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I've used Bengal before. Powerful stuff, but we're trying to go more organic in all things in our life right now. Thanks, though, Itchy. |
yep LB real or fancied? most of whats in ours minds is fancied i think we were wired incorect at birth! lol |
Hey, LDT, I sprayed some nematodes last month. I don't know if it's worked, because I stopped letting my cats go out there...but I love the concept of unleashing this army of tiny monsters on a mission to eat every flea in sight. Speaking of which, I haven't seen a live flea anywhere today. Could it be? But they've tricked me before. Cunning little bloodsuckers. If they resurface Itchy, I will be looking hard at every available weapon... our giant roaches down here that fly and get from 1-2 inches long most of whats in ours minds is fancied Instant, I hope things improve soon. I think you have a great perspective on it all, and admire the effort to settle old accounts. LB, wow, that's a huge leap—good for you!! This seems like the perfect time in your life for an adventurous move. When you get to DC you need to find a busy spot downtown, twirl around, and toss your hat in the air! http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-vAXC4bC2CQ...tossed-hat.JPG |
Lotus I say go for it! I have moved and lived in countries 4 times now, from NZ to Australia, Australia to UK, UK to Aus, Aus to Scotland, ummmmm more than 4 lol, UK to France, France to NZ, with loads and loads of countries visited in between! Each of these times I had to start from scratch, with no job and no home to go to and always as a single woman until I came back to NZ(although the hubby did leave me 2 months later with a 1yr old)! I also spent a period of 8 months before leaving NZ driving around and sleeping in the back of my 4WD. (Hah! The stories I could tell). Not one single time have I regretted the choices I made to go out there and see what was on offer. And I started this travelling/exploring adventure when I was 27. :) I now look back, and although I own no home, have no savings nor many "things" I feel like one of the most wealthy people in the world. My wealth is in memories, experiences, places visited, people met, cultures, music, food...........a whole heck of a lot of fun!! And now I am only 41 I believe another new journey is just around the corner......in fact, I am on that journey right now. Not sure what the point of that was............oh right.......GO FOR IT Lotus!!!!!! Anyway, I have been sick and spent the day glued to the sofa hardly able to get up and move. feeling slightly better now thank goodness as I have my Market tomorrow and need to be there to set up for everyone else! Have a great one all you Overs!!!!!! |
if I move to Bengal and focus on getting myself right it will be OK as long as the flying bugs don't get me!!! |
Hey all! It's 4:30 am the birds are awake and singing so my dog insisted in going outside to enjoy the morning. LB, I used to live in DC and getting a rental at $400 a month sounds incredibly dodgy. Please be careful. Also, I hated DC with a passion:) Instant, i found that getting sober didnt stop me from having problems it just meant i was able to hane them. Have you and your spouse ever gotten counseling? It might help now that you are sober:) Having some angst about whether my art will ever take off. I work so hard and never seem to break through. I'm tired of working 3 jobs just to get by...I feel like if I had 1 year to dedicate to my art it would open doors. Sadly, I burned through my savings thanks to booze:( Sargent has come back inside so I'm goin to try for a little more sleep. Nite! |
Lots going on here! LDT, I hear ya, lots of folks doing that as much as possible nowadays. R&A! :lmao I forget how this place seemed when I first got here. Where you live no one freaks out at the beach when they see a seal or a whale breach, in fact they get a good thrill from them. I get a real kick when I see a large gator in its wallow when fishing the swampy woods. Ther are copperheads everywhere and I wear leather heavy gloves when moving things on shelves in my large steel workshop because I have black widows in there all the time. I see big ones in there all the time. I have every kind of animal there are on this continent here. And all of the biting and stinging and invasive and pest insects too. We have gotten used to them. Both of us now refuse to hunt them or allow hunting on our property, although I did hunt when younger, the only thing I shoot them with now is a camera. Every day when I walk the pups they find and chase rabbits and even the rabbits know it is a game. The deer herd and foxes and snakes and turtles etc. are all protected here. But when I first got here the giant bugs were a little unsettling, and having snakes in the trees over us when frog gigging at night, and dropping in the boat occasionally did keep me wide awake! :scared: Instant! you are so right!:lmao |
1 Attachment(s) BTW R&A when I say I get a lot of Black widows in my workshop many may get a mental image of cobwebs and dark dirty shops. Here is one pic of mine and you'll see. If I get Black widow infestations in there you can imagine what the dirty and unkempt ones get. |
you can imagine what the dirty and unkempt ones get. And I may never be able to enter my dirty and unkempt garage again! :SpiderHL: :SpiderHL: __________:c041:_____________ |
itch, whats that red gizmo? a new age go cart? |
Thank goodness I live in a country where the most lethal things are not in nature.....the scariest critter or bug we get are giant slugs, or the giant weta. Now........the giant weta is terrifyingly creepy...... check these babies out! The largest known insect!!!!!!!!!!! Man Finds Huge Giant Weta, Single Largest Insect on Record | Geekosystem Anyhow, you can all keep your scary deadly bugs/animals to yourselves. Yep, I live in paradise. Had another market today, and how hilarious....a lady came up to my stall where I sell my jewellery....and asked "where can I find the stalls that sell jewellery?" to which I gently asked "what do you mean"....... "Oh" she says "I mean real artistic jewellery, not craft". Boy did I practice biting my tongue abecause I really wanted to say... "F@#k Off you pretentious B@#*h!" Instead, I smiled sweetly and said "what exactly do you class as real artistic jewellery" and pretended to be interested as she bleeted on and on. End of the day....... I sold a few hundred $$ worth, got orders for more......and treated my weeman to a special afternoon tea and the toy car(Shu Todoroki) that he has been dying to have, got gifts for my step dads birthday and my neice.....and will be able to pay a couple of bills. So there!!! Have a lovely weekend Overs :) |
Oh....... i must also share this here, as I can without fear. I have been thinking a lot recently about having a drink. Like seriously thinking that it may be a good idea, that I could handle it. Dreaming about it. Going to the bar and watching others drink and wanting one(hah, like it would only be one) myself. I am also thinking about how to deal with this, challenging my thoughts...knowing that the reason that I want a drink is truly not healthy and knowing deep inside that it would be a big mistake. I don't think I am in real danger right now. Just having these thoughts on a regular basis has not happened in.......... well over a year. Next week it will be what......17 months sober. Not going to give that up. But geez............. It is horrid to be feeling this right now. This too shall pass........... |
R&A, Mine isn't an attached garage. It's a separate 24X30 building with two 10X10 roll up doors which are always looser sealing than garage or entry doors. Sometimes we don't go in it for a week at a time so critters that get in can establish a nest. RZ, I guess you could call it that. It was part of my drinking days and fun. It wad a Snapper Yard cruiser 38" cut zero turn radius mower. The reason it was a drinking days artifact is that it was one of the few mowers made with a single joystick control. It is 100 degrees and humid here in mowing season so I wanted to have a beer in my hand all the time. Every guy kniws that a mower's cop holders are useless for beer as the vibrations make it go flat in 30 seconds! Because it had a single joystick control lik a trackhoe, I could hold a beer in one hand and control the mower with the other. I even put au new motor in it as they stopped making them. I sold it a few months ago because it was really too small for my acreage, and because I no longer drink beer. Now I take ice tea or coffee breaks. My bigger 50"cut two hand zero turn is much faster anyway letting me cut the whole place in three hours at speed rather than taking two full days to cut weekly. But it drove like a bumper car and it was a hoot to drive. Selling it was a real act of faith in my sobriety. Manz, You have an almost identical venemous spider to the black widow there called the redback and two other venemous species too. Yours even has a red hourglass marking like ours does on the undersides. It looks identical in shape to ours too. The venom is the same too. The bites are rarely fatal but excruciatingly painful spreading pain all over. New Zealand’s venomous creatures Here'san article about the widow spiders and if you scroll all the way down to the bottom you'll see yours in the same family: Latrodectus - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Since you go to the beach a lot you also know about your local sea snakes and jellyfish right? Now I am no slouch in handling snakes and bugs, have done my share of taking the stingers off scorpions and putting them on a friend as a prank. But I believe I know why you call them giant wetas. Because if one of those dropped out of a tree on me, I'd have a giant weta my pants! :scared: |
Just noticed all the typos in the above from using the touch screen keyboard in the Tab. :wild |
Manz....I am so glad you shared this. I have been having similar impulses.. Seems more triggers than average have passed my way lately, and I've been distracted with those same kinds of thoughts. Interesting that you and I have close to the same sober time. (Is this what happens closing in on month 17?) I know lately I've been surrounded by smiling people sipping summertime drinks by the water, or on a boat.....things I use to do. What's interesting is that I'm bothered by the fact that it bothers me ( does that make sense?). But then I remember someone ( EQ maybe?) posted something like " I know what my life was like with alcohol.....now it's time to find out what my life is like without it" ( my apologies if that's not exactly a quote). That struck a chord with me. And so did something else.....2 days ago, at a party with people I hadn't seen in a year or so, I saw a former " friend" of mine. This person has had her share of problems with alcohol, and apparently still does..... she was very drunk, her behavior was so bizzare, everyone noticed and was commenting in hushed whispers. It was heartbreaking to see her falling apart ( and literally falling down ) so publicly. But in that moment I was incredibly grateful for my own sobriety. I thought to myself " there but for the grace of God, go I." And so my thoughts of maybe "testing the waters" are laid aside once again. I'm not drinking. Have a fabulous Saturday Overs! |
I haven't been on here except to say hello.... So, after a year of sobriety, I now have my acceptance letter for work. I'm very thrilled! I'll be getting a physical, so let's hope I'm okay to work. I will have real insurance, but I need to quit the cigs to get a discount on the insurance. I've lived on so little money, I hope I will be able to maintain living on little. Of course, I have a few purchases I would like to make, but all in time. I love a bargain. And I will be able to pay Comcast what I've owed them for the last year and I will acquire cable internet so I won't be sitting here waiting for a signal.....my satellite engineer friend explained that the satellite signals are more effected by what is on the ground as opposed to what is in the air, so that is why my signals are terrible... I've made a few more friends in AA, so this is nice, too. LB, I live near DC, so if you move this way, send me a pm and we can go for coffee. DC isn't that bad, at least I don't think so, but I live in the suburbs and not in the city.... Another gorgeous day today! Time to get ready to go out and about... Have a wonderfully wackulous sober day! |
Manz, I missed the post before my last two. I must have been still finding out about your spiders in NZ when you posted and missed it. Sorry you are struggling a bit. My feeling is we are here because we chose to be sober. We can also choose not to be sober. That choice for all of us can only be made when we are sober. I was powerless over alcohol and could not stop easily and in my case I needed a lot of medical help I was fortunate to have access to as part of my retirement. Many don't. You may remember me posting that I loved drinking when it was voluntary, but hated it once it became mandatory. I can't choose sobriety when drinking beyond promising myself I'll quit on the ever elusive morrow. So in reality I had no choice. I can choose to drink, or not, easily when sober. I can't make that choice drinking. I can safely say all of us have had the thought that surely we have shown the restraint and control to drink again and handle it. Remember our friend Kevin? Lots of us will try to see if we can control it again, when we never controlled it at any time. If we have to think about self control and limiting ourselves we are admitting we can't. You see normal drinkers never have a thought about control. They are not in danger of losing a control they don't need nor was ever an issue. The reason I know I will never drink again is because I read about what lies down the path of "just one drink" from those, who sober, convinced themselves they could control it, which automatically says they can't. When I interact with the world now, I don't feel like I fit in like I did when I was drinking. See, back then I was only concerned with two things. Hiding my hangovers and dealing with my sloppy work. And hanging in there until I could get off and go home to sedation and feeling gregarious and smart. We all know how clever and smart we were drinking right? I never drank when working! But for the last few years I did need a few shots in my coffee before work to stop the shaking. I have also read about how bad relapses are and that they get worse with each relapse and harder to come back from? I want that? No. I am quite happy seeing myself in the mirror, and dealing with problems of my own abilities and developing my talents and dreams however modest they might be without wanting artificial courage, with all the real incompetence and degradation into one long self pity party with alcohol. I am also not an attention junkie. Some folks are in a perpetual state of relapse and recovery just for the attention we never get as a boring sober person, or a comitted drunk. SR has given me those insights here where we can talk, and share our mistakes and our struggles in recovery. Here in this thread we are over the terrible cravings, and faced with the questions from the song "Is That All There Is?" Avoiding that question is a plateau in our sobriety and why the steps can be so powerful in AA. If we can't move past that question we will struggle. That question is at the bottom of the serenity prayer. We only have two choices there, and alcohol is not in the selection, just a result of avoidance. We can only choose to accept that we are never going to be rich and famous, truly accept it, and then use what we have, satisfied that we have enough. The proof of acceptance is being satisfied, or having satisfaction in your being. The other choice is to start on getting what you need to be satisfied. At over a year we can all see the possibilities. Fear can take over here. Drinking for me for the rest of my life means I let fear beat me back into alcoholic avoidance. I would rather be a sober pauper full of all the sensations of living, than a rich drunk who can't feel regardless of all the money they want. Most say they hate pain. Pain is my friend that keeps me safe! If I could not feel pain I would not know to jerk my hand back from being burned more by heat. I would rather the pain to losing a limb. Sedated with alcohol I almost didn't feel the death upon me. What saved me? The pain! The daily hangover! The pain of wondering what I did and what I said and to who in the first panic moment of waking. The pain of no respect from anybody, least of all myself. Being sick and tired of being sick and tired. I feel pain even more now, not more quantitatively, but more intensely. It is still my friend as the oain of embarrassment sober tells me not to do that again, and sober I remember the lesson! Sober I can choose. We are all unique just like everybody else! No humans are unique in having more than the two choices we all have when faced with the pain of our actions or their consequences. We can either change our belief about the behavior, or change the behavior. I will not drink rational for me. I changed my belief that alcohol was fun to alcohol is a killer for me. Before I changed that belief I resolved my painful consequences from my drinking with denial, a belief it was not my drinking causing my issues. Now I am sober. I no longer can have the belief that alcohol is causing my problems. Or use it as an excuse. Now my choices are to change my behaviors or change my beliefs. Sober! Hugs your way my friend. :ring |
Firstly........... the katipo spider as you say Itchy has a nasty bite, but you very rarely if ever see the suckers. As does the white tail spider which I see a lot in the house and is the only thing I am really pleased to kill! But I stand by my assertion that NZ has nothing within its borders that can kill you.....thank goodness. :) Thanks for your words LDT & Itchy. I am struggling with the idea that I want a drink and am annoyed that I am even thinking it! I feel that my life is about 90% great, I have no major concerns that I am thinking to drink away........so this is also what is particularly annoying! maybe it is because I have been around people who have been enjoying a drink socially and I haven't done that for a long time? Who knows. The only thing that I know is I do not want to drink, I choose not to. It is just flipping annoying to be even struggling with thoughts of doing so. Humph!!!!!!!!!!! I am off to think about how to spend my Sunday, have a great one guys and gals. :) |
But I stand by my assertion that NZ has nothing within its borders that can kill you.....thank goodness. :) :lmao Seriously though I hope you get over the last part of getting over it soon. Guys, Yesterday I finally got the new grill on my truck as well as the new RAM insignia and the new bug deflector and eyebrow shields for the hood and fenders and I must say it looks terrific! R&A you may remember I recently painted it as the hood and roof had that Dodge fade the Diesel trucks seem to get at 5-10 years old. Now all I have left is to detail it and hand wax it and it will be like a new truck. I love my Cummins powered truck. It is my second and now has 403k miles on it and still looks and runs like new inside and out, with a little help from the painter. It is a 2002 Ram 2500 quad cab that had the standard chrome grill on the front which I changed to the black one so I don't have either chrome or paint for the bugs to pit and destroy. The black plastic cleans up easier, and shows no damage, because under the black plastic, is the same color black plastic! Now that it is all together it looks even better than I had hoped. It is fast approaching 100 degrees out so I may defer waxing and detailing until tomorrow morning. When it cools the mosquitoes come out in droves and I hate the feeling DEET gives my skin.This is a perfect day to go for a ride in my A/C so I think I'll run over to the other family property where my BIL is putting a new deck on my wife's Dad's place. I love watching other people work! I might even go out and bring him an ice tea. :lmao Have a great weekend overs! |
Manz, I think it's normal to think of alcohol from time to time - it's what we do with those thoughts that count. You've built up a great life and a great new career (or two) in recovery - I'm super confident you won't put that at risk. BUT...if you think you need help pls don't be afraid or too proud to reach out for it :) D |
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