Free on the Internet

Free on the  Internet.

Free credit scores: with a membership in beautiful benefits you'll never need or use. These can cost anything from $99 a month to $199 a year. Maybe more, but those are the ones I've looked at. The good thing here is that you cannot cancel until 30 days have lapsed, (and then there's a cancellation fee)and your informational brochures will be delivered in about six weeks.

Free samples, usually health & beauty substances: just pay shipping and subscribe for monthly deliveries. The shipping fees are more than the product. There are sites devoted to sending people free samples -- after they sign up for at least one thing off each of ten or twenty different pages. And they still need shipping paid in advance.

Free reverse phone look up: I really like this one. They look it up. They tell you the carrier. But if you really want to know who the number belongs to, get ready to pay up. $1.99 for each look up or by a membership.
The look up is free. The info is not.

And there's the seasonal. Free income tax: Step-by-step guidance while filling out your return, checks and double checks that everything is being done properly. Filling out the forms is free. Filing is not. There's a filing fee, with the tax preparation companies.

People get all enthused about all this free stuff. Then their finances are compromised as shipping, memberships, and automatic deliveries are taken out of their banks or added to their credit cards.

People: Stop and Think. How free can it be, if they need your credit (or debit) card number before they will send you anything?
Nothing is free, expect to pay.

Just know when why and how much, and enjoy the freedom of the 'net.

Weather and Health

Whew! Another night of snow. This kind of steady snow fall is more legendary than usual in this part of the world. I think we've had snow on the ground since Thanksgiving. Normal for some places, and it's not unheard of in the lore of the area. The kinds of stories they used to tell us were tall tales, and that diarists of the day exaggerated. Seeing this year, one has to wonder.
At least, one does if one thinks about it.

Every one did finally recover from the Cold from Hell, but it looks and feels like we're getting ready for round 2. Would that be the Cold from Heck?
Anyway, cranky, cranky baby today. Grouchy Mommy, testy Mammaw. Nobody female in this house was doing well at all. I think Baby may be getting a yeast infection from being on antibiotics, It's too soon to tell, but I know how to handle that -- and it would certainly make me cranky.

I apologize for not writing anything more interesting. I haven't been able to stay at the computer long enough. There's things in the works, but Life, being Life, is putting up the usual roadblocks for me to overcome or detour around. Haven't figured out, tonight, which it will be.

But it will be one, or the other, or perhaps an entirely unseen option. (Helicopter? Rockeater?)

Fat Like a Fruit

The over hyped world of weight loss has too many women convinced that if they are fat, they need to decide what fruit they resemble. Their fruit shape indicates their probable illnesses (even if they have no other indicators or symptoms.) Their fruit shape somehow indicates how they can more effectively lose weight.

The apple diet used to be eating apples with every meal. Now it is what you look like.

That's where there's a problem. The whole 'look like' thing.

When she's coming at you, she looks like an apple. All that can be seen is the large sized upper portion.
When she's walking away, she may be pear shaped, because what is seen is the big juicy bottom.

Only the tape measure can tell.

Truth is, she may be a perfect hourglass. 50-40-50 is close to the same shape as 35-25-35 --an hourglass.
There is no hourglass diet. Research suggests that there may be no need for one.

So, large ladies, check with your doctor for general health, and check your tape measure for your shape. You may not be a fruit at all.

Forgive: Like a 2 Year Old

Dealing with my granddaughter on a daily -- and nightly -- basis, I marvel at the resilient spirit of the child. You can tell, smack (at hands), wrap, time-out, make her do all sorts of things she doesn't want, just because you are bigger (her point of view)and wiser (your angle). When she wakes up from the forced nap, or when she can't reach the fork or scissors she was running with, there she is climbing in your lap or up your back, laughing.

When you have to swaddle her to tame her for sleep, and she screams and bites and spits until she settles, and she finally sleeps -- when she wakes up, it's you she comes looking for. Your name that she chirps from her bed, or calls through the empty rooms.

How great it is to see such love and forgiveness. To know, somewhere in your heart, that this mean and hateful behavior on their part is somehow good for you. That that person is wonderfully looking out for you.
And that when you wake up, or get done screaming, or otherwise misbehaving, that person is going to be there for you.
Isn't that a wonder?

Children seem to know how to hold on to the love, and to let the other stuff go. Or at least to accept that 'other stuff' as part of the person we love.

It's not hard to see that we should all love like a two year old.

My Good News/ Bad News Life

We all knows what happens during the coldest part of the winter, right?

Several of my friends know. Your furnace quits running.  (Adams County Heating and Cooling is currently getting rave reviews on my Facebook. They are Johnny-on-the-spot, and get the job done.)

If only that was my problem.

 

We're out of fuel. We do have some Kerosene, got it for that first big snowstorm. Have credit at Community Fuels in West Union. We can use that to buy jugs of K, but had hoped to get enough paid in to get a delivery. Guess that won't happen now.

But I also have electric heaters for every room, as long as we keep them on the low setting. Just what you need to do during a freeze wave. If we put them on high, they trip the breakers. Hooray for old houses.

 

EXTRA NEWS:The wick is all burnt up in the stove we have here at the house! We have other stoves, in storage, miles away across the ice and snow and cold.

 

I'm back in my good news/bad news Life Story. Someone screwed up -- I wasn't getting bored yet! Stay tuned for the next exciting chapter!

More Snow, More Cold -- but less of "The" Cold

It is winter, after all. We aren't even out of January yet.
I have some curiosity about what February will bring. February is usually when we get the worst of winter, although there have been a few 'big snows' in early March.
Recent years, though, the weather has seemed to have shifted about six weeks in its changes -- which would have us warming up for spring in February, if that were to hold true.

I don't think it will. For one thing, in spite of the perceived pattern shift, our recent winter storms have been in February. On one 02/10/09 and then on 02/09/10 -- I have the dated pictures to prove it. For another thing, the early nature signs are lacking. No greens peeking and poking out of the ground, no subtle changes in the dull gray branches of the trees.

I know, because I've been looking.

Time will tell.

On the home health front, this nasty cold is finally loosening its grip. I can stay awake now, and when I'm awake, I can actually do things, like dishes. Like sweeping. Like taking out garbage. I am thrilled, even when I have to stop to catch my breath. Because I got so much more done before I had to breathe this time!

Hooray for healing!

Blogging

I've been reading a lot of blogs about blogging, so I decided to add mine to the mix. Most of them are about  focusing on the topic of your blog.
I should be okay there. My blog is about life, and that's a pretty broad focus.
More specifically, I hope it is about the absurdities of life, and the finding of the positive in the negative. It's up to me to make it about that.

Yes, the writing is important. Writing is why I'm writing a blog, but it isn't 'about' writing. There are many of those and, eventually, they aren't anymore. They still claim to be, though.

Writing is crazy, life is crazy. Writing life is crazy. Everything has its funny side, or a sunny side. Sometimes it's hard to see, and we need to be directed where to look. I hope that's what I accomplish with this blog.

And if it interests others in my writing, that's good, too.

Sad Day. Good Day.

Yesterday, my sisters and brothers and I sorted through my dad's left-behinds. It wasn't too bad. He had everything in order, knew what he wanted done and how he wanted it done, and since most of us are now adults, we went with it.

I don't think anyone who hasn't been through this can appreciate how wonderful it is to have adult siblings. One sees and hears so much of fighting and brawling that can go on at these 'events'. Surely those things are a dishonor to the Dear Departed, however much they may have promised both Bub and Sissy that each could have the Elvis collection for their children.

We had none of that. What few things were grabbed by two people, they were discussed, and usually ended with each sibling saying "Go ahead" to the other.

That's a legacy any father could be proud of. Mine certainly should be

still a cold

This is a nasty one, and it's going through the inhabitants of this house like crazy. It was Hailey who started it, and then me. Now Rex has it, and Hailey's mommy and daddy are both sick. Tam's working in the window in the snow and cold, too, all while washing dishes she tells me. And they are here, for now. Can't throw them out ,sick, in the snow. Although in one case I am extremely tempted.
At least she can get medicine if she needs it.
If Rex can handle it, he can get medicine after the first of February, when his Medicare Drug Plan kicks in. Before that, I guess we'll muddle along as we usually do. It's less then three weeks.

Me, I get to survive on thera-flu and chicken noodle soup. So far it's working, and Hailey and I seem to be feeling better. She's a handful, running me ragged -- which isn't hard to do these days. The overwhelming symptom of this nasty cold has been a need to sleep. Except for Hailey -- she's two. Nothing makes her want to sleep.
If it did, I'd have her at the hospital downtown, you can bet.

Anyway, she's healing, I'm rebounding, and everyone else is expecting me to wave my magic wand and make it all better.

Situation Normal. You know the rest of it.

In the Box

Advertising is weird, and keeps getting weirder. At the least, it is out of touch with how people actually live. And I wonder if the package designers are the ones selling the product instead of the product manufacturers.

I am talking about cold medicines. The monkey on the cell phone, the man watching the movie. Especially the man watching the movie. He coughs so his wife can't hear the denouement, so she runs to the bathroom and takes a BOX of cough syrup out of the medicine cabinet. Then, when the child comes down coughing, she gives him the box.

Wouldn't it be more effective to give him the medicine? How many of us keep cold medicines in their boxes, after they've been used? If we have vast spacious medicine cabinets, we may put the boxed product in there until it's opened, but wouldn't we throw the box away after that? And do we hand off the package to our children so they can self-dose?
(My evaluation of the situation is that people who keep medicine in boxes in their cabinets must be a little on the stupid side. Just my opinion.)

As for the monkey-- well, he's either in his bed on the computer or standing in the cold aisle with his $ell phone. He's choosing his symptoms and picking out which ones he has to choose the proper meds. In the at- home- in -bed ad he then goes out to buy what he needs.

I want that monkey's cold. He can have the one I've had this week. My version of shopping for the cold has been to go into the store and grab something that has worked in the past. Standing waiting for checkout takes all my energy. I ain't standing in the aisle reading labels or applying phone applications.
I'm sick, I want medicine, and I want to go home.

And if the medicine is a bottle in a box, you can bet I'm not going to put the darned bottle back in the box before I go to bed -- without monkeying on my computer!

Choose your Tags

How many times should you have to pay for your plates?

Not the registration. It's fine that that's an annual birthday gift to one's self.

There is a variety of plates to choose from. A 'standard' design, and several specialized designs that point out points of interest, or support a cause, or are just different. These plates are not vanity plates. They are numbered in the usual way.
They do cost more, and there's nothing wrong with that. But year after year after year you have to pay the extra price. There is something wrong with that.

What if you don't pay the extra? Well, you have to turn the plates in (if you want replacements). What if you've had the plates for five years, paying that double-or-more extra price for the prettier picture? Are they going to then hand over the reclaimed plates to the next customer? Is anyone going to pay the extra for salt-soaked, rain-sprayed, weather-exposed plates for the design?

No, they are not. The plates will be scrapped. They will NOT be used again.

It makes sense to pay extra for a fancier plate. Even  tiered price ranges in license tags is viable. But that should be a one-time charge, not a renewable extra fee. Because they are never going to use those numbers on that design again. Instead of scrapping or recycling and re-creating, let's keep things in circulation without having to pay more for the keeping and less for consumerism.

New Year; New Day

As everyone sinks into the revelry of the new year, let's remember that every day is a new day. Resolutions needn't be for the New Year only.
Every new day is a chance to start over, to learn from mistakes, to be not quite as stupid as we were yesterday.
We can learn, we can change, and we don't need any special reason to do these things.
We can wake each morning with the resolve to be a better person. To only speak kindly or not at all. To not have an extra dessert today. To hug our loved ones just because we can.

If we're lucky, we'll get to do it all again tomorrow. If we're not, we'll be leaving pleasant memories behind.

Today, this new day, I resolve to...