Don't Get Me Started with Linda Sharp

Another Virginia Story

Linda,

I've been a lurker at DGMS for almost 2 years now. I see what the power of good people coming together can accomplish. I was always in a position to help, but after the events of the past 14 months, find myself at the opposite end of the spectrum. I've started this email many times in the past week, but it was what I found last night that made me realize I needed to send this. Bear with me, please

August of 2007, after a simple procedure on my knee, I landed in the hospital for two weeks with a post-op staph infection. 3 more surgeries, central lines, liver and kidney failiure and months of in-home health care and rehab left our savings depleted. Needless to say, last Christmas was a bit smaller than usual for us, but we were together, and I was beginning to mend and get back on my feet (and back to work after a few months off).

I'm a single mom of the most wonderful daughter who will be 12 in January. She was left at the mercy of friends and family for 2 weeks, scared that her mom would not make it back home, but kept her wits about her, and helped care for me when I finally did get home. She is the most loving, giving, caring young woman I know and deserves so much more than i can give her this year.

I was laid off from my job of 23 years this past August. We live in a fairly small town, and job prospects are slim. Because of all of the medical bills of the past year, we are scraping bottom. Please, if you can find a little bit extra, help give my daughter a Christmas that will make her smile, and to let her know that there are people out there that we may never know, that truly care about others. She has given soooo much this past year, not only of herself, but of her own creature comforts. While we are not homeless, we have had to make some lifestyle changes - including moving into a much smaller home to help make ends meet. She has moved away from friends, has moved into a much smaller bedroom, and never complains.

Last night I found her "wish list". There are 3 items on it: an exercise ball (still boggling over that one!), the Jonas Brothers game for Nintendo DS, and the Sims 3 for PC. Seems like such a small list, but I am unable to fulfill any of these wishes. If you can find it in your budget to help with one of these items, I know a girl who would be most appreciative (and her mom too!!).

Please keep my identity private, although I am very much okay with you sharing our story. If you can help, please let me know. I will send you contact info.

Thank you!

(Name withheld)

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Consider it done!  I have emailed you for some more information and the DGMS elf will get to work ASAP!

To everyone - the donation link is open 24/7 and I promise I am squeezing every drop out of every penny!

Yes, Virginia Request

Asking for help of any kind is never easy.  Personally, I am the absolute worst at it - I will run myself ragged from one end of town to the other just to keep from asking for a ride for one of my children.  So I understand how hard it is for folks to come forward to request assistance from Yes, Virginia.  But we are here, and to the extent our fund can help, we will help. 

(An update for those of you who sent donations towards something special for the Mom I wrote about last week - according to Veronica she is a diehard Yankees fan, so I combined her passion with the practical needs of the cold months ahead.  She will be receiving a special warm winter jacket emblazoned with her beloved Yankees logo!)

With permission from those who write to me, I will post their emails so you can share in how your efforts will be touching other's lives.

I received this one two days ago...

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Dear Mrs Sharp,

I dont really know how to start this but a friend on another board told me about your website and the people here who help make Christmas happen.  We have two kids a girl and a boy.  She is 7 and he is 4 and they are what keep me and my husband going every day.  Our life is what you read about in the news.  We did not do anything wrong but were in the wrong jobs at the wrong time.  My husband was laid off six months ago and has managed to find an hourly position at a local movie theater.  He also delivers pizza at night but it is so hard to make ends meet and I worry all the time that someone is going to get sick and we do not have insurance. I worked part-time at my daughter's school but was let go when they had to cutback too.  We have wonderful friends and family but they are strapped like everybody now days.  I am not asking for a lot but if you and your readers could help us put a couple presents from Santa under the tree this year it would help us so much.  We have already tried to explain that Santa may not come this year but not because they are bad children just because he might run out of toys.  If you can help us please write back and I can give you some ideas of things they like.  I have read about the people you have already helped with mattresses and wish we could chip in.  There is always somebody worse off isn't there?

Sincerely,

(name withheld by request)

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I have already started the process to find out what we can get for her children to make sure Santa comes.  And I would like to encourage the blogmunity, if you know anyone who is struggling like this, or if you need help making Christmas happen, please email me.  Again, we are not the Oprah Show, but we still have money available right now.  And PLEASE, embarrassment does not need to be a barrier here.  I promise I will protect your privacy and that we all - regardless of income - understand what is going on in this world of ours. ~ Linda

Something To Put The Purrfect Smile On Your Face

Seema just sent this to me.  Try not to smile.  I dare you.  :O)

Surprised Kitty @ Yahoo! Video

The Twit Hits The Fan

I'm not a Twitter fan, I'll state that up front.

Do I have an account?  Yes.  But unlike so many folks, celebrities, businesses out there, you will not find me updating every time I fart, drink some coffee, or need to "Sigh."

But Twitter is here to stay, as are the legions of twits (Tweeters?  Twitterists?  Twats?  Wait, that would be past tense... ) who embrace it for their every emotion.

An Alabama news channel decided to climb onto the cool train and now offer Twitter updates of their news feeds throughout the day.  That's fine.  Until you combine that modern electronic technology with their billboards...

Yep, those three smiling faces are their news anchors, but thanks to the coolio Twitter feed on the electronic billbard, these could easily be mistaken for three of the friendliest gang rapists around.

I imagine back in the news room, the twit hit the fan over this one...

Jon Stewart On Party Crashers

LOVE me some Jim Gaffigan!

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The Real Asswipes of Washington, D.C.
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Dead, But Questions Will Live On

He is dead.  Shot down in the wee hours of this morning by a lone police officer who ended his worthless life, as he had ended the lives - full of worth - of four police officers over the weekend in Seattle.

Good.

And good riddance.

The only reasons now to even acknowledge that Maurice Clemmons once lived will be to examine how our judicial system so badly let down the public they are supposed to defend before he died.

The questioning begins in Arkansas where this bad seed began his criminal career racking up a sentence of 108 years at the young age of 16 in 1989.  His sentence was commuted to 47 years by then Governor Mike Huckabee in 2000, making him eligible for parole, which he was granted.

He then went on to more illustrious crimes like child rape.

Yet there he was wandering the streets freely, EIGHT felony counts currently against him.

Much is being made of the Huckabee connection.  And I don't disagree with all of the finger pointing.  Especially given how Huckbee is covering his own ass and pointing the finger at so many other people in the process.

Is it all Mike Huckabee's fault?  Of course not.  He has no crystal ball to predict who is going to commit murder.  Laying all the blame on him would be like laying the blame on Clemmons's mother for giving birth to him in the first place - how could she have known?

He, and she, couldn't.

But I'm not going to give him a free pass like Bill O'Reilly has done (color me shocked).

The very fact that the process exists to allow a 108 year sentence to wind up being parole?  Our judicial system is apparently the legal equivalent of Swiss cheese.

As for the Willie Horton lines being drawn?  The comparison is apt in the political arena.  Republicans used Willie Horton to torpedo the S.S. Michael Dukakis.  One couldn't exactly fault the Democrats if they went after Huckabee in the same fashion.  Time will tell on that one, but it seems the current blood in the water is actually drawing in more conservative sharks.

Regardless of how the blame is spread out, and there is plenty to go round here, the bottom line is we have a criminal system that seems to work better for the criminal than the innocent people it should be protecting.

Frankly, I am tired of joke sentences like 108 years.  Very few people live that long from birth.  Sentence someone and mean it.  If they are given 20 years, serve 20 years.  50?  Serve 50.  And if we need more jails?  Build the damned things.  But first, overhaul a system clogged up by people selling weed.  When a pot salesman is locked up and a child rapist walks free?  Well, you got trouble in River City, folks.

And sadly, you have four dead police officers in Seattle.

Debate For The Day

Afghanistan.

Tonight is the night when President Obama will gve his speech detailing the next steps we will take in regard to that cave laden, desolate, crater laden piece of Mother Earth.

I fall into the camp of not wanting to believe what the preliminary news reports are - that we are investing even more lives into fighting in that toilet bowl of a country.  Have these leaders not seen Charlie Wilson's War? 

I have.  And that part makes this whole thing even more laughable (in a totally black humor, perverse kind of way).  It was not so many years ago that we were pouring hundreds of millions of our dollars into that very country so they could defeat the USSR.

I'm sorry, but I just don't see the virtue in following that old Bushism, 'We've got to fight 'em over there so we don't have to fight 'em over here."

You know what?  Let's fight 'em over here.

Let's bring our soldiers home, stop buttf*cking every country we don't approve of, in turn pissing off every militant, extremist mind on this globe, and actually work on HOMELAND SECURITY - you know, SECURING OUR HOMELAND.

We have so many problems right here, right now.  And we sit on the brink of yet another decision to take from what's left (or borrowed from China) and essentially feed it into the insatiable war machine we have become.

Hey, here's a crazy thought.  How about we become a peace machine?  We are simply never going to convert to our democracy lovin' thinking every person on this marble of ours.  And that can be OK.

I'm not saying shut the doors and turn our backs on every problem beyond our borders, but this time?  When it comes to Afghanistan?    Perhaps this is the time to say, American lives mean more than Al Qaeda deaths.

To those who would argue that we haven't caught Osama bin Laden yet?  Truly, what do you think is going to happen if we do?  Will every follower of his demonic mind set simply collapse in tears and fear and go back to their lives before we all knew his name? 

Of course not.

Capturing, taking to trial, even killing bin Laden would change nothing.  It would not bring back a single life lost on 9/11, or the thousands of lives lost since.  Capturing and killing Saddam Hussein did not suddenly make the milk and honey flow through Iraq.

From an insider info standpoint, I have none.  Neither do you.  I'm sure we both sleep better for not knowing what those in the White House, those in the hierarchy of our military know, but from where I sit, I just don't see the virtue in continuing.  If it is just because we Americans have to be right, have to win every time - that's not enough.  Think Vietnam. 

And this is not because I'm some bleeding heart liberal, whateverwhatever name some neocon would like to sling at me.  Honestly, these days, I don't know what I am.  I do know I still think good ideas and bad ideas can be found in every corner of the political arena, just as good people and bad people make up our leadership.  And I hate that so many families are continuing to be torn asunder by uniformed visits bringing news of their son's, daughter's, wife's, husband's, father's, mother's death in this war.

I think I want what most people want.  I want to live and let live.  I want to sleep well at night with a roof over my head, food in my belly, my children safe in their schools, some money in our bank account.  And I want to pledge allegiance to a flag that represents the better angels of a human being's nature, not the need to always be right, or the inability to apologize when we have been wrong.  And we have been wrong in our past, in our present, and we will be wrong in our future.  Being the United States doesn't grant us magical powers, and no matter how many politicians end their speeches with it, I don't believe God blesses the USA any more or less than he blesses any other country.

Michael Moore has written an open letter to President Obama.  Give it a read.  Whether you like him or not (Moore and/or the President) there is serious food for thought there.  And then chime in.  I'd like to hear how other people are feeling, what you are thinking as we face another decision that will either define us or refine us.

And I ask, please keep it civil and respectful.  This is a debate.  I'm not necessarily right.  You are not necessarily right.  Let's keep this a conversation.

An Open Letter To President Obama On Afghanistan

Special Requests

Just got this from Katy...

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I have a really good friend, he's married to his college sweetheart, is a father of two beautiful girls still in elementary school and a very active member of the church I belong to.  He's got a super personality, and a very dry sense of humor which always makes me laugh out loud.  A week ago, I saw him at church with a bandage on his face and one on his ear and I callously made a joke about cutting himself shaving.  Later, I e-mailed to apologize and said that I hoped it wasn't something serious.  He called me today to say that one of the spots was malignant skin cancer and he would be going in for surgery this Friday (December 4th) to have it removed.  They won't know till later if it's entered into his lymph nodes.  I'm praying that it hasn't.  He is a very faithful person, and is very upbeat about it, but I wanted to pull in some of the "blog" positive prayer power to help him too!   I don't want to give his name, but if everyone could say a prayer for "John," I think God will know who it's for!  Thanks Linda!

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(I have been there and done that, Katy - mine have all been basal cell (the good kind), but my Dad has had many malignant melanomas removed.  The waiting is definitely the hardest part.  I will keep your friend in my thoughts. ~ Linda)

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Also received this one while I was away...

Vonn Anderson, my high school best friend's aunt (then I married into the family and she became my aunt, too) was rushed to the hospital today.  She is now in ICU.  So far, they suspect she has had a pretty severe stroke and is continuing to have seizures.  They have her on a ventilator and heavily sedated and trying to control the seizures.  Vonn has not been in good health for quite some time.  She has had mini-strokes from time to time and has had some serious heart problems and heart surgeries.  She, her husband, Roy, daughter, Loree, and three grandchildren and all the rest of the family could really use some good vibes right now. We're all a little scared.

Thanks,

Jackie

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Sendsing good thoughts their way, too!

Yes, Virginia Update

Hi everyone - just wanted to thank you all again for your outpouring of generosity in helping us purchase new mattresses and bedding for the family I wrote about last week.  I came back from Dallas to find a new email from Veronica, and she had managed to take some pictures of the beds we are replacing.

I'm not posting them here out of respect for the family's privacy, but please believe me, your heart would break.  Reading her words was one thing, but if ever the saying "A picture is worth a thousand words" were truer, I have not run across it.  Everything is exactly as she had described and you should all be so proud of coming together to help in this way.

Several of you have sent donations towards getting something special just for the Mom - rest assured, I am working with Veronica on ideas for that.

In the meantime, the clock continues to tick towards Christmas.  If you, or someone in your life needs some help this season in keeping Santa alive  please email me directly.  This isn't exactly The Oprah Show, but DGMS has a heart just as big.

My inbox is open, and the Yes, Virginia donation link is always active on the left side of the page.

~ Linda