Advents Corner

OK I saw this laundry hamper and I just thought it was the coolest thing. First off I know I would not use it for a laundry hamper because there are so many more things I could do with this. Besides my house is not that big that I need to worry about wheeling my laundry from one end to the other. I could however see this to be useful for laundry if you had to go to a laundry mat or something.

I thought about all of the times me and Lani come home in the evenings and she has her paperwork for the day, lunchbox, jacket, my purse, work folders and of course the items that we picked up from the grocery store on the way home. We could just throw everything in there and make only one trip instead of two or three. Then I run into the issue of having to chase Lani down because she left out of the house on one of my trips to the car. I really think I am going to get one of these. Maybe I will ask for it for Christmas. I really like this thing the possibilities are endless.

What about the picnics or trip to the park or just trips to the store. You could just put you bags in it as you come out of the store and when you get home everything is already in it and all you have to do is wheel it into the house….perfect.

I don’t know what is going on with everything these day, insurance, taxes, mortgages, gas prices (which are better now) the rising cost of food.,….it is all just becoming too much.  We have our home insurance and our property taxes escrowed into our mortgage payment so most of the time we do not pay attention to the rates until the beginning of the year when they adjust our mortgage payment to cover the raising cost of taxes and insurance so in turn your mortgage payment goes up.

This year our property taxes when down a couple of hundred dollars but our home owners went up 100 and our flood went up 200 so at this point we are exactly where we were last year.  Florida tried to help everyone by lower our property taxes but they let the insurance companies raise their rates so it really did not help.  We are now shopping for a new home insurance company because there are some out there that really do try and keep the rates down so be on the look out for the good ones.

Matt and I were in town the other day and the mini cooper in front of us had the most appropriate plate on it.  I do not remember the exact spelling they used but it read: IM L8 2  I’m late too.  I thought that was so funny because you know every time you are in a hurry you get behind someone that is going so slow.  I have always wanted to get one of those Private Number Plates but I can never come up with anything cleaver.  I really like the sites that point you in the right direction so you can have a very cleaver plate without putting too much of your own brain power into it.

I really like to cook and one of the things I wish I had done was gone to one of those culinary arts schools. I would love to be able to go to school and learn all of the neat things you can do with food. Matt tells me I should just do it but I don’t know. I have been looking around at them and found that no matter where you leave you can find a school close to you.

Maybe when we move out to California and I am looking for a career change I can try my hand at culinary arts school. I really like to cook and I love to try new recipes so think I would be great to broaden my knowledge. I don’t know if I would want to work in a restaurant or not but I think I would be awesome to be able to have the chance to. I always tell Matt that if we get rich one day and I do not have to worry about money I would like to work in a soup kitchen or something just volunteering. I guess I should just do what I want with what I have and not wait for the perfect conditions to come along because we all know if you wait for the perfect moment you will be waiting forever. Sometimes you just have to jump in and do it.

Now that Matt is starting to branch out with services on the Internet our ability to have credit card processing has come to the forefront of our business also so the ability to accept credit cards without paying more for the service then we make is very important.  Finding a company that would fit our small business needs was crucial, luckily we found such a company to help us expand without digging into our profit.

I wanted to pass along this post from another blog, Sarah Palin banning books.   Take the time to look at it and then do your own research.  We need as much information as we can gather on the eve of what could be a dog fight election.  We are looking at more and more of our children turning voting age.  This will be my oldest daughter’s first election, she turned 18 in July.  With that in mind we could have one of the largest voter turn outs in a very long time.  Everyone is on their soap box screaming for change but we need to make sure it is the change we really need and not just simply “change”.

When we were preparing to go to Asia we looked on Amazon books and found two really good guides for Bangkok and Singapore. Now we are in search of some good guides for Los Angeles, you know the kind that tell you what locals like and not just tourist traps. We are looking to move in the Glendale or Sherman Oaks vicinity.  I know I have readers all over the place and if any of you live in LA and would like to share something with us please do, we would love to hear from you.

I am excited about Mom and Dad moving down because Mom is very active and I hope I can start to do things with her. I know I need to add more exercise to my life but maybe a supplement would help too something like Orovo or something. I just need something to give me a little help. I have about 15 pounds I really want to get rid of. I seems like every time I talk about it I tack on a couple more pounds. I guess that is life….you are never satisfied.

Listed below is the consumer reports top 11 worst cars to own.  These are not listed in a particular order. 

JEEP WRANGLER UNLIMITED

HUMMER H3

JEEP LIBERTY SPORT

CEVROLET AVEO5

DODGE NITRO SLT

TOYOTA FJ CRUISE (Matt and I were actually looking at one of these at one point)

TOYOTA YARIS

SUZUKI FORENZA

JEEP PATRIOT LIMITED

CHEVROLET TRAIL BLAZER LT

MERCURY GRAND MARQUIS

It is really no surprise to me that a Mercury has made the list.  I had a Mercury Sable once and it stayed in the shop more than it did in my driveway.  I hated that car so much.  It does surprise me that Jeep has so many on the list and Toyota has a couple.

Here are six signs that your job sucks

1. You ask your new boss for supplies and she hands you a No. 2 pencil and legal pad — and nothing else.

2. You were shown to a cubicle your first day of work, given a company manual and haven’t spoken to anyone since.

3. You get the same reaction every time you tell someone about your new job and employer: Raised eyebrows and “Really? … Good luck with that.”

4. After two weeks on the job, you are already halfway to becoming the employee with the most seniority.

5. You answer the phone while the company’s secretary is away from her desk and find that the voice at the other end is a collection agency calling for the third time that week.6. You notice that every day for the last week, at least one person has run crying from your boss’s office.

Does any of this sound familar?  If so, maybe you need to start looking for a new job.  To read the entire article click here.  You should always try to be happy where you work because it affects you entire life not just your work life.

For those of you confused by the notion that Florida’s delegates are not being counted I am posting this explanation.  One of my dear friends emailed one of the writers for the Tampa Tribune for an explanation and this is the response he received.  Thanks Bruce for passing this on to me and everyone else.  I hope this sheds some light on this for you.

This is a point that confuses many people.  I’ve explained it in several stories, but of course, not everyone sees every story I write.  The answer is that your intuition is correct — the national parties have NO right to say when Florida or any other state holds its primary.  However, they DO have the right — litigated up to the Supreme Court more than once — to choose their own nominees for president, including setting the rules by which those nominees are chosen.  That’s basic freedom of association, guaranteed explicitly in the Constitution.  So the Florida Legislature can set the Florida primary for any date it wants.  It chose Jan. 29.

But the national party then gets to decide whether and how to seat delegates to its national nominating convention.  It said it wouldn’t seat any delegates chosen before Feb. 5, or chosen as result of a process that began before Feb 5.

Republicans, of course, had a similar but less draconian rule.  Both parties enacted the rules in an attempt to limit the rush of states moving their primaries ever earlier.  Florida Republicans were happy enough to accept the penalty in their national party’s rule, which was loss of half their delegates.  But the Democratic penalty was worse — in this case, the national party said it would eliminate the entire delegation.

The national Democratic Party asked the state Democrats to hold a caucus on Feb. 5 or later to choose their convention delegates, which the state party legally could do if it chose to (and paid for it).

The state party refused. They said that would amount to refusing to count the votes cast in the Jan. 29 primary, and therefore ignoring the expressed will of the people.

Unfortunately, there aren’t enough pine trees for me to include this long-winded explanation in every story I write.

So feel free to pass this on to 250,000 people or so.

William March, reporter

The Tampa Tribune

Office 813 259 7761 wmarch@tampatrib.com 

Namco Bandai says it is because of the Wii that they are shutting arcades through out Japan.  People are saving their pocket change to buy games for the Wii verses spending it in the arcade.  We have a Wii and it is so much fun.  Talk about a family gaming system.  When my in laws were in for Christmas we spent many nights all bowling on the Wii. 

With my blogs getting the smack down from Google I was really concerned about my page rank going from a 3 to a big fat 0.  I also watched my opps for good money fade into the darkness.  One bright light at the end of the tunnel was the introduction of Real Rank.  With Real Rank your Blog Ranks are gathered by using the number of visitors to your site not the index that Google gives it.  Even though my page rank is in the toilet my Real Rank is still good because of the number of visitors to my site daily.  Thanks guys for coming back to Corner everyday to see the craziness in the world.  You can check your weekly average daily so you can stay on top of things on your own terms.

The data is pulled using a piece of code you embed in your blog.  The system uses the following formula to get your Real Rank: 70% daily unique visitors, 20% daily active inbound links and 10% daily page views.  So as you can see it is solely based on your blogs performance and not on some phantom algorithm.  So sign up and get ranked by the traffic of your site not by a toolbar or an algorithm

East Japan Railway Co. has said “no” to the promotion posters for the festival held at the Kokuski temple saying the posters amounted to sexual harassment.  I agree with the Rail company, what woman wants to see chest hair?  I know I don’t!!!!!  The festival has been held for over 1,000 years where men dance in loincloths and wrestle for charms made of wood. 

Disney has said that you can take your child to eat at one of the other 97 restaurants if they are under the age of 10 because at Victoria & Albert’s in the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa they are not welcome.  According to Rosemary Rose, Disney’s vice president for food, beverage and merchandise operations, only about 3 families bring their children into the restaurant each year.  I wonder if there are only 3 families in a whole year, why do they need to make a rule saying you can not bring them in.  And, with prices starting at $125 that would make for one expensive happy meal.

Democrats:  Obama, Edwards, Clinton

Republicans: Huckabee, Romney, Thompson/McCain

Next stop, New Hampshire! 

Their primary is on Thursday and the predictions going in are as follows: Clinton and Obama are tied for the Democrats and Romney and McCain ore in a close race the Republicans.I know is it hard to really get into this now but the mud slinging is about to start for real.  We have heard little jabs here and there but nothing like it is about to be.  The gloves are coming off, so to speak.  What is a caucus?  Do you need a refresher course?  Don’t feel bad a lot a people are not really sure what the fuss is all about.  The caucuses tend to be dead on about whom the next nominees are so now is the time to start watching all of these candidates.

As everyone knows I am in the title business and when it was booming we had a lot of people flipping houses to make a quick buck, well so they thought under the bottom fell out of the market and a lot of people were stuck with houses they did not live and could not afford. I found out today a new trend that is starting, land flipping. There is South Carolina land for sale and land in most states that people are starting to flip. I guess I just never thought about jumping on the band wagon.

I have lived in several places through out my life. I was born and raised in Louisiana but moved away shortly after graduating high school and since then I have lived in a few different places such as, Orlando Florida, Saratoga Springs New York, Auburn Alabama and a few more. I have always said my favorite place was when I lived in Charleston South Carolina.

I loved it there because we had beaches but we still had a winter. You lived in a city but you also had that southern charm. People there were always so friendly and the variety of things to do was just amazing. There is Rainbow Row for those that like old houses and the farmers market to get all kinds of souvenirs. You can take a boat out to Fort Sumter or see the beautiful steeple on St. Michael’s Episcopal Church. There were just so many things we did when we lived there it is hard to name them all. I also enjoyed walking around Charles Towne Landing and watching them make candles in their period dresses. I think Charleston is the only place I have lived that I would actually move back too. Of course that is not in my future because right now we are talking about LA although I wish we were talking about Hawaii. If you are thinking of going there sign up for the Trusted Travel eNewsletter to get more information on the places you can see.

My brother is not really a boxing fan but this bout has got him in a whirlwind over these two guys.  This is the not first time Manny Pacquiao and Juan Manuel Marquez II have met in the ring.  Way back in 2004 when they stepped into the ring Pacquiao was clearly the favorite taking down Marquez 3 times in the first round but through true grit Marquez bounced back with the battle ending in a split draw.

There was some talk about Pacquiao moving to fight David Diaz but instead decided he would once again fight Juan Manuel Marquez.  This is going to be a battle from the sound of the first bell.  Everyone has waited for what seems like forever to get this two back in the ring.  HBO PPV is covering this fight because there is such demand from the fans to get quality fights available to everyone.  With both of their records outstanding Pacquiao is 7-1 and Marquez is 6-1 this is sure to be a fight you do not want to miss.  If you are going to be in the Vegas area on March 15, 2008 you can try your hand at getting Manny Paquiao tickets for ring side.

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