Updates

Well, the Food Stamp wait is over. The mail showed up ( at 1:00pm - this is early lately, as it's been showing up after 6:00 for the last several days!) Lo an behold, there was the letter with the EBT card in it. Yea! At first I got torked because the paper the card was inserted into had a notice that the pin number would be mailed separately within 10 days. Sue kept a bit more of a level head than I did. There was another paper included in the envelope that told how to set up a pin number.

So we now have access to $78.00 worth of food stamps. Not much but better than nothing. We also found out that we will get access to the monthly $32.00 on the 11th of each month. It's not much, but it is better than nothing.

So it looks like I don't have a reason for any more rants today.

Also on the plus side, we got word how much we can get for a down payment from different members of the church. Now, armed with this information, we can now start looking for a card in earnest. We can tell a car dealer how much we can put down on a car, so that will make it a little easier to go look at cars. This makes me feel a lot more confident that we will find a car soon.

Tuesday Rant!

It's Tuesday, and here the promised rant. Remember I mentioned before that we had applied for Food Stamps, and been approved? Well, we got a letter a while back telling us we are entitled to $32.00 per month. You read correctly. $32.00 per month. This is supposedly a supplement. When I asked the lady how we were expected to buy food for two parents and a 15 year old girl with $32.00, I could envision the Prince-nez glasses perching on the end of her up-turned nose as she said:

"Food Stamps are only supposed to be a supplement, sir!"
She actually made the 'sir' sound like a curse.

Okay fine. According to the statement we got we are entitled to $12.00 for September, and the aforementioned $32.00 for October and every month thereafter. Fine. Great. The next hurdle is how do we access the $32.00? (Now that it's December, we're up to $108.00) We had a card when we lived in Dallas County. We tried calling the information from that card. Nothing. We finally get hold of the lady with the snotty attitude again. She tells us ( oh so contritely now)the card we have is just fine, and that there is a computer glitch, and we should be able to access the Food Stamps by the next day. You see she and her assistant were working on the problem until 7PM the night before, until the computers were taken down for the night. Okay I'm an idiot. I buy this one.

I try back the next day. Still no access. I try for a couple more days. No dice. I call the lady again. She gives me more song and dance that they are still having computer problems. After going round and round about this thing for another 2 weeks, she suddenly decides that we do need a new card, after all. We have to go into the Denton County office to get it. I leave a message asking if they could possibly mail the card. She responds to the phone tag, and says she will send the card. That was last Wednesday, As of today's mail, no Food Stamp card. One begins to wonder if she sent the bloody thing via Pony express! Hell, I could have walked to Denton and back ( even with my screwed up back and sciatica) faster than this!

Don't ya just love a bureaucracy!

Monday, Monday

Here we are, another week. The first week of the last month of the year. Last night we had our Christmas play at church. The youth group put it on. It was called, "A Cricket County Christmas Cruise." This was a sequel to a Christmas play the youth group did 2 years ago. "A Cricket County Christmas."

In the original story the city cousins ended up in Cricket County at Christmas to meet their country cousins, and attend the reading of their rich uncle Zeke's will. It turned out the country cousins of Cricket County ended up with Zeke's millions. However the city cousins learned that Christmas was truly about a lot more than money.

In this story, the cousins end up on a cruise ship. The Country cousins are mistaken for the ship's custodians by the cruise director, they mistake an actor portraying one of the wise men in the Ship's Nativity play as the real thing, and everyone thinks a country man posing as a millionaire, is the real deal. Hilarity ensues. The play was a lot of fun, and the kids had a great time with it. Sandy played Pete, one of the city cousins, and enjoyed herself.

We started out the evening with a pot luck (We're a Presbyterian Church what a surprise!) We finished up by making some Christmas stockings to go to The Austin Street Shelter, that we support throughout the year.

Today, Sue and I tried to relax, as last night when we got home, I threw my back out. ( I really gotta replace that back one of these days. The damn thing goes out more than I do!!! Tonight we had a fire in the fireplace, so Sandy could get a chance to see it. Sue and I broke the fireplace in Friday night while she was gone. Anyway, that's about it today. Tomorrow, I will attempt to think of something to rant about. It's been awhile since I have blogged a good rant. I will have to see what I can do about that!

Free to good home: 2 Cats, and one kitten!

Yesterday I mentioned about the decoration fest that Sue went on. When Sandy got home, she helped Sue put the rest of the ornaments on the tree. After they were done, I got a picture of the newly decorated tree. Fortunately that is.

When we got up this morning, the tree was on the floor. Ornaments were on the floor. 2 cats and one kitten were sitting there looking at me like"So where's our breakfast, man?" The only thing we can figure is that when we went to bed, they decided to help decorate the tree themselves. Being kitties, they couldn't go down the street to Dollar General, so they used the next best thing for ornaments. Themselves!

Obviously the wight of 2 cats and a kitten was just a bit too much for our five year old artificial tree. Hence, he tree on the floor. We put the tree back up, and tied it to a plant hook in the ceiling above the tree, with some twine. The angel tree topper didn't quite fit correctly, so I used the ribbons at the neck of the angel and tied her to the twine. Hey, you gotta use what you can to make things work.

Needless to say I can't wait to see innovative decorations our felines come up with in the middle of the night tonight... just wont guarantee they will live to do any more decorating after that...

You've got to be $#@ing Kidding!

I get humor from a newsletter entitled: Joke of the Day. ( If anyone wants the link to this just let me know)
Usually the jokes are a bit lame, and they also have pictures that are often pretty funny. Every now and then they have a gem.
This one is a brilliant, flawless diamond!




Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens...
In a recent issue of Meat & Poultry magazine, editors quoted from ''Feathers,'' the publication of the California Poultry Industry Federation, telling the following story:
It seems the US Federal Aviation Administration has a unique device for testing the strength of windshields on airplanes. The device is a gun that launches a dead chicken at a plane's windshield at approximately the speed the airplane flies. The theory is that if the windshield can withstand the carcass test impact, it'll survive a real collision with a bird during flight.
Apparently, the British were very interested in this and wanted to test a windshield on a brand new, high-speed train they were developing. They borrowed the FAA's chicken launcher, loaded a chicken and fired. The ballistic chicken not only shattered the windshield, but went through the engineer's seat, broke an instrument panel, and was embedded in the back wall of the engine cab. The British were stunned and asked the FAA to review the test to see if everything was done correctly.
The FAA reviewed the data thoroughly and had one recommendation: ''Use a thawed chicken.''

Decking the Halls ( or at least the Walls!)

Today, Sue went on a decoration fest. She added some more lights to the tree, and some garland, and dug out the ornaments for Sandy to put on the tree later. (Sandy was at a drill meet, so will have to do her thing later.)

Sue usually does a pretty good job decorating for Christmas, but I think this year she will go all out. And who can blame her. This is the first Christmas in our new hose, the first house we have ever lived in, let alone own. So I figure if it makes her feel good to decorate why the hell not! I take care of the outside, not because it's a man;s domain or any of that macho bullshit, just because that's how we usually do it. She decorates inside, and apart from setting up the tree, she does the inside!

I like being festive. It makes it feel like we are getting closer to Christmas, the more lights we string up, and the such. Soon we will be making cookies, Chex mix, and Slushies.. (I still remember my mom getting sloshed on Slush! She maintains she wasn't blitzed, just well organized. I'll have to ask mom if she is going to make slushies this year.

Well, getting near time to make dinner.

Friday Movies

Here are this weeks movie reviews. Enjoy!


New releases this week
Click on the film's title to read a full review.
The Nativity Story
Kid-friendly adaptation of the Christmas story focuses on teenage Mary's remarkable task of bearing Jesus.
Turistas
A Brazilian tour bus wrecks, forcing its passengers to face a conspiracy aimed at picking them off one by one.
Sleeping Dogs Lie
A finacée confides that she once performed a sex act on her dog in this blunt, provocative comedy.
Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj
Kal Penn returns in this sequel to the 2002 film from National Lampoon. This film did not screen for critics before press time.
More movie reviews
Read about all the movies now playing in local theaters.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it....You get the idea!!!

Last week, when the temperatures were in the 80's, we started getting weather predictions of an Arctic Blast coming our way. Usually North Texas winters are somewhat mid. However we began hearing dire warnings of a big freeze. Temps down in the 20's, wind chill factors barely above zero.

I was thinking that it would be neat if w got a little snow. I love watching it fall, just don't care for driving in it, or shovel it. I was also hoping that Sandy would get the chance to see some snow. She has spent most of her life in Arizona, and other than going up to Flagstaff, hasn't seen much of the white stuff.

Well late last night, the temps started to drop, and this morning, we had to watch to see if Sandy's school was going to be open. It was, but they may be delayed tomorrow. At around 11:00 this morning, it started to sleet. Later it turned to snow. Sandy did get to see some snow falling from school.We didn't get much in the way of ground cover, but Sue and I tossed a couple of half assed snow balls at each other!

I suspect that although this storm petered out on us, that we may have a cold wet winter ahead.

Every man should have one!

I went to see my doctor today. Pretty much a standard checkup. One thing I needed to have done, was a prostate check. For anyone of the male persuasion who has not been initiated into this club, let me tell ya, It ain't exactly fun.

I am pushing 50, so it seemed like a good idea to have the old prostate checked, as I seem to be getting up in the middle of the night a little more often than I used to. Let me just say, I am not getting up for a late night snack, or to check my email. No it seems like every time I wake up in the middle of the night, my bladder says "Hey, dude... Guess what!!! It's that time again." Then I stand there, taking matters into hand as it were, and stand there, and sometimes, stand there some more. Then I look down at matters in hand, and remind him that this trip was his idea after all.

Well, that started me to wonder, along with the big 5 - oh staring me in the face, combined with the commercials I see for medications for enlarged prostates made me wonder if this was the problem.

SO there I am in the doctors office telling her ( yes I have a woman doctor) that I am concerned abut this possibility. She tells me "Well, you realize this means a rectal" Oh yes, I am aware. Oh boy, am I aware. I had a doctor in Phoenix, that seemed to want to do a rectal every time she saw me.( Yep, another woman doctor)
Anyway, I digress. She has to do something that under other circumstances ( and with the right person I might add, ) could be pleasurable. Not with a doctor. Let me just say, doctors do not exactly have a gentle touch. Oh well, at least I should be grateful she used K-Y!

And now, a brief interlude.

While watching an episode of Mythbusters in which they were testing various methods of beating Police Radar guns, I was reminded of an unusual method I employed many years ago to beat a speeding ticket.

I was the Navy nearly 30 years ago, and was in training to become a Hospital Corpsman. We had a long weekend for Memorial Day, and as it turned out one of my classmates, Carolyn, who lived in New York, offered to give me a ride to Ohio for the weekend, and pick me up on the way back to Great Lakes (Chicago). We shared expenses and driving. We each had a nice weekend with our respective families, and on Monday morning, she picked me up and we started our journey back to Chicago.

It's important to know that Carolyn and I were not dating, or even all that close. At any rate, I was driving on the Turnpike. I glanced at the speedometer, and realized I was going around 80 miles per hour. Then I looked in the mirror and saw an Indiana State Trooper behind me with his lights flashing. Carolyn looked at me and said,
"You're driving, it's your ticket."

I was hoping he was going after someone else, as I was slowing down to the speed limit. My luck had run out. H was pulling me over. The trooper walked jauntily up to the car, and smiled at me.

"Tell me one I've never heard before!" he sad.

"Well, " I began. "My wife and I ( at the word 'wife' Carolyn started shaking her head saying under her breath" I'm gonna kill him, I'm gonna kill him!") have been trying like hell to have a baby, and she just took her temperature, and she's ovulating! We were trying to get to the next toll plaza!"

The trooper stared at me for a full 30 seconds. This is quite a long time to have a cop stare at you, let me tell you!

Finally He busted out laughing, tossed his Smoky Bear hat on the ground, and finally when he could recompose himself, said to me still chuckling:
"Get the hell out of here, and keep it under 55!"

I have no doubt that the story was told around the State Troopers Barracks in Indiana for years!

The Great Car Hunt Continues!

For the last two weeks we have been fortunate to have the use of a car. The week before last, our Pastor was kind enough to loan us his car while he was away on a pastors' retreat. Last week, another friend who was out of town loaned us one of their cars. They are back this week, but are allowing us to continue to use the car.

As it turns out, the car we are currently using is a 1989 Acura. It runs well, and Bob and Jane are planning to sell it. We asked Bob about the possibility of buying it. He was reluctant. The car is old, and has over 140,000 miles on it. He is afraid that if he sold it to us, and something happened, that we might be upset. More to the point he would feel bad. We can understand that.

On the other hand, Bob is a pretty good hand at finding good used cars, and has offered his expertise in helping us to find one. He has suggested we look for something along the lines of a 7 or 8 year old Honda, or Toyota. Preferably with somewhere around 70,000 -80,000 miles or so on it. He thinks we should be able to find something like that for around $3500.00 or so. This coincides with our thoughts. We want to find a car for less than $5000.00.

So now we have yet another person willing to help us find a car. George, another friend from church had helped us find Vickie, our late lamented Crown Vic. He feels bad that she didn't last for us. We told him not to feel bad. He didn't hold a gun to our head to buy the car, we thought it was a good deal, and she did last us for several months. You can't have everything. The problem was we pretty much bought the first car we saw. This time we will be a little more picky.

I have faith that we will find a car soon that will fit our needs, and be able to get us around town, and hopefully around Texas next summer to visit some points of interest with the kids. More news when it becomes less available!

Thanksgiving Movies

I missed writing in the blog yesterday, due to helping to cook Thanksgiving dinner. We had a nice turkey, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie. As is usual on holidays, I ate too much. Ah well, that is the nature of holidays! Happy Turkey Day!


Special Thanksgiving Edition
New releases this week
Click on the film's title to read a full review.
Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny
Pick acts as both a mythic telling of the band's origins and a grand adventure in this loose, loutish film.
Déjà Vu
A federal agent (Denzel Washington) investigates a ferry bombing in this vintage Tony Scott flick.
The Fountain
The lack of character development makes it hard to care about a man's 1,000-year journey to save his wife.
Deck the Halls
The Christmas arms race between Matthew Broderick and Danny DeVito is a leaden slice of fruitcake.
Bobby (opens Thursday)
Engaging ensemble piece follows folks the day Bobby Kennedy was assassinated at the Ambassador Hotel.
Unknown (opens Friday)
This tale of five trapped amnesiacs comes together in the end, but doesn't let the audience play along.
More movie reviews
Read about all the movies now playing in local theaters.
Opening Friday, Dec. 1
Bug
A paranoid veteran sees bugs everywhere he looks.
The Nativity Story
Keisha Castle-Hughes stars in this tale of Jesus' birth.
Paper Dolls
Doc follows a group of transvestites working in Israel.
The Architect
An architect clashes with a person living in his building.
Cave of the Yellow Dog
A girl befriends a dog in this Mongolian film.
Turistas
A backpacking trip takes a wrong turn in a Brazilian jungle.
Sleeping Dogs Lie
A relationship changes when a woman reveals her past.

Paging Alfred Hitchcock!

We were heading out to Golden Corral tonight for dinner. It was about 5:00. As we were at a stop light waiting to turn left, we spotted some birds heading south. A lot of birds. My first thought was: "It's a bit late to be heading south for the winter isn't it?"

As I made the left turn, we saw what at first glance was hundreds of birds flying south. Wrong! It was closer to thousands! I cannot in recent memory remember seeing that many birds flying all at once. It took us about 10 minutes to get to the place we were turning into to get to the restaurant. All that time, the birds continued to pass by. We saw them stopped for a few minutes on power lines, atop telephone poles, and alight on buildings. We thought perhaps they were looking for a place to roost for the night. Then the mas flight started up again.

We turned into the Wal Mart lot ( which leads to Golden Corral) As we were slowly winding our way through the parking lot, we saw birds teeming on the trees in the parking lot. They were acting aggressively flitting here and there, and all but dive bombing customers of the store as they came and went.

We got to Golden Corral, and while we were eating, two birds got inside the restaurant. They were flying back and froth, and finally an employee managed to get hold of some type of a net. She was still attempting to catch the errant avians as we left. Good luck with that, Hon!

Kitty Shenanigans

(Sorry, I missed yesterday)

Yesterday morning, Sue went to feed the kitties, and Shadow ran out into the garage. ( We have to keep the food out there since Jenny got up on the fridge, and knocked it down. Cat food went everywhere! )
She decided if he wanted out there so darn bad, he could just stay there! So she fed Mac, and Jenny, and then put down Shadow's food. She let him in and he began snarfing. Mac decided he was still hungry, and stuck his head into Shadow's dish. Shadow growled hissed, spit and Sue was sure that pawticuffs were about to commence. Shadow asserted himself and violence was averted.

These cats antics certainly keep us entertained.

Celebrity Crap!

The Headline reads: TomKat ties knot at Italian Castle! Frankly MikeSue couldn't give a rats hairy butt! What is all this Hero worship we seem to heap on Actors, actresses, sports figures and the like. Some politicians, like Barak Obama even get the star treatment. Why? I ask.

What makes them so damn special? These people put their clothes on the same way that you or I do. ( Okay, some of them are so pampered they may even have servants to help them pull on their socks and wipe their soft pampered butts!)Still they sweat, they belch, and believe it or not, they even have to go to the bathroom to eliminate their bodily waste. (I'm sure if they could figure out a way to pay someone to do that for them, they would!)

These people are not heroes, They are not worthy of our adulation. They are well paid to do what they do for a living. Period. They have chosen to work in jobs that certainly pay a lot, and give them a certain amount of exposure to the world, but again this doesn't make them HEROES!!!!

What is a hero? How about the firemen that risk their lives putting out fires caused by idiots who fall asleep smoking in bed? How about a cop that pulls over someone for a speeding ticket, not knowing if he or she is going to live through the encounter? How about the men and women in uniform that are in foreign countries dying every day for wars started by idiots who don't have to go die for their political ambitions? These are heroes.

On this same subject I get sick of hearing celebrities complain about having to encounter the public. Okay when they are eating dinner and are obviously engaged in a private conversation they have have same rights as anyone to be left alone. But to have them scream and complain when a fan asks for an autograph is ridiculous. Or to use their celebrity to get preferential treatment (Right Madonna?) If they are in the public eye, for the most part they wanted to be there. So having strangers walk up to them and ask for a few seconds of their time to write their name on a piece of paper kind of comes with the territory. So either get out of the business, and become a hermit, or learn to deal with it. After all are not these people who come up and bug the celebs the same ones who go to their movies, games, and concerts? So in effect these people are paying for that 25 Million dollar home on the beach, or that 90 day stay in rehab.

Just the same remember to pay homage to those real heroes I mentioned earlier. Want a real hero to worship? Try the One who died for your sins 2000 years ago.

Friday Movies

Sorry, I missed yesterday. No car yet, but we have a couple of people at the church working on it now as well as us.

Here are the movies opening today. One is "Casino Royale", the new Bond movie with the new Bond, Danial Craig - Looks like the best Bond since Sean Connery We'll see! . Another is what looks like the stupidest comedy ever put on film, "Let's go to Prison" (No review on that one, but the trailer is enough to make me want to gag )- Chi McBride, usually an excellent actor- all I can figure is he must have lost a bet. From the trailer:
Would you like some Merlot? I make it in the toilet!" EWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!


New releases this week
Click on the film's title to read a full review.
Casino Royale
Daniel Craig ushers in a mature and invigorating tone for a franchise in need of a new direction.
Happy Feet
There's a lot to charm in this tale of a penguin named Mumble who is an outcast because he can't sing.
For Your Consideration
Much of the humor in Christopher Guest's parody of movie-awards season will be lost on general audiences.
Come Early Morning
This tidy tale of personal triumph follows a woman's (Ashley Judd) journey to find fulfillment in life.
Fast Food Nation
Adaptation of the Eric Schlosser book is a humorless, glum, multicharacter melodrama.
Wrestling With Angels
Documentary of Tony Kushner is best approached as an admiring portrait of a likable, creative powerhouse.
Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus
Nicole Kidman stars in this audacious make-believe snapshot of the photographer's life.
Let's Go to Prison
A criminal heads to prison to seek revenge in this comedy starring Will Arnett and Dax Shepard. This film was not screened in advance for critics.

Mid week car hunting blues

Well, not really blues. We did go out looking today, and stopped at a Big name car dealer to see if we would get laughed off of the lot. Actually, they were fairly decent to us. We told them our limitations, and they did make the attempt to accommodate us. The downside is that the only car they had currently that we might have been able to get, was a 2003 Ford Taurus. It was a light green, a nice color. The Price was $8995.

The guy ran our info and told us that they could approve us. The downside was that to get the payments we can afford we would have to come up with a down payment of $4000 to $4500. We may be able to get help from the church but I doubt that we could get that much help. Oh well.

The good thing is that we now can be relatively assured that we will be able to get a loan. So we have gotten some good news. We will keep looking. Something tells me that soon we will get ourselves a car. God will help us, as long as we keep the faith!

The Car Hunt Continues!

Well here it is, a new week. Time to go car shopping. We have the use of a car for the week. The Pastor of our church is away on a Pastor's retreat in San Francisco ( The City by the Bay according to the Journey song) and he and his wife decided that since he isn't here that we could use the car instead of it sitting in the garage. What wonderful people!

We are in the process of figuring out just what we want and then breaking that down into what can we afford. We have a couple ideas, we just have two attributes that are non-negotiable. Air conditioning ( we are not going through another Texas Summer without A/C in a car ) and Automatic Transmission.

SO tomorrow we will be checking out the legitimate dealers. Then we will probably have to check out the Rip off houses that will charge us 20% interest and up... You know, legal Loan Sharks...

Anyway. Check back on the blog to read about the continuing car hunt..

Veteran's Day (Yeah I know it was officially yesterday)

We had our Veteran's Day Pot Luck at church today. I came up with the idea a few months ago, and got Session approval to do it. With the generous help of several people in the church. I managed to drop the ball due to the car issues last week.

We had a nice set up, there were small flags on the tables, poked through some upside down Styrofoam coffee cups! You use what you have. It worked. We had some patriotic music, and we honored all our veterans. During Church service, all the vets were asked to stand up, and the youth handed out ribbons with pins that had a space for us to put our names, ranks, branch and dates of service. We are going to use this information to put out a booklet.

I am hoping to make this a yearly event. Anyway. Happy Veteran's Day to all those who once wore a uniform to defend our country. We salute you, and those who are still in uniform, fighting, and shedding their blood for us all.

The great auto search begins

We start by looking in the paper. Well there are a couple of cars in the paper today that may be affordable... At least under 5 grand. Actually there are a couple showing up under 3 grand. One is an 89 Nissan Maxima. Possible, I guess. We are going to start by looking online, then segue into seeing if we can get somebody to take us around to a couple of car lots.

Then, the fun starts! If we can find a car that we like, we gotta see if we can talk them into dealing with us with little or no money down. Haa! That ought to be good for a laugh! Well, if it comes down to it, Terry did say we shouldn't worry too much about that.The downside is that tomorrow, he is going to be out of town for a week at a Pastor's retreat. I don't know what the process will be if we are able to find a car before he gets back that we need help with as far as getting help with the down payment.... We shall see what we shall see.

We have figured that we can afford a car payment of $100 - $120 a month. We would prefer not to have to pay a used car dealership, or bank or anything like that, but if we must, we must... In the meantime we are praying that we will get something soon, that we can afford, that won;t completely break the bank. (Hmm. Department of redundancy department there!)
As my old friend Claude LeMorte used to say... "More News, when it becomes less available!"