Up out and about

Pay your monthly bills intelligently

2012-01-14T12:35:00.000-08:00

A while back I was doing my normal monthly routine of monthly bill paying; it’s very boring and depressing, having to pay out MY money to these other companies. After I have paid all of my bills for the first half of the month which is about 8 of them I have paid out over $1300.00; I get to save my home mortgage payment for my second paycheck. After I have paid my bills, I am so down and out that I do not feel like doing anything. Then I got to thinking. What if I could skip paying one bill for one month and keep that money in my pocket to use for anything I wanted. So I started to see if that could be done. I asked some co-workers about this and they thought I was crazy. There is no way you can skip a monthly bill payment and get away with it. You don’t pay a bill, you get hit with late payment fees; and then you have to pay the last months and this month’s payment together to bring the account current. Believe me, I have missed a payment and it’s not fun. The bill collectors call day and night you asking “when can you pay this bill”, most of the time I do not even pick up the phone. So I kept thinking, there must be a way to avoid paying a month bill. Where there is a will, there is a way.
After many days and nights of thinking about this, I figured it out. There IS a way to avoid one bill payment and not get hit with any late fees. This was amazing. I made a 12 month calendar and marked my entire bill due dates and then I marked all of my days I get paid. If I pay my bills when I have money, which is my payday over time I can really skip a bill. This is way cool. The 12 month calendar showed me that if I paid my bills on my paydays, when I actually had the money. I could skip paying a bill a few months later. If I did this constantly, I could skip one of my bills one time each year. Remember I have to pay 8 bills every month. Some of them are small like only $20 dollars and some like my car payment is over $350.00. Wow, avoiding paying my car payment that is money I want to keep. I talked again to my co-workers, carefully explaining how to do this. Proving on paper that this does work and they still would not believe me. Well it’s their loss.
I have been doing this now for about 3 years. In June 2011, I was able to skip my mortgage payment and buy Disneyland annual passes for my family. In November 2011, I skipped my car payment and made Christmas a little more special for my entire family. This is not rocket science, anyone can do this, and all they need is a steady paycheck and pay your bills online. As the saying goes there are two kinds of people in this world, those that do and those that cannot do.
Currently I am selling this idea, with a total money back if you do not save at least $200.00 on bill payment. Goto my e-bay auction page to purchase this and to read more.

To Do Things Right, or Do Things Now

2011-05-27T19:03:00.000-07:00

With the economy in the tank, and gas prices high, everyone seems to be rushing around doing something. But is that something just getting done, or is that something getting done with care. If you do a task that needs to be done now, you might hurry and cut some corners, maybe fudge a little just to get it completed. It will be ok, but that is it, just ok. Only to have whatever you did, be a temporary fix and have to go back and do it again later on to make it right. Why not do that task with care, and do it right with the right parts, taking your time the first time. You might delay the task until you have the time or the right parts, which will means you may never get done. So it comes down to a question, get it done now and possibly have to do it again, or wait, a day, a week, a month to get it done right. I personally would want to wait, and do it right. Of course, this does mean I may never get to it. But im human, I can change my habits. I can “split the difference”, I can do the task now, but maybe take a day or so to get it right, using the right parts and taking my time. With that new attitude, things will get done and everyone will be happy.

Reserve Price

2010-07-17T12:22:00.000-07:00

I shop ebay frequently, in fact when ever my computer is on, I'm on ebay, viewing all of the auctions. I do more viewing than purchasing. When purchasing, its buyer beware on ebay or any auction website. Some of the items on ebay are advertised a new, and its true, but the items, especially electronic items are ones that did not sell in a store for one reason or another. On the ebay auction listing, there is lots of information, the starting price of the item, a picture, shipping information and sometimes a reserve price. Sometimes the seller places a "reserve price" on the item for sale. The auction listing says, for example $10.00, but the "reserve price" is hidden and is usually more than that price, sometimes a lot more. You can bid $11.00 on the item and keep bidding and keep bidding $14.00, $20.00 and on and on, but never win the item. Placing a reserve price on an auction item is dumb. If you want to sell a $10.00 item for $50.00 just put $50.00 as the starting price. Don't waste buyers time with a reserve price. If an item is worth more than you want to sell it at an auction price, or you don't want to sell it, just keep it.

Satellite TV providers

2010-06-03T11:04:00.000-07:00

I get annoyed at some commercials. The ones that really get to me are the ones that complete against each other. Like ATT and Verizon (see my post below). The newest ones that get to me are from DirecTV and Dish network. Both are satellite TV providers. Each one has different channels packages you can add on or purchase separately to make your TV viewing better. But which one is better? Channels are channels, which company has what channels I'm not going to debate. What matters are all the hidden fees you have to pay; both companies have them, so stop with your bragging. Some of these fees are collectable upon insulation, 6 months, or 12 months later, or when you cancel your service. My information comes from the latest flyers I received in the mail. OK Direct TV is first. The flyer says I can get 150 channels for $29.95 a month, sounds pretty good. BUT that’s for a time period of 12 months. After 12 months, the price is automatically increases to $58.99, but that’s not the best part. That price will not kick in until 6 to 8 weeks AFTER your have had the service installed. Plus you have to have an E-mail address and be subject to lots of junk mail. Forget to pay your bill or miss a payment in those 6 to 8 weeks, no more rebates. Cancel your service before the 12 months is up you get to pay an early cancellation fee of $17.00 from Direct TV or $20.00 a month from Dish Network at the time left in your contract. Contract you say, yep both companies want you to sign a contract. Want HD channels? It's a fee of $10.00 a month from Direct TV or you have to sign up for auto pay and paperless billing from Dish Network.
This is just the tip of the ice burg on small print from both satellite TV providers. I guess I will stick with cable.

Keeping what you want, knowing what you need

2010-02-15T12:41:00.000-08:00

I’m not a pack rat, although some may say that after seeing my inside of my garage. But everything I save I some how know I will need it in the near future. What is the near future to me? It could be a few months or a few years. It’s not uncommon for me to have some thing “saved” in my garage that has been there for 6 years and I finally need it. But if I did not have that item saved, could I go out and get it, maybe, find it in an auction on eBay, maybe. I could pay a high price and have to wait a few days for it to get here, maybe. But why do you have to buy when you could have saved it, for free? Here is one good case and point. I have an IBM ThinkPad laptop computer; I have had it for over 8 years. It has Windows 98 installed on it. The processor speed is 500 MHz, pretty slow when you compare it to today’s laptops. For the past few years, it has just been a DVD player for my daughter on long road trips. Well it finally crashed; some of the hard drive files got corrupted. An average person would probably never have or use a computer that was over 8 years old, or even think about restoring it to working order. That’s not me. When I purchased the laptop I got a DVD drive and also a 1.44 floppy drive with it. The drives simply snap in to the laptop. Why would anyone even keep the 1.44 drive when they would only use the DVD drive? I did. I got the 1.44 drive off the shelf, snapped it in. I also found my saved windows 98 restore disk. I booted up the 1.44 drive with the restore disk and I fixed the hard drive. I replaced the 1.44 drive with the DVD drive and the laptop is good as new. The time to find the items I needed, took me less than 5 minutes, keep in mind that the items have been setting on the shelf for 8 years. If I would have had to buy them, I would still be waiting and be out some money.

Cell Phone Coverage

2010-01-27T10:31:00.000-08:00

At&t has a series of TV commercials currently airing. These ads promote all the good things about AT&T’s cell phone network verses Verizons network. Of course, Verizon has completive TV ads showing the opposite. Verizons TV ad shows their networks coverage map with more cell phone network coverage, lots more, that at&t’s map. Funny thing, at&t’s ad never shows their map. At&t’s ad promotes the fact that you can surf the web AND talk at the same time with your web enabled phone. But if your call gets dropped, or you have “no service”, who cares that you can surf and talk at the same time.
In another TV ad, at&t goes on to tell you about their roll over minutes, and how Verizon does not have that feature. If you don’t have any coverage, your rolls over minutes are not going to matter. Plain and simple, coverage is everything. All the features in the world are not going to mean a thing if you do not have cell phone coverage. Isn’t that what cell phones are for, mobility? If you still can’t figure out which cell phone company to use, try Sprint, their network coverage is better than both at&t or Verizon.

Customer Service

2010-01-18T11:29:00.000-08:00

Today I went to pick up a medical prescription for my wife at CVS pharmacy. I know that CVS has higher standards than Wal-Mart, that’s why we choose to go there, or so I though so. Being a paying customer that pays a premium should expect and get excellent customer service. I did not get it this time. One customer service feature CVS offers is a phone call with a prerecorded message, informing you that your prescription is ready. We got that call. Walking up to the pharmacy I mention that I want to pick up a prescription. I give the pharmacist, yes; I was talking to the pharmacist, one on one. Usually you get to talk to a “pharmacy attendant”. He looked in the alphabetical bin to find my wife’s prescription, it was not there. He then types on the computer to make sure I know what I’m talking about and that a prescription IS ready. The computer shows nothing. He consults with a co-worker; I can over hear her say something referencing an old and past medication that my wife no longer takes. By now it’s starting to take longer than expected. Both the co-worker and the pharmacist are looking through all of the bins one by one, medicine by medicine. They finally find it, it was in a bin with a letter no where near my last name. I sign the medicine out going log and pay for the medication. Good thing that is done. In today’s economy, when you pay for customer service you should receive it. What should have taken less than 5 minutes, took over 15 minutes.

Raising prices

2010-01-09T12:58:00.000-08:00

I will admit it; I’m a die hard ebayer. I shop ebay pretty much everyday. Most days there is nothing that I like, but on some days I hit the jackpot with a very good deal. One of the cool features of ebay is the ability to “watch” a favorite item all the way through to the end of the auction bidding. Most items will have no bids until the last day; some get bid up at the very last second. While you are watching an item, and it doesn’t sell, the seller can re-list the item if the auction ended with no bids. The idea of re-listing an item that did not sell is to lower the starting price or shipping charges to make the item more appealing. But in today’s economy, lowering prices is unheard of; raising prices seems to be in style. So until people wake up and start lowering prices, instead of raising them, we will be stuck in this economic slump.

Thank you for making us close our doors

2009-12-17T10:31:00.000-08:00

There is a radio ad currently playing for a jewelry story that is closing their doors, and they want to say thank you to you and me; for what? Not shopping there and forcing them to go out of business? To me, that does not make sense. So the radio ad states that they have marked down their prices “As a special thank you”. Well I have never shopped there, and I obviously never will. So I don’t deserve a special thank you? Why would any retail store want to say thank you for forcing them to close up shop. Usually a store wants to say thank you, by lower their prices AND remaining open. I don’t know if this is some kind of reverse psychology or the store owners really think they are doing us a favor? I doubt it. I bet they would get a better response from the radio ad if they just said “were closing our doors, we have lowered our prices to move the merchandise out the door”. With this economy that makes more sense. After hearing that, I just may go and check out what deals they may have.

Truth in Advertising

2009-11-25T10:52:00.000-08:00

It amazes me; lots of companies that advertise “bend” the truth. What I mean is, to the average consumer, the deals these companies offer sound too good to be true. Take Netflix for example. The radio and TV ads for Netflix state that you can rent as many DVDs as you want to, with a monthly fee. This is true. But what they do not tell you, is that with the basic plan, you can only have one DVD out at a time, and you’re limited to two DVD title exchanges a month. So for about $5.00 a month you can rent two movies. As a bonus, you can watch up to two hours of movies from their new internet video streaming service right to your computer, not to your T.V. Somehow, that deal does not sound that great. You can rent a DVD from a Redbox for about $1.00. The Redbox kiosks are located at shopping centers where you already purchase your food, so getting to a Redbox is not a problem. Returning a Netflix requires you to send back your DVD Before you can get another one. This is way too complicated. Maybe I should not rent any DVDs at all; I will just spend some time with my family.

Getting it done

2009-11-14T10:10:00.000-08:00

If you know of Larry the Cable Guy, then you probably know of one of his famous sayings, ‘Get Ur Done”. With the holidays fast approaching, you really have to hustle to “get it done”. You have your normal daily tasks, if you’re male and married you also have the “honey dos”. Those things take first priority. Combine all of the must dos with what is coming in the days ahead, and you could say your plate is full. But, how do you get everything done? You need quality time for yourself and your family/friends. It has to be a perfect balance. One way that works for me is to make a daily list. Each day I write down on paper the things I need to do. The list is usually five to seven items long. Do I ever get everything on my list accomplished? No. So everything that did not get finished on that day’s list, gets re-written on the next day’s list. The hardest to do things on my list, or the things that I do not want to do; appear on several daily lists, sometimes over a week long. I do eventually get to them, but it takes a while. The list idea kind of works for me, but I do need a better way. Maybe I just need to get off this computer and do some real world tasks.

Privacy policy

2009-11-02T21:42:00.000-08:00

Recently I received a privacy policy from one of my credit card companies. In case you are not familiar with a privacy policy and what it is, let me bring you up to speed. This policy tells you, how the credit card company uses or distributes your personal information. It describes in detail how they get your info, what they do with it and how they can share it with others. It’s really a lot of bull, basically they have your personal information and they can do what ever they want with it. That involves giving it out to “approved” third party companies that have been “careful screened”. You can request that your personal information NOT be given out to third party companies, but that does not stop them from sharing it with their own companies. So your personal information is not on one computer system, but on as many computer systems the credit card company may own. At my last count, this credit card company owns fifteen different companies all of which may have different computer systems and my personal information. I don’t know about you, but that is scary.

Nice, because you have to be

2009-10-28T09:54:00.000-07:00

Maybe it’s me, but I can sense when a person is really being nice and when it’s faked.
Case in point, I go to Jiffy Lube to get my oil changed on my car, nothing new, I have been there lots of times. But with the economy the way it is, everyone that works at this Jiffy Lube seems to be extra nice. They hold the door open for you when you drop off your car. Mention that they have coffee and to relax in their waiting room. When I leave, they hold the exit door open for me to exit, they say “have a nice day, and come back soon”. The service person also opens and closes my car door when I get in to leave. As I pass I look at the workers, they all have smiles on their faces. But it doesn’t feel sincere. It’s faked. They are told to do the nice stuff, “to make the customer feel more comfortable”, so they will come back again. I really don’t care if they hold the door open for me. All I want is a good fast oil change. If they stopped doing all the nice stuff would I come back, yes. It’s the price that drives me to go there, especially on Wednesdays when the standard oil change is about half price. But I guess some customers love the nice stuff, even if it is faked.

Customer Service

2009-10-26T21:33:00.000-07:00

Recently I had a problem with my land line phone service. This problem started when the “760 overlay” went into effect. My phone service is provided by Time Warner Cable here in California. In fact, I have the “bundle” they offer. This includes Cable, High Speed Internet and phone service all together. The issue with my phone was that no one could call in to my home and talk to me. I could call out to anywhere, but no called made it into my home phone. So, no one could phone home. I called Time Warner customer service and spoke to a customer service representative. He was nice, and had me go through some basic testing. What really upset me was that he was reading from a script, doing what he read on the page. He didn’t have the slightest idea how to troubleshoot a phone problem, must less how it worked. After all the basic testing on my end checked out (I knew it would) he attempted to tell me that the problem was not Time Warner’s, but all of the other land line phone companies. That’s a pretty big statement to make when you have to read from a script. His theory was that all of the other phone companies somehow “blocked” my phone number, so no one could call me. I googled phone companies in the USA; and came up with over 100. So what the rep was telling me was that because of the new 760 overlay, ALL of these phone companies have somehow blocked my land line phone number from being called. Sorry, I did not buy it. Then he attempted to tell me that Time Warner was NOT responsible for any incoming calls, only the out going ones. Wonder what he was smoking? I did some research online and found some troubleshooting tips that I could do. One tip stood out. It read to turn on and turn off your call forwarding. I tried it nothing happened, I tried it again, bingo something “clicked” at Time Warner’s central office. That was it that fixed my problem. Now why did I waste so much of my time talking to someone who is supposed to know something but didn’t?

People doing the wrong thing

2009-10-22T11:18:00.000-07:00

Part of my job includes me getting price quotes and other information from manufactures for parts we need using email. Lately, I have been running into road blocks in getting the correct part information in a timely manor. This does not help when you have project deadlines. One example, I contact a new manufactures sales representative for part number and pricing information. The rep emails me back asking when he can meet with me. I don’t want to smooze, or meet with him; I just want to get some very basic part information. I just want the part number and price. That’s all, nothing else. If this was some multi-million dollar program, then ok, Ill meet with you, but its not. Just send me the dam information so everyone can get on with what they have to do. Another example, I have a broken part and I need a replacement. I can’t read the last digit on the printed part number; it’s either a “1” or an “l”. I email the company and try to get a price quote with the incomplete part number. You would think they could some how look up the missing part number or try both variables of the part number. Nope, they respond “That number is not in our system” They don’t even think to try to get creative and try an “l” instead of a “1”. Everything is black and white, cut and dry. It’s almost like the reps are robots, unable or unwilling to do any thing extra that might make it easier for me, the customer.

Money Game

2009-10-16T09:26:00.000-07:00

The economy is starting to show signs of a recovery. However not everyone is contributing. Mainly, the large food stories and what they are doing. About a year ago, the food stores basically kept their food prices the same. They did not lower them, some even increased prices. The food stories had their daily sales and newspaper fliers send out every week. But the prices never made a big drop. Now, all the food stores are advertising “thousands of new lower prices” and “we’ve lowered our prices for you”. Why didn’t they lower their prices back a year ago? If they had, we might be in less of a financial mess than we are now.
Same issue with gasoline prices; a year ago the gasoline prices were about $1.75 per gallon. Last month, the price was increased to $3.00 a gallon. Currently, the price is hovering at the $3.00 mark. The pricing is based on a simple economic rule, supply and demand. The gas stations know they have a product people need, why not raise the price and keep raising the price until the demand slows. When the demand slows, just a little bit, drop the price a few pennies. Wait a few weeks and raise it more than when you started. Slowly bump the price up a little bit by bit. Drop it again and then raise it more. It’s a sad game to oil companies play with us. But you need gas to go to work, so you have to spend money to make money.

Techno-smeckno

2009-10-13T10:19:00.001-07:00

I’m not a techno-geek, but I do love all the cool things new technology brings. I don’t have the newest, greatest and fastest computer. I do not own a blu-ray player, but I am thinking about getting one. But, what bothers me is that when a new high tech item comes out, lots of folks have to have it right now. Sure they get to pay a higher price, than if they just waited a few months. But I guess it all has to do with today’s society. You could call it the “”I need it, and I want to pay a higher price, but I really don’t need it” society. If people would have some patience, things would be better. Now I’m not talking about waiting a long time to upgrade, you do have to upgrade sometime just not at the same moment something new comes out. Because you don’t have the newest thing it will take you a few more second more to get one of your tasks completed. This could be a good thing. You could get the newest hottest cell phone or blu-ray player cheaper if you just wait. But waiting is not “fashionable” nowadays. So I guess you could call me a delayed techno-geek.

To New Cell Phone or Not

2009-10-09T09:27:00.000-07:00

I have a Moto Razr cell phone that I use. It’s nice, and I have had no problems with it. It has survived several falls, once in a sink with running water. I really don’t use it all that much, maybe twice a day. I have had the phone now for over two years. My cell phone provider, which is at&t, has a program where you can “trade up” to a new cell phone every two years. They offer the newest and greatest phone. This time around, they are offering the iPhone. Not the iPhone 3G version, but the first one that came out about three years ago. The iPhone is way cool, with its apps (that’s short of applications, or programs) for almost every need. I can switch if I need to make some king of statement, but I don’t. Of course, if I do switch I get to renew my cell phone agreement for another two years. Its not a big deal to renew, I would probably keep my Razr phone for another few years. The service is good, very few dropped calls and no other problems. So I do not have any reason to get a new phone, or to renew my agreement for another 2 years. Yes, without an agreement at&t can raise my rate or change my plan at will. So I am faced with this minor problem; renew and get a cool new iPhone, or just keep everything the same. I really don’t like the iPhone, I do like the calm shell design of the Razr. But I don’t feel comfortable being “locked in” to a new two year agreement.

Being Green

2009-10-05T10:17:00.000-07:00

You have heard the term “being green” or “are you going green” this doesn’t apply to the color green. It’s a new way of life; one that cuts or reduces pollution, or recycles something to so has a new life. Saving and recycling aluminum cans is one way to be “green”. Changing out your old light bubs in your home to the new compact fluorescent lighting (CFL) is another way. Switching to these new CFL bulbs will save money, plus they will reduce the overall power usage. The cost of these CFL at Wal-Mart is less then a dollar since the cost is offset by the electric company. So that means the electric company will basically pay you to buy these new CLF bulbs at Wal-Mart. These new CFL bulbs are nice, they are bright, and give off a brighter color of white light then the basic light bulb. But like any electric device, these CFL bulbs do fail and just burn out. What do you do with them? Here in California, we are not supposed to toss these brunt out CFL bulbs in the trash, we are supposed to take them to a hazard waste materials center, Huh? Yep. Because these CFL contain mercury, it must be disposed of properly according to mandates by the State. But what happens to all the CFL bulbs accumulated? It costs a lot of money to remove the mercury from these CFL bulbs. I know the state of California does not have any money to fund the recycling of CFL. The only option is to crush them and send them to South America for “disposal” so it’s not our problem any more. And the best part, California stays green. There are private programs in place that will recycle fluorescent bulbs, but it is costly, since the costs must be paid upfront.

Where is the respect?

2009-10-02T09:22:00.000-07:00

Rodney Dangerfield said it best, “I get no respect”. Unfortunately it is true in today’s society. No one has any respect for anyone else. Back 20 or so years ago, people respected each other, not so any more. Personal property is continually tagged by spraying painting teens; Shopping carts are taken from stores and are left in the front yards of others. Little things like leaving your parked car driver side door open when you go to your trunk, this forces passing motorist to swerve around to avoid hitting it. Cursing and rude remarks that should not be voiced are on a daily basis. At Wal-Mart, I was just finishing placing my purchased items in my trunk, I was not hurrying, just going normal speed, when a driver yells “Go ahead and take your time” at me. Apparently she wanted my parking space. Was she in a hurry, probably, do I care, no. She did not respect me, no; so I just returned the favor. If she respected me, she would have found another space near by or just not voiced anything and patently waited. Everyone is out for themselves, no one else cares. The saying “It’s all for one” takes on a new meaning, it’s not about a group; it’s now about a single person.

Getting Sick

2009-10-01T11:02:00.000-07:00

Now days when you get sick with a sinus or head cold and just don’t feel good, it’s a bad thing. Back 20 years ago when you got sick, and you missed work; it was no big deal, your co-workers pitched in to help you. You were never penalized. Now, when you are sick and you miss work, you get assessed some sort of points, the more points, the closer you are to getting fired. Besides getting points at work while you’re gone, you’re missed work piles up; things that only you can do don’t get done. What about your home? If you have to clean up and mop the floor, it doesn’t get done, so the dirt and grime just builds up; making it harder to clean the next time you are feeling better. If you need to coach your son’s baseball game, you have to do that, but you’re doing it just because you agreed to, and there was no sick clause. When you don’t feel well, the things to can do don’t get done as fast or as good as you would like to have them done. So many times you have to go back and fix what you did when you were sick because it was not right, not up to your standards. When you’re sick you just want to lie down and rest, but you can’t.

Christmas Is Coming

2009-09-28T22:56:00.000-07:00

I was out shopping at Lowe’s the other day and noticed that they have displayed Christmas decorations.
It’s not even Halloween yet and the stores are decorating and displaying Christmas decorations. What is this world coming to? Ha! I fooled you into thinking I was just another person who thinks Christmas is just another holiday. The fact is, I love Christmas, the earlier the stories bring out the Christmas decorations the better. I love to look at the lights, the sounds, the little villages, I love it all. But the best thing about Christmas is the effect my decorations have on small kids. Yes, I decorate my home up right, with all the lights and sounds. I love to look at small kids and how their eyes grow larger with amazement just looking at the lights. My daughter is also one of those kids, seeing her face light up is such a joy to watch when I plug in the lights on the Christmas tree or turn on the outside Christmas decorations. Christmas is a total joy for my family. One last thing, we should never forget the reason of the season, Jesus.

760 Area Code Change

2009-09-26T12:25:00.000-07:00

Coming this October, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) will make it harder for me to call my next door neighbor on the phone. Instead of just dialing the seven digit phone number like we do now, I will have to dial ten digits, the 3 digit area code AND the 7 digit phone number. While I know this really doesn’t sound like a big deal, it is, and it gets better. If I want to get a second line into my home or if I need to change my phone number, I will get a new area code and a new number! So if my neighbor wants to call me on my new number, they will have to dial a new area code AND a new number. Even though we live about 500 feet away from each other, we will each have different area codes to dial for our home phones. Is that messed up or what? All this happens because the current 760 area code phone numbers will be used up very soon. Instead of just splitting the area code into two sections, and adding a new area code to the new section. We ALL have to dial the area codes, old or new. The CPUC calls this an overlay of area codes. The real reason of the overlay, instead of a split, is a few folks, about 100,000 of them. They all live in the north San Diego county area. They did not want to change their business cards and stationary to a new area code. Instead, they get to keep there current area code and phone number, in fact, every one gets to keep their same area code and phone number. Except we ALL get to dial 10 digits instead of just 7. Keeping track of which area code to use is going to be a real challenge.

Head Lice

2009-09-24T14:40:00.000-07:00

Well it finally happened, my daughter got head lice. We are not sure how she got it, the word is that some how she touched someone else’s head, since head lice do not fly or jump. We figure it was obviously from school. My wife got some RID head lice removal stuff from Wal-Mart. I guess it removed the living creatures, but in our case, they already laid their eggs. The head lice eggs are called nits. Head lice live of your blood from your scalp and the hair shafts make it idea for them to hide, relax and eat. They lay their eggs about ½ an inch from the scalp on the hair shafts. These eggs are really small and stick to the shafts with a stick that is stronger than glue. You can try to remove these eggs, but they do not come off easily. Surfing the internet, there are lots of chemicals you can buy with and without a doctors prescription to cure head lice and to get rid of the nits. But it’s not an over night process, and none of them work really well. You may get some results, but the process of shampooing and combing the complete scalp with a metal tooth comb makes the whole ordeal very hard. My daughter only seems to have a less than 20 eggs on her hair shafts. I think the best way to get rid of them is to just cut the single hairs out, nit and all. Bingo, no more head lice. I really don’t think my daughter will miss 30 strands of hair. To make things worse, my daughter is not allowed back in school until she is nit free.

Up Out and About

2009-09-23T13:07:00.000-07:00

Today was an easy day, as compared to past days. This one I had to just complete a few errands. I jumped in to my wife’s van to get it gassed up for a trip to the Honda center in Anaheim tonight. The time was already past 10am. From past experience, I know the later you put gas in a vehicle, the more it will evaporate and the less you get. So it was important to put gas into a vehicle as early in the day as possible. After gassing up the van, I went over to the natural foods store to get some snacks for the trip. We don't like eating high fructose corn syrup so we try to purchase food that does not contain it. The trick is to read the food labels. Some food manufactures try to hide the fact that their product has that nasty chemical in it. They list it near the bottom of the ingredient list. It doesn't fool me. After the natural food store, I wanted to go to Wendy's and try their new boneless chicken wings with my favorite, a chocolate frosty. Since I have never tried the boneless wings from Wendy's, I was eager. I love chicken nuggets from almost any fast food place, but Wendy’s nuggets are the best. Wendy's adds one of three sauces to their wings, bold buffalo, Honey BBQ and an Asian flavor. I opted to try the bold buffalo flavor. I love hot foods, so this was going to be a treat. The service was fast, so my mouth did not have a change to water for long. The sauce to a little sloppy, but that did not stop me. I bit in to the boneless chicken wing. WOW, the flavor filled my mouth. It was hot tasting, just how I like it. The crunch of the chicken coating was fantastic, not soggy at all. I finished off all 5 pieces and a matter of minutes. I chased the good and hot flavor with the frosty. The cool ness on my throat mixed with the hotness left over was true taste sensation. I drove home slowly, savoring the taste and thinking about the next time I will get the chance to try the Wendy's boneless wings again.