Itching and Twitching The Night Away

Lights out early - early morning tomorrow....

My left pinkie is twitching...It won't stop.  Shove it under the pillow and pin it.  Thigh itches.  Now ribs.  Scratch scratch.  My face feels funny.  Something weird around my mouth.  Feels all strained.  Strong desire to pull upper lid down over chin and lower lid up towards nose...More itching.  Arthritis in right hand is sore, uncomfortable everyplace I lay my hand.  Drat.  Gotta pee.  Now I need a drink. If I drink I'll have to pee again.  Drat drat.  More itching...

Pretty much all night long.  I was supposed to have the SUV at the shop at 8 this morning for inspection but it didn't happen. I think I got some sleep between 7 and 9:30, when Perry decided to lay on my head.  Inspection will have to wait until tomorrow. 

For some reason this is much more common on Sunday nights.  I'm hoping retirement will cure it.

If You Are of a Praying Bent

A couple years ago a friend was diagnosed with breast cancer. She had surgery, chemo, and radiation, and was found to be clear of cancer. Just after her hair grew back, she was diagnosed with lung cancer, had surgery, chemo, and radiation, and was found to be free of cancer. Then, just after her hair grew back again she was diagnosed with brain tumors, received treatments, and was found to be cleared of all cancer. Her hair has just grown back... Now her doctors have detected new tumors on her kidney and in her lungs. Biopsies can't be done for a couple weeks. 

I understand that this seems to be associated with a particular gene and that the members of her family who have the gene have suffered rampant cancer of all kinds.  Whatever the cause, she and her family are much in need of prayers.

Well, That Was a Bit Disheartening....

So, since a cousin I hadn't seen for years was visiting my sister down Raleigh way, I headed off for a long weekend at her place.  Saturday was a beautiful day.  Right up until I got a couple miles past Opal, VA, on Rt. 17.  At which point I felt a...um...frisson of unhappiness pass through the engine.  Hum.  And then there was a miss, followed by another miss, followed by the engine rockin' and rollin' and holy cow I gotta pull over.  In the middle of nowhere, VA.  Blast and damn.  And my car repair skills consists of opening the hood, looking in, and saying "Yep, there's an engine in there."

Cell phones.  Have I ever told you how much I love my cell phone?  Probably not, because until that point it had merely been useful, as opposed to USEFUL!.  Except... repair shops and tow services all close at noon Saturday or aren't open at all.  Sheissa.  Ah, wait, there's one that doesn't say closed.  Yay! A nice lady answers and while there's no mechanic on duty they just towed in from an accident and as soon as he unloads he'll come get me and I can at least get it off the road.  And by this time I've confirmed that a friend who lives in Fredericksburg is home and I can be rescued and will have a place to stay if I'm stranded.  So nice fellow, last name Stribling, arrives with tow truck, has me pop the hood to give a listen.  Says it sounds like I've thrown a plug.  I don't know what that is but at least it's diagnosable.  On the way down the road I find out that they actually aren't open on Saturday, but were on the rotation for accident tows and had just picked one up.

Down to Joe Stribling Service Center in Bealton we went.  While they pulled my suv apart to take a look, the elderly couple whose car had been trashed by a careless driver were on the phone trying to find a rental.  Nearest place open was down in Fredericksburg and darned if Chester didn't run them down there rather than tell them to call a taxi.  And in the meantime they opened up my SUV and found that yes I had thrown a plug that is located under the ignition coil.  It simply blew out, destroying the coil when it did.  They were able to get a new ignition coil delivered chop-chop and showed me the damage, old against new:

The grey piece being the one that lost the fight with the plug. 

So happy, happy, they are going to fix it and I'll be heading on down the road again.  Except....When the plug blew out it stripped the seat.  Not to worry, there's a tool you use to deal with that and Chester has done several of these on Ford pickups, which are apparently prone to the problem.  Trouble is, the shaft he has to get into is smaller than that of a Ford, or any of the other makes he has the tools for.  He can't get to it.  Hopes crushed.  The only thing to do is tow it into the Hyundai dealer in Fredericksburg and spend the weekend with my friend and hope that the dealer's shop can fix it Monday.  Not that I don't love spending the weekend with my friend - we have great times together - but that's not what was planned.  Plus I just sank $3,500 into this vehicle for a rebuilt transmission.  Not happy.  Not happy at all.

So load it back up and down the road to Fredericksburg.  But, wait!  The bay doors at the dealer shop are open!  Oh frabjus day they are open until 7 on Saturdays!  And they can fix it.  But oh what a price.  On top of the $177 tow charge, $585 for the repair.  Most of which, of course, was labor.  And he says he did the best he could but there's a lot of damage.  I'm not a happy camper.  I had faith in the rebuilt transmission - I was comfortable with running the suv to Michigan to see the kids.  Now I'm beginning to doubt the solidity of the vehicle.

Guess Saturday's trip to the Dulles gun show to look at shotguns is off.

And I'm joining AAA.

PS - If you live in that area and need car work, give Stribling's a try.  They've got all sorts of good ratings out on the web, they are really nice people, and I'll bet they'll not charge the arm and a leg the dealer charged me.

Sad Sad

Rest in peace, Chessie.  At 20 years of age we knew it had to be coming but you were such a sweetie that maybe in the backs of our minds we hoped it would never happen.  Or that you would simply not wake up from a nap in the sun one day.

But when your family got home from the vet's after you were gone, your best buddy Jack was collapsed on the floor.  He has a ruptured lymph node that is draining into a lung and he's too old for surgery.  So you may have his company again soon.

I'm Such a Baaaaaaad Grandma

So I was standing in line at the grocery store last night and my cell phone rang.  It's my daughter.  The conversation starts something like this "This is a really serious question and I need a serious answer so don't laugh."

Seems she turned her back on 19 month old Grandbaby during dinner.  When she turned back Grandbaby was patting her nose and saying "Ow."  Then Grandbaby blew green beans out of both nostrils at the same time.

I'm still laughing.  And wishing there was a video.

Wow. Another Pigs Flying Moment.

You know the whole assault rifle nonsense.  You probably also know that The New York Times hasn't felt the need for honesty for decades.  But someone there has screwed up and actually published the truth about assault rifles.

"On September 13, the 20th anniversary of the signing of the federal assault weapons ban, The New York Times ran a column explaining that the very term "assault weapon" is one the "Democrats created" in the 1990s in order to ban "a politically defined category of guns." 

Moreover, the Times points out that the threat posed by the private ownership of "assault weapons" is mythological in comparison to FBI stats on the actual use of such guns in crime. "

Somebody is probably going to lose their job over this. 

Read the rest here.

A Reflection on Obama's Foreign Policy

“I know some in Washington would like us to start leaving Iraq now. To begin withdrawing before our commanders tell us we are ready would be dangerous for Iraq, for the region, and for the United States. It would mean surrendering the future of Iraq to al Qaeda. It would mean that we’d be risking mass killings on a horrific scale. It would mean we’d allow the terrorists to establish a safe haven in Iraq to replace the one they lost in Afghanistan. It would mean increasing the probability that American troops would have to return at some later date to confront an enemy that is even more dangerous.” George W. Bush, 2007

Obama Administration, 2014:

Maybe it would be better if he just stayed on the golf course.