I offer to launder illegal funds, a trip down memory lane and more pain.

There are a couple things I thought you might be excited for me about: I have contacted by the Irish Lottery, the BBC Lottery, the Microsoft Lottery, The Dell Award Team, the Japan Jumbo Lottery and also three different lawyers representing people who have many millions of dollars they need to transfer into a bank and they just happen to know ME. Zowie! I find it slightly surprising that I won so many lotteries at once but if all they need is all my personal information and my credit card number, well, what a bargain!

I’m not joking about all those Lottery emails (I didn't give them my info), there is even the EU Lottery which I have won. Sadly, none of them know how to use a phone? So for all the people who are very jaded and cynical when you get the emails with the title “Urgent” and start, “I am the Financial Minister of the country of xxxxxx, and we need to transfer 132 million dollars into your account.” I have a NEW message.

Here it is. I am a very shady individual who has a LOT of drug money and I need to launder it through someone who is willing to take a risk for a 10% share. If you are interested, please email me to get my address and then sent me $10 to show your interest and for the one minute of my time it will take to explain how I will launder this money through your banking and credit cards (Hey, I am shady AND greedy, I don’t do nothing for free, get it!). Once I get your dough, off we go!

See, sadly, not only did I probably just break several federal and international laws with that piece of irony. But I think I will probably getting people sending me $10 for the next two years going, “So, how much are we going to launder?” If you tell someone they get something for nothing, I think people have figured out that isn't happening. But considering the numbers of people watching Weeds on TV, I think a great many North Americans would find laundering money, as long as they got their percentage, worth the risk, and so sadly, you do not catch more flies with honey in this land, but with severed horse heads in the bed (Godfather film reference).

The second is, if you haven’t guessed it by now, I am still in unbelievable amounts of pain. In fact, I am probably going to have to go to my doctor soon for more pain meds and have another LONG lecture about drug addiction. Well, if I ever felt high or total pain relief, that might be an issue. What he SHOULD be giving me is a long lecture on STUPID addiction. Because while the 10K was inspirational and all, did I need to move around so much in the days afterward? Or decide that the next morning was a good time to start rearranging all the piles of books and furniture in study? Or try to restock the fridge by myself? Linda isn’t home much so I am free to be stupid a lot. Of course I never tell you, “Today I went and tried to refill the fridge with Gatorade holding my body upright with the walker, and WOW does my shoulders and back hurt!” Because that is a blog that makes me look like a moron who can't figure out that maybe if I let my muscles heal by letting OTHER people do things for me, instead of trying to do it all myself, I would get better.

See, now I am going to get a BIG lecture from my readers. Hey, that pile of Manga NEEDED to be moved! Plus, I didn’t know the home care person was coming last night so I HAD to help clear out the study of stuff, so she could sleep there. See, I am sure I still have a LOT of 10K race pain, but I think I might have some STUPID pain mixed in there. Plus I am still working and typing 10 hours a day hunched over a computer instead of leaning back and watching things which probably isn’t helping. Still hurts all the same. And like YOU never did STUPID when you were in pain?

So I decided that I am going to do a mental wander through a few places. First, it is BACK to Hurricane Ridge in America, a week and a half ago (I counted the blog entries to figure that out). Because there was that sort of 90 minutes which were pretty good. First off there were DEER. And while Maggie and Cheryl have seen enough deer that they want to see “When DEER ATTACK!” for Linda it was more of a “Look! Look! Deer!”

So after I went to the bathroom and saw tje surreal gift shop: surreal because a) I don’t expect to find a lot of wineries on the top of a mountain called “HURRICANE RIDGE” but they were selling a couple different ‘local’ wines. And b) Either Maggie or Cheryl called me over and told me there were “wooden postcards”. I was thinking they would be like the incredible thin wood postcards from Kakunodate, Japan which had a woodblock print on it. Instead I found a quarter INCH THICK piece of wood with a coloured plate (machine mass produced) which said “Hurricane Ridge” and it was glued on. Was I supposed to send this CHUNK of WOOD as a postcard (after paying $5 in postage)? So then the reader might…..throw it on the fire after reading to keep themselves warm? (“Hey Martha, no need to bring in some more logs, Elizabeth just sent us another US Forest Service Post Card!")

Anyway, Linda went scampering off to look for deer and we stayed behind and made sarcastic comments. But she did find a group of about three deer or so in the woods, and got a picturesque nature framing of one. Of course, my childhood, so traumatized by Bambi, looks at this picture and then immediately hears the blast of a shotgun with a somber male intoning, “MAN was in the forest!” with the sick knowledge that some lovely deer was DEAD! But actually since it was four WOMEN in the forest, Bambi’s mother did not die today. And Linda came back and then decided to make poses on a snow/slush pile. I think this is where I talk about how wonderful it is that after so many years together I haven’t the faintest idea what she is thinking or doing. But the reality is, What is she doing? Has she decided to reenact scenes from the film Sunset Blvd. on the top of Hurricane Ridge?

But then who I am to talk because a few minutes later I am trying to enact a “magical transformation” from an anime. As you can see in the picture, I am not only waiting for the sparkling stars to transform me into some brill costume with extremely short skirt, but I have opened my hoodie so the new DD cup breasts that come with BEING an anime girl will have space to erupt! Yeah, so what if most girls give up 5, or 10 years after puberty. Not me, I am STILL waiting for the breast fairy to come back!

Anyway, before we leave here, which was about when the trip turned pear shaped, let me tell you an important lesson that I, in fact, I think WE have learned. That taking someone who is oxygen conversion compromised up to a HIGH ELEVATION where there is less oxygen and it is harder to convert is probably not going to be on our future plans. So, that whole “Doing the Alps on one Lung!” tour is being cancelled for now! Too bad, I had a lecture series planned after that where I tell people that a lung is like the mental fears in their own mind, the ones which stop them from getting raises and from achieving the life they want! And by facing my fears and repeated passing out before being med-evac lifted out in a helicopter, they too could be like me and by following my example, they could be homeless, or OUT of a job. Thank you, please buy the book at the door! (yeah, still wacked out of my mind on pain, why do you ask?)

I also went to badminton last night. Which was supposed to help me. It did: it helped me feel depressed. Because I lost every single game. Admittedly I kept getting the same partner and I once politely said, “How about we mix things up and I go with them” and he was like “No, this will be more even and fair.” While my brain was going, “I’ve lost three times already and you think things are even?” But that is just the competitive aspect of me I guess.

Truth is I just had one of those evenings that sucked, a lot. I couldn’t seem to connect or when I did, the people just seemed to play around me. I felt useless and frustrated and that is what happens sometimes. But I still got out there and played (notice my partners' concentration!). So I guess the theme of this memory lane trip is that just because things don’t turn out perfect, doesn’t mean I’m not going to keep trying (like I am here trying, missing the birdie and then my chair fell over). Actually, Linda who did work on her computer for the government most of the time probably had more fun that I did. And it hasn’t seemed to improve my circulation. I just wanted one really nice fun game. But even with two females, they just played long and over my head. Admittedly, one of the females actually was dissing the other girl on her own team (Girls aren't nice ALL the time, get over it). Oh well, next time.

Um, I had a couple seizures today, including one where my care giver said I “shook” for five seconds. Which means….not long enough to make ice cream? I dunno. I have had the care agency wake me by phone this morning to tell me they were sending ANOTHER new person, so after training my ‘night worker’ from 10:00 pm to 11:15 pm, I went to sleep and got up to train and supervise a new day person for a couple hours.

Also, I got an email from three places wanting to advertise on my site, including one saying they were DIFFERENT because they did Canadian content and thus I could make money AND help Canadian businesses. So I wrote them back an email and said, 'hey, I write about disability and since Canada HAS no disability act, and I am only interested in being a partner with an organization which will represent ALL Canadians, and the recent survey showed that 1 in 7 Canadians are disabled…….what percentage of your organization is dedicated or donated to disability or heath organizations?'

I have not heard back so I guessing I am not a good “fit” (as in, being greedy would be a “good fit”).

I also got an email from the people doing Creature Discomforts, done by the people who do Wallace and Gromit. They felt that as they had these ads which were part of a campaign to “change attitudes to disability”, they wanted me to promote them on my blog. So I spend an hour writing them, explaining that we had all looked at high hopes when the FIRST series of Creature Discomforts came out. But most disabled people/PWD were disappointed by the series as for example, a turtle character says because he can’t get into a sweet shop to buy sweets (due to poor accessibly) has “lost the will to buy sweets” (meaning, we are sad pathetic characters).

I pointed out to Leonard Cheshire Disability (who paid for the ads) the fact that people with amputations now use this NEW thing called a PROSTHETIC! And don’t actually go around on retro crutches like it is 1917. And indeed the assistant editor of the BBC magazine OUCH! uses a prosthetic and doesn’t actually sit around talking about losing the will to buy sweets. And that while they say their ads want to change attitudes to disability, is the change so we are seen as even MORE pathetic? Or just more stereotypical?

And that was my day.