They say in Florida there are no seasons. I disagree.

One way we know it is autumn in Florida is that certain trees lose their leaves. It isn't like up north where the leaves turn a pretty color and then drop like little fiery fairies to the ground. No. It's more like .... well... they were green and now they are brown and ooops. They all fell off.

We also know it's autumn when the temperature in late September doesn't reach above 90 degrees in mid afternoon. Sometimes that doesn't happen until mid October. You get this feel in the air on September mornings, and a bit of a breeze that says, "Guess what? A reprieve is on the way!"

I do love autumn in Florida. We have a fire pot sort of thing outside that we use to build fires when the weather gets cooler. Some folks here have indoor fireplaces. Generally they run the air conditioner in order to have a fire going, but sometimes in autumn it might get cold enough to burn inside. Usually that is the end of autumn.

Another way we know that autumn has come upon us is that people start decorating their lawns for Halloween. Not a red leaf in sight, but plenty of dead corpses, and ghosts hanging from trees, and tombstones where they shouldn't be.

I really am making fun of a Florida autumn. The changes are so subtle, but if you are a Floridian you can make them out.

The other morning I got up early and saw Orian rising in the east. Tonight I saw a harvest moon. Soon northern birds will be visiting our area, taking a sip out of our pond.

My husband just planted his winter vegitable garden which in northern climes would be the spring planting.

Our summer sun withers almost anything you could imagine planting to eat. We can plant a few things. Okra--- ewwwww, yuck, petuie. Hot peppers--- yum. Eggplant--- oh yeah. For the most part he just lets the ground go fallow during summer.

But Autumn comes around and it is time for cucumbers, green peppers, green beans, awesome tomatoes, and my oh so loved herbs like basil, and oregano. Collard greens and mustard greens are beloved by me.

Autumn is the time I start thing about the end of the year. I start wondering what I could have done differently, and if I could have should I have. It is a time for reflecting. It doesn't matter where you are, the end of the year is coming up, and you have to just .... well ..... wonder.

Tonight my daughter called me and said, "Mom! Go look at the moon! It is so full and big and pretty!" Funny. I used to tell HER to go look at the moon!

Harvest moon. Autumn is here.

My son was married in Santa Cruz Bolivia on December 30, 2006. While we've certainly taken vacations a week at a time several times in our 26 years as a family, there was something about traveling out of country that was major stressful, and that it was right after the Christmas holiday did nothing but add to the stress.

My mom and dad went to Bolivia as well for the wedding, in fact my mom and dad were the impetus to this marriage from previous visits to Bolivia. It is a long long long story...

Anyway, so my mom is also getting ready to go out of the country at the same time, and she's cleaning out her refrigerator and freezer giving me her stuff. I knew it was hopeless to argue with Mom about giving me her food stuff. She is smart as a whip but such a space cadet at times. I took her food stuff, which included a frozen half-used package of polish sausage.

When I arrived home from an 8 day stay in Bolivia, there was a stench so bad in my car it made me gag. In all of my hurry and stress, I forgot to remove the package of sausage. Getting the smell out took months. It was horrible.

This morning I got in my car and smelled something... not quite right. I thought to myself, hmmmmm.... did I leave a half eaten McDonald's hamburger in here somewhere? I shook my head and started the car, thinking it must be my imagination. Then I thought..... hmmmmmmmmmmm, the weather is still hot for late September and I'd better check the trunk for say......... something I forgot to remove when I went grocery shopping?

The offending object was easy to find - - - a package of Italian sausage in a plastic grocery bag, which I guess got away from the other groceries I purchased on Saturday. I promptly deposited it in the outside garbage can, then went to work with the windows rolled down.

Just now I got into my car and could smell .... THAT smell! Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww. I just sprayed the trunk with Lysol, but I hope it goes away quicker this time around. How could I do this twice in one year????? I have no excuse this time around!

Man, there is nothing worse than the smell of rotten meat!

What is it about death that scares us so much?

There is this person I have to interact with who majorly annoys me. Basically, micromanagers majorly annoy me. They stifle creativity from everyone around them.

I'm trying to temper this with the optimistic outlook I read recently on another blog post. You promise yourself that you will be upbeat no matter what happens to you. You are in control of how you feel.

Yes, you can control how you feel but you can't control other people and the way they might put you down in a oh so subtle way in front of others. And you can't control what those others think. That annoys me the most.

Why is it that people feel they need to put down someone in front of others? Isn't the high road taking people aside and speaking to them privately?

The answer is that putting people down in front of others gives that person a sense of power.

I just wonder how you keep that person from getting the power. I'm not the competitive type, and I don't think fast when put on the spot. Wish I was. I've never been good at this crap.

On the other hand, I just got a compliment tonight on being one of the nicest people. Wow. Guess I'd rather be thought of as nice than a person who snipes back.

Funny world this.

I think I've spent a lifetime trying to figure people out. I mainly started this venture when I was a kid because I was such a freakin' nerd. I kept trying to figure out how to fit in.

So I categorize people, but not in a mean way. I do it as a way to relate. The problem is, categories don't always work.

Take my boss for example. She's a vegetarian, tree-hugging, leftist extremist. She reuses the other side of paper in her printer. Again, I'm not being mean. I'm just categorizing for the sake of not saying anything offensive in front of her, like "I love animals. They are tasty!" I mean I have to work with her every day, so I really don't want to offend.

Her husband too is my boss, and while he isn't a total vegetarian, he still is a tree-hugging leftist. They are so about the environment, own a Prius, own a vacation home outside of Boulder, Colorado where their daughter is an environmentalist.

So I'm figuring I've got them pegged, right? Then I catch him throwing away computer monitors in the garbage dumpster at work. I say to the man, "Hey, you know you shouldn't dispose of those in the garbage. It's not good for the environment." Then I gave him an alternative. It meant driving a few miles away to drop off said monitors and computer equipment. Still he drops monitors in the garbage.

I guess that is better than my alternative which is allowing them to stockpile in my garage.

So this brings me to a guy on Myspace that reamed me a new asshole for supporting our soldiers with care packages. He was extremely rude, and called the soldiers baby killers and that any soldier who didn't go AWOL was in conflict with the Geneva Convention. Seriously, you had to be there to try to figure THIS guy out. Visions of Hanoi Jane floated through my head. When I pointed out to this individual that he supported the war through his taxes, he went apeshit. Now according to him I was warped and a baby killer myself. Okay, well, it takes all kinds of people to live in this world, and I certainly try to see everyone's point of view. I guess the idiosyncrasy here is that this same individual supports abortion. I don't, but - - - I'm the baby killer.

Extremist example #3. For 8 years I attended an incredibly extremist fundamental church. Members were expected to attend church every Sunday morning and night, and Wednesdays, too. Women were encourage to wear skirts, not pants or they might be dressing like a man. The man was the head of the household, and women were expected to follow the dictates of their man in every aspect of their lives. Women were not allowed to teach men, even teenage boys. We were discouraged from clapping to music. That is the tip of the iceburg. Pretty much anything you did in life was wrong. And boy were you guilt tripped for it.

The irony was that three married male leaders of this church, all within a year's time, had affairs. Two of the leaders had affairs with other women in the church. The Pastor had an affair with my daughter's Sunday School teacher!

I guess I've come to the conclusion that convictions are fantastic, and without them alot would not get done in this world. But sometimes the convictions rule us, instead of us ruling the convictions. We sort of forget why we feel convicted and it just becomes habit.

I work for an organization that vocationally rehabs folks with severe mental illness. Oddly enough, people with severe mental illnesses are creatures of habit. If their schedule goes askew they don't handle it well. They like their world black and white so they can deal with it. There are no shades of gray. It makes me wonder how many of us are actually suffering from mental illnesses.

The purpose of this post? I guess I want people to look at their convictions and really think them through. Don't do stuff by rote. Think about it. Try to see the other side. ~shrug~