This is a very sad situation and I would like to strongly encourage anyone out there that is reading this that they should buy enough life insurance to at least pay off their house should they die.

So I decided to cook it in the crock-pot in our garage, where the stink wouldn’t bother us. It worked out just fine, I kept the big garage door open to help the stink escape the garage, and a fan blowing to circulate the air out as much as possible. So I plan to do that in the future, too, when cooking something stinky in the crock-pot!

When he came to us, he was not housebroken or obedience trained in any way.  That’s one reason I thought he was a puppy.  Turns out that he was NOT a puppy, he had all his adult teeth!  But, apparently he was kenneled outdoors with other dogs, and never trained.  We found out that he was deaf and partially blind!

That made training the little guy very challenging, since he can’t hear, and can barely see!

So far, we have made great progress in the housebreaking department, and have trained him with hand signals (and treats!) to walk with a leash, come, sit, shake hands (paws) and lie down.  We are working on the fetch, but he only will do it as long as he is interested in playing tug of war with us when he brings the toy back to us.  I’d like to train him to do more tricks, but he is resisting the roll over training.

Her company knew how many vehicles you have, whether you voted Democrat or Republican, what brand of cigarettes you smoke, if any, and all kinds of personal information. They then sold that information to companies to be used in telemarketing and direct mail advertising campaigns.

Telemarketing has become much more sophisticated now. The information used by the telemarketers is more accurate so calls aren’t wasted on people that don’t qualify, and the calls are better targeted to the demographics and lifestyles of people who might be interested.

Small companies can now use telemarketing in select markets to their advantage. It doesn’t have to be a bad word – you should check out some of the good things that telemarketing can do. And with the price of postage going up again, it may make more sense to use the telephone instead of the mailman to deliver your company’s message.

I just joined my local Freecycle group and spent some time looking at the offers of things that people want to give away.  I just got a perfectly good used crock-pot and some crock-pot cookbooks!  Now I’m going to have to pick out some recipes and start using it!

So I hope this year will be a good one for me and for you. Stay safe, be kind, and laugh every day.

Happy New Year!