sad news, photos, and a distracting survey

Went down to see my parents yesterday, and got sad news – my uncle died yesterday morning. He had been very sick with Alzheimer’s for years, so it wasn’t sudden, but still. I feel so sorry for my father. He’s lost two sisters and his brother in less than a year. He’s taking it well – none of them were sudden, all were very ill – but I know he’s depressed about it. When I got there yesterday he seemed very gloomy and I was afraid he wasn’t feeling well (he’s been doing REALLY well after the bypass, at least) then he told me about HL. And mentioned several times how he just isn’t feeling like doing anything lately. No wonder. They were planning to go see him on Tuesday. He and my aunt moved into an assisted living place in Raleigh years ago, so it’s a pretty long trip for them. The good thing is that he’s being buried in Winston-Salem, where they’d lived since way before I was born. So it’s only about an hour and a half for me to go to the funeral, which is Tuesday, and maybe two hours for the parents. I think they’re riding with my brother, too.

I don’t think Baker B is going with me to Winston Tuesday, since his office is very busy right now and we’re taking off the whole next week. I wish I’d never mentioned that to my mother, though, because she’s become fixated on my making that long, strenuous, danger-filled drive all by myself. I mean, it IS an hour and a half. And I AM only … a few days from forty-four. That’s pretty young to be out driving thousands of miles alone in a very reliable car with a charged up cellphone and a can of mace. She seems to have forgotten how I used to routinely drive from here to DC in my fifteen-year-old Beetle back when I was in my twenties. Before cellphones. She was saying, "Why don’t you come down here and go with us!" Yeah, that would be much better, to drive an hour and a half to Asheville, drive with them two or so hours to Winston, drive two or so hours back to Asheville with them, and then drive the hour and a half back up here by myself. All on Tuesday because I really can’t take off another day too. Great idea! My poor mother has driven me nearly mad this weekend, obviously. Her own mental dysfunctions are enough to make you crazy if you’re around her long enough. I give Daddy lots and lots of points for being incredibly patient when she gets fixated on something like that which really doesn’t make any sense, or asks the same question a zillion times, or tells you the same thing a zillion times. I wish the Memory Clinic could work her in earlier.

Oh, well. I’m home now, thank god. And here are some pictures of HL, cool old photos from the forties:

HL in front of their house. The house which is now being the bane of my father’s existance.

I’ve posted this one before, but I just love it for some reason. How it’s all lopsided, and HL looks so dashing. And it’s where I grew up, although it looks NOTHING like this now. My parent’s not-yet-existant house is on the hill to the right of HL’s elbow.

The whole gang. HL, Sis, (who died in July) Merle, Daddy, Mabel (who died in September) and Jean (who died back in the 80s).

And again with their parents. I just realized this must be the same day – they’re all wearing the same clothes. My grandfather looked just exactly like this when I can remember him, which was about thirty years later.

Okay. And if that’s not enough, here’s a survey I picked up from somewhere. I don’t know who I got it from but I’ve been seeing it around. An OD Survey:

1. How many Favorites do you have? 45 – wow. No wonder I’m always behind! Several of them haven’t updated in ages, though.

2. Who is at the top of your Favorites list? When I’ve got it sorted by updates, Halley. When I have it sorted alphabetically, ~Invict~.   

3. Who is at the the bottom of your Favorites list? Alphabetically, Trebora. Trebora is also next to last by update, having not updated since May 24, 2004. Dead last is Lola Bean, who hasn’t updated in so long that it doesn’t show the last update. Okay, looking at Lola Bean’s diary, she last updated in February of 2004. Maybe she went favorites – she was one of those people I liked to read but never really exchanged notes with. Maybe I need to cull out my favorites a little.

4. What method do you use to come up with topics or titles for entries? I wish I had a method. It’s usually whatever pops into my head. I like them to be entertaining, but that doesn’t always happen.

5. If you were asked to pay a small yearly fee (like $5-$10) to use Free Open Diary, would you pay? Well, if you paid a yearly fee to Free Open Diary, it wouldn’t be Free Open Diary any more, now would it? I do in fact pay a reasonable yearly fee for Not-Free-Open-Diary, and yes, it’s well worth it. Remember all the hoopla and drama when OD started the pay diary, though?

6. Do you ever click on the advertisement banners? Doesn’t apply, but I wouldn’t if it did.

7. Is there a topic that you see written about on OD that pisses you off? Not really, although if I saw entries praising our current regime it certainly would. I can’t think of anything going around lately that does.

8. Do you let your friends read your OD? I do let Baker B read it, and I told one of my cousins about it but I don’t think she’s ever checked it out. My best friend knows about it too, but I don’t think she has either. I actually bought her a subscription for her birthday year before last, and she never used it. She’s REALLY busy, and I don’t think it appealed to her. It’s too bad, as I really think she’d enjoy it if she did it, and she has so much drama going on that she’d be lots of fun to read. She’s never been a big writer, and thinks you have to be a writer to do this, which is SO not true. I can see that it would be a little intimidating, though.

I’m really pretty happy that nobody I know in real life other than Baker B reads it. I wouldn’t mind, but I think I’d end up having to watch what I say more carefully if I had family or friends reading. I’d start getting worried about hurting their feelings, or saying things that I don’t want them to know about me.  

9. Do you ever make Private Entries? The only private entries I’ve made are things I intend to post later. I have a paper journal for things I REALLY don’t want anyone else, including Baker B, reading. The more I get used to typing my journal, though, the more I can see making private entries for myself in the future.

10. Have you ever met anyone from Open Diary? Not yet, which is pretty sad considering several of my favorites live fairly close to me in the scheme of things. And we DID plan to go to England and Scotland this spring, and I was GOING to meet up with Marg, but that fell through. Hopefully next year.

11. Are your entries showing up on the main pages’ Recent Entries column? I guess so, but I am far too lazy to check. I don’t know why they wouldn’t be.

12. Do you ever get mean notes? I honestly can’t think of one mean note I’ve ever gotten. Except maybe one of those drive-by-random noters. I’ve never been involved in any of the Great OD Battles, never had a flame war. God, I’m boring.

 I did once make another diarist mad by making fun of her for having Steve Buscemi in a list of men she considered hotties, but I was kidding. I said something like "Steve Buscemi? Steve Buscemi?? I can understand Ralph Feines, but STEVE BUSCEMI???" I felt terrible – I really was joking and she took it seriously. Well, I wasn’t joking – I adore Steve Buscemi  – he’s a fantastic actor and I’ll watch anything with him in it, but …

He just wouldn’t be in my list of hotties. But I thought it was funny. I didn’t expect her to get mad at me for saying that!!

13. Do you have a favorite Favorite?  Why of course not. I love ALL my favorites. And I certainly wouldn’t publicize my favorite favorites anyhow.

14. Do you ever use Random to find different diaries to read? Very rarely. I have a hard enough time keeping up with favorites lately.

15. Are you able to successfully copy and paste things into your diary? Well, yeah.

16. How many notes have you gotten total? 5452. Wow – that’s a lot of notes. That’s since..October 2001, though. Although I guess it doesn’t include my pre-not-free-od notes. I think they didn’t transfer over.

17. Do you or have you ever erased any of your notes? No, never. It would have to be pretty bad before I’d erase a note.

18. Do you ever read diarists and not note them? Sometimes. There are a few people I read and don’t note regularly, although that’s just because when I noted them they never noted me back and after awhile noting someone who never notes you back just starts to seem a little.. needy. And neurotic. Like, "Pay attention to me!! Hey, hey, hey, PAY ATTENTION TO ME!!!!" I mean, I figure if someone never notes me, they have some good reason.. Like I’m way too weird and boring. But there are several diarists that I really like to read, and I read them just because I enjoy it, notes or not. Okay, I’ll give a couple of examples of diarists who are no longer amongst us, who I read faithfully but if I noted them I never got notes back and I started to feel a little weird about continuing to note, but I really did enjoy reading them so just didn’t note: Sunny Bouledaire (sp??) and Josephine Roberto. Both were excellent writers, hysterically funny, and a great read. And both have been gone for ages, and I still miss reading them. 

19. Do you read diarists who don’t note you back? I think we just covered that. Lately I’ve fallen way behind on the people I read who don’t note me back since I’m having enough trouble keeping up with my favorites who DO note me.

Oh – that’s it. We’re done! And only 29,999 characters used.