just something to know

Dirty, crazy, spit on you, Panhandlers. Drug addicts, wineO's, whatever it is that bothers you or makes you feel sad for these folks just be aware that the # is growing. Channel 5 did a blurb on it last nite. see www.wmctv.com
Reported by Ben Watson
Hard times bring longer lines to Memphis Union Mission
Updated: Jan 25, 2009 11:15 PM

Panhandlers are homeless people by their choice of addiction of by forces of nature and now the recession that should by now be hitting you in the face. Here is some food for thought that is good to have tucked away in that back part of your brain just in case you ever come across the situation.(k.Heath)
And please know that the ministry I'm involved with IS helping. It is not cheap. So lets say you are not really anywhere around homeless people or the mission and you want to help or heck maybe you're in danger of losing your home, your job, your trips to the grocery: see www.compassioninthestreets.org ~ donations desperately needed ~ and YES- Prayer is a donation and they need prayer.
Today I dedicate this blog to my new friend John I met Saturday @ Court Square who asked for a pair of sz 10 tennis shoes and said "dont forget about me,my names John" . Prayer sent up for John and I wont forget.
...............peace and love people , peace and love
The following info is from Memphis Union Mission website.
Most of us want to help someone in need. But well-intentioned gifts to panhandlers usually enable their self-destructive lifestyle and encourage them to continue panhandling, rather than seek the help they need.
Instead of giving cash, consider giving coupons from Memphis Union Mission. Each coupon entitles the bearer to a dinner and night's stay at the Mission, including breakfast the following morning.
Coupons can't be converted to cash, and they direct panhandlers to a place where they can truly be helped. Coupon books consist of six coupons and are available for a suggested donation of $20 per book. I Need Money to Stay at the Mission"

Panhandlers often use a line similar to this one: "I need $[x # of dollars] to stay at the Mission."
This excuse causes a fair amount of confusion. To clarify, here is how our policy works for overnight guests:

• Each calendar month, overnight guests receive four free nights at Memphis Union Mission. After they've used up their four free nights, they are asked to pay $6. This includes their dinner, overnight stay, and breakfast the following morning.
• Even after using up their free nights, guests can still use Mission coupons, as well as vouchers from various churches and non-profit agencies, who have their own outreach programs.
• On nights when it is 32 degrees or colder outside, guests can stay for free, even if they've used up their four free nights.
• We provide work and day-labor referrals to guests who are seeking work.
• We encourage those with substance abuse problems to enter our free recovery programs.
  

Furthermore, it is our experience that panhandlers who often use this line rarely use the money to stay at the Mission. For more information, please call (901) 526-8403

I'll be the girl with the clear head.

Happy New Year. I missed me.
So for what its worth, December 08 was a long weird life altering /relationship changing month. After putting T.M.I. about my personal happenings out in the universe I found no one really needs to hear that except the parties involved.
I am such a huge fan of being real, being direct that I surprise myself looking back at my emails and horrible self loathing status updates.
Is social networking dangerous? Sure. Absolutely. It is too tempting to let it all out at 1 a.m. when you are really ticked off. Gmail has this tool in its settings called Mail Goggles where it inhibits you to send late night emails or drunk mail/texts by making you solve 5 math problems. I don't drink but I do drama.
Resolutions? I don't really have a resolution. I have a plan. I am gonna run. This time next year my head should be so clear. Over Christmas we were all pumped up about finding the jingle bell rock and spent a whole entire day on the Wolf River Trails hunting for it. I fell in love with the trails and there are many. I had never been thru them. Johnson Park has a really great trail, but the Wolf River Trails are awesome and are for a runner. Scenery changes every mile and is so well layed out its ridiculous.
And I am channeling my destiny. When I was 8, My mom used dress me and my sister up and make us go with her to her grandmothers beautiful house off Alicia Drive. I hated that house, I was so scared of old people in general ,but this grandma- Mama G- was in a way dreamy but sad and she lived with her sisters that were old and sick. Aunt Jimmie probably had Alzheimer's,was bed ridden and I just thought she was always ghostly hallucinating. So on one visit Aunt Jimmie looks at me and tells me I look like a good running boy. WHAT? running boy. I was already sensitive about being so tall and now she thinks I'm a boy~ in the same sentence she also told me to get the spaghetti out of her closet :-)
Anyway I think the story was her dad worked for the post office and she was a runner or helper. Ill have to ask mom on that. So I still don't do good with old people, but I have enormous patience for toddlers. I love littles. I need to love MY littles more. I haven't put them before myself lately. I'm gonna make some cookies and listen to them today. Here, catch some loveYY

homey dont play dat

It's not like this kind of thing hasn't happened before. Markers, a flat surface, all hard to say no to such an enticing act of expression.
It's that no one thought to clean it up before the mama got home from work at 1 a.m.
I know I clearly expressed my art of screaming "please guys help me out here, yall have got to pick up after yourselves" at least 3 times before I left for work.
Did they think I would want to take a picture of it?
So I guess homey the house daddy don't play dat.
I could be wrong, I mean maybe the tooth fairy drew on the table.
At supper tonight, Kyle did lose his 2nd little tooth that he had been growing for 6 years . Oh sugarfoot. Homey don't play tooth fairy either; because when the mama went to get a towel to clean the table, there sat her baby boy's lonely tooth in the bathroom where the mama had put it so it would not be missed at tooth brushing time - and would be placed under the pillow.
Maybe they think there is a bathroom/tooth fairy. I mean who does clean that bathroom every day? (oh stop. i know- please, no really please-give it up for the mama)
My "what to do w/ a lost tooth" version is just more~, more everything, we look at the tooth, put it in the tooth box, find just the right spot so the fairy wont get squished or suffocate and we kiss and hug and we just cant get over ourselves.We go to bed so happy because we are so greedy we cant wait to spend that $5 tomorrow. Although I must let you know, the Mongolians totally have me beat in this department. Look it up for yourself and see if you don't concur.

disturbia

Does karma come back to bite you in the arse? I was talking my distubed friend that is going thru a divorce he does not want and he said it is just karma coming back to bite him. For him it most likely is true. He is so down and thinks there are a million things wrong with him. He said he was going to go take the 'O-Path" Test. as in are you a sociOpath, psychOpath etc.
It made me think of once when Kyle was born and we had just moved to MS and the MS Health Dept. called me and said I needed to have my newborn screened at the health dept. for over 32 genetic diseases that the hospitals and pediatricians don't screen for. Why would I? I told her no way, I mean he is here, whatever might be found "genetically" can not be undone. And why just for newborns. If we were all tested for more than 32 genetic malformities, wouldn't we all have something wrong. I bet the answer is an astounding Yes. Then we could all go thru life and say our failures were the fault of our genetics. Haven't we blamed our poor parents enough. So I bet if we took the O-Path test we might all be bordeline koo koo.
I know this is true for parents. I have gone totally koo koo raising three boys. I never knew I had a seething temper until I had kids. I keep it in check so I am probably low on the OPath test.
And I think you can redirect your karma too. Change the world people. My kids are depending on it. Get on fire. I need to find a fire passion now that the election is over. I was really on fire for it for a long time.
I don't like this period from Nov. to Feb. The waiting.
I did spring clean my closet this week in Nov. I tucked away all the summer stuff, and hung up all my cold weather stuff. I have a load of old jeans, coats and sweatshirts that I am taking downtown to my homeless peeps. I am true to my passions. Crazy, lost, broken, liars, and OPaths, no one deserves to be freezing cold.
What do you wanna do this week? Wanna get in on my barter business. Reapairs on my gas fireplace that decied not to work this winter, hanging a light fixture and installing a garbage disposal the Correct way : For: Free babysitting and /or interior/ exterior painting . That looks so generic in print. I'll have to think on it for a while.

morse code for dummies

So I live rock star hours. I have a few day hours to think and reflect. As I was taking my shower at noon. I was trying to get Brian's attention before he left for work(to say bye gutter minds) and tapped on the wall. He didn't hear me. Then I did the da da da da da(long pause)da da knock.
My mom hates that knock. She says in school they(the '60's kids) called it the queer knock. Funny. Anyway Brian never heard my queer knock either. So it crosses my mind I watched a movie and a show this weekend and both had morse code moments.
I decided to learn morse code. I have always wanted too, but I haven't learned it Not in the sense of " oh I always wanted to do that" it has been more like an Obi-Wan " when the time is right you will learn morse code" thing tucked in the back of my mind.
Well Peeps, today is the day. I need to learn Morse code and I am quite interested and into it. Should I start a FB Group called MC?.

Sponge Kid Mind Fodder

I logged on to check my email today. My 4 year was sitting beside me. Typical blurbs on the election popped up. My 4 year old says "there's McCain and Obama". My seven year old said he is voting for McCain because Obama is gonna make kids go to school 3 hours longer a day. My six year old came home with a picture he drew of McCain standing beside a building captioned 'McCain has a job, Get a job here'.
What are your kids absorbing? Ask. Talk. Teach. They know things. Fantastic things. Wrong things. Right things. Get into their minds. Absorb if you need too right along with them.

You Gotta Dog

I leave my house at 6 pm to go to work. My husband blows in the door from his day at 4:45pm, I say a quick hi to him, start dinner, get my 3 sons settled, lay out homework and shout instructions for the night. I call this The Witching Hour. It’s hectic and little boys are loud. I blow out the door and on any given day stop by my neighborhood gas station for my tri-weekly fill up.

I like to go inside grab a bottled water or an o.j. and prepay for my gas so I can leave with only one receipt in my wallet. Gas Station Guy is always at the register; he has worked there forever and a day. We have a rapport. I walk in, say ‘What’s up”, smile really big, grab my drink and pay.

He's a flirt and I am going through my “I am 38 when did that happen”? life-crisis. He is all flirt, not a lot of talk and this totally strokes my ego. I know on the days when I actually hot iron my hair and perfect the make-up that he has an extra big smile for me.

So the other day I’m paying and Gas Station Guy goes “You have a dog?” I spin my head in a 360 and try to peer across the lot into my car thinking ‘dog?, did my dog jump in my car during the witching hour and I did not notice’? My expression is saying “I don’t see a dog in my car’. I mumble “yeah, I have a dog’. Gas Station Guy says “yeah, I see the dog hair all over your shirt”.

That was a blow to my stroking needing ego. I left thinking how rude to say that to a lady. Then I thought – well he IS foreign. Then I decided I didn't have it goin' on that day, but my hair looked good and I had on my fall color lipstick. Ode to the dog hair. So I came to realize that I don’t prepay for my gas to leave with one receipt. I prepay for a little me time, a little winding down time after the witching hour. I have not been back inside this week. It is fall. I am wearing dark colors and my dog is a super shedding jack russell. The proof is on the shirt.