another one of those songs I FEEL

Let my inspiration flow
in token lines suggesting rhythm
that will not forsake me
till my tale is told and done

While the firelight's aglow
strange shadows in the flames will grow
till things we've never seen
will seem familiar

Shadows of a sailor forming
winds both foul and fair all swarm
down in Carlisle he loved a lady
many years ago

Here beside him stands a man
a soldier by the looks of him
who came through many fights
but lost at love

While the storyteller speaks
a door within the fire creaks
suddenly flies open
and a girl is standing there

Eyes alight with glowing hair
all that fancy paints as fair
she takes her fan and throws it
in the lion's den

"Which of you to gain me, tell
will risk uncertain pains of Hell?
I will not forgive you
if you will not take the chance

"The sailor gave at least a try
the soldier being much too wise
strategy was his strength
and not disaster

The sailor coming out again
the lady fairly lept at him
that's how it stands today
you decide if he was wise

The storyteller makes no choice
soon you will not hear his voice
his job is to shed light
and not to master

Since the end is never told
we pay the teller off in gold
in hopes he will come back
but he cannot be bought or sold

GRATEFUL DEAD - "Terrapin Station: Lady With A Fan" lyrics

Volunteering for the animals

Well, I have decided to get involved in volunteering at the Kokomo Humane Society. I know what you're all thinking...I'm going to end up with 5,000 pets at home after it's all said and done. Maybe you're right, but I'm going to try to control myself.

My inspiration behind this decision has been a book called "The Man Who Talks to Dogs." A friend of mine from St Louis gave it to me for Christmas, and I can't get it out of my mind.

The book is about a man who has taken the strays of St Loius and given them some hope. He has set up several programs for adoption, shelters that didn't exist, broken up large dog fighting rings, and has helped with the huge puppy mill problems in the big cities. His personal story of how a dog basically saved his life is very moving, but much too detailed to get into here.

I know we all have our own problems and families to take care of, but there are so many little things we can do to help the homeless and hopeless animals in our community.

Here are a few pictures of some of the sweeties in Kokomo waiting for homes right now. (I had to do that to tug your heart strings a little)


The program I'm mainly trying to get involved in is where you take a pet from the shelter to nursing homes or assisted living homes to visit patients and people who live in these places. (Ryan said "great, you'll bring home a ton of pets AND old people. You know you'll fall in love with everyone!") I have already gotten my dog Jerry involved in this type of thing here at work. He is a huge inspiration in his little wheelchair to so many patients at the hospital.

There are so many things that can be donated to help the shelter care for their animals. I posted a list of some of the things that are easy to get...just incase anyone is interested.



~ Blankets
~ Small Rugs
~ Collars (multiple sizes)
~ Leashes (this could also include harnesses, 'gentle-leaders', snap-off cat collars)
~ Towels and washcloths
~ Carpet pieces or small rugs
~ Non-clumpable cat litter
~ Dog and cat food
~ Purina Puppy Chow (because of their sensitive digestion system, we keep them on a consistant diet)
~ Grooming supplies (shampoos, brushes, combs, fingernail clippers,etc.)
~ Small animal pet food (rodent food, rabbit pellets, guinea pig pellets, bird seed, alfalfa or Timothy hay)
~ Aspen or Pine litter for bedding (NO CEDAR SHAVINGS, please)
~ Small animal cages (bird cages, small pet cages, aquariums)
~ Pet toys for cats
~ Larger pet toys for dogs (small toys and balls get down in drains)
~ Laundry detergent
~ Any other miscellaneous pet supplies YOU can think of !

Anyway, just keeping you up to date on my latest obsession. If anyone is interested in donating anything at all, or donating any time, let me know, and I will take care of dropping off any items, or getting any info you may need for any other interests about the strays and the shelter.

Good advice!!!

Dance like nobody is watching... live like there may be no tomorrow....

Tell everyone important to you that they ARE important to you...that you love them

Smile at the people we have lost and loved every day

Just some food for thought

"If people let the government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as the souls who live under tyranny." - Thomas Jefferson


"One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors." - Plato


"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty." - Ben Franklin


"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." - Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948)

"Wisest is he who knows what he does not know" -Plato

"If a man who cannot count finds a four leaf clover, is he lucky?"-Stanisalw J Lec

"when the student is ready, the master appears"-Buddhist Proverb

"If you think you're free-there's no escape possible"-Ram Dass

"To learn something new, take the path you took yesterday"-John Burroughs

"By all means marry. If you get a good wife, you will be happy. If you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher, that's a good thing for any man."-Socrates



YOUR THOUGHTS?????

A New Year!!!

Hello All!!!!

Sorry it's been awhile since I've been online...I actually took some time off work...Yeah for me!!!

Anyway, not much exciting, except for the fact that another year has passed, and I'm STILL scraping wallpaper ( I mean LAYERS of wall paper) from the wall in my old bedroom.

So, does anyone have any big plans for the new year ahead? Nothing exciting to speak of from my end....no new dogs, no new roommates, no new husbands etc....

I did make a New Year's resolution which has gone pretty well so far. It's very simple...all I want to do is get my lazy butt out of my soft, cozy, warm, snuggly bed early enough to make it to work on time.....so far, so good....but don't hold your breath :-)

So, the Colts lost today....I think I better go home and have some wine to consol myself!! What a bummer after such a great season....and don't you all feel awful for Tony Dungy. He's going to have a lot more time on his hands and on his mind. What an awful thing for any parent to ever have to face.

On the up-side of things, we celebrated Grammy's 88th birthday this week!!! WOW!! Can you imagine everything you could see in that amount of time? I'm so thankful for Grammy and the whole family for that matter!! If it weren't for her, none of us would have eachother...she has built a beautiful family for us. It sounded as if Grammy really enjoyed herself this year. She partied hard until at least 10:30, because that's about when I left....what a woman!! Sorry I missed the rest of the family. But you all know me...I'm always the last one to arrive:-)

I guess that's it for now. I appologize for the lack of interesting content....just wanted to let you all know I'm still out here!!!

I found this picture on a website of strange pictures. I found both the picture and the story behind it pretty interesting.

Back in the 1800's, there was a convivted forger named A. Schiller who was a great artist. He was found dead in his cell with seven straight pins laying on his body. They all had a part of the Lord's Prayer etched into them. It was carved into the pins with a tool too small to be seen by the naked eye. There were six silver pins and one gold one, which was flawless according to the article I read. The Lord's prayer has 65 words and is 254 letters long. It took this man 25 years to finish his masterpiece, and he went blind due to his artwork. (The picture was taken at 500x zoom)

Bottom's up!!!

The School of Textiles and Design at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh have begun what is believed to be the world's first-ever study on how women's clothing affects the bottom(AFP/Illustration)

OK, so this is a photo that caught my attention. Wish my cheeks were that smooth!!!

Happy 2006!!!!

Well, 2006 is officially under way. It's pretty hard to believe another year has passed. Time seems to go so fast anymore...now I know what all the "old folks" meant when they used to tell me that time goes faster and faster every year. Doesn't it seem like it was just yesterday that everyone was freaking aut about the new millenium???? Now, here we are, six years later......

Anyway, I hope everyone had a great New Year celebartion. Our trip to Kentucky was a blast!! When I figure out how to work my nice new camera, I'll post some pictures from the show.

The concert Friday night was enough to bring in my new year, but we still made the trip to St. Louis as well to visit some friends. Three days later, I'm still recuperating from a crazy weekend.

Before the show Friday night, we met up with Dave and Kelly ( a couple friends we met at Hookah shows) in Newport and had dinner and just hung out at the hotel. Eric Lanese (the drummer & my guilty pleasure) came and hung out with us before the show!!! It was so nice to actually have him in our room where we could have a decent conversation rather than a quick "hello, how've you been...e-mail me" type thing. We tried to get him drunk, but he was being a "good boy." (Those are his words) I would never call Eric a good boy :-) Nevertheless, we got some good quality time in before the booty shakin' began. That made my day...if not my year!!!

The show was very bitter sweet. It was great to be up in front of the boys one last time. The energy from both the stage and the crowd was out of this world!! I ran into several friends I have met through our travels following the Hookah boys, so that was nice. They played for about three hours, and closed with an encore covering "Don't Fear the Reeper." Who would've ever seen that one coming?!?!? Not this girl!!! There were tons of people in the audience screaming "more cowbell!!!" It was hilarious. I wish I could figure out how to put all my feelings into words, but the situation is still so fresh in my mind...I need more time to think...It's hard work, you know!!

Our trip to St. Louis was fun also. The drive was rough after only about three hours of sleep, but Ryan is a champ. He drove the whole trip and I slept quite a bit.

We arrived in St. Louis at about 2:30 Saturday afternoon. So, we were there for just over 24 hours...but it was worth it. We stayed with our friends Jeff and Karen...both wonderful people. We went to Jeff's parents' house on New Year's Eve for the annual family get-together. It's only the second year I have gone with Ryan, yet I feel right at home with all these new faces. Jeff's family considers Ryan one of their own, so I have come to accept them as part of our extended family. We had a lot of fun playing shuffel board, ping pong, drinking, eating, and well, lots of other stuff...maybe I'll remember more details later...who knows!!!

Hope everyone had as much fun as I did bringing in the new year!!

The Final Treck

Well, the time has finally come to officially say goodbye to my boys.......Hang on while I grab a tissue.

Anyway, tomorrow night, at about this time, I will be shaking my booty for the last time to Ekoostik Hookah as I know them. Their last show is actually new year's Eve, but due to other plans, I will not be there. However, Ryan and I are leaving in the morning for Newport, kentucky where they will play their last show at the Southgate House.

Going back to Southgate House alone is exciting for me. I have continued to dream (literally) about this place on a pretty regular basis since seeing Hookah play there last year. I had a blog entry about Southgate House and how it constantly haunts
my mind a few months ago...I think I called it "dreams." So, it should be interesting to see if this visit raises as many questions in my head. I have done a little research since I was there last year, and hope to get some more answers to this bizaar obsession of mine. I plan on taking plenty of pictures with my new digital camera that Santa brought me, so hopefully I can capture some of its eeriness to share with all of you.

It is going to be a very bitter sweet evening. It's exciting as always knowing that I have another show right around the corner, but that will all be done and gone after tomorrow night. I'm not usually a softy about things, but it will be rough to hold back the tears at the end of the show. I feel like I'm losing a big piece of my heart. I know it may sound rediculous to some people who have never been in my shoes, but for those of you who have, I'll take all the sympathy I can get.

I have been reassured that my one big fear will not happen. That is losing touch with these guys. I have come to call them my friends over these last few years of following them. Eric and I have been in touch several times, and although he doesn't have any other side bands right now, I think we'll manage to hang out and keep in touch. I've also talked to Cliff, the bass player, and he will be moving to Colorado this spring. Ryan and I already have his address, so hopefully, we'll be able to keep in touch with him as well.

As for the rest of the guys, I guess that remains to be seen. We plan on following them in all their future endeavors, wherever that may lead. We will definitely be following Johnny and Ed with their new band One Under. ( oneunder.net ) The way I'd like to look at it is....this just means more shows for us in the future. Maybe Eric will join us for a few.

So, as I end my year with my favorite band, and my favorite man, I wish you all the best in the new year.

Thank you all for being so kind and making such a wonderful difference in my life. i would be lost without my family and friends..........................I came for the music..............I stay for the family.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

back in 1942

Back on this day, December 22nd, 1942, there was a very wonderful person brought into this world.

Jack Robert Simmons 1942-1998

He would have been 63 years old today. It's impossible to not think of Dad on this day every year, which is a good thing, because he always makes me smile.

He always told me that smiles and laughing were contagious. With Dad around, that was always true!!! He was one of the most jovial and positive people to anyone who ever knew him.

On this day, I hope everyone will smile at my dad just like I do every day. He would be happy to be responsble for putting another smile on our faces one more time.

I LOVE YOU DAD.......and I pray you are at peace............

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

MERRY
CHRISTMAS
EVERYONE!!!!!!

MY MOTTO FOR GOOD OL' ST JOE

WE, THE WILLING,
LED BY THE UNKNOWING,
ARE DOING THE IMPOSSIBLE
FOR THE UNGRATEFUL.

WE HAVE DONE SO MUCH
FOR SO LONG
WITH SO LITTLE,
WE ARE NOW QUALIFIED
TO DO ANYTHING
WITH NOTHING.

need a good laugh?

Make sure you turn the volume up for this one.

Maybe I'm just plain silly, but I laughed so hard, I almost peed (or tinkled..for Andrea) my pants when I saw it!!!

You will need to scroll to the top of the screen when it comes up. For some reason, I can't figure it out otherwise.

http://www.funnyjunk.com/pages/cat.htm#tell

Hope it puts a big smile on your face!!!

stuff that annoys me!!!!

Stuff that Annoys Me!
1.People who point at their wrist while asking for the time. I know where my watch is buddy, where the hell is yours? Do I point at my crotch when I ask where the bathroom is?

2.People who are willing to get off their butt to search the entire room for the TV remote because they refuse to walk to the TV and change the channel manually.

3.When people say "Oh you just want to have your cake and eat it too". Screw off. What good is a cake if you can't eat it? What, should I eat someone else's cake instead?

4. When people say "It's always in the last place you look". Of course it is. Why the hell would you keep looking after you've found it? Do people do this? Who and where are they?

5.When people say, while watching a movie "Did you see that?" No idiot, I paid $9.00 to come to the theatre and stare at the frigging ceiling up there. What did you come here for?

6.When something is "new and improved", which is it? If it's new, then there has never been anything before it. If it's an improvement, then there must have been something before it.

7.When a cop pulls you over and then asks if you know how fast you were going? You should know a$$hole, you frigging pulled me over.

8.When people say "Life is short." What the hell?? Life is the longest damn thing anyone ever does!! What? Are they going to do something that's longer?

9.When people ask "Can I BORROW a piece of paper?" Sure, but please don't return the favor! It's one piece of paper!

10.When you are waiting for the bus and someone ask you "Did the bus come yet?" If the bus came I would not be standing here idiot!

11.People who ask "Can I ask you a question?" Didn't really give me a choice there, did ya buddy?

hugs

Isn't it nice when the day just isn't goin' right, and someone comes along and does something really nice for you?

I didn't do anything out of the ordinary, or go above and beyond my call of duty, but one of my patients just decided that I needed a hug today.

Whether he knew it or not, I really needed that hug...it's those little things that make a big difference in our lives every day.

So thank you to my thoughtful patient that made me feel better about the day.

LIFE IS GOOD

innovative..or just plain cruel???

OK, seems like it would work, but I'm not sure the kids need to learn the idea of multitasking so early.........any comments???????

women drivers suck...yeah, I said it!!

I think I must have come across all the idiots in Kokomo today on my way to work.

The route I take to work requires me to go through five stop lights. There were four old women drivers infront of me stopping at the green lights!!!!!!!!! Four out of five freakin' lights, I made unecessary stops at. Do you realize I could've clocked in about three minutes sooner if it weren't for these idiots? What the hell is wrong with these people?

I like to scream a lot in my car, but I try to be careful not to flip people off, because I might just have to x-ray that stupid old woman when I finally make it to work that day!!

Some days people just drive me crazy!!!

Where's my Klonopin when I need them?!?!?!?

be awake

Be awake
Love yourself
and be awake
-today, tomorrow, always.
First establish yourself in the way,
then teach others,
and so defeat sorrow.
To straighten the crooked
you must first do a harder thing
-straighten yourself.
You are the only master.
Who else?
Subdue yourself,
and discover your master.

May the Four Winds Blow you Safely Home

"May the four winds blow you safely home"................

These are lyrics that have gotten me safely home at least in my mind so many times......Thank you Robert Hunter for writing these beautiful words, and of course Thank you to Jerry Garcia, for putting his music with them to become the song.........Another collaboration that has touched me deeply.

Franklin's Tower

In another times forgotten space

Your eyes looked from your mother’s face

Wallflower seed on the sand and stone

May the four winds blow you safely home.

Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew

I’ll tell you where the four winds dwell

In franklin’s tower there hangs a bell

It can ring, turn night to day

It can ring like fire when you loose your way.

Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew

God save the child that rings that bell

It may have one good ring, baby, you can’t tell

One watch by night, one watch by day

If you get confused listen to the music play.

Some come to laugh their past away

Some come to make it just one more day

Whichever way your pleasure tends

If you plant ice you’re gonna harvest the wind.

Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew

In franklin’s tower the four winds sleep

Like four lean hounds the lighthouse keep

Wildflower seed on the sand and wind

May the four winds blow you home again.

Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
You’d better roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dew
Roll away the dewYou’d better roll away the dew - roll away.


PS This is the song I named my dog Franklin after...incase you care:-)

Fly in the toilet????

The following article from About was forwarded to me from a friend. Who knows if it's really true....but it sounds like a good idea to me!!!

You can see a better picture from this link:

http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_fly_in_urinal.htm

For more information on this topic, be sure to check out the Urban Legends and Folklore site.