One of the biggest reasons why my life is in such a mess is because the lady who caused the traffic accident I was in over two years ago didn’t have enough on her car insurance limits to pay for my medical expenses. That doesn’t even begin to touch the lost income, either! Naturally we had under-insurance coverage on our own auto insurance policies, but even that isn’t enough to pay for my medical expenses.
I’m all for people trying to get cheap car insurance as a way to save money, but I think that the best way to do that is by increasing the deductible, not decreasing the liability! If you are checking around for cheap auto insurance, please think of the other people who you may accidentally injure and get a policy with decent liability. Only having $25,000 is not enough. I know that is legal to have that low, but it shouldn’t be!
Today a big box arrived in the mail addressed to me. It was an assortment of goodies that my daughter had found up in my mother’s house, along with a birthday gift for me. A lot of the things were old brain-teaser puzzles. It was fun to pull them out and challenge my wife to see if she could figure out how to do them. One of them, called the Russian needle she did what I told her she had to accomplish, but she cheated. Of course she pointed out to me that I did not specify HOW I had to solve the puzzle, and she did accomplish the goal, so I guess she has a point there! Next time I’ll be more specific!
My wife’s parents live in a very remote area that is not highly populated. When we go to visit them, it seems like we have left all civilization behind us! And that’s really saying something because we live in a very rural area ourselves! Out where they live it is very poor radio reception, and up until recently they only recieved one television station! With the digital conversion, however, we’ve convinced them to look into getting DIRECT TV. They only have a couple of rooms with television, and for the most part it is just the two of them.
I was surprised when I went online to see what DIRECTTV options might be available for their neck of the woods, and found that there are a whole host of DIRECTV offers at reasonable prices for them. So I’m going to email them the information that I found out. I hope it helps them to make up their minds about what to do for the television entertainment needs!
Today I found a television channel that displays photos of the music bands of the 50’s and 60’s while playing the popular songs from the era. That was the time I was growing up. The music of MY generation. I’ve been listening to the music all afternoon, singing along to every single song. Sitting at the dinner table, eating our dinner I told my wife “now THAT’S REAL music!” She just gave me a funny smile. When I asked her what was behind that funny smile she said “That’s what my parents used to say about the big bands like Glenn Miller and Lawrence Welk!” It’s hard to imagine in about twenty or thirty years ago our kids will be listening to songs like “Put a ring on it” and saying “now THAT”s REAL music!” (Although I have to admit I like that song!)
In this troubled economy, my wife and I spend quite a bit of time looking for bargains that will help us to stretch our budget dollars. Especially since I’ve been on the “injured list.” So I was really excited to find the Offers.com website. The website is chock full of freebies and discounts on a wide variety of items. There are several different categories set up to help you find the best deal on credit cards, software, travel, clothing, and much more.
Many of the links lead to a section full of links to click to get coupon codes, but there is also a category that I’m really enjoying that is full of free things. Like a free towel, free dog food, free fabric softener, free engine belt wear gauge, free ruler, free ice cream, free paint sample, free polishing cloths – the list goes on and on! I think I could easily spend over an hour checking out all of the free stuff! And this free stuff doesn’t appear to be “free trial” where you end up having to pay for something if you keep it; this is really free stuff!
I’m going to have to let my wife take a turn at looking at this site! I’ve bookmarked it to come back to in the future. This one is a keeper! I’m definitely going to order the free sample of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee! And I see a couple of free cookbooks for my wife! I’d claim this bargain hunt time today a glorious success!
I just saw on the breaking AP news that a killer whale trainer at the Orlando Sea World has died today; apparently at the fins of one of her trained whales! The article has two conflicting stories – the police are saying that the trainer fell into the tank and died. The incident happened at the beginning of a show, and was witnessed by an audience. Audience members claim that the whale jumped out of the water and grabbed the trainer and started thrashing about.
This is a terrible tragedy! I wonder what triggered this behavior. The news article continues to talk about how other trained whales have attacked their trainers. And yet these whales continue to perform. How smart is that, I wonder, to let a proven hostile animal continue to perform?
One thing I’ve always been adamant about throughout my adult life is making sure that we have insurance. Whether it is life insurance, auto insurance, or health insurance, one thing is for sure. If you don’t have it, you WILL be sorry! So when my nephew decided to move to Providence, I told him that I’d help him by trying to find some competitive rates for insurance for him.
With the assistance of some great search engines, (and the expertise of my wife!) I’ve been searching the keywords of Insurance Providence, RI, Business Liability Providence, RI, and Renters Insurance Providence, RI. I think my nephew will be pleased with the results that I have to give him. I hope he listens to my advice and gets as much insurance as he can afford to get! I wouldn’t be in the mess I’m in now myself if the lady who caused the car accident I was in had the right insurance!
Yesterday we drove to F’burg and met my in-laws for a late lunch at an all-you-can-eat buffet restaurant called Ryan’s. It’s located in the Central Park shopping center. I had never eaten there before, and was reluctant to give it a try. My wife get very frustrated with me sometimes; I tend to resist trying new things! But she kept telling me that she had eaten there once before and that she was SURE I would enjoy it, so I went along. I’m glad I did! The salad bar was very fresh, and they had great steak. I’ll be agreeable to going back there again someday!
One of the things that I enjoy a lot about where we live is the fact that we have three acres of land, and live across from a large farm. On our land, about half of it is woods. We don’t really notice our neighbors very much, the landscaping has been nicely done so that their houses are not immediately visible out of most of our windows. I like the fact that at night there is no light pollution, so we can look up at the sky and see the stars. For the most part, the only sounds we hear are the sounds of the livestock from the farm across the street, or the birds singing.
One of the things that has surprised me about living out here is how many of my neighbors say that they can’t get high speed Internet at their homes. I can remember when we lived in New England we were stuck with slow dial-up, but technology has advanced considerably and now it seems that people can get high speed wild blue Internet service just about anywhere in the country!
The next time I meet someone who says that they can’t get high speed Internet at their place, I’m going to ask them if they’ve tried satellite internet. It’s worth a try!
My wife tells me that she has found a website that can give piano lessons! I thought that was remarkable, so I asked her to show me the website. This site actually has videos showing you how to play the piano! I’ve always wanted to take piano lessons but when I was a child my parents said that there was no room in the house for a piano and they couldn’t afford to pay for piano lessons anyway!
Well, now I see that I could use this online method to learn on my younger son’s keyboard that he left behind when he went to college! I think that maybe I’ll give it a try. I’ve got plenty of time and nothing to lose. This should be interesting!
I was using my John Deere tractor to plow and scoop snow out of the driveway, and the oil line broke. Well, it is never a good time for a breakdown, but this is one of the worst times! So I took my tractor to the local John Deere dealer for repairs. There was a time that I would have been able to do the repairs myself (I have done it before) but ever since my accident I have not been able to do that kind of repair anymore.
Well, they really overcharged me drastically. They charged me for five hours work when I know it would have only taken me three, and they charged me for four quarts of oil, when I know it only takes three. Even the owner’s manual tells you that it only takes three! I told my wife about it and she told me that I should bring the error to their attention and ask them politely to correct their mistake. I’m afraid that if I complain that they will remember me as a bad customer and not take good care of me in the future. So I’m inclined to let it ride. My wife says that I should just approach them nicely and assume it was a typographical error and for them to please correct it. She says if I handle it right then they won’t be upset. I really don’t know what to do!
Sometimes I wonder what parents are thinking about nowadays when they decide to name their children really crazy names. With the popularity of video games, I have to say that I won’t be too surprised down the road in the near future to learn that a lot of babies are named after video game characters. I can imagine that my grandaughtersmight be named Lara or Zelda! Or my grandson’s named Link or Simon! I don’t know anyone personally that has been named after a video game, and to be honest I haven’t heard of any famous people doing that either. But then again I probably just don’t keep up on the celebrity news as much as a lot of people do! As much as our son loves video games, I can imagine he might name his daughter Chun-Li!
I do find it interesting, as the business of video games evolve that people can easily download games from the Internet now, and not have to go to a brick and mortar store to buy their own copy. The sheer number of video games out on the market now are mind-boggling! Naturally, our son needs to have every system imaginable, and all of the role-playing games that they sell! I think that downloading games is a good idea; our house is starting to be over-crowded with game cartridges and game CDs – storing them all has become a true challenge!
We are still trying to recoup from the weekends snow storm which left us with over 2 feet of snow and the skies have opened up once again and there is more snow coming down. We are supposed to get another 10 inches or so in the next 24 hours or so. Many businesses are being hit very hard and power is out everywhere.
I’ve discovered some nice shepard fairey prints online at shepardfaireyprints.com, along with some pretty interesting obey giant art. I’ve never really been all that keen on art, but now and then I do see some work that catches my eye such as this collection. This shepard fairey art is authentic and they have out of print work offers there as well.
The Internet makes appreciating and learning about artists. They have taken a lot of music and art out of schools, for budgeting issues, which is a real drag. If you aren’t brought up with art in your life and not given a chance in school to find out about it, it makes it difficult to get into later in life. If it wasn’t for what I learned in school, in art class, I really would be pretty much clueless about most art. I basically about shephard fairey art because of his famous Obama HOPE poster that became so popular during last year’s election, how can anyone forget this classic?
Well here we go again. We are supposed to be getting a lot more snow starting tomorrow sometime. My car still has over 2 feet of snow on it’s roof from the storm we got over the weekend. I’ve been driving my truck these past days, the roads are still a mess and I trust my truck a whole lot more than my little Honda in this type of weather.
I just got back from having my taxes done and I am glad to say that I’ll be getting a few bucks back from good old Uncle Sam, I have to say that it really hurts to have to shell out so much money to the tax preparer. I really don’t have all that much involved when it comes to my taxes. It’s not like I was able to take advantage of the recently extended First Time Home Buyer Tax Credit, although I did have a lot of medical and charitable deductions that certainly helped the situation. Well worth the time and effort it took to keep track of all of those pesky pieces of paperwork for the past year.
There are a lot of options (credits, deductions, etc.) out there for people to utilize for the yearly tax issues. I can’t imagine doing taxes for a living, way too many variables involved there and when you are dealing with other people’s money you really need to be careful! My luck some one would get upset with what I had done and come after me with a shotgun or something crazy like that.
I did find an interesting video on You Tube that I wanted to post here for anyone interested in learning about the Home Buyer Tax Credit Extension. Anything to keep more money in our pockets and not the I.R.S. right?!
I think that a lot of us are down sizing on a lot of things that we used to take for granted a few years ago. I know that I have made several changes with my TV, cell phone, home phone and the Internet, trying to get my budget under control. It is a tedious process, having access to the Internet certainly makes the process a bit easier, but it’s all worth the time and the effort these days.
My sister-in-law has been asking me what kinds of family-friendly shows there are around here. She’s been thinking about coming to visit us in a couple of months, and wants to bring her kids with her. She was particularly interested in trying to buy some Sesame Street Live Tickets or Disney on Ice Tickets. Personally I’d rather get some Kentucky Derby Tickets but I guess that wouldn’t make her very happy! Besides, the Derby isn’t local, and we don’t have the resources to travel that far right now. And it will be quite some time before I’m up to traveling that far anyway. Just my luck I’d travel there and then be in too much pain to leave the motel room!
So it is probably just as well that we look for local entertainment. I’m sure glad that finding places to see and go and do is so much easier than it used to be – just a few clicks of the mouse and you have fun at your fingertips!
One of the reasons we chose this house to buy was because it had a propane fireplace in the family room. We reasoned that it would be a good emergency heat source in the event that we lost electricity during a storm. Well, we have used it once or twice, just for atmosphere, not really for heat, but let me tell you that fireplace certainly did heat up that room!
Well, we DID lose electricity yesterday due to that blizzard, so I went to turn on the fireplace. Wouldn’t you know that fireplace would not start up? I couldn’t get the gas to turn on! So I brought our kero-sun heater into the house from the garage and lit that up for heat. My wife complained that the fumes gave her a headache and she cracked open a window for ventilation. She was convinced we were going to die of some kind of cabon monoxide poisoning. I’m sure if we had been able to get on the Internet at that point she would have been looking that up!
One of the things that I think is great about the age of the Internet is how easy it is now to get services that once were hard to find. For example, when my kids were in school, they were often making and receiving phone calls after school from other classmates who needed Math help. Our youngest son even became a Math Tutor in his senior year in high school!
Now I understand that students can access Free Online Tutoring when they need help with their studies. I think that is a really wonderful thing, as long as the students have access to the Internet! You would not believe how many people I meet around here that tell me that they don’t have Internet access at their house! I don’t think my family could survive without it at this point in time; it is so heavily intertwined in the running of the family!
We had quite the blizzard this weekend – I think we got about 20″ of snow in less than 24 hours! For this area, I understand that is a record for the past 103 years! We lost a few trees in the front yard; the snow was quite wet and heavy this time around. Unfortunately for my wife, who had to go to work, one of the trees that fell blocked the driveway. Fortunately for my wife, I am in my glory when I have the chance to get on my John Deere tractor and push and scoop snow, and when I can start up my chain saw and cut up trees!
So although I am still in a lot of pain from my car accident, I popped a couple of extra pain pills and managed to get our place cleared up enough for my wife to get out to work. I know she certainly appreciated my expertise! Now I hope we don’t get any more snow for a few days, I’m going to be in a lot of pain for the next couple of days!
My wife has always liked having copper cookware in our kitchen. She said that she’s always liked the warmth of copper, and that it conducts heat better than any other metal cookware does. And she said that a copper mixing bowl is the absolutely best bowl to use when beating eggs whites – she said that there is a chemical reaction between the egg whites and the copper that makes the egg whites beat up stiffer faster.
Today I found a website that sells ruffoni copper cookware. To be honest I had never heard of ruffoni before, but I was really impressed with how many different copper pots and pans and molds they sold! I’ve never seen so much copper for the kitchen before! I’ve bookmarked their site for me to go back there when it is closer to my wife’s birthday. I’m sure she would love one of the brioche mold sets to hang on the wall over the range!
When we moved down here a few years ago, I really felt that we were living out in the “boonies.” After all, we live across the street from a farm. When we look out the front room window we never know if we will be seeing cows, sheep, goats, or horses grazing in the pasture. Things move at a much slower pace around here, which isn’t really a problem, it’s kinda nice actually. I just wish that the snow removal on the roads went a little quicker. It’s been 2 days now since the last snow storm and the roads are still a complete mess. School was cancelled today because of the roads and tomorrow they are opening 2 hours late.
