I want to stand with you on a mountain

Savage Garden - Truly Madly Deeply

I'll be your dream,
I'll be your wish
I'll be your fantasy.
I'll be your hope,
I'll be your love
be everything that you need.
I love you more with every breath
truly madly deeply do..
I will be strong I will be faithful
cause I'm counting on
A new beginning.
A reason for living.
A deeper meaning.

I want to stand with you on a mountain.
I want to bathe with you in the sea.
I want to lay like this forever.
Until the sky falls down on me...

And when the stars are shining
brightly in the velvet sky,
I'll make a wish send it to heaven
then make you want to cry..
the tears of joy for all the pleasure
and the certainty
that we're surrounded by the comfort
and protection of..
the highest power.
In lonely hours.
The tears devour you..

I want to stand with you on a mountain,
I want to bathe with you in the sea.
I want to lay like this forever,
Until the sky falls down on me...

Oh can't you see it baby?
You don't have to close your eyes
Cause it's standing right before you.
All that you need will surely come...

I'll be your dream
I'll be your wish
I'll be your fantasy.
I'll be your hope
I'll be your love
be everything that you need.
I'll love you more with every breath
truly madly deeply do...

I want to stand with you on a mountain,
I want to bathe with you in the sea.
I want to lay like this forever,
Until the sky falls down on me...

I want to stand with you on a mountain,
I want to bathe with you in the sea.
I want to lay like this forever,
Until the sky falls down on me...

Heard this song on the radio this morning. I haven't heard it in years. It came out the summer that Jim and I met/started dating.

I started singing and got louder and louder. You know that singing you do in the shower or the car when no one is around to hear the missed notes. That was me this morning.

Today is 2 years and 10 months since Jim has been gone.

Eat for a dollar a day

Eating on just a dollar day?

I was reading this blog about a couple that decided to try and eat for a month on just one dollar each per day. Now this was interesting because they did a lot of home baking, some dumpster diving and visiting places like Costco that had hand out food. They said they did have some basic rules and one was not to ramen unless absolutely necessary.

They wanted to see if Americans could do it and as such let go of their processed, corn syrup filled, fast food. Each day they blogged and talked about what they ate and how much each meal cost.

The trick was.....they were able to afford to buy bulk of some basics like oatmeal, corn, rice, peanut butter, flour and beans. They started the experiment with a few gallons of each. So, at breakfast they would have .08 cents of oatmeal and some hot tea. A PBJ for lunch with homemade bread and maybe some burritos with refried beans and veggies for dinner. Even starting out with the bulk materials, being able to make healthy and tasty meals took some doing. If interested, here is there blog - http://onedollardietproject.wordpress.com/

I found the comments people gave to be more interesting then the blog itself.

Reading is fundemental

What kind of reader are you? For that matter, do you still read books or just kindle or just wait for it to come out as a movie?

I have been reading for about 40 or more years. As a young child my parents would read to me at night. My dad was great at doing the different voices of characters. This is a side that he wouldn't show to the real world but for us kids to entertain us as we went to sleep.

The small town I grew up in had a nice library on main street. We were in smalltown usa and main street had shops and the post office and library and movie theatre. Living about 4 blocks from the main street made it easy to grab a bike and ride down on a Saturday morning. The ritual was to start at one end of the street to work your way down to the library.

One end held the 5&10 store, with half being grown up stuff like material and yarn and some clothing and the other half being a plethora of small wood bins with things like army men and candy and children's bracelet and necklaces and little dolls and balls and cars and jacks and marbles and just about anything a kid in the 60's could need. And no I don't mean a flower child, but just your cut and dry 8 yr old. Next stop was the other store to get candy or toys. That was the drug store and it was more expensive, so usually it was a go in and look deal. Next could be the movie theatre and an afternoon of Disney fun. I saw lots of them there before they ever hit the tv or vhs or dvd. Finally the Library.

My brothers and sister were never into the library as much as I was. I grew tired of the kids books and worked my way in to the teen section of books and then later even the adult section (that sounds so perverted when I say adult section, but I don't mean the porn area (not that there was one) but rather novels, bios and non fiction). My mom guided me in this area. She and my Dad also loved to read and she always found some really interesting books that I would then see around the house and pick up to read. Taylor Caldwell, Asimov, Shirley Jackson (but not the horror, it was Life Among the Savages), Madeleine L'Engle and others. I had some favorites that thanks to the scholastic book service, I still own today - The Great Brain My side of the Mountain, The trolley car family, Light a Single Candle are ones I can see right now on the shelf.

One thing with me and books is that if I find a book I really love, I will keep it and reread it. Some of them at least once a year I will pull them off the shelf. Some not for five years. Unfortunately for my shelves, which are pretty full, some books I just want around in case I ever decide to reread them. Oh and to be fair, some do go to the used book store or to other friends when I finish them. There are some books I enjoy, I want to read again, know that I own them, can't find them ANYWHERE in the house....so I go buy another copy at the local used book store. And then of course, find the original copy. Also what has happened is that I have a series of a favorite author - Marion Zimmer Bradley for example, and I see a few of them at the thrift store, so I think "gee my nieces would love this" and I buy them. I am glad when my nieces come back to tell me how much they did enjoy the books.

I have had people tell me how strange it is that I can reread a book. Maybe it is my memory disability, but I like to think of it as finding something new in the book each time I read it, or reliving a story with old friends or maybe just enjoying the cadence of the words the author puts out. Oh and I do this with movies also. I like to rewatch my favorite movies much the same way.

I hit a lull in book buying a few years ago. I couldn't find any new authors that tweaked my interest, so I reread the ones on my shelves and waited for the Next in the Series of a couple of favorite authors. Last year I joined an online book club and they talked about some new books that I picked up. Some I read and said 'eh' , but a couple now I have been entranced by and have been scrabbling to get the next in the series (if there is one).

When I wake up, I will read for a few minutes. When I fall asleep, I read before the turning the light out. I can read in the car/bus/train/plane. I read while I am eating. Jim and I meshed in this way perfectly. He was not a book reader, but rather a comic reader. Which was fine. Sometimes he would have his comics at the table, and I would read my book. No big deal that we weren't talking - because we had talked before or would after - we were comfortable. We both would read in bed for a little while. It was a calming, end of the day way to relax.

I love to read in the backyard with the temperature at the perfect 70 and no humidity and just a summer breeze making it all perfect. I could do that one for hours. In fact, it is going to be like that today. I think I am going to grab my newest book and go for a read.

Community garden

Sunday morning and it is community service day. This is not imposed on me by any judge, but rather a commitment I made to myself a couple years ago.


The neighborhood association that I am a member of, actually on the Board of directors for, does a lot of neighborhood clean up. In the Urban community it is important to keep on top of that. We go out once a month or so and work on cleaning a few alleys or working in a community garden or planting some trees. The last is fun. It is called Guerilla Gardening. Not approved by the City, but done with the hopes to make the city a greener place.


Today we are attacking a section of land that right now is weeds and concrete. A house was there, it burned down, the city tore it down and has left the spot vacant for many years now. We are going in to break up the concrete, dig up some ground and put in some community garden boxes. These are large 5 x 10 wood frames that allow us to put in a good topsoil and then plant vegatables.


Our neighborhood has one community garden already and it is a succcess. Neighbors can pay $15.00 and plant what they want in some of the boxes and then reap the benefits from the 'community' ones that usually have basics like tomatoes and cucumbers and such.


We got some of my husbands fathers tools. He has this great rod that Jim called the concrete cracker. I think it is actually a railroad tie "Gandie" a rod that is round up top and then becomes square ending with a wedge. It was used by RR workers to wedge under a railroad tie and lever them into place. There were about 8 Frat boys there and they were sledgehammering the concrete. The rod helped and it was neat to see it being used. That may sound odd, but I was just glad to offer it to help out.

I went back in the evening and they made some real progress. We should have a garden in just a few weeks.

The snow is now brown

The almost 50 inches of snow we had here has dwindled down to a soggy brown in my backyard. Some of the brown in mud and some is dog poo that had been buried by the 50 inches.

Guess what I am doing this weekend. Oh boy. I am pulling out the gardening shovels now.

I also decided to rearrange the house a bit. Move some of the furniture that is upstairs and maybe paint the downstairs Kitchen and Living room. That may be my April/May projects. So in the two rooms upstairs the office/closet/library and the bedroom I have things split up. Some clothes are in dressers and rolling closets in both rooms and some books are in both rooms. I want to move all the clothes into one room and all the books into one room. But to be odd, I want the clothes in the front office room and all the books could be in the bedroom.

None of that may make sense without pictures or drawings, but I can see it all in my mind so that is all that really counts!!

I also want to find someone to help me put some brick down in the backyard where now there is just mud and sometimes there is grass. I would love to open the space up and make it like a patio.

I told myself back in 2007 when Jim died that I wanted to move. I still do. I am still trying to get rid of stuff but I guess I am also trying to make the place easier for me to live here.