Mary Anne Carter » Opinion

Pest control

Mary Anne — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 01:19:24 +0000

One of the things that has bothered me ever since we moved down here is how many ticks there seem to be. Almost every time my family spends more than a couple of minutes outdoors, they seem to be coming inside and finding a tick or two trying to make itself at home. I’ve never been very good at removing ticks, it seems that even though I try really hard to remove them correctly the head seems to stay in the bite and then there is a swelling around the bite that takes a very long time to fade away.

The folks on the Yahoo groups that I belong to are frequently writing about how they keep a small flock of backyard chickens to help keep the ticks at bay. In addition they say that they enjoy all of the fresh eggs that they could possibly want. From time to time they offer up some chickens for sale and my hubby and I discuss the ins and outs of owning chickens. My biggest concerns involve predators and who would care for them if we went on vacation. I really don’t think we just dump a bunch of chicken feed in a trough and leave them for a week.

Wouldn’t you know it

Mary Anne — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 17:24:03 +0000

When I was younger I saw a really pretty spice rack for sale that just “spoke to me.” Now, you might think that is rather weird, that I am a person that speaks to spice racks, but what I really mean is that for some crazy reason I simply fell in love with it. It was a wall spice rack, and it had a country look to it that just made me feel “at home” for some reason. I don’t know, maybe it reminded me of the spice rack in my grandmother’s kitchen and I never realized it. But the thing is I bought it on a crazy impulse and brought it home with me. Wouldn’t you know it my hubby hated it and told me that he did not want it in our kitchen. So it was relegated to the basement for a very long time.

When my hubby and I split up and I moved out i brought that spice rack with me, intended to mount it on the wall of my new kitchen. Wouldn’t you know it, all of the kitchen walls were completely filled up with cupboards so there was no space to put that rack on the wall! I did find space for it on the counter, though, beside the stove and there is where it stayed for a good number of years.

Eventually all of the original bottles from the spice rack broke and I could not find replacement bottles that fit, so the little rack got “freecycled” away when I moved again. Now I store my spices in my pantry, and have tried various methods of storing them, but I really have not found a suitable system for the spices. I miss that rack!

This crazy family needs to learn to communicate better

Mary Anne — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 22:56:13 +0000

For several years now my younger sister has had an ADT Home Security that she signed a two year contract for, and although she has been happy with the Home Alarm System she has been trying to get someone else to take over the contract for her because ever since her hubby died she has been struggling financially. So she has talked to everyone in the family several times about how she is trying to do that, and if someone in the family decides that they are interested in Home Security Systems of some sort to please consider taking over her contract.

Apparently the company told her that even if she moved out of her house that she would still be responsible to pay the remainder of the contract. Her house is currently for sale because she cannot afford the mortgage payments anymore and she is trying to get out from under it. So when we found out that our own mother went out and bought herself a security system instead of taking over my sisters, we were really upset. This crazy family needs to learn to communicate better – my mother could have taken over the contract and had a perfectly wonderful system!

Reducing the costs

Mary Anne — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:58:36 +0000

When I keep hearing that the United States Post Office is struggling financially and is looking for ways to reduce the cost of running the organization, I immediately think about how much money they could save if the stopped individual home delivery six days a week and instead delivered to cluster mailboxes five days a week.

The reason that I think this would help them save money is because if they only delivered mail to a neighborhood centralized clustered mailbox then they would reduce the amount of time that the delivery person had to actually go to deliver the mail. In addition, if they used commercial cluster mailboxes that had a lock and key to them, the mail would be very secure.

And delivering the mail only five days a week instead of six days a week would reduce costs tremendously, don’t you agree? I know I wouldn’t mind not getting the mail delivered on a Saturday – sometimes I don’t even like to leave the house on a Saturday to go down to the mailbox and get the mail!

Gift baskets

Mary Anne — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 04:13:39 +0000

One of the many gifts that I like to give is a gift basket. Sometimes I like to make them up myself of lots of little things that I’ve made, either crafting or cooking, or a combination of the two. Doing that pretty much ensures that they are not getting a duplicate gift that someone else has given them.

Sometimes life gets hectic, and an unexpected gift giving occasion arrives and time doesn’t allow the luxury of making the gifts. That’s when buying a gourmet gift basket comes to the rescue. There are so many gourmet gift baskets on the market, it is pretty easy to find one that will suit almost any occasion and please any recipient.

I’d like to do a reverse painting on a clear vessel sink

Mary Anne — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 03:40:37 +0000

When I go to visit Tom, I always end up having to use his restroom when I arrive because it takes over an hour to get to his place, and often I won’t have the chance to find a restroom for quite a while later. The guest bathroom features a very pretty clear vessel sink with gun metal gray vessel sink faucets.

Whenever I go into that bathroom, when I wash my hands I always look at the sink and think about how much I would enjoy doing some reverse painting patterns on
vessel sinks and I wonder if I bought some and painted them whether or not I would try to sell them or keep them. I have found that when I do some decorative painting on objects that I sometimes have a hard time “letting go” of the object when I’m finished with the job. Do you think that is normal or do you think that is odd?

Tom Kincaid paintings

Mary Anne — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 20:10:48 +0000

My sister in law loves Tom Kincaid paintings. She is convinced that they are a good investment, and has spent a small fortune buying them. I’ve noticed that most of the paintings that she has that bear his signature are of old English-style cottages with window boxes that are overflowing with some kind of cascading plant. I can’t really see the detail of the flower boxes very closely to be able to tell for sure if the plant is a trailing petunia or a creeping garden phlox, or even cascading rose buds, but I do have to admit that having that
windowbox full of flowers on the painting adds a lot of charm to the painting.

One thing worries me, though. If I recall correctly I saw a special about the Tom Kincaid dynasty and I worry that my sister is over-valuing her collection. Sure, they are limited editions, but there are thousands of them out there. Not quite as valuable as if the limited edition only had less than a dozen. I guess only time will tell, and for now she is just as happy as a pig in mud with her collection, so who am I to rain on her parade? As a famous advice columnist advises from time to time “MYOB.”

Great review site for gadgets

Mary Anne — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 12:05:07 +0000

The publishers of Stuff – a leading magazine dedicated to reviewing gadgets – have created a website that is also dedicated to reviewing gadgets. So now everyone that is interested in learning more about the existing, or upcoming gadgets out there in the world of commerce has a place to turn when they want to learn more about them. They cover just about everything you can imagine in the gadgetry world, leaning heavily on the electronics such as digital cameras, cell phones, televisions, and computers (just to name a few!)

The website has lots of different sections that you can go to. My two favorite links on the website are the Top Tens and the Reviews pages. In addition to those links, it has blogs, news, videos, and it has forums. It even has contests to win prizes; the only hitch is that you have to register as a user of the website. That’s shouldn’t be a problem, registration is free!

Special anniversary gift

Mary Anne — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 22:39:24 +0000

Our tenth anniversary is coming up in a couple of weeks, and I’m starting to get really excited because I have a hunch that my hubby is going to give me one of his late aunt’s anniversary rings diamond that he inherited when she passed. That woman always had to most beautiful jewelry! That was one of the things that we had in common, a love for the sparkly jewelry!

Family gatherings are matches of wits around here!

Mary Anne — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 22:30:24 +0000

We have a large family, and we like to get together for big family reunions and meals. My mother recently married (after being widowed) a man who lives for teasing people and making sarcastic remarks.

Well, my entire family is quick witted, and we have a great time sharpening our teeth and using sarcasm right back on this man! He tries so hard to get the “upper hand” but he doesn’t have a chance against us! It’s very funny to see how hard he tries, and yet always ends up licking his wounds. It’s very ironic because he is always the one who starts the “match of wits!”

Making the best decision

Mary Anne — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 21:03:12 +0000

The article written by Alonso Kramer

I was trying to use thewww.texaselectricityproviders.com/ website to figure out what the best options were for my energy utilities. I really need something I can rely on. At my one of my old houses, we had some problems with the provider. My husband and I always felt like we were being overcharged and it seemed like the electricity would cut out randomly for what seemed like no reason. We both decided we really wanted to do our research for the next house and avoid the same problem. We are set to move into our new house next month. We are both really excited. It is a lot bigger and a lot nicer than our first house together. However, since it is so big, I am a bit concerned about the price of our utilities and if we can handle it. My husband told me that he really thinks we will be fine. I just get a bit concerned because electricity is essential. I do not want to be strained for money so making the decision for the most cost-efficient and reliable source would be ideal for me right now.

Maintenance plans/extended warranties

Mary Anne — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 11:40:15 +0000

A lot of people tell me that maintenance/extended warranty plans are a gimmick and a waste of money, but I have found that when I pay for when, I usually end up using the service and it ends up paying for itself several times over. In this day and age of “planned obsolescence” I find that most products die within a week of the warranty period being over! So, I buy the maintenance/extended warranty if it is available and the item is expensive.

Making old pets comfortable

Mary Anne — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 02:03:45 +0000

Poor Squeaky is getting so old and uncomfortable with her arthritis that I decided that we really needed to buy her a couple of memory foam dog beds to use. One in the living room, and one in the bedroom. That way she can sleep near us and be more comfortable while doing it. Unfortunately the durn cat has decided that he wanted to use them as supplemental kitty litter boxes, and after several attempts to clean them appropriately and prevent the cat from repeatedly soiling them, we determined that we needed to replace them with waterproof/weatherproof orthopedic dog beds.

Our hope was that the waterproof dog beds would be able to be washed off easily enough for the odor to be eliminated, but that was not to be. After a couple of weeks of constantly cleaning those dog beds, we ended up just putting them outside in the hope that the sun and the rain would deodorize them.
You may suggest that we “get rid of “ the cat, and although we did discuss that as an alternative solution, his advancing age was also something we had to consider.

How much longer can it last?

Mary Anne — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 03:59:08 +0000

When I listen to the news about how the U.S. Postal service is struggling to stay afloat, I think about all of the competition that it faces – the UPS and Fed Ex are the largest competitors for packages, and for letters and documents the competitors are fax machines and the World Wide Web. People nowadays have a lot of options to choose from when it comes to delivery services. Sometimes I start to wonder if actually putting mail in our residential mailboxes might become a thing of the past.

I wouldn’t be terribly surprised if home delivery of the mail was cut down to only a couple of days a week, or even eliminated completely in favor of people having to pick up their mail in a central location like cluster mailboxes at the intersections of their roads, or like commercial mailboxes in a post office or a general store, like in the old days when the post office was just delivering mail by pony express. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that we would revert back to ponies, just that the mail delivery would end at the posts office and people would have to come get it from there.

Worn out clothes – the modern day

Mary Anne — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 15:13:33 +0000

Nowadays it appears that many kids are too lazy to “earn” worn out clothes the old fashioned way by buying new clothes and then wearing them long enough and hard enough to get the “worn out” look the honest and old fashioned way. They want to go to the stores and buy clothes that look like they have already been worn out by someone who had class, who then donated the clothes to the homeless shelter, and when the homeless person died the clothes were then sent to a high priced retail store to be sold for $50- $80 to some rich spoiled kids who want to look like they had done something more than sit on their butts and spend their parent’s hard earned money on clothes that should be in the rag pile. You can buy clothes that look exactly like that at the Goodwill store for $2 or less!

I think that if parents allow their kids to spend their money in that way, they should be ashamed of themselves. What a waste of money, and what a terrible message to send to the kids – you don’t have to work hard to make it look like you worked hard. I think it is a form of “cheating” and I don’t like cheaters!