Friday, February 28, 2014

Friday Nacht Musik

DSC03488

How it looks outside (above)


Now
First searching for Cafe Societe…..

DSC03498
Joe's Dream
 
The first one I did for Joe Bonamassa
He’s invited.



DSC03499
This one is Carolyn Wonderland & Guy Forsyth.




DSC03501 
This girl is from outer space,
Man can she sing the Interstellar Blues….
Her name is Queen Indigo Maiden



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Every Cafe needs customers
and waitstaff….
Here is a cool cat Dexter
and
the Bartender, Joe, of course...


What's playing?

This is how the night starts...........my heart be still....Love Levon....<3 p="">

Because no matter where the music goes,
it all came from somewhere




Thursday, February 27, 2014

Former oil exec calls Exxon CEO out on his hypocritical anti-fracking lawsuit

Former oil exec calls Exxon CEO out on his hypocritical anti-fracking lawsuit


Blogging forward....

Ponderings on Monkton,Vermont, The Monkton Chronicles

Pondering this proposed gaz pipeline
Because my gut says urgency,
I stumbled onto this nice bit of town history.
It was on rootsweb.

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~vermont/AddisonMonkton.html

Suddenly my next post is solved,
My curiosity raised,
My afternoon consumed.

As I read this, reminded of my poem about Haystacks,
About the first woman settler of Monkton,Vermont.

http://traveloguefortheuniverse.blogspot.com/2010/04/haystacks.html


Also reminded we are being invaded by a different country,
A fractional tribe of thieves.
Cloaked in false promises, unrevealed horrors,
Undislosed plans.

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

When there's a turn in the Weather....Random Findings on Twitter



That summer...............................................................................................................
I started following Janice Dean on Twitter. She is one of our favorites on the early days of us watching/ listening to imus, to connect with the NYC scene. Janice, with her smoothe style, would handle Imus's barbs as well or better than most. Her low reactivity a good lesson in avoiding confrontation. It wasn't as much about the weather. We are a few hundred miles north of NYC.
It was about Janice dodging and getting a barb in...
So today, as I surfed the twitter stream,
Janice wrote this great piece about the MonSter.
Please share and take some inspiration from the weather lady,
she is one tough cookie 





Happy 99th Birthday, Uncle Jay, wherever You are in the great beyond....2.26.2014

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Council of Canadians sends ExxonMobil CEO Fractivist Toolkit to help in his fight against fracking | rabble.ca

Council of Canadians sends ExxonMobil CEO Fractivist Toolkit to help in his fight against fracking | rabble.ca


This just in...........

Stranger than fiction.

More on near death experience

More from my life on near death experiences...

I've been a Registered Nurse from 1980 to present.
Spent almost 20 years in hospital nursing. All over.

Neuro, ICU,med surg, etc.
People died, people almost died, some kept dying,
Or trying to die, or trying so hard not to
And dying anyway.
There was a spectrum of circumstances.
Some people had unresolved conflicts.
That can hold you back.
Some afraid they would go to hell,
Some wanted to die and wouldn't
No one talked about it much.
It was a fact of life. Death.


Oh we learned Kubler- Ross and Maslow
And how to titrate pain meds.
The doses, the side effects, the Doctor's preferences.
We learned the protocols, the rules, laws, the procedures.
We learned some of the patients, an extended family.
We learned whose gift cookies we could trust.

Still pretty much on my own, and among some other nurses,
We learned when to ask, quietly and discretely,
After a successful resuscitation,
"Do you remember?"

Some of that came from patients relaying a disturbing memory,
Being out of body,
During a down time.

Might even have been years earlier,
Still unresolved.
Somehow, sharing a story between people
Is a powerful healer sometimes.

I talked a lot to Mom about these.
Not specifically,
Generally.
She seemed so close to full understanding.
What concepts did she fail to master?
Not many.

And here I sit somedays,
Wondering what was her experience
As she crossed over the threshold,
Having been there several times before,
This time she went for real,
Into the Invisible.

Monday, February 24, 2014

Near Death Experience...Resources

Late at night,
One of us might flip on Coast to Coast
We call it the Art Bell channel at night...620 WVMT.

Last night caught a bit of this woman's journey
To study the Near Death Experience....

Check out her blog that has links to her website,
Twitter address, and more...

http://drpennysartori.wordpress.com/

Sunday, February 23, 2014

Late Night #Fracking Updating

This is a little piece I got from looking for NY info.
Now as I post this I wonder how NY can say fracking isn't in their plan,
And yet the NY Paper mill is why Canadians want to run a pipeline
Through my neighbor's property.
Oh, and under Lake Champlain.
1/2 of that is in NY.
So if there ever was a leak, under a sheet of ice, will NY help?


http://www.wptz.com/news/vermont-new-york/burlington/ny-energy-plan-released-doesnt-include-fracking/23835298?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=dlvr.it

Endangered Species II

Endangered Species II

The technology is running my posting tonight,
 Really now tomorrow by the scheduling.

I was going to post my original I am an Endangered Species poem.
It just became too difficult.

So thought I might crank out the sequel to the first one.

Endangered Species II
By Mary E. Gerdt © 2014
All rights reserved.

I am still an endangered species,
American, woman, a girl sometimes.

And other women,
None too weak,
Fight for their rights
To own the homesteads they settled on.

These women prosper, breathe, drink nature's waters.
They worked and paid and made their own way.
What is different about these 4,
Women they are,
Women who were told their rights are like the wind.

The bobcat warned me,
So many years ago,
Be careful,
Tread lightly,
You are endangered too.

I laughed and gawked and drove on,
Not a care in this world.

Now these women,
Don't want frackers,
Don't want pipelines,
Don't want troubles.

Neither did my bobcat friend,
He said always move on again,
Keep moving, he said,
Keep you head low,
Your time here is short,
Those frackers should go.

One thing we know,
My cat friends & I,
If that pipeline goes in,
The little people lose,
The big people win,
Making a few endangered again.


Making Monkton Gaz' slave,
The path Canadians made,
Was serving a mill,
A bitter smelly pill.

Their picking on a few,
It could have been me or you,
Endangered again,
Could be your friend,
Son or daughter and when,
The pipeline springs a leak,
Do we turn the other cheek?

This is a first draft,
Hastily thrown down for you.
I hope you're not
Endangered,
What would you do??








Saturday, February 22, 2014

Psalm Challenge 144

Psalm Challenge 144
Reality can be very cold

ready for spring



Psalm 144

Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)
144 I will extol thee, O God my king: and I will bless thy name for ever; yea, for ever and ever.
Every day I will bless thee: and I will praise thy name for ever; yea, for ever and ever.
Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised: and of his greatness there is no end.
Generation and generation shall praise thy works: and they shall declare thy power.
They shall speak of the magnificence of the glory of thy holiness: and shall tell thy wondrous works.
And they shall speak of the might of thy terrible acts: and shall declare thy greatness.
They shall publish the memory of the abundance of thy sweetness: and shall rejoice in thy justice.
The Lord is gracious and merciful: patient and plenteous in mercy.
The Lord is sweet to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.
10 Let all thy works, O lord, praise thee: and let thy saints bless thee.
11 They shall speak of the glory of thy kingdom: and shall tell of thy power:
12 To make thy might known to the sons of men: and the glory of the magnificence of thy kingdom.
13 Thy kingdom is a kingdom of all ages: and thy dominion endureth throughout all generations. The Lord is faithful in all his words: and holy in all his works.
14 The Lord lifteth up all that fall: and setteth up all that are cast down.
15 The eyes of all hope in thee, O Lord: and thou givest them meat in due season.
16 Thou openest thy hand, and fillest with blessing every living creature.
17 The Lord is just in all his ways: and holy in all his works.
18 The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him: to all that call upon him in truth.
19 He will do the will of them that fear him: and he will hear their prayer, and save them.
20 The Lord keepeth all them that love him; but all the wicked he will destroy.
21 My mouth shall speak the praise of the Lord: and let all flesh bless thy holy name for ever; yea, for ever and ever.
Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)by Public Domain

So much Music.....

So much Music,

being made,
around the world...
and here along comes another snippet preview of some Joe & Beth et al...

Wow...


Friday, February 21, 2014

Friday Nacht Musik

Friday Nacht Musik

Searching for Cafe Society....

Was thinking how I started using Twitter, and how it was Guy Forsyth who had a twitter account on his card. We saw him at Levon's twice with Carolyn Wonderland & band.
So I fought to find some music that was there.
Rosetta kept saying...let me do that number at the train station again,
She felt like a princess and played...well she showed the guys how to do it.

So decided to put 2 links from YT for Friday.
Sister Rosetta Tharpe (yes, playing again...)
Guy Forsyth.

The Past....oh so lovely foundation of rock & Roll
Sister Rosetta Tharpe.
The Present...Guy Forsyth....and all his cool friends...




And one more for the future of musik...
From a Wayne's World like Teen cave
emerges a band
worth posting on friday...

Macseal

Thursday, February 20, 2014

Midday Gaz Report...

It was like the farther I tried to get away from the frackers,
there they were, messing with the neighbor women who I care about. What did Augustus McCrae say in 
Lonesome Dove? by Larry McMurtry
"Woodrow doesn't tolerate rudeness in a man..."
Fred always calls me Woodrow...
It really is about being a nurse. You spend your whole career sticking up for weak, vulnerable, abused, sick, despondent.
People who have been invaded, diseased, attacked, traumatized,
cut, robbed, blinded.
Sometimes it is us. 
Nurses can be funny, girls too. (and boys..:) 
We can be very assertive or aggressive in one realm
and submissive in another.
Yes, I guess that goes for most people.

Just that some people never do the submissive thing,
and we let them get away with it, chip, chip, chipping
at our self esteem.

So it is rare to have so much news in Monkton, Vermont I have to write a midday report, but what the frack? Who says I cannot??

A couple more updates about the 4 women who are being threatened by a Canadian company with ...Or else!!!

I am standing with these brave women.

Looking at the roots of economic injustice, the robbing of womens' inheritances and assets are ignored. Financial rape if you will. Both physical & financial rape have roots in power, control, taking. Robbing assets depletes a woman's power over her life. A Pauper less able to fight. Monkton, Vermont nearly sold my century farm for paying property taxes 9 months late and everyone knew but me. No one really cared. That is how it starts. Now women in Monkton, Vermont are being threatened by Canadian Gaz Frackers. That is how it starts.


The Digger has been digging a little...
http://vtdigger.org/2014/02/19/landowners-seek-safety-assurances-vermont-gas/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=landowners-seek-safety-assurances-vermont-gas

I think they could use a better shovel...maybe a broadfork.

Will keep posting links as they come in. There is a definite scatter factor on the part of the farckers.
They really want to keep us animals scurrying about while they put the greenbacks into unkown hands.
Bahhhd....

Why are you all in the pen?
Because we told you to go there.





Canadian owned Vermont gaz threatens US Landowners

We happen to flip on Vermont abc 22 last night with Lauren Maloney...
She's quite a good anchorwoman.
So she had an interview of the women of Monkton,Vermont who are challenging
Goliath Gaz.

Below are links to press..

Fox 44: http://www.mychamplainvalley.com/story/d/story/residents-feel-pipeline-pressure/27833/abq_qVnjV06-Fe8ZWAMrwA

WCAX channel 3: http://www.wcax.com/story/24765383/vt-homeowners-fight-natural-gas-pipeline?clienttype=generic&mobilecgbypass

Here's the link to Burlington Free Press article on the same...
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20140219/NEWS02/302190041/Vermont-Gas-puts-eminent-domain-on-the-table-over-natural-gas-pipeline-debate-Monkton


Will post more as I get it in.

Say a prayer or light a candle or send good energy to these women.
Wherever you are,
They need all the help they can muster.

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Captain's Cave




Captain's Cave.

The girl told the old lady where the cave was,
The dream she had,
The Captain was the sign.

What did all of this mean?

Tuesday, February 18, 2014

YT link...Ansel Adams

You Tube link

A short movie about Ansel Adams.

Certainly my hero before the movie,
and so much more after watching this...


Monday, February 17, 2014

Sunday, February 16, 2014

Fracking Fighting Fatigue

Fracking Fighting Fatigue


Fracking Fighting causes Fatigue.
That's what the warning label said,
So why exactly was I so attracted to it?

No Fame nor Fortune nor Fantastic new thing,
Was offered in return for fighting the beast,
The Fracking ugly Subterranean Monster.

Each day I comb the net, looking for the news,
Daily reports, exploded pipeline, pipefitters on meth,
Cooking up new stories of the miraculous New gas.

I tweet, email, I comment where I can.
Wrote the Corps of engineers, the PSB and
What a few rural people thought
Of a pipeline they don't want,
No one seems to run with this,
Is the deal all done?

The papers show their bias, Gaz advertising there,
Once that money dries up, it would come from where?
Some people call the Gaz, au Naturale,
We know it's all a lie,
She is a femme fatale.

This poem doesn't rhyme so well,
Of that I will confess,
The Fatigue has sat me down again,
Into my easy chair.
Fracking Fighters,
Growing numbers,
Building roads to lead the way,
We can stop this greasy pipeline deal,
Someday, some fine fine day.

I reacquainted with an old neighbor. She is in the sights of the pipeline route.
She said the Canadian owned Frackin gas land agent threatened her with eminent domain.
Looking for some backup. Monkton,Vermont is at a crossroads.
One way, slaves, transmission fields.
The other, a community of people not afraid to dig the soil,
Drink the water, play in the fields and forest.
My fatigue overwhelming. Finally stopped opening gaz related stuff for a week.
There's too much.
That's how the gaz bullies want it.
Pick, pick, pick, until they cave,
Divide & conquer,
Pit one against the other
Pay the Press,
Pay, promise politicians & businesses.
Litlle guy be damned, says Vermont gas,
We'll just take your property....
Canadians.
Do you hear something???
Ethan Allen????
Is he crying the words
Freedom
Sovereignty
Unity
This is your land, Americans.
We shall fight.



Saturday, February 15, 2014

Psalm Challenge 143

Psalm Challenge 143


Psalm 143 (Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition)

Psalm 143
Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)
143 Blessed be the Lord my God, who teacheth my hands to fight, and my fingers to war.
2 My mercy, and my refuge: my support, and my deliverer: My protector, and I have hoped in him: who subdueth my people under me.
3 Lord, what is man, that thou art made known to him? or the son of man, that thou makest account of him?
4 Man is like to vanity: his days pass away like a shadow.
5 Lord, bow down thy heavens and descend: touch the mountains and they shall smoke.
6 Send forth lightning, and thou shalt scatter them: shoot out thy arrows, and thou shalt trouble them.
7 Put forth thy hand from on high, take me out, and deliver me from many waters: from the hand of strange children:
8 Whose mouth hath spoken vanity: and their right hand is the right hand of iniquity.
9 To thee, O God, I will sing a new canticle: on the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings I will sing praises to thee.
10 Who givest salvation to kings: who hast redeemed thy servant David from the malicious sword:
11 Deliver me, And rescue me out of the hand of strange children; whose mouth hath spoken vanity: and their right hand is the right hand of iniquity:
12 Whose sons are as new plants in their youth: Their daughters decked out, adorned round about after the similitude of a temple:
13 Their storehouses full, flowing out of this into that. Their sheep fruitful in young, abounding in their goings forth:
14 Their oxen fat. There is no breach of wall, nor passage, nor crying out in their streets.
15 They have called the people happy, that hath these things: but happy is that people whose God is the Lord.



Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)
by Public Domain

Eating Disorders, What I know, Who I am, Where I came from


notes: even as I started to write this I was resistant. It is a tender subject. It cuts to the quick, the nerve, a shooting pain, an agony of sorrows, a remembrance of teasing, looks, reflections of repulsion, most of it imaginary. As a small child I was not obese. I was quite active as we all were with mandatory gym every day and recess and free time unencumbered by lots of techno crap.  We had Mom & Dad's old console stereo, which was for dancing, too. If you got to jumping too hard the record skipped.

As a young child and as I grew older, food was important. There were 7 kids and 2 parents, all eating. I never knew what leftovers were when I met Fred. I still eat like a vacuum cleaner. My parents were born around the depression era. Dad's family had a grocery store in St. Louis and they did OK. Mom's Father died in 1930, leaving our widowed grandmother Fanny, their Son Jay, 15 and Mom 5. Mom had food anxiety. Hoarding. Nibbler. I am her clone. But add the not hungry, not full thing. I don't understand it. I don't want to understand it.
The farther back I looked, heavy, heavy, heavy people. My Dad was the skinniest that I knew, and Brother Dan. Was that because I stole his portions?...see I said this is painful. I will only scratch the surface of my culture about food.Jay was trim, solid. His sister, My Mom overweight. But not until she had kids. She thought the weight was from having kids. Then I never had kids and my weight went up in my 20's. 
Yes I consume more than I burn.
I survive.
Right now, nausea creeps in from meds, diseased neurons.
My feelings about food, constantly change.
Except chocolate.
We do try to avoid processed foods, prepared foods, we try to choose healthy over not but we really must balance with desserts or other treats to keep us thankful we came down to this planet of plenty for one more spin. Growing up we did not have dessert with meals like my friends did. That is not to say we were not creative about cooking even at a young age. 
So as this flows out, maybe it was not so bad. I get sensitive when I hear, eat healthy, live longer.
So many years working ICU. Healthy ones dropped too, sometimes more precipitously.
Then a nurse I knew, how did she stay so thin? Exercise, aerobics. And she ate the white part of the lettuce, you know, the stem end? She ate very little. I worried about her. Me plus sized. I worked hard but pretty sedentary, flat footed. Here was my friend, I was Envious
It should have been a warning. We spent a lot of time together, 12 hour shifts, coding dead people, 
chatting over half dead people, keeping people alive until the next shift.
I asked her one day when I gained the courage.How did she stay so thin?
She had been an exercise addict. She actually felt more laid back than before.
She weighed more than she ever had.
She moderated her exercise, she dropped the food obsessions. It was not easy.
She was pushed to the breaking point,
She was like a toothpick. I did not know her then. I was glad she told me. 
Nothing is as it appears. You never know people's struggles.
I never looked at thin people the same. 

Lastly, my ancestors did not think about eating too much or vomiting their excesses.
partly because there were no excesses.

Here is a link for the scientific low down on eating disorders.


There was in me more of a story. Perhaps more will come out later. Perhaps not. 


Eating Disorders...

It is a modern phenonmenon, no??

     We snickered in 6th grade when the boys talked about 
     the Roman excesses-they ate and then vomited at the Vomitorium.



Friday, February 14, 2014

Friday Nacht Musik Part Deux

Because sometimes you just can't stop you tube surfing...

Happy belated birthday to Brian Mitchell...

Oh man..a foundation song for  Virtual Cafe Society...







Then some more songs du jour by Jim Boggia...love those notes he finds...




and because I cannot stop listening to this guy...




and one more for Valentine's day...
all the credit goes to the artists...





Friday Musik Link, Valentine's Day, Searching for Cafe Society

Happy Valentine's Day
For my Fred....


Now a little story and some music.
Searching for Cafe Society,
True integrated music, art, and pure human bliss,
Down in the Village in NYC, 
Still a cultural center,
All these years later.

This morning under a boatload of snow...

I was trying this week to place Khahlil Gibran at the Cafe,
No success yet.

So will post another gem from yt.
In the spirit of Cafe Society...
People all over the world,
Will listen today,
In a nice little club
In NYC.


Im going to post Richard's new movie once I find the link again...this was wonderful..






Thursday, February 13, 2014

Last Spring


Last Spring
These crab apple trees were loaded
With blossoms.
All winter,
Flocks of birds have been dining here.





Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Revisiting Vermont Property Tax rules, sinkholes

Tis the season for town meeting planning.
In Vermont, there is quite a system of taxation...learn all you can.


Revisiting some old articles I wrote about Vermont Property taxes and the practice of selling owners' lien to pry from their hands that scrap of Earth their heart occupies.
Let's get real.
There's no place like home.
Our dream, our ancestors had a dream.
They worked, paid.
We worked, paid.
Then those people tried to take our farm.
9 months late. Narrowly averted.
I was more embarrassed than anything at first.
I missed it. I owned property for 20 years and no one told me it was for sale.
It was in the print version of the newspaper that I read on line.
It sounds selfish I know, but it bothered me the indigent clients I worked with looked at me like, whoa, girl, do you need help??? I was hopping around carefree,
Should have been a warning.

First the link http://traveloguefortheuniverse.blogspot.com/search/label/Halls%20of%20Shame

Then a painting I did...

My nightmare


Finally a movie of our property, our lives.



Monday, February 10, 2014

Guest Post…Owl Sighting


photo5MA27444620-0005
Fred was out by the Dead Creek Wildlife refuge.
There sat a beautiful owl. A Great Snowy Owl.
Many people with long lenses captured this stunning bird’s image.
Fred snapped a few…Thanks!
photo1MA27444620-0001

Sunday, February 9, 2014

Cold & Crisp

Cold & Crisp, the air,
Tumbling down,down on us,
Hope spring comes sooner.

Meanwhile, while you are waiting for spring,
A Music link from YT
From John Lennon tribute...





Saturday, February 8, 2014

Psalm Challenge 142

Psalm Challenge 142


Link from bible gateway.com

Psalm 142 (Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition)

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Psalm 142

Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)
142 Hear, O Lord, my prayer: give ear to my supplication in thy truth: hear me in thy justice.
And enter not into judgment with thy servant: for in thy sight no man living shall be justified.
For the enemy hath persecuted my soul: he hath brought down my life to the earth. He hath made me to dwell in darkness as those that have been dead of old:
And my spirit is in anguish within me: my heart within me is troubled.
I remembered the days of old, I meditated on all thy works: I meditated upon the works of thy hands.
I stretched forth my hands to thee: my soul is as earth without water unto thee.



Hear me speedily, O Lord: my spirit hath fainted away. Turn not away thy face from me, lest I be like unto them that go down into the pit.
Cause me to hear thy mercy in the morning; for in thee have I hoped. Make the way known to me, wherein I should walk: for I have lifted up my soul to thee.
Deliver me from my enemies, O Lord, to thee have I fled:
10 Teach me to do thy will, for thou art my God. Thy good spirit shall lead me into the right land:
11 For thy name's sake, O Lord, thou wilt quicken me in thy justice. Thou wilt bring my soul out of trouble:
12 And in thy mercy thou wilt destroy my enemies. And thou wilt cut off all them that afflict my soul: for I am thy servant.




Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition (DRA)by Public Domain