After reading this I was still confused. I guess Michigan and Florida don't have the market on weird...
Man dressed as woman accused in perfume thefts
April 28, 2009
Sun-Times News Group
A 34-year-old Chicago man whom customers mistook for a woman was charged with the theft of 22 bottles of perfume from a Hobart, Ind., store.
Jose A. Torres Rivera was charged with felony theft after a customer reported to store personnel at Ulta, 2395 E. 81st Ave., that a woman was taking perfume bottles out of the boxes and stuffing them in her purse, authorities said.
The store caught the thefts on its security cameras and employees took down the license plate number of the car Torres Rivera left in. Torres was still at large Monday, Chicago police said.
A license plate check revealed the automobile was owned by a Chicago woman who said she had loaned the car to a Ramon Aguilera, whom she identified in the store video.
Chicago police Detective Brian Gibbons said Aguilera's real name was Jose A. Torres Rivera, who produced Rivera's driver's license photo, which appeared to be a woman.
Hobart Officer Thomas Autterson said the license photo and video were of the same person.
Torres Rivera has a lengthy criminal history in Chicago and has used at least 46 aliases, Gibbons said.
The phone rang a minute ago. It was Gene calling and I could tell by his voice he was feeling better. He called to tell me that his temperature has gone down to close to normal. He asked that I let you all know. He expects to be going home tomorrow as planned.
I thank you all so much for your concern and your prayers and please keep praying that Gene will continue to improve and this has just been a bad case of pneumonia.
It is 11:58am central time and it is with a very heavy and sad heart I write to you. I was just on the phone with Gene and his doctor came in to tell him they do suspect his leukemia is back. The oncologist will be by his room in about 2 hours and give him his thoughts and the facts. Gene had a stiff upper lip so to speak and he said he has decided this time to make a new web site called "The Easy Way Out.com and chronicle his day to day fight. As for now he has a brave but heavy heart and it makes me smile to think he wants to write even with this news.
Folks, he is really trying to keep it together and I know he does not want to be all down with his boomer friends but I am here to tell you that this is going to be a big WAR and he needs all of our prayers. There are members here that have fought the good fight for quite a long time now and to know this and live it with you as much as each one of us can is such a responsibility. One in which I take very seriously. Please remember Gene and his family and let's let Janet know we are praying for her as I know she still has a deep love in her heart. I'm at a loss but my God is Great. Debbie
What do you do when you’ve just read something like that? And get the news on a website instead of from the person you should hear it from? I ran to the bathroom. Ok, I’d just eating some chicken vegetable rice soup and an old pancake with peanut butter on it, so that could have had something to do with my stomach issues, but I definitely felt it in my stomach and it’s still rumbling an hour later.
So I’m sitting tight, waiting for the two hours to pass so I can call Gene and find out what he knows. And I’ve been going over “should I-sâ€Â, just in case. Should I go to the hospital, should I go stay with Gene to help take care of him and drive him to his treatments and dang, just drive him anywhere, fishing, whatever he wants….just in case? Or should I let him come down here to stay. My house has all the amenities, unlike his and it would be much easier caring for him here than up there. And he’d have Pippen.
But he loves Island Lake and his camp there in the U.P. Can…should one take a man from where he is at home…from where his heart longs to be…especially when he most needs to be positive and upbeat? And what about Kris? What would he be willing to do for his dad, living in Minnesota and would my being with Gene set well with him?
Maybe there’s a reason why I haven’t found anyone permanent to be with since Gene. Maybe God knew I’d need to be free at this moment in time. Maybe.
I’m not much good at praying for what I want. Too many times we don’t get it and then what? Do I say it’s God’s fault? So I pray for God’s will...and peace about that...and grace to face whatever comes.
Gene has a very bad case of what he thinks is bronchitis with a fever that went up to 103 though it's down a degree right now. His son is trying to dig the car out after a foot of snow fell to get Gene to the closest VA hospital. When he was first diagnosed with his cancer he had gone into the hospital with bronchitis like now. He told me he's scared. Pleae pray for him.
Update (6:30 pm CDT): Gene just called me. He has been admitted into the hospital with pneumonia in one lung and, as he put it, his white blood cell count is "shot to the moon." That could be just something he caught or it could be the leukemia coming back. We'll pray for the first of the two. Hopefully, once the pneumonia clears up, so will the high white blood cell count. He's feeling pretty bad right now and is short of breath, but he asked me to let anyone know who would like to call him that he requested calls be put through to him. He's at the Iron Mountain VA hospital (906-774-3300) and you just ask for Gene Plankey.
Thank you all for your prayers.
Update (4-22-09 8 am CDT): First I want to thank all of you, those who have left comments and those who have not who are praying for Gene. I spoke with him this morning. He sounded a bit more upbeat but still feels awful and didn't rest much last night. They've told him his lungs are not "that" bad for all the years he's been smoking. He did start again but today said he will be quitting when he gets out. The hospital stay should give him a bit of a head start with no cigarettes. He will probably be there till the weekend.
Still free, day 40! I'm just amazed that it's happened, and so thankful. Thought I'd check in and give a small update on my new life as a non-smoker. The Chantix medication now makes me feel a bit nauseous just after taking it but that subsides. I have had no depressive feelings from the pills. I still long for a cigarette at certain times but I've been through some rough stuff and still haven't gone out to buy a pack, thanks to God. And the house smells wonderful!
Thank you to everyone for all the great supportive wishes and comments. I probably won't post again on this subject, but I promise to come back and post if I do smoke...even one cigarette. So in this case, no news will be good news.
And I apologize for not wishing everyone a Happy Easter. Life got complicated over the weekend and, well, I thank you all for the beautiful Easter comments, blogs and bulletins. What I did do was get myself to church before having the family here for dinner. Most of us were there, except Manuel my middle son. Even their dad was with us. If there's any day to celebrate in God's presence, it's Easter!
Thought I should check back in and give an update, as promised, on my announcement that I am no longer a smoker. Today is day 10 and, with a medication called Chantix, God's help and the support and prayers of many, I have not smoked one cigarette.
I don’t want this to seem like an ad, but having some information on cost can be helpful. There is no generic form of Chantix yet. The cost of Chantix is definitely less than buying cigarettes. With the free RX plans I have because I am on Social Security disability, it cost me about $3 for one month's supply of pills! I believe the regular price is somewhere around $110 for the month, still much less than what I'd be paying for cigarettes and SO much more worth the money. For those without insurance for prescription medicines, CHANTIX may be available through Pfizer Helpful Answers -- a family of programs that helps people without prescription coverage save on many Pfizer medicines, no matter their age or income. People with limited incomes may even qualify to get their Pfizer medicines for free. For more information call toll free 1-866-706-2400 or visit http://www.PfizerHelpfulAnswers.com.
As I have been working with the GetQuit support program offered by Chantix, I've learned some ways to help myself not smoke. And I've also learned about some of the benefits, many of which, admittedly, I was already aware:
Some quick benefits:
* My food may taste better
* I may have more energy
* My breath, clothes, and hair won't smell like smoke
* By not buying cigarettes, I may save about $3,285 per year. (Based on the information I provided during registration of 1 1/2 packs a day at prices here in the Chicago area)
* I may feel more in control now that I’m not dependent on cigarettes
I may have to live till I'm 73, according to the timeline in the GetQuit program, to reap the full benefits of stopping smoking today i.e. risk of stroke or heart disease of a non-smoker, but I just may LIVE to be 73, and in so much better health than I would have been if I continued smoking.
I'm not saying it has been a breeze. I have had the urge to smoke, but along with that have come increased energy and initiative to do things around the house, so I get busy.Today the temperature was in the 60’s and it's been heavenly outside. Iput screens up and washed a few windows, trimmed back some hibiscus plants I started from seed last summer in hopes they will maybe produce some blooms this year, and in general reveled in the arrival of spring!
Some time ago my daughter told me that every night my grandson, as he prayed before bed, would ask Jesus to help his grandma not smoke any more. They were here over the weekend. My daughter told him, "You know what, JoaquÃÂn? Grandma stopped smoking." He was playing a computer game but jumped up with a "wooo hoooo!". LOL I told him I know he'd prayed for me and God answered his prayers. I told him sometimes it's not right away, but God hears and answers in His time, a good faith lesson for a 9 year old boy. And just one of the many reasons I have to keep on this road and never look back.
Thanks for everyone's support and prayers. I know we each have to do this when it's right for us. I hope those of you who read this and are still smoking will find your "right time" soon and, with the same prayers and support, be able one day to say, "I am free!!!"
Ok..at the risk of boring everyone to death, I've decided to share my journey here from time to time into the coveted (at least by me) world of the non-smokers. And just sitting down to put my thoughts together for a blog makes me instinctively...better said habitually..want to light up, but I won't.
A little history about my life and smoking:
-I grew up in a fundamental Christian family so smoking was on the list of things one did not do, along with drinking, dancing and going to movies as I recall. So being a smoker now gives me a feeling of displeasing God and puts a barrier between Him and me in my mind. After all, He gave me a perfectly good body and I’m damaging it. *sigh*
-I started smoking as an adult, quit cold turkey the first time when a dear friend who had smoked all his life was diagnosed with end stage lung cancer (it felt like I'd be laughing in the face of this tragedy if I continued), started again during a difficult time in my first marriage and quit with the help of the nicotine gum the day I asked my cocaine-addicted husband to leave prior to becoming legally separated (I knew I was all my children had at that point and it was IMPORTANT to me to be there for them). I thanked God for freeing me from that habit.
-I did not smoke one cigarette for 10 years during which time I was alone raising my three children with God's help.
-In 2000 I met a man who would become my husband. He came with cigarettes, I started smoking, he left in 2005, but the cigarettes stayed. *sigh*
[I just took a half hour to go clean windows and dust walls..yeah, dust walls...gotta keep busy when the urge hits..LOL]
SO, after, during this last stint with smoking, trying the gum again and the patches which made my skin irritated and then itchy as heck when I took them off, my doctor suggested this new medication, Chantix. I'd heard some bad press on Chantix but also some very good, so I am giving it a go. So far so good.
Chantix has no nicotine like most of the other stop-smoking aids. Instead it has a drug that attaches to the nicotine receptor location in the brain. This receptor is what gives the smoker the pleasure feeling when they light up. When the medication in Chantix attaches to this receptor, nicotine cannot attach, therefore giving no pleasure sensation when smoking.
Chantix also comes with a support program, by phone or online or both. The first week one is taking the medication, one continues to smoke while getting prepared for ones quit date with the help of the website and daily e-mails. Seven days into taking the medication is Q-day (something like D-day but I use the "q" for "quit"). Now, I've never bought into the support aspect of quitting smoking, but this time, possibly more desperate, I have been working along with it diligently. And I believe it may be helping more than the actual medication, not sure. All I know is it has given me ways to think about what I will feel and how to deal with it that have been very helpful. And it's all positive and not at all judgmental. I even get a call from the support program each night at a time I've scheduled asking if I've smoked. So far I have been able to say "no". I think this is not so much confession time (maybe a bit of accountability?) as to prepare an appropriate e-mail and next step for the following morning's contact from the support program. Lots of positive reinforcement and upbeat communication from the program has been very helpful.
There are some possible side effects from using Chantix. My only side effect, which is very rare and has now subsided, was a sense of loss of equilibrium on rising from being seated or lying down for an extended length of time. I almost toppled down the stairs in the theatre after a movie and walked around like I was drunk for a while one or two mornings, but that was it. Others experience a number of other side effects. I guess my doctor thought it was worth giving it a try. Smoking is bad for my high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and, well, we all know its other detrimental effects to ones health.
My skin has aged a great deal in the last 8 years I've been smoking. One day off cigarettes, that stops. I will no longer have to buy a multitude of air freshening products because my whole house reeks of cigarette smoke, nor keep my bathroom fan on continuously to suck out the smoke (and in the process the heat or air-conditioning I'm paying for..sigh), worry if someone stops by unannounced because I haven't had a chance to air out the house, etc. etc. I have felt embarrassed even smoking in the car because I think, "That person next to me must think I'm really stupid to be smoking" and I was. And I do NOT like looking stupid, not in front of strangers, much less my family, especially my grandchildren who KNOW it's not good to smoke and worry about losing their grandma. And last but not least, cigarettes are expensive, especially for someone living on a fixed income. What will I save? At about $6 a pack (and that is about to go up!), smoking 1 1/2 packs a day, I will save about $3285 a year, and that's just the cost of the cigarettes, not taking into account those things mentioned above.
But a habit is a habit and this one, I've read, is worse than kicking a cocaine addiction. But it's day three and so far so good. I am no longer a smoker. Ahhh...that feels good to say!
I’ll be back occasionally to give an update. I hope what I’ve shared here will be an encouragement to someone else to give it a go. Oh, one last thing. The first morning I got up and knew there would be no cigarettes that day, you know what I decided to do? I decided to smile..big, and said to myself, “I’m SO glad I’m not smoking!†And I swear I felt a surge of pleasure and relief from the urge to smoke. I’m wondering if the physical act of smiling causes a good feeling as much as a good feeling causes us to smile. Something to look into….
I’m off to keep busy. Probably go wring out dozens of towels on my basement floor soaking up the rain water that leaked in last night. *sigh* But the sun’s out and though it’s still chilly, I put away the snow shovels. Positive thinking? You betcha!
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