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Life … that bumpy ride

Posted in Friends, Older women, On getting older, Writing for fun, WTF?, Younger men, tagged , , , on December 3, 2008| 5 Comments »

Life is a funny old thing, isn’t it?

Ups.

Downs.

In between ups and downs.

Way up ups and way down downs and everything in between, like a perpetual elevator ride with a lunatic at the controls.

From sub-sub-basement (heartbreak, betrayal, misery, pain) to penthouse (rapture, joy, dizzy love with icing on top), we traverse at the whim of the insane controller up and down the shaft … often getting it as we do.

All I can say is … THANK GAWD FOR ELEVATOR MUSIC!!!

A few months back, when my lift was just beginning to emerge from the depths far beneath the earth’s surface, my dear friend Tisha put a CD together, and posted it to me. She titled it “Lowdown, Cheatin’, Lyin’ Man Music”, and included on it 18 songs specially selected for their capacity to either commiserate with my pain or prompt a new search for my own bootstraps.

Carrie Underwood’s, Before He Cheats is one in the latter category, and playing it full blast in MY new car … emphasis on MY … and singing along at the top of my lungs still makes me smile every time.

My great bud from back in high school days, Virginia, with whom I’ve had the amazing good fortune to reconnect after 30-something years, today sent me lyrics to a tune from “Phantom of the Opera” that she knew I’d find poignant this week:

Child of the wilderness,

Born into emptiness,

Learn to be lonely,

Learn to find your way in darkness……

Who will be there for you?

Comfort and care for you?

Learn to be lonely….

Learn to be your one companion.

Ever dreamed….out in the world,

There are arms to hold you?

You’ve always known,

You’re heart was on its own.

So laugh in your loneliness,

Child of the wilderness,

Learn to be lonely,

Learn how to love…

Life that is lived alone.

Learn to be lonely,

Life can be lived,

Life can be loved…..alone.

I’ve already posted the vid of my theme song when I start doing the Country show on Paradise FM next year … a song I listen to often that makes me laugh every time, and I can’t tell you how good that feels.

There are penthouse songs, too, of course, but I’m not quite there right now, although when my friend and co-worker on Adoption Under One Roof, Julie, sent me this link to an ASL version of “So Are You To Me” by Eastmountainsouth today during a long chat, I felt a jolt upwards.

As Bette Davis said in “All About Eve” …

Hold on!

We’re in for a bumpy ride …

This trip we’re on may not always be fun, but at least we can sing.

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Island Life: When it sucks ….

Posted in Expat Living, Friends, Island life, NaBloPoMo, Seychelles, Writing for a living, Writing for fun, WTF?, tagged , , on November 15, 2008| 5 Comments »

So, sure, we break out in spontaneous parties, have fab friends, lovely weather and azure-blue seas, but anyone getting the idea that life on a tiny island in the Indian Ocean is all sunshine and lollypops was clearly not around the past couple of days.

Thursday: Just after 6pm, when I’d just finishing the agonizingly slow process of uploading a photo to this blog, the Internet crapped out. Phone call to Internet Service Provider prompted.

You must understand that the term “ISP” in this part of the world is misleading in that they often do NOT Provide any Service, and since I’m such a raging bitch I call whenever my connection fails. (Keep in mind that this is how I make much of my living, so live and die with my connectivity.) All the guys at Kokonet … my “I” not quite “S” and flaky “P” … know me too well, and answer any call with a number of mine they recognize with a roll of the eyes I can hear and a consigned-to-their-fate “Hi, Sandra” that carries the same tone conveyed by a 10-year-old whose mother just caught them smoking … crack.

Here’s the conversation from Thursday, 6:20pm:

Ring, ring, ring, ring, ad nauseam (and this is the HOTLINE number) which doesn’t daunt me one single bit.

“Hello … ”

me: Who am I speaking to?

Richard … Hi, Sandra …

me: So …

him: Routine maintenance. We sent out an email.

me: Funny, but I didn’t get any email.

him: Well, we sent one.

me: Not to me.

him: Not my job …

me: Fine … so when are we back on?

him: Eight.

me: Really?

him: Well, around 8 …

me: sputter, sputter, doubt, sputter …

him: Maybe before.

me: Yeah, right. You do realize that every time you all do maintenance the system craps out?

him: intentionally obtuse blah, blah, blah …

me: So … 8 …

him: Definitely …

Of course, 8:00 comes … and goes …

By 9 I’m back on the phone …

him: Hi, Sandra …

me: Well … ?

him: Just heard that it will be another 45 minutes.

me: And then … ?

him: blah, blah, blah …

But, miraculous as it may be, 45 minutes later we’re reconnected and I’m working away … only to have the bloody thing die in 15 minute chunks every half hour or so.

So … I dial the hotline again, and … no answer, ever.

So … at 1:30am I call the mobile number of another guy who works at Kokonet, Selwyn.

Here’s that dialog:

Selwyn, sleepy sounding: Hi, Sandra …

me: What the feck is going on tonight … rant, rave, rant, rave ….

him: I have no idea what you’re on about. It was working fine when I left the office …

me: Well, it’s not working at all now.

him: Why is it always you?

me: Tell me!!!

him: I left my computer at work so I can’t check if the problem goes further than your place …

me: Selwyn, what DO you do for a living? You left your feckin’ computer at work?

him: Yeah … forgot it.

me: How bloody comforting. Now, give me some hope, please …

him: I’ll get into the office early tomorrow and sort this out … I promise.

After trying like crazy to get him to give me his bosses private number … “You know I can’t do that, Sandra. I’ll get sacked if I do,” … I give up, turn music up loud and do my nightly stretching exercises that spring my unstrung springs. (I am VERY bendy … even at this advanced age. Former dancer, you know … )

So … Friday dawns to … no feckin’ Internet.

Ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, ring …

Selwyn: Hi, Sandra …

me: And, so …

him: Big problem. I have no idea what’s wrong. Basically, though, we’re screwed.

And that’s were it stayed until half an hour ago.

One aside, that’s is SO more than an aside, but will sit there for blog purposes …

When I woke up this morning, not only did I not have Internet, my freezer had defrosted and my 50 bags of frozen bananas … along with everything else … had defrosted. Ever seen bags of thawed out frozen bananas? Well, they leak sweet, sticky black gunk. (It’s lovely warmed up on ice cream, actually, and in smoothies, which is why I had 50 bags of bananas in my freezer. When my bananas are ripe, there are hundreds of the buggers.) These had leaked the black gunk down every shelf and out the bottom of the fridge door all over my kitchen.

We have no such things as refrigerator repair people here. None. And there are no spare parts even if we did have someone who could diagnose the problem and tell me which parts were needed.

In other words, I’m screwed.

But, at least I can write about it.

(I must, however, throw in the NaBloPoMo towel for the month, as I missed a day, and that’s a no-go.)

Feck!!!!!!

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Gnomes, men and Daisy Duke … the last in the series

Posted in Children, Expat Living, Friends, Fun, Island life, NaBloPoMo, Older women, On getting older, Seychelles, WTF?, Younger men, tagged , , , on November 11, 2008| 3 Comments »

This is, I promise, the last post on what should have been the mundane job of leveling the road that leads to my house in the bush, but ended up providing blog fodder for days.

That’s the thing about island life; you just never know the entertainment value of a day until you’ve lived it since so much can go wrong or HiLarryUS or climb to the pinnacle of WTF without one whit of warning.

You’ve already read about the Magnar in my life and how handy he is when a girl needs a Norwegian nag … or road work … and seen the photos of the work. You’ve also read of my preference in lawn ornamentation.

So what can possibly be left to this tale? My utter and complete humiliation, of course.

You see, although I didn’t have to fork out any cash for the amazing amount of work done resulting in my drive now being flat and negotiable, rather than a rutted goat track that caused any car not an SUV to bottom out numerous times on the way up and on the way down to my house, there was a price to pay: I had to dress up in stilettos and hot pants … a la Daisy Duke … and drive the bloody excavator.

To be fair, I really did want to swing that big sucka around a bit, fondle the knobs and feel the power of a huge hunk of MAN STUFF at my fingertips, but in yellow polka dot 4-inch heels and with my skinny legs dangling?

Not what I had in mind.

Unfortunately for me, that was EXACTLY the picture that came immediately to Magnar’s mind … I should’ve predicted such an image dawning, knowing him as well as I do .

So, for all you readers who are needing a good chuckle today, here are some photos. (There’s a video on my facebook page if you really want a laugh … ) Please, be kind in your comments. (Remember, I do moderate … )

(By the way, the kids are with Mark this week, so not subject to the trauma of seeing their mother being so incredibly silly. They won’t read this blog for a while, so I’m hoping they’ll be prepared by the time they do.)

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Love in the time of calamity … or … Economic meltdown on a small island

Posted in Island life, NaBloPoMo, Seychelles, World politics, WTF? on November 3, 2008| Leave a Comment »

I’m forced by my usual brutal honesty when it comes to my writings to admit straightaway that I know nothing about economics. The whole shebang seems to me nothing more than a giant crap shoot where the crappier things get the better off some are and goal posts are shifted according to whims of whoever it is that is truly in charge of the world we live in.

Nothing about the present global crisis relates in any way to the lessons I learned early in life about pennies saved or rewards for developing a good work ethic, so I tend to ignore the ups and downs that have so many ready to leap off buildings or raise their credit limits.

Half a century of paying so little attention to, even being annoyed by, the amount of time business news takes out of every newscast has paid off nicely … in a non-financial way, of course … in stress-saving oblivion, but I’m now is a situation that demands I wake up and smell the burning toast: the shit has hit the ceiling fans of Seychelles.

Last Friday night, President James Michel addressed the nation on the macro-economic reform program that would go into effect today. I didn’t watch the speech, being otherwise occupied being all in love and stuff, but did begin listening to the all the yack-yack that followed on Radio Bamboo … the Seychelles version of the grapevine.

Basically, with IMF insistence, all currency controls have been lifted and our artificially propped, but oh-so-pretty, rupee, is now to float and find its own level of worth.

So far, the rupee has slid from an official exchange rate of around 8 to the US$ to 13, and a stop at the bank this afternoon revealed that the amount has already changed more than 5 times today. Confusion is the order of the day and everyone has a panic-stricken look, albeit some only due to a rumored rise in the price of beer.

Actually, all prices will be rising, and rising fast. Where the leveling happens is anyone’s guess, but there’s no doubt that life in this already pricey country just took a giant leap toward how-much-did-you-say-that-potato-costs?

We all knew this was coming … it had to, given the reality of how the world works and the fact that this is a country, not a country club … but it does seem sooner would have been better than later for this major shake up, as recovery might have been much easier before the rest of the world went to hell in that hand basket now swirling (counter clockwise on this side of the Equator) down the flusher.

Even econ-morons like me were smart enough to do stock-up shopping on Friday and fill the car with fuel before the prices jumped, but hysteria is beginning to glow through the tan lines as “What happens next …?” becomes the mantra of the anxious.

Given that my new life is now getting underway, that ancient curse “May you live in interesting times” comes to mind.

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The New Black

Posted in Adoption, Fun, WTF?, tagged , , , , on February 20, 2008| 3 Comments »

No, I’m not harkening back to the flap last year that had tacky t-shirts emblazoned with the what was either cleverly hip or cynically horrid “Adoption: the New Black”, but rather the REAL New Black, which is black.

Yep. Black: The New Black.

Blacker than black, this new black is amazingly cool to a science geek wannabe like me.

It’s the Washington Post that puts out a version of this I can wrap my head around … almost … as it describes a new material that absorbs — get this — 99.955% of any light that hits it.

Hmmmmmm … If a moth gets to it, does it leave a Black Hole?

“It’s very deep, like in a forest on the darkest night,” said Shawn-Yu Lin, a scientist who helped create the material at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y. “Nothing comes back to you. It’s very, very, very dark.”

I’m trying to imagine aiming my eyes at a bit of fabric from which nothing comes back.

What’s that like? Brain death, maybe? Like, I’m looking, I’m looking, I’m looking, but there’s so much nothing to see that I might as well not have eyes?

Cool.

Wondering what use the New Black will have, besides being the height of whatever heights get that groovy designation?

Well, the military is jazzed about adding it to stealth coatings that absorb radar waves. Why not?

But check out this stuff:

Solar panels coated with it would be much more efficient than those coated with conventional black paint, which reflects 5 percent or more of incoming light. Telescopes lined with it would sop up random flecks of incidental light, providing a blacker background to detect faint stars.

And a wide array of heat detectors and energy-measuring devices, including climate-tracking equipment on satellites, would become far more accurate than they are today if they were coated with energy-grabbing superblack.

Of course, I’m thinking of the fashion potential. Those extra pounds I’m toting could disappear with just a little nip and tuck, not of me, but of an outfit sporting strategic touches of “super black”. And think of the contouring possible if it could be added to a makeup line! Double chin! What double chin?

And Halloween! Head! What head?

I also can’t shake the idea of Bug Bunny’s portable holes … those disks of black he’d toss when he needed a quick getaway. With big enough circles of the New Black anyone could appear to exit Stage Right for “Wonderland”.

Of course, having all the light sucked out of the immediate area is one way to hide, but not the only one almost possible these days.

Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak is also in the works, but rather than gobble light the stuff being used bends it backward.

Known as transformation optics, the phenomenon compels some wavelengths of light to flow around an object like water around a stone. As a result, things behind the object become visible while the object itself disappears from view.

Does that or does than not give goose bumps the size of headlamps?

Okay … now that we can cloak a Volkswagon like a Klingon war bird, can we please get that beamy-uppy thing in the works? I’d really like to meet my oldest son’s girlfriend.

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The biggest nuts in the world, and other stuff to sell

Posted in Fun, Island life, Seychelles, WTF?, tagged , , , on February 18, 2008| 4 Comments »

For a couple of reasons … 1) I’m old and becoming ever more resistant to new ways of doing things, and 2) I live on a tiny rock in the middle of nowhere … I have long managed to ignore a global phenomenon that has become part of the daily grist for the consumer mill and so common in the common vernacular to be included in almost ever reference that might have anything to do with the world’s favorite contact sport: shopping.

Yes, over the weekend I took the time needed to add my name to the list of millions of humans who are buying and selling as if life itself depended on the activity on eBay.

I have been familiar with the concept of eBay for years, as my step mom has made a good part of her fortune of dealing in hard-to-find specialty items on the site … not that I’ve ever looked at what she’s selling, but I hear that she hawks everything from dolls to dressers after combing estate sales and such for valuable antiques and collectables others have been undervalued by a bundle.

For myself, however, I never saw the need to frustrate my stifled shopping heart any further with a whole lot more stuff on offer that no one would send to Seychelles … having never heard of the place, or understanding that our money isn’t worth anything anywhere else.

The list of online companies I can’t shop from is long and disappointing, and often confusing. For example, I can buy books and movies from Amazon … and they’re great at shipping quickly and reliably … but ask the same website to let me buy a toy for one of my kids and I’m out of luck — or the kids are, actually. Toys, electronics, clothing … any of the items sold from the Amazon site that don’t happen come printed on paper or embedded on disks won’t come to Seychelles.

So, no I haven’t become a registered eBayer in hopes of buying any of the wonderful items available there and impossible to find here, but rather to sell, or attempt to sell things others might not be able to get their paws on, but that I have ready access to.

And what sort of treasures do I have that you many not? Well, aside from the biggest nuts in the world, there is the Bush / Bin Laden Racetrack Toy … that trashy bit of terrible taste I wrote about recently.

I’m not at all sure I’ve correctly eBayed in a way that would have anyone actually find the silliness I have for sale, but if you know anyone in the market for the crappiest toy of this year and next, here’s the link to my very first eProduct.

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Teen pedophiles invade SE Asia

Posted in Cambodia, Children, International Adoption, WTF? on February 15, 2008| 11 Comments »

There is, reportedly, a new a popular new pastime for 18- to 20-year-old northern European men that is catching on and has many deciding to see more of the world, unfortunately; they are Asia’s new pedophiles.

There is a virtual invasion by northern European men aged 18 to 20 whose arrival has expanded the pedophilia market. Young Swedes come seeking sex with under-aged males …

WTF?

It was a sick enough world when the shriveled uglies headed for Thailand and Cambodia and other such countries where the people are lovely and poor and preyed upon the delicate young flowers, trampling them under their filthy heels as they satisfied whatever base and vile urges they felt the need to satisfy at any cost, and now the young are taking to the life of vermin?

Don’t know about you, but my mind conjures a rather attractive, if boring, image of the Swedish version of early manhood, but I’m sure there must be some population of moldy trolls there too, and I suppose it can be difficult for them to get a date anywhere, but I have to wonder about circumstances that now make a trip to Thailand for the rape of children THE thing to do.

Doesn’t a quick wank in the can do it for teens any more? That visit to the Rosy Palms was more than enough for millions of young men in the throes of needing a toss over the course of history, and although young boys have historically been used as a substitute … think Sparta … you’d think MANkind would have moved a bit beyond that in the last thousand years or so.

Apparently not.

It was one thing when any port in a storm was confined to the neighborhood … a boy could always join the Navy and see the world … but it seems now any horny little creep can pick up a cheap last-minute ticket to Bangkok and can get anything he wants, and what he wants these days in the big numbers is children.

Why would any 18-year-old want to have sex with a child? Yes, I know that question should also hold true for any 68-year-old, or whatever, but the idea of the dirty old man is well ingrained and less unimaginable than someone just over the line of consenting adult himself looking back down the path and deciding that a little boy is more to his taste than another grownup like himself.

If it’s power they’re after, these are some right scary guys here, for if they are already craving the sort of control they could have over children at 18 the world should shudder at the thought of where this leads as they move further into manhood.

Some in Thailand are advocating for European countries to do something:

It is important that the mass media not limit themselves to denouncing the problem and put the fiends’ names and pictures on their front pages. They must look at the pain and grave problems that are caused to the children who are used in such a vile fashion, then thrown away like some disposable rag.

For us it is impossible to defend them all. Europe and the world must do something.

Yeah. It would be a good thing to publish their names and faces and disgrace the slime. So would cutting off their nuts and serving them to the dog.

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Choking hazards from China

Posted in England, International Adoption, World politics, WTF?, tagged , , , on February 13, 2008| 2 Comments »

nazimos0902_468x196.jpgAfter posting yesterday on Chinese-made choking hazards in the shape of toys in really, really, really bad taste, this story out of Britain provides another.

British Olympic chiefs are to force athletes to sign a contract promising not to speak out about China’s appalling human rights record – or face being banned from travelling to Beijing.

… The controversial clause has been inserted into athletes’ contracts for the first time and forbids them from making any political comment about countries staging the Olympic Games.

What the hell is it with China and the huge and hugely disturbing and disgusting pass it’s getting, especially around this whole Olympics hoo-haa?

The upcoming games … and can we remember that this is what it’s about — GAMES? … should be providing an opportunity for the world to focus on the host country, and not through filters but with the glaring light of global attention thrown in every representation of the often ugly face of real-life China that can be taken in by the hundreds of thousands of people traipsing through the place this summer.

The Chinese government signed on for this sort of inspection at the time they begged, borrowed and pleaded to get the games to run, swim, dive, shoot and so on on Chinese soil, and if those doing the running, swimming, diving, etc. happen to notice some of that soil as it collects under their fingernails while in the process of cheerfully competing under the banner of good sportsmanship, or whatever, they damned well should be able to talk about it.

Or whatever else they want to talk about, for that matter.

Since when does an ability to move quickly disqualify one from developing opinions, along with muscles, and speaking out?

Apparently, for British athletes, since the 1930s when the photo above was taken, the year the British soccer … okay, ‘football’ … team did the Fuehrer’s High Five … the Nazi salute … and were so shamefully captured on film doing so.

Personally, I have been a supporter of the movement to boycott the 2008 Beijing Olympics and have wished a large proportion of participants would simply opt out and make a big deal of exactly why China does not deserve the implied respect the games convey.

I was very pleased to see just minutes ago that Steven Speilberg has bowed out of his role as artistic advisor … his stated reason is Darfur, just one of the human rights issues China should be forced to account for … and hope others will do the same, and publicly, as the games draw near.

(Interestingly, his withdrawal comes on the heels of the British “gag order”, so this step may backfire. One can hope … )

I do understand how difficult it would be for an athlete to just say no to what must be a lifelong dream, but these games, the competition, the ceremonies, the venues, and the medals that will come from victories, are tainted.

They are tainted with the waste of opportunity to force change, the whorish rolling over of those who should be standing and pointing fingers and demanding China play by rules of better-worldsmanship, the pandering to money interests with advertising dollars, the good-ole-boy, slap on the back, wink-wink-nudge-nudge cronyism that is spinning the world down to a place where rich and poor are so far removed from each other that neither seems human in the eyes of the other.

An article in the CSM called “The Olympics in China: a moment for pride – and world scrutiny”, gives a look at how important it is to the Chinese to come through the games unscathed:

An unprecedented opportunity to shine in the international spotlight for an intense three weeks. The Chinese government is treating the Games as a symbolic end to 150 years of humiliation by outside powers and a confirmation of its status as a global power to be reckoned with.

But the problem is China should be scathed and scathed badly in ways that illustrate just why 150 years of humiliation was deserved and why its status as a global power needs to be carefully monitored. Carte blanche has not been earned.

And as for the Brits … well, gagging their own athletes is about as spineless and unhelpful a move as can be imagined under these circumstance, but since it’s not the first time it’s happened, it didn’t take much imagination to come up with it.

If only Monty Python were still around to take the piss out of this mess, or if Sid Vicious and the rest of the Sex Pistols could do a rousing rendition of something appropriately irreverent.

It would be good to give the Chinese something to choke on for a change.

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Toys for kids? How about a “Path Cra”? (Bin Laden included)

Posted in Adoption, Island life, Seychelles, WTF?, tagged , , , on February 12, 2008| 14 Comments »

Path Cra toy?>The Internet was out all day today, so I’m far behind on way too much work and playing catch-up (ketchup?) tonight.

Had a meeting in town today … so at least had something constructive to do with the time I would have been working … and also needed to do some shopping, as a friend’s little boy is turning three this weekend and we have a birthday party to attend.

Shopping for gifts here is always an adventure, as options are always both limited and a bit on the wacky side. Plus, you never can tell which shop might have what, as a place with motor oil in the window might also sell dolls where somewhere that displays faded boxes of toys may have nothing but plumbing supplies.

The first place I stopped had nothing appropriate, but while on my way to another place that has proven fruitful in the past, I needed to pop into what we’d call a grocery store to pick up some diapers for Cj. Lo and behold, toys were presented near the entrance, so I did some perusal of offerings.

And just LOOK at what I found!

No, this is not what the soon-to-be-three-year-old is getting, but could I pass this up? As blog fodder alone it’s worth the SR 71/- (Seventy-one Seychelles Rupees) it cost me.

Made in China … where else? … I’m thinking the box is actually suppose to read “car” not “cra”, but the spelling error is nothing compared to the ultimate wrongness of the product itself.

Of course, I’m coming to this from an American prospective, and I’m sure people from other cultures are certain to have a far different reaction, but how this made it to Seychelles can only be chalked up to the likelihood that it was cheap and easy to ship.

There were a couple of more on the shelves, so if anyone is interested in the gifts that hit the height of tacky covered in sprinkles of bad taste, perhaps I could do some shopping for you … ?

Man! The world is a crazy place.

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XXX

Posted in Adoption, Adoption Advocacy, Cambodia, Entitled to opinions, Family, International Adoption, NaBloPoMo, Writing for a living, WTF?, tagged , , on November 30, 2007| 55 Comments »

Funny how things work out. At the beginning of this month when I started the whole NaBloPoMo thing, I would not have suspected November would end up with an obscenity of the XXX variety, but it has.

It seems that budget constraints and an abrupt shift in editorial policy, or something, has prompted Adoption.com, one of my employers over the past couple of years, to terminate the contract of their highest paid and most uncompromising blogger: me.

I have not been provided with any official explanation; in fact, there has been no explanation at all no matter how many times one is asked for by me or other bloggers confounded by my sudden departure. A change in editors in October did signal changes in the wind, however, and the handwriting began to appear on the wall when I decided to discontinue the assistant editor role I had stepped up for.

Is it a money issue? (They did bounce paychecks recently.) Has my advocacy for adoption been more than the site is willing to support?

It most certainly can’t be my lack of dedication, as I have been the most prolific of all writers having posted hundreds of well-researched blogs over the past two years.

It can’t be a lack of talent, because I can put words together well and keep to topic.

It can’t be for lack of readers, because before Adoptionblogs.com began hemorrhaging bloggers and listing dead blogs by the dozen I was topping out at more than 100,000 hits per month.

Yes, I did manage to piss off a few people along the way. The looney fringe of the adoption community whipped themselves into a frenzy over some of my posts … and, yes, I can hear them jumping up and down, elated over my temporary departure from the adoption blogging world. (Enjoy it while you can, ladies. Oh! and those three guys.)

Should I mention that the new “editor”, someone who freely admits on her personal blog that she can’t write … Whose bright idea was it to put someone like this in an editorial position? … is a birth mother? Should I read anything into this? (I don’t want to. I really don’t want to. But so many of the personal attacks, the truly hideous assults I have suffered over the years, have come from that angle of the triad and I can’t ignore the connection.)

Since she removed my access to the blogs before I had an opportunity to adios my wonderful readers there, I’ll just invite you all to continue to join me here.

I’m rather sick of the adoption world for the moment, however … rampant abuse and nastiness tends to do that, and XXX feels as bad as it looks and leaves one sore … but, as always, I’m happy to help out when I can.

It is a bit strange that after writing so much about abuse in the world, I find myself the victim of those who provided the platform. I’m still trying to figure out what that says about them, but I’m sure it isn’t pretty.

I do know the real world, however … I’ve seen first-hand how cruel, how base, how downright evil people can be … so I should not be surprised by bad people doing wrong things.

No matter how old I get, though, I’m still side-swiped by petty meanness and a tendency to behave badly. I simply expect better of people.

I’m happy about that part of me.

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