Mary Anne Carter » Business

A great fuel alternative

Mary Anne — Mon, 10 May 2010 10:23:23 +0000

I was sitting in a doctor’s office Thursday, reading a very old Time magazine dated March 24, 2008. There was a very intriguing article about how a scientist named Blen Kertz from Vertigro Energy is developing a way to turn algae into biodiesel fuel that can be burned by cars, trucks, and airplanes. According to the article, if this process is pursued we could develope enough fuel from algae to meet the transportation needs of the entire United States! Wouldn’t that be WONDERFUL! I found an article on the Internet regarding the same story, you can read it by clicking here. They also have a video about it, you can watch that by clicking here.

Incredible rechargeable flashlight

Mary Anne — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 00:49:36 +0000

My brother loves to collect gadgets. He is always spending his disposable income on the latest and greatest gadget he can find. He came over today to show off his new flashlight that he just bought over the Internet. This new flashlight that he bought is a LED flashlight that is rechargeable, requires no batteries, and runs for an hour on just one charge.
What a showoff he is!

Cool conversion software

Mary Anne — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 03:17:46 +0000

My kids have been telling me that they found a website that converts audio and video files from one format to another. They said it is a new program that is quick and easy to use, and that the company is offering a free trial download of the program. They lost me when they started talking about video encoding. I’m embarrassed to say I don’t even know what video encoding is! I feel so old!

Modern bedroom furniture

Mary Anne — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 12:03:51 +0000

Modern Bedroom Furniture is what my niece says she wants for her new apartment. She is moving out of her parents’ house for the first time in a few months, and she is looking for modern furniture for her new place. She came over yesterday to rummage around my basement and see if I had any “hand me down” furniture items she could have. She says her biggest hope for her Modern Bedroom Furniture is to have a really great Modern Platform Bed.

She says she has been looking at furniture from the eroomservice.com website and has found several different platform beds that she likes a lot. She hasn’t yet made up her mind which one she wants, but has narrowed it down to four favorites. She said that the website sells some really nice bedroom sets and that she is trying to decide whether to buy the complete set, or just the bed and then try to do some mix and match with the rest of the bedroom furniture.

She found a couple of modern lamps in my basement that she liked that I wasn’t using – my house isn’t decorated in the modern style, and these lamps were given to me by a friend. I told her she was welcome to take them, and she was thrilled.

Outlet store vs discount store

Mary Anne — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 18:40:14 +0000

I was reading an article on Businessweek’s website that was talking about how a lot of the big “snob” companies like Sak’s Fifth avenue is opening more outlet stores, in the hopes that they will attract more customers to the outlet store’s lower prices. The article confused me a little bit because I had read many years ago that “outlet stores” were not necessarily a “discount store” and that when people shop at outlet stores looking for a “bargain” they usually are not really getting a “bargain.” What they are often getting are closeouts, over-runs, or factory seconds.

After I had learned that “outlet stores” were really not “discount” stores I pretty much avoided them. So now I’m wondering if “outlet” stores are changing their strategy and really ARE offering bargains now!

Sun shield for my car

Mary Anne — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 08:25:28 +0000

When we bought my Lumina I told my hubby that one of the first things I wanted to buy for it was a quality sun shield for the windshield. I bought a “universal” sun shield at my local big box discount department store but it does not fit well and keeps falling down. But this week I finally smartened up and realized that I can not just put my visors down to help keep it in place, but I can take them out of their little holder brackets and put them down at an angle, and that works perfectly!

Maple syrup shortage?

Mary Anne — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 18:44:08 +0000

I remember reading last year that there is a maple syrup shortage from Canada that is effecting the price of food. I did not realize that Canada makes 80% of the world’s maple syrup! Many consumers have been switching to maple syrup as a sweetener in their baking products so the demand for maple syrup has been increasing. Canada had a mild spring this year, which lowered their maple syrup production. New England, however, had a banner year and had lots of maple syrup.

As I was reading this story I found myself wondering why it took so long for this story about Canada having a mild spring (effecting the maple syrup supply) to enter the news media – their spring was six months ago for crying out loud!

And I was surprised to learn that so much syrup came from Canada because when I buy maple syrup at the store it always says it was from a New England state!

I wonder how the supply is this year!

Penny pinching

Mary Anne — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 16:34:33 +0000

With the economy the way it is today, I want to make absolutely sure that I am getting the best value for my hard earned dollar when I have to spend it. This applies to every aspect of my daily life, from groceries, to clothes and shoes, laundry supplies, to home improvement, and even to work on my car. That means that I am spending the extra time to research the credentials of everyone and everything that I possibly can. Was it Ben Franklin who said “A penny saved is a penny earned”? Well, I’m not earning enough pennies, that is for sure, so I need to save all those I can get my hands on!

Gas prices continue to increase

Mary Anne — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 18:27:50 +0000

With Hurricane Ike bearing down on the Gulf Coast, the price of gas is going up again. It seems lately that any and everything seems to be an excuse to raise the price of gas! I understand that there is concern that the refineries might be damaged and that will cause an oil/gas shortage. I sure wish that “we” (and by “we” I mean this country) would aggressively pursue finding other sources of energy so we could end our dependency on fossil fuels forever! I think that what the American consumer is going through over gasoline prices is simply highway robbery!

Auto body work

Mary Anne — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 02:22:09 +0000

My hubby was looking at my car a few days ago and declared that we need to take it to an auto body shop to have the roof repaired. He said that they were going to have to remove the windshield and cut away part of the roof due to rusting. He has done a lot of auto body work himself, and said he was not comfortable doing this himself; he wanted to let the experts handle this job. We’ll be looking for one of the Collision Repair Experts companies to do the work; we’ve heard that they are the best in the business.

Had a flat tire today

Mary Anne — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 00:40:30 +0000

On my way home from work I had a flat tire. I was glad it was on the way home from work, and not on the way TO work, as it would have made me late for work and the office has a pretty tough “tardy” policy. (Note to self – look for a new job, these people are not very nice!)

I was very glad that I have AAA insurance for just this kind of thing, I used my cell phone to call them and they sent a truck out with a guy to change my tire. I’m really glad my spare was good! So tomorrow I have to take my old tire to the tire shop and see if it can be repaired, or if I will need a new one. The guy who changed my tire seemed to think I was going to need a new one, and I suspect he’s right. If it isn’t one thing, it’s another! Money doesn’t seem to sit in my bank account very long!

Wonderful seafood recipes

Mary Anne — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 20:37:25 +0000

The word is out that there is a Great American Seafood Cook off happening in New Orleans. The cook off is supposed to be using domestic sustainable seafood recipes. This cook off is one of the most prestigious contests. The winning chef will win the title of King of American Seafood. I went onto the Internet to find out what I could about the contest.

I’m very excited about the event because it is featuring local, fresh food instead of something foreign, frozen or canned. I think that promoting local seafood is important. I’d love to be able to enter my Aunt Johnnie’s baked seafood recipe in a seafood cooking contest!

This is her recipe:

Aunt Johnnie’s baked seafood casserole

1 pound of fish (suggests scallops, shrimp, or crab)

2 T butter (or oleo)

2 T flour

1 c chicken broth

1/8 t nutmeg

salt & pepper

Parmesan cheese

Bread crumbs

To make veloute sauce: In a saucepan, melt butter, stir in flour, slowly add broth. Return to heat, stirring constantly until thick & smooth. Blend in salt & pepper & nutmeg. In a separate frying pan saute fish in butter for approximately five minutes. Combine the fish with the veloute sauce and put all in a shallow baking dish. Sprinkle top with bread crumbs and Parmesan cheese and brown it quickly under the broiler.

This recipe does not specify what KIND of bread crumbs to use, whether to buy the canned seasoned bread crumbs, or crumbs made from fresh bread. So I’ve tried it both ways and I think I like the the fresh bread crumbs version the best.

If you’d like to share your favorite recipe with me, I’d love to hear from you! Feel free to leave a comment with your recipe in it!

Tried a new dinner entree last night

Mary Anne — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 17:40:32 +0000

I had a coupon for a Smithfield’s seasoned pork roast, so I decided to buy one last week and we tried it out last night. It was the one that is seasoned with herbs and stuffed with Wild Rice. It took longer to cook than it was supposed to, which I guess is normal for most roasts – it is aggravating when the directions say 22 minutes per pound and you have 1 1/2 pounds and it takes an hour to cook! I know the temperature on my oven is good, I bought TWO oven thermometers and they say it is right on. Anyway, it took longer to cook than it was supposed to, which is aggravating.

I guess my entire family is not a big fan of heavily seasoned items, we found this to be way too spicy hot with black pepper and way too heavy on the garlic. We would have liked it much better if the seasoning was cut in half. I might buy it again and then wipe off half of the seasoning before cooking it!

I was hoping for grilled burgers tonight

Mary Anne — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 03:34:43 +0000

When I got home this evening I was hoping that my hubby was going to cook burgers on the grill outside. I love it when he cooks burgers on the grill outside. Let’s face it, I love it when he cooks ANYTHING outside! Probably largely due to the fact that leaves me with one less pot or pan to clean up from cooking inside! But also I like it during the summer because it helps to keep the house from getting overheated from cooking inside. During the summertime, cooking outside is definitely the way to keep a house cooler!

But my hubby was asleep when I got home, and he stayed asleep so I had to fend for myself. I don’t like cooking on the grill outside. I don’t know why the propane grill makes me nervous, I guess it’s because I have to make sure to turn the propane on and off again and I’m afraid I’ll forget. Or maybe it’s the open flame, but I rather doubt that because I cook with propane inside! I think I’d really like to buy one of the Outdoor Electric Grills for me to cook on, I would not be as nervous about that. I’d probably keep it in the garage, though, and leave the garage door open.

Curtains add so much to a room

Mary Anne — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 22:53:50 +0000

I used to work with a woman who had bare naked windows. She lived out in the woods, with no neighbors in sight, and she loved having no window coverings at all. She showed me pictures of the different rooms, she was very proud of the fact that her windows were bare. Although she DID have some hanging plants in front of the windows and some shelves with plants in front of some windows, for the most part I thought that the windows looked too sterile; I feel that curtains add a lot of personality and warmth to a room. I also feel that insulated curtains are a good idea to help save energy and reduce heating and cooling costs. I’m always all about saving energy and heating and cooling costs!