In 2000 we were living in Lincoln, NE. My hubby (a psychiatrist) was losing his
office in a medical office building (owned by the attached private hospital) that was requiring all MD tenants to be on-call
at the OTHER hospital in town, which they had just bought, which had been a public hospital. He did not want
to be on-call--after 30 some years in practice--so decided to build a small, detached home office adjacent to our
house on our property. The city gave us a permit. We hired a contractor and he began construction, which required
tearing down a little brick playhouse (that had been built by previous owners) in the spot where the office would
be located. Everything was above board (permit) and according to city regs (no employees).

The neighbors--both sides--and one other down the street (an attorney) got together and filed a lawsuit to prevent
us from building the office. They claimed home based 'businesses' were prevented by restrictions in the deeds for
all the houses on the street. There was no homeowners association and our house had been built in 1924. One other
neighbor--who no longer lived there--had run a home based high end clothing business out of her house for several years and everyone
in the neighborhood attended her 'showings' and bought from her. One of the next door neighbors--party to the suit--was also running a home based property management business out of their home--as well as leasing a garage apartment on their property (and had for several years).

It was clear during the trial that the neighbors were simply discriminating against people with mental health problems.
They were such bigots. One street over was a psychologist who had a home based practice.

The court ruled against us--frontier justice--since the judge was buddies with the attorney.
They had no legal basis for the ruling. Our attorney presented evidence that the 'regulations' that were cited
running with the deed expired after 75 years.

I convinced hubby that if the ruling was against us we'd list the house and move to Chapel Hill. And we did.
But not before it cost us about $25,000. in payment to the contractor for his services...plus attorney's fees,
plus moving costs (about $12,000, I think), plus costs associated with selling the house and buying another one.

Yet, if those neighbors hadn't been such a$$holes, we probably never would have moved to Chapel Hill. I love it here--
although I'm very disturbed by the right wing takeover of the state government--but can't imagine living anywhere else
now.

When our house here burned down in 2007, our neighbors took us in, helped us salvage photos and other items from
the debris, and basically behaved the way neighbors should. They also have never objected to hubby having his
private office in the house where he sees patients.

HATED where we lived--out in the boonies of northern San Diego county--sent by my parents
to a different school district. Had zero social life on the weekend
as a high school student.

Ended up in L.A. at UCLA for college undergrad/grad school. Got married. Got a job. Got divorced.
Never liked it although I lived in Westwood, Santa Monica, Studio City,
Woodland Hills, and Pacific Palisades.

Second hubby and I left L.A. in 1988 and never looked back.
Ended up in MO (St. Joe) for 6 years and then NE (Lincoln)
for 6 years. Hated both places. When our Lincoln neighbors
filed a lawsuit against us to stop us from building a detached
home office on our property for my husband to see patients
(he's a psychiatrist) I convinced him that if we lost the lawsuit
we could move to Chapel Hill. Best damn thing that ever happened
to us was those nasty neighbors! I LOVE Chapel Hill (been here 13 years)
and I finally felt like I've come home. Small town feel, but highly educated
and progressive population (due to the University); nice neighbors; good
restaurants; TERRIFIC public schools for our kids (who graduated 2004 and 2008);
decent shopping; good international airport within 25 minutes; FABULOUS beaches
only 3-4 hours drive away.

Only trouble is, now, that the stupid which has been overtaking
this country since Ronnie Reagan days has taken over the state government in NC.
I'm not going to leave the country--or move elsewhere--now that I'm 62 and hubby
is 70. So here we are. We are, however, glad to see our youngest going to Berlin
for 10 months next year on a Fulbright scholarship. We will be visiting him while he's there--and probably encourage him
to think about the idea of what it might be like to live permanently in Germany,
as opposed to the US.

We Are Not For Sale!

&feature=youtu.be


More than 2500 people rally outside the North Carolina State Legislative Building on Halifax Mall Monday, June 24, 2013, prior to an act of civil disobedience opposing the Republican legislature's agenda. About 120 activists were arrested by General Assembly and Raleigh police. About 600 have been arrested over the course of 8 "Moral Monday" demonstrations.

U.S. Rep. David Price, a Democrat from Chapel Hill, was among the crowd outside the Legislative Building. “This is beyond politics as usual,” Price said. “It’s so extreme, so drastic and so threatening to so many people.”

Price said what is happening in North Carolina is more extreme than when tea party politicians were swept into office at the federal level and pushed a similar agenda. “They created plenty of problems,” Price said. “But in the U.S. Congress, they didn’t have unchecked power.”

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/06/24/2985465/first-wave-of-moral-monday-protesters.html#storylink=cpy


I have friends who have been attending the protests. Hubby and one of our sons are planning to go next Monday...but not get arrested.

The guy who is behind all the money that put this group of Repubs in office is Art Pope--who is now the Budget Director
under the Governor. He is also the primary source of funds for Civitas, (referred to in the article) and the song that I posted
that mentions the mansion on Granville Dr. is his house (3324 Granville Drive, Raleigh, NC 27609)

an internationally known AIDS researcher from UNC.



The historians, doctors, preachers, lawyers, raging grannies, students and others gathered around the second-floor fountain inside the Legislative Building and belted out “This Little Light of Mine” and other songs.

They were diverse in age and backgrounds but united in voice as part of a protest movement gaining numbers in recent weeks.

<snip>

The dissenters plan to gather weekly at the state legislature for “Moral Mondays” – a series of demonstrations that have resulted in 50 arrests so far. They acknowledge that their concerns might be tuned out by the supermajority against them. But the protesters hope to persuade others to rise up with them and raise their voices to a future that might bring a political shift in 2014.

Thirty demonstrators were taken to the Wake County jail on Monday after capital police cited them for trespassing and disorderly conduct. A week before that, 17 people were arrested at the demonstration organized by the North Carolina chapter of the NAACP.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/05/10/2883118/nc-protesters-willing-to-risk.html#storylink=cpy



I posted another thread yesterday with the opinion piece detailing the protests/arrests written by two NC Historians (Professors at Duke and UNC) that appeared in yesterday's N & O. http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251304297

Nice to see that this movement is gaining steam. NC is one of 12 states with no recall process so the first opportunity to reverse
the trend of all this regressive legislation will come with the election of 2014.

The disaster that has been unfolding in NC as the Repub Governor and Repub controlled State house
have been at work turning the clock back and dismantling every type of progressive program or policy
they could think of has been shared--in dismay--with members of DU.

How refreshing to open the local Raleigh paper this a.m. to see an opinion piece written by two
leading historian/educators in NC who got themselves arrested protesting!



This week, we were arrested at the General Assembly. We chose the path of civil disobedience – along with 29 others – as a means of calling attention to the headlong assault on our state’s history by the governor and the state legislature.

We are not radicals. Each of us has been president of the Organization of American Historians, the leading professional organization of all American historians. We cherish the history we have spent our lives studying. Yet now we see a new generation in Raleigh threatening to destroy the very history we have spent our lives celebrating.

During the last half century, North Carolinians helped pave the way for racial justice, educational leadership and fairness for all citizens.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/05/08/2880510/an-nc-history-worth-preserving.html#storylink=cpy

to do a research project in Berlin, Germany for the 2013-14 academic year!

Hubby and I plan to visit him...hopefully both in the fall and next spring.

This is my son with a vision impairment due to a juvenile genetic disease
that causes macular degeneration. He is legally blind--and has been since
he had major vision loss when he was nine. He never let his disability
prevent him from anything he wanted to do. He sees with his peripheral vision.

He was a double major in college: German and Comparative Lit.
Studied abroad in Berlin for summer session prior to his senior year.

We're just so proud of him!

at the Rainbow Bridge.

They weren't really brothers, but born to two separate litters in the same home.
I answered an ad for 'free kittens' in early December 1995 in Lincoln, NE.
When I got to the house, a little old lady opened the door and invited me in.
There were cats everywhere! Resting on a chair was the biggest cat I'd ever
seen--must have been more than 20 pounds--and probably the father of
both Mouse and Simba. The litters had been born 5 days apart, but the
little old cat lady had paired the two kitties up because they seemed to like each other.

I took them both home. Tanya, the dog we'd adopted from the pound about 6 months earlier,
accepted them both. Mouse adored Tanya and would always come lie down next to her.
We often wondered if he thought Tanya was his mother as she was black and he was
a black/gray tabby.

They did the job for which they'd been hired--the 'mice' we'd been hearing soon moved
out of our house.

When we moved to Chapel Hill in 2000 all the pets came with us. Tanya rode in hubby's car;
Mouse and Simba each had a carrier and rode together in the back seat of my car.

We used to put them outside at night. Simba got so that he really didn't want to go out;
he would hide under the baby grand piano. Often I had to crawl under it to get him so
he could go outside.

Being outside is probably what saved both kitties the night our house burned down
in 2007. There was no time to look for kitties that might have been hiding. Tanya
came out of the house with us. The day after the fire, I came over to the house,
calling for both of them. Simba peeked his head out of an opening a firefighter
had chopped where there had been a window in order to gain access on the lower level.
No Mouse. The next day I came over several times, calling for Mouse. He finally came
out from underneath an elevated walkway--where he'd been hiding--and let me pick him
up. He was really scared...and so happy to see Simba!

After Mouse died in 2009, Simba would go around to all the hiding places that Mouse
had made for himself in our new house. He was clearly missing Mousie and looking for him. One time,
when hubby and I were talking about Mouse, Simba came over to my chair, looked
up at me, as though he were understanding every word we were saying. Both my
husband and I were convinced that Simba knew we were talking about Mouse--
and wanted to join the conversation. It was a really eerie moment.

So, now the kitty boys are together again. RIP Simba and Mouse.

[IMG][/IMG]

was wearing: Naeem Khan
http://mrs-o.com/

Here are both:

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[IMG][/IMG]

I sent a LTTE of the Raleigh N&O two days ago highlighting precisely these actions.
Waiting to see if it's published.

But this graphic is terrific. Really says it all.



on fb: https://www.facebook.com/TheBlueStreetJournal?group_id=0


and the blog for The Blue Street Journal http://bluestreetjournal.com/

North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) today signed a law that imposes severe cuts to his state’s unemployment insurance program, a change that will also cost jobless workers in the state access to the federal unemployment compensation program.

McCrory’s signature earned him a rebuke from the National Employment Law Project, which said in a release that the law will result in “the most severe cuts to both state and federal unemployment insurance of any state in the nation”:

These heartless cuts, in the state with the fifth-highest jobless rate in the nation, at 9.2 percent, show a shocking disregard for 400,000 unemployed North Carolinians and their families, many of whom will now go from struggling to barely make ends meet to outright struggling to survive. The immediate pain of these cuts will fall on North Carolinians unfortunate enough to lose work through no fault of their own in a weak economy where jobs are scarce. But the entire state will take a hit from the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in spending at local businesses that would’ve boosted the local and state economies.

The law reduces the maximum benefit allowed from $535 a week to $350 while cutting the number of weeks an unemployed worker is eligible for the program from 26 to 20. As a result, 170,000 jobless North Carolinians will also lose access to $780 million in federal unemployment funds. The average unemployed worker in the United States has been off the job for 35 weeks, meaning many jobless workers will now face the prospect of searching for a new job without access to a safety net program.

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/02/19/1610571/north-carolina-unemployment-cuts/


This is from a Governor, who, first thing he did, was RAISE the salaries for his cabinet. Why? Because he claimed
they couldn't live on $121,807./year.

http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/01/10/2598132/gov-pat-mccrory-gives-his-cabinet.html

It is going to be a VERY long four years here in NC.