Dear Dona, I know we have spoken about our pain before, and my heart goes out to you and others who live with chronic pain. I battled against using maintenance medication for a few years until there were no other options, and take my meds as scheduled. What I really love about you and your story is that I never think of you as disabled. You always send out such positive messages with every post. I know there is still a lot of joy in your heart. I wish I could take you with mom and I on our cruise this year (we leave Sunday), but I offer an open invitation to join us next year to celebrate her 80th Birthday. We already have to have an O2 concentrator in our Stateroom along with a portable nebulizer. It would give us an excuse to get a big Suite that would accomodate that scooter! HUGS!!!! CA

Hmmmmm…solitary confinement is a gift. I know this will rattle some cages (excuse the pun), but I support the death penalty as well. Rather than Solitary I think they should divide the prison population into Cell Blocks of like minded criminals. White Supremists, Crips, Bloods, and all the others in separate cell blocks. If one is unable to get along with their ‘like-minded’ Block Mates, then they should be sent to spend some time in the Cell Block of the enemy they hate the most, and let them take care of the problem. I’m sure that would help trim down the prison population without even having to use the death penalty.

We just ended the protracted trial of a duo of murders (actually "one" because the other flipped on his partner so he would only get Life in Prison) who killed or injured humans and animals randomly over a two year period of terror in our city. The one pleading not guilty was convicted of 6 of the 8 murders, and dozens of other charges. The Jury sentenced him to 6 death penalties, and hundreds of years in prison. As I understand it, most spend a minimum of 20 years on death row before they are executed or die of natural charges. When I think about all the time and money that was spent by our State Law Enforcement and Judicial System to give this man his day in court disgusts me. The thought that we will now have to pay more tax dollars to keep him alive in prison while waiting to be put to death boggles my mind. It is probably more $$$ than the budget shortfall our state is now facing…go figure. CA

Black Water Beetles found in the rivers in Southern China on the border with Viet Nam. They have big wings and itty bitty legs, and they were being served as a local delicacy at dinner. They actually didn’t taste that bad stir fried once I was politely informed that one yanks their hard shell wings off before eating and wash them down with a potent plum brandy.

CA

I used to follow almost all sports…then I married a watcher of sports, I divorced him and moved in with a man with two young sons and found that Little League, Pop Warner Football and Soccer made me crazy, then I dated a sports fanatic with season tickets to absolutely everything involving sports, and a 13 yr old son who played all of the above and more. The young man, and I use that term loosely, lacked good sportsmanship, swore like a truck driver, lived like a pig, and was a spoiled brat. After a while I figured out that he was merely modelling his father’s behavior. I lost all interest in watching sports when I found out I was dating the most well known heckler at all our local professional sports venues. It wasn’t a pretty sight. I saw a replay of ‘the three of us’ at a pro basketball game when one of the players took a swing at my date and struck me in the face instead. I survived and I look for a better quality man to date or I don’t date at all. Oh! Did I mention the settlement from my game injury lawsuit paid my way through Grad School. ;-)

I currently watch professional tennis and golf and horse racing. The rest of it is pure madness and I won’t even watch the others at home with QM (mom). She yells so loud at the TV you can hear her across the street. CA