A couple of weeks ago while lunching with my friend Susie, I lamented that the last two pair of slacks I’d bought both were going into the Goodwill bag. (I don’t really give to the Goodwill — I give to Big Brothers/Big Sisters or the local charity, Opportunity Village, but in my mind it’s still the Goodwill bag.) Anyway, the nice black slacks I’d bought seemed like lint magnets. And not just lint, but cat hair stuck to them like it had been glued on. No amount of brushing could remove it. Even washing them only helped a little — they came out of the washing machine still sporting remnants of cat hair. With four cats, this was a major problem. I’d already gone through two lint rollers, and the Norwex Lint Mitt I keep in the car had worked overtime. (I sit at red lights working the lint mitt… Read More »
You want me to swallow WHAT??
Sometime back around the 50s an advertising agency got the brilliant idea of marketing directly to children. So instead of “Hey, mom and dad, wouldn’t little Nancy love a Betsy Wetsy Doll for Christmas?,” the ads changed to “Hey, kids! Tell Mom and Dad you want a Hopalong Cassidy six shooter for Christmas!” (And if you remember either of these products, I’m guessing you’re ready for Medicare.) I am reminded of this because the pharmaceutical companies have decided to bypass the doctor and speak directly to us. Now obviously if you simply have a headache, you don’t need to see the doctor, but they now are essentially saying, “Doctor? Doctor? You don’t need no stinkin’ doctor! Trust us!” Acid Reflux? Incontinence? Erectile Dysfunction (which we insiders know as “ED”)? No problem. Yes, you might need a prescription but all you need to do is “ask your doctor if [our product] is right… Read More »
Where in the World … ?
Pop Quiz: Who or what is Burkina Faso? Had I not been looking at it in context, I might have guessed a fashion designer, a casino game, or a new hybrid grass seed. But it’s Perhaps it’s a fashion designer from India … not any of these. Take a guess — go ahead, guess. Give up? It’s a country in Africa. Really? Yep –I looked it up. It’s just north of Ghana and west of Nigeria. And why would I care? because, oddly, someone in Burkina Faso has read out my blog. One of the fun things about writing a blog is that WordPress keeps track of the statistics — the number of people who look at my posts and the countries where they live. I have not looked at this in awhile, so today I decided to see where in the world my readers live. Of course, I expected lots of people in the U.S., and I knew my friend… Read More »
Why is saying “Goodbye” so hard?
So I’m sitting in my car thinking, “why was that so hard? Why do I feel like crying?” It makes no sense. The relationship had not been good and it was past time for it to end. Yet, as walked away, I felt pricking behind my eyelids. I turned around for one last look. I truly don’t know why saying goodbye is so hard. “Goodbye, Foster,” I whispered. “Someone who really wants you is going to come by soon.” Foster was a 2012 RAV4 that I’d bought under duress. My old car was a Ford Explorer that I’d saved for, planned for, shopped for and loved. We’d had wonderful adventures together until he started having more problems than I could deal with. I finally threw in the towel and traded him for something almost new. From the day I drove off the lot, I knew the RAV4 was all wrong. I told my friend Phyllis Palmer… Read More »
I will not Shop on Saturday !
Before I retired, I made myself a promise: when I no longer worked full-time, I would not shop on the weekends. One of my pet peeves was to go to the market and stand in line behind someone who was obviously retired and could have shopped any day of the week, but NO!, they chose to shop on my day off, costing me precious minutes as I stood in line behind them, waiting for them to check out and get out! (Now I must admit that I have a lot of pet peeves, probably enough to stock a menagerie. A friend who is more open-minded than I am, suggested these people might have to wait until the weekend for a friend or relative who works to drive them to the market. I admit that is a consideration — for maybe 5%.) So today, Saturday, not only was I shopping, I was shopping… Read More »
