to the library boys, who will never read this

fidget works her warm fuzzies, originally uploaded by McBeth.

First of all: I'm old enough to be your mother. Even if I wasn't I am a fellow student who wants to just get through this time so I can move along to what comes next. You don't have to be a dick when someone asks you to not do something annoying. Try using some of the manners that I hope I am not wrong to assume your guardians taught you.

When I asked you to please lower your voices because I couldn't concentrate you were awfully attentive to my needs, like that cosy little moment when you suggested that I go into the 'Quiet Room' section of the library if I want quiet. Really, the way you are looking out for me nearly brings a tear to my eye it is just that touching. But c'mon dudes, look at the situation! I am seated at a school computer - in a LIBRARY. It's not like I can yank the cables out from the back of the Dell and drag computer guts into the Quiet Room to do this non-interactive online work. I have to sit at one of the school computers where it is set up and plugged in, to do this thing I'm doing. You don't have to be in a library to share the best secret hunting spots you've discovered across the tri-state area. Go somewhere else to yack.

Yes I concur with you, the library is indeed a public place. But it is also a LIBRARY, where people are doing homework and research and reading and studying. Were you raised in a barn or something? Did nobody every teach you the concept of indoor voices? Use them. Trust me on this one... annoying and interesting are two very different animals. You're not that interesting. If I squint a little I can understand why you'd think you have every right to carry on a loud conversation about hunting and blowing up crows with inappropriately large guns, but the thing is not all of us think you're awesome or that your immaturely gruesome hunting stories are exciting. Not everyone else seated around you wants to hear what you expect you should have every right in the middle of a LIBRARY to chortle over. Want to hear about my menstrual issues? Mmhmm, thought not. Context, my little friends, context.

And try some freakin' manners. Sheesh.

solid footing

inaugural socks, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Set your expectations high; find men and women whose integrity and values you respect; get their agreement on a course of action; and give them your ultimate trust.

-- John Akers

back home

crawfish , originally uploaded by McBeth.

When I get away from home for too long I start to get crazy, so I need to get back, ... We have to get back just to get our feet in the mud, in that crawfish juice, or something.

-- George Porter

headed there

as the crow flies, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Life begins at 40 - but so do fallen arches, rheumatism, faulty eyesight, and the tendency to tell a story to the same person, three or four times.

-- Helen Rowland

a one and a

on a scale of one to ten, originally uploaded by McBeth.

According to most studies, people's number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that sound right? This means to the average person, if you go to a funeral, you're better off in the casket than doing the eulogy.

-- Jerry Seinfeld

small medium and large

available at fine retailers everywhere, originally uploaded by McBeth.

You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

-- Mark Twain

ten inches deep

scarletta's snow day, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Worry is as useless as a handle on a snowball.

-- Mitzi Chandler

preferences

anticipation, originally uploaded by McBeth.

We do not belong to those who only get their thought from books, or at the prompting of books, -- it is our custom to think in the open air, walking, leaping, climbing, or dancing on lonesome mountains by preference, or close to the sea, where even the paths become thoughtful.

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Test

This is a test

stillness in action

meditation, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Activity conquers cold, but stillness conquers heat.

-- Lao Tzu

those lessons are finally paying off

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

don't hold back

buffalo pilgrim, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.

-- William Arthur Ward

close your eyes. listen.

This song is a childhood memory that surfaces from time to time. My older sister was in the Luther College Nordic Choir, as was my uncle Buzz. When I was young I dreamed about being in Nordic. I used to hit that soprano 1 note 4:23 in. But never ever will anyone be able to direct it like Weston Noble directed it. He was a elf of a man, slightly built and quiet. With Weston you got huge direction from his barely-there direction. It was like a magic trick you thought you'd see coming but each time you'd be surprised all over again. I say this like I know him well, ha. I did participate in a few choral events under his direction in my pre-college days. I didn't know him well and wasn't his student per se, but he knew my family and was so kind to the weird kid I was so, believing he took a special liking to me, I took a special liking to him too.

Each time I saw this piece performed by Nordic it was at the beginning of this song that I remember Weston's slim frame sort of hunched over forward as though burdened, or tired. Then, as the song unfolded he'd physically open up, raise his spinal colum, raise his chin, his arms, widen his posture until the shivery place there at the end of the piece, each time, when I realized I had just watched a man transcend.

it is coming

first of the season, originally uploaded by McBeth.

There is no terror in a bang, only in the anticipation of it.

-- Alfred Hitchcock

clarity

vanilla sunshine, originally uploaded by McBeth.

This is the mysterious world which is available to you if you can pass the jungle of questions and doubts and reach into the clear, where there are no questions and doubts, and no answers either. Just you are in utter silence, with immense clarity, with tremendous sharpness.

-- Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh

how does this thing work

bus stop, originally uploaded by McBeth.

We are forced to participate in the games of life before we can possibly learn how to use the options in the rules governing them.

-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

it's not so bad

fork it over lady, originally uploaded by McBeth.

I bring to my life a certain amount of mess.

-- Kitty O'Neill Collins

for so many, the beginning of prayers answered

looking up, originally uploaded by McBeth.

The V is for vote

winds of change, originally uploaded by McBeth.

It might not hurt to take advantage of early voting by stopping by your local place where voting can be done (for me, it was the local town municipal building) and just get it done without lines, and in peace.

Knowing I took care of the important-est business I can now either pay attention or not for the next week.

Please vote.

they did it with bras, we can do it with bills

kd and mom, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Mom spent the better part (or worse, depending on how you want to fill that particular glass) of this past summer either in hospital or in rehab center following a full knee replacement and a (hello St. Mary's Hospital? Yeah, this one is for you...) a seriously ugly major medical error in having given mom meds that she was known to be allergic to, as in meds listed on the charts as big hairy no-nos. As in, meds the intake nurse and the anesthesiologist and the other nurse and those other people all talked with her about, both pre- and post-surgery. Each person who went over her chart with her talked about medication allergies and this particular one came up repeatedly in discussions. I was sitting there, people. She might not have remembered much through that month but I kept a handy little notebook into which I jotted down the particulars, including the name of the doctor who authorized the panic. Just for fun I think it'd be a hoot to have the individual who made that landslide decision and all the short-tempered staff we had to deal with following the breakdown be fed enough of whatever pills could induce psychosis so they also are able share in the heartfelt experience, the joy of being even more unwell and in way less manageable ways. Please don't misunderstand, there were some very very kind and patient staffers, particularly nurses, who provided care for mom and who took the phone calls from her children, and the repeated questions and the follow-ups and the follow-up follow-ups. I would like to thank you few for the work you do. You are underpaid and vastly under appreciated, and I want you to know I saw the support you offered my mother and my family is grateful to you.

I've heard that people can die by hospital error and frequently do, while hospitals still don't have to assume responsibility for making a person be dead. In fact, 18 patient safety indicators evaluated contributed to $9.3 billion excess charges and 32,591 deaths in the United States annually.

I think that sucks. Yes of course it's true that users and malingerers exist, people who want to swing from someone else's coin purse. But I just want to say here to the collective staff -and specifically, to the billing department, who probably only ever handles the credits and debits- at St. Mary's Hospital in Madison Wisconsin, who has been sending bills, including charges for the week of care they provided to my mother after they had to re-admit mom from a rehab center when she took that drastic allergic reaction downturn: My mother isn't one of those malingerers. She was merely trying to get healthier while in your care, and you broke her. After the insurance payments shake out she may have some out of pocket expenses for her first few days there, but as for the time and charges for the time following that mistake you made? You can eat that one.

She came out alive. You were lucky.

All this is to say, my mom is smiling and walking and is much more mobile with her new bionic knee. Not everything is easy to do yet, but not everything was ever easy to do. She's healthier, fitter, and looking sassy here on my brother's wedding day.