Dementia? another TBI? It saddens me to see

10/15/12 Monday

          I got up and over to Mary’s by nine this morning. This will make the seventh trip I have made over to her place since the strange change in personality and subsequent anger directed towards me. At 24 miles per trip that means I have traveled 168 miles hauling sticks off her property. She had guests over as I saw the vehicle in the driveway. Anymore I don’t go to the door as she seldom, and lately, never, answers, plus there was company over.

          So I went straight to work, picking up and breaking into smaller pieces the many small branches and sticks that she had asked me to clean up. I was almost at the limit of what I can fit on the truck when I heard a voice saying “What are you doing?”. Turning I saw a man, maybe in his late 50’s, looking at me sternly. “I’m picking up sticks” I responded. “Why” he asked, so I explained “Mary asked me to”. “NO SHE DIDN’T” he said, with an obvious disbelief. I explained that she indeed requested that I do this and in fact she had written a letter detailing what to do and how. “Really? Do you have that letter” the conversation continued as it became clear this man’s opinion of me was not very high. Fortunately I had a strong impression this morning to make sure I carried that letter with me so I got it out as this man expounded on how Mary never wanted me there and wanted me to leave.

          I handed the letter to this man as I explained I had been coming here and helping Mary for a year. He quickly read through the two pages of the letter with no discernible change in attitude and said “Well, Mary has changed her mind. You need to leave now”. It is sad to understand that Mary’s mind is slipping. Now that I think about it I realize she went through this drastic change in personality after the fall that broke her wrist. We suddenly went from friends she enjoyed visiting with to someone she did not trust, like, and was very angry with. This is classic symptoms of and evidence for a traumatic brain injury. She has endured several serious falls recently and they included hard knocks on the head so I suspect this has happened. Add to that depression, medication, and age there is a strong likelihood that we are seeing the early stages of dementia and perhaps Alzheimer’s disease.

          It is sad to watch but something that is happening all over this country and the world. I don’t know who the people were who talked to me as he never identified himself, but I assume they were relatives or somehow involved with her well-being. I asked him for an email address so we could continue conversing and his response was “I’m really not interested”. I had debated emailing Mary’s daughter and decided not to as it might be perceived as a violation of trust or something, and did not want to rock the boat. Now I believe it would be in Mary’s best interest that her daughter be apprised of the situation so will send her an email.

          So I left. Brought the truck load of sticks home, where it will be piled on top of the other loads I brought. Mary had the impression that all this wood would be ideal for me to burn for heat over the winter but it really is not. I will burn the pile just to get rid of it.

When it comes to firewood the Lord has provided already. I had noticed a dead tree with some limbs cut down as I was towing the diesel to have the flywheel replaced. Curious and hopeful that it could be a source of firewood I drove back over there and knocked on the door. The lady gave me her landlords number so I called and asked him if he would like it cut down. “How much would you charge?” he asked. I explained that normally I would charge $600 to cut down and remove a tree of that size but because I needed firewood would do it for $200. He was quick to accept the offer and thus we are blessed. The two hundred dollars will just about cover my expense of cutting the tree down and hauling it away. God is always good and our needs always supplied. Of course I must go out and do the work but I find that preferable anyway.

The farmer next door sprayed his cotton with defoliant, as they do every year. Unfortunately it once again drifted over and has impacted our trees and plants again. Here is a picture of the corn. I had a picture taken just days before and it was all nice and green but a day after the farmer sprayed I found my corn severely impacted, with all these yellow spots suddenly there. This is not good and I need to talk with the guy to see if they could be more careful. I am growing food for sale and to eat, plus the defoliant is deadly and can cause cancer along with other problems. We had a dog, Midnight, who died when his liver and kidneys failed. The vet suggested he may have been poisoned running through the cotton fields after they were sprayed. Now we watch the dogs carefully to prevent them from playing in the cotton.

That is it for now. I must go unload the truck and then get to work on the irrigation stuff.

This is as much as I had written Saturday. As often happens in my world I probably got distracted and went to work doing something else. So I will post this and then work on another journal entry that will fill you in on stuff. The picture is this mornings sunrise

10/13/12 Saturday

          It’s 12:32 in the afternoon. I came in for a pain break at around 11:30 . I have been working on reinstalling drip irrigation for days now and there are many more days of work left on that. Much of the old drip irrigation has been damaged and repaired many times and in addition the hard water has plugged up many of the emitters. I call it old drip irrigation but this stuff is only two or three years old. Can’t really remember how old it is and would have to go back through this journal to find out, but this inability to remember how long ago something was done is one of the issues that came with the brain injury. I can remember putting it in but could not tell you if it was last year or four years ago.

          But as I go I learn and sometimes I remember what I learned so this year we are putting in all new stuff in a better way than before. Each drip line will be a little deeper than before. I will spread fertilizer throughout this soil before I shovel it all back in over the drip tape. Mixed a bunch of the fertilizer together in the cement mixer this morning. I have bags and buckets of fertilizer all over the place but unfortunately can’t remember what is what. I often try to be careful to label things, knowing I will not remember what it was, but I often don’t remember to do that so a day later it is a mystery package to me. Fertilizer is fertilizer so I figured I would just mix it all together and hope for the best. I have gypsum, sulfur, and a variety of soil amendments which include minerals, slow release, and who knows what else. So much of it I scavenged from wherever I could, even shoveling up some that had spilled out of broken bags at a nursery’s parking lot. Was always careful not to get anything that had weed killers in it so we should be good.

          Cherie fixed us some hamburgers for lunch. I took a pain pill and laid down for about an hour. Thus I feel much better so it is time to go back out to work and go until I once again hurt too much to keep on. Then I will take another pain break and do it all over again. Nothing new, I’ve been doing this for years and refuse to let pain turn me into a vegetable. 

I just got this in an email. One of the many things that we do not hear about on the news but the internet can sure get the word out. So I am posting this on the blog and encourage you to spread it as well. Of course that is why the government wants to gain control of the internet, to keep things they don't want us to hear quiet.

Unbelievable! Thank God for people like Tedd Petruna. 

Tedd Petruna is a diver at the NBL (Neutral Buoyancy Lab) facility at NASA Houston. Tedd happened to be on the AirTran Flight 297, from Atlanta to Houston. Here's his report :

"One week ago, I went to Ohio on business and to see my father. On Tuesday, the 17th, I returned home. If you read the papers the 18th you may have seen a blurb about where an Air Tran flight was canceled from Atlanta to Houston due to a man who refused to get off of his cell phone before take-off.. The story was only on Fox News. That was NOT what really happened. 

I was seated in 1st class coming home. Eleven Muslim men got on the plane in full Muslim attire. Two of them sat in 1st class and the rest seated themselves throughout the plane, in coach class, all the way to the back. As the plane taxied out to the runway, the stewardesses gave the safety spiel that we are all so familiar with.

At that time, one of the men in 1st class got on his cell and called one of his companions back in coach. He proceeded to talk on the phone in Arabic very loudly and very, very aggressively. This activity took the 1st stewardess out of action for she repeatedly told the man that cell phones were not permitted at that time. He ignored her as if she were not there. The man, who answered the phone back in the coach section, did the same and this took out the 2nd stewardess. Further back in the plane, at the same time, two younger Muslims, one in the back on the aisle, and one sitting in front of him by the window, began to show footage of a porno video they had taped the night before. They were very loud about it. 

The 3rd stewardess informed the two men that they were not to have any electronic devices on at this time. One of the men said "shut up infidel dog!" 

The stewardess attempted to take the camcorder and the Muslim began to scream in her face in Arabic. At that exact moment, all eleven of the men got up and started to walk throughout the cabin. I guess that because of the noise, the flight crew must have decided that there was something amiss and changed the plane's directions to head back to the terminal. 

The commotion and noise was reaching a feverish pitch, and at this point I had had enough! I got up and started towards the back of 1st class, when I heard a voice behind me, from another Texan twice my size, say "I got your back." Then I grabbed the man, who had been on the cell phone, by the arm and said "You WILL sit down in your seat or you WILL be thrown from this plane!" As I "led" him around me to take his seat, the fellow Texan grabbed him by the back of his neck and his waist and headed him back to his seat. I then grabbed the 2nd man and said, "You WILL do the same!" 

He protested loudly, but my adrenaline was flowing now and he was going to go also. Just as I escorted him forward, the plane stopped, the doors opened and three TSA agents and four police officers entered the cabin. Myself and my new Texas friend were told to cease and desist for they had the situation under control. 

I was quite happy to oblige actually. There was still some sort of commotion in the back, but within moments, all eleven Muslim men were escorted off the plane. The TSA agents then had their luggage unloaded. We talked about the occurrence and were in disbelief that it had happened. 

Then suddenly, the door opened again and in walked all eleven Muslim men! Stone faced, eyes front and robotic, (the only way I can describe it) they were reseated. The stewardess from the back had been in tears and when she saw the men, she was having NONE of it! Since I was up front, I heard and saw the whole ordeal. She told the TSA agents that there was NO WAY she was staying on the plane with the Muslim men. The agent told her that they had searched the men and were going through their luggage with a fine tooth comb. However, nothing had been found and that the men were allowed to proceed on to Houston. 

The captain and co-captain came out of the cockpit and told the agent, "We and our crew will not fly this plane!" After a word or two, the entire crew, luggage in tow, left the plane. Five minutes later, the cabin door opened again and a whole new crew walked on. Again, this was where I had had enough! I got up and asked the TSA agent, "What the hell is going on? I was told to take my seat. The airlines and TSA were sorry for the delay and we would be home shortly. I said "I'm getting off this plane". The stewardess sternly told me that she could not allow me to get off. Now I'm really mad! I said "I am a grown man who bought this ticket, who's time is mine with a family at home and I am going through that door, or I'm going through that door with you under my arm, but I AM going through that door!" And then I heard a voice behind me say "So am I!" Then everyone behind us started to get up and say the same thing. Within two minutes, I was walking off that plane where I was met by more TSA agents who asked me to write a statement about the incident. I had five hours to kill at this point waiting for the next flight to Houston, so why the hell not give them my statement. Due to the amount of people who got off that flight, it was canceled. I was supposed to be in Houston at 6 PM, but I finally got there at 12:30 AM. If you don't believe this, look up the date and then Flight 297 from Atlanta to Houston. If this wasn't a terrorism dry run, I don't know what one is. The terrorists wanted to see how TSA would handle it, how the crew would handle it, and how the passengers would handle it. I'm telling this to you because I want you to know. The threat IS real. I saw it with my own eyes."

 Tedd Petruna 

I suggest you keep this going until this incident reaches the email of all POLITICIANS and the news media!

Planning for massive level of dead people??

 Once again, Simon Black finds more stuff our government is doing. Planning for massive levels of dead people? It's a house bill introduced last week.

You just can't make this stuff up.

Late last week, a bill HR 6566 was introduced on the floor of the US House of Representatives. I couldn't believe my eyes when I read it.

The bill is entitled the "Mass Fatality Planning and Religious Considerations Act," and its stated purpose is "[t]o amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to require the Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to provide guidance and coordination for mass fatality planning..."

Hmmmm. Homeland Security. FEMA. Sounds like a fun party.

The bill was introduced a week ago, but it took the US Government Printing Office until this morning to actually make the text available to the public.

It turns out that my weeklong wait was for nothing. The bill itself is just a handful of paragraphs that merely reiterates the title... that the cracker jack team over at FEMA should be prepared to respond to mass fatalities in the United States, and to account for religious burial differences.

This is just one of those things that makes the stomach turn: the people who brought us the National Defense Authorization Act (authorizing the detention of US citizens on US soil) now deem it prudent to prepare for mass fatalities on US soil...

Moreover, they're outsourcing it to one of the most failed government agencies in history.

FEMA, as you may recall, is the same organization that couldn't get bottles of water delivered to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina... and held up hundreds of seasoned volunteer emergency service workers from entering the city for several days of mandatory sexual harassment training.

I doubt a Soviet boot factory could have botched the job more miserably than that. I can't wait to see these guys in charge of whatever 'mass fatality' event the government is preparing for.

It boggles the mind that this agency still exists... and more importantly, why with so many other problems to deal with, 'mass fatalities' is even a topic of discussion at the Capitol.

Whether well-intentioned or not, this strange little bill is yet another telling indication of how the political elite thinks. At best, they're incompetent and out of touch. At worst, they're dangerous and sociopathic.

Either way, this ought to be a reminder of what representative democracy really means in the Land of the Free today... and why it's so important to take control of your freedom.

These people are not the solution. They're the problem. The real solutions lie within. If you're not free, you can get free. It just takes a little bit of effort, a reshuffling of priorities, and some rational thinking. More to follow.

An old Cherokee

10/3/12 Wednesday

          There is much on my spirit these days. Spend lots of time in prayer as I seek the answers to what I see. We live in a spiritual as well as physical world and they are inextricably entwined. When it comes to spiritual things there is a war between good and evil.

An old Cherokee told his grandson “My son, there is a battle between two wolves inside us all.

One is Evil. It’s anger, greed, resentment, inferiority, lies, and ego.

The other is Good. It’s joy, peace, love, hope, humility, kindness, and truth.

The boy thought about it and asked “Grandfather, which one wins?”

The old man quietly replied “The one you feed”.

          There is no arguing the truth of this saying, though I am sure someone will try. It brings to my mind what we find in 1 Corinthians 13 in the bible, what is often called the love chapter.  

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12 Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. 13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

The bible also talks a lot about what we feed ourselves and illustrates in many places the results of allowing negative or poisonous talk in. It is never good. This is part of what is heavy in my spirit, seeing the results of that negative and watching poison people with serpent tongues spread strife. Sometimes I feel helpless and unable to stop the evil I see, and know that harm will come because of it. So I pray, and pray hard.

A friend is coming over soon to help me tow the diesel to where it will get the flywheel replaced. I was going to get on the tractor but will hold that off for now.