Secretariat

This evening I went out to a friend's place for dinner and a very nice visit. Pat & I used to ride horses together several times a week and were very close though now that we no longer have horses in our lives we rarely see each other.  I think it's time to change that and see more of this wonderful woman.  Anyway, we went out to see an incredible movie about one of the most famous race horses in the world... Secretariat. That horse must have been on some mighty potent multivitamin.  Wow, he sure earned his fame & his owner's fortune.

Wikipedia says this and more about this horse:
Secretariat (March 30, 1970 – October 4, 1989) was an American Thoroughbred racehorse , who in 1973 became the first U.S. Triple Crown champion in twenty-five years, setting new race records in two of the three events in the Series—the Kentucky Derby, and the Belmont Stakes — records that still stand today.
Secretariat was sired by Bold Ruler (a grandson of Nearco) and foaled to Somethingroyal. He was foaled at Meadow Farm in Caroline County, Virginia. Like the equally famous horse Man o' War, Secretariat was a large chestnut colt and was given the same nickname, "Big Red."
Owned by Penny Chenery (aka Penny Tweedy), he was trained by Lucien Laurin and mainly ridden by fellow Canadian jockey Ron Turcotte, along with apprentice jockey Paul Feliciano (first two races), and veteran Eddie Maple (last race). He raced in Penny Chenery's Meadow Stable's blue and white checkered colors and his groom was Eddie Sweat. Secretariat stood approximately 16.2 hands (66 inches, 168 cm) tall, and weighed 1,175 pounds (533 kg), with a 75 inch girth, in his racing prime.

If you like horses at all I highly recommend this movie.  I would see it again.

Pellets

I very much enjoyed having a sunny, warm October this year.  September was unusually rainy and glum so to have a September-like October was great.  I didn't have to start heating my home until about a week or so ago.  I did light the pellet stove a couple times just to take the chill off, but didn't even need to do that much.  I enjoy using the pellet stove to heat my home as it's a nicer heat than the natural gas furnace puts out, as well as it heats the part of the home that I am in without heating the part that is not often used. In order to use the pellet stove, I buy pellets by the ton, 50 bags that are each 40 pounds, and I store them in the carport to be brought into the house as needed each day.  I like to think of these big bags of pellets as being muscle builders as I have to be strong to pick up and carry each 40 pound bag into the house and dump it into the stove and I am sure that doing this helps me to stay strong.  Unfortunately, this year with having broken my wrist I am unable to pack the pellets as I usually do, so I have a friend who comes over every few days to fill the stove up and put a few extra bags into the room by the stove so I can open a bag and scoop pellets into the stove when needing to refill.  This is a slow, tedious way to fill the stove, but you do what you have to do.  I am very grateful to Dan for coming over to help me out like this and I don't know what I would do without him just now.

Killing Time

I seem to be doing a lot of mindless time killing things lately, like playing Solitaire on my computer. Click here, drag there, look for another move. right click to move them up to their piles at the top.  I don't know why but I really am loving playing Solitaire lately and can't seem to get enough of it.  I have so many other things I could and should be doing, yet I keep wanting to play the silly game.  One nice thing about it is that I can do it with one  hand if I want to so I don't need to use the left hand when it's hurting, or I can use it but to a minimum. It would be better if I was riding my exercise bike or cleaning my house.  I want to figure out a way to have my laptop on my exercise bike so I can surf while I ride.

Kitten Fostering

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have been fostering 2 kittens for the local SPCA.  Well, it started out being 2, but unfortunately, Tiny passed away yesterday.  He was just so tiny and young, as well as not as healthy as he could be.  It was so sad though, and hard on me to loose the little guy.  I still have Stamp who is older, bigger & healthier.  Trust me, this is a lot of work to look after a kitten who has no mother cat to do it. It keeps you so busy that you don't have time to be bored or to over eat, so you don't really need diet pills.  Or at least I don't.  Every 2 hours you have to make or warm up a special cat milk replacement & bottle feed the kitten(s), then you have to wipe it's butt like mama cat would lick it to stimulate the bathroom process. Thankfully, Stamp is old enough now to be able to 'do his business' on his own, though I had to help Tiny each time I fed him.  This happens all day and night, by the way.  There is also the washing of the little bitty bottles & nipples which is no small feat. I find it more of a challenge now than I usually would as my left hand is only partially working.  Tomorrow will be 6 weeks since the crash I was in where I had my left wrist broken & the right one sprained, so will be awhile yet before I have real use of my left wrist & hand.  I picked the kittens up last Saturday at noon and will be taking Stamp back tomorrow.  Before Tiny died I told them I found the fostering job a bit too hard with the broken wrist, so she found a new foster parent.  Now that it's just one kitten I am handling it better and was thinking I could keep Stamp longer, but then was told there is another foster home set up.  It saddens me, yet I know it is for the best since I am getting too attached to the little guy.  Even Mewsic is starting to like him & that is big, lol.

Online working

I've been doing a lot more internet surfing lately, looking for custom made trikes (3 wheeled motorcycles) that are somewhat similar to the one I had.  Well,  I still have it, but it's smashed beyond being repairable. Anyway, I must find trikes comparable to my one-of-a-kind trike in my quest to establish a fare value for mine.  The insurance company wants to just pay me book price on a 2 wheeler without acknowledging that it was even converted to a 3 wheeler.  I don't know if I will get anywhere with my quest to get them to pay what is fair, but I will keep working at it and do the best I can.  I wish I would just find a place that said  click here and have it take me to exactly what I need, but it's just not that easy.  It's taking me a lot of hours of work.

Oneness in Action

Below you will find an email I received today and thought a lot of people would benefit by reading.

Dear Team Mates,

 

We are now fully in fall season. I’m wishing all of you a Happy and Marvelous Thanksgiving Day! Why not using this special day to make a list of all your blessings……read your list regularly, focus on it everyday, it is the best way to have them produce more blessings!

 

Humanity’s Team World Wide, is announcing that Sunday, October 24th they will celebrate the First Global Oneness Day. Although UNO did not yet confirm this declaration, we want to start to Celebrate! We know that around the world there is 50,000 peoples that want to join us…they have already signed our petition! We won’t stop there!….We are still adding names with a goal of 100,000 signatures!……If you did not sign yet, please sign it now, and ask your friends and family to do the same. …..we want to demonstrate that Humanity is willing to focus on similarities instead of differences!

 

For this first Global Oneness Day, let us all do a little good for someone else…Bring a plate to someone living alone……pay the coffee for the  person following you at your Tim Horton car service, keep the door open for a young mother struggling with her stroller, smile to a perfect stranger, compliment a colleague……the list could be very long….. Just a little gesture could make a huge difference! With 2500 Humanity’s Team Mates in Canada we could make life just a little bit better and make a difference to someone’s life. 

 

If you have more suggestions for this Celebration feel free to write! We will share it with all members! We could also post your pictures of how you did Celebrate on our website!

For more info go to: http://www.global-oneness-day.org/

Or to: http://humanitysteam.org/whattodoOct24G1Day

 

 

I’m wishing you an outstanding Celebration!   WE ARE ALL ONE

 

Namaste,

Francine Corbeil   francine@humanitysteamcanada.com

 

www.humanitysteamcanada.com

I've Got BABIES!

Pass the  cigar around folks, I have new babies! Well, foster babies anyway.  I am currently fostering 2 kittens for the BCSPCA.  Every 2 hours, day & night, I have to feed the kittens then wipe them with a warm, damp cloth to simulate what the mother cat would do to stimulate the kitten to pee.

Stamp is long hair & almost all black, only a tiny bit of white on his chest.  I think this kitten is male, though it is still too early to be sure.  He is soooo cute, loves to cuddle & to purr.  He's likely around 3 weeks old.


Tiny is very tiny, likely the runt, and very young.  His eyes are open so I'm guessing him/her to be 2 weeks old.  S/he is a short hair tabby and cute as a bugs ear.

I don't know the story behind these kittens.... where they came from, where the mothers are, how they come to be at the SPCA so young, where their litter mates are... yes, I have lots of questions that I have no answer for.  I just know that I answered a plea for help and agreed to foster these two.  My cat, Mewsic, is not at all happy about this though I'm sure she will survive.  She's staying away if I have the kittens anywhere near me, and when she has come close she hisses & growls at them.  She'll either get used to this or will just have to wait it out until they are gone.  I don't know how long I will have these babies, could be a few days or several weeks, only time will tell.  I am finding it a challenge with the broken wrist, though pretty much everything is.  This gives me something good, positive to do and keeps my mind off my problems.

Christmas is Coming!

This is scary, but in just over 2 months it will be Christmas!!  I usually make all the gifts I give, though not sure I will be able to do that this year with a broken wrist.  I am also not sure I won't be able to, lol.  In the 5 weeks since it was broken it has done a lot of healing.  It has a very long ways to go yet to make the wrist & hand fully useful again, but the surgeon said I would have the cast on for 6-8 weeks & then, after doing x-rays he took the cast off after just 3 1/2 weeks. In the week since then, it has come along very well.  I still can't move it a lot, but waaayy more than I could a week ago.  In a couple months it could be working quite well.  I want to make my Mom a pair of earrings, maybe a pair for each of my sisters too.  I need to get some jewelry making supplies if I want to try making things like this.  Last year I put some of my poetry onto some of my photos with Photoshop, and had them blown up then matted them.  They made very good gifts, and I would like to do the same this year, but don't like to do the same thing two years in a row... just not "unique" enough.  Hmmmm.... guess this all needs lots of thought.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I just did a post titled "Random Thoughts" & when I hit the Publish Post button I was "kicked out" of Blogger.  My post that I wanted up before 9pm got lost and I am not impressed.  Ah, and yet life goes on. Now, to see how many random thoughts I can have again:

- in the last Random Thoughts post, I had problems with the 'functions' here, hit Enter & nothing happens.  That is happening again with this post. I have to click the cursor into place after I hit Enter... grrr.
- I enjoyed time with my TOPS friends today.  The meetings are always fairly good though lunch, sometimes shopping, & finally go for desert with the gals is always nicer.
- I had a good visit with Mom this afternoon.
- I prefer the was "social security benefits" sounds rather than Welfare or Old Age Pension.
- I'm reading the book "The Power" by Rhonda Byrne, very good. She is the author of The Secret & I think this book is a lot better than her last one.
- I'm watching Gray's Anatomy on TV, with my cat curled up on my bed between my feet, my bird DW in her cage near by.

Cast Off

I got the cast off my broken left wrist last Wednesday so have now had a week of slowly, bit-by-bit, moving it as much as possible.  This is not easy as it is very stiff & hurts a lot.  Not just the wrist is like this, but the whole hand is too.  In the morning I can hardly move the fingers so must work them as much as I can until they finally almost straighten out & become somewhat usable. I still can't move the wrist very much, but compared to last week... wow, it is coming along well. I've been thinking about taking some bone & muscle building supplements to speed the healing of all the damaged tissues, & have for the last 2 days been wrapping the wrist with chopped up comfrey leaves for overnight.  It does seem to be helping somewhat so as long as I can get comfrey leaves I will continue doing this.  I am determined to get the use of my hand back.  I need both hands to continue being independent.

Some past stuff

I have never been one to drink much alcohol or to do drugs.  Oh, 'back in the day' I tried pot a few times, but wasn't into it like several people I knew. I did spend a couple years of my life with a man that was an 'addict' who was trying to get clean by taking part in the methadone program.  Not exactly a opiate detox situation, but at least he seemed to be trying to get clean.  Unfortunately, he was also too into the booze which didn't sit well with me.  I don't know if it was because of the methadone or because of the booze... or just because he was who he was, but he had a tendency to become mean at times.  It was almost like a split personality the way he'd be so kind & generous, then so nasty and dangerous.  I soon found I could not spend my life with this man and plotted my way to get free.