Trips for YouTube part 2 (still no vids though)

#2 - Kansas

It obviously has been a LONG time since I've been on a "real" road trip...COVID has seen to that. Even now, I'm still not going in stores, still not eating out, still not going anywhere but work, but I needed to take a road trip for my own sanity. I miss my trips because they are my "thinking time"...the time I use to clear my head.

After the first cemetery visit though, I was more than leary because it wore me out both physically and mentally and the thought of travelling a few hundred miles was definitely pushing it. I had been buying snacks and drinks (I have quit drinking Cokes, I'm still not sure of the reason why, I just decided to stop), with the intention of going to Kansas every weekend, but weekend after weekend passed and I never went...I just kept eating the snacks at home and drinking the water and the bottled unsweetened tea. Most weekends, I would leave work early on Fridays with the intention of getting up early on Saturday, set the alarm for 3 am for me to get up, but I would just turn it off and go back to sleep, and spend the weekend on the couch doing nothing.

Finally, a few weeks ago, the alarm went off and I turned it off, but I had another one set for 3:30 a.m. This one I played the snooze button game with till about 4:30 a.m. and just decided enough was enough and dragged my butt off the couch and started to get ready! From that moment on, it was like old times. Everything was as methodical as the trips I used to take, until I got in the car and then there was a bit of a panic attack moment, but by 5:45 a.m., I was heading out of town and up into Southern Missouri!

You guys know how I feel about interstate walls, but unfortunately, there wasn't a lot of interstate roads on this trip, so I had to make due with granite:

I know she's a bit of a hot topic subject now, but I stopped at the grave of Laura Ingalls Wilder, not because I'm a fan of her books or Little House on the Prairie, but because I spent countless hours in my Grandmother and Aunt's house watching that show over and over and over again while my Aunt gave a play-by-play because she had probably seen it as many times as I've seen Once (don't get me started on them and the Waltons or Walker Texas Ranger).

And, I did opt for her grave instead of her house and museum. The graveyard was weird...pretty much surrounded by houses on three sides, except for a bus garage and an open field on the fourth side. I was also surprised at the number of tombstones vandalized and toppled over, especially in a residential neighborhood:

It didn't take me long to hit Route 66 though...I've now been on Route 66 in five States, so I need to add to that total!

At that point, I was starting to feel like I was in the movie Twister...the scenery really looked like tornado alley!

I went to Carthage to go the battlefield:

But they were doing some road construction and I was trying to avoid humans, so I ended up going on to Kansas into Galena and ended up at Schermerhorn Park, playing by the water for quite a while (I'm still not sure why). I did collect a couple of rocks for my collection, so it wasn't a total waste of time.

I probably should have looked up who Schemerhorn was (and will probably do for my video), but I also drove by his house, which, although in a total state of disrepair, was quite beautiful, in a weird way:

Then it was time to find the Cars stuff, although some of it was a bit cheesy:

I stayed at the Luigi's place for a while, even walking out in the road to get a picture of the Route 66 road sign in the middle of the road:

But then I noticed this truck drive past me three times, another truck slowed down to an almost stop and stared at me, and someone else pulled in, so I figured it was time to leave. But next door, there was this very house of the seven gables/serial killer house, so I had to get a picture of it too (well, actually I got several).

Then it was on to Baxter Springs, Kansas...the place where I used to buy lottery tickets all the time. I had a particular gas station that me and my ex-best friend used to go to, but they had a tornado that wiped it off the map, so I needed to find another place. In the process of looking for one on Google Maps, I found another Civil War site called...wait for it...Fort Blair!

I wanted to go up and see it, but it was literally just in a town square and there was no place to park at all. It was completely surrounded by houses and even the side of the road didn't support parking. I circled it about ten times until I felt like I was drawing attention to myself taking pictures out my window, and I just had to leave. I found another oddity on the map, which was called the Rainbow Curve Bridge. It was the last remaining march arch bridge on Route 66, and I had the run of the place to myself, so I walked around for a good 20 minutes just taking pictures and video.

I had several other stops on my map, but it was getting late and, now that I'm not on Ritalin anymore, it's a LOT harder to drive for 33 hours straight, so I had to narrow it down. And, some of the places had a lot of people at them, so that prevented me from stopping as well. The next (and final) stop ended up being a marker that was supposed to be at the Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas border...but it took me FOR-EV-AH to get to it! I'm not sure if it was just poor reception and the GPS kept losing connection or if Oklahoma is just that backwoods, but there were times I got genuinely scared I was gonna get Hills Have Eyed! Eventually though, I did find the marker, and, although I got pictures of all three sides, I couldn't wait to get out of Oklahoma (where the wind comes sweeping through the tree-covered roads that creep me out more than anything else in the world and serial killers wait to eat your guts)...here is "my" side:

That was probably the most exposed I felt the entire trip...it was on the main stretch of road, there was a liquor store across the street, and a reservation just down the hill. I had a LOT of attention standing there taking pictures, so I was in and out pretty quickly. Then I figured I'd better start heading home soon so I wouldn't be driving too much in the dark. I have been on that road dozens of times before (once I got back to the main road), but I swear I have NEVER noticed the part of the road where I'm literally going under rock like this!

And it was a common theme a lot of the way home!

I have never understood why they need to dynamite their way through rock to make a road...just lay it on top of the mountain! I drive through mountains all the time! But, I will say, I'm not sure when Arkansas started taking cues from Texas, but I was surprised to see this:

For those that don't know, you pretty much won't pass under a bridge or roadway in Texas that doesn't have either the state flag or the state shape itself embedded in the concrete (sometimes even a yellow rose). It's kind of gaudy and annoying and now Arkansas is starting it...yea). Needless to say, I made it home about 1:30 a.m. or so and, again, was just as worn out as the cemetery trip, but maybe I'm getting better considering this was over 20 hours and the cemetery trip was just 4. I was lucky, in that I didn't encounter another human other than the clerk I bought lottery tickets from and she didn't speak to me, I just spoke to her. I stopped for gas twice and rest stops twice, but still, no human interaction. I wish I could say the same for the trip I took last weekend, but that's for another blog!

Trips for YouTube (just still not posting to YouTube)

#1 and #3 - Elmwood Cemetery

I have to learn to edit videos, so as of now, they are just sitting on a hard drive doing nothing, but I have been taking my trips to start my YouTube Channel. In the meantime, I thought I'd give some highlights here with my pictures. I didn't do a very good job with taking pictures because I was so nervous...it's been a LONG time since I've been out anywhere, but I guess time will tell if the video is better! Considering the quality of these pictures, now I'm a bit nervous for the video quality!

The first trip I took was to Blytheville, the town of my birth, the town where my father lived for most of my life, and the town where my grandparents spent most of their lives (and are buried). I have never been to their graves and I had no clue where to look, so the first time I went down there, was a bust. I'm not much on the whole "visiting family graves". I don't go to funerals, I'm the person who stays home, takes care of the family dogs, and collects the casseroles. Not only do I not understand the whole practice of talking to dead relatives (or our burial practices in general...no one will be fawning over my dead body), but I have other reasons.

The MAIN reason, is because of this particular grandmother (my Nanny). I know I've told this story before, but when this particular grandfather died, my Papa, (I was 11), Nanny decided I needed to kiss him goodbye and she picked me up and tried to make me kiss him in his coffin! I will NEVER forget Papa's waxy face covered in makeup and the smell of formaldehyde. I was screaming bloody murder in the funeral home until someone came and rescued me (I don't even remember who, I just remember being snatched from her grasp and her reaction "I was only trying to help her say goodbye"...she always treated me differently after that, but that's a different story). Granted, for most of my life now I've worked in a place that smells like formaldehyde and dead bodies have been known to cross my path upon occasion (although it's mainly just body parts), but still...that situation was different, I was a child, and that was family. It was something I never got over and I never went to another funeral again.

Anyhoo, the first time I drove up to the graveyard, I left work early, so I didn't even leave until about 5 pm. It's a little over an hour away, so I was pushing 6:30 pm when I got there. I had no clue where to look. This was also my first time filming in a location. Thankfully, there was no one around and I had the run of the place, but I had no luck. I walked around FOREVER! Come to find out, I walked past them numerous times, but that's for later. I saw a lot of my uncle's relatives (my aunt's husband, so not blood). I also wasn't too good at taking pictures that first night...I only took phone pictures while walking, which didn't turn out so good because my hands were shaking:

I did stay well past dark, which probably wasn't good legally...the cemetery is known to be haunted (although the vibes I felt were minimal and easily ignored, at least that night). I can't even believe that me, the biggest supernatural chicken in the world, was wandering around a cemetery at night by myself! But anyway, the older part of the cemetery is called Maple Grove, and I got some shots of it:

This one was actually taken with my camera and still didn't come out so good...I really was nervous that first night!

It took me a few weeks to actually get over that trip. The following day I was practically bed-ridden (thankfully I did it on a Friday, so I had the time to recover before work) and I was not much better the day after that. I had the same issue when I went to Kansas a couple of weeks later. I'm not sure why I had this after reaction to either trip...I didn't run into a soul, but it may have just be pure agoraphobia and the after effects from it. Brave in the moment, sick afterwards.

It was a few weeks after Kansas before I went back to the cemetery, but this time I had a better plan. I went to FindAGrave.com and got the phone number for the cemetery, not really sure if I could get a person. Well, the number was to the main funeral home in town, I wasn't expecting that. I kind of stuttered out, "where are my grandparents", like an idiot! Thankfully, the nice lady on the other end, got me to talking enough to give her their names although my suttering was HORRIBLE, but she understood me enough to tell me she could send me a map if I would give her my email address or my physical address. I opted for email since I was going the next day. But the map turned out to be uselesss. I noticed there were alphabetical markers in the rows, so they had a system in the field, but the map had blocks of numbered sections. I'm not sure where the numbering system came into play. I even asked her about the letters on the phone, but she said she didn't know anything about them. Thank goodness I have footage of them. The map was bad enough, but my grandparents defintely were NOT in the section the map said they were in. So, there was more wandering the second night.

I also had another issue with the second trip that was unexpected...I was more acutely aware of my surroundings and I ended up more scared this time. It was another Friday night and I arrived about the same time, but the neighborhood was more active. Blytheville is not a safe town on the best of days. Actually, on the second trip, that afternoon, someone was shot in the Wal-Mart parking lot for no reason. I didn't know that until later. At that point, I was still alone in the cemetery like the first night, but I was being watched by the neighbors, and I'm sure my "camera work" seemed incredibly odd. There was a house party at the end of the street and I heard more than a few calls in my direction. I ignored it. I know that's a bad neighborhhood, I knew it the first time I was there too, but this trip I was more jumpy...I think the first trip I was just mission-focused and maybe ignored the surroundings, because I'm sure all this was going on that first night too. The video probably shows it. This time, I didn't stray far from the car, moving it with me if it got too far for this overweight asthmatic to run to (whereas, the first time, I moved it maybe once and walked all over the place). I kept the picture camera in the car, as well as my bag, only walking with the video camera, and every sense was super-heightened. I was almost agitated with myself for not being more aware the first time. But I also noticed the "whoo-whoo vibe" was also stronger this trip and I wondered if I was causing it or it was just a more heightened night.

According to the map, they were supposed to be here, but they weren't.

I just kept pacing the rows (and, although I'm sure grave etiquette means you don't walk across them horizontally, I could NOT figure out how to look en masse if I didn't, so I was walking on the graves and it was freaking me out!). I kept appologizing..."sorry, sorry, I'm stepping on your head", "so sorry, I don't mean to step on you", "don't get up, I'm sorry", "I don't mean any disrespect, just looking for my grandparents". I think once or twice I even (softly) hollered out "Nanny, Papa, I'm getting tired, where are you?". Eventually, after finding some really interesting tombstones (those are in the video, not in picture-form), I found my great aunt first (I didn't even know she was dead):

And beside her I saw another name I recognized, but I don't remember...Ollie Barnes, so probably another great Aunt, athough she died WAY before I was born, so I'm not sure:

And then, viola, directly behind them, my grandparents! There tombstone is in SERIOUS need of cleaning and I immediately wanted to do that, but I didn't have the supplies.

Then things got REALLY weird. I didn't know what to do. Like I said, speaking to dead relatives isn't my style, although I did try (it was awkward and weird and I won't be doing it again). Despite my weariness at being in a bad neighborhood in a cemetery at night, I was kind of enjoying myself up until I actually found my grandparents. Then it got weirder...right next to their grave, I found this:

They apparently had another child! If I knew about this, I didn't remember it and then I got SUPER weirded out because Elizabeth is my middle name (although I'm named after my maternal grandmother). I just kind of stood there, in this weird state of awkwardness, not really knowing what to say or do. I eventually realized that he didn't have his military marker, so I went looking for it...I found it at the foot of his grave, basically at the backside of Aunt Ollie's grave...again, weird!

So the family was just positioned like this, Nanny and Papa with the baby to the left, with Aunt Ruth and Aunt Ollie to the right:

Like I said, it got really awkward, really quick, so I hightailed it out of there pretty quick after that. I tried to drive by the house my father lived in for a long time, but that neighborhood had gone downhill and it wasn't safe for me to linger. In fact, I couldn't even film because there was a guy standing in the driveway digging in the trunk of his car with a gun in the back of his pants! He turned and stared me down as I drove by, and part of me really wanted to just say, "hey, sorry, my dad used to live here", (my window was down), but I kept my mouth shut and drove on. Ironically, two doors down, there was another guy, leaning in the trunk of his car, with a gun in the back of his pants, who turned and stared at me as I passed him too. That was it for me. I did have the camera mounted on my windshield, but I'm not sure if I caught them or not. I'll have to watch the footage and then I'll have to decide if I want to post it, especially since YouTube changed their rules about posting images of someone without their permission. I definitely did NOT have permission to film them.

So, that was my two cemetery trips. Like I mentioned, I took a trip to Kansas, and there was a trip I just took this weekend that was a bit weirder. Those stories are to come if you guys are interested. I have another Kansas trip in the works as well that will be really exciting...based around the show Supernatural, so Lawrence, Lebanon and a few other surprise stops! But it is safe to say, there won't be a trip to the other cemetery where all my other grandparents are buried and I probably won't go back to Elmwood (unless I just really get itchy to clean their tombstone...that really is bothering me, but I can see myself tipping the stone over or something...I'm pretty clumsy, especially when nervous!).

Oh, and as a side note, I made my first Instagram post today! Like most social media, I'm not sure how long I'll last, but we'll see!

I've been baaaad!

When it comes to spending money lately, I've been an angel. Every dime I make has been going on paying down my credit cards. But today, I slipped...bad. There is only one Once Upon A Time Funko I don't have, the Regina SDCC 2015 Funko. Obviously, I've never been to Comic Con, reason #1 why I don't have that particular Funko, but I've been following it on eBay for years. At first, it was in the $200 range, but there was NO WAY I was going to pay that much for a Funko, which is reason #2! Over the years, it's only increased in value, so I just decided it wasn't worth paying that much for a piece of plastic.

My most valuable Funko hops back and forth between an Ursula one and Lotso, but neither breaks the $250 barrier. Obviously, you guys know me...I don't collect things for their value, but Funko does have a cool app, so I do like that I can keep track of what Funkos I have and their current value. I wish every major collectible did that. I'm never gonna sell them, but I like that I know what their worth anyway.

Today, on a whim, I was scouring eBay for Once Upon A Time collectibles, and I saw that SDCC Funko for $451. Of course, as per usual, I was like "No way! That's WAY too high!", but this time, I saw a caveat...PayPal credit telling me I could pay just $46 per month on it. I have a weakness for credit. I got my first credit card at 16 and have had issues ever since. Before I knew what I was doing, three clicks in I had applied and gotten approved. Yes, the interest rate is high, but as long as I pay it off in 6 months, it's interest free. But, once shipping and taxes were added, it ended up being $541 something, which seems high, like they did actually add the interest, but honestly, I still don't care.

"Hi, my name is Keebs and I'm addicted to credit.". Sad, but true. I will pay it off in a couple of months, no doubt, but that also takes away from the credit card I was paying down, meaning I'm that much further from getting my house, all because of a Funko. I should feel bad, but honestly, I don't! I wanted it and I got it. Is that my obsession with stuff talking? Is that my Asperness? Is that my OCD? Why don't I feel guilty over spending that money on something so stupid? Even as I type those words, "something so stupid"...I don't really even mean them. That's my neurotypical conditioning telling me that's what I'm "suppposed" to say. I don't really feel it was stupid at all. Granted, there might be a logical side telling me it was stupid, but I don't listen much to that side.

Now, where the logical side might have a point is that it will sit on a shelf, never to be touched, rarely looked at, and probably somewhat forgotten. It will keep me from getting a better camera for the YouTube videos that I'm trying to create (or maybe it won't...I may have another "whim" day). And, like I mentioned, that's less money paid down on a credit card. I only have three left to pay off out of eight. But at the same time, I'm already thinking about the two Winter Soldier Funkos I also wasn't willing to pay for because I thought they were too expensive, that, once I get this one paid off, I now have the means to get them too! UGH! I have created a monster! And, honestly, it did cross my mind to just go ahead and get those two Winter Soldier Funkos now and pay them all off at once. That would be REALLY bad. Things like that are how I got in debt in the first place. Guess I know the subject of next week's therapy session!

What about you guys...how good are you at controlling yourself? Do you randomly have splurges or is it more small splurges on the regular? Or, are you total control masters with your money? I have control issues across the board, so this isn't new, but I do think I've been depriving myself for a bit too long. Maybe it won't start a chain reaction (fingers crossed)!

Wow, over a month since my last post!

I've been really busy, but not in the way you would think. I've finally started one of the giant princess diamond paintings from Diamond Art Club, and I'm working it REALLY slow. I started Aurora first and I probably should have started one of the smaller ones in my stash first instead of the practically life-size ones, but oh well. I don't really have pictures because I'm not taking pictures routinely like I do with cross stitch.

I've also been filming videos for my upcoming YouTube Channel, but I haven't learned how to edit videos yet, so I just have a hard drive full of vids. Well, technically, I have memory cards full of vids...I haven't transferred them over to the hard drive I bought to store them yet. Follow through hasn't been my strong suit lately.

I have started weening myself off the zombie drugs. My therapist has me seeing a nurse practioner now and she has me on other stuff too (non-zombie). The NP wanted to talk to my neurologist about pulling me off the zombie med, but I just felt that I didn't want her involved and I didn't want to piss him off, so I figured I deal with it myself. She thought that meant I would call him and get his advice, but I meant I would work my way off of them myself. She won't like that, but oh well. She won't find out until it's too late anyway.

So, speaking of the videos I've been filming, I have been travelling a bit to film them, but it hasn't been easy, and there have been side effects. The first trip I took was short and small, but I was down for three days because of it (thankfully, I had taken a week off of work, so I didn't have to call in sick). The second trip was longer, but it took me two days, and the third trip (back to the first location, ironically), was even easier, but again, the after effects were stronger than the first time, only I didn't get the three days off-time. That caused almost catastrophic effects at work, but I did make it through. I apparently was so stressed during a situation, that I managed to cramp my whole body up so tight that I now can barely move, even over a day later. I'm still sitting on a heating pad now. Funny that, how you can make your entire body sore, like I worked out for hours or something, just from stress.

On the flip side, therapy is still ongoing. No better, no worse. Meds are still in my system and they are still tinkering with dosages and other meds, but no help or relief. About the only really good thing is that I've been paying my credit card debt down like CRA-ZY! I have five paid off and only three left to go, although two of those are the "big two". Once those are done, I'll be ready to start working on building my house. I am so laser-focused on that, I can't really think about too much else.

I will say though, that just filming these videos, whether or not I ever edit or post them, has been quite therapeutic. Weird that. It's almost like a little therapy session with myself or something! I took two trips to the cemetery where my paternal grandparents are buried to find them (yes, it took two trips, even after getting a map from the funeral home), but once I found them, things got really weird and I wanted out pretty quick. I had fun roaming around up until then. I also FINALLY took my long-awaited Kansas lottery excursion, although I wasn't able to stop at a lot of the places I wanted to. I did stop at a few places though.

Despite the fact that, on all three trips, I didn't run into a single, solitary soul (other than the check-out girl at the gas station where I bought my lottery tickets), I did still have a lot of "issues" from the trips like I mentioned before. I typically have a "down" day where I can't really function, then I have a "sleep day". The one day I got a third day, I had a "mood day", where I was in a serious bad mood. At work, it just transferred to me sitting in my office with the door closed, daring someone to bother me (they didn't...sometimes I think my moods are displayed on an invisible board or something on my door). I think that's why this week I have a "pain day", because I had something at work where I didn't get the "mood day", so I just transferred it internally.

But I just wanted to say that I'm still here (Hi guys!) and I'm still not ready to stitch yet (I've got to get this HUGE diamond painting out of my way first and work on figuring out how to edit videos). I think my hold up on the video editing is that, once I start posting to YouTube, it will have to be routine and I'm not sure if I'm ready for that kind of commitment yet. I may just be building up a catalog of trips, so I have something to post for weeks to come, while I build up more trips. After all, I do still have a full-time job and can only travel on the weekends. As much as I would LOVE to quit and travel full-time, I actually have to start making serious money on YouTube, and that could take years and luck. If I manage to keep my attention span up long enough for the years, luck has NEVER been on my side!

I do need to start posting some of these pics to Instagram though (my pictures I'm taking while filming vids are also still in the camera...that memory card hasn't even made it out yet, let alone been edited), so that's a whole other ball of wax! UGH! When I think about the dedication this channel will be, I really start to chicken out! Oh well, I'll try not to stay away for so long, and hopefully I'll be able to give you guys some pictures soon!