I love you Dad

I got a comment from a dear friend about one of my posts where I was thinking of jumping out of a window.  She noticed how lucky I am to have my Dad.  Yes I am.  He is an amazing man and has been an inspiration for me since my husband died.  The day he died I asked my Dad "how am I going to do this?"  and he said "you put one foot in front of the other and just keep going"  He knew cause his soulmate, my Mum, had died in May, just months before my husband died.  My Dad is the most practical, sensible, grounded, smart, funny man.  He plays drums and trombone.  And he loves me and that gets me through my worst days of grief.  So thank you dear friend for noticing how lucky I am to have such a wonderful man for my father.  I treasure every moment I have with him and am grateful for the love he has given to me since the day I was born.

The Third Industrial Revolution

Started reading this book by Jeremy Rifkin which describes the progressive model being implemented by the EU and lead by Germany.  Its all about how the internet is causing power to be lateral, not top down, but distributed and collaborative, and how that will solve our energy problems and the economy on a global scale.  What are the biggest users of current energy?  1) buildings and homes, 2) beef production and animal husbandry practices, and 3) transportation.  This book makes it easy to figure out the direction our government should be taking and how one person can contribute to getting ourselves off of petroleum and leaving nuclear behind - its already a thing of the past.  The EU is so far beyond where the US is, we are still fighting over whether or not to invest/spend money to build infrastructure that supports the old energy - roads and bridges.  When we should be working on green buildings and homes, eating local, consuming less meat unless its raised locally, and then investing in electric plug in cars.  This is all about changing the central control of energy to a new system of using energy that's everywhere - wind, water and sun.  And the stuff about hydrogen?  Holy crap - this is great stuff.

Hanging on for dear life

Wow.  I'm really sad today.  This is the week, 5 years ago, that I lost my husband.  I feel like I could jump out of a window, but wait, I can't do that.  I have my Dad aka Pap and li'l Phil my 3 year old nephew to live for.  I spent time with them on Columbus Day having a carb-laden lunch at Bob Evans.  Me and my big mouth - told Phil they had mush there.  Mush is something my mother made on Sundays - mix corn meal and water, let it set, slice it, fry it and pour butter and syrup all over it.  Only problem is Bob Evans doesn't have mush anymore and Phil got it into his li'l head that he WANTED MUSH!  So we ordered him mashed potatoes, told him it was mush, and he was quite pleased.  Being 3 is so awesome - you don't even know what mashed potatoes is yet!  After Phil went home my Dad and I listened to the Four Freshmen and the Beach Boys and cried during the  Bobby Troup song "Their Hearts Were Full of Spring."  Yeah, you got it - a song about a couple who were in love, grew old and died.  My Dad and I cried together cause he misses my mother something terrible and I miss Mr. White (although we never got a chance to grow old together).  Oh by the way, my Mum died 8 months before my husband did, so remembering what was going on 5 years ago is doubly miserable.  Zoom back to thinking about jumping out of a window - no, I think I'll wait a bit for that.  In the meantime, I will look forward to spending days off with my Dad, having a blast with l'il Phil as often as I can, and being grateful for the blessings I have which are many.  Its not easy to stop feeling sad and miserable when you in fact do have some pretty heavy stuff to feel sad and miserable about.  Now I remember that I can chose between feeling miserable and feeling OK.  Besides someone at work just told me I look skinny so I think I'll take comfort in that and move my thoughts from being sad and heartbroken to planning my next low-carb meal and exercising to Fela Kuti music.  Everybody say Yeah Yeah!

And speaking of Ryan Cartwright

Having a blast watching all the old TV shows Ryan Cartwright has been in, thanks to http://fuckyeahryancartwright.tumblr.com/

Watched Donovan last night - wow really intense and not only was RC in it but one of my favorite actors Tom Conti starred.

So I came across what I think is Hallmark Channel's schedule and it shows that Dear Prudence (2009 Jane Seymour movie on Hallmark that RC is in) might be shown at 8am on 10/23:

http://www.hallmarkmoviechannel.com/SPP/Default.aspx?SppID=371

I know what I'll be doing at 8am on 10/23!  Cheers n'at!

Clutter be gone - made easy

So I still have a basement full of junk and treasures that have been piling up for the past 25 years of my life.  I already know there are many boxes of papers full of printouts from a computer class Mr. White took years ago--not a treasure.  But to get to the treasures, I have to go through the junk.  One of my neighbors told me about free recycling and shredding services nearby, and I found this:

http://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/apps/News/Blog/solidwasteBlog.asp?blogID=2&Cat=Paper%20Shredding

So this free service happens every couple of months at local high schools and malls.  Problem solved!  I can take 10 boxes out of my house every couple of months and will see the light at the end of the tunnel of junk. I can handle taking bites out of the Junk Elephant in the room - how I love the iterative process. Soon I'll have another room in my house that I can actually use.

Thank you neighbor!

Ryan Cartwright from Sironia web site cast photos & link to movie trailer. Fast forward to 19 for a glimpse of RC playing the maracas

Trailer for Sironia

Radiohead heals

We are all lotus flowers

Music soothes

Black Tide Into the Sky

Ryan Cartwright obsession whilst watching Tarzan Action Theatre

So right now I'm obsessed with an actor who is on a TV show I'm obsessed with.  The TV show is Alphas on SYFY and the actor is Ryan Cartwright.  I was drawn to the character he plays on Alphas, Gary Bell, who is autistic because I have a friend who is autistic and he has been discriminated against so often because he is different and people don't take the time to experience things from his perspective.  Alphas not only has created a realistic character, one with all the challenges faced by persons with autism, but also non-stereotypical traits like humor and love and passion.  Every episode demonstrates how people who are not autistic can appreciate a person with autism, how they can treat that person with respect, and how to have a relationship with someone with autism.  Ryan Cartwright is so amazing in this role.  He embodies all the quirkiness that can go along with autism, and at the same time gives a poignant and tender performance in every episode.  I just love Alphas for having a main character who is a person with autism.  As for Ryan Cartwright, I'm learning that he's been on TV a long time - as Mr. Vincent Nigel-Murray on Bones, a few appearances on Madmen, and on a slew of British TV shows when he was a teenager.  He's played along side some of my favorites - in The Grimleys with Nigel Planer (Neil from The Young Ones), and in Hardware with Martin Freeman (The Office brit version and Hitchhiker's Guide movie).  He's a great, comedic, character actor.  Stay tuned for season 2 of Alphas in 2012.

Love this Life

As in the Crowded House song - Love this life, don't wait til the next one comes.  Its my first blog and my first step in sharing my experiences from before, during and after the loss of my soulmate to frickn cancer.  Cancer took his life and ruined mine.  So working from the starting point of a ruined life, I have progressed to defining myself without my husband, best friend, lover and companion in this material world.  Stay tuned for the ups and downs, progress and setbacks, and accounts of the awesome people who came into my life since I began life's journey again, on my own.