I was thinking about new glasses and RVing

When someone RVs full time, I am told, they plan for dentist appointments, labs, and xrays, and doctor appointments back at their "home base", scheduling as many appointments or procedures as possible for the time they are there. I am assuming most RVers also think to schedule their optometrist appointments then as well. If you are a person who does not need glasses or contacts, your time is probably coming. Just one word of advice (or two or more):

• Glasses are made on site by few places. You are quoted 7-10 days to get the lenses made and back to the optometrist. So, be sure you will be around that long! On that note, if you cannot see well enough to drive or function without your glasses, you may want to start saving now for a second pair to hold you over for those 7- 10 days.
  
• That 7-10 days stretches really quick into 14-20 days if the lab or optometrist messes up your prescription. I'm afraid you would be unpleasantly surprised if you knew how often that occurs. I have had it happen several times (in different states). So, add to the doubled time the few extra days of "hold" time, also known as, "You just need to try them out for several days first, your eyes have to adjust. We cannot send them back or send you back to our optometrist for a recheck until you have tried them."
• Ask if you can return them somewhere else if they need to be repaired under warranty and you are 3000 miles away merrily camping and grilling away. It may be that a national or several region wide chain is what you need and there are a lot of resources for that: Costco, Sears, Walmart, and national eyeglass chains, just for examples.
• One other tip, there are eyeglass repair shops that carry full line of clip on dark glasses for any shape lenses. It is amazing how many they carry.
  
• If you can hold out until a half price sale of some kind, do. Glasses are so expensive, seriously, they are going to have to have a Farm Aid or similar just to buy glasses for people. . . . Dare you to call and see how much just progressive lenses are with anti-glare coating -- just the lenses, forget the fancy smancy frames, just price the lenses. We got half off on our lenses (because we saved more than the limited buy one get one free for lenses and frames -- I know I questioned it, too, but did the math.)
  
• One afterthought, it was also mentioned that if my glasses still aren't right, sometimes the actual material used to make the lenses can be "wrong". I just can't wait for my glasses to come back.

OK, I can't resist telling you, so you can start saving now!

Three pair glasses and frames, 2 of which had progressive lenses with anti-reflective coating, and one special safety frame and lenses without the coating: 774.85 (and the safety frames were only 24.95). The credit card interest alone scares me.

Now, in honesty, you may be able to find the lenses cheaper. . . we waited so long to get our eyes rechecked, I grabbed the first national half off coupon and drug Leon over there - and then didn't use that coupon but their in store special. "Do as I say and not as I do."

My first 7-10 day wait from a Friday night turned into only about 3, but I couldn't get there until the following Friday night (figures) and they weren't right and it was a holiday weekend, you know the routine, just try them. So, I did. Tuesday, the optometrist reexamined me and I was told the lab had not followed her instructions exactly on one lens. . . but she then CHANGED the prescription back to my previous prescription. And off to the lab went my new "cool" glasses so Leon read the lunch menu to me. He had suggested we donate our old glasses that very Friday we picked up the new ones. I knew better. So, now, they won't even let me buy my safety glasses until the first glasses come back. . . So, IF they get it right this time, then I have to wait another 7-10 days for those and hope the lab gets that set right. So, no earthquakes or errant limbs on the hill until I get them. OK?

Actively making a difference

Are you actively making a difference?

You probably are even if you feel you are not. Each time you smile or hug or shed a tear in sympathy in front of someone, you are making a difference in their heart.

Each time you acknowledge a person's existence, you are making a difference, you are adding to their reasons for taking another step when they feel least like it, when their own self-worth is injured, however temporarily.

Could you make a bigger difference?

Most of us, have to answer that with a resounding, "Yes!"

How are you going to make a difference?

I have a few small ways in the works. . . So, here is a toast to the differences we all make and the hope we will all push ourselves to make a bigger difference. Cheers.

Watch for news of my active way of creating peaceful moments within.

Unconscious Mutterings, plus

This week's words for the Unconscious Mutterings meme are below, along with my muttered words. I have chosen to take the 20 words in order to then write a poem or story. It is so much fun! Please, if you decide after you have done the free association meme to do as I have and create your own poem or story, make sure, as a courtesy, you remember to give a link back to her site as you would in the original meme. And even if you hate poetry, you may want to participate in her meme, which is the free association part. That is fun for everyone!

1. Dancer :: belly
   
2. Intellectual :: wizard
   
3. Direct :: confrontation
   
4. Tolerate :: maybe
   
5. Post :: secrets
   
6. Instinctive:: I am
   
7. Brink :: destruction
   
8. Regain :: composure
   
9. Repulsed :: yuck
   
10. Distressed :: not
    

I do occasional change tense or form of one or two words - poetic license, you know.


PMS


She, a dancer,
tossed her belly fat
with wild abandon
in contrast
to her intellectual mind
that created words a wizard
would be envious of.

In direct confrontation she
rarely rose to the challenge,
but cowered.

tolerate change?
Maybe, though
post secrets
told a different story
of following instinctive steps
more than to tolerate sidesteps
or forward marches.

I am, she screamed, on the brink
of destruction!

He reached out and licked her cheek,
a man's fumbled attempt at dealing
with a crisis he did not understand.
Rather than to gain composure
(as he had hoped)
she threw herself onto the chair
repulsed at the dampness on her cheek
and vomited the word, yuck.

He stood, distressed at his wrong doing,
but daring to stand his ground
(he was, after all, a man).

Not for one moment had she doubted
his motivation, only his execution of it.
The hormones subsided hours later
(yes, it took that long).

His dancer,
tossed her belly fat
with wild abandon
in contrast
to her intellectual mind
once again.

PMS, by natural definition was over,
she had survived the alternate definition
both would return again.
(After all, nature will always be
and
he was man, and loved confrontation)

MeeAugraphie
05/27/07

Copying our words is unappreciated. Sharing by link is. I am using NiñaLuna's Unsconscious Mutterings words in her order in my poem with permission. . . all she asks is a link back. . . more than fair, don't you think! That is all I ask for my own. . . Thank you.

Link to Walmart Woman - too funny

I look at a lot of RV related blogs as I dream. There is one site that specializes in RV related videos. This video is not about RVing, but because so many RVers overnight at Walmart, this was posted.

It is funny! You will be singing it later possibly, but hey, what's one more song in our heads.

Walmart Woman

Unconscious Mutterings as a Recreational Vehicle

LunaNiña's meme, Unconscious Mutterings, is ten words shared for us, in her words, to have,"Free association fun!" I kept meaning to play along, I even have it on my RSS feed, but I get lost in my own ramblings.

Today, I could resist no more -- I did the free association and then turned it into a poem, keeping the words in the same order, but, of course, adding some. . . I have no idea if anyone else has done this, but cannot imagine I had an original idea. . . These are WONDERFUL prompts for poems or stories. . . and the great thing is that once we have written using all of them, the possible good or gibberish that comes out of them may prompt great stories or poems from pieces.

My free associations felt a bit weak, and this time, I went back and added my thoughts on them in parenthesis, just for the pure heck of it:

1. Coastguard :: men (oh, yeah, lots of men)
   
2. Buddies :: not (I know where that came from)
   
3. Nap :: tired (well, I am)
   
4. Groan :: yeah (what was I thinking?)
   
5. Sitcom :: not (I just don't like the word "sitcom")
   
6. Reader :: me (I love to read)
   
7. Heroes :: them (so, so many of them out there)
   
8. Amazing :: them (was my mind stuck?)
   
9. Woman :: yes (and excited I am NOT a man)
   
10. Don’t! :: you (maybe a song line in my head?)
    

That fun exercise became this rambling thought/poem:

Some coast guard(ing) men
are buddies, not
(by the definition he told me
from his Navy years),
they nap when tired
but
when duty calls
they jump up
(and groan -- yeah, they are
after all, human)

the reader (me, if no one else)
see heroes among them
and amazing thinkers
and amazing bodies, too, (of course)
though only by imagination as they
are wearing clothes and a woman knows
clothes do hide a multitude of sins,
and, yes, I am not so sure some
men don't know it as well
though you men fake your
lack of knowledge well,
after all,
you are human, too.

MeeAugraphie
05/25/07

For those of you who might think my poem worth copying, please don't, link back instead so the link to LunaNiña's meme is intact! I couldn't have written them without her words, too. Thank you.

It was so much fun, I think I will do it every week and maybe go back and do old ones as well. . .
One person's play, is another's prompt.
Try it, it could become the Recreational vehicle for your genius!

How will you alter this Recreational Vehicle?

RV Reflection One

RV
poetry
is life

reflected
by souls
who carry
their homes
in their hearts

not because
they are afraid
to leave homes behind

but because
they are brave enough
to create homes

wherever they are.

MeeAugraphie
05/22/07

Please, honor my words by not copying them without permission, though links are welcome. Thank you.

Note: If you stumbled on this blog via the word Poetry, please click here to go to my poetry blog, MeeAugraphie. Once you have read your fill, feel free to also follow links in the sidebar there to Haiku and Poetry Thursday, two wonderful blogs that give us a lot of weekly inspiration! For that matter, follow any of the links to those that commented on my poems -- they are most all either writers or poets -- and all interesting!

The idea? Calling all RVer poets

(Note to Leon: how quickly you forget it was I who suggested I start yet another blog to document our future RV experiences - in the car, on the way to our friend's house. Yes, we did, totally misunderstand each other about the purpose of this blog, I just thought you were being clever because I am a poet at heart.)

So, any RVers out there who would like to see their poem published here? This could be your recreational vehicle for getting your playful words out there without the bother of keeping up a blog - or just to get to a different audience. Just email, it really would be fun to have a section of RVer poetry, after all, although we would all have a lot in common, we would all be so different, minds and emotions are so varied.

For now, my poetry will have to suffice. In the meantime we are brainstorming jobs we could both do on the road to support ourselves, because we certainly won't live in the lap of luxury, but more like the gutters, I just hope clean ones. But at this point, even gutters feel right to me. . . (That so did not sound right!) Leon can do most anything as a job, he is quite coordinated and one of those men not afraid of hard work; I am the problem child, and as such, my mind keeps leaping for things for Leon to do!

Perhaps it is time to treat my writing as a job and try to get paid to think. After all, I spend all day thinking. . . . hmmm.

A non poetic entry

WELCOME

Yes! The title for this blog site was my idea, but I had not planned on having to be responsible for the content. MeeAugraphie is the poet in this partnership and, if I may say so, a good one.

When I suggested the idea and title for this blog I envisioned a site for RVers who are are (or not) poets, emerging poets, or just someone who enjoys poetry. Little did I know (but should have) that she would take it in a totally different direction, a direction that is a definite improvement on my original idea.

As for myself I am a performing artist, you create it and I will find a way to present it in an interesting and entertaining way, both orally and visually. I will of course, offer my opinion freely and often, right or wrong, and sometimes it seems as though the later is the case.

That's it for now
I must milk a cow

Happy Mother's Day

Children are oft times recreational vehicles
for their parents, meaning in their wonderment
and spontaneous
joy of everyday things they remind us:
play is very much a part of our lives and
if we observe how they do it, we can relearn.

May your children
or neighboring children
act as recreational vehicles
for you today

-- may they show you the value
in laughter and play today!

That may just be the best
Mother's Day present
you can receive - or give,
I hope you are playing along.

Choices

Life is about choice. If you think about it, every moment of our life involves choice. We either do or we don't. We think we are spending time thinking or planning or even procrastinating, but reality is that every moment we are doing those three things we have made the choice to do those three things and the choice NOT to do anything else for that moment in time.

That scared the heck out of me when I realized that each moment in time involves our making choices. Even if we measure it in minutes rather than moments, the numbers are as staggering as infinity felt when we first learned it in school.

Then I realized that each choice is a domino waiting to fall; its direction determined by one moment's choice. That excites me as much as watching each domino fall in a gymnasium full of dominoes in an intricate pattern that took days to build, knowing how difficult it was to put each one carefully in place without destroying the rest repeatedly and admiring the creators for their work - and patience. But it also scares me, knowing the effect one choice can make on all of us. We all "know" it, but for me the dominoes "show" it. . .

Which way will your next moment's choice cause the dominos to fall - the right way or the wrong way? More importantly, perhaps, have you the patience to start again if you need to and haven't hurt someone else in the process? Can you repair the damage your moment caused? Or was your moment one that lifted someone instead?

You have more moments. Make your choice count and shove the dominoes the kind way, both for you and for others. Life is choice; choice is life. Makes it simple doesn't it, but at the same time it really complicates it.

Category selection

First - I have put this photo on my other blog, but I love it and it is appropriate for RV Poetry's first photo, don't you think? This is on the water next to one of the WA ferry terminals. There is a huge expanse of water and more mountains. In spite of the ferry terminal there was little traffic that day. You can see for miles and miles (sing it). I knew that day that come hell or high water I was going to RV, but then, if I were in Hell (unless a town by that name) I wouldn't have much of a view. If I were in high water, my RV would be flooded, so let me rephrase that: I knew that day that an RV lifestyle was exactly what my mind had been searching for all those years. . . .

So, let's try and keep this blog organized -- a bit more than my other ones -- by setting up categories from the beginning.

Let's see, the obvious one: RV
Next most obvious ones would be: ReVised Living, ReVisited Values

Hmmm, how about: Citified, Countrified, Stagnant, Active, Boring, Enthralling, Peaceful, Hectic, Long, Short, Intelligent, Dumb, Comedic, Tragic.

Looks like I built in categories in my blog description without even trying! Now, unless someone comes up with more, I'll start with these.

Wait! Wait, wait.

I forgot poetry. Well, maybe. I have a poetry blog and I like its title, MeeAugraphie, as strange as it is, and it has become a pseudonym of sorts. But, knowing me, since I throw a poem or two in my Tumbled Words, among others, I'll throw some in here, despite that poetry in the title was more a reference to the poetry of living life and I did promise some in my first post. So, yes, OK, I talked myself into it: Poetry.

There won't be certain days for certain things like I assign post types in two of my blogs -- because if we pull off getting the actual RV, who knows what or when we will be doing anything.

So, to whomever is along for the ride, whether a quick one, choppy one, or extended. Thank you. Oops, I forgot Photo. . . and I even have one on this post. See y'all around.

And for the record, I will try for more use of the Short category than the Long one.

Welcome

Yes, yet another blog, and though I tend to like variety within one blog rather than a single niche, this one will be more restricted on topics.

You fell for that? Then you must be a new reader, welcome!

In RV Poetry you will find occasional poetry of the written kind as well as life poetry: photos and sound bites -- and -- RVs.

You may, however, find my interpretation of RVs a bit broad or even eccentric at times; you did pick up on that in the description, right? ReVised living, ReVisited values and Recreational Vehicles. I purposely built in a bit of flexibility for content, not wanting to misrepresent. Ah, you are catching on to my need to wander off subject occasionally.

As for the title, Leon came up within seconds of my asking for suggestions! Thank you, Leon!

But yes, we have been to eight RV shows in three cities in 2.5 years (the eighth today, 4 hours of walking). Started out looking at every size, now we are concentrating on around 24 feet, give or take. We'll see what happens. We wanted to RV full time and life realities preclude that for now, but that subject definitely fits in the Revised Living category as well as Revisited Values. Again, we'll see what happens.

Check back soon, but I won't be writing every day here at first. . . so, let your curiosity be satisfied simply by clicking on the RSS feed (for now, in the address bar of your browser). You wouldn't want to miss a photo would you?