WELCOME EVERYONE ~ this thread is for anyone with any kind of physical obstacle and/or challenge like SB, CP, MS, MD, PK, Lupus, Osteo, Arthritis, Rheumatism, or any other condition (s), whether genetic or acquired (like injuries), that causes physical limitations and/or difficulties. Please join us in this special thread ~ to give support and encouragement; and share ideas, or just chat with one another ...


HAPPY SEPTEMBER EVERYONE


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ROSEBUD

Good Morning . . .

Wowee ROSEBUD . . . my last day of August was very different from yours . . . actually about noon, the weather didn't look too bad and since the back was also feeling pretty good, I decided to go to town. Oh boy, what a mistake.

I was wandering around Walmart when a really nasty freak storm arrived (obviously not hurricane level, but bad enough that you couldn't see to drive it was raining so hard). Got thrown out of Walmart because they took a generator hit when the storm started and were trying desperately to get as many people cashed out and away from the store while their emergency backup power was still working. Since I got soaked anyway, decided to do a couple more stores before heading home. Storm continued to rage throughout the night.

More rain in the forecast for today. We have been having a couple of sunny breaks though. Getting caught in the rain and soaked to the skin has not helped any of my arthritic little places, I'll tell you. Luckily nothing much going on today anyway. Maybe I'll get some sewing done.

Hope everybody else has a great Labour Day . . . it always seems to be the start of Autumn even though the new season doesn't officially arrive until the 21/22. I'm so old-fashioned, the first thing I did this morning was change purses -- no white after labour day, you know.

See you later . . .

HELLO CHICKIES ~ today, we had one of the hottest days of this entire year; our outdoor thermometor read 90F in the shade, and it was humid, but bearable. The kids played outdoors anyways, but kept scooting under our umbrella for shade (couldn't blame them really).

WE had some good news today: apparently, our landlord cannot evict us for no cause; they must obtain a court order, because it's the law. They can't evict for the reason they stated becuz all she had to do was incrementally increase the rent to cover the increased costs and they didn't do that. Also, they cannot turn off vital services (like fuel, heat, hydro, water, etc) as they threatened, becuz that's illegal too, and they can be fined up to $25,000.00 for each of those violations. Plus, her feeble attempt to trick us all into signing a paper to voluntarily vacate the premises is also illegal and very unethical. It takes a while to get a court order and it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to evict four families (some with children) in the winter time here. Regardless of what they want to do with the property in the future, they must go through the legal procedures first.

So, we all have a temporary reprieve for now; this will give us all more time to find suitable accomodations in the near future. I did finally get some return calls; but all the places we looked at were already taken, BUT we will keep on searching for a nicer place.

I picked another basket and half green and yellow beans; we took some to a lady friend who is battling cancer right now and she sure appreciated it. We have way too many and she can use a little lift right now too. Just did stuff around here today like laundry and stayed close to the A/C.

HI MEOWEE ~ thanks for stickying the new September thread for us. Boy, what nice weather you are having out there; we've had some doozy storms this year too. We have had dry weather all this week, but the farmers are so happy because now they can all clear their fields; they were getting very worried for a while there.

HELLO TO PURPLE and VALDINE ~ hope you both are having a lovely day; and a good Labor Day Holiday for you VAL!!!

Well, we had a nice steak dinner tonight with veggies from our garden and sweet Ontario corn ... yummy! It was a good day all in all! DH got a lot of stuff done today and that made him happy too. That's all the news from here for now, so take good care ladies, your friend ROSEBUD

Hi there . . .

How can you tell the last long weekend of Summer '08 has now passed into history? The sun is shining this morning, that's how. Oh well, at least Mother Nature's DS Gustav seems to have fizzled out, although her latest creation, DD Hannah, does seem to be picking up steam. Looks like the predictions for a bad hurricane season this year are coming true. Hannah may be heading our way by this coming weekend according to this morning's forecast; although a lot can change between now and then.

Nothing very exciting in my plans for today -- but that is one of the joys of being an ORF -- you can change things up on the spur of the moment; so who knows what kind of mischief I may get into. Still a couple of things I need/want to get at Walmart that I didn't have time to find before we all got kicked out of there on Sunday.

Have a great day . . . try to keep things moving and shaking as much as you possible can . . .

HELLO LADIES ~ we had another scorcher today, but I think it was only in the mid-80's today and we had a nice breeze to make it more bearable. We went to town today to run a few errands and I picked up a few deals while I was there. We didn't stay too long as it was too hot with all that payment around ~ lol!

I am having to use my other PC tonight, as when I came home, I couldn't get my faster PC to go on the net; it seems that I have lost another modem , so we will pick up a new one for it this time. Thank goodness that I still have this backup here to use; it's a lot slower, but it will do in a pinch. I had to bring all the Security features up to date before coming in here.

MEOWEE ~ I guess you need to 'batten down the hatches' and get ready before that new storm hits the coast; but at least, you have a bit of a warning. Our weather is gonna cool off for the rest of the week and I'm glad of that really.

HI PURPLE ~ glad your trip was good and the treatment went well; nice of you to drop in when you are so busy! Are your Mom & Dad staying with you until you go on your holidays? I'm glad your Dad is feeling better so that he can enjoy the vacation too.

HEY VAL ~ only a short workweek for you this week becuz of the holidays. Have you given your notice yet; or do they already know? Guess what? This week, there was an ad in our local newspaper for a 'COMMUNICATIONS CO-ORDINATOR' and the position falls under the auspices of our CDC (Community Development Corporation); now, how funny is that??? See I told you they were related ~ lol!!!


Well, we just had bangers and beans for dinner becuz it was just too hot for a big dinner; although we did have our A/C going full-on. We are so grateful to have that little machine; should have gotten one years ago. I am thankful that my brother encouraged us to get one; he was right right that the small ones don't cost as much as people thought: your dryer uses much more power than the A/C.

It's time to go have some tea and put my feet up and do a puzzle to keep my brain cells workin'. Take care ladies, your friend ROSEBUD

Good Morning . . .

I'm here . . . surprisingly . . . Just to let you know, I've been having really weird computer problems the past few days and will be making an appointment to get this beastie a checkup either Friday or Monday. At the moment, 3FC is one of the few places I'm able to access, but I don't know how much longer that may last. Bought myself a new toy yesterday, a laptop, (like ROSEBUD, I really need something for backup, especially since I do have committments around 3FC) along with a cute little stand for it (which took me over 3 hours to put together ) and a thingamajig to allow me to set up my own little wireless network -- BUT -- this nasty desktop (which is currently hardwired into the cable connection) will not let me load the software to set up the wireless.

Today I will tackle the laptop set up and hope that Vista cooperates. Must admit I haven't heard great things about it so far. Any of you guys have it? My brain cells 'need' a Mahjong fix and it is one of the things I haven't been able to access since Sunday -- major withdrawal pains.

At least the weather was gorgeous yesterday and this morning is an instant replay, but "they" are predicting more rain for this afternoon -- wowee, we do not need that -- a lot of places around my little town and county are still dealiong with some flood damage from the freak storm on Sunday. Luckily I'm on higher ground and didn't get the major problems that hit those who are closer to the harbour.

So . . . have a great day everybody and hopefully I will be back . . .

HI MEOWEE ~ yah, my PC has been running a bit slow the last week too; so I did scans every few days and did find some trojans. I don't go to many sites, so I was surprised to find so many in one week. These are probably tracker trojans; and I had hundreds of cookie trackers too.

Congrats on the new laptop PC; it is a good idea to have a back-up when one goes. My BIL has a laptop with Vista and they really like it; they brought it up for their holidays and watched movies on it while they were here at the cottage. We never really discussed many problems associated with it, except I remember them saying that one of his music programs he bought wouldn't load for him through the Vista ... hmmm; dunno if they ever solved that one.

We had a lovely day today; they had predicted rain, but it didn't come: yeah! So, we decided to go to town and get a new modem for my PC: they had one left, so I'll put it in tomorrow I guess; and just keep using this one for now.

We also went to look at a small house that a friend told us is coming available soon. We would have liked to have it, but the price was way too high. I'll try and see if he'll put the price down, but I really doubt that he will. I just can't believe the prices they are charging here right now for apartments and houses.

For only a one bedroom apartment, they want from $650 to $750 a month, PLUS utilities; I think that is outrageous; and DH is getting very worried that we are going to be homeless soon. Our neighbour (who is on a disability income) says that her maximum limit that she is allowed for a place to live, is $700 INCLUDING all utilities: that means they are already over the maximum allowed for these people. As if we don't have enough challenges already, I think it's going to be very hard for all of us to find a place that we can afford.

I don't think the Ontario Government is keeping abreast with the times; they need to take a closer look at the housing situation, and see what is really being charged out there in the open market for apartments and houses; and then increase the subsidies accordingly. They say that they want to end homelessness in Ontario, but then they have to make sure that people have enough income to get a place to live.

If you only can get a minimum wage job or are on a pension, then by the time you pay your rent and utilities, you'll be lucky to have enough money left over to eat and for transportation. What is going on in this country? This is crazy ...

WELL, that is my rant for this week: I hope something changes soon. Will be staying home tomorrow and starting some packing; I'm not going to wait until the last minute, because this old body can only take so much at a time.

HI PURPLE and VALDINE ~ I hope you both are having a wonderful day and week; and great fall weather too. Some of our leaves are turning yellow and falling off the trees already, even though (like Meowee says), Autumn isn't official until September 22 this year. I think that the seasons should fall on the 1st of those months, like April 1st, June 1st, September 1st and December 1st; but they go by some fancy, smancy daylight hours thingy ... oh pooh!!!!

Take good care ladies, and have a great evening, your friend ROSEBUD

HI LADIES ~ We had another lovely day today: ideal really ... sunny and cool; perfect fall weather that some call 'a FALL SPRING. DH and a neighbour went to the city today and had a nice trip; I just stayed home and did stuff here. Picked some more veggies to have with our roast Chicken dinner which is in the oven right now.

I'm so glad to have NIKO here with me when DH is away; I don't feel so lonely although I still miss my girls terribly. I guess I always will, but NIKO is becoming a wonderful companion now that he is about a year old (he may be even older really). He seems to have stopped growing so looks like we have a medium-small size doggy friend. He was so excited when DH got back home and went bonkers all over the place. It's funny, he stayed outside the whole time DH was gone and wouldn't come in; but just as soon as DH got back, he asked to come in the house straight away ... how interesting that is.

HEY PURPLE ~ glad to see you back and that everyone is getting ready for your holidays up in Ireland; is that where you said your were all going? Sometimes the short-term memory plays tricks on us now that we are getting older ... LOL! Yes, you have some nice benefits for your low-income famililes; I think our rules are a bit unfair in some ways: if you have been fortunate enough to have been blessed with children, they will give you much more money. And so many couples are crammed into tiny box-sized apartmentettes or even motel rooms because they can't afford a house or regular-size apartment.

I noticed this week that lots of our motels have people living in them long-term because of the shortage of places to rent here; I hope we don't end up the same way. That's the real reason all our motels are maxed out or full-up, not because we have a giant tourist influx in our town, and we have several motels in this small town. I was wondering how come they always said that they are full; now I know the TRUTH ... live and learn, as they say!

HI MEOWEE ~ I hope you can get your new PC up and running well for you, so you can come by and post ...

HIYA VAL ~ TGIF tomorrow; only one more day this week and you have another weekend!!! You know, when I was working, I always counted the days to the weekend ~ lol; can you tell??? I loved the jobs best that were only 4 days a week; they were my favorite, as the week seemed to fly by faster too.

Well, that's all the news from here from my vantage point; so I hope you all have a wonderful evening. Take good care, your friend ROSEBUD

Hi . . .

This desk-top is getting more temperamental every hour. Lap-top is now up and functioning, but I cannot connect to the new wireless net connection until this old one cooperates. At least the new one came with lots and lots of free games. Hopefully, I'll be in good shape on both machines by the beginning of next week. A friend gave me the name of a local computer wizard. So far now answer on his phone (I suspect he actually works at a regular job and just does this as sideline) so I will try the number again a little later. If he doesn't work out, I've always got the option of hauling it into Staples.

Hopefully, I'll see you tomorrow . . .

my personal laptop crashed. Will have my brother look at it this weekend.

I put in my notice at the CDC yesterday and will be starting at the city on the 29th after my cruise.

busy busy. just checking in to say hi take care all,
Val

Hmm...guess I fit in here.

I'm a mess.

I have a heart I have to keep an eye on. I had to wear a monitor with both pregnancies. I've got PVC's which make it hard sometimes to get my heart to get back to beating correctly. I've got an abnormally fast pulse...always have...and an abnormally low BP when I'm healthy. Because of the pulse and the fact that your baby doesn't get much oxygen if your pulse gets over 140...I wasn't allowed to exercise either time I was pregnant. My resting is 98 and when pregnant, doing a nice brisk walk up a mild hill I could get up to 190.

I have arthritis in my hands and feet and I have hips that are showing serious signs.

My feet are ruined also from having done ballet for 10.5 years plus other stuff. I had a tumor, some bone, and some tendon removed...the tumor had grown into the bone...it was benign. They think the tumor was from going up en pointe too much as well as at the same time doing soccer (on the boy's team, my school didn't have a girl's team), track, and cheerleading...it was too much for my feet. My feet went from an 11 in high school down to an 8.5 in college...go figure. I'm the only person who I've ever known that had their feet shrink 2.5 sizes. I was almost able to wear my dad's shoes and then was finally able to share shoes with my mom...it was great but I think it caused problems too. If you know anyone else who has had their feet shrink so much I'd LOVE to know I'm not the only total freak in the world.

I have scoliosis and a tilted pelvis. Because of the scoliosis one leg is a bit longer than the other (and one shoulder higher than the other). I was in a car accident a year ago too, that I haven't yet managed to get pain free from.

I was able to take 3 sessions of a water aerobics class geared for people with arthritis and chronic pain. It was lovely. I want to swim 3 times a week if possible (the Y will be having a sale later this month so I have to wait to sign up till then). I'd go for 5 but my youngest is only in pre-K for 3 days a week, so that is all I get. It is almost 11 and I'm about to try to find some way of getting my heart rate going faster other than staring at a camera I want (I'm a photographer...the one I'd love is more expensive than if I bought 2 of my car). Walking is difficult for me with my feet and my legs/hips/back, but I try. I'm looking forward though to when I can exercise during the day without my youngest trying to help (though 35 pounds sitting on your neck when you are trying to do crunches really DOES offer resistance).

CAFFEINEIV . . . so glad you found us and we all hope that we can help you through the fun time of losing weight with additional obstacles that definitely do not make it any easier . . .

Good Morning to everybody else, too . . .

Another glorious morning in northern Nova Scotia but it is definitely just the last lull before the storm. Hanna is coming for us.

On the computer front . . . sorry about your lap-top's demise, VAL

My desk-top has an appointment for this afternoon about 3 . . . add to the time estimate from the 'wizard-guy' of 5 or 6 hours in his shop plus another hour or two when he brings it back, . . . the fact that it is the weekend, and . . . the fact that Hanna is supposed to hit us late Saturday (with possible power outages) . . . I have absolutely no idea when I will get back on-line.

Hope to see you all soon . . .

I was using my grandfather's laptop for a while there. The battery didn't work so you had to keep it plugged in. If one of the kids kicked the cord it would shut off instantly. It would get so hot that my legs would hurt. We didn't dare run Windows on it so were using Linux. Then, the motherboard finally decided it was going to retire.

I used to do computer tech work for a big computer company. Some of the calls I'd get were interesting. Had one from a guy from Nasa. Had one from a woman who offered to send me brownies and asked if I was single because her grandson was. I had one from a woman I actually had to tell her to look under the desk for her CPU and then tell her which button to push to turn the computer on. She'd told the computer to shut down, hadn't meant to, it shut down and she was sure she'd broken the computer. One of my friends spent a couple hours trying to figure out what was causing a beep from the computer. Finally when he heard the beep after they'd taken the computer completely apart he asked the guy if there happened to be a smoke detector above the desk. Yep...it needed new batteries.