I choose to enjoy my plants when I can. I live in China now, so I have a good friend who is taking care of my collection for me. I have him send pictures during the growing season. I am trying to figure out which ones of my relatives are into c & s, so I can decide who to 'leave' my plants to. I start most of my plants from seed, including saguaros and pachycereus pringlei. So I have no hope of ever seeing them grow arms. I plan to be cremated and thrown into the Atlantic off Maine along with my dog's ashes. I can't validate, but I believe VT was one state that took up the issue of being buried on private property. The school I teach in was on a former cemetery. The bodies were dug up and moved somewhere else. China has a very large population and cemetery land is being reclaimed for second uses. The government is encourage people to consider 'green funerals' such as cremations and burial at sea. The whole area was once a rural village. Traditional Chinese want to be buried in their traditional hometowns, so many want to be buried here. Where do they bury them? Along the median strip of the boulevards under the electrical towers. Last Christmas, I saw one burial right out side the school gate. Coffin and all, along with one guy digging a hole and the other lighting off firecrackers (the ever preset firecrackers). I was told there was another funeral yesterday. You see mini cemeteries along the roadside. Walk along the road and you'll probably bump into a grave. Maybe I use part of my ashes as a growing medium for my pachys or pachypodium rosalatum!

Is anybody else on this forum the last remaining family member due to a recent loss ????? If so I could really use some advice on getting back on track!!!! It's especially hard for me now, I had a small family to begin with consisting of my mother, older brother and me. We all had health problems but moms and brothers were the worst and I was caregiver but lookin back I feel I could've done better. We lived in a condo together and turned the downstairs into a hospital bedroom for mom until she started having frequent mini-strokes and had to have 24hr. care, then her cancer returned and took her in 2004. While it was tough I had my older brother Mike 58 to console me Mark 54 but we both grieved constantly, after all we were all we had left except for our kids and Mike's were kind of far away and didn't care to visit because of his cirohsis and they didn't like seeing him that way (geee) Mike's cirohsis got much worse and we fought to get him on Johns Hopkins Liver transplant list,but after taking all tests we didn't hear anything back from them after making many attempts. My brothers ability to walk with his walker now was seriously in jeopardy now and I was in a constant state of denial and when I got flashes of his passing I got mentally upset and lost my ability to deal with the my caregiving duties until I gathered myself. I couldn't face the possibility of my brothers death and me being completely alone so I blocked it out totally. That weekend I was helping him back from the bathroom and he stsrted talking and not making any sense and after several attempts he managed to tell me to call rescue, but I remembered the last time this happened he responded to me when raising my voice and kinda snapped back but it didn't work this time, my brother fell into coma and passed 2 weeks later. He was so much to me because we lost our dad when I was 11 and he was 15 and I looked to him as father figure and then we became work partners and later to become growing old together until now. He was always there for me and we both realized we were all that remained from our deceased parents and tried to console each other but he always seemed to keep calm where I had anxiety and he calmed me down. I am totally by myself now and feel like I am loosing it because I feel I should've paid more attention to those feelings I had that Mike was nearing death instead of blocking them out, I should've had him re admitted back to the hospital even though I had just brought him home a week ago. Then He had a few good days to make me think he wasn't getting worse and the back and forthness of this disease drove me to the brink and I would find my ability to deal with his next downturn almost impossible because that sinking feeling of the worst reality that my brothers death returned made me want to knock it away and made me lose my temper knowing I was loosing the battle. Since his passing on October 18 I constantly have feelings of guilt like something I did or didn't could've prevented his coma and I keep replaying it over in my mind constantly, and the constant solitude is neverending, but when I try to go outside I feel like the "Stranger in a Strange Land" and hurry to get back home where no-one is. I agree with the other poster that this is the worst year of my life and after 2 1/2 months since my brothers passing I can't tell if I am making any progress in my grieving because being totally alone it's so hard to tell. I saw my kids for a few hours for a late Christmas visit because they always visit their mom and her most recently divorced husband for the holidays first, and I could tell they were slowly getting bummed out by me and my problems but I guess I have to try and pretend I feel alright. I am sorry for everyones losses and I hope the New Year is a better one and I thank you for listening and welcome any and all responses. Sorry for the long read Mark

Spoke to my Dh about your question. ANd the answer is........YES...TADA!!! A logical answer from a concerned father of a baby and his disfunction child raised 96% by biomom , aka pot mom! Yes he would phone the cops on his child in an instant and he would call his mother who lives 1 1/2 half away to go pick him up. But you see because my DH and i are on the same page about behaviour and not tolerating certain behaviours under our home this ugly situtation last year turned around very quickly. SS no longer takes out his anger on my son, aka his brother and SD has learned not to play games or lie or talk back or anything. In fact she is expressing dislike for both parents and keeps a distance from me but with sadness. I truly feel bad for these kids. I told my dh to take 50% custody the day i met him. But he wont. And now after 7 years its a little too late. The damage is done. I can't change his mind. Alli know is to butt out now and let the pieces fall. I will only intervene when i have disrespect towards me and disrespect towards my son. And no KKny and Tos, abuse is not used as an excuse for disrespect...its FOLLOWS it afterwards. Cause once they hit the disrespect level towards another human being, it doesn't take long for it to turn violent and physical. ANd to give you an example, my next door neighbour just threw out her 13 years old daughter out of her house. Because she was at her end rope iwth her. SEx drugs, talking back and then it finally turned violent to the other children. She has one child of her own and 5 adopted kids. Guess what, the 13 years old was thrown out to save the others from her abusive nature. Just stop picking lines out of peoples postings and twisting them. You two have shown such manipulation at times and you are standing proof of a human being who is miserable and having nothing good to offer in this world. I'm sure you have tons of friends eh? Get over your pasts and move on. People like me have seen quite alot. And i am a stepchild as well. Am i the evil person cause i'm a stepmom too. EH?. L:Ol , well i'm happy knowing im a fully balanced person who demands respect and i'm not a rag doll to anyone. Including my family and kids. I've survived many things over the years and i know fully well where i stand as a human being , as a mother, as a stepmother and as a stepchild. Those are my titles, I wear them well and i'm proud. I do not make people miserable. And as for kids being sent out of a home, its done usually for good solid reasons. If his SD spoke rude to me, i would tell her off myself and let her dad then give punishment. But my SD has learned i wont stand for it and so has my SS. Kids needs boundaries. Do they hate me? NOPE. Its the opposite. My SK do love me. They just wish they're parents got along and now my SS told my DH ' ' mommy always talks about you badly and says bad things about maria too. I dont like it daddy, i want her to stop saying bad things. they're not true. make ehr stop! you never talk about mommy at all." Now what do you say to a child after this? Even SD was visibly shaken. Yes my DH is not the greatest father, he procrastinates and is lazy. That doesn't mean he doens' tlove his kids. He's a typical male! human male! I find woman have more insight into things like this. I've noticed a change in SD. She has refocused her energy and anger towards school and friends. Advice i give her all the time. And i'm pround she is doing that. I dont hate my Stepkids. I do care for them. what i dont like is the loser biomom and also the lack of communication between my dh and her. But you can't speak to her. SHe's a nut!

THE RUGS I RECEIVED OUTGAS. QUESTION IS, WHAT IS THE CHEMICAL? Edit: Since posting this I found a web page on Overstock that explains it. Search for "overstock how-to-get-rid-of-new-rug-smell" I bought a polyester Savahieh rug from Amazon.com and returned it, and today received a wool Savahieh rug from Overstock.com. I returned the polyester one because it filled the room with a mildly disgusting 'sweet' smell of some kind, a volatile compound. It seems like the rug must have been soaked in or sprayed with during manufacturing. The wool rug I bought as replacement was received today. Sadly, it has the same issue. I'd hoped it was just the polyester rug that had the problem. This time I took it outside to air immediately. Now I will look into products that might remove the chemical that causes the smell, because the rug is otherwise nice (and a hassle to return). There is, as other posts in this discussion mentioned, a distinct sort of oil/silicone/teflon feeling when you rub your hand over the top or bottom of the rugs. It leaves enough residue on your hands that your fingers will be a bit slippery against the palm, but it washes off easily with soap and water and odor goes with it. I want to know what that chemical is, what the rug is sprayed, soaked or coated in. I want figure out if it is a toxicity issue for us or, our cat. I definitely had the burning eyes, which at least one other poster in this discussion mentioned. That tells me there is a definite volatile irritant, and if it turns out to be toxic that would be worth reporting. I hope someone can clear up what it is as I'm forced to keep digging for information. The eye burning and mild upper respiratory irritation that I experienced showed up after a few days of the rug outgassing; and that was in spite of running a fan in the room multiple times daily, as an exhaust fan in the doorway venting to the outside. Although it didn't move out as much air as I'd hoped. The eye burning went away quickly after removing the rug. It is discouraging to read that the vendor is denying this. People have a right to know if we're being poisoned by these products or being exposed to carcinogens. I'm not saying that's exactly what's happening, but we need to find out and the vendor should cooperate and also advise on what if anything can be done about it by the consumer and or their company. We need to know if this is a consumer safety problem or not.