Awwww, thanks for all your sweet wishes, they are MUCH appreciated! Yesterday was a tough day, but I took your advice and brewed myself a pot of tea, read lots of posts, saw many great decs here and then took a long nap. DH got back here early and we drove down to pick up my car. The new battery was a no-charge, but the brake job ~just on the front end~ was over $400! Living here in the mountains, I can't scrimp on good brakes, but good grief, that's a ridiculous amount! (Sigh) what's done is done and my car (actually, minivan) is in great shape once again. Afterwards, DH & I had dinner at a favorite restaurant in town to avoid the rush hour traffic and relax a bit. We had a glass of wine and played Gin Rummy for an hour when we got home, too. That was a lovely way to end a crummy day! With the rest, I'm doing as you advised and taking it one day at a time. All this will pass . . . eventually! Thanks! Yachter: I'm keeping you and your family in my prayers. Please know how much you're liked and appreciated here on this forum! We miss you when you're not around here with us! Lynn

I'm going through that right now. She's a neighbor which makes it worse. This woman calls me every day on the phone expecting to chat for an hour or two or three. My handset has a speaker so I just let her talk away while I clean the house. Nothing I hate more than a person who talks AT me instead of TO me. Have you met people like that? You start to appreciate there is an art to conversation when you meet people who don't understand that it should be TWO WAY! She talks, I listen. I have no sympathy for her problems because she's so self-serving. Has no interest in my life. Day after day she calls mostly to repeat what she said the day before. She lives alone. Talking on the phone is her favorite pasttime whereas when I'm bored I turn on the TV or get on the internet. When I tried to ween her off of me by not answering the phone she started calling at odd hours like 10pm or 9am in an effort to catch me. She would even show up at my door if I didn't answer the phone after a couple days. I can't not ever answer her calls or she'll think I've died or something so now I "return her phonecall" with an email. She hates email because she can't monopolize the conversation and you're in control. That's what I recommend you try. Don't answer her phone call, instead reply by email so you're still being polite. With a properly scripted email you can impart a message without being overtly rude. Doesn't require brutal honesty. The shorter the response the quicker she'll realize you aren't interested in her. If I'm not home when my neighbor calls she'll have a conversation with MY ANSWERING MACHINE! She doesn't just leave a message she will talk until the machine cuts her off. DH laughs that even the machine can't listen to her for very long. She's the only person who has ever run the time out on my machine. A couple of times she's run the battery down on my handset because she's talked so long. I thought we had been disconnected but a slow walk to the other end of my house to pick up another receiver revealed that we hadn't. I just wanted to call her back to explain I didn't hang up on her when I realized we hadn't been disconnected. She was still talking! Completely unaware that there was no one on the other end. Didn't matter a bit to her. LOL The problem comes when people are too dense to pick up on "social queues". Those are the ones we all loathe because they force you to act in a way you'd rather not ...rude, curt, or the bearer or the silent treatment. But when polite hints fail you do what you gotta do!

Time to get a lock for the bedroom door. A ten year old is also old enough to understand that one doesn't enter another person's bedroom without knocking. You should give him the same courtesy. I don't think it's the Oedipus thing either. It is either a bid for attention and control or maybe he is just at the age where mom and dad being mushy and romantic is "gross" to him.LOL

Haven't told this story in a while because we were embarrassed. Friends daughter was getting married in a large city and the wedding was going to be at the hotel. We got to the hotel, checked in, had all the luggage brought up, tipped everyone, paid for the valet parking, we are starting up to the room. My friend called and ask why we were not at the hotel. I explained that we were at the hotel. She said well send you luggage on up and come down to meet me in the lobby. Down we go and look everywhere, my phone is ringing and she said I can't see you. Where are you, I describe where we are standing and she was saying are you sure you are in the main lobby. She finally asked , are you at the right hotel. Well guess what, wrong hotel, we are checked in, luggage in room. How very embarrassing to have to go to the desk and explain we are at the wrong hotel. They were so polite to us, they got our luggage back from the room, brought the car around and were even trying to return our tips. Of course we told them no. How on earth I got confused with the wrong hotel. I will never know. Of course, all of our friends knew by this time, that we had checked into the wrong hotel. From that day forward, when we have an event that involves a hotel I recheck the hotel information before booking. Guess they were trying to make us feel good at the first hotel, they were saying that was not the first time that happened and would not be the last.