In the Navy....
So much has happened since I last posted. Looking at a stint in the Navy. If they'll have me. So far so good. Now I just have to survive the physical and a stint in boot camp. Told the recruiter if I make it alive I'll buy him a beer. So it goes. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!!! ALL YOU NAY SAYERS CAN KISS MY YELLOW (1% too fat) ass!!!!!!!!!!!

Ladies and Gentlemen; the verdict is in...
And the final verdict is that men and women are different from one another. "Huh"? you say. Its true. Scientists have determined that not only are men and women different physically, but also neurologically and emotionally and mentally as well.

I wonder how many rocket scientists it took to figure this out. /:)

I would like to take the men in the audience on a specially guided tour of the female mind and heart. First of all, I know there is more to you guys than just satisfying your libido. Much more. You guys need your time and space and a little "cave" to retreat to, to decompress. You don't much care what color the curtains are, as long as they aren't on fire. For you guys, reality is concrete.
For us though, we view life in a different way. We talk about our problems for the extension of sympathy, whereas you guys talk about them to solve them. Our conversations with another girl might look like this: "Oh my god, he's so gorgeous? Did you see the look in his eye when he looked at you? He must be Prince Charming." And then we have the nerve to get upset when we hear the conversation between two guys: "Did you bone her?" "Yeah."
We are emotional creatures, and we thrive on intuition. This is different from males of the species who operate on logic and reason. It's not bad, it just is. We are forever pining for you guys to pay us a compliment. We naturally hate to think that you'd trade us up for a better looking model with bigger boobs and a firmer backside, etc. Sometimes, we do get insecure. Too much so, sometimes.
Yes, I have tried to meet you guys halfway. I know that if you eat my dinner, you liked it, regardless if you paid me a compliment or not. I really like compliments, but know that in your language, a loud belch is as good a compliment as a standing ovation. I know that a lot of times my oversentimental nature could be construed to be whininess. Yes, I know you guys really, really like hummers. bwahaha. I believe that the key toward success in any male-female relationship is trying to understand where one another is coming from.
Much of it depends on trying to understand each other's frame of reference. If one of the persons has undergone a past divorce and the other has not, then the person who has not may not fully understand the anger, the betrayal and the other emotional fallout. You can't really judge a person until you've walked a mile in their shoes. And even then, the male and the female will react differently. Men are more prone to see a solution, or see no solution and then feel they are drowning in their problems, whereas a woman will reach out for the life raft of her friends and make the attempt to swim back to the safety of shore.
In some of us more so than others, we let the fear get the better of us. Please understand that it is not 100% your job to make the fear go away. Fear is something that we must all face and conquer.

In closing, there is very very little hope that you will change me into a football lover, much as I know there is no hope I will ever get you to LIKE shopping. So rather than lament our differences from one another let us enjoy them -- both in the sack and out of the sack! :)

Connie "No one in their right mind would give me a therapists license" Goodnow

Just call me Connie the BITTTTTTTTTTTTTTCCCCCCCCCHHHHHHHHHHH
WELL, I'm happy to report that Scott's surgery went well -- it was done in an hour and a half and he came out of general anesthesia quite well and is doing fine.

But yesterday was not only violently stressful. Yesterday was quite educational. It reminded me of what a bitch patient advocacy truly is. Try and get a prescription for Tylenol w/ codeine filled in Oswego County -- all you can expect is strange looks and "we can't fill this because...."
After the surgery and his discharge we plodded up to Wal-Mart's in Oswego where the pharmacist took one look at it and said "We can't fill this because its not properly stamped or imprinted by the doctor. This is a controlled substance and federal law says bla bla bla." Fine. Only after I said to her in a loud voice "For Christ's sake this man had surgery this morning!" did we turn around and leave. We went to the doctor's office where he wrote out another prescription. One would assume that one would have no more problems after this. Right?
WRONG!!! This time I took the medicine up to Kinney's in Mexico. I leave the prescription at the desk and come back. The man says "We can't fill this because its a controlled substance and the doctor forgot to fill in the strength part of it. I can't alter it, its against the law. And you better not alter it either!"

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I WOULDN"T KNOW WHAT TO PUT IN THERE EVEN IF YOU TOLD ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AND ANYWAY WHAT MAKES YOU THINK I'D DO SUCH A MORONIC THING, YOU STUPID SON OF GEORGE W. BUSH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So in my deadliest, most earnest, "you'd better not f*** with me because I am premenstrual and I've absolutely had it" voice, I said, "Look -- this man has three incisions in his abdomen. And one in his leg. If this prescription isn't filled, he's GOING TO BE IN A WORLD OF HURT." (Mind you I kept from yelling this whole time.) He said "I'm sorry there's nothing more I can do but you have to call the doctor." At this point it was after six o'clock which means *surprise* the doctor went home!!! At this point I had no choice but to turn around and leave.

In the van on the way home I was sobbing. Had the whole world suffered a drastic drop in IQ points??? How could someone become a doctor who didn't know how the FUCK to fill out a decent prescription? AAAAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

I got home and had no choice but to announce to my boyfriend that I still didn't have his pills. I began to make a series of harried telephone calls to the Emergency Room at Oswego Hospital, to the Same Day Surgery Dept, to anyone that could help me! I kept getting "There's nothing I can do...." to which I'd reply, "That is not acceptable to me." Finally around seven o'clock they managed to get ahold of the doctor so he could call the damn prescription in. By this time I was seething -- it should NOT have taken me six hours to get his pain meds. I began to cuss in the most frightening manner at everything -- other drivers, even my BF's boss Gary "Fuck you, Gary Dennis, with your stupid coke bottle glasses and bla bla bla...." (poor Gary hadn't actually done anything to deserve that but in the actual absence of any one person to smack upside the head he seemed like the best choice.) I finally managed to get home so he could get his pain meds and I could change his dressings. Then I went in the other room to angrily bang out some harsh riffs on my electric guitar for an hour or so (to calm down, others drink or take Quaaludes -- I play the gitbox)

So there it is, my horror story. Pharmacists who wouldn't accept my boyfriend's prescription for pain medication even if it came from two stone tablets carried by Moses -- not unless it was accompanied by two forms of ID and a letter from the Pope. The Moral of the Story? Always have your doc call your script for something like that in -- otherwise they are too stupid to get it and you'll be like me -- a seething, blood boiling crazy woman who's mad at the universe.... :)

Connie the BITTTTTTTTCCCCCCCCCCCCCCHHHHHHHHHHH :)

A little perspective...
OK I'm back writing in this thing after a couple weeks worth of hiatus...

I read a story on the internet how startled scientists are that there is a giant asteroid headed in our direction, possibly on a collision course with Earth, in the year 2014, and that we might go the way of the dinosaurs. Any humans left alive would be so miserable/terrified/starving/diseased etc. that life would no longer be worth living. etc. etc. ad nauseam.

I have news for the doomsayers: We are all going to die. Period. One day, my heart will stop beating, my lungs will stop breathing, my brain will cease function, my organs will shut down, my kidney's won't function, and whatever soul I have (if the human soul exists) will separate from my body. As will yours. As will everyone else's who ever lived. I am at peace with this fact. Whether an asteroid slams into the Earth or a giant snake eats it, we are going to all die one day. We don't know when. There is no "if". None of us knows when or how. There are any number of things that could conceivably happen to me before March 21, 2014.

I could drown.

I could be murdered.

I could be:
struck by lightning, hit by a car, diagnosed with AIDS, diagnosed with cancer, killed by a drunk driver, suffer a heart attack, suffer a stroke, die from an aneurysm, or hell, the government might kill me if down the road it doesn't like what I say. A tornado could sweep through my neck of the woods in the middle of the night. Or Joe Blow could shoot me because I looked at him funny. These are all more likely scenarios than your scary sounding "asteroid slamming into the earth" theory. When your number comes up, that's it. You go with the angel of Death. You go to the Judgement seat. Or whatever.

No matter how much we try to avoid death, we can't avoid it forever. I'm all for saving life if it can be saved. But death is also part of life. And if a comet does wipe out all life on Earth...

Life will begin again, either on Earth or on a planet someplace else. Life has a way, you see, of going on, even in the face of catastrophe. I have faith in that much!

So, you NaSA types can quit trying to scare me with your "comet slamming into the world wiping out all life on Earth oh isn't it terrible" tripe. Do the rest of us a favor. SHUT UP! Or at least let me know the date so I can tie a blindfold around my head, light up a cigarette and await my inevitable fate.

Constance Goodnow, Corpse-In-The-Making

Prepare for the Future of E-Commerce...
I must admit I've become something of a recluse in my old age. I used to love going to the mall and Wal-Mart -- now I just out and out hate it. Dollar stores, which formerly looked like gold mines with great prices, are now just obnoxious mom and pop shops full of junk. (Hard not to feel that way when your own hearth is full of dollar store junk!)

A lot of good, rare stuff can be found nowadays on Ebay. But-- Caveat Emptor. Two little words -- in a dead language everyone should learn -- meaning "Let the buyer beware." I love to shop on Ebay as do millions of others -- the instant payment, the stuff is brought to you as your sitting at home and you don't have to go out and get it. But at times Ebay can present a real pain in the ass.

I plan to present some guidelines to Ebayer's and warn them as to what they're getting into. Here they are:

"Too good to be true" Looks too good to be true? It probably is -- I once won the entire Voltron series on VHS. Turns out that I paid $76 to the guy for SIX TAPES OF UNWATCHABLE CRAP! We exchanged nasty emails and he took off with my money -- never to be seen again. LOOK AT THE AUCTION -- what does it tell you...?

"Shipping too much" A seller has the right to charge you whatever shipping and handling he wants. I've seen $20 DVD players on Ebay where the shipping was $29.95. A lady who won multiple auctions ran into problems because the seller insisted on her paying $10 shipping for her 10 auctions. She dropped out of Ebay. If you can't afford the shipping don't bid. And don't believe for one minute Ebay cares -- they are run by a bunch of nasty squalid people who only complain if you stiff them seller fees.

Feedback -- how it works. Quite simply put this is a review of bidders and sellers and how they conducted their past auctions. If a person honors an auction either by selling their item or paying within a reasonable time, the person usually deserves positive feedback. If the seller doesn't sell or the buyer doesn't pay they should get a negative feedback. Three negatives and you risk account suspension. Generally speaking, when you bid you are entering into a legal contract with the seller to purchase the item should you win the auction. If you don't intend to buy, don't bid. Its that simple.

Know Your Item -- This is perhaps the most important thing to remember. I've recently seen the new Godzilla movie on DVD go for $60-$70 on Ebay. The thing that irritates me is that I know I can go to dddhouse.com and buy it from them for much, much less. "A fool and his money are soon parted." <--- wise old adage to live by! Learn it and love it!

If you are KNOWLEDGEABLE and don't let your guard down chances are you can keep the bad experiences on Ebay down to a minimum.

Happy bidding!

Constance A. Goodnow, Ebay addict extraordinaire

Religion the opiate of the masses?
What I'd like to address is the tendency of religious people to become overly soft and dependent on God as they use their religion as a comfy couch instead of the life raft its supposed to be.

They have indeed become as little children. "God, give me a home. God gimme a job. God, gimme a wife. God, gimme a Jack Russell terrier. Gimme Gimme Gimme, in Jesus' name." And they point to the Bible, to the Scripture verse that says, "Ask, using My Name, and it shall be given to you..."

What they conveniently forgot to mention is that most of the time they have to get up and go to work each day. They have to work to earn the money to buy food. God won't go to the grocery store to buy them a bottle of Dom Perignon and a frozen lasagna. They must pay the rent and bills. God won't send out that check every month. They have to get up off their butts and out of their prayer closets to fill out applications and find a job... God won't drop one in their lap. God has been relegated from an all wise, omnipotent eternal Being into a gigantic Santa Claus in the sky listening to us mutter our every whim, or an eternal go-fer. The way people relate to God, they must think He's the servant and we're the masters, or something or other, when its quite the opposite.

Note on the day of my road test I didn't ask God to give me a driver's license. I didn't ask God to "touch the examiners heart" so that no matter how many mistakes I made, no matter how many people I endangered, no matter how many dogs/cats/kids/little old ladies I ran over, I would get a license. I prayed for wisdom, acuity of vision and common horse sense so that I WOULDN'T endanger anyone. Therein lies the difference.

The reason I quit going to church is this: It's become a sodality, or a good old boys' frat club full of commiseration where the bread of Life is served always with a large cup of Whine. "I need this, I need that. I'm too lazy to go and get it. My son's on drugs, my daughter's a whore and its because I was too busy praying all the time to be a parent." Puh-LEEEEEEEEEEAAASSSSSE. When was the last time any of you got off your asses and went to help out someone in real need? Maybe God gave his answer. Maybe that answer is YOU.

Quit being part of the problem and be part of the solution!

Constance A. Goodnow, Rogue Roman Catholic

Hard Choices
We all have difficult choices to face in our lives. I know of a woman whose 11 year old daughter faces major surgery. See -- the little girl is in a wheelchair, and has severe scoliosis. Untreated, it will crush her heart and lungs. Surgery also carries some risks -- infection, permanent damage, death. What's a person to do?

To be sure life throws many a curveball at us it seems. We're damned if we do and damned if we don't. It's not always people who oppose us, but circumstances. Difficult circumstances, frustrating impossibilities, and cons on both sides. Depressing to say the least.

Hard choices define the kind of person we are and sculpt the kind of person we are to become.

Constance A. Goodnow

I did it again!!! I'm so sorry!
I certainly have a way of putting this writing stuff off, don't I?

Well I had to take a couple days off to mentally prepare myself for taking my road test. I completely cleaned my bedroom and spent alot of quiet time alone. I visualized myself doing everything perfectly and without flaw. I unlocked my inner Buddha. I prayed to God to give me acuity of vision and common horse sense. I am one with the universe, I am one with the universe. Nothing can disturb me.

AAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The day of the test came and I laughed and joked with my teacher as usual. Then I saddled up with the examiner. I winced as I saw her mark me some points off for mistakes I'd made -- no way in hell was she going to catch me not signaling or looking over my shoulder.
Then the test was over and I turned off the key. I remember thinking, "This is it -- lets have the bad news, come on, FLUNK ME!" Au contraire -- I passed. As I held the slip of paper in my hand this realization hit me and I began to tremble. I was now a licensed driver. I could go anywhere I wanted. This... was... INCREDIBLE. I pinched myself to make sure it was not a dream. (It wasn't.)

I am going to miss my teacher. He was smart as a whip and we always had the best conversations. If he's still around I'd like for him to teach my kids how to drive -- why not. :) Why should they have to wait 29 years as I did?

In any case no I am not loony. Nor did George Bush make me disappear. (Not yet anyways.) I was merely taking care of important business I should have managed 13 years ago, I haven't forgotten all about you guys.

Now watch: the government will raise the terror threat level to red because Connie Goodnow got her license. :)

Constance A. Goodnow (Don't like my driving? Stay off the sidewalk)

Proven Antidote against Anxiety and Insanity
Dear readers,

Sorry that I have slacked off yet again on writing an article -- I had to take a couple of days off to get my head screwed on straight. For once.

For once I took a mini-vacation from worrying about the evil plans of George Bush, or the sorry state of the world, or the purest form of evil which is Key Bank, and did something I have been putting off for three years -- building the Godzilla model that has been sitting in my closet for years.
At first it was in pieces and shaded a rather unattractive color of green -- but with my artful ministrations coupled with my step-by-step technical know how, the model began to take shape. Its very nearly complete now -- all I have to do is paint the box cars, stick one in his teeth and another in his claws, paint and attach the nametag and I'm done...

How often is life like that! We have a bunch of pieces lying about, and we're not quite sure what each one is for but put together properly they reveal meaning. And the end result can be beautiful or scary dependent on which way we're leaning toward.

All too true, too, is the fact that we have to recreate and have time to ourselves as well as time together and time spent working. If we are to have a balanced life, that is. Rest and recreation is the Testor's model glue that holds us together. Without it, we are so fragile and come apart so easily. Of course it doesn't take a model builder to recognize that fact!

So, have you a project that you have been putting off with the excuse that you never seem to have any time? Why not put off the housework for a day or so, and pull it out and get started on that project? Hell, as soon as I'm done with ol' Godzilla, I plan to head on up to Wal Mart and pick up some beautiful fabric for a quilt I'm planning to make... after which I'm going to make one quilt for each of my children. :)

Just one word of caution. Building models and drinking alcohol do not mix. :)))

Constance A. Goodnow

Who can I sue for being stupid?
Everywhere you go these days, today's stupidity will mean tomorrow's litigiousness, and the litigiousness (for you poor dumb suckers out there, this word means propensity to sue the pants off of some poor stupid idiot) of today will mean all the more government overregulation tomorrow. Or maybe not. There are a handful of good judges out there who would rather not have their time wasted with frivolous lawsuits. What of the others though?

Think of a smoker who's chuffed his way through a carton of cigarettes a day and has done so for the last 25 years. His habit has finally caught up to him in the twin spectres of lung cancer and emphysema. Who wouldn't have all that tar in their lungs?? He then turns around and sues Philip Morris. Why? For having "addicted him."

How about the family whose son is involved in a bad drug deal and then murdered. Their outrage and grief is understandable. However, they launch a lawsuit against... GUN MANUFACTURERS?? For having made the weapon that killed their son, despite the fact that the gun in question had no manufacturing flaws and the manufacturers have no control over the weapon onces it leaves the plant.

Or the person struggling with overweight and diabetes who turns around and sues McDonald's "for not offering more healthy foods" as if the person would eat them instead of the fried, unhealthful trans-fat laden foods they scarf down almost daily. Because of our propensity to blame others for our miseries and take 'em to court, governments have taken the initiative to make new laws every day, basically speaking to "protect us from ourselves."

It brings to mind the day a frantic woman called me on the phone at the Chinese take out restaurant where I worked -- seemed there was a piece of metal from the brillo pad used to scrub the pots and pans in her grandson's food. While the owner could get in trouble with the health department for that, the only way I could even recommend a suit is if SOMEONE GOT HURT. I don't want to hear about another fat person suing a restaurant for their troubles because they are mad their overweight butts will not fit into one airline seat -- such a person would be better off flying in the cargo hold. I don't want to hear of another dying smoker filing a lawsuit against Philip Morris because of their own dumb propensity to smoke, despite the warnings, the bans on indoor smoking, the prevalent anti smoking education and all that.

We have quit feeling we are responsible for our problems and have deemed it to be someone else's fault. About the first time a patron sues a bordello because he caught the clap I am going to scream with laughter, and probably die laughing. If the person wins a large money award, then I will be very very frightened. But I'll be careful not to hold a large cup of violently hot McDonald's coffee as I'm trembling, because then there'll be a lawsuit. Right?

On the other hand maybe I should sue the Lord. Sure, why not? He stuck me on a planet where a sweeping 2/3 of the population doesn't have the brains God gave a rock. But then again He didn't make them that way. They make themselves that way. It's truly maddening. It must be for Him, anyway.

For all of you who are thinking of suing me for telling the truth: LIFE SUCKS AND YOU SUCK ALONG WITH IT. GET OVER IT. MORONS! THERE I SAID IT, HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Learn to take some risks for crying out loud and if you get hurt, live with it. Don't sue -- the judges' time is valuable and there are people out there with real problems who need their time. Don't come crying to me, the taxpayer, because you are stupid.

Constance A. Goodnow