Mary Anne Carter
Mary Anne has her own blog now
Tag Archives: life
May 10 2012

Tired of junk mail

by Mary Anne

I don’t know about you, but I get so tired of all of the junk mail that I get almost every day. What irritates me even more is all of the resources that are wasted producing and delivering the junk mail! When I get junk mail, sometimes I shred it, sometimes I just toss it in the trash.  Sometimes, if it has a postage-paid return envelope in it I will tear up everything except the postage-paid return envelope, put it all inside the postage-paid return envelope and mail it back to the company that sent it to me.

I think that the US Post Office continues to raise the rates of stamps because they are not getting enough work (competing with Email, UPS, FedEx, etc) so this is a relatively painless way to give them more work at the expense of some other company! So, it is creating a little bit of job security for the Post Office workers, and some job security for the people who end up opening the envelope at the company it is going to! And, hopefully, their company recycles (most big companies do) so maybe the papers will get recycled there instead of filling up the junk yards in the local municipalities!

Categories: Around the House, Business, Life, Local, Opinion | No Comments »

May 5 2012

Dressing up the cluster mailboxes

by Mary Anne

I don’t know about you, but I’ve never really paid a lot of attention to cluster mailboxes up until now. Seems to me that they have simply been very Spartan and utilitarian in design. After all, how can you really make a group of cluster mailboxes visually appealing? Well, today I saw some photographs of some cluster mailboxes that had been accessorized with finial tops and decorative pedestal wraps and they looked like they were part of a Victorian themed amusement park.

You may think that I’m being a little bit crazy here, and to be honest I would normally have to agree with you. But when I saw these mailboxes all gussied up like that my mind wandered to memories of wonderful vacations that I had spent in luxurious surroundings. Thoughts of Norman Rockwell settings of a time and a place when life was less frenzied, and more serene. Odd, I know, but there it is!

Categories: Around the House, Life, Memories, Opinion, Shopping, Travel | Comments Off

Feb 8 2012

Life skills

by Mary Anne

Sometimes when I look back at my childhood I have to wonder how it is that I grew up without learning very much about real life. Maybe my parents expected more from the school system than the school system could provide, I don’t know. Home economics was taught in school, but it was very basic. I can remember learning to cook a little bit, a little bit about personal grooming, and how to sew.

But nothing was taught about interior decorating, or such basics as the practicality of using Bed Skirts to hide stuff that you are storing under the bed, or how using Satin Pillowcases might be good for your hair and skin. And not a word was spoken about doing laundry, about sorting by colors, and different temperature settings. Come to think of it, that is really weird because I can remember there were washers and dryers in the home economics room! And for the sheer economics of extending the life of your mattress, how one should use water resistant Mattress Covers on the bed. Nothing about the right way to clean a house, how you should dust from the top down and vacuum after you dust.

In this day and age, these are important things that every person should learn, regardless of gender. I wonder how many students are being taught these life skills now.

Categories: Around the House, Cooking, Family and friends, Life, Memories, Opinion, Shopping | Comments Off

Feb 5 2012

Home improvement stores

by Mary Anne

There was a time when I hated to go to home improvement stores like Lowes and Home Depot. If I happened to go there without a man in tow, it was almost completely impossible for me to get the attention and assistance from one of the sales people on the sales floor. The customer service was terrible! In fact, there was a period of time when I signed up for a mystery shopping company and they assigned me some home improvement stores to do the “mystery shop” so they could evaluate the customer service and when I took on that shop I was supposed to walk around the store and time how long it took for a store associate to acknowledge my presence. If after ten minutes of walking around no one acknowledged me I was supposed to approach an associate and ask for assistance in finding a particular product.

Well, no one came and offered me any assistance and when I approached the associate and asked for help that associate blew me off! Needless to say that home improvement score got bad marks on that mystery shop!

But that was another time and another place. A completely different state than where we live now. Now when I go to the local home improvement store with my hubby I like walking around different parts of the store, looking for things that I might have never known existed before. Sometimes I feel like I have led a very sheltered life when I walk around a store like that! When I see all of the different beautiful light fixtures and ceiling fans I just stand in awe and try to imagine which room in our house would benefit from some of those being installed. For example, I would love to have a new ceiling fan in the master bedroom – especially one that is quiet so it would circulate the air but also provide some white noise to sleep by.

The fan we use right now is one that takes up space on the floor, and although it does what it is supposed to do, I really would prefer a pretty ceiling fan in there; I think it would make the room look more like a luxurious retreat. Whenever I find any great deals from lowes stores I am more than happy to accompany my hubby there so he can buy whatever lumber or pipe or cable he needs while I go and fantasize about my dream bedroom.

Categories: Around the House, Family and friends, Home Improvement, Life, Shopping | Comments Off

Jan 29 2012

Maintenance plans/extended warranties

by Mary Anne

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.

Categories: Around the House, Computers and/or Internet, Finances, Home Improvement, Life, Opinion, Shopping | Comments Off

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