Frank Maiello says “Freedom has nothing to do with the state of the world around you. you can be in a straight jacket in a rubber room and be free; yet on the other hand, you can be on a wide open beach on the ocean and be in a vision-stifled prison. the difference is created by the mind. if you’re free of the mind, you are free. if you’re captured by the limits made by the mind you are incarcerated. and yet, even if you’re apparently captured by those mind limits, you’re STILL free…because the limits are as illusory as a dream. do you see? you can be in a dream and swear you’re being chased by a tiger…whereas when you wake up, you realize there never *was* a tiger.  And so it goes.”  

My fave line from the movie Don Juan De Marco is when Depp says to Brando, the shrink (paraphrased):  “If you think I’m simply a delusional person in a mental institution, you have a limited perception of my reality.”

I seriously need to organize my library! Hmmm, by author name or topic?  After reading Sonia Choquette’s Walking Home, about her pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago, I searched my library for Shirley MacLaine’s 2001 The Camino, when she walked it. I figured it would be with all my MacLaine books. There are like 10 books and I couldn’t find any of them last night. I just now checked all the smaller bookcases in all the rooms and found them with the astrology books. The Camino was not with them. Time to organize the books.

RELATED: A list of my library books, dvds and cds

Jehovah Witnesses in the neighborhood! I made a new sign for my door. I added the definition since I’ve had girl scouts and church ministries ignore it and say they are not soliciting.  They have been told this by “those in authority.” They may think what they’ve been told is true.  With all due respect, if you are knocking on anyone’s door asking if they want to be involved in anything that requires their time or money, that’s soliciting..

Click the Text Message icon as if you’re going to send a message. On the top right you should see 3 vertical dots. Touch that, then you should see Settings in the list.
Open Settings > Notifications > Notification sounds

I used to hate when they began padding all the bras. It’s cool now because being older, there’s lots more wiggle room so I can make them point in all sortsa wacky directions if I want under a tshirt. My physical vehicle for this incarnation never fails to entertain and educate me.

Some loved ones just left, they were only here two days, but I was chomping at the bit! I love my family and friends but you have to not make me the first choice for a crashpad when you’re on vacation. I work from home. My work requires focus, solitude and quiet. While a guest is here, my business is on hold. It doesn’t matter if they’re in the other room or in and out on daytrips. It’s an interruption. It doesn’t matter how courteous, it doesn’t matter how much I love ya and wanna see ya, having a guest interferes with my work. You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here. I know you understand.

A friend got bit in the face by a dog. It broke the skin but does not need stitches.  A neighbor was walking two dogs and my friend bent down to pet them — she’d petted the big one before, but this time it bit her. Her last tetanus shot was over 10 years ago, remembering the helpful review I read on tetanus, I insisted she go to the doctor for one. I cleaned the bite and put Neosporin on it and bandaids over it to keep it clean until she could get to the doctor a few hours later.  She also got a round of antibiotics.   In 2007 I got bit by a neighbor’s dog. I wrote about that here http://horizonsmagazine.com/blog/?p=32661 so I knew we had to contact Brevard County Animal Services at 321-633-2024.  The dog owner walks them around my block about 8:00 each morning the next day I was going to ask her for her contact info.  Except she didn’t walk by the house the next day.  I took a walk around the block and didn’t see her, so I got in my car and figured I’d drive the route she likely takes the dogs on their walk.  I didn’t see her but asked another dog walker if he knew where she lived.  He did, so I knocked on her door.  Continue reading →

I just cleaned up the back porch, which I’ve been using as a gardening shed the past year. I let yard tools, work boots and overalls turn it into the mud room — until now. I moved the black wrought iron table and 3 chairs to the east side near the chimenea. I moved the rocker and one chair to the west side and made a reading nook for myself and a place for the tabletop charcoal grill. There’s a great breeze and now that I’ve been clearing my woods on either side the house, I have a new view of them. Now that I’ve reclaimed the back porch as living space, it might be time for new porch furniture. A love seat maybe, something to nap on. My uncle built this home for me 30 years ago, and it never gets old living here.

There are tons of loquats on the trees right now.  I’ve processed 3 gallons already and that was just from the bottom branches! I wash them, cut the stem off, score in half to remove the seeds and then store them in a gallon freezer bag. I spread them out on a baking tray so they freeze in one layer. That makes it easy to break off a chunk for a smoothie when ya want.

Last night I emergency pruned the mulberry tree. When the tree cutters cut it back radically in January, it shocked the north half of the tree. The south half was heavy with new branches, blossoms and fruit. The north half appears dead. I wanted to lighten her load while she recovers. the next day, a raccoon family helped themselves to the mulberries on the branches I cut! I hadn’t moved them from under the tree, so it was all piled up like a buffet for them. I snuck out front and cut 2 gallons of ripe loquats and tossed them onto the trail they would head back on. My gift to them!  Four days later, the entire tree blossomed into blossoms and fruit.