a racist, nor has she taken advantage of people and made her money on the backs of the poor emotionally disturbed people who call her.
I have heard stories about her over the years that she could be quite the demanding, difficult, prima dona. And I do know there was a bit of nastiness that she tried to put a small business out of business because he had a certain magazine on his counter. And who could forget her dive into Orthodox Judaism where she took the bible seriously and felt that homosexuality is wrong. Before that, though, she was a staunch supporter of gays and lesbians and I heard with my own ears how she could never condemn 2 people who love each other to a life of loneliness. I think after the Orthodoxy got too strenuous for her, she returned to that opinion.
She is human everyone. She is imperfect just as all her listeners and critics. Just as you and me.
So here is the wisdom I have learned from Dr. Laura.
Being home with your children to raise them is the best thing you can do for them.
Husbands are easy, wives are difficult. Women control the relationship and when they take the best care of their husbands, they get everything they desire. (The caveat, pick the right person to marry)
Having children out of wedlock is a mistake.
Getting married, having children and getting a divorce is a mistake.
It would be a better USA if 1,000,000 babies a year weren't aborted.
When one marries, one needs to cleave to his/her spouse and leave the apron strings of his/her mother.
Kids are really cool, need love, love, love, and discipline. A strict schedule for kids isn't such a great thing. Have fun with your kids.
And my favorite, be your husband's girlfriend.
I told my husband I am sad that Dr. Laura is going out this way. She should have been praised by Women's groups because of her success as a public figure, a wife and a mother.
She lived the life she espoused and whether you like her or not, she had a lot of really good things to offer to the human condition.

Aversion Therapy

I believe in aversion therapy. Make something really nasty for someone, and they probably won't try it again. Though when I think about it, why would people become addicted to smoking when the first time a human inhales burning vegetable matter, the cough that follows is painful and very nasty. But I digress.
Did I raise my sonny boy with aversion therapy? I kind of didn't have to because his own personality style kept him mostly on the straight and narrow. It was more of a "natural consequences" type upbringing. I didn't want to tell my own kid "no, no, no." all day, so I would either quickly take something away from him, or let him find out on his own that it didn't feel good or would break or whatever. That may sound irresponsible on the surface, but it worked out quite well.
I do believe in a harsh voice rather than a soft one when a child is doing something wrong, especially a young child. Because the tone of voice helps them define good from bad choices. If a mom or dad is sweetly saying no to something wrong, and sweetly saying yes to the right thing, where's the boundary line.
Anyway, back to my first point. Years ago I was speaking to a mom who's son had a heart condition that kept him from doing any kind of strenuous activity. They had to get special permission blah blah blah from the school district so the kid wouldn't die on the track running laps or end up in the ER after doing some push ups. It was all very bureaucratic and a little scary. So one day she comes home with bags of potting soil and manure in the trunk of her car. The kid goes over to the trunk and lifts one of the bags out of the trunk and carries it to the backyard. She told him he's not supposed to do anything like that and he just shrugged. I told her I would have told him. "See that shovel over there? Go get it would you, and start digging your grave, cause that's where you're gonna end up." She was shocked at what I was telling her, but I thought it was quite clever.
Flash forward to this last weekend. Talking to another friend who has a young relative with a serious addiction to heroine. The young lady tried rehab, got clean for a little while, met some dude, and is heading off to another state to go live with him. I told my friend, "she's going to die." My friend said, "I can't even think of that. I just have to think one day at a time." I felt bad for my friend because she is so close to this young lady, and so frightened and frustrated by her.
After we hung up, what she told me sort of rolled around in my head. What do you do with a young woman who could have the world in a great way, and chooses to use lethal drugs and really bad behavior, instead? I told my hubby, "I think if I had a hold of that kid, I'd say, let's take a little ride." And we'd drive to a mortuary and buy a death plan, so that when her body arrived, everything would be in place. Then we'd drive to the cemetery and pick out a plot. I wouldn't laugh or shy away from it, or let her back out in any way. I would let her hold on to the paper work on the way home. Hubby wondered if that might work. Me, too.