Observations

[Diane Amberg]

Have you declined any since last year or are you about the same. Good for you for pacing yourself to do as much as you do. Al has to do the same. He has good energy most mornings, has to rest for awhile in the afternoon and even nap a bit if he has an evening event or meeting. Some evenings he just doesn't have the energy to get out of his own way and gets really nasty leg cramps. We never know when they will hit. He's the Constitution and By-Laws chair for the fire company and had a long meeting this afternoon so he will need to hit the hay early tonight. What kind of hens do you have?

[srkruzich]

i've gotten worse. I was diagnosed with pancreatitus last week.    I have maran chickeens and buffs.

[larryJ]

Some years ago, maybe seven or eight, my wife decided we needed an alarm system.  So she found one that guaranteed no increase in the monthly fee as long as we displayed their solar powered, two foot tall, eight inch oval shaped logo in our planter.  Advertising!  The few times that the system was used such as when one of our kids or my in-laws don't know the system is on when we are gone, entered the house, the system functioned perfectly.  There is a password to be orally spoken when the person from the alarm company asks if everything is okay.  Wrong or no password brings the police in a hurry.  I am totally happy with this company.

Now then, recently the company sent a notice that they were changing their name and that an employee would be along someday to change the logo on their little sign to the new company name.  This took a few months to occur. 

I was gone the other day when this guy showed up.  He removed the two sheet metal screws from the post and replaced the sign----------------upside down!  As I sat outside on the swing, next to the little sign, I began to repair the mistake and at the same time began to wonder about the company.  These are the people looking after my safety!  Then it occurred to me they probably hired a bunch of day workers or school kids to go around and change the signs. 

Actually, the whole thing was kinda funny.  But then again, what does that say about the intelligence of some of the people who are out there?

Larryj

[larryJ]

This should probably be posted in the "out of the mouths of babes" thread, but I will put it here.

I dearly love my 6-year-old granddaughter.  I am in charge of going to her house in the morning, waking her, feeding her, helping her get ready and taking her to school.  Later, when school is out, I pick her up and bring her to my house until such time one of her parents shows up to take her home.

She is reasonably intelligent, maybe a higher percentile than most, but has come up with some doozies in the past few months.  This comments are unsolicited, things I don't where she might have heard, but totally off-the-wall.

I was waking her from a nap as her mother would be arriving soon to take her up.  Conversation:  "Wake up, sweetie, mommy is on the way and will be here in a few minutes."  Response:  "Don't bother me, I haven't had enough beauty sleep."

Some days on the way home, she spots a convenience store and asks for an ICEE.  And I usually stop and get one if we are not in a hurry to be somewhere.  One particular day, when I picked her up, the teacher commented that she had done a beautiful job that day.  It was a hot day and so, on the way home, I stopped at the store.  Conversation:  "Papa, why are you stopping here?"
Response:  "Because the teacher said you did good today and I thought I would get you an ICEE for doing so well."  Her response:  "And I didn't even have to ask!"   After buying the ICEE and leaving the store, I heard behind me:  "I want to marry you."  I looked down at her and said, "What?"  She said, "I want to marry you"...............to the ICEE."  She was kissing the cup and saying, "I love you and I want to marry you."

Today, while waiting for the school bell to ring, I commented that we would receive our new gas range today and the old one was being taken away.  Comment: "YAYYYY, now you and nana can fix me chicken nuggets and pancakes and bacon and eggs........................................."   You would think we were starving that child!   

Larryj

[larryJ]

A little bit of information for you.

Having had my identity stolen in recent months, I went through all the motions of notifying credit card companies, banks, etc.  One of the steps is to notify the three credit reporting agencies and to have a fraud alert placed on my name.  After having to change some credit card accounts and getting a new different debit card, things appeared to be in order.  In other words, nobody seemed to be using my name and whatever personal information to buy anything.  By the way, if you notify one credit reporting agency, they, by law, have to notify the other two.

Today, I received in the mail a letter from a department store, well, the money institution that all department stores use when someone applies for credit.  The letter thanked me for my recent application for a credit card with a major department store.  Now, I have had a credit card account with this store for over thirty years.  So I called the 800 number listed in the letter.  It appears some one wanted to open a credit card account in my name.  Because I had place a fraud alert to the credit reporting agencies, the finance company sent out the letter telling me they needed more information.  I talked to a young man and he was extremely helpful and explained that the letter was a result of the fraud alert.  He assured me that appropriate action would be taken and the application denied with no detrimental effects on me.  During our conversation, I asked if someone wanted a credt card, wouldn't the address for the card to be mailed to be suspect.  His answer:  If someone walks into the store, then an address would have to be verified with proper identication and no charges could be made until the person actually had the card.  However, in today's wonderful world of Iternet offerings, someone may apply on-line and be given credit to order something over the internet without having the card.  He added additional alerts to their system so that if anyone attempts to open an on-line account through them, I am to be notified.

So there you go.  Sometimes the system actually works.

Larryj

[larryJ]

Last February, as I probably posted somewhere, my wife and I enjoyed a trip to a cottage on a beach in Oceanside.  We boarded R.A.M.B.O. and the new cocker pup, Sir Charles, or Charlie to his friends.  When picking them up, we met a dog trainer.  After a short conversation, we had his card and would call to set up an appointment.  Now then, R.A.M.B.O. has had dog training at the local Pets Mart.  It was fun and exciting and he did well.  However, he didn't retain a lot of what he learned.  He is stubborn and prefers to be pampered when he wants it and be left alone, when he doesn't.  Charlie, on the other hand, being about nine months old and now bigger than R.A.M.B.O. is one that will lick you to death and is a very lovable dog.  So, the dog trainer was called, appointments were made, and the homework assignment is that my wife, and her cousin who has moved in with us, work with the dogs in the evening to train them to act, well, like dogs.  One of the highlights of my day is these dog training sessions in the evening.  I get a cup of International coffee and retire to the backyard patio to watch all this.  There is just something amusing about watching two 60+ women trying to control two rather small dogs.  I would probably even pay for a ticket if there was an admission charge.

That, and a In-N-Out double-double cheeseburger, animal style, make for an almost perfect evening.

Larryj

[larryJ]

I am sure most of you are familiar with the comedian, Bill Engvall, you know the one who did the "here's your sign" routine about stupid people or otherwise lacking in their way of thinking before speaking. 

Today, I went to my Oncologist for my monthly check-up and shot in the butt.  Kaiser hospital has 4 floors.  However, on the side where the doctor's offices are located the elevator only goes to 3 floors.  I got into the elevator and punched 3.  It stopped at 2 and two older women (maybe my age) got on.  Now, my immediate thought was that they wanted to go down instead of up.  I started to say something as the doors closed, but one of them turned to me and said, "Going to 3?"  I said, stonefaced, "So far."

Here's your sign.

Larryj

[Wilma]

That reminds me of the elevator in the building where I worked.  There were two floors, so when we would get in on the first floor, we would say, "Up, please" or "Are you going up?"

[larryJ]

As mentioned on another thread yesterday and today, we went to Irvine to the Great Park.  Now, being the older, wiser person that I am, I took along a light jacket.  I am aware that in SoCal this time of year it can be very warm during the day, but once that sun goes down, it can get very cool.  As mentioned, my wife, her cousin, my daughter and family, and my son and his daughter were in attendance.  The Great Park is in a wide open area subject to ocean breezes in the late afternoon.

I WAS ONE OF TWO PEOPLE THERE TO BRING A JACKET!

Is this a result of poor training of my children in their formative years?  Have they not lived here all of their lives and not know how the weather is?  As they waited for their turn on the balloon ride, it got dark and cooler.  It became a matter of wits to see who would turn tail and run for the car to stay warm, but they toughed it out.  I took pity on my wife and her cousin, knowing there were two jackets in the trunk of the car and so, retrieved them.  My son, being a resident of the area, was aware of the conditions and brought his jacket and of course, a wrap for the baby and a blanket for the baby.  Sadly, my daughter and son-in-law did not bring any for themselves or my other two granddaughters.  Fortunately, there was a light blanket in the car for someone to use, and my son gave up his jacket to my son-in-law.  My wife's cousin gave up her wrap for one of the girls until such time until she was getting cold and managed to get it back for a while. 

Where did I go wrong?  But then, my oldest granddaughter is 6+ and my daughter has never learned how to properly pack a diaper bag, either, no matter how many times her mother has talked to her about it.  When will they ever learn? 

HERE'S YOUR SIGN!

Larryj

[larryJ]

Here in the great urban area of Los Angeles, one of the highlights is a high speed chase.  This is where some idiot breaks the law, refuses to pull over for the police and it is off we go.  Highlight, you say?  Well, it must be because if the chase should occur during the news hour, any TV stations airing the news will drop all other news coverage to watch the high speed chase. Short of a world war, nothing else is important. Sometimes I wonder if these idiots do this just to get on TV.

In L.A all the TV stations are located in or around the Glendale/Burbank area on the northwest side of downtown L.A.  So the newscasters and the traffic people in the heliocopters are not always familiar with the other side to the east of downtown, because they live closer to the stations.  The news guy I was watching last night didn't have a clue where he was at.

Everyone is familiar around the country with the slow speed chase with O.J. Simpson.  Some of these chases reach very high speeds both on the freeway and the city streets.  Some end very peacefully and others tragically.  Many times people are hurt or killed, either the guy being chased or some innocent bystander.

That said, I was working on the desktop computer last night when I heard on the TV that a chase was going on.  So I stopped what I was doing and watched.  Here in the San Gabriel Valley, we don't see a lot of these chases in our area.  They mostly occur closer to Los Angeles.  I have seen some where the guy actually tried to leave the county, but that is rare.

The chase last night was happening to the south of us about ten miles away.  It ended on a freeway on-ramp two miles south of my house when the Highway Patrol did a pit maneuver by bumping the back corner of the car being chased causing it to spin out of control.  As this was an SUV, it tipped over.  The guy wasn't hurt that I could see.  Then I went outside and over the roof of my house I could count 4 heliocopters, three news and one CHP. 

I went to bed happy that something exciting happened

Larryj