What is Your Definition of Compassion?

 From the Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary, the definition is “sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress together with a desire to alleviate it.” That sounds like someone spent many years in therapy to come up with that one!

Compassion comes out of personal pain and frustration. If you were one of the lucky ones who got a date for the prom, how would you be able to understand the pain of never being asked? 

Well, for some folks it comes naturally. They “get it” without living that moment of pain or frustration. For others, they never “get it” and this is what I am writing about today.

Barbara Sher (author and speaker), uses a term, “infant narcissist.” When we are born, we are all one of these. As a child, all our needs are taken care of. We are dependent on adults for our survival, but as we grow, we move past that. Our need for connection plays a part in caring and wanting to help others, meaning, it isn’t all about us. 

We’ve all known or have met a person who just doesn’t understand that everyone else’s life doesn’t revolve around his/hers. President Donald Trump comes to mind. The narcissist lacks the compassion to understand that we all need understanding from one another.

In essence, we should be grateful for all the pain and frustration we’ve gone through in our lives. Because of it, we gain connection with each other. Compassion equals connection, and without it, we can’t be the caring human beings that most of us strive to be.

I’ve made many mistakes in my life, and I’ve hurt a lot of people in the process, much to my regret. When I did, it was because I lacked the compassion to understand the harm I was causing. As I've gotten older, my ability to feel compassion toward others has improved. I'm so thankful for that.

Due to all the traumatic events that happened in 2020, many people lost their ability to be compassionate. Lets hope that changes in 2021.

Until the next time...

Our 2020 Christmas Newsletter written by Miss Gracie (the Sheltie)

 

Dear Friends and Family,                                                   Christmas 2020

     This year's newsletter is being written by me, Miss Gracie, the Sheltie. My ancestors come from Scotland! My mommies let Fast Eddie write the last one (in 2018), so now it's my turn! You didn’t hear from us last year because we were all very busy with me.

     I turned one this past May! Oh, you may be wondering where I came from. Mommy Sharon found me at a pet shop in July of 2019, when I was eight weeks old. She looked in my face and said, “Hello Gracie”, so she had to take me home. She had told her friends that she would “never, ever buy a dog from a pet shop.” Oops!

     Talk about drama. She got me without talking to Mommy Mary first! But Mommy Sharon had to make a quick decision or someone else would buy me. There was a woman in the pet shop who asked Mommy Sharon, “Could I hold her for a minute?” Mommy Sharon said “No.” She knew I was already hers.

     Mommy Mary was working out-of-state (Massachusetts) and was facing a big deadline that day, so Mommy Sharon didn’t call her until after supper. When Mommy Mary returned home the next night, she loved me right away. Who wouldn’t? She said I belonged to the mommies and Fast Eddie and there was no sending me back!

     Fast Eddie, my Puggle-brother, turned 14 years-old in October. He pretends he doesn’t care about me, but he does. If one of the mommies takes me out without him, he starts barking and won’t stop until I get back. He loves me!!! And I love him too. He’s an old man, but he is healthy, and he can still run. (He’s FAST Eddie, after all).

     We are still living in our apartment. It’s on the third floor. My mommies complain all the time that they want a house with a fenced yard so they could just open the door to let us out. But they also say they are grateful to be here.

     Fast Eddie and I know there is this scary thing called “the pam-dem-ick.” Not sure I have that right. Anyway, it works out for us because the mommies are home all the time now. We love it!  We go out at least four times a day and sometimes even more. Mommy Mary is working from home so sometimes we have helpers to walk us.

     This year, Mommy Sharon is going all out decorating for Christmas. Last year, because I was still a small puppy, there weren’t so many decorations. They were afraid I would charge the tree or eat the ornaments. I don’t like it when things are moved or are different. Mommy Sharon says, “I have issues.” Especially when I chase birds and try to fly.

     We want to wish you all Happy Holidays and a wonderful happy, healthy, and prosperous New Year.

Mary, Sharon, Fast Eddie, and Miss Gracie

Woman with the "heavy" 30 lbs. Child (True Story)

 

This story is about an incident that I witnessed at my local post office this past week. Due to the mailing deadline set by the post office, there was a long line of customers. Everyone was being patient and respectful except for the woman with the 30 lbs. child.

She was ahead of me and I noticed two things. That she had a super-large shopping bag with gifts; and she was carrying a child (not a baby).

I did not give her further notice until I heard her raised voice. I looked over to the counter where she was. She had two packages wrapped in Christmas paper tied with red ribbon. No boxes and no brown wrapping paper within sight. She was shipping both out of the country.

There were labels to fill out and the postal employee politely asked her to move over to the empty window so that other people could be helped while the woman was filling out the labels. When she was done, she could come back to the window.

Scene 1: The woman said using a loud voice that she was being kicked out of line and she did not find that acceptable. At this point, she mentioned the 30 lbs. child and how heavy he was. She refused to move.

Scene 2: The postal employee again asked her to move to the empty window so that she could help others in line. The woman would not budge and started complaining of poor service.

Scene 3: The postal employee decided not to push it further and started the steps required for packages going out of the country even though the labels had not yet been filled out. As the postal employee was weighing the first package the woman turned the package around on the scale to get the address. Again, the woman mentioned the 30 lb. child she was holding and how heavy he was.  

Scene 4: The postal employee said she would no longer help her until what she needed from the woman was completed.

Scene 5: The woman said something to the postal employee that I did not hear. At this point, I heard the postal employee say, “You cannot talk to me like that.”

Scene 6: At this point things got a little crazy and the postal employee told her to leave the building and come back when she had the packages completely ready for shipping.

Scene 7: The woman said that no one in line was complaining. That was true, but I bet they all were in their minds, because I was having an entire conversation with that woman holding the “heavy” 30 lbs. child.

Scene 8: This was when I stepped up and said, “If I were arguing with the postal employee about the rules and holding you up, I bet you would have told me to move along.”

Scene 9: She looked at me like I was dirt on her shoes and said, “Stay out of this.” I gave her my best death stare that I learned from my own mother. She was not impressed.

Scene 10: The woman said to the postal employee, “Were you raised by wolves?” several times.

Scene 11: The woman said she was going to report her and asked for the postal employee’s name which she gave without hesitation.

Scene 12: Finally, after much muttering and head shaking, the woman left the building with her packages and her very heavy 30 lbs. child.

My Part 1: I got to the counter and asked the postal employee if she was okay. She said she was, but I could tell that she was shaken up about what had just happened.

My Part 2: We then proceeded to handle the mailing of my properly boxed package that was going to Massachusetts which was a lot less complicated than mailing internationally.

My Part 3: I do not know why I did this. When I left, I stopped at the entryway of the post office and I looked out at the parked cars. The woman was sitting in her car and not backing up. Was she cooling off? Or was she waiting for me?

My Part 4: So…I stayed put and waited. And waited… until she finally drove off.

My Part 5: As she drove off, I noticed that she was driving an expensive car. To my way of thinking, that explained one of the reasons she acted “so privileged” throughout the scene in the post office. I would not be surprised if throwing fits was her way of getting whatever she wanted.

My Part 6: Two days later (there was a snowstorm in between) I went back to the post office with a stack of Christmas cards and a small gift bag for the very harassed postal employee. I had included my contact information in case she needed a witness to the incident if the woman followed through with her threat to file a report.

It’s a tense time of year, especially this year. Choose to take a breath and realize everyone is just trying to do a good job. Don’t take your frustrations out on others.

Until the next time...

Hitting a gas pump...

 {This is a true story of my adventure moving to New Hampshire in March, 2018 while driving a rental truck.}

Well…we finally made the move to New Hampshire, and of course, there was drama. For those who don't know me, if there wasn’t some sort of drama in my life, then it means I'm dead. Drama has followed me gleefully since I was a baby.

As we did when we moved up to Northampton, Massachusetts 14 years ago, we rented a truck to take our possessions to our new home and I was the designated driver.

When I was describing to the Penske Representative how much furniture and stuff we owned, I over estimated. It was suggested that I rent a 26’ truck and I said, “Why not?” Oh, such a big mistake. I should have rented a 22’ and things would have turned out so much better than they did.

When I picked up the truck, I couldn’t believe how BIG it was. It looked like a mini-version of an 18-wheeler. Holy crap! There were two steep metal steps that I had to climb to get up into the cab. Yikes!

I joked to friends that my driving a large rental truck up I-91 would result in my appearing on national news. And before my trip was over, that came very close to being true.

One of the men that I hired to help load up the truck, backed it out onto the road for me (he is also the one who pulled it in to the driveway) so I could begin my trek. I couldn’t tell if the transmission was in “Drive” or at a lower gear because I couldn’t get it to go above 25 miles an hour. Since the State Patrol Headquarters was nearby, I stopped for instructions. The Trooper was very kind and helpful. I had been in “Drive” the whole time!

My next issue was accelerating and keeping it at about 50 miles an hour. It was a struggle and scary as hell. I stopped at the Vermont Visitors Center and had a nice chat with a driver of an 18-wheeler. The best advice he gave me was to keep the headlights on and to use the flashers if my speed went below 50. A two-hour trip took four hours as I rumbled up I-91 at 35 miles an hour using the flashers the entire time.

My next hurtle: Up near Exit 6 on I-91 (VT), there is a bridge that has been under construction forever. It is a one-lane nightmare. I've seen 18-wheelers barrel through that section so I know it can be done. But not by me. I drove very slowly, between 5 to 10 miles an hour. I was so afraid of having an accident and blocking traffic for hours. Thankfully that did not happen. Right after the bridge is a steep hill which requires momentum to climb it which I didn't have, so the truck had to crawl up the hill, while cars went speeding by.

Mary had done some research in finding a local motel where we could keep the truck overnight with easy access into and out of their lot. I woke up on that fateful Tuesday morning to find the truck covered in snow from a blizzard. Schools and businesses were closed for the day. Could it get any worse?

We were concerned that due to the storm we wouldn’t be able to have the truck unloaded. The movers (Robert and Mark) that I had hired from Daniels Moving and Storage were wonderful. With the snow falling heavily, they continually swept off the ramp. There were many times that they ended up sliding down the ramp carrying our beloved possessions into our new home.

After six hours of unloading, it was time to return the truck, thank goodness! The night before, Mary and I had searched for a gas station near the drop off point and we found a Sunoco. If I didn’t return the truck with a full fuel tank we would have been charged $8 a gallon! In retrospect, that would have been a much wiser way to have gone.

There were two driveways to enter the station and I took the first one which put me and the truck too close to parked cars in front of the station. I was so worried about the cars as I was rounding the pump, that I wasn’t making a wide enough turn. Then I heard a GIANT CRUNCHING sound. OMG! I hit the gas pump. Crap!

I immediately turned off the engine, and ran into the station saying, “Call 911! I just hit a pump!” My main concern was that an explosion could happen, and all the people at the station could be hurt. No one seemed concerned. The staff just shut down all the pumps. I could see heads popping up as people realized there was no gas being pumped into their tanks. The pumps were slowly turned back on and when they got to mine, they just left it off.

I insisted that the police be called. My first encounter with the local Police Department started off badly. I addressed the individual as “Officer” and he informed me that he was a Corporal. Yikes! I almost rolled my eyes, but I don’t look good in orange and didn’t want to go down that path. 

The Corporal then asked for my personal car insurance card, which I’ve never carried on me and probably should. I just stared blankly at him. All I could think of was that I was not driving my car. I was driving a monster of a truck which I definitely didn’t have an insurance card for.

He then called Dispatch and asked them to verify the Indiana license plates. He informed me that they weren’t showing up in the system. Oh God, could this nightmare get any worse? 

I showed him my Penske paperwork and he called them to verify it was their truck. (What did he think? That I had stolen it and painted the Penske logo on it during the night?)

He explained the situation to the Customer Service Rep who informed him that the limited liability coverage I had paid for only covered damage to the truck and not to property. And, a gas pump is considered property. Yikes! It just kept getting worse.

I tried calling my Insurance Company in Massachusetts, but due to the snow storm, they were closed. Their recorded message said to call their Insurance Claims Department, which I did. It seems that their office was closed as well. 

In the meanwhile, I had to return the truck and the office closed at 5 p.m. It was 4:30. I needed to get the infamous diesel or pay a late fee of $109. First, the truck was straddling the u-shaped metal protector at the end of the island.  It sure didn’t do a good job of protecting the pump.  

It was suggested that I move the truck and I just stared at the Corporal. He drove it over to the diesel pump. Sunoco staff couldn’t assist me with fueling the tank. Mary who had just come over from her office, volunteered to do it for me. The other option was to drive several miles to another gas station (the next victim) and seeing what damage I could do to their station.

The next morning, I called my favorite person at our Insurance Company back in Massachusetts.  I was informed that my policy didn’t cover damage that occurred while I was driving a rental truck.  She suggested that I call my credit card company. She knew that her credit card company covered accidents if the rental was charged on the card.

I then called my bank and was given the number to the Card Benefit Services where I had a lovely conversation with one their Customer Service Reps based out of Richmond, VA.

With my sense of drama and a touch of humor thrown in, I had her laughing about all I had experienced. I realized that the details of “the incident” would make a great monologue if I ever decided to be a stand-up comedian.

Unfortunately, she informed me that the policy to pay for damage when renting a vehicle applied only to cars but not to trucks or vans. Double shit! Well…it looks like Sunoco was getting a new gas pump thanks to my checking account. Could it get any worse?

Well folks, that old saying that “in every black cloud there is a silver lining” it's true in my case!

A week after “the incident” I heard from the Penske Claims Department. Sunoco had made a claim.  The Claims Adjuster called me for the details and I went into the saga of the whole event. She informed me that she would need to do some research and would get back to me and she did!

Penske would pay for the damage to the gas pump. The reasoning was that it was not a malicious act on my part and I was the driver of record on the rental policy when the "the incident" occurred -- hence I was covered. Amazing! 

P.S.  I am done driving rental trucks. In my lifetime, I have driven five of them and this last one did me in. For our next move, we will be using Daniels Moving and Storage again. They were the ones who unloaded our possessions in the freaking snow storm. They are my heroes. Plus, they know how to drive a moving truck!

Until the next time…

Life's Many Annoyances...There are So Many!

              

 I made up this list years ago while sipping a Latte on a snowy day!

·       Zero Chance of Rain – that’s what the weatherman said and it's raining cats and dogs!

·       Dusting – what’s wrong with leaving love notes on the furniture?

·        Colonies of Dust Bunnies – can’t they find somewhere else to live? 

·       Making the Bed –is it really necessary to do every day?

·        Dental Flossing – every night?

·       Exercise – bad for one’s health!

·       Folding Undies – what's wrong with just throwing them in the drawer?

·        Trimming Nails – especially toe nails, hard to reach!

·       Shaving Legs – Hobbit toes anyone? Plus, what's wrong with the braided look???

·       Getting ready for bed – why does it take so long?

·       Missing Socks – where did they move to?

·       Ironing – there is a good reason for cotton, a good shake and you are off and running!

·       Selecting Clothes – what to wear to work ??? – having a uniform when in grade school made life so much easier!

·       Showing up on time to meetings, events – not a problem, I’m consistently late!

·       “Can you hear me now?” –  isn’t that what satellites are for?  

·      Umbrellas – own three but they are never where I and the rain are!

·       Pulling Weeds – they grow faster than my plants do, why?

·       Stop Signs – especially the 4-way ones, what happens if everyone goes at once?

·       Not finding a State Patrol Officer when some creep is following you - yikes!

·       Finding a State Patrol Officer when you are going over 80 mph!

·        And, doing chores, where's the fun in that?

Until the next time...

Biden Won -- Not Trump

 

The first thing I do every morning when I wake up, is to access CNN from my iPhone. After what I read on November 22, 2020 (see opinion piece below) about Trump’s latest antics, it made me so angry. Trump is not willing to admit that he lost the 2020 election. The numbers do not lie. Joe Biden actually won with a convincing electoral college victory and a popular vote of over 78 million votes. The most votes of any presidential candidate in history.

What does Trump do? He sends out lawyers and his henchman, Rudy Giuliani, to make accusations of voter fraud with no evidence to prove it. So many courts have thrown out the lawsuits that have been submitted to the court systems in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Georgia, to name a few.

====================

 Opinion by Richard Galant, CNN

Updated 9:28 AM ET, Sun November 22, 2020

“Addressing the former New York City mayor, who was parroting Trump's lie about massive voter fraud, US District Court Judge Matthew Brann posed a devastating question at the hearing on Tuesday.”

"You're alleging that the two individual plaintiffs were denied the right to vote. But at bottom, you're asking this court to invalidate more than 6.8 million votes, thereby disenfranchising every single voter in the Commonwealth. Could you tell me how this result could possibly be justified?"

On Saturday, November 20, 2020 the judge effectively answered his own question by dismissing the lawsuit and saying, "this Court has been presented with strained legal arguments without merit and speculative accusations...and unsupported by evidence."

====================

On Saturday, November 13, 2020 Joe Biden was declared the winner of the 2020 election. What was Trump doing? Playing golf. He has reportedly been on the grounds of his golf courses or played golf elsewhere 299 times since becoming President in 2017. Pretty impressive record. That will look good on his resume.

What will not look good on his resume is this latest debacle. A grown man (questionable) is throwing a hissy fit, making baseless claims about massive voter fraud because he lost an election. He is not able to act dignified (he never does), and congratulate President-Elect Biden on his win. Why can’t he do this? According to him and his posse he won the election by losing over six million votes to the other guy. 

He doesn’t know how democracy works. He never committed to a peaceful transfer of power. Does that sound like democracy? More like Fascism or a dictatorship. Is that what his followers voted for? Then they don’t know what democracy is either.

Democracy: “a) government by the people esp. rule of the majority  b) a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections.”

Autocratic leadership is just the opposite of democratic. These leaders tell others exactly what they want done – and assume full responsibility for the results. There is no consultation. The leader speaks and expects absolute obedience.

Whoa, “the leader expects absolute obedience”. What does that sound like? Trump wants to be the “King of America” and not the “President of America.” That is not what millions of Americans fought wars for and lost their lives to protect all of us so we could live in freedom and make our own choices.

Home of the Free – Because of the Brave 

Remember when Trump called Senator John McCain a loser because he was captured by North Vietnamese soldiers in 1967? McCain endured being a prisoner of war until 1973. He was a hero and not a loser. Trump discredited the work of real American heroes (as he recently called many members of our military, losers), just as he now seeks to tear down the workings of democracy. 

In the Washington Post, Paul Waldman put it starkly. "No president in American history has ever before spent the end of his time in office trying to discredit our democracy, degrade the federal government, and set Americans against each other," Waldman wrote. The Republicans, "are finishing the Trump presidency the way they started it, with a show of complicity and cowardice."

When historians write about all the corrupt polices that Trump and the Republicans stood by during 2017 through 2021, the word “democracy” will not be used to describe what we have lived through these past four years.

Update: (CNN) “On November 23, 2020 General Services Administration has informed President-elect Joe Biden that the Trump administration is ready to begin the formal transition process, according to a letter from Administrator Emily Murphy sent and obtained by CNN. The letter is the first step the administration has taken to acknowledge President Donald Trump’s defeat, more than two weeks after Biden was declared the winner of the election.” BUT Trump has not conceded because he still thinks he won the election. Really??? 

   

What is Family?

Fam′ i-ly n. the members of one’s household; close relatives; a social unit, such as a tribe; a related group, as of certain plants or animals (from Webster’s Pocket Dictionary, 2002 Edition).

Since I was a small child of six or seven, I have been on the hunt for a family to belong to. Yes, I had two people in my life whom I called Mommy and Daddy, but we were not a “family.” We were three humans living under the same roof and remained that way until my father died when I was 17. Life improved somewhat after his death, but I still felt that my mother and I did not constitute a “family.”

My vision of a family was a group of people consisting of parents, grandparents, siblings and their girlfriends or boyfriends, aunts, uncles, multiple cats/dogs, and a picket fence. Events such as: births, christenings, graduations, weddings, funerals, family reunions, and celebrating the holidays with huge dinners and lots of presents, were part of the picture.

This was not true in my case. We never invited over to the relatives for the holidays, nor did we go to any of their houses to celebrate. When I asked, “why?” I was told that Daddy’s relatives lived in Philly out on the East Coast, which was too far away to travel. And since we never visited them, I thought that the East Coast had to be another planet, far, far away from Nebraska.

While I was attending the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, I latched on to anyone who would invite me to their house for the holidays. I was never happier, even though I wasn’t part of their family. It was always such a wonderful time plus there was great food to boot!

In my mid-twenties I got married (ex-husband #1) and thought, finally I’m in a family. No such luck. I just didn’t fit in with them. They were my first experience with a large group of people who were members of  a “dysfunctional family." That was truly a mind blowing experience! First time in my life, when I thought I might be "normal."  Both ex-husbands' (2 & 3) families were better, but I never developed a history with them so it still didn’t feel like "family" to me.

So when Mary came into my life with a large family, I thought bingo! How lucky could I get? Unfortunately, her family decided not to have contact with us. We were sad over their decision, but we moved on and created our own family.

Our family consists of Fast Eddie and Miss Gracie (our four-legged fur children), some amazing friends, and of course, we have each other. What more could one ask for? Life is good!

Until the next time...

 

Masks - Why Not?

 

Face masks are part of the daily patter of words we hear over and over these days: COVID-19; pandemic; fatality rate; flattening the curve; social distancing; ventilators; stay-at-home; lockdown; quarantine; and essential vs. nonessential businesses and services.

When the virus outbreak first started in China, what I saw on the news was that everyone there was wearing masks. When the virus arrived here in the U.S., we were told masks weren’t helpful. We were told that washing your hands and not touching your face plus social distancing would help stop the spread of the virus.

On Friday, April 3, 2020, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urged all Americans to wear masks when leaving their homes. Those masks are not the medical or surgical grade that hospital and emergency workers would need to stay safe while administering to the sick and dying.

Then we have Trump who said, “With the masks, it is going to be a voluntary thing.” He also said, “Wearing a face mask as I greet presidents, prime ministers, dictators, kings, queens – I don’t know,” he added, though he stopped receiving foreign dignitaries weeks ago. “Somehow, I just don’t see it for myself.”

When a person is presenting no symptoms of a disease, yet has the disease that is called being asymptomatic. And that’s a problem. There are people wandering around who do have the virus, but show no symptoms of it. Instead, the virus just moves to the next person and feeds off that person's lungs. If an asymptomatic person is wearing a mask, then that person's “droplets” would not jump over to someone else’s lungs. 

How do you know if you are the one spreading the virus? You don’t. Current testing for the virus is only happening to individuals who are exhibiting a high temperature, dry cough and shortness of breath. Unless you are the President then you can get treated with drugs that the general public doesn’t have access to and that cost around $100,000.

Where do those who are not in the medical field find masks? Well, I tried a number of cloth masks that neighbors and through friends whose family members were making them. They just didn't fit right. It was especially a problem when I heard that masks should be dried in the dryer. All that did was make the masks even smaller!

Recently, I was shopping (a rare event), looking for a sympathy card, when I saw a table of masks. So many different choices. I wanted to get it right this time. Well...I found a company called Ocalm. I bought my first package of five masks and went home. Hallelujah! 

I went online and ordered another two packages (10 masks). I was impressed with their quickness in letting me know that: they received my order; they were packing my order; they shipped it and included an easy-to-use tracking link. Plus they replaced one of the masks that had a defective loop. Wow! Check them out at: www.o-calm.us

By the way, in the early days of the pandemic during his press conferences, Trump’s staff members were seen standing less than six feet from one another. Could their reasoning have been that the virus was not contagious to Republicans and only to members of the Democratic party?

Then came the super-spreader Rose Garden event to introduce the nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court in late September. I guess there must have been Democrats present and that is how the President and his staff got it. Just kidding!

Trump also suggested his getting the virus in early October happened during a ceremony to honor fallen soldiers. He said it was from the Gold Star Families that he met at that event and not at the Rose Garden event. More likely he already had COVID-19 and he exposed those military families to the virus.

Another one of my favorites - Trump also believed that Hope Hicks caught the disease from “people from the military and law enforcement” who keep wanting to hug him and his team (which included Hope Hicks).” REALLY? My experience is that military and law enforcement are not the “hugging type” especially while on duty which these individuals he mentioned would have been.

Thankfully, President-Elect Biden, realizes that we need a consistent message and plan from our government on how we should conduct ourselves during this horrific crisis. I personally feel that the Trump administration never got a clue as to how to handle this pandemic other than to say, “it is rounding the corner.”

As of November 15, 246,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 and there are over 11.1 million cases. Just wear a mask…wash your hands… and stay a minimum of six feet from others to save lives.

========================

Until the next time...stay safe.

 

 

 

 

You are a New Englander....

If any of these witticisms from Jeff Foxworthy hit home, you live or have lived in New England:

 

v If someone in a Home Depot store offers you assistance and they don't work there;

v If you've had a lengthy telephone conversation with someone who dialed a wrong number;

v If vacation means going anywhere south of New York City for the weekend;

v If you measure distance in hours;

v If you know several people who have hit a deer more than once;

v If you have switched from 'Heat' to 'A/C' in the same day and back again;

v If you can drive 75 mph through 2 feet of snow during a raging blizzard without flinching;

v If you design your kid's Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit;

v If the speed limit on the highway is 55 mph you're going 80 and everybody is passing you;

v If driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with snow;

v If you've worn shorts and a parka at the same time;

v If you know all 4 seasons: almost winter, winter, still winter, and road construction;

v If you have more miles on your snow blower than your car;

v If you find 10 degrees "a little chilly";

v If you think everyone else has a funny accent.