Oh, I guess I never updated on the STAR testing. He finished yesterday after only an hour of work (good boy! for a change...). There was only one likely sighting. The first day she was gone when I dropped him off, and on my way down the hill I saw a vehicle that was either hers or identical to it going the other way. Then, when I picked him up a couple hours later she was home. The second day she was there when I dropped him off and gone an hour later.

My other recent trigger is the house AJ applied to rent a few doors down has a For Rent sign out front again. It is a reminder to me every time I drive past, so I have to grit my teeth and think happy thoughts for a while, going and coming.

It is weird how stuff will bother me only small to medium when I am alone, and send me into a stupor when AJ is there with me. Like last month when AJ watched Jarhead and the adultery part came on without warning. Once I could move, I went into the bathroom and cried for a long time. I came back and sat with him, (just staring into space and not really watching the movie), but ready to jump up and run away if anything else like that happened. Had I watched it by myself (me watch a war movie voluntarily....bwaaahaaaahaaaa) it would have bothered me quite a bit but I wouldn't have lost any marbles over it - I would have just turned it off and done something else.

Or the new version of the Ten Commandments, which that just reminded me of. We started out watching it together. It tried to show each of the commandments being broken, though I didn't catch onto that until later or I would have been forewarned. When the adulterous pair sat up with a gasp, "I have betrayed my wife!" "I have betrayed my husband!", I shut down again. It was very late and I was too groggy to get up, so I hid my head and don't remember anything else.

But a couple of nights later, when he went to sleep early and I was wide awake, I went back and watched that part again. I will be honest to my discredit. Mostly I was hoping they got stoned. When the wicked pair kissed each other it made me squirm, but I remained conscious. And yes, they did end up getting stoned, after they killed the BH when he found them together. I was actually glad I saw it, and only a little maliciously so. It is kind of weird, because although I would not want AJ to be stoned, and would even grant Gargamel her life if I held ultimate power, it seemed to be a good reminder to me that God sees all, knows all, and He will judge and administer both justice and mercy. Justice if sin is cherished, and mercy if it is forgiven and forsaken.

But I digress. I don't know if I'm the only one or not, but it is just strange to me how differently I react to the same stimulus, depending on whether AJ is there or not. Weird, just weird.


A smooth sea never made a skilled mariner.
~ English proverb



Neak's Story