Postscript on being a bad Catholic

Anyone who read my post about lying to the nice old lady at church, and the fact that I "forgot" to do a required confession when I was confirmed should know I got totally busted today. My husband and I do some classes on baptism and a lady who also instructs was talking about the sacraments. For non Catholics, these are the big things. Life changing things, ie baptism, communion, marriage, holy vows, reconcilliation (confession), confirmation, and annointing the sick. She was asking about experiences we had with confession, and I had to confess I'd never done it. Even my husband did it once. She was horrified and pointed out it was a requirement, and we'd have to do something about it. I told her no way, God already knows my bad stuff, and between us, he forgave me, so no way. She decided since I'd not commited any mortal sins, maybe I could slide. Anyway, if we still believed in purgatory, I'd be there for a few more years. Thank God Pope Pious decided we didn't have to go. That's why you just have to love the Catholic church. Something new every 5-6 centuries. Keeps you hopping!

Shining spot of good news

Oh I forgot, even with my shitty vacation, something good came of it. My in-laws felt so badly that we didn't get squat, they are flying us home in about 3 weeks to visit and have dental work. I'm so excited I didn't even tell them I already got my teeth cleaned. They did a shitty job anyway, and their hygentist (sp?) is tons better. We'll stay for a few days and fly home in time for school to start, and since my husband needs a crown, they'll fly him back on his days off a couple of weeks later to put the permanent crown on. PLUS, they file our insurance for us and give us the money back! My husbands bad teeth are a money maker for us!

I could scream

Again, for reasons of confidentiality, I can't go into huge details, but I got a new advocate case last week. I was able to spend some time with the kids today. These kids were removed from their mother for ample, legitimate reasons. Now it's 18 months later, and they've been in foster care the entire time. Not for one second has the state made any attempt to find a suitable family member for these children to live with. Despite the fact that a bazillion studies have shown that children need desperately to know their families and where they come from, the state has been too lazy to look into it. It's really easy when the foster families want to adopt to just let them sit there and not encourage the mother to learn to be a mother, or find a family member to raise them. I'm not about to say foster families shouldn't adopt, because I've recommended that very thing WHEN THE MOTHER IS OUT OF THE QUESTION AND THERE ARE NO OTHER SUITABLE FAMILY MEMBERS. This isn't just my opinion, it's the law. Yet these kids have had 18 months of pressure from a foster family telling them that they are the ones who love them and care about them. Now that an excellent family member has accepted that their niece is never going to be able to be a mother to these kids (until last month, the plan was for the children to stay in foster care until being reunited with the mother), they are having to fight the state, and being sabataged by the foster parents for trying to be a substitute parent to these kids. The foster parents have deliberately kept these kids in an infantile state, and when the mother was trying to do her services, the foster would call her all the time asking her to just bring the kids over any time and leave them as much as she wanted. They were enabling someone who needed encouragement and boundries, not a free ride. When she took it, they reported her to the state for negligence. The fact is, it was grossly inappropriate for the foster parents to even be having contact with the biological mother in the first place. She was negligent, and even she has admitted she is probably not going to be able to parent these kids, but for Gods sake, don't punish the relatives because they hoped the childrens' mother would pull her head out of her ass and be a mom! I know the fosters love the kids, but when they accepted the responsibility of being foster parents, they were told in training to not expect to ever keep these kids. The training stresses this over and over. Three kids from 2-4 and all are in diapers and not one is even pee trained. All are still drinking out of a bottle. This is a good relative placement, and if the state thinks I'm going to go along with this, they are in for a big shock.

This explains my fat ass

When I decided I was going to be a nurse, I also decided the smoking had to go. It's pretty hard to reconcile the healthgiver part with the death wish part, so one of them had to say bye-bye. Now, I'm not saying it for sure happened this way, but there was an article in the paper today that said it has been discovered that rather than 5-10 lbs of weight gain, people who quit smoking actually gain more like 20 lbs. This is such a relief to me since I was afraid it was the shoving food down my face and not exercising that was causing it.

Hurts so good.

Well, maybe the hurt isn't so good after all. I don't know what my middle aged ass was thinking. Back in the day, I was majoring in Fitness Management, and I was an obsessive exerciser. My job was actually teaching corporate fitness programs for private corporations through a national healthcare company and as a fitness instructor at a community college. Those days have been long over. I'll go a year or two being absolutely devoted, and then spend the next year doing next to nothing. This is one of my do nothing years. Since moving to the Hoosier state, though I do belong to an exercise studio for the fitness classes, PLUS live across the street from a fully furnished gym with everything you can think of, I've still let myself go. I sporatically use the treadmill or eliptical machine and I'll take a swipe at the weight machines, but that is about it. We're talking 4-5 times a month, not anything regular. You'd think the pain I was in while skiing at Christmas would have been a wake up call, but no. It wasn't and hasn't. Well yesterday, I decided enough is enough. I did a hip hop class and then a lower body thing with weights and squats. OMG!! OMG!! OMG!! Except for childbirth, I don't think I've ever been so sore in my life. I've been stretching all day, and can finally (painfully) get up and down, but something has to be done. I'm middle aged, not senior citizen, and it's ridiculous that I've let things go this far. In only two years since I went back to school, I've gained 20 pounds and a size up in clothes after wearing the same size for a bazillion years. We'll see what happens, but I'm really, really going to try.

The smallest and weakest

Ok, here's my huge rant. Big one, huge one. I love animals. When I come home, and there are a bunch of kitty and doggy faces at the front door, I'm happy. If you don't tell the dogs, I'll confess I'm probably more a kitty than a dog person, but I really love MY dogs. I'm a little embarrased to admit I have six cats and two dogs (with my sons' dog here about half the time, sometimes it's three dogs). I never meant for this to happen, and for a long time, we were a one dog, one cat family. Then I started volunteering for an animal rescue group. At first, we lost a cat who was born with FELV, and adopted two since my husband and I liked both of the cats the same. Then I was involved in a direct rescue of an abused 4.5 week old kitten and for some reason, I couldn't give this one up. He was so dependant on me and only liked me, and I had to keep him. My husband was wary, but he was easy to talk into it. Then came the mom and her two kittens. I fostered them, but I'd fostered lots of others who are in really good homes now. No one would even look at these cats. I dragged them to adoption fairs for a year and no adoptions. Maybe it's because they hissed and spit and tried to scratch and bite everyone who looked at them. Yeah, that's probably it. Anyway, we found out we were moving, and I couldn't find another foster home to take them. It was kitten season, and everyone was full up, so we talked about it, sucked it up, and adopted them ourselves. So yeah, I'm the crazy cat lady, but I do know my limits and my limit was hit when my husband said one more and he's out of here. I don't think he really means it, but I'm also not the only one in this house, and his happiness matters too. Not to mention, he's gone way above and beyond and he really loves the animals too. I'm lucky that way. Now for the rant. This morning as hubs was going to work, he took the dogs out. I heard him yelling at one of the dogs and I came down and asked what happened. He said there was a sick cat in the driveway, and Yoda was going over there and smelling it so he had to yell at him. I went outside, and the cat was drinking out of our fountain which has a little bleach in it to repel algea. I got it some water and watched it. It was wobbling around and crying. It wasn't at all scared of me. I got it some food but it wouldn't eat. It had a big scabby place on it's side. It would drink, and drink, and drink but it couldn't lick the water off of it's face very well. I was SO upset and called the police. The dispatcher must like cats because she sounded as upset as I was and said she'd find someone to help me. I got a call from a police officer who was off duty, and he said the local shelter wouldn't accept any animals. Now I don't live in a tiny, small town. It's not huge, but there are 60,000 people here and the city has a contract for shelter service from the local Humane Society. I asked if I am just supposed to let it wobble around until it got to the busy highway and got hit by a car. Is that how they humanely treat animals in this city? Is that their euthanasia program? I told the policeman that this cat obviously at one time belonged to someone because it would let me pick it up and hold it, and that when it needed help, it found a person to help it, and I'd be damned if I was going to let this poor thing spend it's last moment in the middle of a highway being mowed down by a car. He was upset too, and finally said he'd come out and get it and figure something out. This guy went above and beyond too, and you can be sure that I will follow up and find out what happened to this cat, and woe to the shelter if they didn't take care of it. I will be like the hounds of hell if they refused to accept a sick animal and put it out of it's misery in a caring responsible manner.

Ticket to hell

As my nephew would say, my ticket to hell has been signed, sealed, stamped, and shipped 2nd day air. Not bad enough for overnight, or worse, same day delivery, but bad enough all the same. I just lied to an ancient old woman with the Alter Society at church. When I said I'd do volunteer work, I said fine to the Alter Society. I thought I can certainly show up and fix the alter up for services. I guess that isn't what it is. I think what it is is the old ladies club at church. This sweet, sweet, sweet old lady called and said they meet once a month for a fun filled hour in church to recite the rosary followed by a bag lunch. Now, just pretend for a second that I don't have a clue how to recite the rosary. I know it's something about the stations of the cross, and the Our Father and Hail Mary (I think), but I've never done it. I was born Catholic. Been one all of my life. Not only have I never recited the rosary, at least in my current memory, but I've never done the confession thing (only now it's called reconciliation). I was supposed to the week before confirmation. It's kind of a requirement, but I "forgot". Even bad Catholics are supposed to do it around the Easter season, but nope, not going to happen. I'd have to do some really serious shit to go there. I've been assured (by my kid for one) that it's a really nice, touchy feely, sit face to face with the priest, and talk about anything that might be bothering you, and your love for Jesus (which I seriously buy into and believe), but nope, not for me. The old ladies still like the box, and every Saturday, they're lined up. Anyway, this is my confession and I don't have to feel so much guilt because I can confess without looking anyone in the face.

Pretty perfect

If boring and pedestrian days are not too interesting, then leave now before you die of boredom, BUT it must be noted that today was pretty close to perfect and they don't happen all of the time, and should be noted. It's a lot more fun to bitch and rant (I could talk about the fit I threw in the financial aid office, but that was yesterday and it wasn't perfect). No cat bit me too early, so I was able to sleep in until 8:00!! The dogs willingly went out in the back yard, and I had a full hour to read papers and drink coffee before my husband got up. I love to curl up on the couch with a snuggly kitty and drink my coffee and read newspapers all by myself. The day was beautiful and warm and not humid, and we went out and let the dogs out to wander around the flowers with us while we worked in the garden. My husband wanted to play internet games, and I went to my sons' apartment and hung out with him for a while. We went to Panera Bread for pannini sandwiches (the roast chicken, my favorite), and talked and bought asiago cheese bread to bring home. I dropped him off at work and came home and Hub was already getting ready for church. We're those cheating Catholics who go on Saturday. In my defense, I'll go in the morning too with my son, but since Hub works on Sunday, we go to the Saturday afternoon mass. We then went to a little microbrewery for dinner. We tried out three new beers, and I ate a veggie burger and cottage cheese, and we split a piece of chocolate cake with truffle filling, and came home. Hubs is going back to work tomorrow, so he went to bed early. I then went outside and watched the fireworks they were shooting off at the fairgrounds. They were beautiful. Just about a perfect day, and I feel grateful for my life right now.