The 'Horse Capital of the World' Is an Underrated American City With Beautiful Nature Trails, Craft Beer and Bourbon, and a New Luxury Hotel
Mostly showing off our new luxury hotel, the Manchester, but a nice write-up by Travel+Leisure on Lexington itself, as well.
Saturday, August 26, 2023
How about you?
Do You Read Faster On An E-Reader Or A Physical Book?
I'm not sure faster is necessarily 'better', though. I mainly read on my Kindle Scribe, but I don't always have the comprehension I have from an actual book. I tend to skip over words, I've noticed, although that may be my attention-deficit issues. But it seems it happens more with an e-reader than physical format. On the other hand, I can try techniques such bionic font and others in the hopes of counteracting that very problem, something I can't do with the physical book.
I'm not sure faster is necessarily 'better', though. I mainly read on my Kindle Scribe, but I don't always have the comprehension I have from an actual book. I tend to skip over words, I've noticed, although that may be my attention-deficit issues. But it seems it happens more with an e-reader than physical format. On the other hand, I can try techniques such bionic font and others in the hopes of counteracting that very problem, something I can't do with the physical book.
Sunday, August 20, 2023
54 years ago today
my parents got married. It was not the best thing to do, in my opinion, for any of us. I lived in a home where everything was very disconnected. We never did anything as a family, except move across the country when the Air Force demanded it. Dad had his radio room, Momma had her ceramics, and I had my reading. We did eat together at about 4:30 or 5 pm when my dad got home, but we weren't really a family. We never took vacations (and as a result, neither do I, really. I just use my PTO for doctor's appointments and an occasional time off at home, going nowhere.) We lived in California and never went to Disneyland or the San Diego Zoo, for example, and I would have loved to.
Before you say, yeah, but you wouldn't be here. Sure I would. At eight years old I did the math and realised it was only eight months between my parents' wedding and my birth, and I wasn't born early. My parents had actually broken up and then she found out she was pregnant. It was 1966. Abortion was illegal. She was barely 19. To their credit, my mom's parents both said she could stay home and they would help take care of the baby, which was pretty enlightened for the time. Despite my withdrawn relationship with my parents, I loved my grandparents very much, and my grandfather in particular was a very good male role model for me. It was my dad's mom who wanted them to get married, and they did. I loved Nana very much (she was the 'fun' grandmother, after all; Ma showed her love in other ways), but she should have butted out.
Within a month, seeing as they'd both dropped out of school (he was in engineering at UK; she was in Good Samaritan's nursing school to become an RN), my dad lost his exception for the draft, and knowing that he would be drafted, he decided to enlist to make sure he could choose the branch to serve in, at least, and he chose the Air Force. Besides, he needed to get a job to support his new family..
That's how my dad wound up doing three tours during the Vietnam War. He was in Vietnam, Thailand, and Cambodia repairing aeroplanes. I always felt that he blamed us a bit. I know he tried to divorce my mom when I was two, while he was overseas, but she wouldn't do it long distance. My mom was very emotionally needy, and in her entire life [after they finally divorced when I was 15] she had to have a man in her life, and her personality changed with each one (she married a total of four times). She liked what he liked. The only time I really saw my mom's primary personality was between marriages.
I grew up as a hindrance, and I was mostly ignored, except I was expected to console my mother emotionally when she was upset and we were very enmeshed at the same time. I spent years trying to get their love, trying to be the 'good girl', getting great grades, and quietly trying not to do anything to upset them. I never really wanted for basic physical needs, and I was never physically abused, but emotionally I was neglected and I've spent the rest of my life trying to get over that.
As a result, as an adult, I broke off my relationship with my dad after he lied to me. I'd tried to rebuild our relationship after the divorce when I was out of the house, but we wound up estranged. That happened in 1993, after my grandmother died, and lasted until his death in 2018. We never reconciled.
In retrospect, living with my mother did more damage than my dad as I was growing up, because she was there. He was off serving overseas most of the first six years of my life and then left when I was 15. I modelled so much of my behaviour off of her. There was a lot of good, of course, I'm sure. But we were way too close in some ways. But it was always about her. I know she didn't mean it to be, and I've never figured out why she was so insecure. I do know she had social anxiety, and in retrospect, she had a lot of anxiety, and that's where I get it from, I'm sure. I never cut off ties with her, though, even though I should have. But as we got older I pulled away. I spoke with her about every three months and came home for birthdays and Christmas. I especially stayed away once she married my last stepfather. He was an okay guy, and I'm thankful he was there in her last years, as he was able to take care of her where I wasn't, but his sons were all addicts and caused all sorts of grief, to the point as my mom lie dying my grandmother's house where they were living was known as the 'drug house' and the cops were there time and time again. I refused to go there after a visit where my mom casually mentioned that I should be careful about loose needles as my youngest stepbrother had Hepatitis C and tended to leave them around. I'd just stayed in his room, and she hadn't mentioned it then. I never went back, but rather visited her whenever she was in the hospital.
After my parents died (she did in 2017, just shy of 70, and he did in 2018, when he was barely 70) I got a bit of closure but not really.
I'm not writing this to whine. I'm just trying to get a handle on my feelings. Mostly I felt unloved. Now I know people who have certainly had it much worse. But I don't even remember most of my childhood, and I know there was trauma, but I don't necessarily remember what happened. Most of my memories are from school or playing with friends. Frankly, there were a few good things about my childhood in the home I remember, but very few. I thought everyone's memory was like that for so long, but then I found out it wasn't. I think it's very telling that I've blocked out whole swaths of my childhood, but I don't really know why. It bothers me immensely.
Anyway, that's my story. Make of it what you will.
Before you say, yeah, but you wouldn't be here. Sure I would. At eight years old I did the math and realised it was only eight months between my parents' wedding and my birth, and I wasn't born early. My parents had actually broken up and then she found out she was pregnant. It was 1966. Abortion was illegal. She was barely 19. To their credit, my mom's parents both said she could stay home and they would help take care of the baby, which was pretty enlightened for the time. Despite my withdrawn relationship with my parents, I loved my grandparents very much, and my grandfather in particular was a very good male role model for me. It was my dad's mom who wanted them to get married, and they did. I loved Nana very much (she was the 'fun' grandmother, after all; Ma showed her love in other ways), but she should have butted out.
Within a month, seeing as they'd both dropped out of school (he was in engineering at UK; she was in Good Samaritan's nursing school to become an RN), my dad lost his exception for the draft, and knowing that he would be drafted, he decided to enlist to make sure he could choose the branch to serve in, at least, and he chose the Air Force. Besides, he needed to get a job to support his new family..
That's how my dad wound up doing three tours during the Vietnam War. He was in Vietnam, Thailand, and Cambodia repairing aeroplanes. I always felt that he blamed us a bit. I know he tried to divorce my mom when I was two, while he was overseas, but she wouldn't do it long distance. My mom was very emotionally needy, and in her entire life [after they finally divorced when I was 15] she had to have a man in her life, and her personality changed with each one (she married a total of four times). She liked what he liked. The only time I really saw my mom's primary personality was between marriages.
I grew up as a hindrance, and I was mostly ignored, except I was expected to console my mother emotionally when she was upset and we were very enmeshed at the same time. I spent years trying to get their love, trying to be the 'good girl', getting great grades, and quietly trying not to do anything to upset them. I never really wanted for basic physical needs, and I was never physically abused, but emotionally I was neglected and I've spent the rest of my life trying to get over that.
As a result, as an adult, I broke off my relationship with my dad after he lied to me. I'd tried to rebuild our relationship after the divorce when I was out of the house, but we wound up estranged. That happened in 1993, after my grandmother died, and lasted until his death in 2018. We never reconciled.
In retrospect, living with my mother did more damage than my dad as I was growing up, because she was there. He was off serving overseas most of the first six years of my life and then left when I was 15. I modelled so much of my behaviour off of her. There was a lot of good, of course, I'm sure. But we were way too close in some ways. But it was always about her. I know she didn't mean it to be, and I've never figured out why she was so insecure. I do know she had social anxiety, and in retrospect, she had a lot of anxiety, and that's where I get it from, I'm sure. I never cut off ties with her, though, even though I should have. But as we got older I pulled away. I spoke with her about every three months and came home for birthdays and Christmas. I especially stayed away once she married my last stepfather. He was an okay guy, and I'm thankful he was there in her last years, as he was able to take care of her where I wasn't, but his sons were all addicts and caused all sorts of grief, to the point as my mom lie dying my grandmother's house where they were living was known as the 'drug house' and the cops were there time and time again. I refused to go there after a visit where my mom casually mentioned that I should be careful about loose needles as my youngest stepbrother had Hepatitis C and tended to leave them around. I'd just stayed in his room, and she hadn't mentioned it then. I never went back, but rather visited her whenever she was in the hospital.
After my parents died (she did in 2017, just shy of 70, and he did in 2018, when he was barely 70) I got a bit of closure but not really.
I'm not writing this to whine. I'm just trying to get a handle on my feelings. Mostly I felt unloved. Now I know people who have certainly had it much worse. But I don't even remember most of my childhood, and I know there was trauma, but I don't necessarily remember what happened. Most of my memories are from school or playing with friends. Frankly, there were a few good things about my childhood in the home I remember, but very few. I thought everyone's memory was like that for so long, but then I found out it wasn't. I think it's very telling that I've blocked out whole swaths of my childhood, but I don't really know why. It bothers me immensely.
Anyway, that's my story. Make of it what you will.
Saturday, August 19, 2023
Agenda
Today's list. I didn't include making coffee for my roommate in the percolator and waking him so he can attend services; I do that every Saturday as he cannot cook on the Sabbath. I've gotten a late start, but none of it is actually time-sensitive except painting the rust spot (daytime) and Kroger (before 10 pm). Even the pharmacy and storage unit are 24/7, although I should do them in daytime. It is going to be a fairly busy day, but there's time to relax, too. At least I already did the game notes.
REVISION: I found out I needed more items for the rust repair, so I took that off the list. My friend Jon can't talk tonight, so I have more time to read the books that might help him. Oh, and I bought a mint plant the other day to put a few leaves in the soup, so I'm going to pot the plant. So I updated the list.
UPDATE: Well, I got a lot accomplished, but not all of it. I got the blanket and one of two loads of my laundry finished, took some items out to the car that are supposed to be there, but not the ones that go to storage, nor took those to storage. I dusted shelves and did my Duolingo (despite a cat lolling on me)..I will pick up the book tomorrow or Monday, put the storage items in the car tomorrow and take them to the centre on Monday. I need to pot the mint tomorrow. I did spend a lot of time on the books for my friend's job search and started working on a potential résumé for him. I did take a friend to his event. I'll get the medicine tomorrow, hopefully, as they may put it back if I don't. I hate paying for parking, so I try to get it on the weekends. I did everything else.
Friday, August 18, 2023
Frustrated
Sigh.
1) I just bent down by the table in the living room and when I came back up, I hit my arm on the lip of țhe table, and ripped my sensor off my skin. It wasn't responding and had to be removed. This is the sixth sensor I have had issues with. Four outright fell off on the first day, one stopped working, probably because the blood gushed out when we are are the hit a capillary . (I did not have this problem with the old system. I really wish I could use the sensors on my abdomen. :(
2) I also started a new medication, tramadol, because I had to go off diclofenac after my feet started swelling. It did a lot to help with pain. The tramadol, not so much. I was a tiny bit drowsy/loopy, but not bad. But i've had a lot of issues with my pain today. Nothing had helped until I stretched out on the bed.
Saturday, August 05, 2023
Friday, August 04, 2023
Better
I was in a very bad place earlier tonight, in a lot of pain, and I railed against the Universe there for a moment in a since-deleted link from Facebook to this page (which still has it). Four hours and some good rest later, I feel better. Still hurting a bit, but back down to a 2 from a 7. We joke that my bed is my 'cocoon of love' where I retreat when needed. But I have to admit, this time it helped.
Thursday, August 03, 2023
Sunday I hurt my foot, and I'm in a Unna boot wrap with a walking boot, and you know what?
I am not a great person to be around right now. Indeed, I'm really not a happy camper. My pain is around 7 out of 10 for various reasons, the NSAIDs and acetaminophen that I can take are doing nothing. I'm trying not to be irritable, but I am. I had a decent day at work, I made it through, tomorrow is Friday, lots of good things, but at this precise moment I just want to kick off the stupid boot, get into shorts (have I mentioned the AC seems to be broken, so we turned it off?), get into bed, squeeze a teddy bear, ice my foot, and let Ed Sheeran music take me away. At the moment I think Dolly Parton could come into my room and I'd growl at her, and that's an unpardonable sin.
All over a toe, which turned into a foot, which necessitated a boot, which exacerbated pain in my back and knees, which reminded me that I'm out of fibromyalgia medicine, which means I'm in a flareup, when I'm still getting over sciatica, so my body feels like it's burning on the inside and outside and I just am therefore no fun.
And it makes me mad at myself because it's not like I have cancer, or some incurable disease, or I'm in a wartorn country, or have just lost a child, or all the other things that are so much more painful and significant. This too shall pass. But at this moment, I'm having trouble reminding myself of that or breathing through the pain (I was never good at meditation anyway). I'm good at low chronic pain. But this is acute and all over, in every joint, in every muscle, and I just want to scream.
Instead I'll get into my bed, also known as the cocoon of love, and ice my foot, and hug my teddy bear, and try to lose myself in music and drift off into the land of dreams. For tomorrow is another day.
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