Monday, November 23, 2009

Feels Good....

....to have the whole house clean! I absolutely hate to clean, but will be the first to admit that when the house is sparkling from top to bottom it feels amazing. I had my first whole weekend off in a long time this past weekend and spent all day Saturday and Sunday cleaning the carpets (got a new carpet cleaner), washing the other floors, doing laundry, dusting and pretty much everything else you could imagine. My house feels so fresh and is completely ready for family and friends to come over for Thanksgiving. I think I'm gonna try to cut back on some of the cooking chaos this year by making a few of my Thanksgiving dishes ahead of time so that all I have to do is pop them in the microwave to heat them up. Might go so far as to peel and cut up the potatoes. Did you know if you do that and then put them in a bowl filled with water, they won't turn brown? Would much rather do all that stuff before the guests come....that way there's less work and more time to spend with them. Good idea, right?!?

Friday, November 20, 2009

AMAZING!!!

A lot of people think that this is a computer generated video, but it's not. I used to live near this house in Cincinnati and while I never made it over to see it for myself, I have friends who did and they said it was even more spectacular in person than it is in video!

Friday, November 13, 2009

Holiday Mail for Heroes

If you're looking for info on Holiday Mail for Heroes, here it is:

~Pennsylvanians are encouraged to help make the holidays a little more merry for our troops. Holiday cards will be accepted until December 7th and all collected will be delivered to US veterans and soldiers all over the world.

~Cards need to be addressed to:
Holiday Mail for Heroes
PO Box 5456
Capitol Heights, MD 20791

Thursday, November 12, 2009

It Goes On and On and On......

Remember that post from February when I told you about my horrible issue with the dentist? Well....here's what happened today (I've pasted from my FB page). You'll get the idea:

Traci Taylor: Sitting at the dentist. My wait time is usually an hour except there was a time they let me sit and wait for almost 3 hours. Wasn't that kind of them? Cross your fingers it goes faster today.

Yvonne Colleen Bachman-Johnson: <--- doesnt like dentists... terrified of them.

Heather Kunkel: fingers crossed

Traci Taylor: Thanks!

Olivia Westcott Lancaster: We run on time in my office.. any longer than 20 minutes is totally UNACCEPTABLE !!!!!

Traci Taylor: Where are you located? Does your dentist take time to talk and listen (I'm needy when it comes to my teeth)? Do you accept Ameritas?

Traci Taylor: The one day I had to wait for 3 hours it was just to have the dentist look at my molds and the whole thing lasted just 5 minutes. Crazy, right? Especially since I go to a place that has 4 dentists...

J.J. Duling: agree with Olivia- frankly, I show up at mine 5 min. early and expect to get in on time. I understand and appreciate emergencies, etc., but making you wait more than 10-15 minutes is quite unacceptable and motivation to find a more customer-friendly DDS.

Angie Messersmith: I don't enjoy going to the dentist!

Olivia Westcott Lancaster: The dentist I work for.. is my hubby. We're on Lincoln Hwy East by the Brassierie Restaurant, Lancaster. Yea, he talks.. to much... LOL. I'm here right now and we do have Ameritis patients.

Traci Taylor: Good news- only had to wait an hour. Bad news-have to go back at 4pm. Dr. broke something & can't fix until then. Want this fixed and done. Been up since 2:30am and still have other things to do today. Yep- havin' a pitty party.

Olivia Westcott Lancaster: Wait.. did he break something IN your mouth????
I am dying to know where you go?

Jennifer Mears Arrigo: I barely sit down in a chair in the waiting room and I am called back to visit the dentist. Never a wait. Now my medical doctor is another story.....two or three hours is the norm there. He talks to everyone.....about everything.......and you continue to wait your turn.....but he is the best doctor on earth!

Traci Taylor: He broke a chunk off my lower temporary partial when he was trying to reshape the wire. Said I didn't need it since I'm getting my permanent in 2 weeks, but I want it fixed because I paid for it and want it as backup in case something happens to the permanent...

Traci Taylor: Ready for this? I'm back at the dentist and they've told me they need to take another impression because the one they took earlier today broke. I couldn't even make this stuff up. I want to scream out to all the women sitting in the waiting room to run.

Friday, November 6, 2009

Snakes

Snakes also known as Garter Snakes (Thamnophissirtalis) can be dangerous. Yes, grass snakes, not rattlesnakes. Here's why.

A couple in Sweetwater, Texas, had a lot of potted plants. During a recent cold spell, the wife was bringing a lot of them indoors to protect them from a possible freeze.

It turned out that a little green garden grass snake was hidden in one of the plants. When it had warmed up, it slithered out and the wife saw it go under the sofa.

She let out a very loud scream.

The husband (who was taking a shower) ran out into the living room naked to see what the problem was. She told him there was a snake under the sofa. He got down on the floor on his hands and knees to look for it. About that time the family dog came and cold-nosed him on the behind. He thought the snake had bitten him, so he screamed and fell over on the floor.
His wife thought he had had a heart attack, so she covered him up, told him to lie still and called an ambulance.

The attendants rushed in, would not listen to his protests, loaded him on the stretcher, and started carrying him out.

About that time, the snake came out from under the sofa and the Emergency Medical Technician saw
it and dropped his end of the stretcher. That's when the man broke his leg and why he is still in the hospital.
The wife still had the problem of the snake in the house, so she called on a neighbor who volunteered to capture the snake. He armed himself with a rolled-up newspaper and began poking under the couch. Soon he decided it was gone and told the woman, who sat down on the sofa in relief.

But while relaxing, her hand dangled in between the cushions, where she felt the snake wriggling around. She screamed and fainted, the snake rushed back under the sofa.

The neighbor man, seeing her lying there passed out, tried to use CPR to revive her.

The neighbor's wife, who had just returned from shopping at the grocery store, saw her husband's mouth
on the woman's mouth and slammed her husband in the back of the head with a bag of canned goods, knocking him out and cutting his scalp to a point where it needed stitches.

The noise woke the woman from her dead faint and she saw her neighbor lying on the floor with his wife bending over him, so she assumed that the snake had bitten him. She went to the kitchen and got a small bottle of whiskey, and began pouring it down the man's throat.

By now, the police had arrived.

Breathe here...

They saw the unconscious man, smelled the whiskey, and assumed that a drunken fight had occurred. They were about to arrest them all, when the women tried to explain how it all happened over a little garden snake!

The police called an ambulance, which took away the neighbor and his sobbing wife.

Now, the little snake again crawled out from under the sofa and one of the policemen drew his gun and fired at it. He missed the snake and hit the leg of the end table. The table fell over, the lamp on it shattered and, as the bulb broke, it started a fire in the drapes.

The other policeman tried to beat out the flames, and fell through the window into the yard on top of the family dog who, startled, jumped out and raced into the street, where an oncoming car swerved to avoid it and smashed into the parked police car.

Meanwhile, neighbors saw the burning drapes and called in the fire department. The firemen had started raising the fire ladder when they were halfway down the street. The rising ladder tore out the overhead wires, put out the power, and disconnected the telephones in a ten-square city block area (but they did get the house fire out).

Time passed! Both men were discharged from the hospital, the house was repaired, the dog came home, the police acquired a new car and all was right with their world.

A while later they were watching TV and the weatherman announced a cold snap for that night. The wife asked her husband if he thought they should bring in their plants for the night.

And that's when he shot her.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

You've GOTTA check this out!

I'm in love with this baby! He can't be more than a year old and already playing DJ. Check out the adorable video...