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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cfu8nsPlglY

My dog is thirsty; he has been thirsty for the last three hours. His bowl is empty, and I don’t really care. My son took him on a long walk, and my dog returned very thirsty. His bowl can’t be more than three feet from me, yet I am unable to get up off my couch and replenish his water. Why? I have PTSD.

This is a crippling disorder that is not only mental and physical; it is a biological disorder. I never thought I would encounter something so physically and mentally disabling.

In brief, I was the first responder at a fatal, freaky accident that took the life of an innocent young girl younger than my daughters. An errant double axle tire came loose from a semi-truck and traveled 400 yards before crushing a girl to death, then bounced back at my wife and I. The tire destroyed our car and came within feet of killing us. I couldn’t save the girl. I carry that guilt.

I wrote a book about my experience some years ago, “Espiritus,” which helped set me on a new writing path to help me cope. Writing is my therapy. I always thought PTSD couldn’t affect me because I wasn’t a soldier who witnessed unspeakable things. PTSD is fairly new; in WW1, it was considered shell-shocked; in WW2, it was called battle fatigue. Vietnam introduced PTSD. Apparently, first responders, police, and firefighters can suffer as well. Anyone can suffer from this disorder. There is no cure, just ways of curbing the edge of this depression.

You go about your daily business, and suddenly you are derailed. There are many triggers.

The more you deny you suffer from PTSD, the worse it gets. Learning self-control of situations that suddenly hit you out of nowhere is something else that happens, and you need to find your “safe place” in your mind when this happens. I have a daily box of tools to delve into. My dog is one of my tools; he is extremely helpful. His unconditional love helps. My daily song for my bride releases my heart; planning and cooking dinner is great therapy, as well as long walks to sync my mind and body.

Finally, the most important part of my daily therapy is pausing several times each day to thank God for my wonderful life, followed by prayers for the young girl who died.

I support Wounded Warriors, and the proceeds from my book are donated to this worthy cause.

Thank you for reading my stories.

Peter Arcuri

I found $20 in the parking lot of the supermarket, so I thought to myself, what would Jesus do?

So I turned it into wine.

Just saw an ad for glass coffins, do you think it will take off? Remains to be seen.

I may have been destined to become a concert pianist. After all, I began my piano lessons at age 7, like my two older sisters. Piano playing was a prerequisite for the Catholic school we attended. A nun, Sister Stella had a sister who was also a nun at St. Anthony of Padua in lower Manhattan; her name was Sister Catherine Marie. Sister Stella, who was in her 80’s, small and ornery, had the difficult task of teaching us. My love of music was put on the back burner after I realized the pain and agony involved in learning. A wooden ruler would grace your knuckles for every sour note, not like the piano was ever properly tuned. The fear of striking the wrong key would resonate through my body. I would begin to sweat, and I already stuttered, which didn’t help. By the time I was eight, my knuckles were raised with callouses. I was the envy of the martial arts world.

My earliest memory of nuns was when I was in the first grade, standing in line after lunch, waiting to go back inside the classroom. The kid behind me didn’t appreciate his lunch, or maybe he was scheduled for a piano lesson and threw up on my pants. He vomited all over the back of me. The nuns felt this was not part of their job description to clean me and began to yell at me. What did I do? They called for my older sister, who was in the 8th grade, to come down and clean me up. I was crying, stuttering, and everyone was yelling at me. That day I learned every curse word in the book; my sister was muttering them under her breath.

As I have mentioned, I stuttered, and I was a big kid, so I sat in the back of the classroom. Because I stuttered, I was made fun of, and the nuns who were teaching me thought I was either an idiot or I couldn’t see well. But they didn’t move me to the front of the class. Instead, they told my parents I needed glasses. Duh? Glasses to cure stuttering! I started wearing reading glasses when I was 55; to this very day, my distance vision is great. Funny, back then, whatever a nun would suggest, my parents, and all parents, would blindly follow.

I wasn’t particularly bright. Since I stuttered, I never raised my hand to give the answer. One day I knew the answer; I raised my hand. I am beaming with information this time, “Sister, Sister, Sister.” She ignored me and said, “John, what’s the answer.” As John searched his heart and soul for the answer, my insides were bursting, and I yelled out the answer. No one knew I even had a voice; I did, and I wanted to answer. When I bellowed out the answer, the nun turned to me and said, “Is your name John?” I was sent to Mother Superior’s office. Mother Bettina was not a force to be reckoned with. She was 90 if she was a day. You knew you were in deep trouble when she rolled her sleeves up. I always wondered what was up their sleeves? She kept a metal ruler handy, not wood, metal, probably because the wooden rulers cracked after so much use. If you failed a test by 10 points, that meant ten cracks on your open palms to make up the difference in your grade. If you still failed, they didn’t give you back the points, just the pain. My knuckles were sore, and my palms were beet red; I could hardly hold a pencil. That yelling out in class got me ten cracks, and I knew the answer! What a way to teach.

My sister Joanne was left-handed. The nuns constantly tried to correct this; they thought being left-handed was a problem. Ironically, my sister became a Sister herself. I never thought nuns were human; I thought they had wheels for their feet like robots. Then one day, their habits were adjusted for more comfort. Imagine my surprise!! Oh, my, they have hair and feet! I then realized they were human.

Some of my works, all available on amazon

AOC is in full panic mode

https://youtu.be/7ukbOKAhqZc?si=3yMAAyHWg4c1jFYt

People always ask, “how do I come up with topics to write about?” I’m a creative writer,, so I’m a dreamer. My four children write better than I, there are technical writers, couldn’t come up with a creative thought. One daughter is a veterinarian, the other daughter is a teacher, one son is a Michelin chef, and one son is a savant. To creative you have to be a little odd and think of things others don’t. I can suffer from writer’s block for weeks and turn around and write 3000 words in a morning. They way to cure this is to sit in front of a blank piece of paper, dream and write, just start writing, everything else will fall into place.

The Grapevine…

I have always liked reading weekly or daily columns by Earl Wilson, Herb Caen, Jimmy Breslin, etc. This will be the first of a weekly column, mostly about real estate-type businesses. Here are my two cents.

I heard that buying or selling a house right now is as difficult as putting a square peg in a round hole. All y’all know better than me. My wife and I have been working with a realtor in Tampa, Donna Davidson. Bless her Irish soul! She is great to work with. My wife and I found a house in Ocala, Florida, and called Donna with two other listings, all within ten minutes of each other. Donna was, at the time, visiting her sister on the opposite coast and said maybe if she called ahead to the listing realtor, that’s exactly what she did, and she spoke to Ortiz, who was handling one of the listings. Donna asked if he could possibly show the two others; his response was yes. ”We realtors have to stick together.” He was more than happy to do so and contacted my wife. They spoke briefly on the phone as I chimed in that I would give him $50 cash for his trouble. He agreed at 10 a.m. Friday morning, just before 10:30, the time we were leaving, to make the hour and a half drive to Ocala for a noon appointment. At ten minutes to twelve, he calls my wife—mind you, we are ten minutes away—and changes his mind. He now says he wants Donna’s 3% commission on the two other listings, and, get this, he wanted 6% on the house he was showing! He wanted me to screw my realtor broker and collect fifty bucks. Being the New York City boy as I am, I said, Well, you really don’t want to know, and I cursed at him like I was a drunken sailor who hasn’t been on shore leave for two years. We immediately made a u-turn and headed back to Tampa. I turned to my wife and said in my best mafia voice, “Now he’s got nothing.” I’m supposed to be buying from this guy and trusting him, and he’s screwing me even before we meet. I will only give you one chance to be trusted; if you fail, there is no second chance. He had a one-in-three chance of us buying his listing, plus he would have a crisp Grant in his pocket. Now he’s got nothing. Is this common? Also, while I’m at it, who determines the percentage rate for the realtor? Some realtors state 1.75% or 2%. What’s that all about?

Let’s get back to realtors: who do they work for? I am always confused about the buyer or the seller; they can’t sell a house without the owner, right? That’s where the cash is being generated. So they work for you, the owner. However, they play footies with the buyer, saying, “Don’t worry, we can get them down in price.” When my wife and I sold her previous house, we used. Nice people, so I thought they just wanted the listing. When we had a prospected buyer, I knew right away by the sidebar conversations that something was brewing and it was rotten. They asked me if they could have someone inspect the roof, and I agreed. The buyer brings one of his drinking buddies, wearing sneakers and a roofer. They ascended the ladder; they had no tools, had a little pow wow, and left without saying a word. People must think I’m a complete idiot; I am street smart! I have an IQ of 185 on the street! I look and sound like I came out of central casting for a mob movie. You are not pulling any wool over my eyes. Within minutes, our realtor, remembering the person working for me, calls and says in an excited voice, ”You need a new roof; the next strong wind will rip it right off!” I’m smiling and saying to myself, Are they for real? I responded to her, sort of like the drunken sailor, and told her to pick up her sign,For Sale,” which would be in the street. I pulled that sucker out of the ground as if it were a strong man’s cement or wood post and tossed them far in the street. They never came back for the sign, so I kept the 4×4 post and trashed the sign. So I ask again: who does your realtor really work for?

You heard it through the grapevine.

The Power of the Holy Spirit🙏

https://livingproof.co/what-is-the-holy-spirits-role/#:~:text=The%20Holy%20Spirit%27s%20role%20is,life%20and%20makes%20us%20new.

livingproof.co

What Is the Holy Spirit’s Role in a Believer’s Life?

The Holy Spirit convicts believers of sin, fills us with God’s strength and wisdom, and produces fruit that draws people to Jesus. When we place our faith in Jesus, the Holy Spirit dwells inside us. This permanent indwelling means we … Continue reading

Do all states or counties in states require permits on Accessory Dwelling Units often referred to as ADUs? I like to put an accessory dwelling unit for additional rental income due to bidenomics and the out of control inflation and cost of living.

A1C, or glycated hemoglobin, is a blood test that reflects average blood sugar levels over the past two to three months. It is often used to diagnose and monitor diabetes. The test measures the percentage of hemoglobin—the oxygen-carrying protein in red blood cells—that has glucose (sugar) attached to it.

When blood sugar levels are elevated, more glucose binds to hemoglobin, leading to a higher A1C level. The results are expressed as a percentage, with higher percentages indicating higher average blood sugar levels.

For people without diabetes, the normal range for A1C is typically below 5.7%. An A1C level between 5.7% and 6.4% may indicate prediabetes, while an A1C level of 6.5% or higher is often used to diagnose diabetes.

A1C testing is valuable for managing diabetes because it provides a longer-term view of blood sugar control compared to daily glucose monitoring. Healthcare professionals use A1C results to assess the effectiveness of diabetes treatment plans and make adjustments as needed. Regular monitoring of A1C levels is an important part of diabetes management.

Diabetes is a chronic medical condition that occurs when the body is unable to properly regulate blood sugar (glucose) levels. Glucose is the main source of energy for the cells in the body, and its levels are typically controlled by the hormone insulin. There are two main types of diabetes: Type 1 diabetes and Type 2 diabetes.

Type 1 Diabetes:

Cause: It is an autoimmune condition where the immune system mistakenly attacks and destroys insulin-producing cells in the pancreas.

Onset: Usually occurs in childhood or adolescence.

Treatment: Requires lifelong insulin therapy through injections or an insulin pump.

Type 2 Diabetes:

Results from insulin resistance, where the body’s cells do not respond effectively to insulin, and the pancreas may not produce enough insulin to compensate.

Onset: Typically develops in adulthood, but it can occur at any age.

Treatment: Initially managed through lifestyle changes such as diet and exercise, and medications may be prescribed. In some cases, insulin may also be required.

Symptoms of Diabetes:

Excessive thirst and hunger

Frequent urination

Fatigue

Unexplained weight loss

Slow healing of wounds

Blurred vision

Tingling or numbness in the extremities

Complications of Diabetes:

Cardiovascular problems

Kidney damage (diabetic nephropathy)

Eye damage (diabetic retinopathy)

Nerve damage (diabetic neuropathy)

Foot problems

Skin conditions

Increased risk of infections

Management and Prevention:

Healthy Lifestyle: Regular exercise and a balanced diet are crucial for managing diabetes.

Medication: Depending on the type and severity, medications such as insulin, oral hypoglycemic agents, or other injectable drugs may be prescribed.

Regular Monitoring: Regular blood sugar monitoring is essential for managing diabetes effectively.

Education: People with diabetes should be educated about the condition, its management, and the importance of consistent self-care.

It’s important for individuals with diabetes to work closely with healthcare professionals to develop a personalized management plan that suits their specific needs and lifestyle. Regular medical check-ups and adherence to the prescribed treatment plan are crucial for preventing complications and maintaining overall health.

As a diabetic, I can provide you with some general information that may be helpful. However, it’s crucial to consult with a healthcare professional for personalized advice tailored to your specific situation.

Managing diabetes involves making lifestyle changes that can help control blood sugar levels and reduce the risk of complications. Here are some general tips:

Healthy Eating: Focus on a well-balanced diet that includes a variety of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins, and healthy fats. Limit the intake of refined carbohydrates and sugars. Pay attention to portion sizes to help control blood sugar levels.

Regular Exercise: Engage in regular physical activity, as it can help improve insulin sensitivity and control blood sugar levels. Aim for at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise per week, along with strength training exercises.

Weight Management: Losing excess weight, if overweight, can have a significant impact on blood sugar control. Work with a healthcare professional to establish realistic weight loss goals and strategies.

Monitoring Blood Sugar Levels: Regularly monitor your blood sugar levels as advised by your healthcare team. Keep a record of your readings to identify patterns and trends.

Medication Adherence: Take prescribed medications as directed by your healthcare provider. If you have concerns about your medications or experience side effects, discuss them with your healthcare team.

Stress Management: Practice stress-reducing techniques such as deep breathing, meditation, yoga, or any activity that helps you relax. Chronic stress can affect blood sugar levels, so finding healthy ways to manage stress is important.

Regular Medical Check-ups: Schedule regular check-ups with your healthcare team to monitor your overall health and make adjustments to your diabetes management plan as needed.

Quit Smoking: If you smoke, consider quitting. Smoking can contribute to complications associated with diabetes.

Remember, diabetes management is highly individual, and what works for one person may not work for another. It’s essential to work closely with your healthcare team to develop a personalized plan that meets your specific needs and circumstances.

Inspired by a tragic event that occurred on Fat Tuesday, March 5, 2019. A story of life, death and faith and the journey of an ordinary guy called by the Holy Spirit, this odyssey follows him through the senseless death of an innocent girl and his struggle with PTSD, his own mortality and his devout beliefs. The Spirit travels through the lives of other realistic characters as they find their way through their own beliefs creating their own unique moral compasses. The perils of day to day life culminates each journey with a heartwarming story of faith and love of others.

https://www.amazon.com/Espiritus-Spirit-Peter-Arcuri/dp/B09PRZ1XFP/

LCongratulations 🎊 and 🇲🇽 Salud Senior Hamburgesa on you acing 100% ciento 💯 💯 💯 💯 💯 positive on your STD examination.

Why you should be protected to avoid STD

@Bill Burg

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Follow @WeTrendingWorldWide 📈 ᴄᴏᴍᴍᴇɴᴛ ʙᴇʟᴏᴡ 📈 🫣🤣😱😳 🎟️Tag Your Friends 📱Share For More New Funny / Entertaining Content *Content creators Dm me for Credit or removal of video* *Dm For Promo* • • #WeTrendingWorldWide | WeTrendingWorldWide 📉📈 | wetrendingworldwide · Original audio

Follow @WeTrendingWorldWide 📈 ᴄᴏᴍᴍᴇɴᴛ ʙᴇʟᴏᴡ 📈 🫣🤣😱😳 🎟️Tag Your Friends 📱Share For More New Funny / Entertaining Content *Content creators Dm me for Credit or removal of video* *Dm For Promo* • •...

Many folks who enter their fifties suddenly notice how fast they age. Bags under their eyes is one of the most noticeable aging signs. South Korea is the most popular place for cosmetic surgery such as facial effects and tightening skins. He’s a very informative article about cosmetic surgery in South Korea.

https://www.fodors.com/world/asia/south-korea/experiences/news/best-pracitices-for-findng-cosmetic-and-esthetician-prodedures-in-south-korea

fodors.com

Looking for a Beauty Refresh? South Korea Is the Destination for You

Fodor's provides expert travel content worth exploring so you can dream up your next trip. The world is a weird and wonderful place—we want to show you around.

What does it mean by positive energy? Is positive energy real?

Hilarious comedy from Comedian Robin Williams on Donald Trump

https://youtu.be/rTCUl5SKyf8?si=1b2NwAKCe3GHwFMV

Here are political humor that is true and fact checked many of you will find humorous

This subforum will feature Tatiana Bougdaeva, a mortgage loan originator licensed in multiple states and banking professional with over thirty years of experience. Besides being an expert in the lending and real estate profession.

Tatiana Bougdaeva @Tatiana My good friend and business associate Tatiana Bougdaeva is a the owner, founder of Kalm Strategy. Tatiana Bougdaeva is a life coach and will explain what she does helping fight the aging process, and bringing yourself to peaceful and healthy life style.

Organic Anti-Aging Coaching Program

Check out her website at http://www.kalmstrategy.com

kalmstrategy.com

Kalm Strategy | Stress management, bring peace, health and wellness, Yoga, Reiki and Shamanic healing

Kalm Strategy | Stress management, bring peace, health and wellness, Yoga, Reiki and Shamanic healing

Breaking news from heavy set obese Chris Christie Presidential Election Campaign is the heavy set former New Jersey Governor and Trump Ally turned enemy has suspended his 2024 Presidential Election Campaign due to his addiction to fried chicken 🍗

Silver broke $24 per ounce. Buy silver. Still a very low price per ounce.

There are so many scammers in the United States. Every part of the country is invested by fraudsters at all levels. I know there are many different types of fraud and each type of fraud is stealing. Fraud is when a natural person maliciously deceives its victims by scamming their victims with the goal of taking advantage of the victim thus causing financial hardship. Common goals of scammers committing fraud is to take money, or assets of monetary or intellectual value or stealing private data, and information from you, your family, or your employer, or your business. Scammers commit fraud via email, text, phone or in person, either on the street or on your doorstep. Some adults may be especially vulnerable to fraud and financial abuse.

Can you train a 40 year old person self-defense training? For example, if someone were to attack you, is it possible that you can train someone how to defend yourself from an aggressor and if so, can you do this type of training online and how long would it take?

There are many conflicting questions about the type of people that become cops and police impersonators. I heard kids who were picked on in high school become cops. Cop impersonators are those who could not become POST certified to become cops or could not pass the background investigation

Here is breaking news about our politicians

Barack Obama slips calling his transgender football player wife with balls Michael and I. LOL

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT8pwjuWq/

Cops are human and can make mistakes like the rest of us. However, are Cops above the law? What’s this professional courtesy among police officers? Why do Cops expect to get out of tickets and DUIs? What’s this code of silence among police officers?

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Idiot Cops Who Got Caught DRUNK On The Job | Idiot Cops Who Got Caught DRUNK On The Job | By The JudgeFacebook

Idiot Cops Who Got Caught DRUNK On The Job