BikerBabe

I'm so sorry I missed this when you first posted. I know you, but I didn't start posting till recently, so I doubt you would know me. What you know about me and don't realize is my pain, I'm sorry to say I've been where you were 2 years ago, when my first husband was murdered in 1977. It breaks my heart to hear that anyone else, especially someone as sweet as you, has also been thru such a tragic turn in your life.

As Shellon said, anytime you need to talk, vent, whatever, please feel free to drop me a line. When she and I are in chat at the same time we run 'the widows club', it's a club we never want to see anyone else have to join, it's easy to see why, but all our love is there if you choose to stop in one night and talk. I've been busy lately with a lot of medical stuff from my various doctors, so don't get in every night as I used to, but try to stop in as often as I can. I'd love to say hi to you in real time.

I did post back during the TraceChat days, if you go back that far, using a different nickname. There is a chance you might know me by that if you had found that site or later on in Waydale. I can run it past you when we talk one day, I'd prefer not to post it openly, since I don't use it anymore and so much has changed since then. :)

It's good seeing you here again, you've been missed. Again I'm so sorry for your loss, I was only 19 when I became a widow and I'm 50 now. It still hurts when I think about it and I cry still every year on the anniversary of his passing. I moved on with my life though and God has always been there to give me one thing to smile or laugh at every day. I found it's the little things that help me keep moving on, I try not to be too caught up in something or myself and miss them daily. Not sure if that's your way or not, but it's what helps me and I thought I'd tell you. Soooo, welcome back to the cafe, grab a cup of coffee and settle in with us. :)

Elmo has his own cage, it lives in the closet. LOL. He and Cleo have always shared her cage since the day he moved in with us and that is how they want it. Cockies are very social, flock oriented birds, they like to be with others and it doesn't matter if it's another bird or their human, everyone the love they consider part of their flock.

You didn't say if your new bird is a male or female. If it's a male, then I'd advise reading up on breeding. They have those little books you can get at the pet stores about different subjects on different types of birds. I have one on breeding cockatiels, even though it has turned out one of ours is sterile because the eggs never develop and hatch. *sigh* They LOVE making them still though. Hahahaha. You will know if it happens, Rascal will make a new noise, what I call the horny sound and look like she's trying to almost lie out on the perch. The male will mount her front behind (she moves her tail to the side to allow him access to her vent) and then will put his vent to hers. They will go at it for 2 to 5 minutes depending on the couple and how good of a grip they have in the cage to allow them to do this. After about 4 days to a week after they start doing this, quite a few times a day with the case of my two, she will lay the first egg and then lay one every other day until done. They lay between 4 and 6 normally. The eggs hatch in the same order they were born in about 21 days, give or take a day or two.

If both are females, they they are just becoming friends and want to hang out together when they aren't sharing shoulder time on you. :) Enjoy them, it shows how much they love you when they sit on you together instead of just hanging out on the cage with each other. They want you, their whole flock involved in their lives.

Cockies do have attitudes as you know. Expect a fight or two now and then, but it's nothing to worry about. They normally settle their differences fairly quick and everything gets back to normal. I see Elmo reach over and give Cleo a peck on her head many times when he feels she's not doing what she should be, which is the same thing she does to him when she feels he is in the wrong. It's never really gone any further than that with my two, but I know with some birds new to each other it can take a couple weeks of some longer fights before they get the 'pecking order' arranged that they need for their flock, then all will be fine.

I'd let them choose the cage they want to live in. If they are happier together, let them share one and put the other one up as a spare in case it's ever needed due to one getting ill or their chosen cage developing a problem that needs to be fixed.

Hope all this helps you some. Feel free to ask me anything you aren't sure on when it comes to two birds and I'll help if I have the experience to answer it for you. Tell your son birds can remember a LOT and for a long time. Once Rascal gets used to his changed voice she will act the way she used to with him again, just give her the time to get used to it first and let her make the first approach to him to restart their relationship. When she's ready she will go to him as she used to, but pressing it by trying to make her do that now may scare her and delay the process, so let her pick the time when she feels it's all ok and it's really him.

The dogs I think probably came from her getting scared by dogs she came across when she was alone out there, before she was found and rescued by the family that cared for her till they were put in contact with you. She should settle in again with 'her' dogs once she is there awhile and feels secure again. Cleo has never been around a dog, but hearing one outside barking where we used to live would make her run to me for protection, I think from instinct. She knows the barking sound means trouble and will go to her flock for protection from it.... then sit and poop on me. LOL. (Actually she will stick her little butt out and do her best every time to not get it on me when she 'goes'. My chair sits on one of those plastic things they use in offices on top of the carpet so they roll easier and that makes it real easy to clean up then for me. Elmo doesn't poop as much, but he also doesn't eat people food with me when otu of the cage like Cleo does and I think that is the reason. He will hop on the cage when hungry and eat his seed, poop in there and then come back over and resume his stance on the top of my chair. He sits up there and protects Cleo and I from anything bad that could happen (or so he thinks at least, it's really cute). Cleo will vary from sitting on my shoulder and then climbing up to sit with Elmo for awhile thruout each day and night when they are out of the cage.

Love ya sweet lady. I'm still so thrilled you have your whole flock back together again now.

Cleo and Elmo are celebrating when I told them your sweet baby is back home with you! I'm sure I don't need to tell you how fast tears formed in my eyes out of happiness when I read your post. I'd be lost without my 2 cockies and know how much it hurt you when you lost Rascal.

Praise God for the internet, bird lovers and her being found by good people that cared for you until you could be reunited. Give her a big hug and head scratch for me. :)

Before buying online it's always a good idea to go to www.ripoffreport.com and do a search on the company. If there are a lot of reports there, you will know to stay away from them and avoid getting ripped off.

Thanks for your sweet comments ladies. I'm still amazed at how when I originally posted asking if anyone had a disk they were willing to let go of, that I would actually need it so quickly afterwards. Even if I did have my old XP Pro disk, it wouldn't have done me any good for a full install due to my being unable to get updates from MS these days now that they have cracked down on everyone. I would have been forced into having to buy a new full version XP disk to install and I just really couldn't afford that on the little income I get from SSI. I had saved for months in order to get what I had in the bank that allowed me to buy the video card and the unplanned power supply box.

WW really saved the day for me, without knowing it. After it happened, I sent him a PM asking if I could do a post about all I went thru to get my new vid card installed and use his nickname in it. I wanted everyone here to know who it was who helped me so very much. He said I could, but I didn't tell him the full story, he had to wait until I posted it last night. All he knew was that I crashed and ended up needing to install that disk he sent me, but none of the craziness that surrounded it. Once he reads my original post on this thread, he will then understand why it meant so much to me to be able to use his name and to thank him in front of all our friends in here.

Being poor, I learned to build my own computers as a way to save money. I upgrade as I can afford to get new parts. I know it's never easy when you are building them, something simple can end up totally different than you expected, but I never in my wildest dreams would have expected the 2 days of hell just to install a new vid card. LOL.

Now that it's all up and running, I must say, it's totally wonderful and I feel it was worth all the hassle and problems to get it working. My games have never looked so good visually nor run so well due to the increased power supply now and twice the RAM on the vid card itself.

Thanks again WordWolf, I couldn't have done it without you!!!

I did a post on Aug 3 2007, 06:39 PM in the Questions and Some Answers part of the forum in the Computer Questions section. The thread is here: http://www.greasespotcafe.com/ipb/index.php?showtopic=14522 and the post of mine I'm referring to is #22. The other ones I did on that thread aren't relevant.

I asked in that post if anyone had a copy of XP Home or Pro they would no longer need once they upgraded to Vista that I could have. My XP Pro disks were missing after my ex roommate moved out and if I would crash, I would have no way to reinstall Win XP. In a couple of days I got a PM from someone and he said he had a XP Home disk he no longer needed that I could have and register to my computer *if* he hadn't thrown it away. He said he would look for it and get back to me. He did in fact find it and then mailed it to me using 2 day express mail. It arrived to me on August 9th and I put it in my CD case where I keep all OS, keyboard, mouse, etc. type of disks. I liked knowing it was there should the XP Pro I had installed on the computer every have a problem, I could just install the XP Home and actually have a XP version I could register and get updates for, along with just having the computer running again. My XP Pro was given to me after a ME crash a few years back, but it wasn't exactly one I could register as the reg number came off a key gen. For a long time I could get most updates ok, but then had to turn all updating off totally when MS got nasty last year. I couldn't afford to buy a copy either, so just made due the best I could.

Never in my wildest dreams would I have guessed what that XP Home disk would actually mean after it was sent to me by our very much beloved WordWolf from here on the GS Cafe forums.

Around the same time he sent the disk to me, my hubby's new monitor was giving him fits due to him having such an old vid card in his box. I told him to hang on before just buying one online and let me have a go first at a search. I hit Amazon.com and found an ATI X1650 Pro 512 mb RAM video card which was what I dearly wanted for my gaming and the ATI 9250 256 mb RAM card I was presently running was just want he needed for his monitor to like him again. So we made a deal. He bought my card off me for 62 bucks instead of the 100 plus it would have cost him online. I then bought the X1650 Pro card from Amazon while it was selling for $160 plus 11 bucks for 2 day shipping, instead of the 200 bucks before shipping all other sites online were asking for that same card. We both got the cards we needed at half the price we would have had to pay doing it at different times.

The Video card got here Monday, Aug. 13th. I pulled my card out of my box and installed it into his and had not problem one, which was shocking since his box is normally very hard to work on. I was pleased by that. Then I grabbed my new card and went to put it in my box. I cram myself in under the counter top I use as my desk and put it in, then climb out and start up the computer and get ... nothing. *sigh* So I look thru the book that came with it and find a section I'd missed the first read that said I needed a power supply of at least 450 watts. Funny, it didn't say that on Amazon when I read the stats. So off to Staples DR goes on his bicycle (just as the 2 benedryl he'd taken to help him sleep were kicking in of course) and he finds a choice .. 430 Watt for $60 or 500 Watt for $108. Needing at the min. of 450, he had to buy me the 500 Watt power supply. That was money I had NOT planned on spending and I was left with just enough cash in my bank account to be able to pay for my meds I'll get from the doctor tomorrow that my insurance doesn't cover. *sigh*.

He gets home and hands me the power supply and I put it in the box and go to plug in the main line that goes to the motherboard ... it had too many holes in it compared to the pins my MB has. Panic time yet again. I look thru the book and find the last 4 are removable for people with the smaller pin MB connectors. I take them off and see then it lines up fine and go to push it in ... it still won't go. The clip on the side that holds it down, that piece is wider than the space between 2 little things on my MB that sit next to where it clips in. Great, now what do we do. I put on my thinking cap.

I compared the new one to my old one. Then I got out my big pair of scissors and cut off one corner of the clip where it was the thickest, took everything I had to cut it off. Next I got out my diamond encrusted nail file and started sawing on the rest of it. As I went I would try it off and on to see when I was getting close to where it would fit. I also pushed those 2 little round things welded onto the MB apart as far as I could without doing any damage to them, which gained me a slight bit more room. I finally got to the point I'd filed it down enough that it did snap into place. We both sat back and sighed a big sigh of relief.

Next I hit the button and we watched my screen ... it booted up fine! Yes!!! Now all I had to do was get in there and do all the updates to the new vid card and I would be set .. or so I thought. As I was doing this, XP Pro decided to do a major crash and I lost all my video and could NOT get it back. I couldn't even get into Safe Mode and there was nothing in the BIOS to help me and it was the only thing I could see, anything Windows related would not show on my screen, I had lost all my VGA settings. By now it had been about 3 hours I was working to get the new vid card to work and was starting to get tired. Now I had no choice but to pray the XP Home disk WordWolf sent me did install and would register me to Microsoft. (By this point DR was the walking dead and he went to sleep and I continued on ...)

In goes WW's disk and I start praying as I watch it go thru the install. At the end it did register to me!!! I was back up online, albeit was now yet a couple more hours gone by, but in doing this, I lost all my .dll files to all my programs I have running on other partitions. Everything will have to be reinstalled before it will run again. First I had to get all my settings done, still get the new vid card set up, blah, blah, blah. I ended up finally getting to bed almost 2 days after the video card arrived via UPS.

I've been building my own computers for 9 years now and I can normally rely on DR's giving me fits and having no problems with mine. So much for that, mine made up for lost time. By the time I finally did go lay down to sleep though, I had installed one of my games that I could never see all the graphics on at the best settings due to the card not being powerful enough. It's Black and White 2 for those of you who know games. I reinstalled it and got thru the beginning part and then to the first level when I could really look around at things. I scrolled in tight to the ground and looked around. I saw for the first time the flowers in the grass I'd heard about and then joy of joys ... I found some of the tiny little ants running around and I followed them around awhile getting such a kick out of them. I then scrolled back out to a normal view and built some houses for my worshipers to live in and accidentally hit my mouse button, but it was in an area of grass where I saw nothing, but yet I heard the 'pick up' sound which I found odd. I scrolled in for a closer look and there in my 'hand' was a little chicken. Hahaha. I looked around and there was a whole flock of chickens running around there pecking at things to eat they found in the grass. I was so slap happy by that time, I just sat there and laughed till I had tears in my eyes. Then I put the chicken down so he could go back to doing his thing and scrolled back out, so I could go back to getting the housing finished.

I then just moved around the island of that level of the game and saw other 'firsts' like the waves crashing on the beach or rocks. I saw details on buildings that were never there before making them even more beautiful (I play a good god in the game, so get the nice pretty buildings, not the ugly ones you get playing evil). That was when I knew it would all be fine and knew I could go lay down and get some badly needed sleep and wake up in the morning (today) and have a very nice working computer.

When I did that post on the thread about Win Vista asking for anyone willing to give up their unneeded XP disk, I had NO idea how much it would become needed and how soon. Had I not posted, had WordWolf not sent me his disk, I would be offline right now waiting until my SSI check comes on the 1st of next month when I would have had more money so I could buy a copy of XP.

I want to publicly thank WordWolf for saving me and for his generous heart in giving me that disk. I want to also thank God, for His perfect timing. I can see His hand in all this from my first thought to do that post, to WW reading it and taking the time to look for his old XP disk and then sending it to me quickly. Between the two of them I am still up and running ... and now I also have the added bonus of having a legal copy and I've been able to get all the upgrades and Media Player 11. I'm sure I'll find more things as time goes on, that will add even more joy to it all. They turned what could have been a complete disaster into something good .. lemons to lemonaid. Thank you doesn't feel like it conveys how much this means to me. Being sick as I am with the Crohn's and Fibro, I spend almost all of my waking hours every day on my computer doing something .. I'd be totally lost without it. All my friends are online even, I don't get out enough to meet local people really. My world is 98% on the computer at this point in my life.

GSpotters are the greatest bunch, my only regret is I live too far away to be able to give WW a real life hug and can only send him a cyber *hug*.

Love reading this stuff!

thanks guys

Ladies, I think we should start protesting these guys who post naked pics of themselves, BUT THEY ARE HIDING BEHIND SOMETHING! First we had Larry, our beloved lawyer who hid behind his chair. Now we have Exwaycorps who's hiding behind the board of a fence. If *we* tried getting away with doing a picture like that do you think the guys in here would let us get away with it?

LOL. OK, I admit it, it's 8 am PST and I still haven't crawled into bed. Being tired and in my normal warped sense of humor way of thinking ... seeing that naked pig behind the fence board brought back the memory of the pic of Larry. (I kept a copy of that one too Sudo, even though it showed more chair than it did Larry.) I couldn't resist posting and having some fun with the cute piggie.

See those of you in chat who are normally there later tonight, if I wake up at a decent hour. I love everyone here, so put your name here on my list ______ .

What about civilians or relatives of those in the military? Can we salute the flag if we love it just as much? While I always do in my head and heart, doing it for real, would feel so much better. Does anyone know the answer to this?

My daddy was Air Force, my cousin was a Seal who didn't make it back from Nam, my daughter's father was Army and her husband today is in the military, so I consider myself as having a son in, who's going to Afghanistan in 8 months for a year or more. I have a very close friend (he's ex Way in fact) who's going to Iraq very soon. So yes, I also would love to salute our flag openly at the appropriate times, but am not sure if that's considered something the public are to do if they are not a vet personally and only related to many.

I'd surely appreciate it if one of you know the answer, so I know how to act the next time such an occasion would arise. If it's not something for non vets, then I will continue to put my hand over my heart as the flag passes.

50 bucks a bottle?!? They don't even show a picture of it, only the picture that's on the bottle or box itself. 50 bucks for 4 oz of cologne. Not very much for that price. I looked thru their main bookstore site too and all those prices there were very high too.

...and what the heck is it with the 3 bar crosses? I've never seen one like that before and they don't say anything about them, just that they cost up to 110 bucks depending on the size. It looks like a regular cross with a shorter bar piece above the one we normally see (where the arms go), then in the middle of the down piece in the open section that's left at the bottom, the bar piece is diagonal from left side highest, down to the right. Very odd looking and I wonder where it came from. I see a lot of Roman Catholic Church references, is this something that church has? I've never been to a Catholic church so have no idea, but I've never seen any of my friends from that church/religion wearing such a strange looking cross.

Yep, that video was cool Rhino. I sent the URL to DR and he liked it so much he kept a copy of it and was watching it on and off for quite a few hours. LOL. He said to tell you thanks. He likes the good ones like that to add to his ever growing collection of vids and pics. :)

Well, well, you are birthday girl today huh? I sure hope it's been a great one my friend. Wish I was closer so I could give you a BIG hug in person, but ... *sigh* ... will a virtual hug from 1500 miles away be ok?

*hugs* I love ya lady.

Ladies! You are BLOWING my mind!! Are you all certified members of the NRA on national and local registers? You girls might be better suited to take your vengeance out against “men” in Iraq. Did TWI do this to you?? :(

Sounds like y’all have enough fire power and toughness to sign on the marine line!

Lord knows “W” and all of America could use a few more boots on the ground...Yikes!

LOL, since I'm still awake being the night person I am and waiting for ex to get here after he gets off work to go to the store to pick up some meds I need I thought I'd let you know I'm harmless Bumpy, unless you try to hurt me.

I didn't include any TWI related rapes in my original post, that one I left out as I think I touched on it before in here. Maybe not, that one is the one that took me the longest to get over.

I had broken up with the guy from TWI I'd been going out with, then lived with for quite some time and found my own little place. It was a sweet little one bedroom 'mother in law' house behind the main house in the next town over closer to where I had found a job. One night, the wrong night, I forgot to lock my door I guess because I woke up in the middle of the night to find someone standing next to my bed. He then spoke and I realized who it was and he had been drinking, something he didn't do often so didn't handle it well. He drank with friends from work, which then made him horny. He thought he'd just come on in and see me.

I told him to leave and started to get up. That got me pushed down and held down as he took what he wanted in any body orifice he wanted. Finally after about an hour he left. I curled up, cried myself to sleep knowing I had to be up in a few hours for work. I did talk to my twig leader the next day and was told to try to forget it happened and go on with life. Same thing they told every girl. I was told that too, like with the other ones before in the 70's and early 80's I talked about in the other post .. this was in the mid 80's, shortly after VP died.

Then about a week later I got some bad food from one of the fast food places I'd hit for lunch I guess. I woke up and hours later when I was able to leave the bathroom the only thing I was passing was water and blood. I couldn't even stand up. I crawled to my bedroom window, thankfully it was low and sat beside it until my neighbor got home from work and called out to him to come help me. I had no phone, but he did. He got me to the hospital and they did all kinds of tests on me.

They couldn't figure out exactly when I got the bad food, so we couldn't say which restaurant it had come from. I was reported to the health dept though it was a serious enough type of human transferred virus due to someone not washing their hands then preparing food and told to stay home for a week, which of course meant I lost my job.

As I was leaving the ER the nurse handed me some scripts for what the doctor wanted me to take. The last one she handed me, was one for prenatal vitamins. I asked her why he was giving that to me, she said 'oh, you don't know yet I guess, blood tests pick up before you would normally start your period. You are pregnant, congratulations.' I thanked her for all the help I got there and went home and I cried again.

Another couple weeks went by and the bleeding started and didn't stop. I was slowly miscarrying and needed to get a D and C done the doctors said when I was again looked at, but with no insurance and no job, I couldn't afford one. They suggested using a woman's clinic since it's the same procedure an abortion is and it was something I had to do. That virus I caught shortly before is what they felt caused me to lose the baby. That was the only thing I could afford after borrowing some money from my mother. My twig leader took me there, holding her baby so the anti abortion group protesting outside wouldn't attack me as they did all the women going in that day. They thought we were going in for her, not for me. She left me there and then picked me up when they said to later on after it was done.

I wasn't put to sleep, they just give you laughing gas, twilight sleep my foot. I remember to this day every second of that and knowing as I was losing that innocent baby to begin with, I had to lay there and listen to it all that was left inside being sucked out of me and feel the pain emotionally and physically. While it wasn't a true abortion, I went thru all the same things a woman getting one, against her will, did. You will find many of us here on this site. My circumstances are just a bit different in this case is all. If I would have had insurance I would have been in a hospital sound asleep and never have had to go thru that. Had that boyfriend from TWI not been such a jerk and believed TWI's line about women I wouldn't have been there to go thru it. Had I stood up for myself I would have turned him in to the police, but I instead obeyed leadership. So now I will live with the memories the rest of my life.

I found a silver tie tac on one of those black plastic squares they use to show them to you on a rack in a local Christian book store when I first moved to Phoenix 9 years ago. I bought it. It is the size and exact shape of a 10 week old baby's feet in the womb. I keep it still on the black plastic square, pinned on the corkboard that is always next to my computer, wherever I may live. I look at it many times a day and ask God for His peace in my heart for yet another day, till the day comes that my life ends. It really helps me get thru life and I'm so happy I found it. As I look at it now I tear up, those feet are so very tiny, but perfect. 10 weeks is normally the time a woman has an abortion it says on it. I wasn't quite that far yet, but close enough. I know it was made to shock people, but I use it for comfort. I know one day I will be reunited with that baby I lost again in heaven and am reminded of that when I look at it every day. I'm a reunited adoptee, so I don't use the word reunited lightly.

When I made the statement in my original post I'd been raped in the 70's, 80's and 90's, I only talked about the near rape. I didn't include the total rape from the 80's because it's still hard to talk about most of the time, I have to be in the right frame of mind to be able to. I was there now, so it was time to post it and add it to the first part of my story already here. The other time I mentioned it I didn't go into much detail I know.

...and I see it's after 6 am which means he will be here any minute, so I have to go run and get ready to go out. Then it will be time to come home and sleep for 'my night' which is actually morning and part of the early afternoon. Typical 3rd shifter. :) Have a great day everyone, see y'all later tonight when I'm online during my 'afternoon' and 'evening'.

Biker Babe

Be VERY, VERY careful about where you keep those weapons.

It might not be such a good idea to keep them in plain view.

The point is this:

Any weapon you present, can and may likely be used against you if you are not skilled enough to render it effective and maintain possession of it.

Nothing is in plain sight here. Only I know where they are and how to quickly get to them should it ever be needed. One of my ex's was also a nidon in Karate and taught me well. I ranked around a 3rd brown belt before we divorced. I did not want to go to a black belt due to at that time, the state we lived in required you to register your hands once you got your black belt.

My soon to be ex hubby, who I'm still buddies with and hang out with daily for the most part, is a retired cop. As I said, I have a lot of the 'toys' of the job around and he taught me how to use them.

I've always been a knife fan. I still mourne the loss of my balanced throwing knife I lost in a move. Never have found another one to equal it, but when I do, it will be mine. LOL. If I should ever pull one, I would have every intention of using it and know how to use them.

I may look like nothing at my 5 feet even and with the Crohn's my weight can vary from my lowest 9 years ago of 72 pounds to the 104 I am at today, (due to separating from, then starting the divorcing my husband, so I was able to get the SSI and medicare I had qualified for ... if I had no income. Gotta love our Government huh?) but now I'm under the care of a very good pain doctor and G. I. doc. Where I live is mostly disabled and elderly people, so there is no fear to be had in this building and the manager ensures it stays that way. It was where I used to live that I was terrified to go outside the front door with all the drug dealers and gang bangers that had invaded that few block area, as the wave of illegal aliens has now reached that part of town. Now away from there all is good, but I still keep my toys handy, mainly now just out of habit and the feeling of security. Hang around with cops and the like the majority of your life and you kinda pick up the habits of keeping your home, thus yourself, secure.

I don't have a TV, but was able to watch it thanks to David. I see it as the 3rd guy was imitating the sounds the DJ at the club he dreamed about was making and the ahhhh at the end meant he had a great date with Sunny.

It also made me remember why I don't have a TV. I miss all the stupid commercials like this one they put out and which seem to get worse each year.

Honestly they did give me free basic cable, only 22 lousy channels, none of the good ones you really want, for that you have to pay like 60 bucks more each month for extended basic. I have a winTV unit that enables me to watch TV on my computer, I just haven't gotten around to installing it again since I moved here 9 months or so ago. Guess that shows how much TV means to me. LOL.

I had no intentions of giving up my virginity until I found the man I would marry. I made this very clear to every guy that liked me when I was a teen so he knew he wasn't gonna get any from me. The ones that stayed I knew were there to enjoy time with me and not just to try to get me into bed.

I was still young, just about to turn 16. I met the guy I was hanging out with and considered my boyfriend at the beach. He was 18 and spending the summer in town with his father. He had gotten the same talk all guys got and we'd been going places together, driving around town in his little VW bug for over a month. He smoked pot on occasion and asked me always if I wanted some, which I declined. I wasn't into drugs. He always asked though .. daily. One day I guess I just got fed up with it and said sure, figured I'd smoke it once with him and he wouldn't bother me again.

The next thing I remember we were at his dad's house and he was helping me down the basement stairs to where he had made his makeshift bedroom for that summer. We hung out down there and watched TV quite often. That night though, he decided to take advantage of my inability to function due to the pot and he didn't stop where he normally did and I lost the one thing that mattered to me the most.

Funny part was I didn't know how to have sex all the way even. I wasn't a bit curious due to wanting to wait. Kissing and hugging were plenty for me at that point in my life. I just had no desire to know until I was ready to marry, then knew I could find out from my mom or books. Turned out I never got that chance and I found out how it was done while I was in a position where I couldn't stop it. All I could do was lay there as the room spun in circles and everything went out of control. I broke up with him shortly after that night and didn't bother saying no to other guys after him I met, it didn't matter anymore, what I treasured was gone and I couldn't get it back. This was in the mid 70's.

In the 80's I was home alone with my newborn son and my brother in law stopped by. He was married to my then husband's sister. He asked to use the rest room and I said sure, then heard him call me. I had to use cloth diapers on the baby due to his sensitive skin and I had a messy one soaking in the toilet. I went in there and removed it, then left him so he could use it. I stopped in the hallway and put the diaper into the diaper pail and as I was walking back down the hall towards the living room, he came out of the rest room right behind me. That's when he started to try to grab me.

I ran into the living room before he caught me, threw me down on the floor and attempted to get my clothes off and kiss me. I bit his tongue as hard as I could which made him stop and relax his grip on me enough that I could get away. I ran to the front door and opened it and went out onto the patio. I then ordered him to leave my house and never come back again.

When my husband got home I told him I was almost raped and by whom. He told me to go ahead and call the cops and make a report, he didn't care if the guy was married to his sister or not. I did just that and even though I did not press charges, I wanted the cops to scare him so he would never do this again. They did their job well. I'm still friends with that cop to this day in fact and have enjoyed watching him rise in his dept. thru the years. Doing this alienated me from the rest of the family of course and to this day they still hate me. They never believed he would do such a thing and claim I made it all up. I had been friendly with him until that day, so had no reason to make such a story up unless it was really true.

Then the 90's hit. I was divorcing yet another husband and stopped by the house to pick up some of my belongings. He was not supposed to be there and until I was inside the house I didn't know he was. I was in the bedroom getting clothes when he came in and closed and locked the door. I told him to get away from me (I was leaving due to physical abuse prior) and to unlock the door so I could leave. He of course blocked my way, threw me down on the bed where I fought him until I had no strength left. He then said goodbye to me 'his way' as he so put it. He didn't hurt me physically, but he really showed me what a sleeze he was by doing that.

Now it's the 2000's. I would pity any guy that tried to touch me that I didn't approach first or given permission to saying he could. Within reach as I sit here at my computer, where I spend the majority of my time, is a blackjack that I would not be in the least bit scared to hit someone with. On the shelves next to me on the left I have a very sharp Buck knife and one very intimidating looking bayonet. On the floor to the right I have a police baton with handle that I know how to use if needed. On the other other side of the room there is a bigger blackjack and a straight baton too. There are sets of handcuffs all around this place. Being with a retired cop for almost 9 years I've gotten quite a collection of nice 'toys'. On the table to the right behind one of my speakers is a bottle of pepper spray.

While I've never had a need to use any of these weapons, I feel more secure when I know they are within reach when I am home alone. My cellphone is always within reach too. I'll be damned if I get raped in the 2000's. The 70's, 80's and 90's were plenty enough for me in my life.

Catcup gives wonderful advice and knows what she's talking about ladies. We all handle it differently when it happens to us. I am fortunate in that I'm the type who can go thru very bad times (what I've talked about above is the least of things I've been thru), without needing to talk about it to someone else, like a doctor, in order to move on. I couldn't have afforded it even if I wanted to. I just accept it happened and moved on. I thanked God I wasn't physically hurt and so there was no lasting damage. The sun always came out the next day and I would begin again as they say.

I've talked to many women online who had the opposite reaction though and done my all to give them a shoulder and drawn from my own personal experience to help them if I could in any way. I do that to anyone on any painful issue that happens in life if I've been thru it, which more than likely I have. Due to losing what I treasured most at almost 16 years old, I made some really bad decisions for many, many years after that. Add TWI into the mix and you have what would make a great Movie of the Week if I ever sit down and write it all out, or so I've been told by those who have heard the majority of my stories. If by talking about the painful things I've been thru, I can help people learn from it and avoid it happening in their lives, then it was worth my going thru it. I do that a lot online with the young teens I meet in different chats I go to. The ability to openly talk about it all helps me, knowing that by telling them the stories, then they will never go thru it in the first place. So it's all good.

Wow Biker, that goes way back. You should have bought a hundred shares of a small company called Microsoft back then. Ha, ha. (Or IBM for that matter.) Those ould be worth millions maybe by now.

I still like Vista but I like Pro more I think because I am in a comfortable rut.

We'll all be using Vista in a matter of years so I might as well get used to it.

I know 2 guys online who did invest in MS back then, they are very rich today. *sigh* Wish I would have done it, but back then I had no income at all and was going thru a divorce, so investing wasn't on my mind.

Besides being online since late 1993 / early 1994, I also dated my ISP for 2 years. He's the reason I learned what I did, as he'd let me play at the console when I was at the office, much of the time at his root prompt. :) I never broke anything thankfully as I surely didn't have $150,000.00 to replace his DEC Alpha 2100. Beautiful machine, I miss it, even if it was as big as my refrigerator. Hahaha, when he moved into a new office, I even got the honor of being the one who got to plug in the T-1 line! That will always be one of my favorite memories about my first years online. Back then it was a big deal to have a T line, today my cable connection is just as fast as the T was then. It's been a true joy watching the internet grow and change. The only thing I hated was when spam started, I had been online over a year before I got my first spam email ... today, even with filters, I get 10 to 20 times that daily.

I think it was during the summer season in 1994 when my then boyfriend who owned/operated the ISP offered TWI a free website with as much space as they needed. They turned the offer down and then locally I was told to make a choice, TWI or the internet. Told them I'd think about it and slowly faded away so I didn't get kicked out and lose touch with family that remains in to this day. I often wonder if they even realize what they turned down, it's not often you get such an offer and now that they finally did decide to get a website, instead of it being free, it gets paid for by ABS I'm sure. What a waste.

I seem to have a little problem here. When my ex roommate was kicked out of here by the manager after he went nuts on me (long story, ask in PM if really interested), seems to have stolen my WinXP Pro discs.

It is going to be some time before I can afford to upgrade and get Vista, couple years perhaps, SSI doesn't go far every month after I pay my bills. If there is anyone out there that upgrades to Vista and has no need for their copy of XP Home or Pro, I would love them forever if they could pass their copy on to me and let me register it on my machine here. There is a good chance I will need the full version, but if that isn't what those willing to pass theirs on have, I still have my full win98 discs and my upgrade to ME that I could install first, then use an upgrade to XP Home or Pro. LOL, just a lot more time consuming doing it that way for sure.

I will leave the question if this can even be done and work to those in IT work here. I've heard from some people it would and heard from others that MS won't allow it and as soon as Vista is installed your old version of XP will be marked in their files and it can't be used by someone else that's stuck in my position and needs the CD's in case of a crash. If they are going to allow it, then I ask anyone who's upgrading and not needing their XP discs anymore to not toss them out, send them to me and let me install them here so I am assured if I crash, I can reinstall without a problem.

Thank you to anyone who can help me with this. I don't like sitting here knowing I have no way to fix this box if it crashes other than to drop back to ME which is the only disc I have left after he stole my XP Pro ones. *sigh*

Some synonyms for “backbone” according to the thesaurus in Word: moral fiber, strength of character, stamina, fortitude, courage, guts, grit, determination, resilience, and self-discipline.

Guts? Cool, I can *prove* I have guts, but will behave myself for a change and not post the URL to the picture I had the surgeon take of the foot section of my small bowel he removed that the Crohn's Disease had destroyed.

Sorry, it's late and y'all know my humor is warped anyway and gets worse when I get slap happy later at night. Seeing guts in that list when I read it, just had it calling to me and I had to post. LOL. Consider this the humor break in the thread.

Seriously, I have always pretty well said what I thought, which is why I was normally always in trouble in TWI with the higher ups for something I said or did. I never went higher than the Inter. class, knowing that if I did, then I'd end up getting myself kicked out and due to family members still being in, I had to avoid that happening. I did my best to protect them from being used for many years till I just couldn't take it or fake it any longer and had to fade away before I got M and A'd which would have resulted in TWI telling them never to speak to me again. Thus we can still talk on the phone to this day thankfully.

I think the 20 years I gave to TWI was more than enough and even though I was aware of all the crap really going on as early as 1979, I stayed until 1994 due to the love and concern I have for family still in, who bought every word TWI told them hook, line, and sinker and were open to be used if I wasn't around. (The using did happen off and on after I did leave.) They will probably never get out, but at least I'm thankful I am able to call and talk from time to time. It would have been hell had I gotten myself M & A'd and never had contact again.

I will say the relationships are very different now that I'm not in though, the love and closeness feeling left years ago, shortly after I got out. I just have to remind myself where it comes from .. TWI .. it's not the true person saying rude things to me, it's Corps training and Advanced Class teachings that changed them into how they think today, so I ignore it and avoid talking about anything TWI at all. I remember who they were prior to TWI and keep praying one day they will leave, but am not expecting to see that happen.

After getting out I grew stronger yet mentally and have been told by many I'm the most obstinate woman they've ever met when it comes to something important to me. I openly agree with them and know I'm stubborn as a mule at times. I will stand my ground if I feel I'm right and won't back down no matter what they try to get me to change my mind. If it turns out I'm wrong, I'm strong enough to admit that too and will when I apologize to the other person for being wrong.

I got in TWI at 16 years of age and I left 20 years later still mentally at the same stage. It's taken many years of hard work to 'grow up'. I still don't think like most people my age who were never in a cult. At least I am up to around 25 to 30 now emotionally and growing more towards where I should be at my 50 years of physical age every day. I think that was one of the worst things TWI did to me was to keep me from growing mentally in age thru the years, so when I got out it was very hard for me to communicate with people my own age. I still have many friends half my age that I relate to great and some my own age I just don't understand at all at times, but then they grew up outside of TWI. Once I explain it to them, they then do realize what I've been thru and will help me to understand them, which in turn helps me grow up more mentally to my real age. I'm sure there's plenty of you out there who've experienced or are going thru the same thing.

Isn't it wonderful to be out finally and be able to say things like 'no' or 'I don't feel that way about the subject at all', without condemning ourselves. Feels good to stand up on our own two feet and speak our minds, like we should have been able to do our entire lives, but we had that stolen from us by TWI when we were still in.

It seems a latin cult leader in the Miami area who truly believes he is Jesus, but his wife wouldn't quite agree with that and is saying so in divorce court! You can find the video on CNN here: http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/living/20...rcing.jesus.cnn

I hope that link works, if not, I found the story as I scrolled down thru their main news page more towards the bottom. It's a section on left called Video and they have thumbnails you can click on to start the vids playing.

He really has a nice sized cult going down there with many followers who find him blameless of course. There's some good scenes of him 'in action' during one of his services and the place is packed.

He reminds me of a Latin VP from what I saw in the video and is also very loved by everyone in his cult, one guy even says when he sees the leader he sees God, not a man....that's scary!

Thanks to his wife and divorce court though, now the government is starting to look a little bit closer at this cult. Hahaha. I'll shut up now and you can go watch it and see it all yourself, much better than I can put it into words.

I just checked over my bottle of Chlorpheniramine Maleate (Allergy Relief Antihistamine, for those who don't know it by the chemical name) and all it shows is that it was distrubted by CVS. There is no where on the bottle that says where it is made. You could try asking the pharmacist where you buy yours, but I am not sure he would even know. OTC (Over The Counter) meds they aren't as involved with as they are with the drugs they give out via prescription.

BTW, I have tried almost every antihistamine on the market and this is the only kind that doesn't leave me with a hung over feeling the next morning. I have bad sinuses and insomnia, so along with a prescription form of drug called Vistaril (HydroXYzine Pamoate capsules, USP) 25 mg I take one of the Allergy Relief tablets at bedtime. The Vistaril leaves me nodded out in my chair for hours after getting up the next day if I take more than one. He originally told me to take 1 or 2 by mouth daytime and 1 to 4 more at bedtime to help with sleep. Hahaha. I took 2 and I couldn't stay awake the next day. Then I tried only one and mixed it with the OTC Allergy pills and bingo, works great. My doc just laughs and tells me once again I confirm I react so totally different to drugs than normal people. :) At least we found a combo that works when mixed with 2 Soma and 10 mg of Valium. I now can sleep thru an entire night without waking up instead of waking every half hour to hour on the half hour to hour all night every night. It feels wonderful to finally be able to sleep again, breathe while I'm sleeping and feel rested when I wake up the next day.

My paradoxical reaction to the high amount of pain meds I take for the Crohn's and Fibro is the cause. Instead of pain meds making me sleepy like normal people feel, they do the opposite and keep me awake. It's like I've taken speed of some sort that keeps me awake (just not the high that real speed would give LOL). Via trial and error, we finally came up with what combo of other drugs works to make me able to get tired and fall asleep in a couple hours after taking them.

Anyway, I wish I could offer you more help. I know a lot about meds after having so many tried on me thru the years, but where they are made at I can't answer. If a pharmacist can't help, the only other person I could think of to ask would be the person responsible for buying the OTC drugs for that chain of stores you buy yours at. S/He may know where they are made since all that info should be in the wholesale book the buyers would use to choose the drugs. This is only a guess though, hopefully someone else here will know exactly where you can find out and save you a lot of hassle.

I am happy to hear you found the great antihistamines though. I try to tell everyone I know about them, since not all of them on the market use that chemical, in fact most don't and that is why you are left feeling so tired still when you wake up the next day. I check bottles for the ingredients so I'm sure I'm buying the one I need.

Now, now Excie, you know 11 pm to some of us, *cough* *cough*, is just like 11 am is to day people. I did get up early today though ... at 2:30 pm, so I bet I will actually go to bed (my) tonight at 4 to 5 am instead of my normal 6 to 7 am. :) (You *know* I couldn't resist saying that to ya sweetie.)

John, I have emailed with you many times, but not in the past few years due to illness mainly. Now that I am under a doc's care and on SSI, I do owe you one if nothing more than to say hi and how much I love you for all you do to help the victims of TWI personally as well as in here.

You may not know me under this nickname as I more than likely emailed you using my real name, which very few know. It doesn't matter though, I'm not writing this to be remembered for emails done back then, but to just say hi and how loved you are by so many on this site who have been helped by your website. :)

Toppie, if you are serious and want to get rid of it, I would love to have it. I would like to read it. I would go nicely with the proof drawing given to me by Meg that ended up being used as the cover of the children's book TWI put out. I love unique things I guess you could say.

You should still have my phone number, if not, drop me a line and I'll give it to you again or call you if you say to. I have yours in my cell.

Was just gonna say what Bear did. I take Soma for my Fibro and there are two generic brands that most pharmacies use. One brand (Watson) work great for me, the other which I forget the name of, doesn't work at all. When I was given the other generic I took my normal dose and it felt like I'd taken nothing at all they were so bad. The burning pain in my shoulders would not go away the entire month I was taking them. It was explained to me what caused the difference was the inert ingredients used to hold the pill together, since the medicine itself is the same, only the bonding / inert stuff the companies use can vary. I got the Watson brand again and all was back to normal and I had no pain at all the following month.

The pharmacy I use now carries both brands, so they wrote on my file that I need the Watson brand of Soma, so they are sure they give me the correct kind. I've had the same thing, but not as noticable with other meds over the years too. When added to my paradoxical reaction, it makes for fun times. LOL.

If you ever find a drug you take suddenly doesn't work the same, ask someone at the pharmacy if they have changed who they are buying them from and if the inert / bonding ingredients are different. If they won't be going back to the kind that helped you, then I'd suggest asking them what it's makers company was named and find a pharmacy who does use that brand and change over to them. I've had to do that a few times in the past in different places I lived.

At around 12:45 pm today 2 news choppers collided in midair as they were taking video of a police chase that had been going on for about an hour. It looked like it was coming to an end when the perp hopped out of the stolen truck, but then he stole another one and then took off again. At that point, the choppers hit each other and both went down in flames into Indian School Park. (We ride our bikes there often and hubby even worked security for a year there.)

Both pilots and camera men from channels 3 and 15 were killed. We'd appreciate prayers for the familes of these four men and also for their news stations families. Everyone in town is still pretty much numb and in shock. I see those choppers in the air daily living in uptown Phoenix and it sure won't look the same now when I look up to see what they are doing or which way they are heading.

The lastest news on the perp is he has barricaded himself inside a house in west Phoenix. The police have the house surrounded, so he won't get away again and they are talking about trying to charge him with causing the accident and deaths of the newsmen. I hope there is a way to do that, he deserves it. The short look I got of him as he ran from the original truck to the second one he stole showed an overweight young mexican man with a shaved head and the baggy clothes the gang bangers are so fond of wearing around here. Given where the chase started also leads me to believe he is a gang banger, it was in the area of town that's filled with them.

No surprise to me. They stopped allowing smoking in their parks except in a very few designated areas a few years ago.

Remember they are family oriented, so would want to show evil smokers or allow them in their parks. They do have Gay Day at all their parks though. I'm still trying to figure out how they consider that family, since it's obvious gays can't have a baby together unless they involve a 3rd party of the other sex or use an artificial form to conceive. A few states allow them to adopt too. I have nothing against gays, have friends that are, I just think that it's odd that something legal Disney will say is evil and ban, then go against what is considered family by having Gay Day every year in their parks.