It’s My Imagination

New Sunglasses

I spent the morning at the optometrist. My eyes have become so dry that I no longer wear my contact lenses, they’re just not comfortable. I’ve tried several different types of contacts and prescription eye-drops. While the eye-drops did help, it wasn’t enough to make wearing my contacts any more comfortable.

So, today, I told the doctor that unless I could find a way to eliminate the dryness of my eyes, I was going to basically give up on wearing contacts. She recommended plugs. Plugs do exactly what their name implies, the plug the drain ducts in your eyes in an attempt to keep the natural tears from draining away. She explained that it’s a 15-20 minute procedure done in her office and the plugs are permanent.

Because it would be considered a medical procedure, it’s possible that my health insurance would cover a large portion of the cost. I have to doctor’s office checking on it and hope to find out tomorrow.  In the mean time, I did order a new pair of prescription sunglasses.  Even after my insurance paid over $300 of the expense, I still had to pay almost $200.  That was a pain in the pocket book.

I’d love to hear from others who have either heard of this procedure or had it done.

Emergency Preparedness

My husband has made a list of things he wants taken care of, or at least looked at, on our van before I drive it to Tennessee in a few weeks. I also want to make sure it’s ready for the trip, since he’s not going with us, the last thing I want is to break down along the highway somewhere.

His list includes all of the typical things associated with the engine as well as possibly having the brakes looked at. We just recently had all four tires checked, rotated, balanced, and aligned, so they’re all set. The last thing on my list would be to get the little dings taken out, but, they’re all just door dings, so, unless I’m going to auto body Nashville, I’m not going to worry about it. It’s not like most other cars don’t have their share of door dings! Now, if it were major collision repair, I’d be going to the experts!

Looks like we’ll be trying to put it in the shop either this week or next to make sure it’s all ready to go. I can’t believe I’ll be leaving in just a couple of weeks!

Technically Bruised

This has been a very trying weekend spent battling my computers and a number of technical difficulties.  I feel bruised, but not beaten.

It all began Friday afternoon.  My laptop had been somewhat sluggish for weeks, but I blamed it on all the online work I was doing, opening and closing of websites, fast paced website visits that I do with Entrecard on my other blog and just the siple fact that my laptop is getting older.  Everything was working normally when I set down my laptop and went into my sewing room to work on another project.  I came out an hour or so later, only to find that my laptop had “lost” its wireless connection.

I tried everything, but could not get the wireless to work.  The network setting simply said “not connected”.  I did a system restore, I did wireless network searches and would come up with “none available”.  This was odd because just about every house in our neighborhood has wireless and I usually see 5 or 6 of them when I do a network search, but this time I got nothing.  I became so frustrated that I finally handed the computer to my husband and asked him to take a look.  He then spent an hour or so doing what I had just done and he, like me, had no success.  I finally just went to bed.

Saturday morning I picked up the laptop to try again and found that I now had wireless service!  Somehow the computer had righted itself and was back online.  Everything worked smoothly, albeit slowly, all day with the exception of the Entrecard website and the entrecard widgets on any blogs I opened, including my own.  (I don’t currently use EC on this site).  I spent a good part of yesterday fighting with this, checking all my setting, ad blockers, security, everything I could think of and nothing helped.  I was even having problems with it on my desktop computer so wondered if perhaps it was a website issue.  I put out a call to other bloggers and found that no, it was something on my end.  I had no idea what it was and, out of frustration, again went to bed.

I  woke up in the middle of the night, unable to sleep.  I can’t relax when I know things aren’t working properly.  I decided to get up and take another look at it.  When I came out of the bedroom I noticed that my desktop computer was still running.  Usually, it goes into hibernation during the night.  I decided to shut it down completely, something I rarely do.  I then went in and picked up my laptop, turned it on and discovered that, not only was everything working, including Entrecard, but everything had picked up speed.  I worked on it for about an hour and then went back to bed, content.
The one thing my husband had done with the wireless network was to create a bridge.  I’ve never had that done before and am wondering if I now need to disconnect the bridge.  The desktop computer is still turned off, but I’m concerned that when I turn it back on, the “bridge” will cause problems again.  I guess the way to find out is to turn it on.

Anyway, for now, I’m back up and running, but very tired from lack of sleep!

Auto Accident

Have you ever been in an auto accident? I have, twice. The first time it did damage to the front end of the car, the 2nd time, it totaled the car. Truthfully, I’m not sure which is worse. It’s so hard to find a reputable auto body repair shop to do the work. Many times, once a car is damaged, it’s just never the same.

I was lucky though. At the time of these accidents, we were living in Souther California and that gave me access to auto body Los Angeles, experts in auto body collision repair. I was fortunate to have an expert do the repair work on my car. I had that same car for another 6 or 7 years after the repairs were done and never had a problem.

Just make sure you work with an expert if you ever need collision repair.

The Sneeze

THE SNEEZE (received in an email)

They walked in tandem, each of the ninety-two students filing into the
already crowded auditorium.

With their rich maroon gowns flowing .. and the traditional caps, they
looked almost … as grown up as they felt.

Dads swallowed hard behind broad smiles, and Moms freely brushed away
tears.

This class would NOT pray during the commencements—-not by choice, but
because of a recent court ruling prohibiting it.
The principal and several students were careful to stay within the
guidelines allowed by the ruling. They gave inspirational and
challenging speeches, but no one mentioned divine guidance and no one
asked for blessings on the graduates or their families.
The speeches were nice, but they were routine…..until the final speech
received a standing ovation.

A solitary student walk ed proudly to the microphone. He stood still and
silent for just a moment, and then, it happened.

All 92 students, every single one of them, suddenly SNEEZED!!!!

The student on stage.. simply looked at the audience and said, ‘GOD
BLESS YOU!’ And he walked off stage…

The audience exploded into applause. This graduating class had found a
unique way to invoke God’s blessing on their future with or without the
court’s approval. Isn’t this a wonderful story? Pass it on to all your
friends………and GOD BLESS YOU!!!!

This is a true story; it happened at the University of Maryland

Financial Counseling

One of the first things we did when we relocated was to find a new financial advisor. I believe it’s important to have someone who will not only offer financial advice, but also answer my questions. Trust me, I ask a lot of questions.

Our retirement funds and my daughter’s college savings are very important to me and I want to make sure they’re earning a good return. We want to make sure we have an individual who is monitoring our investments for us, not just putting them in a file and letting the file collect dust.

If you haven’t yet found a qualified financial counselor and are in the Baltimore area, you might want to consider contacting George Divel who runs his own investment firm, Global Wealth Advisors. Whether it’s stocks and bonds, mutual funds or retirement planning, we all need someone who is licensed, experienced, and with our interests in mind.

Wordless Wednesday – A Dog’s Day

Get Smart – A Review

I took my daughter and her two friends to see Get Smart this afternoon. I always loved the television show and the movie had received rave reviews that stated it was hilarious and a must see. It’s rated PG-13, so I felt it was safe to take the girls.

The movie begins much the same as the television show did and occasionally, Maxwell Smart pulls a stunt that reminded me of the show. Beyond that, there really are no similarities. I take that back, the actor who played “Chief” did an excellent job. I found myself several times looking at him to see if it was the same guy from the t.v. show. Of course, it wasn’t, but that just shows what an excellent job he did. For me, he was the highlight of the movie.

This movie had the potential to be very funny, but for whatever reason, the writers felt the need to use profanity, sexual innuendo, body part grabbing and same sex kissing and thought that was humorous. Sorry, I found no humor in those scenes whatsoever. They also decided to make Maxwell Smart too intelligent. Part of his charm in the t.v. show is that he really is an idiot trying to do good. In the movie, he comes across as a very intelligent agent who happens to be a little bit of a klutz.

I was very disappointed in this movie and was wishing it had been the same length as the television show, 30 minutes. Instead, I had to suffer through almost 2 hours of boredom. I recommend waiting for this movie to come out on video and even then I’m not sure it’s worth the price.

Vacation vs. PayDay Loan

I have two driving vacations planned for July. The first, a trip for my daughter and I to Tennessee is combined with our first public attempt at selling our handmade goods. The second trip will be in celebration of my husband’s birthday and we will all three be going on this one.

I’ve been planning the trip to Tennessee for quite some time and have been earning money online to pay for the trip. I’ve all ready paid up front for my share of the cabin rental where we will be staying and so just need money for gas, food and entertainment. I’m hoping to earn more money while we’re there by selling some of my fabric creations. My daughter has also been busy making beaded bracelets and I’m hoping she’s also successful in selling those.

Our trip at the end of July was planned last month. I wanted to take advantage of the hot summer Texas weather and take my husband someplace nice to celebrate his birthday. I’m unable to say where we’re going because the destination is a surprise for my husband. He knows we’re going, I had to tell him in order for him to plan the days off from work. I’ll be anxious to write about it once we’ve been, I’m certainly looking forward to it.

With all of my financial planning for these trips though, the one thing that had definitely been out of my control is the price of gasoline. Gas prices here in Texas are some of the lowest in the country, but by the time we leave in July, they will more than likely be above $4.00 a gallon. So that I don’t have to take out Fast Payday Loans to cover our fuel costs, I’ve shortened the length of our trip and eliminated a couple of destinations. This makes me very sad, but it had to be done.

Do you have any vacation(s) planned for this summer?

A Day With the Girls

We’re now in our second full week of summer vacation, or is it the third?  Either way, it’s the first time my daughter has seen either one of her friends from school since that last day of school.  Don’t get me wrong, she’s seen her softball friends and neighborhood friends, but these are her two close friends that she usually only sees at school.

T invited them over for the afternoon and we are going to the theater to see Get Smart.  One of the girls has all ready seen it with her family, but she said she enjoyed it so much that she wanted to see it again.  That’s a good sign!  I’m a little disappointed that my husband can’t go with us, I think he would enjoy it, but he has to work.

Maybe I’ll do a review of the movie when I get back, so stay tuned!