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Showing posts from 2007

It's almost time

Less than 13 hours left in 2007. I have been working on my goals for 2008 and I think I have them ready. Actually I have decided on only one for next year. It's too early to let the cat out of the bag though so you will just have to drop by in 2008 to see what it is. I will give you some hints but no fair guessing. I had about 5 on my list and was trying to make them all positive. In a nutshell they were things that would make me a better person, physically, mentally and spiritually. All would be challenging and I would need a lot of help to make them happen. I still couldn't decide which ones I really wanted to commit to because I didn't want to bite off more than I could chew. There is nothing worse than setting your sights on a goal and then not being able to make it. (see 2007, 2006, 2005, etc goals) Anyway I finally took a break from all my goal setting and that's when it hit me. The one goal for 2008 that would really mean something to me. It would make me a bette

Goals and remembering

As the year comes to an end, I am again thinking about my goals for the coming year. I have some already in my head but I think I need more. So far most of mine are general and I do want to pin myself down to some specific ones. You don’t want to just have those “ Miss America” goals like; “ I want to do good things for good people and be a sugary sweet person blah blah blah. “ Goals need to be specific and measurable. That is something I learned in Management class. They must also be achievable so no goals of becoming the next President although I do think I am as good of a candidate as the ones we have. Wait, I am not worth 208 million dollars. This year all my goals are going to be positive. I want to start things and do things and go places. In the past all of mine have been negative like lose weight, Stop doing this or that or be less of something. In general I want to make a positive impact on the world. I know, I am only one person but a little positive change is better than no

What's in your future?

Did you ever have one of those job interviews where they ask you: “Where do you see yourself in five years?” This is one of those questions where there is really no right or wrong answer. You start second guessing yourself wondering if you should say that you will still be where you started or really lay it on the line and tell them that you hope to be the CEO in five years. As someone that was forced to ask such ridiculous questions, the best thing you do is give a wishy washy answer about doing positive things for the company. The wrong answer is: “God willing I will be laid up at home drinking beer and watching television while waiting on a compensation check from some work related injury.” It may be true but that’s not the right answer. The truth is who knows where we will be in five years or even one year for that matter. As we end another year, every radio and TV show is focusing on: 2007 the Year in Review. They cover the best and worst happenings of the year on everything fro

Merry Christmas

Hello everyone. Having a great Christmas here so I don't have a lot of time to write. We went to a very nice dinner party yesterday and I ate enough for 10 men. Then the hostess brought out the main course. After dinner we met another friend for the evening Christmas service at Church. Good thing the lights were on because I was a little sleepy after eating all that food. It ended with a lovely candle light message and prayer with everyone singing softly in the candle light. I could have never made the midnight service as sleepy as I was. The boys let us sleep late which was nice and then we all opened presents and had home made banana bread and beverages. Lunch is going to be early this year so you better get moving if anyone wants to eat with us. :) The house already smells like ham. We are also having crescent rolls, string beans, Potatoes and a salad. Its diet tomorrow so eat up today people! Merry Christmas Greg

Potpourri

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I took the day off yesterday from work and also from blogging to get some rest and relaxation. As luck would have it though my sons muffler decided it was a good time do dye so I started my day out in the muffler shop. We left his car there though and headed out to go fishing so I did have some relaxation. I forgot to bring my camera though so there are no pictures of the fish we caught. We caught 6 Sheepshead and ended up keeping 4 for dinner. The weather was about perfect and my sons and I had a great time. For those that have never seen a Sheepshead, here is a picture I took last year of some we caught. Notice they really don’t look like sheep but do have some big buck teeth for eating crabs and barnacles. They are a very difficult fish to catch and I was glad to see that both my sons caught some. I fished just until I caught one just to make sure I could still do it. I looked up Sheepshead on Google and this is what I found. Ha ha ha. The only bad part of the day was that it got so

Book Report: "The Glass Castle"

I don't read many books these days. I guess because I have to do so much reading at work. My sister let me borrow a book on tape recently and I have to tell you about it. It was "The Glass Castle" by Jeanette Walls. It is about Jeanette's childhood and the things she went through. Her family lived like nomads and the things that she went through made my childhood look great. After listening to this book, I felt better about my own childhood and the struggles we had. I also came to terms with the fact that some people live like they do out of choice and are happy being the way they are and don't want to improve. I won't give away the ending but I highly recommend this book. There is some adult language so be forewarned. It reminded me of a story. A frog and a scorpion come to a river. The frog is about to jump in and swim across and the scorpion asks if he can ride on the frogs back to get across. The frog hesitates at first because he knows that the scorpion c

Blame and Credit

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“My” Pahthers won !!! Well they aren’t actually my Panthers, they are the Carolina Panthers but I am going to take credit for the win. Since they won, I am going to bathe in the glory of the win and associate their name with mine. Last week though, “they” lost. Those darn Panthers lost. They weren’t My Panthers then. When they win, I am willing to take credit for the win but when they lose it is all their fault. That seems to be the norm these days. Whenever something good happens, we want all the credit but when things go sour, it is someone else’s fault. I have a little joke that I say at work from time to time. People are always afraid of getting fired and I tell them that I am not afraid of it. Seriously I know I could always find another job but this is what I tell them. If I quit, I have to go home and tell my wife and family that I gave up a perfectly good job and lets just say I won’t be on Their “good” list this Christmas. There might even be some negative words spoken abou

Just Remembering

Wanda made me think about Christmas traditions. When we were young,we would go to Grandma's house for Christmas and she would always make party mix and popcorn balls for us kids. She knew that party mix was my favorite. Later on in life when the big dinners were long gone, we would go up and see her and exchange presents. She would still make the party mix for me each year. She didn't have a lot of money and usually someone else would buy her the ingrediants to make it. I still make party mix each year but I wish I had a good popcorn ball recipe. I tried to make them several times and they came out tough. Hers were always chewy but never tough. Maybe it was the love she put in them along with some good gum drops.

"Poor old Jeff"

Mom always said that. But don't cry for him, things are looking up. First off my brother is a drug and alcohol addict. He has been this way since high school and he is now 55 years old. Wait I forgot, mom says he doesn’t drink and only takes legal drugs. He lives with his 80 year old mother, on her social security check. He hasn’t had a real job in over 15 years. About a year ago, we thought he had hit rock bottom. He had run out of friends and money and because of this had to cut down on his booze and drugs. I mean he was able to bum a small amount of money from mom but she wouldn’t give him enough to support his habit. After all she did already buy his cigarettes. Because he was out of money, he was starting to dry out. For the first time in as long as I can remember, he wasn’t drunk or high when I saw him. He kept talking though about all this money that he was going to get and I believe that was what was keeping him going. Since he was a child, he complained about aches and p

Life isn't Fair !!!

I hear that a lot these days, especially at Christmas time. Life just isn’t fair. So what does it mean when someone says that? For starters you never hear people at the top saying that. I doubt if any corporate executive ever looked at their lowest paid employee and said that. No, it is usually said when someone sees that another person has something that they want. So in essence, they are saying “Hey, he got more than I did.” So fair isn’t even the right word to be using. If you truly feel that way, then what you should actually be saying is “life isn’t equal”. I know you have heard the saying “No one said life was supposed to be fair.“ But just so that no one can ever say that again, I am saying it now. Life should be fair. So there you have it. I said it and you may quote me on that. Greg said “Life is fair” Notice I didn’t say life is equal, because it isn’t. So who out there wants less? Not many of us I am afraid so what we need to change our statement again. Admit

Our Son isn't "Normal"

Well that’s what they told us at the “trial” yesterday. Ok it wasn’t a trial it was a parent/teacher conference but it more closely resembled a trial. First off you would expect it to be a one on one meeting between teacher and parent but it’s not that way anymore. To start out with all the 5th grade teachers participated as some kind of unified front. Then they brought along the guidance counselor, the student psychiatrist and the principal for good luck. That makes it 6 to one odds. Pretty even I must say. So what is "not normal" about our son you might ask? Well he just isn’t like the other kids. First off, he likes people and tends to get close to them and look them in the eye when he talks with them. He also smiles a lot which makes the other students as well as teachers nervous. As one teacher put it, he gets in my “space” when I am talking to him. To put it another way, most kids and adults don’t like it when you are less than 3 feet from them. He needs to be more no

New Web Sites

This morning someone sent me a link to a list of where all the "speed traps" are in the area. Along with this email I also got a few replies from some others that got the same email thanking the person who sent it to us. Obviously these people don't know the difference between "reply to sender" and "reply to all" but that is neither here nore there. What gets me is how many people think it is ok to speed and are very excited to know where these traps are so they can slow down in those areas. Here are a few other ideas I have that some people may be interested in. What about a list of where the cameras are located in Walmart so that people that want to shop lift can do so without fear of getting caught. They could also post on a website pictures of all their undercover workers so that we can watch out for them too. The site could be called www.ItsOkToSteal.com How about a website that tells you how to get out of paying child support. That would be very

ARE WE THERE YET?

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Remember those trips with the family when you were young and how you constantly asked that question? It always seemed like an eternity when you were stuffed in the back of a station wagon and on a long trip. Well that’s the way we traveled anyway. Your trips may have been different. There were 7 of us so the car was always crowded. Mom and Dad sat in the front with my youngest brother. Then three kids sat in the back seat and I would get way in the back with the luggage. None of us were strapped in either but somehow we lived through it all. Anyway the point is there had to be a destination in mind in order to ask that question. Usually for us it was upstate NY to visit the relatives or Camp JOY (Church camp) in West Virginia. Both were long trips from Florida. So this morning I was listening to the Steve Harvey show on the radio as I do every morning at 6:00. If you are ever up at that hour, I highly recommend his show. He starts his show each day with an inspirational mes

Where are you going?

Where are you going and why are you in such a big hurry? That is what I would like to ask some of the people that pass me in the morning. Each day I get up and get ready for work then head out and join in the Indy 500 as we all rush to work. Well I am not in a big hurry so I lose the race. I get up 15 minutes earlier than I have to so that I don't have to rush. I like to get ready then sit quietly and meditate for a few moments before getting into the rat race. Once I hit the road, I drive the speed limit and make it to work with lots of time so that I can again relax before starting my work day. Not everyone is like me though, Every morning someone gets right on my bumper and swirves back and forth waiting for just the right moment to pass and then they head on down the road at high rates of speed. I usually catch up with them at the next light only to see them fly off again trying to get somewhere quickly. I admit it, I do drive what I consider the speed limit. If it is 55, I sta

Things that scare me

Here are my top three.... Number one in my list is going to the dentist. I have always hated going to the dentist because nothing good has ever happened to me in a dentist office. I mean there are needles, pain, blood, gagging and an occasional throwing up episode and I just can’t get past that sound of the drill. I know I am a grown man and shouldn’t be afraid of it but I am. By the way, I have an appointment this afternoon and am dreading it. I am claustrophobic too and I always feel like I am going to choke with all that stuff in my mouth. When I was young, my dentist was named Dr. Fang. The name alone says it all. Number two on my list is spiders. There is something scary about a spider. I think they were created by the devil just to scare me. Once when I was very young, I got a big banana spider on my face and to this day I nave nightmares about it. They just look creepy to me and then there is that anticipation of the bite when they get on you. Number three for me is heights bu

Merry Christmas

There I said it. I will say it again "Merry Christmas". How could anyone be offended with that statement? I saw on the news the other day that some town in Colorado is putting some restrictions on Christmas this year so as not to offend anyone. Things like only white lights and no tree visible from the street. I just don't get how it could. I mean the whole reason we celebrate Christmas is the birth of Christ right? So how could someone even think of separating Christmas from religion. This world has gotten so crazy. In protest, I am putting up extra lights this year. I have my whole driveway lined with lights and a big star up in the air. And none of those silly decorations either like Snoopy or Charley brown holding a candle. I do however have a big frosty the snow man up on the roof. (remember free frosty) If any of the offends anyone, I suggest you drive by quickly and close your eyes. Pretty soon the churches will have to take down their signs and crosses so that non

I want to help but.......

This morning on my way to work, I stopped for a cup of coffee at a local convenience store. I always stop there as it gives me a few moments to wake up fully before hitting the heavy traffic and they do have great coffee. The place is very clean and bright inside but outside things are not so good. There are usually a few people hanging around having their last few beers for the night or possibly their first few for the day. This is at 5:30 in the morning mind you. Today I was approached by a woman asking for some change to buy a soda. I would dare say that she has approached me over a hundred times asking for the same thing. She really doesn't want a soda. She just wants money. She probably doesn't even know that she has asked me before. Once she gets enough she heads back to the closest crack house and gets her fix. Soon she is back on the street asking for money again. A year or so ago in that same general location a man came up and asked me for money. He said he had run out

Time to reflect

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Fall colors We didn't go to the mountains this year to see the leaves change. I really wanted to go but with changing jobs and so many things going on, we just couldn't make it. I don't know if the leaves were as lovely as they were last year when I took this picture, but this is how I remember it. As the weather turns cooler and the days grow shorter at least I have this picture planted in my mind. A brighter day. The other night there was a documentary on TV about Thanksgiving. It covered the history of it from the beginning until present time. What it all boils down to is that the holiday has changed throughout the years but there was always a central theme. Taking the time to be thankful for what you have. I do want to thank everyone for the comments on my last two posts. After my two humerus Thanksgiving posts, I wanted to take a moment and reflect on the things I am thankful for. Oh I am sure if I wanted to, I could dwell on the negative things in my life but I choose

Gobble-De-Goo

Gobble-De-Goo: That’s Turkey talk for Eat My Stuffing. Today I was thinking about Thanksgiving and realized there is a lot about it I don’t know. I really have a lot of questions about the entire holiday. I mean I can cook a great turkey and dressing with all the trimmings but some other things baffle me. For starters, do American Indians celebrate Thanksgiving? I seriously would like to hear from a Native American because I really don’t know the answer to this one. I mean the whole concept is kind of weird to me. It is like celebrating the beginning of the end. I mean this was sort of the kick off meeting before the Pilgrim Executives took over the new world. Several years ago I worked for an American chemical company that was taken over by an English company(sound familiar?). It all started with a big meeting/meal with everyone happy and friendly and then they took over our company. I don’t celebrate that now though. Question #2. And I am really serious about this, but were there onl

Thanksgiving memories

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“ A Thanksgiving Story ” I just realized that Thanksgiving is only a week and a half away. Where did this year go? It seems like the older I get, the faster time goes. I wonder when you get near the end, if it will be like warp speed on Star Trek and everything will just be a blur. That would be kind of cool. Well depending on where you end up that is. Anyway Thanksgiving always reminds me of family and big dinners. The whole family would show up at my Grandmother’s house and it was a great time. I remember one Thanksgiving most of all though. It was back in the 60’s and I was just a youngster. My father was in charge of getting the turkey. I think that was his assignment because they usually gave him free turkeys at work and he would supply it for the meal. This one year, there were more relatives than usual attending so he had to “buy” a turkey because the one they gave him wasn’t big enough. A few days before Thanksgiving, my Dad and uncle brought home a nice big one. It was a fresh

Just plain wrong

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I have read the movie reviews but have to disagree with the masses on this one. Everyone is raving about the movie "Ratatouille". The critics are saying the animation is superb, the voices are wonderfully done and the plot is delightful. Wake up people. This is about a rat in the kitchen of a restaurant. Am I the only one that sees a problem here? This rodent came from the sewers below Paris and who knows what diseases it is carrying not to mention more bugs that one can imagine. Did everyone forget about the black plague that they say was carried by rats? This is a Pixar film which is a division of Disney. I dare say that if Walt was alive today, he would agree with me. What started out as a cute little Mickey Mouse is now a disease carrying rat in a kitchen. What's next Pixar ? Oh I know, how about a roach that wants to be a doctor so he lives in a hospital and crawls all over the medications and such. Yes that is hilarious and wholesome. Yea right. This is why I don&#

My predictions

First of all, my sympathy goes out to all those that lost their houses in the California fires, but the biggest hurdle is still in front of them. As was the case with the hurricane in New Orleans and the one in Charleston, we can expect some changes in insurance coverage. After these hurricanes, the three major insurance companies got together and changed some definitions. For instance now there is a difference between flooding and rain damage. If your roof blows off and rain ruins everything you own that is hurricane damage and not flood damage. If wind damage associated with a major storm is determined to be wind shear then you better have wind damage coverage along with hurricane damage. There are so many loopholes that one really doesn't know what will be covered. Now that all these wild fires have destroyed so many expensive houses, I see the major insurance companies changing the policies to say that a house fire must start from within the house. In the future you will have t

Not a big Homer fan

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As you can see from this picture, our cat Mr. T is not a big Homer Simpson fan. He managed to stay inside most of the weekend but he really didn't do much besides sleep. I on the other hand worked like a Dog. Notice no one ever says "worked like a cat" and for good reason. That would be slept like a cat. I heard the other day about a dog that saved his owners life by waking him up when their house caught on fire. Later the investigation revealed that the fire was started by their cat knocking something over. This proves it, a dog really is mans best friend. Cats are mean.

Mystery solved

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“The case of the evil refrigerator” For months I have been dealing with a refrigerator that from time to time decided to ruin everything in it by slipping into a deep freeze mode. I have had to throw away tons of lettuce, tomatoes cucumbers and many other vegetables, not to mention other foods that just no longer looked appealing after being frozen by this evil machine. I was unable to figure this case out myself so I knew I needed to do something drastic. I decided to assume the identity of the greatest detective that ever lived. As a child I loved watching him on TV and knew he could get to the bottom of this case. I am now Charlie Chan. Chan: Greetings kind people. #1 Son: Look like open and shut case to me Pop. Just a faulty refrigerator. Chan: Not so hasty #1. Why would refrigerator deliberately ruin food? End up in trash heap. Perhaps we start with suspects. They are: Wife, #2 son, Mother in Law, Trusted neighbor Ann, Kitty cat #1 Son: Ok Pop. Lets throw the book at Mom. She prob

A visit from "The Man"

There I was last Saturday. Sitting at the flea market, quietly selling a few plants. Trying to make a little extra pocket change when who walked up.....The Man. You might also know him as "The system", "The Establishment" or some names I won't print here. He walked up, observed me making a few plant sales and then spoke. "Hello, I am from the South Carolina Department of Revenue" OOPS, Busted. No I didn't get hauled off to jail but I did get a warning and now I have a license so the state can take taxes from the little bit I sell. Saturdays total is four dollars and ninety cents that I owe. It seems hardly worth the effort since there is a local man that "lost" over 5 million dollars and he is out on the street today. But I will do my part and pay my taxes but as a person once said. "I didn't know my fair share was going to be so much" Now that I am a legal business, and the national debt will be paid with my taxes. I plan o

Around Town

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Pictures from Wadmalaw Island. Martins Point plantation as it stands today. (site of "The Notebook") Bohicket Creek. Shrimp boat at Rockville. If you are coming here from the "Time" article, please feel free to look around. I didn't find out until today that they used a link to my blog. Welcome. Very quickly, My wife and I got married at this plantation. It is right around the corner from where we live now so if you have any questions about it, feel free to email me and ask. In a few days, I will post some more photos of the house. I wrote an interesting story about the plantation as my last post. Check it out by clicking here . Thanks to my son, Gregory for taking the pictures. He is making a power point presentation for Irving House Winery. You can see it if you come for a wine tasting.

Ground Control to Major Blog

Sorry folks, I have been lost in space lately. So much has happened that I have lost touch with "blog World" and don't know if I can find my way back. First of all I love my new job. All the negative things that people told me about my new work place either aren't true, they don't affect me or they are actually positive changes. All I know is I leave for work happy and come home happy and get home an hour earlier than I used to. This leaves more time for my home life too. Our little plant business is booming. I have some new contacts and suppliers and have enough plant work to keep me busy for months. Right now I Have almost 500 small plants that need to be potted so I play with that every night which I love. Our adirondack chair sales are taking off too and they will be featured at a wood working open house at a local craft shop early next month. I am really excited about that. After the open house they will be for sale in the craft shop and I have to tell you, t

Strange but true

This may all be a big coincidence with no meaning but for some reason I don't think so. It really has me spooked too so let me just throw it out and see what you all think. This past Monday, I had the day off and planned on sleeping late but I woke up shortly after 5 am after having a terrible nightmare. In the dream, I was driving down a deserted interstate in the dark and came upon an accident site. It was right at an intersection which didn't make sense because there are no intersections on the interstate only on and off ramps. There were bodies laying all over the place and fires everywhere. It looked like a war zone too as trees were leveled everywhere like a bomb had gone off. As I drove along slowly, I noticed a young girl beside the road crying and asking for help, I drove back and forth beside her but I didn't know how I could help (in my dream) so I finally just drive on leaving her beside the road. At the next exit, I got off and parked right beside the road and

Good news and bad news

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First the good news. I am atill alive and kicking and scheduled to switch jobs on the 14th. Now the bed news. That is going to seem like an eternity. I have been called several times every night for the past week and I am working both of the remaining weekends. I did manage to take a few photo's though and I will post them for you to enjoy. The grape stomp at the winery went ok and se made a little money but I was so busy cooking hotdogs I didn't have time to take any pictures. It looks like rain so let me post a few photo's. I hope you like them. Greg

Time is money

I always heard that expression and assumed that it was what a boss said to his/her employees to motivate them to work harder. These days I am looking at it from another perspective and find it is so true. Every week day for the past 7 years I got in my car and headed off to work. My day consisted of 8 hours of actual paid work time, one hour of unpaid time at work and three hours of unpaid travel time. I justified this by saying that the money was good and it was compared to some jobs but it has taken its toll on me and I have aged tremendously in those 7 years. Looking back, I can say it was worht it but there were some heavy proces that I paid along with getting older. For starters the unpaid time has added up and I am amazed at the time I didn't get paid for. I did some calculations and came up with 3500 hours I lost over the 7 years that I didn't get paid for. I'm not bragging but that means over 100,000.00 I didn't get paid. I am not saying that that I should have

I'm still alive

Sorry for not posting for so long but I do have some good news, I got the job and will find out today when I get to transfer. I am very excited but also very busy getting ready to transfer. I will write more tonght and add it to this post, Greg

Short and sweet

Im sorry people but I have been swamped and have not had a chance to write a decent post. Let me give you the nighlights" New job....maybe. The interview went well, I am waiting on the offer and if I get it and it is enough I will be changing positions...Yea New car...My son bought his first car. Did you get that HE bought it. Got it last night. Guess what the first thing he bought for it was? ...thats right a sterio, lol New friends...Still can't believe I got to meet Cora and family last week. New attitude...for once people at work are kissing MY butt. begging me not to go. Everyone is telling me how much I am needed there....Where were these words for the past 7 years? Even my boss is nice....what's up with that?? New weather....We are having violent storms every night so I haven't been able to post at night...real reason I haven't posted. Sorry So much more to tell but I am even swamped today and it is Saturday. Take care everyone, Greg

Happy Birthday to Me

Yes it's my birthday today. I celebrate making it through another year without any major problems. Oh there were lots of hurdles to get over but I made it over them all. Is it my imagination or do the years go by faster and faster? I have nothing really big planned today. I am expecting a visit from a blogger friend though and that in itself will make my day, Have a great day everyone, Greg

CAR For Sale.

Why is it that whenever I hear a commercial for an automobile dealership, the hair stands up on the back of my neck and I begin foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog? To say the least they are annoying, aggravating and usually down right insulting. Some of them try to be funny but usually they fall short of causing me to even think about cracking a smile. Who writes that crap? Definitely not a comedian I can tell you that. Those cute little skits they do make me want to puke. Some of them go on and on like a continuing story and really bore me. Does anyone out there think they are really funny or even go there to buy a car because of the humor? And why do they feel they need to shout? I absolutely hate those commercials that the announcer shouts in your face. You know the ones that make you turn the volume down on your radio or television. Something like: “FOR THE NEXT 3 DAYS ONLY WE WILL SELL ANY CAR AT ANY PRICE, YOU NAME THE PRICE…..DON’T ……PASS ……THIS……….UP.” And that brings me to

The truth about men

I hear a lot of women complaining about men these days. It seems that you are never satisfied with us and can always find some flaw in our character. I have some bad news for you though. We are what we are because of you. Anything you can find wrong with us can be traced back to you. You are the reason for our imperfections. One big complaint that I hear is that men can’t distinguish between love and sex. That may be true but let’s look at the reason why. I can still remember my first time and remember it well. She was my girlfriend and I would buy her all kinds of things. Jewelry, clothes, give her money, whatever she wanted but the only way to get what I wanted (sex) was to say I Love you. See she made me associate love with sex so it is totally her fault. I know I am not alone in this thinking either. I also hear women say that we (men) change over the course of a relationship. Well that is as untrue as it gets. The other day, I read an article that said the women look at a man for

Tagged again

I have been tagged by Snow White ( http://www.blogger.com/profile/04154472411277181939 to tell about the day I was born. She is so sweet an innocent, who knew she would tag me. I was too young to remember being born but I hear it went something like this: On the day I was born. The nurses all gathered around. They gazed through the wide window, At the new joy they had found. The head nurse spoke up. Said leave this one alone. She could tell right away, That I was bad to the bone. Well it sounded familiar anyway (Thanks George T) Actually here are some things in history that happened on my birthday which is July 27. (I forget the year) I won’t tag anyone else but would love to hear from anyone else who would like to follow suit. 1214 - Battle of Bouvines: In France, Philip II of France defeats John of England. I don't know how to pronounce that name so I will call it the battle of cows. 1689 - Glorious Revolution: Battle of Killiecrankie ends. Just who was crankie and why did someo

Bumper stickers

I don’t know why people feel compelled to paste stickers all over their car. They used to be called bumper stickers but some people put them all over their cars so that phrase is out the window. I guess people just like to make a statement. Well I would like to make comments when I see some of them. Unfortunately most of these people are in a hurry and won’t roll their windows down to hear me, so I will post them here. These are some of my least favorite stickers with the comments for the people that have them: The fish sign I am not sure what this means. I am guessing it means that they belong to some secret fish society or something like that. When I see that one, I want to put a Nemo sticker on my car. “My daughter is an honor roll student” When I was in high school there was a girl that was always on the honor roll. She was very friendly with several of her male teachers. But then I am sure your daughter is just smart. “Baby On Board” This one always makes me drive safely. When I d

Wednesday update

I think I will make this a part of my weekly routine. It has been almost two months without a drop of booze. Physically, I am feeling about the same but I feel stronger mentally. My mind is clearer and I am also a little but calmer. I hopefully will continue to improve as time goes by. I know when I quit smoking it was a long time before I felt the full effects. That has been almost 15 years now. My diet is going well too. I am only into week three and have lost 12 lbs. I am starting to get compliments too as people are noticing the thinner me. I have gained some energy which is giving me some more drive to stay with it. I will keep you all posted on my progress. I took some new photo’s the other day but they place where I took them is having trouble with the machine that converts them to digital. It was nice of them to let me know AFTER I left the film with them. Now all I can do is wait. I did get to see the actual photo’s and they came out great. Have a great day, Greg

It's that time of year again.

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It's time again for the annual Camp Happy Days. For those that don't know what it is about, it is a week long camp where kids with Cancer go to have fun. There are only two rules. First off, no parents. That means the kids don't have to hear, "Susan be careful" "John don't do that. " " Mary you are going to fall and hurt yourself". Kids just get to be kids and try to enjoy themselves and forget about their cancer. The second rule is that everyone must have fun. If you have never been, I highly recommend it. It will make you see life in a whole different light. These are pictures from two years ago. I will be taking some new ones tomorrow when I attend. Our plant raises money for this cause and also we set up a tent and hand out boiled peanuts and sodas. The kids look forward to us being there. Have a great day and be thankful for your little blessings, Greg

Happy 4th of July

To all my American readers please have a safe 4th of July. Please don't drink and drive. And be careful with those fireworks. I have mine already to go. I hope everyone gets the rest they need. Greg

M is for Monday???

Why is it we always dread Mondays? I know I do. I guess it is the whole work week thing and I also never know if I will have the weekend off. For me it is no different than Friday except that on Friday there is the "possibility" that I will have the next two days off. Nothing is ever written in stone around here. So to lighten up my Monday, I am going to come up with an acronym for M O N D A Y. Please sing along with me. M is for the tons of Money I am making. O is for the Others I love around here. N is for the nice people I work with. D is for the dedication my fellow workers have. A is for the ample smiles on their faces. Y is for the yearning they have to help me with my job. Put them all together they spell Monday. Now don’t you feel better too? What does your “M” stand for? Should I shut my door when I read this? Greg

TGIF

I am so glad it is Friday. That means there are only two more days this week that they can work me to death and also only three days till Monday. I do so love my job. I mean the pay is good, and the my job part of my job is rewarding its the other things that I have to do and some of the people that I work with that make me insane. I see now why some people go postal at work. Thank goodness I am a level headed guy (as I sit here staring at that kitchen knife). lol Seriously what happened to the gene pool? Did someone pee in it? Ok someone fess up who did it? All I know is somehow we have managed to produce a bunch of super-hybrid morons. These are not regular morons. These are hybrids. And because of that, they are immune to any kind of logical reasoning pesticides and continue to breed more morons. I swear the next time one comes into my office and says something stupid, I am going to eat a booger right in front of them to get down to their level and then maybe I can understand how so

It's official

This is it. As of this morning I am officially on my new diet. I have actually been on it for a week and lost 4 lbs. but it wasn't official until this morning. My reasoning is this. It is kind of like politicians start out. First of all they toy around with the thought of running for office and let it slip out just to see if they have any support. Then once they know they can get some support and won't make a total fool our of themselves they make the big announcement that they are running. I did the same thing. I tested this new diet for a week to make sure it worked for me and now I am ready to let everyone know I am dieting. I would hate to say I am on a diet and in a few weeks when someone asked how I was doing, have to say "not so good". It would be sort of an admitting I failed and that aint going to happen. Seriously though this is a great diet. It was invented for people with diabetes and it involves eating small meals throughout the day and keeping an even ke

5 questions

Here are 5 questions for Dawn and Just me and anyone else who dares to take the challenge. There are no rules to go with my questions except that you have to answer them truthfully. If you don't, I will cast a terrible spell on you. :) Well if I could cast spells I would. 1. You are down to your last dollar. No job and no one to ask for money. What will you buy with it? ( I would go for the lottery ticket) 2. You decide to take a cross country bus trip. Who do you want sitting beside you and why? 3. You inherit a million dollars with the stipulation that you spend it on something other than yourself. What would you spend it on?(no family either) 4. What is the worst thing you have done in a public place? Where was it. (example: Passed gas in church)(no I Have never done that, it was that little old lady beside me, she did it) 5. Who was the most taboo person you ever fantasized about? (For me it was a preachers wife.)

I asked for this, What was I thinking?

I volunteered to answer 5 random questions so here are my answers. 1. You are given one million dollars to plan a bloggers get together. Tell us where, when and what your party is all about. I think I would like to have the get together on a cruise ship. It would be fun to have it there so everyone could get to know each other. It would be a Mediterranean cruise so all of our European friends could join us. We would have a lot of fun but we would also discuss world problems and come up with real solutions which is something our leaders don’t seem to be able to do. No one could be on the ship unless they had their own blog. 2. Describe a perfect day in your life. What would you be doing? Where would you be? I never seem to get to really relax these days. I would like to have a day just to lay by my pool and relax. I would like it to be about 80 degrees, with a light breeze. No clouds in the sky. And NO bugs. I would have some island music playing (reggae) and a nice tropical drink in m

Movies I don't care for

Are there any movies that you really don't like? I started to say hate but that is too personal and I save that for just a few people? I am not talking chick flicks that men naturally sleep through. I mean a movie that everyone around you just loves but for some reason you just seem to despise. There are two movies that just don’t do it for me. They are both Christmas movies too and maybe that is part of the problem. Christmas was always a sad time for me. I always asked for really expensive things but got things from the 5 and 10 cent store. I now realize that is all we could afford but it is too late to go back and change the past. Unless anyone would like to send me expensive gifts now. :) Ok the two movies that I really don't like are “It’s a Wonderful Life” and a “Charley Brown Christmas”. They both have the same plot too if you look at it from a distance. For those that have never seen these movies, here is the plot: They start out making everyone really sad and then toss