Looks like a good day

Here is another picture of our dream, the farm. This is a corner of the garden and you can see how high the West Texas wind has drifted the sand. (click on it to see, that's a four foot high fence) Lots of work here but it will be peaceful work. We look forward to that. Nice to hear from you Byron. You're probably right about this being easier than helping others with their problems but doing that gives my life meaning.


The defining characteristic of guarding alertness
In brief is only this:
To examine again and again
The condition of my body and mind.

Therefore I shall put this way of life into actual practice,
For what can be achieved by merely talking about it?
Will a sick man be benefited
Merely by reading the medical texts?

-Santideva, "Bodhicaryavatara"
From "365 Buddha: Daily Meditations,"

4/27/06 Thursday
I seem to be doing well this morning. It is a bright sunny day. Yesterday was cold with frost on everything in the morning.
I just got back from taking Cherie to work. Had chest pains on the drive back so I took a couple of aspirin to thin my blood. I would not be surprised if my arteries are plugging up because I eat allot of fatty stuff like bacon and don’t get to exercise much. Not a good combo. One of my hopes with moving to Texas is that it will help me, and Cherie for that matter, get back into shape. I miss the days when I outworked all my employees at my companies.

There is nothing scheduled today. I will call Fred because he mentioned he needed to get groceries and see if he is up to going today.
He is. Fred will call me after he has finished his laundry so I can take him shopping. I am running about a 6 on the Bob scale this morning. Hopefully that will improve. There is a slight headache but that’s not unusual. I am still on dial up so I suppose I better get used to it. It was nice to be able to have the high speed Wi Fi for free but that is the way of things. I think I will try to write some letters for Fred. One to Firestone and the other to the Ed Schmidt car dealership.

I just got back from taking Fred shopping. He is doing well and fairly energetic for being 89 with Emphysema. He bought me some pecan rolls and strawberries that were on sale. I always appreciate when he does things like this to say thanks for what I do. Cherie’s car is small so it is harder for Fred to get in and out. I will have to clean the trunk out to accommodate those I serve. Hope to hear from the dealership today. If I don’t I will go there and make myself known. Fred is putting away his groceries and I will take him to get his prescriptions filled next.
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It’s 1:30 now. It is frustrating to tire out so easily. I called Allen to see if he was up but apparently isn’t. Nothing unusual there. Fred told me that Barb let him know that the spot on her lungs was gone. She also said that Dixie is getting worse, yelling and screaming when she isn’t hiding. She is spending more time over at the pervert’s place drinking the coffee she isn’t supposed to have. I hate to see this but it is no surprise. Dixie is another of the thousands of women who were abused as kids and then through the rest of their lives in the sex industry. It is a sad portrayal of the consequences of that lifestyle. Is she a victim? Yes but! Yes but she must take some ownership in this. While she was a product of abuse she chose her life and continued making those choices though out that life. I have known many Dixie’s in my life. The girls who lived next door to me in Michigan had been abused by their father, who was sent to prison for it. Tina was wild and promiscuous as a teen and then became a stripper and everything else that goes with that world. I haven’t heard of her for fifteen years but the last time I saw her she looked double her age, worn and weathered.

Toledo can be a rough little city. We can claim some of the biggest scam artists this country has known. I helped liquidate the largest IRS seizure in their history. I wouldn’t be surprised if that has been surpassed. There was the Bell Beckwith investment scandal, Frankel, who embezzled hundreds of millions from the insurance industry, and most recent is Tom Noe who ripped off the State of Ohio for an estimated twelve million and counting. Now we are having a trial that has and will be shown on national TV. That is the Father Robinson murder trial. Here we have a Catholic Priest who is accused of murdering a nun in a ritualistic manner in the sacristy of the church located in a hospital. This happened twenty six years ago but is just now coming to trial. I doubt they will get a conviction this many years later and suspect some gung ho district attorney brought this up to make a name for himself.

Toledo is an old mafia town that is strategically located between Chicago and Detroit. Many of the old houses here have, or had, underground passageways that had been built to facilitate criminal activity and escape. There is still much going on here but rumors on the street say this is a retirement community for old mobsters now. I did business with a few. All legal stuff now through my liquidation company but still had to be careful. Right now Bob McCloskey, a city councilman who just resigned, is going to trial for accepting bribes. Everyone on the East side, where my companies were, knew he was on the take but he got things done and that was the bottom line. Corruption permeates this city. Perhaps I will talk of that when we are safely moved to Texas. Won’t do it here cause it would bring trouble. I left that life behind and intend to keep it there.
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In looking back through this journal I see I never completed telling how things went with Eileen. Social Security said that they no longer recognize common law marriages so she had no recourse there. With that Eileen just wanted to go home. It had demoralized her. I talked to her as we drove along telling her that she still needed to get official recognition as Glen’s common law wife from the state of Ohio. Eileen didn’t want to telling me “What good would that do? It won’t make a difference”. I explained that it would protect her from further harassment from Vera but that didn’t convince her.

Now there is 360 acres of land out in the Pennsylvania mountains that is in Glen’s name. Eileen has the paperwork on it but had presumed it would be gone. As we drove through the downtown streets Eileen asks “Where are we going”. As I pulled into a parking space I told her “This is the legal service’s office Eileen. I’m going to take you up and talk with them”. She didn’t have much to say then. I know it was kinda pushy but I also know she needs this.

We waited for a while before someone could talk with us. The lawyer or intern who interviewed us started asking Eileen questions about why she was there. She didn’t know what to say so I pretty much took over after telling the intern who I was. Once it was clear what the problem was she said the case would be referred to a “Pro Bono” lawyer. (That would be one who is working for free as a public service) Eileen will be contacted within ten days we were told. So that is what happened.

This is a picture of Sharon in the apartment we moved her to for protection after being attacked by one of the local crack addicts

Sharon called me today to let us know how the court case went with the guy who beat her up. Well the judge for her case is the same judge that is handling the Father Robinson case. That is a national media circus with television trucks parked all around the courthouse. Because of all this her case was continued. The wacko that beat Sharon up is now saying that Sharon had paid him $50.00 to beat her up so NPI would move her. He wouldn’t accept a plea agreement of one to five years so will take it to trial.
Here we are moving her. Waynes apartment is the one under the stairs. he is the next one I will get moved.

I told Sharon that was good news. “Why would you say that Bob, it means I have to go through this for a while” Sharon questioned me. I explained that when someone makes the courts go through a trial and does not accept a plea agreement they will get hammered. “That judge is a mean judge Sharon. He doesn’t mess around so he will give the whacko the maximum sentence he can” I reassured her. The whacko had called Sharon’s parents twice after the judge had sent an order to the jail that if he should call again he was to be placed in solitary. He needs to go away for a while.

I picked Cherie up from work. She is tired and a little moody. She kept apologizing for being grouchy but I told her it was her turn. “I’m grouchy all the time so your due. Go for it. Bitch me out. Tell me something mean. Do it. You’ll feel better” I told her as I made funny faces and danced around. It worked. She was laughing up a storm by the time I got finished.

Patrick (The lawyer in Texas) just called. He explained things to me so I could understand better. It took a bit for me to get a handle on things but he was able to clear up my misconceptions. He said he sent me an E mail about it which I will go look at in a moment. From what he said this should all be cleared up in three or four weeks. This is exciting for us. Things have been so up and down we both were waiting for everything to go sour. That has been a history for us both. Right when things are looking up we would get crapped on. After decades of that you kind of shy away from dreams, become a pessimist, and get nervous when things start to look good again.

Cherie is fixing some strawberry shortcake now. It smells great. I think I will go check my E mail now and send Patrick the address to the blog like I said I would.