Then I ran some parts books to my dad for his riding lawn mower. The parts he needed we ordered online - they only cost 2.50 but with shipping and handling the order ran up to $12, but it saved him a trip to town.

I got home late, then Saturday I was up and off to rejoin WW at the 8:00 weighin, stayed for the meeting. I had to run back home even though I was all ready for the gym because I forgot my membership card. After working out I came home and got ready for a council meeting which I had to run all the way across town for. Then back home - oof - and to call the friend that needed the books, I stopped at the store on the way - got some shopping done and picked up a roasted chicken and salad for dinner. I hung out there for a couple hours and listened to her rant about work.

Sunday, I was up and scanning photo album pages for a couple hours then off to the gym (again). I worked out and came home - then went and got my hair and the kids hair trimmed, then came home and scanned the rest of the photo albums, so that my niece could come over and look for pictures of her mother.

My sister died last year from alcoholic hepatitis. If you ever hear of anybody who drinks themselves to death - let me tell you - it's pretty gruesome and an awful way to die. I guess most alcoholics die at home, I don't know that, but my sister died after 6 weeks in the hospital. It was one of the most terrible things I've ever been witness to. Especially since I think she really wanted to recover, realizing what the drinking had done to her and swearing off of it - but it was too late. The liver is too scarred to heal itself and pancreatitis develops and the digestive system can no longer digest anything nor water. Any water or food has to be done intravenously and since the digestive process can't excrete the water - it has to be drained after it collects in the abdominal cavity. After a while there's nothing that can be done - all the shit builds up in the blood and can't be filtered or cleaned out.

You can't save anybody who won't save themselves. I tried - 3 or 4 months before she died, I almost had her convinced to see a therapist - it was a Friday - I took the day off from work and went and talked to her all day long at her house. I knew that it had to be her own choice - she had to do it herself. She did it - she called the clinic and tried to schedule an appointment. The stupid bastards told her to call back on Monday. She never did call back or schedule an appointment. I don't know that she ever would have really gone.

I see anti-smoking advertisements on TV and think that there should be similar advertisements for alcoholism. I didn't know exactly how a person could die from alcoholic hepatitis until I saw it myself. I guess there may be different complications that can actually cause death, I don't know what they all are, but they all tie into the alcoholism.

We don't see smoking advertisements on TV anymore - why not ban alcohol commercials. Alcohol is advertised like it's the 'fun' 'cool' thing to do. There's nothing really fun about it. You drink til you get drunk, you do stupid things, you puke, then you're sick the next day. The commercials for alcohol show all these perfect people, drinking, acting cool, as if that bottle of whatever in their hand magically has transformed them into the "perfect and groovy". Why don't we see it for what it really is with real people? Bloodshot eyes, staggering, slobbering, acting stupid, ugly people picking up ugly people in bars, driving drunk, fighting, arguing, breaking things, neglecting children, making a mess, and then suffering from all of it for the next day or week.

It's a delusion that U.S. marketing feeds U.S. society. I hate it - I hate seeing those advertisements on TV. I guess I should talk, I have my stupid moments too, and I do like to have my margaritas every once in a while - but I think I've cured myself of that for a while.