Sandee Kortum

10:09 pm: Stephen Fry and a dirty video

I really, really hope this works. I saw it on TV.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9T1vfsHYiKY

12:32 pm: A request for advice, please
I want to get my wonderful son-in-law a special gift for his birthday this year. He very rarely reads LJ so if anyone has a suggestion please share it.

the criteria are: non-perishabel, memorable and within the budget of someon without a job.

07:50 am: Unemployed Again
After my mom nearly died last Tuesday and Wed, nearly 650 miles driving in 4 days, leaving my mom in the hospital in Spokane.

The top of my week was getting laid off this morning; at 6:30 and in the parking lot.

I want to cry but I am too emotionally exhausted from all my Mother's drama.

It  looks like she will be getting better this time.

I am going back to bed.

09:04 pm: name change
I am deeply amused that both "Buffy" and "Llilly" are listed as alternate names for Elizabeth.

06:37 pm: Court martial 1978

Lisa said I should "flesh out" my list from earlier this week. So here is chapter 1. I would cut but I don't know how.

When Lisa’s father disappeared with her I was in the middle of my Army school to be a Med Lab Tech. It was the Friday before Mother’s Day 1978.

I knew that her dad was (and is) an alcoholic and he and his family were drunk every day. I was so scared for her safety; it was all I could think about. I was devastated that I didn’t know where she was, she was just a year old. I couldn’t eat anything without throwing it up, all I could eat was an Arby’s Jr. sandwich with lettuce 5 days/week (Monday thru Friday). I lost so much weight between Mother’s Day 1978 and the first week of June I went from a size 10/12 to a size 5.

I weighted about 140 and went down to about 110, I didn’t weight in so I do not know exactly how much weight I lost.

One day during this time I was dizzy, light headed and nauseated so I went to the doctor. He sent me to my quarters and told me to stay in bed.

 I was living in the barracks sharing a room (about the size of Lisa’s living room) with another solider. We shared laundry with 200 others. It was hard to get uniforms clean so I used the Quartermaster for my uniforms; they washed, ironed and hung them up. This left me time to study. They Quartermaster required each solider to pick their uniforms up in person; there was a big problem with theft.

 

So, in order to have a clean uniform, I had a friend drive me to get them. Somebody reported me to the CO (Commanding Officer; Captain Terrell) who decided that I was “absent from my place of duty and failure to follow a lawful order” and was going to charge me under UCMJ (Uniform Code of Military Justice) Article 15. According to him my “place of duty” was my bed and the lawful order was the doctor telling me to stay in bed.

 

Under Article 15 he could have imposed a penalty of the following:

-          Restricted up to 14 days to work, mess hall, sick call

-          Extra duty for up to 14 days

-          Or both

-          Locked up for up to 7 days

-          Forfeit 7 days pay

-          Reduce me one pay grade

-          Confinement for up to 3 days on diminished rations or bread and water for 3 days.

-          Or a combination of his choice.

 

I didn’t think I had done anything wrong and I in order to impose a penalty I had to sign the paperwork (kind of like signing a ticket). I had a choice sign or refuse. I refused to sign the Article 15 because I had a spotless record. When I refused the CO had the choice of dropping the charges or sending them to a Summary Court Martial. He was not going to back down so the situation escalated to a Summary Court.

 

I was assigned a JAG (Judge Advocate General) lawyer because of the Summary Court.

(I wish I could remember his name; he had no respect for my CO.)

 

A Summary Court Martial is heard by a Field Grade officer (Lieutenant Colonel and above) typically a lawyer or judge. In a Summary Court there is one officer that acts as both prosecuting attorney and defense counsel. In order for them to prosecute me under a Summary Court I and to consent to the trial, my lawyer told me I would not win a Summary Court and I agreed with him. He found a case from England dated about 1952 that had ruled a medical officer could not give a lawful order. So I refused to accept the Summary Court Martial.

That sent things into a Special Court Martial. For a Special Court there is a military judge, trial counsel (prosecutor), defense counsel (my lawyer) and a three officer panel.

The penalty from a Special Court and be up to a year in confinement, forfeiture of 2/3 pay each month for a year, a bad-conduct discharge (which costs most VA benefits).

 

Lisa was missing during the time I was trying to make these decisions. I was also in school and trying to learn Microbiology during this time. He father dropped her off at my parents about the time I requested the Special Court Martial. My CO would not let me have leave to go get her which really ruined my attitude.

 

The Special Court refused to hear the case because they felt it no foundation. The final outcome was a Letter of Admonishment that was removed from my file when I left that duty post (Fort Sam Houston) just a month or so later. My CO lost; I won.

01:02 pm: A blue rat

They have found that blue food dye helps in spinal cord injuries. But it will turn your skin blue, it made the rat look like a cross between a rat and a Smurff.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/07/bluerats/

07:08 pm: Captain Kirk lives again
William Shatner is quoting Sarah Palin as poetry. Funny

Him doing her tweets as iambic pentameter: priceless

06:40 pm: Facebook hmmm
My second husband, that I last spoke to in 1989, contacted me via Facebook.
My reactions were in order:
shock
crying
"What the HECK??"
anger!
really angry
sarcasm
peeved and suspicious

I want to send an email that ask him "Why would I want to talk to the person that told me the only reason people are nice to be is because I am pitiful and they feel sorry for me".  He even asked how my daughter is doing. I don't want to say how much or how badly her hurt her with his mental cruelty and abuse. All I know is that men in her life paid the price and it took years for her to be able to trust men.

I don't know if I just ignore the situation or not. My curiosity is going nuts: why after all these years is he wanting to talk to me. It isn't like I have been invisible.

08:54 pm: My crop
My whole carrot crop so far. I ate all of them for dinner. The red one was sweeter than the orange ones and the white one was fairly bland.

They all tasted more 'carroty' than store bought one.

09:57 pm: Note to self
Stop cooking like Charlie

06:49 pm: Too much down on the farm
I finally read the slogan that is on my work truck. I've been driving this thing for nearly a month.
Company name
"Servicing the Western US"

Servicing! ? ? WT heck.  Somebody didn't thing before they put that on my truck.

My mother said "sounds like they were expecting a man to be driving" and (this is a quote) "if somebody hires them will they get screwed?"

06:59 pm: 40 years later
Today I read my favorite story about the Apollo 11's crew.

Buzz Aldrin was born in 1930.  "In 2002, he punched, right in the face, a much bigger and younger man who was hounding him and trying to get him to swear on a Bible, on camera, that he walked on the moon. That's what he thinks of those who claim the Apollo moon landings were staged in a studio in the Nevada desert."

04:58 pm: Poor Christy
The day after the Big Wedding Christy found the basement freezer door hadn't been closed tight. Then as an added bonus the upstairs freezer door hadn't been shut tight either.

She is having a busy week.

09:26 pm: I love musicians
Joh Bon Jovi has recorded "Stand by Me" in Farsi. I think that is too cool for words. It is for broadcast in Iran.

My inner hippie peacenik is soo happy.

05:32 pm: oh! poo

Lisa has been inconveniently right this week.

03:09 pm: Duh!
I just figured out the awful smell upstairs is the Air Freshner I bought!

I feel brain dead. (no need to comment.)

08:16 pm: okay too odd
I have a follow-up interview for a different new job this week.

It would pay more and be more stable. good things to be said about stable.

07:52 pm: Queen of over reacting
A friend just told me I am the Queen of Over re-acting.

I don't think that is true. I am not the queen and I don't over re-act.

03:05 pm: A job, my job, my new job
I start my new job Wed. 5 days Early!

Happy, happy me

12:07 pm: A job offer
I got a phone call this morning; the man said "The interviewer was impress with you yesterday and we would like to offer you the job". I said I accept.

I am going to be the Project Manager/Inspector for a $700 K job in Port Townsend. I will have a company car, the clock starts when I pick up the company car in Poulsbo. I will be on the clock while I commute. The next step is the drug test, back ground check and getting me certified to use the nuclear gage for construction. (no it isn't a geiger counter)

The job site is on the water front. I have spend the summer on the water in Pt. T. How cool is that!

I will have to work in Tacoma on the site there for a week or two.

Now I need to figure out how to pay my power bill, car payment and purchase work clothes. I don't think my office sweaters are going to cut it for concrete and asphalt testing. I need new jeans and some cotton shirts.