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cw - I meant the app. I have used laptops exclusively for years and am morphing into hybrids. My dd uses a tablet only. I haven't got there yet and may never. I am very slowly using my iPhone more. I agree smart phones and tablets are the direction for the future. I am amazed that R is using his smart phone more!!!

glad - I know there are solutions - even air purifiers I believe.

technie -another good reason for me not to display a pumpkin. I had a bear garbage raider earlier this year.
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Did you know black bears like pumpkins? I didn't until this fall. If you have a fall pumpkin display outside your house, the bears are calling. Several videos of them munching away on pumpkins! Just another item in the "don't attract the bears" list.

My nephew's wife had 3 pumpkins on her porch... then they were gone. My ring video shows 2 yearling cubs walking across the property...
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Oh it's still a desktop PC Golden, no way am I giving that up!
But it seems that more and more developers are focusing on the tablet and smart phone market, which IMO is making desktop navigation less intuitive. I tried for an hour to get some new desktop icons but there were so. many. steps. And in the end I just pinned the most used ones to the task bar instead. (Whatever happened to drag and drop?)

I think I've got the library working. I had to reauthorize adobe digital additions and I'll have to go back to downloading the books there before transferring to my e-reader... that's a bunch of extra steps that were eliminated with the cloud library app.
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Radon is more common than not here. A radon mitigation system is installed in the home and then not considered an issue. And the gases had been building up for four years since I rarely use the basement and it is sealed off with a door. I have never even opened windows.down there.

When the inspector placed the test I asked how often they come back positive at unacceptable levels. He said 2/3 of the time. Radon in the home I am selling, will find out about the new home today.

And in july, the state adopted new requirements for the testing and maintenance of the systems. Who knows if the test or system were in compliance.
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cw -No desktop!!!! Aaack!!!! I use my desktop. I haven't converted to Windows 11.

Radon, glad??? In the home you are considering buying? That's not good.
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And then a questionable radon test! The Rockies not at all uncommon, but buyer in the 80's maybe do not understand?

Going to check out carpet samples tomorrow to replace maybe 15 year old carpet.
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I picked up my new to me windows 11 computer this afternoon and I've been busy trying to figure everything out. One thing that is going to give me big headaches is the cloud library, there doesn't seem to be a desktop app option any more. I need to get my books downloaded to my PC and then transferred to my e-reader and I used to simply plug it in and click transfer, easy peasy. 😬


And I HATE the different emojis (does that look like a grimace to you?)
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No dialysis tech. Interviews were fair. Didn’t pass background checks. Made appts for the rest of the week at dialysis center. Get to know more of the local wino population.
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Drove in to work yesterday morning. In an airbnb three nights this week. Back home Friday. Should only need to do this twice more! Maybe once, depending on how it all comes together.
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Well, thank-you again for sharing your wisdom Golden.

Baby steps as they say.
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That's it, gershun - you can't and God doesn't expect you too. That's why He gives direction to, for example, guard your heart. If guarding your heart means limited or no contact so be it.

ETA
It took me a long time to understand and accept that.
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Becky: I do hope that one of the dialysis tech interviews will work out. Good luck.
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Golden, and that's just it. How can one be a conduit of God's love when one is feeling personal hurt?

I grapple with these feelings on an almost daily basis. It isn't just with my family either. My in-law's are impossible too. Everything is always on their terms. I learned this very early and avoid them.
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My answer via e-mail was"I haven't even thought about Christmas yet, I'll let you know down the road a bit"
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o m g .....
All these many years, I just now realized....
It's Puss In Boots,

Not Puss and Boots!

The last time I invited my sister, she said "I will pencil you in".

Ha ha ha, the very last time, ever!

The best answer could be: "We've made other plans".
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(((((gershun))))) You can't change them. And expecting them to change is likely unrealistic. It may be marginally possible but it is unlikely.

I think being less tolerant of toxic people is healthy, Setting boundaries with toxic people is healthy. Who on earth wants to go to dinner with people who put them down - again and again and again. Your sister who stays apart may be onto something. Maybe she doesn't enjoy those get togethers either and has established the necessary boundaries.

My mother wanted me and my sister to keep in touch. Well, it not happening. My sister is toxic to me and I have had enough of that for a lifetime.

Something I read recently in a devotional by Lysa Terkeurst.

"Love can be unconditional … but relational access never should be. And boundaries help us protect this. Boundaries help us keep ourselves together so we can be the people God has called us to be."

We need to set our relational access as appropriate to the behaviours of others. You don't have to go anywhere where you are made to feel uncomfortable. You have established that with your husband's family. You can set the same boundaries with your own family. There's nothing wrong with that. God says "Guard your heart".

Further quote by Lysa T

"We aren’t trying to protect ourselves FROM love. If we love, we will risk being hurt. But we are trying to protect ourselves FOR love. We don’t want to get so consumed with the pain and chaos of unhealthy relationship patterns that we become a carrier of human hurt rather than a conduit of God’s love."
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Oh I get it.. the first little whisper of THAT holiday brings up shudders here too.

How about my sister's fav tactic *the stall* : That date looks good at the moment - I'll let you know if anything de-rails us.

A 'soft' commitment while you file it under *later* for a week or two. Give yourself time for your boundaries to message you.
🙃
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I apologize for going on about my family. I guess it's this time of year that stirs everything up in me. The inevitable should I be there for Christmas? My sister threw out her invite early this year probably so people can't come up with "last minute" excuses why they can't come. Which leads me to think that none of us really enjoy being around each other. One of my sisters doesn't even make up an excuse. She just doesn't come or answer e-mails etc. I always wondered why in my mom's last letter to us before she died she said she hoped we would keep in touch with one another. She must have known we likely wouldn't.

The older I get the less easy it is for me to handle toxic people. So maybe people aren't getting worse, I'm just less tolerant. So I suppose that's on me.
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Gershun, I used to work with a lady who said her family played games like "Let's pick on A" or "Let's get B drunk!".

She decided one year to book a cheap package holiday. Cheap because while it was a lovely tropical place at other times, December had awful humidity & hardly any tourists or activities - but she enjoyed her alone time (safe from family & ex-family). The next year her adult kid wanted to come & a new tradition was born.

Send, clean-up at our events now come with risk of incontinence care clean-ups.

I am also weighing things up - if the past fond memories + FOG outweigh the known + potential problems.

What scenario would be the least worst.. 🤯
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Gershun, your family sounds un-nice. I wouldn't want to be around them.
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Becky, hope you can find another dialysis tech that you like.
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Send, I don't enjoy the whole sitting around a table making phony talk. Which is what it all is with my family. Inevitably, the embarrassing stories about me start. Really? Was I the only person in a family of eight that had humiliating things happen? No, I wasn't. But, seems like that's the big conversation starter. When I get quiet and look bothered by it, it escalates.

Oh, and the copious amount of alcohol that my family consumes. Probably the only way we tolerate each other. I personally nurse a glass of wine all night. And that brings up another thing with my family. The "let's get (fill in name) drunk." I've never understood the appeal of deliberating trying to get someone drunk. Not to mention letting said person get behind the wheel of a car after you've "gotten them drunk" Another form of ridiculing someone. My family has always enjoyed that.

I try to give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they've changed. But I'm still waiting. Hasn't happened yet. Maybe this year?
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Still no dialysis tech. I don’t like going to a center. Somebody has to take back and forth. That along with dialysis is tiring. I’m interviewing two people tomorrow. Hope I get lucky.
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On my mind, my 84 y.o. elderly friend is at a point that she should be in assisted living, but she can't afford it, and most of all, hates the "old folks homes," and she swears she will never go there. A social worker is talking to her son who lives in another state to get her into an senior apartment. That just makes her mad mad mad.

She has fallen many times, and was hospitalized recently for possible heat stroke. But she's made up her mind, she's not budging. She is mentally sharp as a tack so she gets the call the shot till the end.

This whole thing reminds me of a former forum member Elaine and her mom and how the mom met her end. Like my elderly friend, she also refused to leave her hoard packed home and ended up falling and not be discovered for days, then died in the hospital days later. I know my elderly friend knows this risk and she chooses it by staying in her home. As much as I worry for her, I will respect her choice.
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What has changed for me is that I cannot serve everyone anymore, and do not think I would be a very good guest or hostess.
My attitude and mood has changed, and you will never find me sitting at a table with everyone's face in their cell phones.
I think it's me, not everyone else.
I welcome the loneliness, after working out the alternatives in my head.
I don't need to be exposed to the tension in the room anymore.
And I sure cannot help clean-up after.
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TN Have a good trip to Pigeon Forge! Love to visit there but haven’t for several years. My Mom loved to go there for the quilt shows.
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TN, safe travels and good times for your trip.
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It's hard to always be the one doing the reaching out. I used to think email was the perfect way to connect but the younger generation doesn't do email it's all texting, and texts are pretty limited in length and depth.
And I'm more than willing to host family events but since I live a little off the beaten track my efforts have been met as if I live in Siberia... I'm just the old auntie after all and when the kids need to travel to visit family they are heading to their parents, not me.
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cwillie, I've found that if I'm the one who is mourning the loss of connectedness then I'm the one to do something about it (and I do miss it a lot as we all get older and go our separate ways). In this electronic age I'm assuming that your relatives can at least do email. If this is so, maybe ask each of them to submit info and pics of what they've been up to in the past month and then create a simple email "newsletter". You can start by sending everyone the same set of questions to answer. Even if only a few participate, others may eventually join in as they enjoy the connection and gentle encouragement. This can be done monthly or quarterly. I have a cousin in another state who I seldom see but his Christmas "card" is a printed "newsletter" of him and his partner's adventures for the year. I have another old friend who does the same. I really enjoy it, and especially the pictures. But email is still a great tool. It really does require 1 person to be the instigator or leader on the family togetherness front.
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My family isn't toxic, we've all just drifted apart and seemingly have almost nothing in common any more and I don't know what to do about it. If anything my ancestral family was too much in each other's pocket - almost daily phone calls, weekly get togethers. When we do meet up it's hard to connect because we haven't shared all those little daily parts of life that define who you are - this new kind of dynamic feels lonely.
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