2014 in review
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2014 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 20,000 times in 2014. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 7 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
Click here to see the complete report.
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If You’re Only Going To Read One Thing Today, Make It This.
Most Stories of kindness do not begin with a hospital nurse making a big mistake.
This one does.
This US Marine walked into a hospital and a nurse immediately took him to a hospital room.
She took the tired, anxious serviceman to the bedside. “Your son is here”, she said to the old man. She had to repeat the words several times before the patient’s eyes opened.
Heavily sedated because of the pain of his heart attack, he dimly saw the young uniformed Marine standing outside the oxygen tent. He reached out his hand. The Marine wrapped his toughened fingers around the old man’s limp ones. Squeezing a message of love and encouragement.
The nurse brought a chair so that the Marine could sit beside the bed. All through the night the young Marine sat there in the poorly lit ward, holding the old man’s hand and offering him words of love and strength. Occasionally, the nurse suggested that the Marine move away and rest for a while. He refused.
Whenever the nurse came into the ward, the Marine was oblivious of her and of the night noises of the hospital – the clanking of the oxygen tank, the laughter of the night staff members exchanging greetings, the cries and moans of the other patients. Now and then she heard him say a few gentle words. The dying man said nothing, only held tightly to his son all through the night.
Along towards dawn, the old man died. The Marine released the now lifeless hand he had been holding and went to tell the nurse. While she did what she had to do, he waited.
Finally she returned. She started to offer words of sympathy, but the Marine interrupted her, “Who was that man?” he asked.
The nurse was startled, “He was your father” she answered.
“No, he wasn’t”, the Marine replied. “I never saw him before in my life.”
“Then why didn’t you say something when I took you to him?”
“I knew right away that there had been a mistake but I also knew he needed his son, and his son just wasn’t here. When I realized that he was too sick to tell whether or not I was his son, I knew how much he needed me. I came here tonight to find a Mr William Grey. His son was killed in action today, and I was sent to inform him. What was this gentleman’s name?”
The nurse with tears in her eyes answered, “Mr William Grey…”
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The wife’s revenge
After 37 years of marriage. Jake dumped his wife for his Young secretary.
His new girlfriend demanded that they live in Jake and Edith’s multimillion dollar home and since the man’s lawyers were a little better he prevailed.
He gave Edith his now ex-wife just 3 days to move out. She spent the 1st day packing her belongings into boxes crates and suitcases.
On the 2nd day she had to movers come and collect her things.
On the 3rd day she sat down for the last time at their beautiful dining room table by candlelight put on some soft background music and feasted on a pound of shrimp a jar of caviar and a bottle of Chardonnay.
When she had finished she went into each and every room and stuffed half-eaten shrimp shells dipped in caviar into the hollow of all of the curtain rods. She then cleaned up the kitchen and left.
When the husband returned with his new girlfriend all was bliss for the first few days.
Then slowly the house began to smell. They tried everything cleaning mopping and airing the place out. Vents were checked for dead rodents and carpets were cleaned. Air fresheners were hung everywhere.
Exterminators were brought in to set off gas canisters during which they had to move out for a few days and in the end they even replaced the expensive wool carpeting. NOTHING WORKED.
People stopped coming over to visit. Repairman refused to work in the house.
The Maid quit.
Finally they could not take the stench any longer and decided to move.
A month later even through they had cut their price in half they could not find a buyer for their stinky house.
Word got out and eventually even the local realtors refused to return their calls. Finally they had to borrow a huge sum of money from the bank to purchase a new place.
The ex-wife called the man and asked how things were going. He told her the saga of the rotting house. She listened politely and said that she missed her old home terribly and would be willing to reduce her divorce settlement in exchange for getting the house back.
Knowing his ex-wife had no idea how bad the smell was he agreed on a price that was about 1/10th of what the house ha been worth, but only if she were to sign the papers that very day. She agreed and within the hour his lawyers delivered the paperwork.
A week later the man and his girlfriend stood smiling as they watched the moving company pack everything to take to their new home.
INCLUDING THE CURTAIN RODS.
🙂
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Cranky Old Man
When an old man died in the geriatric ward of a nursing home in an Australian country town, it was believed that he had nothing left of any value.
Later, when the nurses were going through his meager possessions, They found this poem. Its quality and content so impressed the staff that copies were made and distributed to every nurse in the hospital.
One nurse took her copy to Melbourne. The old man’s sole bequest to posterity has since appeared in the Christmas editions of magazines around the country and appearing in mags for Mental Health. A slide presentation has also been made based on his simple, but eloquent, poem.
And this old man, with nothing left to give to the world, is now the author of this ‘anonymous’ poem winging across the Internet.
Cranky Old Man
What do you see nurses? What do you see?
What are you thinking, when you’re looking at me?
A cranky old man, not very wise,
Uncertain of habit, with faraway eyes?
Who dribbles his food and makes no reply.
When you say in a loud voice ‘I do wish you’d try!’
Who seems not to notice the things that you do.
And forever is losing a sock or shoe?
Who, resisting or not, lets you do as you will,
With bathing and feeding, The long day to fill?
Is that what you’re thinking? Is that what you see?
Then open your eyes, nurse you’re not looking at me.
I’ll tell you who I am as I sit here so still,
As I do at your bidding, as I eat at your will.
I’m a small child of Ten with a father and mother,
Brothers and sisters who love one another
A young boy of Sixteen with wings on his feet
Dreaming that soon now a lover he’ll meet.
A groom soon at Twenty my heart gives a leap.
Remembering, the vows that I promised to keep.
At Twenty-Five, now I have young of my own.
Who need me to guide and a secure happy home.
A man of Thirty, my young now grown fast,
Bound to each other with ties that should last.
At Forty, my young sons have grown and are gone,
But my woman is beside me to see I don’t mourn.
At Fifty, once more, Babies play ’round my knee,
Again, we know children my loved one and me.
Dark days are upon me My wife is now dead.
I look at the future I shudder with dread.
For my young are all rearing young of their own.
And I think of the years and the love that I’ve known.
I’m now an old man and nature is cruel.
It’s jest to make old age look like a fool.
The body, it crumbles grace and vigor, depart.
There is now a stone where I once had a heart.
But inside this old carcass, a young man still dwells,
And now and again my battered heart swells
I remember the joys I remember the pain.
And I’m loving and living life over again.
I think of the years, all too few gone too fast.
And accept the stark fact that nothing can last.
So open your eyes, people open and see.
Not a cranky old man, look closer, see… ME!!
Poem originally by Phyllis McCormack; adapted by Dave Griffith.
Remember this poem when you next meet an older person who you might brush aside without looking at the young soul within. We will all, one day, be there, too!
The best and most beautiful things of this world can’t be seen or touched. They must be felt by the heart!
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Turn your web browser into a Notepad
Here is a nice little Trick through which you can turn your web browser into a notepad with editable content: Read the rest of this entry
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Quotable Quotes #10
If you love a flower, don’t pick it up. Because if you pick it up, it dies and it ceases to be what you love. So if you love a flower, let it be, Love is not about possession. Love is about appreciation.
Surprise Me! 