Magic Pill

When sitting in the waiting room of an oil change store, I often look at the car magazines there are there on the table. Most of them have good articles on the next great car. What I find funny is no matter how many articles they have about cars or car technology, the last page always seems to be the anything goes page of advertisements. That page has everything advertised, from weight loss supplements to vacations to self-help tapes. I guess if you want to sell something, it's smart to put it in a magazine that is sitting in waiting room that anyone will be in some time in their life.

Online Courses

My wife and I have been discussing her going back to school. But, going back now is not as easy as it was before we had kids and before we had existing education debt. So the option that seems to work best for us is to get involved in a MBA online university.

I actually heard about the University of Scranton. It is a great-sounding school. They have the only top ranked, AACSB accredited program that is 100% online. That is a great benefit for those who want to increase their education, but they have to have a schedule that is extremely flexible. The University of Scranton has a history of creating great candidates. The richest guy in India got his degree from the University of Scranton. They have a great AACSB program and great felxibility. It is a great school to go to future your education.

The Ideal Vacation

One day, my wife and I would really like to go on a cruise. That is one of my ideas for an ideal vacation. My ideal vacation would include taking a
Caribbean cruise while having everything included. I have never been on a cruise before, I have only heard what they are like from others who have gone or from what I have seen on tv. My ideal vacation would be the cruise and having no plans whatsoever other than what it would take to get on the boat and off the boat.

There is another important part of the vacation and that is having no kids to worry about. I know it would be fun for the boys to be there and it may make for better family pictures, but it would still be nice to just be away from any worries involving the boys. It just doesn't feel like a vacation when you pack it full of activities and when you are constantly worrying about what the kids are doing and when you are constantly chasing them around. The idea vacation would be to just get away from everything, have no plans, no schedule, and not have to worry about what everything costs. The idea vacation hopefully is not too far out of reach. I know if we wait too long, it may never happen. Always putting things off till someday comes means it will never get done. Someday will never come unless you make someday today.

Way Too Hot

I loved the month of June. It rained nearly every day. It was awesome. The rain kept the temperature down and helped with the water bill. The month of July, however, has been completely different. It hasn't rained much and it has been near a hundred degrees almost every day. The a/c has run nearly every day and the ceiling fans are going nonstop and it is still too hot. The lawn doesn't like the heat either. It is nearly on the verge of dying, not to mention it takes more water to keep it alive. It is a bit cooler today, but it's not expected to stay that way. I just wish the weather here was like the weather in San Diego. It is constantly 75 degrees there and it rains plentifully. Bring on the rain.

A Product That Lasts

Our first digital camera did not last very long. One splash of salt water and the camera gave up the ghost. It really wasn't the best camera either. You had to stay perfectly still to take a good picture. Needless to say, it was a bittersweet event when the camera broke.

Now, we have a Canon camera and we just love it. It has been dropped multiple times and gone through 3 kids, one of which loves to play with it. Still going strong. I think it just makes sense for companies to make products that last. If people pay a good chunk of money to buy something, you expect it to last a while. If that is the case, people will have a good impression of the company and you will buy more products from them or encourage others to buy things from them. If a company makes a bad products, they won't be in business for very long.

Come And Gone

I can remember a few years ago when the PS3 hit the marketplace. It was a highly anticipated release. So much so, that the prices of those things were so high. They were selling those things for thousands of dollars and you could not find them anywhere. It was that way for a couple of months. Now, they are back down to a decent price and you can find them in any electronics store. I just think it's funny that the novelty of some items can run the price way up, but then bring it crashing right back down.

Lost Rewards

The recession seems to be affecting us all. If it is not affecting you directly, it is affecting you indirectly. For example, my employer used to give out free ipods to a team of developers a month just for doing a great job and getting everything done. They have since stopped doing that because they had to cut back on everything. They didn't give raises this year. It would have been nice to have those things, but I understand why they did that. Things could be a whole lot worse, so I really don't complain much.

Lost Treasure

It truly is amazing how fast time flies. It has been six years since my wife and I got married. It has been nearly 5 years since we started a family. A couple of days ago, we found a video of our oldest son as he was growing up. It seems like only yesterday that we were making that video. For me, it's just hard to think of our oldest son as that little baby. He seems so different now. He still has the same facial expressions that he had as a baby. It was just so awesome to find that video and look back at what he used to look like. You tend to forget those things as you go through life. It also really puts things in perspective. It makes you realize that family and relationships are the true treasures in life. Not fancy cars, lots of money, or big houses. But the family you have and the relationships that you make are the things that matter. When the things you own are long gone, the relationships still last forever.

Hard Work Is The Answer

I always thought that America was not afraid of hard work. Building a country from the ground up takes a lot of man power and sacrifice. For two centuries that has proved to be the case and the reason why we aren't afraid of hard work. However, lately, America seems to have gotten lazy, especially when it comes to losing weight. There are so many diet pills out there now that I don't even know what the best diet pills are. Why can't we just go back to working hard to get things done? That seemed to work pretty well for a couple of centuries. That strategy should still work.

Entitlement

I am amazed at all the lawsuits I hear about when it comes to prescription drugs. Maybe that is why prescription drugs cost so much. There always seem to be accident lawyers or Mesothelioma lawyers on tv telling people that they are entitled to a lot of money if they have had bad effects of prescription drugs. It's amazing that companies still try to put out any more drugs after all the news that is generated with the drugs that are currently out there.

The Drive Is Gone

Last year, I was exercising like crazy. I was trying to lose weight for a contest. Since the contest has ended, I haven't done much exercising. I have only gone to the weight room at work a couple of times. I need to do one of those slimming pills reviews so I can possibly get some free diet pills. Maybe then I can get my weight back down again. I can see the potbelly growing every day and it makes me nervous.

Too Many Chores, Not Enough Saturday

When I was in school, I worked full time so much of my homework assignments had to be done on the weekend. Everything got pushed to the weekend so that left little play time on the weekend. Things haven't changed much since except different things are pushed to the weekend now. Now, we have so many plans packed into a Saturday that it's hard to accomplish them on all in the same weekend. We have shopping to do, friends to play with, and maintenance things things to do. There never seems to be enough Saturday to get everything done. I guess that is why we only have one Saturday a week. Otherwise, we would definitely overcrowd our lives.

By Hand

Next year we are planning on tearing up part of our backyard to plant some more lawn. I'm not really a huge fan of cement. It doesn't really do much for me. There is a lot of cement that needs to be yanked up. It will have to all be done by hand because I don't think you can get any big industrial equipment back into my backyard. I'm just afraid that if I start tearing things up back there, I'll make a big project even bigger by breaking something or by not considering something.

One Day

My wife and I have been talking lately about having a weekend away just the two of us. It has been a number of couple of years since we have been able to go far away without any kids or without any cares. One day, we would like to take one of a number of cruises just to get away from it all. Right now, the budget doesn't warrant us going anywhere fancy and the wife can't go very long without feeding the baby. It is nice, though, to look forward to something in the future.

Late Night TV

When there are nights that I can't get to sleep, late night tv doesn't seem to help. There is really nothing on to watch. There is always infomercials with the latest diet pills review breakthrough or the singles hotline showing ladies that are in your area, even though they are standing on a beach and there is no beach near you town. I wish they would just stop displaying anything on tv after a given hour. It might help those of us who can't get to sleep because we are left with nothing else to do but go to sleep.

There's Always Something

I guess things were in too much of a routine lately. Things were running like clockwork. The housing gods apparently thought I needed something to do. So they gave me many things to do.

A week ago, the wife and I went out for our anniversary. When we came back, our air conditioner wasn't blowing any more. It was working when we left, but was now blowing nothing. Keep in mind, it was 9:30 at night on a Saturday with the next day forecasted to be about 100 degrees. So up on the roof I went to see what was the matter. Upon pulling one of the sides of the a/c off, I discovered that one of the pulleys that turns the belt to run the a/c fan was actually broken in half. It was then a race to the hardware store before they closed to get a new one. I never did find the piece of the old pulley that had broken off. It definitely didn't have many places to go.

Once the a/c was fixed, the next issue came up. The garage door started giving us fits. It would open just fine, but it would not close unless it was forced to. It would start to come down, but immediately go back up. This is a clear symptom of the safety eyes, or floor sensors of the garage door not being in alignment. Try as I may, I could not get the sensors aligned. Given my history with garage doors, I called a professional to come look at it. Turns out the safety eyes had gone bad. With those original sensors, water runs down the power cord and gets inside the sensors, causing them to fail. The garage guy was surprised the sensors had lasted as long as they did. $115 dollars later, the garage was in working order again.

One last thing has closed the week. Thursday morning, I noticed one of the zones of my sprinkler system was not turning on. When turned on manually by opening the zone's water control valve, the zone would open just fine. It would also close just fine. I switched things around to see if the valve itself had gone bad or if the control valve had gone bad. The valve still wouldn't open automatically. Then I switched the diaphragm over. BINGO!!!. The zone turned on. The diaphragm had weakened over time, causing a bad seal so the valve couldn't moved the diaphragm to open the zone. After waiting a couple of days for a store to open, I was able to purchase a new diaphragm. I actually got two for good measure. Replaced the diaphragm and things work just fine again.

Ahhh, the joys of owning and maintaining a home. If things never came up, how would anyone learn anything on their own. I really don't mind repairing the minor things around a home. It is a lot easier to repair those then let them fester and bigger things happen. I just hope it's the little things that I have to take care of. Big things tend to really do a number on the family budget.

The Ring

I can still remember the day when I took my wife, then fiance, to go ring shopping. I remember looking at all the different rings, their different styles, their shapes, their different sizes of certified diamonds. They make it seem so complex and confusing to buy a wedding ring. I guess if you are planning on wearing the same ring for the rest of your life, you need to find the one that you would be happy with the rest of your life.

Measure First

I started measuring the other day on how many square feet occupies our front room and the kitchen. We're not planning on a huge remodel next year. Nothing that would involve replacing the sinks with copper sinks or anything. We are planning on just replacing the carpet in the front room and the linoleum in the kitchen with new hardwood floors. Both of those rooms have the same flooring as they did when the house was built 15 years ago. If there is any money left over after the tax return, we are hoping to replace the carpet in the rest of the house, too.

Back To The Grind

I swear the weekend always seems to take it's time getting here and then once it is here, it can't seem to get over fast enough. It reminds me a lot of when my aunts and uncles on my dad's side would get together on Memorial Day every year. They would take forever to get to our house. Then, in the mix of a couple of hours, they would hurry to the graveyard and then hurry and have a picnic, and then take off again. the weekend reminds me of that. We wait and toil for the weekend to get here. Then, once it is here, it's gone. There should be more weekends and less work.