Some say it’s good, because I can feel empathy for others.

Some say it’s bad because it can be a sign of weakness, a sign giving others with dubious intent to exploit me or take advantage of me.

I’ve always been overly sensitive. I am even more so when I’m physically exhausted like I was when I got home this afternoon. I tend to take things out of context when I’m tired.

Sometimes, I hate this part of my personality. Maybe I should have a tougher shell. I tend to hide my insecurities behind sarcasm and humor. I get hurt easily. And, when that hurt, intended or not, comes from someone I look up to or someone I respect, I hurt to my very core.

I’ve been doing A LOT of soul searching lately (Larry teases me that I think too much), and there are some things that I think need to change about myself.

But for some reason, making those changes scare the sh!t out of me.

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

Time crunch.

Cap’n Crunch.

Nestle’s Crunch.

It’s starting not to matter anymore.

Yet, here I sit in the library freezing my bodacious Italian backside off, trying to get things done. I now have three projects due on Monday the 16th. And they will all get done, too.  My news package is already late, so another couple of days isn’t going to matter, because if I manage somehow to pass that class, I’ll be thankful. On academic probation, but thankful none-the-less.

=====

This has been a bitch of a semester, and starting it out sick only made it worse. I still have no resolution to the problem with my freaked out health… I’m still bruising way too easily, I still want to sleep all day (or worse, not sleep at all), the Itchies are driving me up the freakin’ wall, and I can’t remember the last time I had a normal temp of 98.6. Mostly, that’s been things like 96.8, or 97.2, or the one that scared me: 95.8. It’s just as bad to have a sub normal temperature than to have a fever…

Oh, and then there’s the headaches. I have more of them more often. Not quite migraines, but pretty damn close. And, I’ve never had what my maternal grandmother called “sick headaches”.

The bruises scare me. There are so many, and  they take forever to go away.

As for the constant itchiness I’ve been having, it’s not dry skin. I use a moisturizing body wash when I shower and I’m drinking more water and less soda (I only drink Sprite when I do drink sodas).

I should have Dean or one of his partners take a look at me, order more blood tests, fun stuff like that. I just want an answer once and for all, and, if it is something serious, get it under control as soon as possible.

=====

I will be practically living in the Max Chambers library tomorrow and Saturday, so if my stuff isn’t done, it’s not for lack of a computer that behaves itself.

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

To all military members, past and present, thank you for your service to our country. It is your selflessness that allows us to remain free. God bless you and your families and God bless America!

With gratitude from the daughter of a WWII Army veteran…

–Stef

Friday.

The 13th.

Four days from now.

Except my news package which is due Thursday @ 0930.

Am I ever going to get it all done?!

Only a month to go in the semester, and I am already frazzled. I’m so worried about passing my classes  that I even dream about it. How whacked out is that?

Then there was the dream in which Larry took me somewhere, then left me there to fend for myself.

What’s up with that?!

Maybe I need to take a long nap after class…I was on campus at 7-something this morning to return the video equipment I borrowed, then went back home to get my books and fix my hair (because Lord only knows which version of Stef 45.9.o left my apartment this morning).

And, I have to laugh…Larry still thinks it’s the circus I “ran away” to join in 2002. It’s kind of a long running private joke…still funny LOL

I better get my bodacious Italian backside out of the library and over to the Comm Building.

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

(oh no! it’s that weird guy from Syracuse, NY from the bus who talks to himself. Does he even go to school here?)

I went to video the wild turkeys that have been roaming my sister’s neighborhood for the past couple of months, and they never showed up. The only one I saw was roadkill on I-35 just as we were getting off at Sooner Road…

So I interviewed my sister, my niece and Marc about seeing the gaggle of turkeys that once numbered around 2 dozen, but that has dwindled by about two-thirds as of last week. It’s hunting season, so I guess they’re getting picked off one at a time.

The assignment is due Thursday, so I’ve decided to put a humorous spin on it by blaming the turkeys for not showing up. I still don’t think I have enough raw footage, so I think I will see if I can keep the camera and stuff another day.

To that end, all that stuff has to be back by 8am tomorrow morning, so I have to be on that 7am bus. That means I have to go to bed now.

G’night!

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

First, some Army officer snaps and shoots at people at Ft. Hood, Texas, killing 12 and wounding 31 others…

Today, some disgruntled former employee (is there any other kind?) opens fire at an office building in Orlando, Florida…

What is this world coming to?

In the case of the Ft. Hood shootings, it appears that the man responsible was a doctor who counseled soldiers returning from the war zones, and was upset by the things he heard. He was scheduled to deploy himself later this month, and didn’t want to go.

And people are freaking out because Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan is a practising Muslim. To some people, that automatically means “terrorist”, but this man was born in the United States. According to news reports,

An imam from a mosque Hasan regularly attended said Hasan, a lifelong Muslim, was a committed soldier, gave no sign of extremist beliefs and regularly wore his uniform at prayers.

In my humble opinion, I think this man just snapped. It happens, especially in times of war. You see too much, you hear too much, and your mind can’t process it all.

I’m not excusing what this man did… he killed and wounded people on a military base. The one place you’d think people would be safe.

It’s just a tragedy all around.

There will be more on this in the days to come. As for this shooting in Orlando, it’s still a developing story, so I don’t want to say anything more about that until there are more facts.

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

There is a display here at UCO today about abortion. It is meant to educate people about what abortion is. Included in this display are posters of aborted fetuses and parts of fetal bodies. It is not pleasant to look at. In fact, it upset me.

Before you jump to conclusions, I must tell you that I have never had an abortion, and would never advocate it to someone else. You should also know that I was raised as a Roman Catholic, and the Church is vehemently opposed to abortion. This is something that I would never and have never chosen for myself, but if someone is thinking about it, then I think that person should have the option to end their pregnancy.

But, a question was posed to me today by one of the volunteers at the display: does an unborn child have human rights?

If it’s not okay to kill your child once it’s born, why is it okay to kill it before it’s born?

I have to admit that I had no answer for that. What’s the difference? If, as I believe, an unborn child is a human being and therefore has human rights, then who am I or anyone else to decide to end that child’s life?

I think that’s where I have a huge problem with Roe v. Wade. Hell, even the woman who inspired the law had a change of heart and is now a pro life activist.

I don’t know what I believe now. Should women have the right to terminate their pregnancies, and have that procedure done by someone who is medically trained to do so? Or, should Roe v. Wade be overturned and we go back to the alternative of back alley abortions by people who probably watched a video about how to perform the procedure, and have women dying because they’re desperate, scared, or think they have no other alternatives?

What if you were the mother of a woman who died as a result? How would you feel?

What if you were the parent of a woman who had the procedure done safely, and you found out after the fact? What if you were the parent of the man who fathered the child? What if you were the father of the now aborted child and didn’t know about it until after the fact?

Yes, I know that there are lots of people who pressure women into getting abortions for one reason or another. I’m not talking about them with the questions posed above.

As many readers of Where It’s @ ! know, I am the mother of four sons. Three of them are adults. What if a girl one of them was dating found herself pregnant, thinking that whichever son she was seeing wouldn’t want to be tied down with a baby in that point in life, and felt she had no other choice to terminate the pregnancy?

This is why I want to get to know the girls that my sons date. I want these young women to know they have a friend and ally in me. That they can come to me with a problem or a question or a concern, even if it doesn’t involve their relationship with whichever son they happen to be dating.

I know this is a loaded post, and a lot of people will find this subject uncomfortable. I know that some may want to debate me on this. I do want to know what my readers think about this, but if there are flames in the comments, then expected to be deleted. Name calling is stupid and gets nothing accomplished. I know I have mature readers out there.

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

If I thought I had to update this post every year, I may not have even written it.

In February of 2008, I had a really wicked case of the flu. Just the flu, not H1N1 or anything like that. I wrote a post about the stages of the flu based on my own experience, and it is clearly the most read post on Where it’s @ !

People are bugging out over the H1N1 virus, the vaccine (or lack thereof), the bottles of hand sanitizer everywhere you look…

I mean, c’mon, people, use some common sense! If you’re sick, stay the hell away from me! If that means you miss school or work, then so be it. Don’t give whatever it is you’ve got to anyone else. If you feel the need to go to the doctor, then, damn, GO ALREADY! H1N1 has killed people, and since I’m kinda addicted to life, then go see your doctor and get it taken care of post haste! I’d like to see some of you around the interwebs when this stupid pandemic is over.

Call your local health department to find out when or if your community is having clinics for the vaccine. Find out if you or your loved ones are in the target groups (young children, children with underlying health issues, pregnant women, etc.), then go get the shot/nasal spray. You may have to stand in a line for a while, but isn’t your peace of mind worth it.

Of course, this is just one woman’s opinion. If you’re vehemently opposed to getting the vaccine, then don’t. But again, if you’re sick, stay home. Call your doctor. Then do what he/she tells you to do.

Ya follow…?

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

P.S. there is other stuff on this blog other than that post about the flu. Check out Where it’s @ ! and tell me what you think. Deal?

…for a change!

=====

I dickered around with some elements of poetry, trying to make them all make sense… but all I was able to come up with were related fragments of my own desires…

This all came from thinking about things and people in my life.

One of my Facebook statuses last night was something along the lines of :

I believe that if you want to make the time, even when you think you have none, you can. If I can do it with all I have to do, then anyone can.

But choosing to not make time for fun, or rest, or something not related to one’s work is entirely on the individual involved. Nothing that I or anyone else can say will change that. People just want to have to change.

I also wrote out a list of adjectives that I think describe me… among those are:

• loyal
• friendly
• smart
• sassy
• loving
• giving
• sensuous
• dedicated
• sincere

And then I started to do it for people I know, and realized that they may not see themselves the way I see them. That my perception of *you* (whomever you may be) is totally different that your perception of you, or of others’ perceptions of you.

Are you (again, whomever you may be) projecting to others what you want them to see, or are you letting them draw their own conclusions about you that may be totally wrong?

=====

Am I seeing the real you, or the you that YOU want me to see?

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–

I still have to go to the store, do homework, take a nap…

I went to bed early last night, thinking I was going to get all this good sleep…but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! I wake up to go pee and discover to my horror that it’s not something like 5am, but not even 1am!

After that, I tossed and turned all night long. Not even hot milk helped (plain ole hot milk is kinda boring, IMHO).

I rewrote my Radio and TV Writing assignment in my head all night long.

=====

You know when your kids are growing up when Halloween doesn’t interest them like it once did. My almost 16 year old went to a party instead of taking his cousins around my mother’s neighborhood trick or treating.

And: most people watch horror flicks on TV or DVD on Halloween. I watched game 3 of the World Series… a horrorfest in and of itself!

Is it just me, or the officiating by the umpires just bad? It’s almost like they want the Yankees to win.

BTW… I hate the Yankees. They have two of the most overrated players ever: ARod and Derek Jeter. I don’t think either of them are anything to write home about, IMPO…

I was really hoping for a freeway World Series between the Angels and the Dodgers. Now THAT would have been worth missing Steve McQueen in “The Great Escape” for!!

That’s all from where I sit.

–MorelaterZ–