Blog Week Teaser

Where has the week gone? Was my last post really the one where I put up pictures of Jethro? Well, that was the day Quigley got new eye medicine — an ointment to put in his eye every evening. Unless I noticed signs of squinting, intermittent blinking or squinting, discharge or redness. Then I was to stop using the ointment, go back to the old meds and call the office.

So I put the new stuff in Tuesday night and Wednesday morning his eyeball was pretty white. But Wednesday night it was pretty red. Redder than I’d seen it. So I  didn’t put any of the ointment in and called the office the next day… had to go and get some new stuff — more drops this time and…

Details. Details of life. Many of them. A hundred zillion small steps and tasks and errands that eat up time like I can’t believe. Wednesday one of my friends took me and another friend to a Victorian Tea here in Tucson. We had a great time with the tiny sandwiches, the scones, the Devonshire cream and lemon curd and strawberry jam.  I LOVE the Creamy Earl Gray tea they serve there. Mmmm. 

Friday I took my mother to her PET scan which will show us if there is any cancer left, since two weeks ago she completed what was supposed to be her last treatment. We’ll get the results tomorrow (Monday) morning when we meet with her doctor.

Dishes, walking the dog, calling the insurance agent, laundry, exercise, cleaning, grocery shopping … That’s turned into a doubled task now since I have to go to one store for me and take my mother to another store for her — she’s vegetarian, almost vegan, I think, and will only eat organic food, so we have to go to a special store. We can’t afford to buy stuff from there, but even if we could… I just can’t get that excited about it all, any more. I did my alternative health methods and health food eating years ago, and was not satisfied with the results. Or rather, I didn’t see any results except lots of money draining out of our pockets and into the coffers of the alternative doctors and health food stores.

Anyway, besides all that, I’ve been reading Why are Jews Liberals? by Norman Podhoretz — fascinating book. They seem to be as blind to the fact that it’s the Christian Right who is most supportive of them as they are to the fact that their Messiah has already come, but he does a good job laying out why. At least as far as one can say why beyond the fact that their volition is simply saying no. I may do a blog post on it, if I can find the time.  

And I’m still not finished writing about that self-discipline article I read… if I could just find the time. And energy. Oh, and I found a site last week where you can take a test to see if you’re an introvert. That was cool. More on that tomorrow I think. AND  just yesterday I stumbled onto a really interesting site with a series of articles on “thought-mistakes” we make that produce unnecessary negative emotions. “By catching yourself making those mistakes, you reduce or eliminate those unproductive bad feelings,” says the author. Since I’ve recently been struggling with bad feelings that seem to come out of nowhere, but I think are indeed a result of some of those thought mistakes, it’s been very helpful. Especially as regards The Other Side of the Sky, that book I’m supposed to be writing, but have lost all motivation and enthusiasm for. Or at least I had until this morning.

Yes, the thought-mistakes site is a collection of human viewpoint, self-help articles of the type I usually avoid like the plague but this one roped me in and while there are no mentions of spiritual principles as such, the avoidance of negativity and the impact our thinking has on our lives is indisputably part of the spiritual life. I’ve found it quite interesting. And helpful.

So I hope to write more about that, as well. I guess this post has turned into more of a teaser than a post, but at least you all know that I’m alive, that I can still type, that my Internet works and if I have to I can babble on with the best of them…

0 thoughts on “Blog Week Teaser

  1. Loren Warnemuende

    I like the way your brain works, Karen…probably because it sounds like mine 🙂 ! I’d say “great minds think alike” except that there are definitely times I wouldn’t say mine is that great! But it is my own, and I’ll stick with it!

    I just read an interview with and review of Podhoretz’ book in WORLD Magazine the other week. Interesting thoughts!

    …And I’ve actually been thinking I’d enjoy a conversation with you about organic food and alternative meds, partly because it seemed we’d be on the same page. We just had a pediatrician come speak to our moms’ group at church who specializes in “wellness” and “wholistic medicine.” She’s also a believer, and I was interested to hear what she had to say. I came out of it agreeing with probably 80% of what she touched on, but still leery about the other 20%. I just can’t buy into all of it. I think that’s partly because by nature (or nurture!) I see a fad and usually run the other way…and this seems like a cultural fad in many ways. The part that concerns me more, though, is that so often it seems to be an obsession–“LIVE HEALTHY! BE THIS! DO THAT!”–that it takes the place of focusing on Christ and what he has for us. Not that we’re supposed to neglect our health and bodies, it just seems to get out of proportion.

    Anyway, I could keep going on that soap box and won’t! It’s just one of those things that’s been on my mind a good bit lately.

    Reply
    1. karenhancock

      Gee, Loren, I agree with you! 🙂 I think the whole obsession with health, be it eating or fitness or both, has become a sort of religion. The idol is health and feeling good and people do all for the sake of receiving blessing from the god of health. Of course they don’t call it a god, just treat it as such. There is a law, as you say: must exercise daily, must eat this, mustn’t eat that. If you break the commandments, and make the god mad, then he’ll smite you with poor health.

      My mother has worshipped this god for some time and he’s turned out to be fickle. She has cancer, never having smoked a day in her life. I know others who have smoked like a house on fire (what a funny cliche) and lived to be 90. It’s God who grants us good health or bad, and sometimes we need the bad. For some people that’s the only time they turn to Him.

      Reply

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