My rat story

I had to start setting my tiny humane trap again this "spring" (I use that word loosely, as I sit here and watch 2 inches of spring snow fall)
Anyway, so far I have caught 2 mice, 1 chipmunk, and one rat.  I have mentioned that my hubby and his sister put enough corn and birdseed out daily that you would think we had a small herd of sheep.  Of course they love to feed the birds and we have some deer that come thru nightly and clean up the corn and a wild turkey that shows up when she is in the mood.  Oh, did I mention we live in town? 
Anyway with all this food on the ground it has to attract rodents.  A couple weeks ago I mentioned to hubby that something smelled funny with the little pickup that I drive to my store.  When I park it under the carport and get out I got a burned smell.  So he looked under the hood and there was a nest of "stuff" right on top of the block.  So out came the air compressor and he blew it all to H-e-double L. 
So I figured I better start trapping again.  The chipmunks I catch get relocated. (they are so cute) The mice and occ. rat gets their brains batted out after we put them in a sack and wack it on the deck.  Figure thats more humane than drowning.  Quick and effective. 
I have mentioned I feed a cat that lives behind my book store and is still pretty wild but waits in the same place every day for her food.  (sister feeds her when I am not there)
I gave her a treat of a dead mouse twice, but when I had the dead rat that was over 24 hours dead in my baggie, I got to the store and looked at that rat and just couldn't put it out there next to the good leftover chicken and cat food for this pregnant cat to eat.  So the rat went into the garbage can.  End of the rat.

Any one want a pretty calico pregnant feral cat?  I think I could trap her. :)

Its not a tumorrrrrr ( said in that accent, you know)

Per Wikipedia:

A lipoma is a benign tumor composed of adipose tissue. It is the most common form of soft tissue tumor.^[1] Lipomas are soft to the touch, usually movable, and are generally painless. Many lipomas are small (under one centimeter diameter) but can enlarge to sizes greater than six centimeters. (a nice way of saying "fat" tumor)

So that is what I have.  I finally got to see the specialist in Kansas City last Thursday.  She had canceled my apt twice and I canceled once when there was a blizzard there.
I really like her and feel confident in her assessment of what needs to be done.  She says that tumors of this nature need to be removed when over 5 cm. and mine is almost 7cm. about the size of a small chicken egg.  The problem that it is causing is that it is beneath my rt deltoid muscle and there are 2 major nerves that are being stretched around the sides of it and they don't like it. That is what makes it ache.  The most of the actual pain that I have is from the rotator cuff in the same shoulder only inches above the tumor.  She feels that this will be improved with physical therapy and I will be doing that after my surgery.  I am scheduled for the 29th of Mar.  So will be getting this taken care of soon. Not sure how long I will be out of commission.  I have a good friend who is my designated driver since we don't like driving in down town KC.  Big woosies huh?

Snake Oil Salesman?

Been reading this book that I think is so right on that it is scary!  It is called the Happiness Diet by Tyler Graham and Drew Ramsey, MD.  Meaning we need to eat food not only for our body but our brain.  It tells the direct link between all the processed, sugary, fatty foods that's common in the American diet now to all sorts of mental problems, no. 1 being depression. 
It is a real eye opener and really stuff that we all know deep down.  We cant eat the garbage we do and not expect to have our bodies breakdown from it. 
I know that I need to do this and only wish I could have made myself get on board with this idea years ago.  But we can't go back, only forward.  Lucky that coffee is a good thing to have. 

What I like about the book is that it goes into details of how we got to where we are and why.  When you see what all goes into things, like a dunkin donut glazed chocolate stick contains more than 40 ingredients including a preservative TBHQ, a form of butane ( a lighter fluid)  Now tell me how did we get to the place that we figure out how to put all this poisonous stuff in food to preserve food and not think that it might just be a wee bit bad for us.

I like to use the word Snake Oil Salesman when I talk about our advertisements (politicians too)  but I digress.  Anyway isn't that what we see day in and day out on TV and isn't it all for the $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
$$$$$$$$$$ ?  We are so darn smart that we are ignorant!!!  Take good healthy food and strip it of all nutrients then sell it as good for you.  You know they have been "fortifying" breads and cereals for years.  Right after they strip all the good stuff from the grains of course they have to add stuff and if you thing it is "real" stuff they add I bet you would be double wrong.

Wheee  I better slow down I am giving myself a headache.  Better just get back to reading the book and maybe have an orange.
I have a feeling I will be back to this subject again soon. (Like how to eat the way you know you should when you live with 2 skinny people who eat all this stuff or expect to have white rice, white bread, and white pasta.  Been cooking my own brown rice for a long time but sometimes its just to much trouble to cook an extra pan)
I think things are going to change around here.   Hear me roar!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Synchronicity verses Serendipity?

I love the Grizzwells, they always get it right.  I wrote a blog yesterday about Synchronicity and when I read the paper last evening this was the cartoon.  Now I feel that is just a bit of synchronicity don't you?   But my question now is whats the difference between Synchronicity and Serendipity?  So I looked them up. 
 Wikipedia says:
Serendipity means a "happy accident" or "pleasant surprise"; specifically, the accident of finding something good or useful while not specifically searching for it.

And it also says:

Synchronicity is the experience of two or more events that are apparently causally unrelated or unlikely to occur together by chance, yet are experienced as occurring together in a meaningful manner. The concept of synchronicity was first described in this terminology by Carl Gustav Jung, a Swiss psychologist, in the 1920s.

So I see a similarity here but I think they are actually different.  Would love to hear someone elses opinion on this. So keep looking for these in your life.  They just may be a key to something important you are supposed to be paying attention to.

Synchronicities

I have expressed my thoughts before about synchronicity (always have trouble spelling that).  I have experienced it many times in my life.  Not a huge deal, as I think we all have them and usually just don't pay attention to them.  My last one that really put a big smile on my face was a couple weeks ago.
I left the store a little early so I could go to the local country store to pick up a bag of oatmeal that I had ordered.  So it took me on a different highway to go home from there. I had the radio on to this oldie's country music.  A song was on by Jimmy Dean called Big Bad John.  The split second that it came to the part of the song when he sang about him going to the Promiseland, I looked up and was passing a country church with a huge sign (you guessed it) Promiseland!  It was really like I had just received a message from someone.  You could call it God, The Universe, My higher self,  what ever your belief.  But it was real and I smiled all the way home with a feeling that I had someone watching over me and they just wanted to give me a little nudge to remind me.
Shortly after this I read a notice somewhere about an author who believes in this and of course had written a book.  So I looked it up and ordered.  It is called Consider the Butterfly by Carol Lynn Pearson.  The title was revealed at the end of the book because she had a period of time that butterflys( in print) popped up 9 times within an hour in unrelated things for her.
She subscribes to the idea that it is God/Universe talking to us.  She calls it Meaningful coincidence.  As you probably know there are no coincidences in life.  They all have meaning if you take the time to look and SEE.  She has documented her syncronicities and been able to link them to her personal life and what is going on with her and her family.
So I have started my own file on my computer and titled it Messages from the Universe.  I know that is not original but I like it so borrowed it for my file.  I want to document my syncronicities and see if I can find some meaning for them and not just "oh, yea I noticed that"  Once I read a word in a book that was something unusual, don't remember what it was but that next day that name popped up on someones license plate.  I have not seen that particular word again.  Now that had to be synchronicity.
So I challenge any readers that I have to look for the syncronicities in your life and see if you can find the meaning for them.  I think it will be an interesting journey and after all we are all on our own journey aren't we?